"What the hell!" Derek raised his eyebrow as a scar on his head shifted to the right as if it had a mind of its own. "What did we just witness!?"
"This can't be real," Rosemary says, wrapping her finger around her blue pigtails. "This is like something out of a children's fantasy. We were able to make this excavation work? Our people were able to make something like this?"
"Yes, they were," Monica says smiling gently. It was the first time she smiled since the start of today. Maybe it was the pressure of keeping a secret, or maybe she feels like for the first time she has some power and control over her life.
"I think it's brilliant, and it shows the glory of our nation," Ian says, putting his hand on his chest. "May Flora live in humanity's pages forever."
Marcus took a toothpick out of his mouth, chewing it softly. He stroked his black Afro. "I have but one question as the grenade expert in the group. Are we able to weaponize this into a grenade type weapon?"
Monica looks back, winking at Marcus. "We have not received reports of any type of grenade type weapons or rockets. Right now, it's mainly a pistol type weapon as the components of the bullets are in a fragile state. There is however, one more surprise I would love to show you."
"Please, please I would love to see it," Abby says speaking above everybody else. She almost pushes over Rosemary, who gave her a frustrated look.
Monica once again pointed the gun downrange as she shot a different dummy. There was a hissing sound, and then silence.
Luna lifted her glasses as if trying to calculate why the bullet did what it did. The numbers flew around in her brain as if vivid memories, but nothing gave her the answer she sought.
"That looks like gel around the straw body." Abby wiped her eyes twice as she blinked. It looks like a protective barrier of sorts.
"You would be correct, Abby," Monica looks back at her, amazed at the brazen young woman. Monica stepped out of the lane and looked back at the gentleman who was a range master, waved her hand and put her finger towards the sky. Their firearms training stopped as Monica opened the half door and started to proceed towards two gel-like figures.
Marcus was due first as his amazement with weaponry got the best of him. He pushes Rosemary and Abby out of the way as he outran Monica towards figures in front of them. Walking in front of the wonder straw figures, he took his toothpick out of his mouth and poked it on the ice that was crystallizing around the arm of the straw. "This is hard as a rock," he says, looking back at Monica. "Using this will impact a human in the same way. We are going to mess up some sons of bitches if we use this in the war." He put his toothpick back in his mouth. "You ought to give me one of these," Marcus says, winking at his fellow dark skin comrade.
Monica paid no mind to the flirting but nodded. "Yeah, we can kill a lot of people with this technology."
Derek smiles as he let go of his own slight nod and leaned back, turning his head around to see the rest of the class make it down the long lane in front of the room.
"I'm going to lose about 30 pounds just walking up down this lane," Bertha says, rubbing her right knee. "I ain't on a farm no more and can't be running like this."
"Then you will be the first to die," Derek says, as he walks up running his hand on top of the crystallized figure.
"Words like that will not be tolerated," Rebecca spoke up. "As your chaplain, I'm here to help all of you to remember your moral compass. If you lose your moral compass in this war, you will also lose yourself." Her eyes were becoming slightly unkind like her early introduction showed.
Derek paid Rebecca no mind, crossing his arms and casting a brooding glance at Bertha. Damn country folk.
Luna looked over at Bertha, walked over, and grabbed her hand. She looks her deeply in the eyes. "We all have things that we struggle with." She smiles, shakes, and walks back towards Abby.
"Where did that come from?" Abby inquired, putting her arm around Luna and giving her acknowledgement on her head.
"Trying to learn from the best," she says, winking at Abby, her eyes frantically bouncing around as if they are going to fall out.
Abby put two fingers up towards Luna. "Don't push yourself too hard," as she walks over to the giant circular sphere that was blue in color. Through the color of the sphere she saw Cody on the other side, blowing her a kiss.
"Blue is a pretty romantic color, don't you think?" Cody chuckles, walking over and nudging Abby with his elbow.
"I am akin to the color purple because it's passionate and deep." Abby quickly started to walk around the blue gel poking it. "How is this possible?"
"How is it possible that you are so beautiful?" Cody stood there awaiting a response but received none.
"Everyone gather over here," Monica shouted. "As you can see by the straw dummy, I hit the arm, the legs, and neck to prevent movement. Though we aim to kill in the war sometimes, we have had to take prisoners of war for interrogation. Make sure you understand the rules of engagement before we go into battle. There are targets of interest that our superiors want to capture. Just put them on ice, okay?" Monica looks around at her nine subordinates, her eyes cunning yet hopeful as she puts the gun back in her holster on the right side of her hip.
"You know what? The rules of engagement can get us killed," Rosemary hisses as she walks out closer to her fellow officer. Even though I'm just a Lieutenant, I'm the only medic on the squad and if we don't aim to kill what are we fighting for? I say screw the rules of engagement and let's win this war."
"I concur with our blue pigtail compadre here," Cody echoes, stroking his short brunette hair. "We are losing the war, what do rules of engagement even mean? I say we fuck them up for messing with our home."
"The rules of engagement are not up for discussion," Monica bellows as she put her foot down, walking over to the circular blue spear that encased the other straw body. "Now this is a little bit different." Monica took out her knife as she stepped forward and stabbed into the blue spear. "As you can see, I can barely penetrate the circle of gel around the body. Popping it gets a little bit difficult because you must use an antiserum and inject it into the ball. These are only to be used in certain circumstances where death is imminent. Based on numerous experiments, the sphere can repel at least 10 to 15 bullets before exploding. That bullet amount also depends on the caliber of gun it is fired from. However, when tested against grenades or sniper rifles, the subjects or dummies I should say, didn't fare so well."