by Laer Carroll
She did so, relaxed but not lax in any way, alert to all the nuances she could discern from the woman's manner. She showed little at first, a wiry major with very black skin and a completely bald head, a fashion statement of the last few years for many black women.
She looked through papers in a manila folder, a practice that Jane considered affected or at least inefficient. The woman did not wear a vear.
Or maybe the physical folder and papers were dramatic props. Jane had become aware that people often play acted in their interactions with others. She herself was straightforward, what you see (if you're smart enough to see it) is what you get. She hated the idea that she must learn to play act too, but accepted that she must.
Major Ngana looked up from the papers.
"You've had an interesting summer, Cadet. You go to Laughlin for briefings on their aircraft and training and a few exciting rides on their aircraft. But you spend all summer there and acquire licenses in helicopters, transports, and fighter aircraft. INCLUDING combat certifications."
She stared at Jane. Jane looked back. There was something challenging, possibly even threatening, about the stare. As always when threatened she and her robot became one. The look the major saw on her face was a cold waiting that might instantly turn into deadly response.
The major had faced deadly threats before. She thought she'd become hardened to them. But hairs prickled on her arms and legs. This might be one of those sci-fi movie terminators come to life.
"A very useful outcome. Congratulations. There are several areas you might want to pursue here. For instance, we have a program for interested cadets to learn flying in sailplanes. You could teach those cadets. There is also a similar program for powered aircraft. Cadets learn basic flight training and can solo if they've the talent and apply themselves."
The deadly machine before the major softened into a calm and cooperative cadet. The major relaxed, making a note never to offer the slightest threat to someone who might be a psychopath or a sociopath. And to be alert to the need to have the cadet expelled from the Academy if she proved to be either.
"Meanwhile I suggest we consider you taking advanced course in the areas of aerial engineering, combat tactics, and the like."
Jane nodded and the major made notes on a form in front of her.
"Now we come to sciences. Both the math department and the physics department want you take independent study in their area. Does that seem something you'd like to do?"
"Sure." Jane thought what the two departments really wanted was for her to teach them. She'd gotten hints of that the previous year.
"You need to take several courses in the social sciences area with a military focus: history, organizational theory and practice, leader ship, and so on. Here is a syllabus. Take it home and check off the courses you want to take this semester, then turn it in by end of day Friday."
She pushed a piece of paper across her desk toward Jane. Jane took it and placed it in the manila folder the major also proffered.
"You are set for foreign languages. I note you passed basic Spanish, Russian, and Mandarin Chinese. We have a course in Russian literature and one in Oriental literature, primarily Chinese and Japan."
"I'll wait till I can study those subjects in the languages themselves. I considered the courses you mentioned last semester and they are in English."
The major nodded and passed on to a different area. "I see you passed courses in volleyball, soccer, and basketball and competed in intramurals in those three areas.
"Basketball. Aren't you a bit short for that sport?"
Jane grinned. "You must have never seen me play. I'm very fast. I can steal balls like crazy and pass them to a team mate to make the shots."
She didn't say that she could make jump shots from the three-point line which never missed. That would bring too much attention to her and her inhuman abilities.
"You might want to consider widening your focus and take other sports courses and activities."
"I'm good this semester with what I participated last year. Maybe in the second semester we might visit this area again."
The major nodded and said, "Last we come to the Humanities. You need to take second-year English."
Jane nodded.
"All the Art courses are third-year and fourth-year courses. But you're an outstanding student and I could approve one of them."
Jane shook her head. "In high school I took three-dimensional computer art and video making. I passed with honors. I'm good there."
She hesitated.
"I'm a little concerned that the Academy offers no courses in Music."
"I've noticed the lack myself. I've wondered about it. I suppose it's because tastes in music are so subjective."
"The same could be said of literature and art, yet the Academy offers courses in them."
The major smiled. "Perhaps you should work up a syllabus and offer to teach a course."
"I just may do that," said Jane, a thoughtful look on her face.
The major got a startled look on hers.
"Wait. Are you the Jane Kuznetsov who's a composer?"
Jane's response was wry. "I'm pretty sure I'm the only one."
The major sat back in her chair, staring at Jane. This time Jane felt no threat.
"If you really want to teach a course in music, DO write up a syllabus and submit it to me. I'll double-check it and pass it on. You wouldn't mind me making suggestions for changes? Before I pass it on?"
"Of course not. I'd borrow heavily from established basic courses but I could always miss something."
The major abandoned any idea this young woman might be crazy.
Still, she never forgot the cold ready look on Jane's face.
<>
Jane felt good about her session with the major. She didn't seem to want to show everyone she was a hard ass by bullying the students for real, unlike the carefully controlled bullying the upper class cadets were required to do to weed out cadets who could never endure the stress of combat. Her suggestions during the course counseling all made sense and gave Jane enough room to choose courses which suited her needs as well as those of the Air Force.
Major Ngana had also given Jane a printout of the cadet clubs active at the Academy. Jane had taken part in the aikido and combat shooting in her first year. This year she wanted something less combative.
In her first full week at the Academy the Cadet Club Association had an informational get-together with many of the clubs represented. There were several dozen, each with a table with pamphlets on it and some members behind it. Jane zeroed in on the Hispanic/Latino Club.
In Spanish Jane said, "Hi, friends. How are you today?"
The man standing behind the table just smiled. He might only speak Portuguese rather than Spanish, or neither language. But the two young women smiled and answered in Spanish. They said Fine and asked if she was also.
"I hate to be so self-centered, but mainly I want to know if you have salsa parties, or know where I could dance salsa or the Argentine tango."
The older of the two said there were a couple of dance clubs in Colorado Springs which had salsa nights. But they were more meat markets and bars. A better place was at the GoLightly dance studio if she was seriously into dancing salsa and the tango. As long as you stayed away from the "International Dance" events where they danced the silly British versions of Latin dancing.
Jane made a retching face and thanked them and said she'd see them around.
At the social dance club she got the same response when she asked about salsa and Argentine tango: referral to the GoLightly dance studio for both dances. Both the cadets behind their table said they regularly went to the studio for swing dancing. But their club also had social dance events on the campus.
Their conversation turned general. Jane was invited to take one of the chairs behind the table and accepted.
She was about to leave when she saw a familiar face: Ricky. She waved at him and he came over. However, he h
ad on his mean face.
"Were you waving at me, Cadet? Stand up. At attention."
"Sir, yes, sir!" She stood to perfect military correctness.
He started laughing.
"Sit down, Cap-- Cadet. You all settled in?"
"Yeah, Ricky. Got most of the courses I want, too."
He turned to the two club members at the table. They were third year and fourth year cadets, so his social equals.
"I know this cadet from this summer at Laughlin. She's one of the hottest pilots you'll ever meet. Get her to talking about that some time. Jane, I'm on duty. Got to go scare some poor firsties. We've got to get together soon. Maybe in a week or two when you get in the groove."
"Will do, Ricky. Stay safe."
"Stay safe."
"You're a pilot?" said the fourth year "firstie" cadet.
The word was bound to become general knowledge sometime. She might as well be truthful now.
"Yes. Military license on helicopters, transports, and fighters. With combat certifications. I had civilian single engine recip and basic helicopter licenses and happened to catch the instructors just right. They needed an extra warm body and pushed me over the top to get military licenses."
"With military certifications?"
"They had a program for which they needed a guinea pig, so I agreed to stay on another month. The program involved military training, so as a by-product of being a part of the program I got the cert."
"You were really lucky."
"You're telling me."
The conversation remained friendly but a bit uncertain. She was only a second-year student at the Academy, yet she had reached heights they might never reach. They did not know how to talk to her. Soon Jane said a friendly Goodbye and left.
<>
The word did get around. It had positive and negative consequences. She was recognized and admired by some, harassed more and more harshly by others.
Jane had expected the latter reaction and it bothered her not at all. She could "drop and give me twenty" all day with her physique. Nor was she frightened or depressed by the harassment. She expected it and neither felt nor showed distress. This neutrality annoyed the harassers even more than active resistance might. They redoubled their efforts.
Finally her entourage took steps. They took careful note of each instance of the harassment and the worst offenders. They notified Kate of the latest instance when it went too far.
"Cadet! What are you doing?"
The fourth classman had Jane doing twenty push ups. He had one foot on her back and was pushing down on it. It was having no more effect than if he was pushing down on a machine.
"I'm teaching this cadet the price of sullen obedience."
"Take your foot off her back this instant. Cadet, stand up. Are you injured?"
"No, sir."
"Is your uniform soiled? Turn around so I can see."
It was only scuffed not dirtied.
"Can you continue your count without injury?"
"Yes, sir."
"I made it seven more pushups. Drop and do seven. Then go about your duties."
"Yes, sir."
"As for you, Cadet Johnson, you are to report yourself to your squadron commander for discipline."
"Who are you to tell me what to do?"
"I'm the one holding this SuperSmart phone which has been recording this infraction. Do you wish me to go to your commander with this evidence rather than you with your verbal explanation?"
He looked as if he wanted to snatch the phone or strike her. But good sense won out. He left.
About this time Jane finished her pushup count and stood up to continue oh her way.
Kate looked around at the few cadets still watching. They hastily turned away to their duties.
There were a few more harassment incidents by other upper class cadets. However they were less punishment and more a statement that the harassers were not intimidated by Kate. Jane endured them but hardly noticed them.
<>
On her first overview of what she'd be studying in English Jane expected to be bored. The first semester they'd read excerpts from world literature before 1600. In the second semester they'd read selections from 1600 on.
She'd already done this in high school. It seemed a waste to repeat it in college. But she buckled down and the work became mildly interesting.
What was a challenge were the compositions she had to do. There was going to be a lot of them. As the semester progressed she hit upon a way to make such writing interesting: think of expression as a form of math. It had rules for constructing sentences and paragraphs and larger works. Very approximate ones with lots of variations. Writing became an exercise in forming works with the absolute minimum of words without the work becoming a skeleton.
"Basics of Economics" was the most difficult course for Jane. The theories seemed needlessly esoteric and involved. Until she was rescued by her deep intuitive understanding of computers. They were basically devices which worked on information units, the ultimately simple ones of 0 and 1, to the information clusters called memes, or memory elements, which were stored in the brain.
Cybernetics explained how info could flow in complex webs of feedback and feedforth. Economical systems were partly made up of top-down systems of control of goods creation and distribution, labeled socialism. And partly made up of bottom-up systems of control, labeled capitalism.
With that literature and economics flipped from vague and dim arenas to ones of great clarity. Human expression was vastly complex but governed by cybernetic rules. Ditto economics.
In literature a story was a device for giving people an experience. It flowed from the first hints about the natures of the people in the story world. Then through a journey full of obstacles large and small. Then to the last obstacle separating the main character(s) from a goal and its success or defeat. The goal might be physical or non-physical, clearly seen from the beginning or only discovered in a meandering journey.
An essay was a device too. It flowed from a thesis through a journey through antitheses to a conclusion. Again there were rules a writer had to follow to make a satisfying work of art.
Similarly microeconomics and macroeconomics had formals which people dimly followed.
As the semester passed the required courses evolved from difficult to easier. So too did Jane's progress on her advanced courses, aeronautical engineering and combat strategy/tactics.
And on her most advanced courses she made phenomenal progress.
She had her detractors and doubters on the Academy faculty, but her supporters were stronger and more numerous. She was given complete freedom to pursue a course labeled "Independent Studies in Mathematics." By Christmas she delivered a paper titled "Proof of the Innumeracy of Theoretical Hyper-dimensional Universes." It was ground-breaking and soon was being debated in mathematical ivory towers all over the world.
In a similarly vaguely titled physics course she delivered a study supported by a well-funded physics laboratory on campus, funded so well because it had yielded impressive results in the past. Jane shared it with three other students working independently. All three were fiercely competitive but coaxed (without Jane's trying) by her into comradely cooperation.
As so much of the students' work was theoretical they only had to jockey little for use of the physical facilities. Jane helped by working mostly from dinner to midnight. She liked the quiet halls and dark world outside and didn't consider such lateness a negative.
By the semester's end she'd made important progress in physics too. She served it up in a seminar a week before Christmas. It was titled "The Decabattery."
At the podium in a large classroom Jane said into a microphone, "Thank you all for coming. Due to the looming holidays this briefing will be, unusual in briefings, actually brief."
That got chuckles from the audience in the seats directly below her. It was small, dwarfed by the huge stadium-format classroom. It included Jane's three lab companions, seven fac
ulty members, her squadron commander Major Ngana, a floor cleaner possibly resting from his duties, and Kate, present in what she stubbornly insisted was her duty as Jane's executive officer.
On the gigantic screen behind her at the click of the remote in her hand appeared a white image with the black title: "The Decabattery, by Jane Kuznetsov, with significant editorial content from" followed by the full names of her three lab friends.
"You may wonder at my unusual move of including the names of three other individuals. This is not a rare instance of sharing credit. Rather it's an attempt to share blame if such comes."
More moderate laughter.
"There are at least two dozen prominent groups trying to improve batteries and likely twice that many or more lower-profile ones who are also trying. What I did was to attempt research in areas no one else was exploring. In my case it was exploring an area being researched for other purposes, so there was plenty of solid research to draw upon."
She clicked the remote and the screen showed several chemistry diagrams labeled Si-C and Si-O and Si-F and so on.
"Both Silicon and Carbon are in the same column on the periodic table and so are both tetravalent. That makes them polysexual, forming long chains easily as in those orgies that I'm never being invited to, darn it."
She needlessly sipped water from a plastic bottle to let the laughter and a couple of annoyed coughs to subside.
"I'll make short a long story--described in the paper my friend is passing out to each of you. I tried a number of schemes of combining silicon and carbon and so on and came up with a battery that holds at least ten times as much per pound as all the others currently available. Hence the name DECAbattery.
"It has a number of other useful properties which will no doubt be improved further. Such as fast charging, safety, and long-term charge storage."
"And now I'm headed on my short Christmas vacation. As you leave you may take from my friend Kate a small example of this battery. Except you, Sir--" She smiled as she spoke to the floor cleaner or whatever. "I'm afraid your sinister features make you look like a dastardly spy engaged in industrial espionage."
The young man, quite clean cut and good looking, startled and chuckled as he accepted the white paper but not the small prototype battery all the others were getting.