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Chapter 34

Chapter 34

January 25th, 2158

The mech suit had protected his body from the fall, but had done nothing to protect his ego.  For the most part, the crowd that had gathered didn't make too much of his incident.  But he was sure that Nora would never let him forget it.

He walked the mech back to the workstation and got out of it.  He and Ed began to go over everything from head to toe, checking for any damage that may have occurred.  It didn't take long, and they found nothing.

"Wonder what to do to fix that tread problem?"  Ed said half mockingly.

Logan grumbled under his breath, not wanting to engage in any conversation.

"Well, everything looks right as rain here.  You'd better head out and grab something to eat."  Ed said as he began to throw tools onto one of the workbenches, seemingly at random.

Logan turned and headed out of the lab, Mike close behind him.  It didn't take long, before the two had entered the cafeteria.  It was a little after one pm and the cafeteria was packed with people.  Logan wanted to be alone, and all of the people around made his mood worse.

Logan walked up the nearest food vendor and started scrolling through the menu.  There were tens of thousands of different types of food to choose from.  After ten minutes of scrolling through the most popular items he did a search for a meal that his mother had made for him and his brother many times, Fufu with a vegetable soup.

The food vender was an older model food printer.  It would take synthetically created starches, proteins, lipids, flavoring, and would print out any food that was programmed in under a few minutes.  The food was healthier, and easier to store than more traditional types of food.  But to Logan, there was something weird about printed food that he assumed he would never get over fully.

Logan pulled the plate of Fufu and the bowl of vegetable soup out from the machine and found that Mike was waiting for him.

"Sorry, for taking so long," Logan said.

"I wasn't waiting long, where do you want to sit?"

Logan scanned the large room and saw Nora waving.  "How about there?"  Logan said as he started to move towards the two empty spots that Nora had saved.

Logan chose the empty seat next to Nora, which left an empty seat across the table next to the Nora's escort.  Logan noticed a slight hesitation in Mike before he sat down in the seat.

Logan began to arrange his plate and the bowl, before he started eating.  As he did, he scanned the cafeteria for the old man and his NBS companion.  It didn't take long before he noticed them sitting close to one of the exits.

Now, he just needed a distraction so he could upload the information onto the OMS and pass it to them.  For several minutes, Logan ate with one eye on the man and NBS, while also looking for a distraction.  Logan began to feel as if he would have to try again on another day, when Nora and her escort stood up and began walk away from the table.

Then an idea came to him.  The distraction was Nora's escort.  When she got up from the table, she smiled at Mike.

"Hey, Mike?" Logan asked.  "What is going on between you and Nora's escort?"

"Her name is Atnea, and there is nothing going on between us." Mike said quickly.

"But you like her," Logan said as a statement.  "And from what I have seen she likes you."  Mike didn't say anything.  "Why don't you ask her out?"

"What?"  Mike said not trying to hold back 

"Is it against the rules for you to go on a date with her?" Logan asked.  He looked over at the two women who were now bussing their trays.

"Well," Mike said hesitantly.  "No, not exactly..."

"Ask her to a movie tonight.  Nora and I can sit in the row in front of you so you guys can keep an eye on us."

Mike was dumbstruck; he stared at Logan with his mouth slightly open.  Logan checked on the progress of the women once again.  They stopped by the door and were standing there.  He needed to get Mike moving.

"How about I send Nora a message requesting to go to a movie, and you go and ask Atnea if she would like to go with you."

Mike still didn't say anything, so Logan activated his DNAC and began to type a message.  There was a minute of silence and then Logan looked back at Mike.  "Well I sent the message, you better go ask her now."

A mixture of anger and panic was plain on Mike's face.

"Go on," Logan said trying not to sound desperate.

Mike suddenly looked much smaller than Logan knew him to be.  He was not the intimidating highly trained and efficient weapon that the company had developed.  He was now a shadow of that man, afraid to go and talk to a woman.

After a brief hesitation, Mike turned and slowly walked towards the two women.  Once Mike was on his way, Logan activated his DNAC and pulled up the saved file.  He carefully pulled the OMS from its protective spot, and downloaded the file onto it.

Logan looked over at Mike who was now standing in front of the two women.  It looked as if he had not yet started talking, but Nora already had a mischievous smile.  He checked the progress of the download and was relieved to see there was only a few seconds remaining on it.

Now, how to get the attention of the old man and the NBS?  Neither of them was paying him any attention.  He couldn't hand the OMS to them, he couldn't draw attention to himself.  What could he do?

He checked back on Mike's progress.  The large man was looking down at his feet, but he was now talking.  Logan didn't have much time, what could he do?

Then Logan had the realization that the NBS was the only one in the room, maybe on the entire station.  He could do something that only it would detect.  He scrolled through his DNAC looking for something that the NBS could be signaled by.

The download completed just as Logan came across his radio signal.  Radio signaling was a cheep and effective way of sending small amounts of information from one device to another.  It was common practice for business cards to have a small radio chip embedded to transmit contact information.

Logan turned his radio transmitter on, set to look for a signal.  The DNAC instantly picked up on eighteen different signals, but instead of selecting one, he simply let the signal continue its search.  He was sure that the NBS had picked it up, but Logan was not sure if he would recognize it as an attempt to contact him.

Mike was still in conversation with the two women, but he knew that it would end soon.  After what felt like much longer than it had truly been, the NBS started to look around the room.  Logan willed it to look in his direction.  All he could do was wait.

The NBS continued his slow survey of the room when their eyes met, and Logan deactivated the signal.  The NBS stared at Logan for a long second as Logan held out the OMS as casually as possible.  He then placed the OMS on the seat where he was sitting and got up and walked away from the table without looking back at the NBS.

Logan felt a slight sheen of sweat on his brow.  He hoped that the NBS would retrieve the OMS and be able to download the information.  His plan had worked; he only hoped that the variables that were out of his control would work as well.

He stepped up next to Mike, who was visibly uncomfortable.  Nora smiled at him in greeting, which Logan returned.

"A little R and R would be nice.  We have all been working too hard."  Atnea said sounding very much like Mike, only much more feminine.

"Great," Mike said with a smile, "I'm looking forward to it."  He paused creating an awkward silence.  Mike smiled once again, turned and started walking away.

"Um," Logan said, "excuse me ladies."  Logan turned and chased after the retreating soldier.