by Aer-ki Jyr
“It’s not a big worry at the moment, and Humans have some blocks that only allow flesh to flesh connections. That won’t protect the other races in Star Force, but we don’t think the Preema or the Dsevmat have touch telepathy. That should make Humans immune, and there are other ways to defend your mind, but the best defense is the person being interrogated not having the information in the first place.”
“Doesn’t exactly fit with the free flow of information that Star Force operates on.”
“We’re not going to start keeping people in the dark,” San assured her. “But there are already some secrets we have that even a Commando of your rank doesn’t know. It’s not even those I’m referring to when I’m referencing trust, but rather things that you will create going forward.”
“Create?”
“How do you feel when you’re depleted of ambrosia?” the Archon asked, seeming to change subjects.
“Not good,” Jyra admitted.
“Incapacitated?”
“Reduced,” she offered instead.
“Then if someone could destroy our ambrosia supplies we would be…reduced, and at a disadvantage. Unless someone hid a small stash that no one else knew about.”
San saw a spark of understanding in her eyes.
“That’s what I mean by trust. Arc Commandos will be trusted, encouraged, even expected to operate off the grid. It’s not a betrayal of oversight, for those who are trustworthy don’t require oversight. If we all know where everything is, then one of us being compromised, or even turning traitor, allows our enemies a battlemap. But if there are elements they do not know exist, or perhaps even do not expect to exist, they are at a disadvantage similar to what you just experienced on this mission.”
“I can only prepare for what is before me or what I know is out there,” Jyra translated. “Everything else I have to wait to deal with until it ambushes me.”
San raised a warning finger. “It’s not a matter of deception, not regarding other Star Force personnel. Trusting you means I don’t pry, and vice versa. Some people erroneously believe that trust means having no secrets, but in truth, trust means being comfortable with someone having secrets and having no worries about them betraying you. Secrets can be weapons, the more powerful my friends are the stronger Star Force becomes.”
“I get what you mean, and understand the significance of it, but other than playing packrat what do you have in mind for us to do?”
“Arc Commandos are given codes, some of which you are already learning to use, that will allow you to bypass security measures and go where you like. There will also be specialized equipment that Regulars don’t get, and some very specialized toys made specifically for Arc Commandos. But all of that isn’t the point. You have to learn to be sneaky on a regular basis, but to do so without disconnecting yourselves from the rest of us. Your ability to function as a team cannot be hindered. You have to learn how to switch from being a teammate to a rogue unit in a fraction of a second. It has to become a secondary mode that you can slip into, but the only way to train that skill is internally. We can’t train you to do that, or a lot of other stuff that Arc Commandos are mandated for.”
“So we each have to customize ourselves?”
“All people do, warriors more than others, and Arc Commandos even more so.”
“I’ve noticed something before, but didn’t think until now to ask. Why don’t you refer to us as soldiers?”
“I’m not a soldier. Neither are you.”
“I’m not?”
“Not if you’re in this program, no. Ideally no one within Star Force is, though that’s only partly true. What do you think a soldier actually is?”
“Someone who fights in an army.”
“That’s one definition…a simplistic one. Shut the door, it’s getting cold in here.”
Jyra turned around and hit the button on the inside of the door frame, with the view of the outside falling snow being eclipsed by the sliding panel.
“What a soldier actually is,” San explained, “is a hybrid. Take a normal person under the instruction of a warrior and the warrior passes on knowledge through instruction and training that the normal person would never have been able to accomplish on their own. Not because of a lack of time or resources, but because they don’t have an intuitive mind. They’re copy cats, people who grow strong from training but have no idea what they’re doing. They follow instructions but do not know how it is affecting them. I can write workouts for other people because I understand training. The people who do those workouts probably won’t, but by using my knowledge they gain power that they otherwise would never have achieved.”
“Then a warrior is…?”
“Someone who can self-navigate. All Commandos can to some degree, you’re not mindless machines following protocol and nothing else, which is why you’re part soldier, part warrior. Archons are full warriors, as are Arc Commandos.”
“Because we can operate off the grid without instructions.”
“Exactly. Soldiers are created by militaries. Militaries are created by warriors. Star Force doesn’t utilize traditional soldiers, like the lizards or Skarrons or hundreds of other races do. We recruit and encourage people to think, and if you can’t do that at least partially you don’t make the cut. That’s why Archons don’t usually refer to anyone within our military as soldiers.”
“We’ve always used that term as a matter of pride.”
“How so?”
“It separates us from the useless civilians…well, useless as far as combat. Techs aren’t useless. And technically the lazy ass freeloaders serve to increase the population, but being a soldier is a huge responsibility and honor. In a firefight we can’t rely on others to aim our weapons or micromanage our movements. We have to think on our feet and act quickly and effectively, else we’re probably going to get injured or killed. So I guess I’ve always thought of ‘soldiers’ as your definition of ‘warriors.’”
“Then I would amend your definition to include that soldiers operate partially within a framework that connects them to other soldiers, gives them missions, and takes a portion of the thinking process out of the equation. Warriors can and do fight in this manner, but they can also step away from it at will where a soldier cannot. If a trailblazer is commanding a naval fleet from within a nexus I trust they know what they’re doing and will follow their cues, which allows me to be more efficient in my tasks by taking some of the thinking involved and having another do it for me.”
“But if Arc Commandos operate off the grid,” Jyra said, making the full connection, “we have to do all the thinking, planning, and reacting ourselves. We can’t rely on anyone else.”
“And you have to thrive in that environment, not simply survive it.”
“And this mission was to prod those warrior circuits within me?”
“You can’t learn to improvise from others, or by studying. You have to grow through experience…hence we’re giving you an opportunity for that.”
“Without monitoring us to see if we’re succeeding?”
“You made it here, therefore you succeeded. How you did it is immaterial. Each Arc Commando will develop tendencies and skills. You’ll share some with each other, if you choose, and some you’ll develop exactly the same by coincidence. But having everyone operate in exactly the same way makes you predictable, and we don’t want that. Letting each of you develop individually, somewhat in secret, makes you more effective. It also allows you to discover new ways of doing things, which perhaps aren’t the best, but if you followed a protocol you wouldn’t experiment and discover them.”
“So chaos is our friend in this?”
“In the learning process, yes. The bulk of your training over the next year, if you can handle it, will be split between individual drills like this and a lot of co-op with one or two others. Arc Commandos aren’t just soloist, we want you to excel in small team functions as well, but do not get a team identity stuck in your head. You can share what you
learn with each other, and we encourage you to, but you have to be able to be a rogue and a teammate at the same time with your peers. That’s not easy to do, even harder to explain, and it’ll be your ultimate hurdle to completing your training.”
“I have no idea how to do both simultaneously,” Jyra admitted.
“Most don’t at this stage. You have to develop both independently of each other before you can try and meld the two. It’s not something you pick up quickly, but we’ll be giving you a lot of headaches to learn from. Unless you gain the skills you won’t complete the final missions…but how you go about doing it is always up to you. One thing that you’re probably already aware of is that there are never any guarantees, and the missions going forward are going to emphasize that.”
“Oh goodie,” Jyra said sarcastically.
“Reality can hit harder than you think, especially in subtle ways. We’re giving you training sufficient enough to give you a taste of that. Going easy on you wouldn’t do you much good.”
“When this is all done and over with I might agree with you, but for right now I’m still pretty sure I hate you.”
San smiled. “That means the training is working.”
6
May 4, 2897
Epsilon Eridani System
Corneria
Jyra held her inverted pose, hands steady on the floor and the blood rushing to her head being kept in check by years of training and prep to her body enough for her to actually be able to meditate while in the handstand. Right now she was in a good place, having cleared her mind and feeling the stress from the morning workouts and the mission the previous day seeping out as only a mediation would allow.
The trick was to remain active on a low level mentally, but not so deep that you fell asleep…which was why Jyra preferred the handstand, which made it impossible to nod off while one was keeping their balance, though at the moment it almost felt like she was anyway. If she stayed like this more than 40 minutes her head would start to pound and the inverted state would begin to get to her, but with each session that she did her elapsed time would increase, and had been doing so ever since her third year as a Commando when she finally learned to do a proper handstand that wasn’t requiring her constant concentration to hold.
Since then it’d become natural, though gravity still eventually won out and her insides would begin to complain at the inversion, but right now she had just enough tension in her body to maintain her form and simultaneously structure her mind enough that it gelled into a neutral state where she was listening to what was around her without making any noise, outside or inside her mind, and being an observer rather than a driver of events.
After a few more minutes she heard someone else enter the exclusive training area reserved for the Commandos invited to attempt the program, of which she was very near to completing. A few more weeks and she’d be at her final trial, but for today and tomorrow she was on a pure training block that was her responsibility to fill. At this level no one told her what workouts to do, for no one knew her body better than her and what it needed at this moment. Training was a way to customize oneself into what you wanted, and the only person that could truly do that for her was herself. Back in her maturia days the workouts had been provided so they’d get the benefits even if they didn’t understand what they were doing, but ever since entering this program she’d never been told to do so much as a pushup…rather given blocks of time such as this to work on her core fitness. The scheduled sessions were always new skill related, or for testing.
Jyra heard someone else join the six of them that were in the gymnasium, but this set of footsteps headed her way and seemed to stop nearby her empty corner where she was paralleling a wall without touching it. She opened her eyes slowly, then saw an upside down version of Keith standing in front of her.
“Need something?” she asked, holding the pose but mildly upset by the disturbance.
“You’re close to the end, aren’t you?”
“So I’m told.”
“How tough does it get?”
“Dude, I’ve told you before I can’t give away mission secrets.”
“I know that…and that’s not what I’m asking.”
“Then what are you asking?”
“Do you think I’ll make it through?”
Jyra sighed and gave up on her meditation, extending a foot back to the wall and kicking off and collapsing over into an upside down ‘V’ that she then stood up from, spinning around to face the slightly smaller man that was one of the newer faces here. “I have no way of knowing that.”
“But do you see any weaknesses that I should address?”
“Honestly I don’t know you that well.”
“Bull shit. If you’re like the rest of us you’ve studied the personnel files of everyone else here.”
Jyra raised an eyebrow. “That’s common practice?”
“You’re saying you didn’t?”
“No, it just didn’t come up in any of my previous discussions. In fact, most of my friends have moved on already.”
“Passed or washed out?”
“I don’t know of anyone who has washed out.”
“Really? I know two who have in the past month.”
“Who?”
“Mark Dalley and Henry Kirshner.”
“Washed out or quit?”
“I…don’t know, for sure. Either way they’re gone and they didn’t exactly stop by to state their reasons.”
“No one is allowed to talk upon departure. When someone passes their final trial they’re immediately removed. We know this going in.”
“What if they fail?”
“Then you wash out and don’t get a second chance.”
“Ouch,” Kevin said, realizing the implications of that. “Even Archons get a second shot at it.”
“Do they? I never heard more than rumors about their training.”
“I’ve got a few that are friends. One actually gave me the referral to this program. She said that if you fail the final Archon trial you have to start the program all over again with a new class…or quit.”
“Archons don’t quit.”
“I think that’s the point. Making them go through it all over again to test their commitment. But why the line of no return for us?”
“It makes sense.”
“How so?”
“You’re new, but you’ll get the vibe later in your training.”
“Vibe?”
“There’s an unofficial moto that’s been passed down through trainees here. ‘Do or do not. There is no try.’ I’d recommend you keep that in mind going forward.”
Kevin thought about it for a moment. “How does that apply to no second chances?”
“You have to find a way to make it happen.”
“That’s counter to everything Star Force stands for, training wise.”
“No.”
“No? What am I missing?”
“Arc Commandos are meant to be the elite, in ways that even I’m still learning. None of us are rookies, and we didn’t earn our way into this program, we were invited. I think the Archons are looking for people with special aptitudes and this training is meant to confirm those picks and enhance what we’re doing naturally. That’s pure speculation, but it’s been echoed by a few others that have come before me.”
“I thought everything could be trained, eventually? That’s why even the Archon tests can be taken an infinite number of times.”
“And yet those that do keep taking it over and over again don’t seem to ever make it.”
“I have no idea. Where did you hear that?”
“San. I asked him why we were chosen rather than tested, and he said they had an eye for talent that precluded the need for public testing…which would also defeat the purpose of keeping us a pseudo-secret. He said those who became Archons usually passed the test the first time, then mentioned something about ingenuity being difficult to measure, and if you can’t measure it you can’t tr
ain for it.”
“So why do they allow the extra testing?”
“I asked him that too. He said it was in case they were wrong and missed someone the first time.”
“That could apply here as well.”
“We didn’t come here untrained. Archons typically go in raw.”
“Some don’t.”
“And for some reason those late comers don’t end up setting records.”
“San tell you that?”
“No. I did some checking of my own.”
“You have access to Archon records?”
Jyra winked at him as she turned to the right and knelt down to pick up her water bottle. She stood up, took a long swig of it, then looked back at Kevin. “If you want some advice, I’d say stop worrying about prepping for anything specific and just try to be as well rounded in your skills as possible. They’re not going to tell you what’s coming, so there’s no point in running the possibilities through your head nonstop. Took me a while to learn that. Best to keep your mind empty until you have something current to chew on.”
Kevin frowned. “Weren’t we trained as Commandos to think ahead?”
“If you have something to work with. If you’re going in blind the mental games are just a waste of time.”
“And they keep us blind this entire program?”
“As far as I’ve come, yes.”
“Why?”
“I know now…and you will too, at the end.”
“That’s not helpful, but it is enticing.”
“While you’re here, could I entice you into some sparring?” Jyra asked, letting go her mediation and choosing to move on.
“Fair enough since I interrupted you.”
She put her hands on her hips. “Well if you put it that way, never mind.”
“No, no…you misunderstand. I’m the rookie here, obviously, and I’d like to help out the experienced ones if I can rather than being a drag. San said I should ask for help and advice, but I’d prefer more of a two way street.”
“We all do, so don’t sweat it. I usually end up sparring with bots because everyone else is busy, so if you’ve got some time I could use an opponent that can think.”