Chapter 23.5
Garrus entered the armory, finding the Cerberus operative over his usual spot on the workbench. "EDI said you wanted to see me?"
Jacob spun. "Yeah. I wanted you to take a look at this." He held up the new component.
The turian took it and looked it over. At first glance, it looked like a thermal clip, a long cylinder with contacts that allowed the clip to extract heat from whatever weapon it was in. But as Garrus scrutinized the device, he noticed variances in the design. The heat sink was smaller than normal, making room for a mechanism that appeared to move the core away from the rest of the component. If it worked like Garrus assumed, it would allow the clip to dumb the heat from firing before returning to its position.
"Is this a reusable clip?" he asked.
Jacob nodded. "Shepard gave it to me. He said he didn't like how weapons now didn't have a backup for when you ran out of clips. Told me he designed it and wanted me to test fire it."
"How does it work?"
"I don't know. I didn't want a pistol blowing up in my face."
The turian bristled. "Don't doubt Shepard's expertise. He's the one that first brought the geth's thermal clip tech to the manufacturer's attention. He helped developed it. He knows what he's doing."
Jacob was still skeptical, and Garrus had enough. He grabbed a pistol, slapped the experimental clip in it, went to the short practice range used to test weapons, and fired. The sink lasted eight shots before a warning sounded, and it popped, dumping the extra heat. After forty five seconds, it returned to its position, and Garrus fired another eight. It ran through its cycle again without incident.
He moved back to the workbench and removed the clip. A wisp of smoke rose from it, but it appeared no worse for wear.
Jacob whistled. "Same stopping power with only a third of a reduction in ammo capacity. That's impressive."
"That's Shepard."