Department of Homeland Security - Washington D.C.

 

“Corporal Kables, the Department of Defense just pulled this off of the new patent list and sent it over. Do you want me to do anything with it, or should I file it away?” PFC Coffers asked his non-commissioned officer in charge.

“Let me at least take a look at it. They thought enough of it to send it our way,” she replied.

“Not sure if that signifies anything important, Corporal. Just last week they sent us an electronic pooper scooper.” The PFC dropped the file on her desk.

The sun was getting ready to set when the corporal finally looked back up. She grabbed the file and her notes and headed to her superior officer’s office. She knocked on the doorframe and waited for him to wave her in.

“You’re still here, Corporal? I thought I was the only one that stayed late. You do know that the Air Force doesn’t pay overtime?”

“Sir, I need to show you something that came in this morning,” she said with all seriousness.

“What the hell is this?” Colonel George Elders asked as he put his glasses on. “The Pulsinator—zaps bugs dead? The DoD sent over a pending patent for a bug zapper? Why?”

“It’s something with the way it works, sir. They thought it could be important, but they just didn’t have the time to look into it.”

“Oh? And we do? For Christ Sakes, just last week we intercepted a dirty bomb off the coast of the Florida Keys and they want me to look into a damned bug killer? What are they afraid of? That Raid will sue for copyright infringement?”

“Sir, it’s not technically a bug zapper.”

“Continue, Corporal, you’ve apparently already looked into it.”

“I have, sir. I’ve spent the entire day looking at. Sir, it sends out a signal that apparently is able to interfere with an insect’s own electric current…thus rendering it inert.”

“Do you mean dead?”

The colonel looked at his subordinate with a crinkling in his eyes. She was a great soldier and he was going to have her promoted to sergeant next week, he just hoped at some point she would use less obtuse wording; he needed a thesaurus every time he read her reports.

“Still sounds like a damned bug zapper to me. What of it? We both know ninety-nine percent of what is submitted to the patent office is pure crap.”

“Sir, you know that I am an electronics enthusiast,”

“Yes, you like to build things as a hobby. How many times do I have to tell you how jealous I am of your working, full-scale R2-D2 astromech. I do believe my grandchildren love you more than me every time you bring it over.”

“Sir,” she smiled back, “I’ve studied this schematic. This is the one percent. I believe it will work.”

“Great for him, sounds like he’ll be the next Bill Gates.”

“Sir, the invention as it stands would be a great boon for his target clientele, local co-op growers and home gardeners.”

“Corporal, I’m still not understanding your concern. I’m sure there’s more.”

“There is, sir. This device can be made more powerful.”

A light began to brighten in the colonel’s head. “How powerful, Corporal?”

“It’s impossible to say without actually building a model, but with some minor changes and additions…this zapper could kill a human.”

“What’s the range?” the colonel asked, standing up. His heart was racing a little faster than his doctor would want it to.

“The current model says it has a twenty-five foot sphere as its ‘kill’ zone. But with modifications, it could be brought up to as much as a football field.”

“From a grenade blast zone to a Sidewinder missile.”

“Sir, there’s more.”

“Of course there is.”

“Anyone with a little know-how and availability to three hundred bucks will be able to make one.”

“You’re telling me that any sick-o with a soldering gun will be able to make a device that could wipe out a city block in the beat of a heart?”

“I am, sir.”

“Get the DoD back on the line. Actually…screw them, we’ll take care of this. I want you to give me a list of everyone that is involved on this project. Addresses as well.”

“Then what, sir?”

The colonel stared at his subordinate; the decision he was about to make was not to be taken lightly. “Corporal Kables, are you absolutely sure about your hypothesis?”

“I am, sir,” she told him confidently.

“I don’t see what my choices are, Corporal, but to implement executive order 241.5. I will give this list to Tonney Emery.”

Corporal Kables swallowed hard. She had just handed down a death sentence to everyone involved in the Pulsinator project all in the name of national security. She’d never met a person in her life with eyes as flat as Emery’s. It seemed to her that death was always within a hand-span of the mercenary.

“Go home, Corporal, have a drink. Hell, have a couple. This will all be over by tomorrow at this time. You’ve done your country a great service here tonight.”

“It doesn’t feel that way, sir.”