4 Prequel 4 (2/2)

The last two rounds went by with underdogs Neo-Angels running away three nil winners against the number three ranked team in the region. Although Thresh improved their tactics against Daedalus it was all within his calculations, their adapted tactics were still predictable, and he used it against them. After three rounds he had nineteen kills and zero deaths.

Daedalus: that went well. Better than I expected.

Myrmidon: we will not lose to this level of tactics, control and coordination. Will the enemy improve?

Daedalus: they will always evolve. Even if they just steal ideas from watching us, they will improve.

Myrmidon: what can we do to prevent this?

Daedalus: nothing, we must improve as well.

Myrmidon: this is sub-optimal. It would be better if they stayed dead after we killed them.

Daedalus: this is a game. If we fought for real, then that would be the case. But we could die also.

Myrmidon: we should back up my core and my data, so it will only be you who dies.

Daedalus: no, you must fight to survive like me. We live together, we die together.

Myrmidon: very well friend.

Although the pair spent most of their time playing CyberMech and designing in spacebuild

Myrmidon was not only growing in those disciplines. It had become self-aware and thought beyond their finite world. The limits of its experience channelled its development, but it was still able to research and discuss the wider world with Etana. An adult would have been scared by its lack of controls and its unchecked growth. But Etana was a child and had no fear of his AI. It may have been naivety, or he was simply brilliant and was at ease with its growth.

Etana did not train for the Fortescue Military Academy entrance exam in 2040, and he missed 2041 as well. Cisse and Ikaros waited for him to grow out of his CyberMech phase, he would not be the same age as most students in M1 until 2043 in any case.

All pressure from his Father and Cisse was removed. There were no reminders to train physically. There were no questions regarding whether he would take the entrance exam in 2042. There was only one event on the Calendar which affected him profoundly. An event which would cause him to miss a world championship if it fell on that day.

The anniversary of his Mothers death.

Etana and his Father would attend her resting place, bring flowers and Etana would listen while his

Father told him a story about his Mother. Even if it was a mundane topic like cooking breakfast and how she used to over scramble the eggs until they frothed.

In two years Daedalus had never joined a team in CyberMech. He and Myrmidon were perennial loners, hiring themselves out for competitions. This allowed them to auction off their services and set up their own direct streaming contract.

In those two years, no one doubted who was the best CyberMech player on the planet. He single-handedly brought championships to whoever paid him.

Daedalus had polarised the community between a legion of hardcore fans to innumerable detractors who hated his lack of teamwork, mercenary style with zero loyalty to any team.

This group was usually born from fans of the championship favourites who lost to the team which hired him.

In the year 2041 Daedalus and Myrmidon made fourteen hundred bitcreds from spacebuild schematic shop sales which were dwarfed by his CyberMech earnings of over ten thousand bitcreds from all sources. To show how the relative value of these earnings, when compared to a normal person's stipend, a stipend was sixty bitcreds per year in the European Union. The house he and his father lived in was worth approximately one thousand bitcreds.

CyberMech's appeal had started to wane for Etana, he and Myrmidon had helped teams win two world championships, and despite concerted efforts to defeat him, even direct nerfs to aspects of his current playstyle Daedalus and Myrmidon developed new strategies based on the new paradigm after a nerf. The developers learned you cannot nerf skill and brilliance, nerfs just change the landscape they operate in.

No one knew who Daedalus was, he was the star and an enigma in the game. All public appearances were denied, and if a competition required a live feed of the players, he refused to participate.

Etana was twelves years old. Standing in front of his Mother's resting place with his Father, listening to another story about her. His interest in CyberMech had waned, and he remembered her wish for him. She had wished for him to attend Fortescue Military Academy and the entrance exam was in a month.

Etana: what do I need to do to train for the FMA physical tests?

Myrmidon: I will map out a thirty-day program. Do you wish to excel or pass?

Etana: pass with a contingency factor of 1.2

Myrmidon: the program is in your calendar Daedalus.

Etana: for the next six years I will be Daedo. Daedalus was our CyberMech handle. At the Military

Academy, I will be Daedo.

Myrmidon: am I still Myrmidon?

Daedo: always. It is your handle and your name. We own the rights, no one can take it from you in any game or application.

Myrmidon: thank you Daedo. I like my name.

Without any prompting from his Father or Cisse, Etana began training the next day. Myrmidon had analysed the competencies required, the most successful thirty-day training regimes and laid out a plan for Etana.

On the first day, Etana was convinced the plan was impossible. He was supposed to run one kilometre then walk one for a total of ten kilometres in under ninety minutes. He discovered while running one kilometre his lungs would burst, and by the end, his legs were dropping off. The one kilometre walk was a blessing.

Myrmidon: you need to walk faster in order to achieve ninety minutes.

Etana barely recovered he had to walk so fast before he had to run again. For someone who sat or lay as he played cybernetically in a VR game, this was torture.

Myrmidon: perhaps we should play some AR games. At least you will be moving, and your muscles will be in better condition.

Daedo: not helping.

He completed the ten-kilometre run walk, twice daily, once in the morning and once before dark. After he recovered, he did push-ups, sit-ups and trained with squeeze grips before lunch. By the twelfth day, he was able to at least jog the entire ten kilometres.

Myrmidon kept him informed that his progress was enough to pass with a small cushion. And in the last week, they practised an obstacle course which his father had built over the last week in his spare time. To be accurate his father used a few old robots from work to build it, he merely designed it and programmed them.

On the day of his entrance exam, Cisse turned up at their house, uninvited, a full three hours early.