i command armies

[autokinetic]

Sue graduates from Tactical School a year early, he's barely fifteen. He's toned down the flirting - he treats Aegis completely platonically, in particular - and has cut down on the unhealthy amount of sleeping-with-everything-that-wants. And he's apparently, via his independent study, gotten far enough through the curriculum that they're nudging him along to Command.

They've given Sue a strange old man for a tutor, who appeared in his room and started a physical confrontation, which Sue won; Sue related this story to her with something between amusement and irritation.

And a quicker-than-average flurry of notes has been piling up in the psych data since about that time, according to the timestamps.

Aegis knows before they tell her that they're going to send her to Command early too. She's just barely fifteen herself when she gets another update of the psych files and sees that Sue's had - well, the files aren't terribly clear, some of the communication is happening via in-person conversation and memos that don't get stored in these folders, but Sue's had some kind of breakdown and the only things they can think of to get him out of it, get him back into shape to train and fight, are her friendship and Howlett. They have mixed feelings about both - Howlett's insubordination problem; their bewilderment that Aegis and Sue can be so close when "she's the one person he can't link!" - but they're desperate.

Bird? They don't talk as often over the long distance, just as there was a lull when he went to Tactical ahead of her; their schedules have nothing in common and their contexts less. But he knows her, and he can reach this far if he tries. And she wants to know what's wrong.

Comments

[autokinetic]

She goes back to her-and-Sue's room.

[pythbox]

"What's up?" says Sue.

[autokinetic]

"You might wanna sit down," Aegis says.

[pythbox]

"...What's up?" he repeats, not sitting down.

[autokinetic]

"Okay, let's start with the smaller revelations and work our way up and see if you wanna sit down. Nasty old fart is Mazer Rackham. They accelerated him and spun him around and brought him back specifically to teach you or whoever wound up with your job about the buggers."

[pythbox]

"Great fucking job he's doing there," Sue snorts.

[autokinetic]

"I know, right? We're shut of him, I'm going to get Ahmed to talk to him about buggers in case he knows anything actually useful. Second revelation: faster-than-light communication exists."

[pythbox]

Sue blinks.



"Okaaay," he says slowly. "Any more?"

[autokinetic]

"Faster than light communication exists and there's devices capable of it connecting our sims and our actual real-life fucking invasion fleet with human beings in it," she says flatly.

[pythbox]

Sue blinks again.

"Damn," he says. "No wonder they were so weird about everything."

[autokinetic]

"I know, right? The psychologists screamed at the security people and eventually the psychologists won and the bureaucrat told me so I could tell you in some non-horrible way." She shakes her head. "But this adds a wrinkle. It's not impossible that you can link up the fleet officers on top of us. Then we can do better - we can lose fewer people. We can't even just aim at not losing entire ships. Anything more than cosmetic damage could kill people, or destroy stuff they need to get home after they're through."

[pythbox]

"...I don't know if I have the range," says Sue.

[autokinetic]

"It's worth trying, isn't it? What do you need to be able to find their minds if you can do it at all?" Aegis asks.

[pythbox]

He frowns, rubbing his hands together distractedly.

"I don't know," he says. "I can link people I've linked before over... any distance, I think. I can find people I haven't linked before, if they're close by, and link them that way. What I don't know how to do is find people I've never linked light-years away."

[autokinetic]

"So basically I get to go have that argument I just had about whether we're allowed two-way communication with the fleets again?" Aegis says.

[pythbox]

"I could maybe find them through the simulators?" he hazards. "I don't know, I haven't tried."

[autokinetic]

"Then they'll be surprised," says Aegis, "if you can do it - what's the adjustment period for new linkups usually like?"

[pythbox]

"Depends on the person," he shrugs. "Not that long. It's not like it takes much time to explain."

[autokinetic]

"Okay. Today wasn't too hard. We could've gotten through with no damage if we'd known to take it seriously. Try through the sim, and if you don't get through then we'll ask again about talking to them before battles."

[pythbox]

Sue nods.

[autokinetic]

She hugs him. "We killed a mess of buggers," she murmurs.

[pythbox]

"Yep," he agrees, sounding not particularly impressed about it. But he does hug back.

[autokinetic]

"You okay, my bird?"

[pythbox]

"Fine." Snuggle. "Hugs are nice. I like hugs."

[autokinetic]

"They are nice," she agrees. "Are you going to hold up okay, do I need to keep one finger hovering over that button now...?"