autokinetic: (Default)
Author: autokinetic
Sue turns twelve. He spends two months as a twelve-year-old in command of Phoenix Army, and then he graduates to Tactical.

The fantasy game is emptier now. But he finished her castle first. And all the space stations are on the same time zone, so Sue knows when to knock on her glass wall and see if she'll let him by.

Flame changes commanders again. The new one doesn't want a girl in his army - thinks she damages unit cohesion or some kuso like that - and he trades her to Rabbit, which would have been great ages ago, but Rabbit now has a different commander too. This one is clever enough - or has enough inertia - to leave her in toon leader position based solely on seniority (she is eleven, now). He gives her the boys most recently out of launch - the vets go to the toon leaders who curry more personal favor - and she trains them into a squad of formbusters and sharpshooters who inexplicably start coming to her about their personal problems too. She helps as best she can.

When she is eleven and a half, she receives command of Asp Army. She scopes them out and sees that she needs to reorganize the toon leadership completely - Asp's previous commander was an idiot, saved from last place only by good footsoldiers who could take vague or outright mumbled orders and turn them into reasonable objectives. Asp's record is still one of the worst in the school; it's ahead of Dragon (cursed), Echidna (they keep getting matched against the stronger armies but as far as Aegis can tell are intrinsically just mediocre), and Rat (the commander has checked out so completely that he's only still there because they haven't decided whether to ice him or take a chance on graduating him).

She trades the whining Asp toon leaders - one has the good grace not to whine - and their disgruntled seconds. (She doesn't demote them first: she wants good trades, and she can get more for a toon leader than for a former toon leader.) She promotes some of those good footsoldiers, trades in Qiaochu and a few other old friends with solid skills and gives them a week to get to know the boys and settle in, and then - unprecedented - lets them submit requests for their own underlings.

Everyone gets the toon they want, except for a couple of leaders with overlapping tastes in soldiers who she has to break ties on. That popularly requested handful (the ones with good records and charismatic smiles) she sorts by skill, not aiming to keep the toons all the same size: if Qiaochu wants to command fifteen men and Blue Moon wants a surgical force of four, she'll let them. The six soldiers no one asks for, she keeps for her own squad of cover fire and scouting; if she can't make them into something either, she'll trade some more.

Her six-man squad is called the Medusa in flat hours after she starts training them separately - if you so much as look at the Aegis, you'll be turned to stone! her soldiers repeat to each other with hysterical laughter. The other toons have roles too. Qiaochu's boys learn to move like a flock of pigeons, pushing off each other gently en route through the battleroom to make it hard to take steady aim at just one. Blue Moon's boys get Aegis's formbusting training. Emilio's learn hand-to-hand engagements - with strict cautions about how hard a blow a flash suit can absorb without injuring the child inside it - and Screwdriver's are a team of sharpshooters. She makes sure they each have seconds and that Qiaochu's huge toon also has a third and a fourth, so they aren't directionless if something happens to their leader. She makes sure that Medusa can be absorbed into the nearest available toon usefully if she's shot and their cover fire is no longer necessary. She experiments with combining toons, putting Qiaochu's flock around Screwdriver's gunmen or Blue Moon's formbusters on an assisted mission with Emilio's hand-to-hand (the skills are related, but not identical).

She has her army for a month, she gets a battle against Tide, and she wins it.

She doesn't win everything. Rabbit's good, Eagle's good, she gives them a hard fight for their winnings but eventually they both beat her (and she has to face Rabbit twice). But she wins most. Asp climbs the standings steadily from its miserable origins until her twelfth birthday, on which she receives an assignment to Tactical.

She sends Beri a message.

I wish to requisition a copy of my save file for the fantasy game. I have put a considerable amount of time into it. While I don't expect to have the software to run the game at Tactical, it is not impossible that I will eventually be in a position to revive my villagers.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
As is usual for Beri, he doesn't waste a word in his reply:

Granted.

The attached file is very large.
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
She doesn't waste his time with a thank-you. She just copies the file to her planetside storage with her mother's teacher access - it's got the space, it's stable, and Renée never uses it - and bids her army goodbye, one by one, and leaves notes for Asp's next commander, and when the time comes she reports to her shuttle to Tactical.

It's cheaper to travel from station to station than between station and planet, but it's not free; she's in a group of three who all graduated at once, the former commanders of Raptor and a kid who never made commander but has graduated into Tactical anyway. They chat, a little, on the flight, but mostly they sleep and read and try to stay out of each other's way on the cramped little craft.

They dock. Aegis is shunted away from the two boys immediately for an infirmary visit. "Birth control implant. You're only twelve now, but we know how long that lasts, and it's cheaper only to do the girls," says a nurse, swabbing her arm inside her elbow where the exo doesn't spider over her skin.

"Any adverse reactions?" Aegis asks.

"Nothing your profile flags for," says the nurse.

After the little chip goes into her elbow and she has a liquid bandage patching the site, Aegis is allowed to catch up with her shuttlemates. They're bunked together in a double. Aegis, though, is asked about her preferences. Girls are harder to assign than boys, and they can't just throw her in with random members of the opposite sex the way they were so comfortable doing when everyone involved was prepubescent; there's flex around the edges.

"Well," Aegis tries, "could I bunk with Sue in a double?"

"Su? Chinese?" asks the officer.

"Sue's American," says Aegis, puzzled.

"Sure, why not," says the officer, and he tries to look up "Sue". "I'm not finding her in the system."

"Sue's not his real name," supplies Aegis.

"Oh," says the officer, clearly finding this sufficient information to identify the student she's referring to. "He doesn't have a roommate right now - they keep soliciting swaps - but - er -"

"You already said I could," Aegis points out. "If he doesn't want a roommate that's fine, but you already said it would be all right."

The officer frowns, and taps some keys, and - there are no color paths to paint, here, but he gives her a list of directions. They're hopelessly confusing. But that's all right. She knows how to find this particular location.

bird, bird, bird
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
You're close, he pushes, friendly. They graduate you?
autokinetic: (good)
Author: autokinetic
Yup. I got bunked with you unless you don't want me. Where are you at? This place is a maze.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Gimme eyes?
autokinetic: (enh)
Author: autokinetic
She has to bird-bird-bird much harder to do anything but talk, but she can.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
As soon as she's sent enough visuals to identify her surroundings, he pushes back a complete walkthrough of the path to his room.
autokinetic: (rapt)
Author: autokinetic
She relaxes the birding and follows the directions. Here I am, she says, and she also knocks for the benefit of any recording equipment.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue opens his door, beams, and hugs her.

"Hey, stranger," he says happily.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Hey, Sue. How's Tactical treating you? It's lucky you're going by a girls' name, I got the guy to say I could bunk with you before he realized who I was talking about."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He laughs.

"Tactical's treating me pretty great. C'mon in, make yourself at home. How's the empire?"
autokinetic: (unclear)
Author: autokinetic
"I got my save file, so that's safe. Desks here won't have it, but maybe someday I can start it up again. I'll probably be homesick for it after more than a shuttle voyage has gone by without. I guess I'll get more reading done, unless there's massively more homework here - are they still putting up with you not turning up to classes? Is there anything besides classes at this level? I doubt they have a battleroom." She stretches up on her tiptoes, touches the ceiling. "Low grav, though, is there anyplace with zero-g to fly in?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"I'm learning everything they want me to learn," he shrugs. "And I show up to tests. Yeah, you can use the docking bays, it's not official but it's fun."
autokinetic: (evaluating)
Author: autokinetic
"Not official like you get in trouble if they catch you or not official like they don't have assigned times or anything?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"No assigned times," he says. "It was my personal combat instructor who showed me how to get in in the first place."
autokinetic: (tomorrow)
Author: autokinetic
"I wonder if I should start taking that. I took like six classes of it when I was seven but I've forgotten a lot of it and I'm not literally super-fast like I would be if my mutation were directly for that, I can just control myself at top normal-human speed, so I probably shouldn't trundle along expecting that to do the trick all the time."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"I can introduce you if you want," he offers cheerfully.
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"Do you suppose they'll put us in the same level class?" asks Aegis.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"If you belong there," he says with a grin.
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
"Trained or not I bet I'm better than you," she says, putting up her hands and throwing a mini-strike at the air in front of her. "Is the room free, could we put on padding and have a looksee?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He beams.

"Let's!"
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Lead the way," she grins.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue does!

Personal combat is taught in the highest-gravity areas, of course. It's a bit of a hike.
autokinetic: (photo)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis slides naturally from low-grav to high-grav walking styles, going from a light dancing gait to a rolling one, and she spins a couple times en route, taking in her surroundings. "What styles are you doing?" she asks.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Little of everything," he shrugs.
autokinetic: (edible)
Author: autokinetic
"Fun," she laughs.

Here they are! She rifles through the safety equipment in search of protective gear in her size. The exo was originally prototyped for military use; it can take a pounding - her bones can't.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue raids the selection like he's done it a hundred times before, which he probably has.
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
Eventually Aegis is all decked out. "You want to take offense, or you just want me to start beating you up unprovoked?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He laughs.

"Come at me," he invites.
autokinetic: (edible)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis only took classes so she could be sure she wasn't making amateur mistakes. She didn't take it so she could learn to do anything in particular. Her style is nothing like anything - it's the pace of frenetic battleroom flight with the precision of a surgeon and the spontaneous last-minute decisionmaking of a housefly surprised by air currents. This is heavy gravity, so her advantage isn't unsurpassable the way it is when literally nothing holds her back - but she is fast, and she goes exactly where she means to go.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue is very, very good.

That makes it a more or less even fight. And, it quickly becomes clear, she is the more to his less.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
Finally, Aegis gets him: she rolls up off the floor, catches his neck between her ankles and slams him down with one of his arms under him, the other caught in her hand, his legs twisted up under most of her weight. When he can't throw her off, she grins; the angle is such that he can just barely see this. "Gotcha."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox


"Yep," he says breathlessly. "You sure did."
autokinetic: (good)
Author: autokinetic
She lets him up when he yields, rolling off him and springing up again. "But it's pretty close, they'll probably sort me into your level."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Damn right we will," says a new voice from among the equipment stands.

Sue laughs.
autokinetic: (tomorrow)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis turns around, beholds an adult, salutes, and says, "Sir."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Howlett," says the stranger.

"My personal combat instructor," Sue adds.
autokinetic: (tentative)
Author: autokinetic
"Pleased to meet you. I'm Isabella Swan, or Aegis, and I just shuttled here from Battle School."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"You're badly trained and you just wiped the floor with my best student," says Howlett. "You should take my class."
autokinetic: (rapt)
Author: autokinetic
"I plan to, sir. I can do this because I'm wearing an exoskeleton." She holds up her hands, netted with copper threads.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"I noticed," Howlett says dryly.
autokinetic: (fold)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis puts her hands behind her back. "But, it only does so much, so yes, I was planning on taking a personal combat course and we were just trying to guess if I'd be in Sue's or another level."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"And now you know," he says.
autokinetic: (rapt)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis nods. "Er, do you need this room now or something, sir?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Nope." He smiles dryly. "Why, do you?"
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"Not anymore. I'm just wondering what you're doing here, sir."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Watching you kick his ass," he says with a nod to Sue, who grins.
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
"We could do it again," she says. "See if it was a fluke or not, sir. Or maybe we shouldn't so you can cure me of bad habits before I cement them."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Wasn't a fluke," says Sue.

Howlett nods. "But don't worry, I've got plenty of time to train you out of bad habits."
autokinetic: (Default)
Author: autokinetic
"Yessir. Is there a sign-up sheet somewhere here or do I register through the computer system?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Through the computers," says Sue. "I can help if you want."
autokinetic: (good)
Author: autokinetic
"Sure." Aegis takes off her padding and puts her shoes back on.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue does likewise. By the time they've rearranged themselves, Howlett is gone.

"He does that," says Sue.
autokinetic: (photo)
Author: autokinetic
"Good teacher?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Yeah!"
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
"I bet you actually show up to this one instead of just doing the assigned reading and showing up for tests, too."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Of course," he giggles.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis twirls and skips back out into the halls. "Anything else I should see before the settling-in-getting-lost-meeting-up-with-old-friends period is up and I get my orders?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Well, I could go show you how to get into the docking bays," he offers.
autokinetic: (good)
Author: autokinetic
"Oh, yes, please, the entire shuttle had gravity, it was stifling."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue laughs, and leads her away.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
Aegis makes sure she hasn't lost any of her flight skills in the time away from a place to dance. This isn't exactly a battleroom - the obstacles are different - but there is enough open air and enough handholds to get in some good flying.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue makes short, controlled hops from improvised handhold to improvised handhold and finds a good spot to admire her while she flies.
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
"They never, like," Aegis says, tumbling past him, "suddenly turn on gravity here or anything?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Nope!" says Sue.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Awesome. What kind of schedule am I looking at, or didn't you read yours before you tossed it?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Pffff," says Sue.
autokinetic: (fold)
Author: autokinetic
"Well, how many tests do you have in the average month," she tries, snickering.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"I dunno, one or two?" he says. "I don't really track time like that."
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"You don't? How do you track it?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"In the short term," he says. "I know what time it is, and when my next personal combat class and my next test are, and when they're serving lunch."
autokinetic: (evaluating)
Author: autokinetic
"Huh." She hooks her foot around a handhold, changes direction, kicks off, bounces. "Is there any battleroom-equivalent here, even? Or is it all classes and meals and blocks of free time?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Nah, that's pretty much it," he says. "That and warship tours."
autokinetic: (Default)
Author: autokinetic
"Warship tours? That sounds maybe interesting."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"They're fun!"
autokinetic: (tomorrow)
Author: autokinetic
"I don't suppose you get to try piloting them anywhere."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He laughs. "Nope."
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
"Pity. What've you been doing in your spare time, without the game - just flying and driving away roommates?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Pretty much."
autokinetic: (evaluating)
Author: autokinetic
"Gonna drive me away too? Steal my socks and play music loud at night?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He snorts. "Yep. By the time I graduate, there won't be a student in Tactical who hasn't transferred out of my room."
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"What have you been doing?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Being me," he says lightly. "Not many people can handle it."
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Well, I asked for you. Maybe I'll stay," she laughs, and she pirouettes through the air.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"You can handle me if anybody can," laughs Sue.
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"But I mean did they cite specific objectionable habits or did the teachers actually move them on the grounds that you were being Sue at them?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"I just make people uncomfortable," he says. "They usually can't even figure out why, but they make enough noise about it that the teachers move 'em anyway."
autokinetic: (enh)
Author: autokinetic
"Huh. Were there problems about that when you were commanding Phoenix too?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Not as much. The commander lives separately."
autokinetic: (edible)
Author: autokinetic
"I don't mean exactly the same thing, I mean people being all 'he's being Sue at meeeee'," she says.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He shrugs. "And I'm telling you, there wasn't much when I commanded Phoenix, but before that I got some of it from my launch and my army."
autokinetic: (Default)
Author: autokinetic
"I got some crap but it was mostly because I was being a girl at people," Aegis yawns.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"What's that matter?"
autokinetic: (pissed)
Author: autokinetic
"Doesn't. But we're strange, exotic creatures, you know," she says, waggling her fingers at him while she bounces from wall to wall, "we have cooties, they don't make us cut our hair off, we must be aliens."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue giggles.
autokinetic: (edible)
Author: autokinetic
"People talked for a while about how you reacted when Suicide Watch got shortened."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Huh?"
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"They thought it was weird you'd go by a girls' name."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"It's funny," he says, as though this is the ultimate rationale.
autokinetic: (enh)
Author: autokinetic
"I just thought it was very like you, to pick a name that someone invented to tease you and adopt it. I'm not sure how it's funny."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"...That is how it's funny," he says, shooting her a puzzled look.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"So you just find your own personality endlessly entertaining, then."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"I guess? Not really? No," he says. "...Well, maybe."
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"There is the decisiveness and clear thinking we need in the fight against the buggers, right there," teases Aegis.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He makes a rude gesture in her direction.
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
She sticks out her tongue and rockets to the other side of the room and back.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue launches to catch her in midflight.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
She doesn't have to, but she lets him catch her by the hand, and they go tumbling crazily together until they hit a wall, and she laughs.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He grins and hugs her.

"I like you," he says. "I'm glad you're here."
autokinetic: (good)
Author: autokinetic
"I like you too and I'm also glad I'm here, although we'll see what I say about that in a week when I'm really homesick for the birds and everybody - I was in the middle of something with the seahorses, too," she giggles, hugging back.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Tell me all about 'em!" he says immediately.
autokinetic: (Default)
Author: autokinetic
"Oh, so the seahorses were aquatic - I got them after the butterflies learned to make glass, I put a fishbowl sort of thing over my avatar's head and carried ballast and it could get around okay underwater, and I found seahorses living in a coral reef, and they had these pests - little jellyfish things, swarms of them, not intelligent at all, I tried to see if maybe they were but they weren't, and they were like mosquitoes to the seahorses. And I tested a bunch of different stuff to see if I could repel them, and I tried finding where they laid their egg packets, and finally I just made a big net and put it around the reef like a fence - with gates in it. And I was in the middle of going around and killing all the jellies and eggs that were still inside the net so this could be a complete solution."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He laughs. "Awesome."
autokinetic: (rapt)
Author: autokinetic
She smiles. "It's really a very clever game. It's a pity they don't have it here. I wonder if they don't need psych data about us anymore, or something."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Who knows," says Sue. "I miss it too, though."
autokinetic: (c'mon)
Author: autokinetic
"Maybe they spy on us to see how we react to its absence," she suggests.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"In your case, with paranoia?" he jokes.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Oh, it's justified paranoia, did I ever tell you what happened when I quit processing my thoughts in English?" she snickers.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"No, what?"
autokinetic: (explain)
Author: autokinetic
"It was scarce hours before I was summoned to a meeting about it. Apparently because I didn't take the standard psych tests when I was little and the monitors didn't work on me, they were using my notebooking for a bead on what's in my brain. They couldn't use the game because it was different for me. I wound up writing a report on the game and what I thought it might mean once a week. I have no idea what they did for you. Did you have a monitor?"
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Nope," he says. "Psych tests. And shrinks. Lots and lots of shrinks. I scared most of 'em off, though." He grins proudly.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Were you just yourself at them, too?" laughs Aegis.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
"Yep!" he beams.
autokinetic: (good)
Author: autokinetic
"Apparently everyone is allergic to you except a lucky handful. You're like poison ivy."
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
He cracks up.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
"Maybe you should be Ivy instead of Sue. Maybe you should collect a whole bunch of three-letter girls' names and have one for every day of the week," she snorts.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
...Well now he's just giggling more.
autokinetic: (playful)
Author: autokinetic
She laughs and launches into the air again, capering across the bay with fey grace.
pythbox: A book. (Default)
Author: pythbox
Sue watches her, and smiles.