Free Temporary Duty by Ric Locke Page B

been pushin’ us away from the food dish for half a century, maybe longer," he said with some heat. "I still got folks back in West Virginia livin’ on huntin’ and home gardens, with spells in jail for shootin’ some critter they’re cherce of. You got a way to cut ‘em down a peg, you let us know. We’ll help if you need it."
    "I need to discuss this with the others," Dreelig said. "For now, you need practice with the
kathir
suits."
    The practice room was as before. "Would you mind if we hurried through this?" Dreelig asked. "I need to talk to the other people in my section."
    "Sure," said Todd. "What should we do? Just play around with the air and gravity?"
    "No, you need to learn the belt controls." Dreelig pulled his belt off and held the buckle up for them to look at.
    The gaudy design on the buckle was controls for the suit functions. One pair of squares increased or decreased the pressure in the "bubble" around the head; the increase one got easier to push as the air supply ran down. "When the square has almost no resistance, the air supply is very low," Dreelig said earnestly. "You should get inside as soon as possible."
    "What about refillin’ it?" asked Peters.
    "That is automatic, as soon as you get back into air. You can check the status by pressing the control."
    Round spots forming a diamond-shape in the center were the thruster controls: up, down, left, right. Up and down together were forward; the center button usually converted sideways push into rotation, so center plus top was lean back, for instance, but up, center, and bottom together meant "back". "You will need to turn the gravity off before these are effective," Dreelig told them. "They are weak, but enough to move around."
    "How long do they last?" Peters wanted to know.
    Dreelig looked at him. "I have never thought to ask," he said finally. "I never heard of one running out or stopping." Peters and Todd shared a look. "Practice with what you know now, and I will see you after the next meal," the Grallt said, and took himself off in obvious haste. They were getting used to Grallt facial expressions, and thought he looked worried.
    "Never runs out of gas, eh?" said Peters when he was out of sight. "Brother Todd, this ain’t Navy issue."
    "It’s not exactly standard around here, either," said Todd.
    "What do you mean? I seen lots of people wearin’ these."
    "Yeah." Todd held his buckle up next to the gravity control. "Notice any difference?"
    Just as a design, the buckle could have been made in Japan or Boston: simple and sophisticated, even elegant. The gravity control was more of a piece with the rest of the ship: a metal panel half a meter square, painted speckle gray, with shiny screws at the corners. The wheel in the middle was a chunk of cast metal, plated or polished. "Looks like somethin’ out of a monster movie," Peters said. "A real old monster movie, last century."
    Todd shook his head. "It looks," he said with emphasis, "like something made by the people who built the doors to the ops bay. Whereas this–" he held up the buckle again.
    "So what? It don’t matter where it came from so long as it works," Peters pointed out.
    "Yeah, I guess you’re right." Todd shrugged. "You want to let the air out, or shall I?"
    "Reckon we need to? Be hard to talk."
    Todd shrugged again. "That’s what the suits are really for. Might as well keep it realistic."
    Having control over their movements made a big difference. As long as the gravity was off, they could glide freely around the room under near-perfect control. Pressing the thruster buttons harder made them push harder, not that they were any great shakes at maximum; pushing off the walls was faster. They were almost fully acclimated to zero gravity, and hadn’t thought about the lack of air in a long time.
    They were making full circuits around the room at an angle, bouncing off all six walls in the process, when Peters thought to check the time. He pulled back his gauntlet to look at