Ten Thousand Fleets Chapter 22: 22. Professor DeVault

Read chapter 22 of Ten Thousand Fleets by DavidNiemitz on NovelPedia.

22. Professor DeVault Academy Hill, Vidako Imperium Stellarum September 27, 2847 By the morning of the first day of academic classes, Arc only half regretted joining the group chat. True, Vee was rather enthusiastic, but her excited messages actually helped to distract him from a sudden and unexpected wave of nerves. As torturous as Hard Burn had been, he hadn’t really ever been asked to do anything other than follow directions and, figuratively, be stubborn enough to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Now, the academy professors were going to actually expect him to think. Even though that was what he’d always been good at, the sudden change was uncomfortable. The time of audible alarms echoing through the dorm room were over. Instead, Arc and his two roommates were each roused by their AI. Iceni was already flashing Arc’s class schedule for the day; a reminder to take his morning dose of the steroids, antibiotics, and painkillers they’d all been assigned during recovery; and his current merit total— one hundred and thirty two, which was more than ten percent of what he needed to earn his first genetic modification. I am far more efficient than the tablet you were using before, Iceni preened as Arc carefully folded his sheets. Now that Hard Burn was over, they’d received a notice that room inspections would be at random intervals, rather than a daily occurrence. In some ways, it was too bad—forty-two of Arc’s merits had come from making his bed each morning. Cal Madine’s attitude might be hard to take, but he’d gotten all three of them off to a good start. In fact , Iceni asked, as Arc went about the business of taking a morning shower, I have a hard time understanding why an assistive intelligence such as I am is not issued to every citizen of the Imperium from birth. That would be even more efficient, would it not? Arc sighed. He was glad that he’d picked up the trick of responding silently, because that wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have out loud while he stood in the showers with a dozen other men. Across the way, Pika luxuriated under a blast of ice-cold water. Arc knew it was ice cold, because he’d made the mistake of getting too close when he walked by, once, and nearly frozen his balls off. He averted his eyes from his naked Alu’kan friend, very carefully kept his bandaged head out of the spray from his own shower head, and set to work with soap. One reason is the cost, he explained to Iceni. The Imperium picks up the tab for all of the cadets here, but only after they weed out the non-hackers with Hard Burn. That works out to something like fifty-surgeries each year. You think they’d only do that many if it was cheap? Iceni considered for a moment. Forty-nine cadets remain in the class of 2851, she corrected, before getting to his main point. According to a quick search run through the academy systems, each procedure costs in excess of fifty-thousand Imperial credits. That means your class already represents an investment of 2.45 million credits, not counting food and housing, waived tuition, expected medical care over the course of four years of training, not to mention the cost of sufficient T-3 Tyro training mechs, estimated at - Arc couldn’t help but laugh. He very much wanted to duck his head under the water; it would be a relief when the bandages finally came off. You can cut it off there, Iceni , he thought. Cost isn’t the only reason, though yes, trained mech pilots are pretty expensive to field. That’s why there’s less than a thousand of them—of us—in fleet. The other reason is the Singularity. Iceni seemed to consider that for a long moment. Ah. I see. There appears to be substantial and irrational prejudice against both cybernetic implants and artificial intelligence in the Imperium . It isn’t exactly irrational . Arc gave himself one last rinse, turned off the shower, and grabbed his towel from the hook to begin drying off. The war wasn’t really that long ago—only about sixty years. I mean,