The tourist buzz around Austin the past weekend raked in plenty of income for the local businesses and showed more people the tech city advancements Future Tech had introduced like sustainable agriculture in biospheres and renewable energy utilizing solar arrays.

A salaryman worked at the Tech Campus sorting materials like wood pallets meant for repurposing at the Future Tech recycling facility.

It would be processed together with other components by Hive Mind suites to produce the new boxed houses plenty of Afghan citizens were ordering every day.

A different recycling company employed the local Austin man before learning about the many benefits and competitive salaries Future Tech provided.

One of his thirty-minute breaks throughout the day began, and he walked into a recreational room commonly found in any Future Tech building for employees, pondering, [I’ve made some good money the past six months working here, so I could probably afford the mid-tier boxed home for $60 thousand Bitcash.]

Unfortunately, most of the advanced prototype homes found in the Tech Campus residential areas were reserved for high-ranking software developers and engineers, though small corporate-subsidized apartments were available for lower-level staff like him.

While the Austin local enjoyed his snacks and contemplated purchasing a new home, the CNN broadcast playing on the rec room flat-screen TV showed the aftermath of the Ghouta Chemical Attack in Syria.

The horrific scenes showing women and children dying affected the young man as he thought, [How could someone do such a thing?! Sometimes I forget how good we have it here in the States. Not needing to worry about bombs and missiles dropping on our houses.]

More than a thousand civilians died due to Sarin Gas, and it became headline news on international outlets, but no hard evidence regarding who orchestrated the attack had surfaced yet.

————-

Nations worldwide were eager to learn more about the horrifying Sarin Gas attack, the deadliest use of chemical weapons since the 1980s, which people were sharing on social media. But, at the same time, the United Nations’ investigation team was delayed by the Syrian government.

Director Price sat in his Kandahar office while in a NetServ video conference with Anthony and said, “Did our ASR-1 drones flying over Damascus record anything valuable?”

The Filipino-American hacker confidently replied, “It was a good call assigning two recon drones to observe al-Assad. His military forces had been very naughty. Watch the encrypted video I shared.”

Price’s heads-up display began playing wide field-of-view and ultra-definition footage of a Soviet BM-27 parked at the Mezzeh Military Airport, launching two guided missiles towards a residential area in Damascus. Viewers could clearly see Syrian soldiers in uniform operating the launcher vehicle.

The African-American FS Director plainly stated, “This video is compelling evidence against the Syrian military, but not concrete enough to pin the blame on the dictator. It could’ve been any of his officers or family members that authorized the war crimes committed.”

The international politics involved in this situation required evidence beyond a reasonable doubt to oust the dictator, though proof of the Syrian Army attacking its own citizens was valuable enough to sell.

Anthony agreed and replied, “Well, at least it’s something. I bet the United Nations will pay a pretty penny for our intelligence regarding the chemical attack, but I’ll keep the ASR-1s in the sky in case anything else happens.”

Price dismissed the quick video conference before waving his index finger to control the contacts list on the Hypervisor display.

He found General Douglas’ account, initiated a secure call via the dedicated NetServ comm satellites for the US military, and connected a few seconds later.

It was early morning in the States, but Douglas was an early riser like many other military men and said, “Director Price, are you calling about the DOD armor bid? I already told the Future Arms director, Mark, their proactive armor system is too expensive for our frontline infantry. SOCOM is the only division that can afford them right now.”

General Douglas was adamant about purchasing Commando Armor for military officers at least, but Congress rejected the idea of spending $10 million for each set, excluding maintenance costs.

The infantry variant that protected the entire body was too advanced for regular frontline troops, so the military opted to upgrade their existing plate carrier’s effectiveness, which focused on protecting the vital organs in the chest.

It wasn’t uncommon to see highly trained soldiers continue fighting after being shot in the arm or leg and provided immediate combat medical aid, so most experts believed Future Tech’s infantry armor was overkill.

Director Price amicably replied, “I’m sure Future Tech can reach a compromise in upgrading US frontline troop capabilities, but that wasn’t the reason I called. Future Security is holding key intelligence about the chemical attack that happened twelve hours ago. I’ve heard the UN was having trouble with their investigations, so we’re open to sharing the info with the government. Future Security can’t do much with the intelligence, anyway. So please accept the gesture as a sign of our prosperous partnership with Obama’s administration.”

General Douglas played the politics game as his full-time job and immediately understood what Price suggested and delightfully said, “Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will appreciate the intel very much. That reminds me of a few potential UN peacekeeping contracts that were recently issued for missions in Africa and South America. I’ll put in a good word for you, Director.”

————-

The local army commander assigned an Afghan recruit named Ramesh to join a war game exercise with US Marines in Kandahar to trial his unit’s training received from Future Security.

The testing area was filled with random inoperable soviet vehicles and abandoned residential buildings. It looked exactly like a typical urban battlefield.

Fifty of Afghanistan’s most promising new blood, wearing their combat uniform with standard-issue level 4 plate carriers, carefully installed FS-spec Hypervisor Helmet accessories on their FA-416 rifles that attached to a modification rail on the handguard.

The Future Arms live-fire training module allowed users to aim and shoot enemies as usual but only released excess gasses and muzzle flashes from the rifle itself.

The Hypervisor would then calculate the data retrieved from the module and register the trajectory of the augmented reality bullet. Finally, the enemy would flash red on the Hypervisor display if the hit was fatal, while the target’s display notifies the user of their defeat.

Ramesh replaced all his magazines filled with green-tip NATO m855 5.56mm rounds with the orange-colored magazines containing training ammunition which included only gunpowder and was easily recycled.

US Special Forces had used the early iteration of MVR visors to train for specific mission objectives. Still, it was the first time Hypervisors could be utilized for live-fire exercises between two opposing forces.

The young Afghan soldiers were intimidated by the slowly forming crowd of Air Force, Marine, and FS officers waiting to watch how they fare in the infantry war game.

An FS Spectre, an elite rank given to FS operators who’d served at least ten years as a Special Operations soldier in any allied military, arrived in front of the fifty soldiers standing at attention.

Ryder Irving, a veteran of the Canadian Special Operations Regiment in his mid-30s, flipped up his Hypervisor and loudly stated, “You’ve spent a month in basic training and two weeks learning from Future Security. But If you want to protect your nation, the ability to fight in urban environments is a requirement. Our objective is to capture the largest building, defended by a platoon of Marines. Follow my orders, and you’ll do fine. Move out!”

The Afghan soldiers understood each word Ryder shouted because of the real-time audio translation they could hear through their costly Hypervisor Helmets.

Ryder led the young soldiers through the narrow alleys as the war game commenced. Unfortunately, an inexperienced member failed to follow instructions to take cover and was notified by his helmet of a successful headshot he received from a sniper across the street.

The US military entrusted marines with the arduous task of clearing entire city blocks of insurgents and regularly took casualties from hidden enemies atop tall buildings. However, they were now very experienced in this type of urban warfare and the perfect adversary for the young Afghans.

Ramesh was top of his class in shooting drills and was able to eliminate three enemies stationed across the objective using a clever gap he found in a barricade.Â

The battle lasted for another twenty minutes until the well-entrenched marines annihilated the Afghan unit.

Ryder wasn’t too disappointed by their performance and reassuringly said, “True warriors train continuously to become proficient in battle. We can’t always rely on high-tech equipment like Dragonflies to win engagements. Persevere in your training, and you’ll eventually join the ranks of modern warriors. So take the day off and regroup at 0500 tomorrow morning. Dismissed!”

Ramesh and his unit returned to their quarters and he pondered, [That exercise was crazy difficult. Now I understand why the US military chooses to airstrike targets instead of risking their lives by entering a heavily contested battlefield.]

He was busy cleaning his FA-416 rifle with a few unit buddies while watching TV until a news segment about the Sarin gas attack caught their attention.

Video footage from an anonymous source recently published by the United Nations exposed the Syrian military’s direct involvement in the chemical attack.

Ramesh felt enraged with a burning sensation in his heart as he angrily pondered, [I enlisted in the Army because the citizens require a pillar to support them as we rebuilt the nation. These Syrian soldiers should be ashamed for killing thousands of people they were meant to protect. President Karzai would never ask us to commit atrocities such as this!]

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