The very slowly moving Matrix gun wall panned by for several minutes of hologram guns, as Gizzy growled and shook her head.

  “We’re almost there, just give it a minute.” she sighed.

  “Why did you make it so slow?” Vicki squinted.

  “This was supposed to go by super fast and then stop in the middle. Doesn’t matter, by the time I fix it, it would be done."

  “Is it slowing down?” Vicki asked.

  “Yep. I told the 3R I wanted it to go by like a freight train…apparently the damn robot interpreted that as slowing down annoying right before you get there and, yep, now we’re reversing. Fuck it, the whole thing is ruined. Anyway the point I was trying to make in a cool way, is that the guns are basically limitless, because the ship’s holographics can solidify any prototype into real matter. All the guns are holograms I design on the computer interface, until we need one and then you just…select “print” and it becomes real. We can select any weapon we want or design any new gun the simulation determined would function within the laws of physics, and when we need it, now it’s real. Same with ammo.” Gizzy said as the wall finally stopped. “Take for example…finally,” she said, grabbing a gun from the shelf. “This is the standard sidearm everyday carry: the 30x4.7YJRP2. That name sucks almost as much as the basic bitch black and olive drab paint job you see here on the table screen. You do see the screen on the table, right?”

  “Yea.” Vicki nodded.

  “Good, your neural link is working. Be glad mine works Better than Elon Musk’s brain implant. Oh, right…you…already had… cancer.”

  “Thanks, I had almost forgotten that.” She said with deadpan sarcasm.

  “Anyway, I’m calling mine the Yellowjacket for obvious black and gold themed custom reasons. Call yours whatever you want. They’re the same gun with different grips and colors. It takes 2 very different systems of ammo, the Magforge 4.7mm BBs and the 30 caliber Blackjack.

  “Magnum Forge?” Vicki assumed aloud.

  “Magnetic Forged. Magnet compressed into shape by the gun itself. Super versatile, but the downside is the bullets can only be a single kind of metal with no moving parts. It’s basically like how a plastic molding machine heats up little plastic BBs and squeezes them into shapes, except this magnetically squeezes hot Osmium BBs heated using the same magnet, and shapes them into bullets inside the chamber before it magnetically railguns it down the barrel. Holds more ammo because BBs store better than a stack of bullets, and you can load 8 BBs in a quad stack row and fire them individually or all at once. You can think of it as 86 packets of 8 BBs, or 688 bbs you can fire individually. Or double, or quad or octo. It’s all programmable depending on your preferences and mission needs. All brain Implant programmed."

  “Isn’t 4.6mm pretty small? Like an actual BB gun? Doesn’t sound very potent.” Vicki said, holding up one of the tiny metal balls.

  “Well when you fire them single yea, that’s a small bullet, but even the railgun’s default speed is 3,000 feet per second, it’s hitting like a 17hmr varmit rifle. Still 320 foot-pounds of energy with a very hard projectile, so you hit a human in the head, they’re still done. Unlike normal guns, the heavier the bullet the more powerful it gets, because the magnets accelerate at 3,000 fps regardless, and more mass kicks more ass. You run that 4.6mm bb gun on quad, and you got more lethality than a .556 rifle that eats soft body armor for breakfast. You max it on Octo, that’s a full 8 BBs in a row potentially forged into a single larger bullet, that’s a 128 grain payload, equivalent to a 308.

  “Holy shit…how big is this magazine?” Vicki asked.

  “Bout like a Glock 17 mag but a bit wider. It’s all magnetically levitated projectiles with no barrel contact, so with a magazine change it can fire the 30 caliber projectiles. The magnetic power cell maxes out at 3,000 ft/lbs of energy, so ultra-heavy rounds can end up slower in the handguns. They only hold one power cell in this gun. That's why it also fires propellant-driven rounds for extra velocity. But even your 30 cal standard pistol mag holds 20 rounds of the big 500 grain blackout subsonics, for silent operations. This is a Blackout round, signified by the fact that it’s black. Technically, the plastic casings are black too, but your eyes will see your own custom color coding for the propellant to tell them from mine. I went with Royal blue and made yours red.”

  “So it fires conventional shells too, plastic cased instead of brass casing?” Vicki asked, inspecting the magazine.

  Not exactly. The plastic casing is solid plastic explosive propellant. It’s consumed, no ejection. Some of the projectiles run nearly the entire length of the plastic shell, in fact, the Jackal rounds have a 35mm long projectile in a 42mm shell. That means more aerodynamic efficient rounds of higher mass, higher velocity and rotation, with full speed achieved in shorter barrel lengths.” Gizzy concluded.

  “Fancy. Don't love the BlackJack name. That won’t remind me of my freshly Ex-ed, ex-husband. I know he's one of your top operatives, but…you invent yourself a new bullet for us and have to name it after him?” Vicki huffed.

  “No. It’s a combination of a Blackout round, named after the Subsonic 8.6 Blackout, and also named after a Jackal round, the standard Osirian hybrid projectile, copper jacketed aluminum fluid core. Jacket aluminum, Jack-al. It’s also a Jack of all traits, because it cuts armor, but expands on soft targets. Jack - all. Jackal. That’s the standard name, blame Anubis.”

  “The… Jackal themed god of the underworld?” she chuckled jokingly.

  “And one of my ex-husbands. He leads the Osirian branch of the Delmar military division. Kind of conceited, but I do the same shit.”

  “We can’t modify the name a little?” Vicki moaned.

  “Sorry, but I already omitted the grenade in the name because BlackJackanade sounds like a shitty explosive lemon drink, calling it the Jackal Black sounds like a Tenacious D joke waiting to happen, Blackal sounds both stupid AND somehow borderline racist, and calling it the Jack-out would have every male soldier giggling and making pump-action jokes instead of killing people. Blackout/Jackal, BlackJack. It’s got James Bond Casino Royale vibes. I like it. Plus, it was printed on the ammo boxes before your husband left you for killing him 3 times. Sorry again.” She shrugged.

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  “Yea I love being reminded that.” Vicki snipped.

  “Awkward. Anywho… Five and a half inch barrel, not including the muzzle device that ignites the incendiary shells, or temperature shifts the molten rounds. The default military finish the printer used for the prototypes, frankly sucks, and so does the designation name, so I’m calling your pistol…and feel free to change this later…” she said, reaching to the shelf and revealing a textured black and red, blinged out version, complete with custom fitted grips. “…The Texas Holdem.” She smiled. Vicki was awash with emotions, both impressed and flattered by the gun, and the opposite of that emotion for the name.

  “Okay, I hate the name and will change that, but GOD that is a sexy gun. Can you be sexually attracted to a gun?” Vicki said, picking it up and feeling the balance.

  “Absolutely. I’d fuck the shit out of the sentient equivalent of all these guns. I make sexy guns. You think I’m not gonna bling up our guns?” she scoffed. "Now of course they are all actually active space camouflage to everyone else, the colors are enhanced by your neural implant, but the textures and geometry is real.”

  “Don’t ruin this moment for me. I’m pretending it’s real red marble. Let's just call it the Deuce, because that thing is wild, and I already know you, so I assume you did a gambling theme on everything already.” Vicki said, raising an eyebrow.

  “I mean, the marble IS real, it’s just that the colors are invisible to anyone but us. It’s a complex perspective philosophy, but it’s not gonna like…turn off or anything. Obviously, it seems to be turning people ON. You gotta get your head around this augmented reality implant thing. The holograms are fake, until activated and made real, these 2 guns are real, but the display and colors are fake, so your enemies don’t see a light up display in the dark or blinged out anti-camoflage. The inlay and the engravings, the metal frames, all holographic designed and tested, then matter-printed into real physical guns. Just like how the two of us are real living beings made of flesh and…well you have blood I have gel, but we’re real and 3d printed like everything on the ship. Now the ship’s walls and furniture need to change and adjust, and we don’t want to just throw good furniture out the airlock, so they’re all holographic, but you’d never know the difference. I know it’s a mindfuck to get used to, but you’ll adjust and be fine.”

  “I just…How does this fit me so perfectly and look exactly how I would customize it if given the options. Like yours is amazing too but, I adore Delmarian red marble like this grip, this brown textured frame looks exactly like my old wood desk back home, that I picked out myself because I just love that weird swirl grain, Rose gold screws, like my grandmas ring that I brought for good luck when I moved, reversed color fiber optic sights, woodprint grip extender that fits my hand, and it reminds me of a 1911, which was my dad’s gun that I adored when I was on Earth, and we went shooting together.”

  “You don’t prefer a Beretta M9?” Gizzy asked.

  “No, that was Jack's favorite, he just trained me on that, and I’m more familiar with it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great gun, I just always had a nostalgic preference for the Colt. Nobody knows that. Does this just telepathically make my neural brain chip alter this to my own preferences?”

  “No…It would have to read your mind, design the gun, wipe your memory of that, then custom remake gun that way. The implant is good, but it’s not retroactive designing time travel good. I just know you. I monitor all my protected humans, which you started off as, before you got less human. I pay attention during therapy sessions, even the ones you didn’t know were me in a different therapist body pretending to be someone else so you’d actually open up and get relief, instead of assuming I was doing some shady spy shit like I was absolutely doing. Obviously, for moon security and protection of the group, bear in mind.”

  “I always knew it was you.” She smirked.

  “No you didn’t. Not all of them. But you’ve mentioned the table, the ring, I know you have a thing for red now, makes you hungry, but it also just gives you good vibes. Colt 1911s are a classic choice, you mentioned that when venting about missing your father, I kinda just guessed between that and the Beretta, and the reverse-colored fiber-optic sights ensure you don’t muddle the normally red for dead front sight with the red gun parts, so I made the rear ones more orange and the one you put over the thing you wanna kill neon green. Green, for go, and also for contrasts with dark red. I know you complained about the old 579 Scythe not being ambidextrous in case you needed to shoot left-handed, so the selector is ambi, just like the magazine release and the grip texture. There’s no manual safety because you never use a safety and always said, If I want the gun safe, I’ll keep my fucking finger off the trigger and stop pointing the gun. So the only safety is the grip safety and the trigger. I remember when you first tried out the Scythe you said the 7mm brut had wrist-fucking recoil but at least it held more ammo than a 45, so I modified the original 45 frame to 30 cal so they fully double stack in a grip you’re used to, angled the magazine feed to fit a longer bullet in a gun you liked. Stop giving me that sly look.” Gizzy said with a huff.

  “You didn’t just design a gun and customize mine. You designed the gun around my preferences. You know me better than I thought.” she almost blushed.

  “I’m aware. I also have your clone files, so I literally have a 3d model of your hand to check with the grips. It’s all in the computer.”

  “I’m guessing The Texas Hold’em name was because I’m originally from Texas?” Vicki smiled.

  “Maybe. This is also what Texas boomers would want if they could get it. You can hold’em in your pocket, draw on your turn, and you only need to put one in the hole to turn anyone face down.”

  “Fucking shit, Gizz, you really went ham with the whole gambling theme.”

  “I’ve been single for 3 decades, I get very bored and need a themed hobby. I like guns and I went to a lot of casinos.” Gizzy recited.

  “This is gonna be a long weapons briefing. We’re calling it the Deuce. I hated Texas.” Vicki sighed, admiring her gun. “What’s the third case for?” Vicki inquired.

  “Me.” Gizzy smiled, opening the third pistol case and revealing a massive Dessert Eagle sized handgun, “The one and only prototype of its kind and my second everyday carry because I am in the habit now of dual carrying. This majestic bitch is the Holy Roller.” She said, looking proud.

  “I might as well ask, you’ll tell me anyway, and this is faster than waiting for the opening. Why is it called that?” Vicki rattled off.

  “It’s blinged out in gold and titanium. It was originally the High Holler but shooting this was a religious experience so it was tweaked. Look at this sleek, sexy slut. Does that not look like the gun a rich old white woman would carry to church, while spending the weekends hypocritically gambling and drinking? That was the vibe I was going for. I was in a weird mood, but the finish came out so damn good. The grip is incredibly huge but…I wanted a 45BMG caliber boosted grenade launcher capable of 2500FPS, that I could holster conceal, so…here we are. But it’s also got a silencer, unlike most holy rollers, you can shit this bitch up fairly easily. And I’ve gotten good at duel wielding with it. The pros and blessings of 3d printing. You want 8 of these, just print 8. I didn’t make one for you because it kicks like hell and only fires the boosted rounds and frankly, my dear, I got the bigger hand. This joker is a real wild card.”

  “I swear, one more Gambling pun, and I’m gonna need a drink.” Vicki sighed.

  “I got about 12 more, let me show you the bar as I recite what I memorized already.”