# 90: Weldon: Splat Team Training

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The spider-riders (children, mostly boys, who lived on the Banana Slug, refugees (children of the storm) and the Farmer Barges) adjusted their Krystal Mojo’s to Channel Zero. One of them had renamed the Dragon Tears in the neuro-loop to Krystal Mojo. The spider-riders liked that name better. Dragon Tears was too Icky. From then on they had Krystal Mojo’s instead of Dragon Tears. Weldon, Chuck and the other adults weren’t likely to disagree. The kids could call it anything they wanted to as long as they got the job done.



Weldon watched over Chuck’s Shoulder. (virtually speaking)

Chuck watched over one of the older boy’s, a squad leader, shoulder.(virtually speaking)

The Squad Leader watched over Jimmy’s , one of the younger boys, a fire team member , shoulder(virtually speaking)

.................via QET.

This was the first run. It should be interesting.

If Jimmy even knew that he was the center of so much attention he didn’t care. This was the ultimate first person shooter game and he was having the time of his life. He was the spider-rider. He had twin gatling guns mounted on the forward pair of spider shoulders for distance work and a mono-molecular sword for up-close-and-personal wet work. His spider could run sixty miles per hour and jump a hundred feet in one leap. That’s what seemed like from his point of view. The reality was much different. In actuality his spider-robot was less than six inchs long.

That didn’t matter to Jimmy. He was young enough that he loved First Person Shooter video games. As far as he was concerned the flies, bugs and other insects were enemy combatants. This beat the HELL out of climbing a radio antenna watching the water rise below him and wondering which would run out first, the food in his backpack or the antenna. He’d climbed a rung every day and had tied himself to the tower with a belt. There had been other kids on that tower with him too....at the beginning. Slowly they all fell off, one by one and in groups until he was the only on left. There hadn’t been all that many rungs left when the talking dragon had found him.

HELL yeah he’d be a spider rider and kill bugs. He had a lot of anger to work off.

As a side effect he was inspecting the plants and the AquaPonics system even if he didn’t know that he was doing that.

His tele-operated spider actually had tiny salt guns that shot puffs of granulated calcium phosphate. When the pneumatically propelled gritty cloud kinetically intercepted a typical insect, the insect lost. The gritty powder, however, had insufficient mass to damage almost anything other than the small insects. The plants were mature enough that it didn’t bother them.

Any large insects that he found he ‘took out’ with his sword.

BONUS! The dead insect as well as the calcium phosphate was a fertilizer for the plants.

The spider team stalked carefully through the grow tube. They were right down in the dirt among the plants looking for insects. They scanned everything. Their video feed was immediately run through a pattern recognition program set to certain parameters. If the program noticed anything wrong that they missed it served as a backup and alerted them. Another human, the platoon leader, checked the video and if something was indeed wrong, such as a hose pulled loose, a rip in the fabric, or a damaged plant, then a maintenance bot was dispatched. Minor problems were fixed before they became big ones. The facility was thus kept in top operational shape.

“Remember Jimmy” Weldon had told him and the other Spider-Riders at the Orientation. “you have one job. Kill the bad guys (bugs), while maintaining situational awareness while you do it. Keep an eyeball peeled. Pay attention to your surroundings. Do that and everything will be fine.”

The kids loved it. It suited them. Before the flood they had spent a lot of their free time playing video games. Since the flood they had spent all of their time trying to survive. This was a win-win.

“You’re doing good boys” Weldon told them “ Keep it up. If you find a problem that you can’t handle call me. I’m right here.”

“YesSir Boss” The spider killer platoon leader said, his attention unwavering. He never took his eyes off his “battle board” as he called it. He was in his element. Weldon considered himself lucky to have this guy. The class had revealed his true talent.

Weldon said to the leader ”You guys are doing a bang up job. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if you don’t get a performance bonus.”

“Yessir Boss”the Squad Leader said, paying very little attention to Weldon.

“I’m sure the boys would appreciate that” Weldon replied.

“Yessir Boss”the Squad Leader said , paying very little attention to Weldon.

“I’ll just let you guys be to do you work.” Weldon said.

“Yessir Boss”the Squad Leader said, paying just a tiny bit more attention to Weldon. He did NOT say “FINALLY”, but Weldon heard it anyway, and grinned.

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The Next Episode Is
#91: Anette - Left for Dead…
The Previous Episode was
# 89: Weldon: Q & A…
The First Episode was
# 1 : Prologue…
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Book One: SoulStone
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