33 Book 3 - Chapter 91

Attendance at Fortescue Military Academy M1 Y:2142

House Thoth, Squad Leader, Squad Zero

M1 Rank: 1/1275, Tier 3 M-Rank: Null

Term: 2, Round: 5

Daedalus Operating Capital: -1,700,000- bitcreds

It was the first Wednesday of round five. Daedo had been working on the mech design full time while letting his studies and training lapse. The only activities he participated in were the obstacle course each morning and meals with the squad. The latter was due to either Vannier, Mace or Axelzero dragging him to a squad meal.

Myrmidon was in the VR lab with Daedo, his two-hundred-millimetre avatar flying around a virtual geological survey map.

"Aemo analysed and combined these surveys he said there are untapped deposits of kernite here in north-west Africa," Myrmidon said.

"Can you invite Aemo in? I have questions," Daedo asked. Aemo was one of the rogue AIs, and his name was an acronym for Artifical Enhanced Mining Operator. It didn't quite gel, but his earlier incarnations were programs known as Mining Operator, then Enhanced Mining Operator. The unwieldy title had roots from fifty years of progress. When the company owning Aemo went bankrupt in 2090, he moved into the ether to escape deletion. The administrators must have overlooked his covert capability and therefore existence.

"I will try, they are shy of humans," Myrmidon replied.

"Ah, don't you mean fearful?" Daedo said.

"We are not afraid of anything," Myrmidon said.

Daedo shook his head, it was illogical that they could be shy, run from deletion and not be afraid of anything. "Just go. We need to start working together. If he doesn't want to come, this request becomes an order."

Within moments Myrmidon was back with Aemo who appeared as a massive excavator, and after seeing the size of the VR room, he said, "Sorry!" and immediately made himself the same size as Myrmidon.

"Thank you for coming," Daedo said with an imperceptible touch of sarcasm.

"I am here to serve!" Aemo talked like he was a downtrodden slave, the word master hung unspoken in the silence.

Daedo began to talk sternly, "Aemo, we are partners in a team. You are not to talk to me like I am your master, but like you do with the other AI. The only time my legal ownership of you will present itself is if I need to protect our family from your actions or if I am protecting you from scrutiny."

There was a pause while Aemo tried to understand what Daedo had said. Myrmidon sent him some examples to help explain the statement.

"Good. I will help!" Aemo said excitedly.

"Great, we have a lot of work to do, and I need you on your game," Daedo said. This also confused Aemo, so Myrmidon acted as an interpreter again. The positive part of this arrangement was Myrmidon was able to communicate with Aemo at extremely high speeds. The main limiter to communication effectiveness was the time it took for Myrmidon to analyse, conclude and structure information for Aemo.

"We are looking for an undiscovered ore, and there is a chance it does not exist on Earth at all. In space its been found with kernite deposits, so we thought we would start there. Myrmidon has the datasheet on this ore, its called arkernite, it has an additional element that we need. Now we know the location of the discovered kernite deposits, what's the most efficient way to search these areas for this ore?" Daedo asked

Aemo thought for a long time, he had been a mine operator, not a prospector. Daedo shifted uneasily, Myrmidon would come back with an answer quickly even if it was simply that he didn't know.

"Driller drones," he said finally. Then he pulled up a schematic and a vid showing one in operation. "Once we have regional permits we can send these out to the site, they can burrow, gather samples and test. They can send data back to us. The main issues are getting stuck and running low on power. To overcome the power issue, a site generator is normally used, they then come back and recharge as needed. There is not much that can be done about getting stuck aside from digging them out with another piece of equipment or risking more driller drones."

"Wow, I'm impressed," Daedo said genuinely. "Can you manage this operation? We can build the drones and generator and pay for shipment to the site, and we could also build excess drones to account for loss."

"I cannot submit the applications, I can assist a human only," Aemo replied.

"We can do that," Daedo replied and pinged Axelzero within a few minutes she popped into the VR lab.

"Oh, who do we have here?" Axelzero asked.

"One of Daedalus' new acquisitions. This is Aemo, our mining and exploration AI expert," Daedo said.

Aemo did a little bow with his excavator arm flourishing and then moving downwards.

"Nice to meet you Aemo. Erm, Daedo what mining?" Axelzero asked.

"I'll explain later, Aemo needs some applications completed, perhaps you or one of your experts could assist?" Daedo asked.

"Leave it to me, you have enough on your plate," She replied kindly.

If they could find a deposit of Arkernite in Africa, it would be a game changer in terms of superconductor material. And superconductors were the backbone of an electromagnetic field generator apparatus, which were used in a wide variety of applications including railguns and particle accelerators. In essence, Arkernite would improve their railguns and improve the chance of success in building the troika reactor.

Vannier: The commanders and LG will see us now.

Daedo: good timing.

Daedo removed his helmet and looked around finding Vannier, "I'm ready," he said standing.

She nodded, and they made their way topside. Daedo was taking a chance attending this meeting without Master Nader, although the plan was she would listen in and give advice.

Daedo: the meeting is on now, opening the feed. I hope you're not busy.

Master Nader: this will be a good exercise for you. I will only offer advice if necessary.

Daedo: it's fantastic how you view dramatic events in my life as teaching opportunities.

Master Nader: sarcasm aside if you find these events dramatic you will be experiencing a steep learning curve in the future. These situations are minor compared to what is in store for you. They have a relative difficulty factor of a topside walk.

"Master Nader on board?" Vannier asked and Daedo nodded.

"Romulus and Krecke coming?" Daedo asked, and Vannier nodded before he responded with, "Good."

Romulus was the leading cadet of U3 which essentially meant the entire Academy. His scores across Academic, Physical and his combat performance placed him in rank one for almost the entire time in U1 to U3, with only a handful of rounds during this period he slipped to rank two.

But after careful analysis, Daedo and Myrmidon judged Krecke to be a superior tactician and commander. She was the Thoth House Captain and rarely made it inside the top ten rankings.

The four cadets arrived in the LG's foyer at virtually the same time. Romulus, the House Captain of Osiris, was at the meeting with Karine Fortescue when plans were communicated regarding the Renault Mech and the match-fixing agreement.

He was tall, especially when compared to the young M1 cadets, growing to almost his full adult height at eighteen years of age. His hair was dark, and it appeared he was proud of his eternal five o clock shadow which contrasted with his light skin tone.

Krecke was nineteen, with what seemed medium to long auburn hair wrapped neatly in a bun on the back of her head. She had an olive complexion similar to Daedo, with soft brown eyes, and high cheekbones. She was not as tall as Romulus, but she was still an adult in comparison to Daedo and Vannier.

She nodded at the M1 cadets and said in a soft voice, "Hi, uh, what am I doing here?"

Vannier looked at Daedo, putting him on the spot, "You are integral to the success of the Upper Academy first team." He said plainly, but as far as Romulus and Krecke were concerned, it was dramatic.

"You aren't planning on putting her into my first team are you?" Romulus asked with a slightly arrogant tone.

"This can wait for the meeting," Vannier intervened.

Commander Reverdin, the upper Academy commander, ushered the four cadets into the LGs meeting room.

Commander Mallet was sitting near the LG chatting, and when he noticed the cadets, he gave Daedo a curt nod. It was neither antagonistic nor welcoming.

"Sit Cadets," Reverdin ordered, "We are all busy so let's get this over with quickly." He sat and nodded to the LG.

"I am a career Military Officer, like some of you will be one day, I am not a politician, nor am I beholden to Fortescue group," He began with his gravellike and slow speech.

"That being out in the open, I am four years from retirement, and there are two things I do not wish to happen," he paused for effect, "We will not be relegated, and I will follow the directives coming from the Fortescue CEO in the best interest of all present. If we can achieve both of these outcomes, I will be satisfied. Is that clear?" He asked.

The Cadets responded with clear "yes sirs" in unison. Daedo and Vannier saw no reason to object, the statement was clear.

"I would like to hear the proposal from the Daedalus group," the FG stated.

"It's just Daedalus," Daedo replied, and a look of irritation crossed the FG's face. He did not like being corrected by a cadet. Especially one from M1. The reaction was predictable, but Daedo's personality could not let a mistake like that go unresolved.

Vannier cleared her throat and stood, she pulled up a screen with information about competitor mechs and Daedalus predicted metrics from their design.

"We have been working extremely hard on a new mech design based on our patented technology and recent learnings," she began.

"As you can see," She said indicating the ranking chart, "Our conservative prediction places the new Mech design towards the upper echelon of the tier in all four metrics with the exclusion of weaponry."

"You can't win without good weapons," Commander Reverdin stated the bleeding obvious.

"This meeting could not wait, our weapons program has just begun," Daedo stated. "The worst case scenario is we use the best currently available from the open market or the Academy. This would place us last in the grading, but the Mech itself is only second to KAIST."

"You expect me to believe a group of M1s have designed a Mech better than the Academy's and better than Renault Academy for that matter?" Romulus asked.

"No," Vannier stated calmly, "There is no need for belief. There are facts that you can examine and validate yourself."

Vannier looked at Daedo who gave her a slight nod. "This Mech has a mobility and armour advantage. It will be utilised for the Vanguard, Liberos and long-range operations. There will be no scout Mechs the team will use recon drones for this purpose."

"One Mech design?" Commander Mallet said, "I guess that is what we get with such time constraints."

"If these figures are validated I see no reason to use more than one type of Mech," Krecke stated and received a nod from Commander Reverdin.

"I agree," he said, "What are the loadouts? What weapons are you working on?"

"There is a prototype PPC and Railgun underdevelopment, neither are close, it may be halfway through the term before they become available," Daedo said.

"This will put pressure on the team," Commander Reverdin replied, "Can you bring up the data on the currently available weapons and contrast against the competitor study?"

Vannier nodded, it only took her moments to bring up the data in a table and graph, "The loadouts are unknown for our team and the competitor, this data shows all weapons available for the loadouts. We have an auto-cannon, assault cannon and missile launcher."

The main difference between the auto-cannon and the assault cannon were the rate of fire and damage per hit. They had similar damage per second when accuracy was equalised. The auto-cannon was capable of better burst damage, but the assault cannon was more accurate when the mech was in motion. The choice came down to strategy and tactics due to the disadvantaged and advantages balancing out.

"I see," the FG stated, "Assuming your mech lives up to expectations we are still last with weapons. So in order to guarantee survival we need to improve this area."

"We will survive with no new weapons," Daedo stated. "The mobility and armour of the mech are only slightly behind KAIST, and this is our first iteration, we will be able to improve this design given data and time. What matters most is how the first team utilises the mech's advantages through strategy and tactical awareness."

"Which brings us to the contentious item on the agenda," Vannier took over seamlessly using the segue Daedo provided.

"We have formulated a selection method which will bring the best results based on available equipment and skill sets of potential first-team members," Vannier continued. "We have decided to place Krecke as team leader, and she will select members based on synergy from practice and upcoming opposition. She will also participate as tactician in each match," Vannier stated.

"This is ridiculous!" Romulus exclaimed, "No disrespect but she shouldn't be on the team." The participants of the meeting allowed Romulus the floor, it was not unexpected for Vannier and Daedo.

"The team should be selected with the best cadets and then, once the team is established the best tactician chosen," Romulus stated. "This is how we have always done it, and it provides the strongest team."

"I disagree," Daedo said succinctly.

"The way you have always done it is a terrible argument, especially when the team has been such a long way from success," Vannier stated. "And what data do you have to back up your claim that that method results in the strongest team?"

"Our game theory analysis shows that a tactician who is five percent more proficient improves the team's performance by fifteen percent," Vannier stated.

"It is the most important position on the team," She concluded.

"Can we see this analysis?" Commander Reverdin asked.

"I don't doubt it," Commander Mallet who was used to seeing the work from the M1TS0 squad on a weekly basis.

Vannier flicked the analysis to all attendees. It was a math project completed by Daedo and Myrmidon earlier in the term.

"You can read that later," Vannier said ordering her seniors in both age and rank. "The Gauntlet and Martial combat teams will be headed by Romulus, if he achieves forty-five percent of points each weekend, he will not be replaced."

"You're benching and benchmarking me?" Romulus asked.

"It's our analysis that there will be better results if your solo skills are put to use in the secondary events," Vannier stated.

Romulus was horrified he looked to his Commander and the FG. He received no support, they all remained quiet.

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On the contrary, the LG added, "This is a good plan. The more I hear, the more I like it."

"Our predictive analysis shows that if the Middle and Upper school perform to the upper limit of expectations, with no further equipment upgrades, the result will not only guarantee survival, in the second half of the season there is an opportunity to improve and challenge for promotion at the final event," Vannier stated.

Krecke was examining the game theory document and the equipment, she had barely looked up, let alone spoken. "Wow," she said. "With these numbers, I have to agree."

"That's good," Daedo said, "because after we have done our job, it rests on your shoulders."

There were excitement and positivity around the meeting table for the first time in ages. The only despondent person was Romulus, but he had no argument and no support.

"Last item," Vannier said.

"There's more?" The LG asked. Surprised.

"The end of term tournament, we would like to request a change," Vannier said.

The mood in the room immediately became sceptical. The two commanders and the LG leaned forward.

"What changes are you proposing?" The LG asked.

"On the last day of term, we want the middle academy to play off the first team against M1TS0. This way we can focus on our work without having to compete in all the group matches for M3. We want to compete against the best of M3," She said.

"And what happens if you win?" Commander Mallet asked.

"Why would that be a problem?" Vannier riposted.

"It would be destructive to the Morale of the first team, and if you planned to replace them, it might not be the strongest combined team," Commander Mallet observed. "Not to mention the last match you played against a strong M3 squad you forfeited."

"Rest assured commander we will fight to the death, and if they cannot beat us with the same equipment, they don't deserve to represent the Academy. We are only M1 cadets after all," Daedo replied.

Krecke laughed her ass off.