"Two clicks out. Quadrant C. Approximate posit X-ray X-ray 112".
My eyes roamed the map, locating the coordinates the radioman had just spurted out to me. Couldn't even be bothered to look up from his screen. Not that I needed, nor really even wanted him to. I hated the way a radioman's bionic eyes looked. Granted, there was no other way for them to perform there complex jobs, but I couldn't get over their electric blue gaze. Something about not having pupils offended my sensibilities. I heard some radiomen got so used to them that even after their term was up and they had earned their franchise, they opted to keep the bionics instead of the nice lab created eyes they could get, free of charge of course. Ironic really considering I was attached to K-9 Unit 7, the Wiley Wolves. How a man who shares a symbiotic relationship to a bionically engineered German shepherd could be uncomfortable around a man with electronic eyes will forever remain one of life's great mysteries. Finding what I was looking for on the map I snapped a none too sharp salute.
"Quadrant C, X-ray X-ray 112 aye sir. Standing by to commence patrol."
"Commence", the radioman responded, not so much as looking up from his screen.
I made my way out of the prefabricated command post into what would have been considered a perfect spring morning back on earth. Here on Peroria it was considered pretty much the same thing, only with the entire landscape cast in sharp shades of violet. The pre-brief had something about reverse photosynthesis and oxidation. I knew I could safely breathe the air and be outside in my normal scout suit without being overly hot or cold which was good enough for me. My Neo, Kate, was waiting for me outside the tent.
"What is wrong" she said, looking up at me with her intelligent brown eyes. Her own loping trot easily matched mine, scouting suit and all.
"You know how much I hate this place" I said under my breath. She snorted, though a casual passerby would have taken it for a sneeze. Kate knew my feelings, knew that I wanted to be on the front lines, putting our training to use instead of running these boring scouting missions that amounted to no more than busy work.
She put her powerfully muscled body between the armory and myself. She rose in what was a beautifully controlled ascent for an animal who normally works on all fours and placing a paw on each shoulder looked into my eyes. I was always amazed by the depth of intelligence I saw in those eyes. I never regretted joining the 9's.
"We do work", she stated simply, and this I could not argue. At the end of the day we do what we do because the federation asks it of us. That's enough. It has to be. The service wasn't forced upon you. It was something you had to want. Anyone could serve their two years doing some menial labor and earn their franchise. Some thing's such as, pilot training, mobile infantry, and of course the K-9 units required more dedication. It took almost two years just to match a handler with their Neo and train them up. We served a minimum six year term. I wasn't worried about being a citizen. I could care less whether or not I was able to vote. I wanted a Neo, wanted to belong in that elite group.
It took a special kind of man or woman to be a in the K-9 unit, to take on the burden of the symbiotic relationship that would develop between a handler and there Neo. A Neo was altered, changed, made into more than any dog would ever have evolved into. They were six times as smart as an ordinary dog, could speak, and were possessed of amazing strength and reflexes. Kate's shoulder came almost to my chest when I wasn't suited up. Her mouth could have fit my entire head with room to spare, and she could easily snap a human bone with her powerful jaws. She was faster, stronger, and more intelligent than any animal that had yet been discovered. She looked a lot like a giant German shepherd, with the same coloring and markings that identified her less evolved kin. She had Bionic implants in her eyes and ears which were thankfully not as obvious as say, I don't know, a radioman's. She was my partner, more than a dog or even a friend, and only slightly less than a lover, though I did love her, and she I.
My only true fear in this world was something happening to her. The first thing they do with prospective handler candidates is to make them observe a handler who has recently lost their Neo. It's terrifying, sobering, and hauntingly beautiful, all at once. I couldn't do it. I had told them I could, I had to in order to move through the program but in my heart of hearts I knew when Kate bought it, I wouldn't be far behind.