15 Book 3 - Chapter 73 (2/2)
”That's fantastic!” Vannier said excitedly, ”The superconductor effects everything; velocity, accuracy and power consumption.”
Everyone in the squad patted Kang on the back, messed her hair or just cheered her from across the room. It was a genuine, spontaneous outburst which made her feel like part of the team.
.
.
Daedo left Barran and Axelzero playing drone wars and headed down to lower two.
”Daedo. Finished your meetings?” Cisse asked. Daedo had made a habit of spending some time with Cisse every day he was in the workshop. It was also decided that Ikaros and Cisse would only attend the meeting if they felt they need, and Cisse did not report on her experiments to the squad, so she never did.
”Yeah, at 0930. Been playing with some drones before I came down to visit you,” Daedo said.
”How is everything going?” Cisse asked as she dismissed an air display that was between her and Daedo.
”Would you be surprised if I said very good?” Daedo answered a question with a question albeit one that had the answer she was seeking.
”Not at all,” she shook her head.
On the contrary, while the squad and Daedalus activities were advancing admirably, Master Nader and here revelations were a major concern for Daedo. He barely slept the previous night. Tossing and turning so much his Father commented in the morning.
”I have good news, I have something back from one of our Military partners,” Daedo lied. He pulled out a particle sensor blueprint.
The blueprint was above his arm, and the pushed and enlarged it out into the air next to Cisse.”This is a particle sensor blueprint. We should be able to build it here and hook it up to your control panel.”
Cisse looked at it and asked, ”Do you have the datasheet?”
Daedo nodded, ”I had to create one, so forgive its sparseness. This is apparently sensitive and not available on the IPO. It has the key information though.”
Cisse read the datasheet that Daedo created from memory from the reports on the sensor from Nader's mystery box.
”Holy,” Cisse exclaimed. While most people were not religious, it was still one of their favourite words when expressing surprise. ”It can track subatomic particles within ten to the minus twenty-one metres (10-21m)?”
Daedo nodded, ”I understand that is the case.”
”Do you know what this means?” Cisse asked.
Daedo nodded, ”I have an idea. It means you will be able to track and therefore control the movement of all the particles, even quarks and anti-quarks.”
”Yes, this is a major breakthrough for us. It brings us one step closer,” Cisse said excitedly. ”Well done Daedo. Do you know why they are hoarding this technology? And why they just gave it to you?”
”It's a trade for something else I am working on. We have an agreement that if we crack the reactor, we will patent the design immediately for everyone to utilize,” Daedo lied again.
”That sounds strange but fair,” Cisse shook her head. ”I'll let you handle that.”
Something was still bothering her, so she added, ”The military seems to have their eyes on you. They might like you now. But, be careful, will you?”
”I will, I promise,” Daedo replied.
Daedo checked a few of Cisse's readouts on her latest tests. ”Oh, I have more good news. I've been working on EMF theory all week. I am hoping to have something to you next week.”
”That would be amazing,” Cisse said. ”You know at this rate we may actually crack this thing.” Cisse beamed.
Daedo felt like shit. The lying was necessary, but it didn't mean he had to feel good about it. It was one thing to pretend a design came from some mysterious military. It was quite another to pretend a major breakthrough in electromagnetic field generation and control came from him.
Daedo's last mission for the day was to talk to Kang about Dead Beat.
”I'll see you at lunch?” Daedo asked heading to the goods lift.
”I have an alarm set this time,” Cisse replied. She had a habit of missing meals when she was neck deep in a task.
”Okay. See you then,” Daedo said as he closed the door.
He headed directly to the foundry. If Kang wasn't there, he would message her.
”Hi,” Daedo said. Predictably Kang was in the foundry, and she was separating materials by hand. Not trusting the robots nor the software he and his Father wrote to remote control the foundry.
”Hi,” Kang said and continued to work.
Daedo smiled inwardly. She was just like him in some ways. He had treated people like this many times.
”I'd like to talk to you about Dead Beat,” Daedo said. ”Unless you would prefer I talk directly with Kang Lee.”
”It's okay. I need to speak to my Father anyway. He doesn't like it if I don't message him every day,” Kang replied.
”Whenever he can get Dead Beat back here I have the new mesh underarmour design ready. My calculations show it will give Dead Beat a major speed boost and a minor strength boost. We can also do some sparring and set him up with martial combat tutorials,” Daedo said.
”Oh,” she said softly, and then more loudly, ”He'll be happy. Except for the tutorials part. He will see that as a criticism of his piloting.”
”His piloting is poor. I will let you handle that message as you see fit,” Daedo said. ”But if one of us pilots Dead Beat during the next break, it will be more embarrassing for him.”
”One of us?” Kang asked.
”You,” Daedo answered.
”You want me to pilot Dead Beat?” She asked again.
”Only in the breaks,” Daedo answered with a nod. ”Your Father better start improving, or you will make him look poor.”
”How am I supposed to tell him this?” Kang asked.
Daedo thought for a moment, ”You could ask the Human Studies AI and workshop out a scenario with it. Or ask Vannier. She is good at this sort of thing. Or you could just tell him. 'Father, you need to improve your piloting.' Your choice,” Daedo replied.
Kang laughed, ”You make it sound easy. Okay, I will try the last option.”
Daedo waited for a moment.
”Something else?” Kang asked succinctly.
”Hmm, how come you aren't using the control software?” Daedo asked.
”I will. I just like to mix by hand to get a gut feeling when I start a new formula rather than setting specific ratios,” Kang replied. ”Once this is done I will tweak and test using your software. It's not bad.”
”Good,” Daedo said and then forced himself to add, ”You had a good first week. Even Master Nader thought you did well.”
”Everyone seems scared of her. She didn't seem so bad,” Kang mentioned.
”Just follow the others lead when she is around. It's not like she has a short temper, but she can be,” he paused and searched for the correct word, ”Forceful, when a cadet doesn't act properly,” Daedo advised.
”Vannier said much the same thing,” Kang said as she busied herself with sorting materials.
”I'll see you at martial combat training,” Daedo said before leaving.
Kang shook her head and thought, just what she needed, more sparring. Before selecting a cold rolled plate of titanium.
[[Skully is not human. He is a disembodied floating skull who likes cosplay girls.]]
[[But even though he does not sleep, eat or defecate, even he cannot write more than one chapter per day. The undead author does not mind people asking, but the answer will always be no. One chapter per day is the maximum meathead. A well-crafted chapter like 93 which the undead author crafted today took ten hours. Then he needs to edit the above chapter, to ensure quality for you meathead readers and then for the other thirteen hours he needs to recover by looking at images of cosplay girls.]]
[[The above is not a rant it is an explanation. It is good when readers ask for more, it means they love the story. And this not-rant was too long for authors thought, plus we needed crap here to defeat the crap reading app]]