One of the soldiers handed her what looked like a white hardhat with a smiley face on it. "Strap in, kid, ride'll be a bit rough." The other soldiers snickered, the sound distorted behind their polarized face plates. Bemused, Abigail put the hat on and fiddled with the safety harness in her seat.
"Watchdog, this is Citadel, proceed to Checkpoint Alpha, treat any Guests well and get our supplies moving, out," a voice proclaimed. "Acknowledged," the soldier who gave her the hat replied, all professional now. Abigail could sense the complex machinery and electrical systems in the four vehicles, especially the engines, weapons, like that big gun, and to a limited extent, the bodies of the soldiers themselves, especially in the eyes and ears. Cybernetics, she recalled.
"Wilson, maintain forward distance, 100 meters, O'Connor, Rear Security, Miles, right behind us. I don't wanna be here no more than necessary, long drive ahead," the Hat Soldier said, to which a chorus of other voices responded through the radio with some variation of, "Yes, sergeant," some of the responses more colorful than others. Music blared from the lead vehicle, some of the soldiers singing along, "THROUGH THE GATES OF HELL, WE MAKE OUR WAY TO HEAVEN." At least they're trying, she sighed.
As the convoy finally started moving, she mustered the courage to start a conversation with the soldier next to her. "Have you been to Chi-Town before? I heard it's really big." The expressionless helmet turned slightly to face her, silver skull of the Coalition proudly displayed. "Matter of fact, I 'ave," he replied lazily, with a weird, warm drawl. "Graduated from the same place you're headin to, I reckon, if that lightshow I heard 'bout be true. Got my coin 'round 'ere somewhere, always losin' the thing."
"What's it like? And wait, you're like me, too? How many people are there like us, and what can you do," she questioned him excitedly. "Whoa, slow down, kid," he patted the air as if to settle her down. "Ain't nothin' too special 'ere myself. I just set things on fire, mostly. A few other tricks, but my best talent is cookin' up a noice barby," the soldier chuckled. "But yeah, you can tell us folk apart by the patch on the uniform here, left shoulder patch," he thumped it, showing off a stylized PSI insignia, intersected with a fancy X shape from a lightning bolt and rifle, along with a teardrop – Specialist – patch.
Another hour of conversation passed easily, the soldier, Paxter as she learned his name was, describing the administrative heart of the Coalition States that was Chi-Town, a veritable Metropolis by today's standards, home to 8 million people. Paxter proved to be an excellent conversationalist. He told her about two other Psychics assigned to their convoy, the really smart Specialist Roy who was their resident Guest detector, their term for supernatural creatures, and another man, Specialist Black, a man with a ton of sensory abilities. He told her about how the Chi-Town Academy for Psychic Development specialized in producing people like them, able and willing to utilize their talents for the benefit of humanity. The Academy was pretty much an advanced school of sorts, paid for by the government, with a focus on practical education, though many electives were available, "if you care 'bout history, that is. Knowin' what we fight for made a difference for me." He didn't know anything about the other people they were going to escort, just that they were Psychics, and that there was only one more Psychic they were picking up, since Kansas was pretty far out of the way, other places took care of the closer locations.
Many questions exhausted, Abigail finally asked him about the railgun. "Have you all shot that big gun before? It's so cool! The electrical output from that thing is amazing. Is that a miniaturized molten salt fission reactor? How do you stabilize the output enough to safely use in weapons? Isn't that really dangerous if the weapon gets damaged, unless you have a some kind of sodium plug to cut the reaction off before it gets too bad, but wait, how did you time the sequencing of the magnetic coils to efficiently project the bullet, whilst also accounting for rail warp and welding? The railgun I tried to build one when I was 7 blew up from the voltage reversal and I electrocuted myself, but I was fine. I really should have added some rectifiers to modulate the voltage with a pulse forming network, that would have stopped the whole ringdown voltage reversal thing, and better inductors would have been really handy. I wish I had better 3-d printers on hand, could have grown a proper graphene bi-layer as a supercapacitor instead of-"
"Whoa, whoa whoa, hold up, you're killin me," he laughed. "I understood maybe half the words you said right then, and I wouldn't know anything about any of that anyway, kid. We just shoot the gun, and bring it back when it doesn't shoot anymore. Spare barrels and such," he replied, waving her down again, as if to ward off an overly affectionate puppy.
"Well, I really just want to shoot it. Pretty please," she begged, using every tactic that worked on mother.
"Hey, sergeant," Paxter called, "lil' dynamo here wants to shoot the big gun, whatcha think?"
"Wasteful use of government resources solely for the amusement of a child, Specialist? What do you take me for, a showoff," the Hat Soldier called back.
The silence stretched. "WHEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED!"
"Fuck it."
It was awesome.
"Watchdog, this is Citadel, we picked up high energy output for a moment there, everything all right?"
"Citadel, this is Watchdog, just a bit of Reconaissance by Fire. Nothing poked up, so it seems we're fine."
Once the conversation died down, the silence was only filled with sounds of the road, and the music coming from the lead vehicle even from 100 meters away, as well as the radio communication between the Hat Soldier and this "Citadel," as well as the other soldiers in the convoy. She even made decent progress on the Ranger's Handbook, well into the 3rd Section on Fire Support and what it entailed. The book was dense reading, with lots of terms and acronyms she had to ask about to figure out what they were, but now she had a basic idea of how infantrymen organized themselves, history of the Rangers, and even some leadership advice. The key point seemed to be information, and especially knowing what was not known, as contradictory as that seemed. Interesting stuff, at least until the convoy suddenly came to a halt about 6 hours into the trip, a little while after they picked up the second Psychic, a shy girl named Toreah.
"What do you mean a Blue Zone just popped up? We literally used this Highway on the way over," the Hat Soldier complained, after ordering a halt of the convoy.
"The lighting makes it hard to see, Sergeant, but Roy says he can sense it from this close."
"Damn it, I'll call it in."
A few minutes later, they were heading via an alternate route through the North, around the Blue Zone. Time to read some more.
The approach to Chi-Town was very interesting. The roads were very well maintained, at least the roads towards actual civilization, and not the St Louis Exclusion Zone or other dead metropoles, and there was a lot of vehicular traffic as well. On a few occasions, the convoy would halt and order oncoming traffic to clear the road so they could pass. "Don't want to take any chances with folks around here. Never know what they might be up to," Paxter would say. Buildings kept building up every direction, now that they were in "civilized" country. The convoy passed several other patrols, a couple helicopters flew over, and they also had to cross multiple Army Checkpoints. It was around 20:00 that they finally arrived at their destination, and she had to say goodbye to the soldiers. As she was walking off with a couple of suited government folk, the Hat Soldier told her she could keep the helmet. She blew a raspberry at him and took it off.
The structure of the Academy seemed simple enough. According to Director Clark, the Academy heavily promoted self-study, mentorship, and tutoring. Her tuition was free so long as a contract was signed guaranteeing at least 6 years of military service at age 16, which she had decided she probably wanted to do, and apparently, it was a good background for becoming an officer after the first term as well, if she had what it takes to be a leader. There were also lots of instructors around for tons of different subjects, as well as military veterans and former Psi-Operatives. Lots of students, too, some of them a lot older than 16. Time to make the most of it.
Y'all got 6 1-year turns to take classes, research, improve, practice, or just laze around and relax if preferred. 7 picks free, with 3 personal options. You can sacrifice up to 3 personal actions for more of the above, and also make Willpower rolls to add more stuff, but that comes at the risk of massive burnout from having no freetime. But hey, maybe Abigail will turn out to be a Workaholic if she gets enough positive rolls, meaning she doesn't know how to have downtime.
Options Include:
Academics (Topic): Abigail already has the equivalent of a middle school to college level education in some topics due to Electrokinesis and Telemechanics making her a minor electrical systems god and also being really intelligent, but she's lacking in specialized education, such as History, Chemistry, Mathematics and Physics that don't include shooting things with a Railgun, Biology, etc. Make suggestions for things to learn. 1 point per subject, more points to advance further. Multiplier to anything electrical or mechanical.
Physical Training: This whole military thing is going to require some physical fitness. Should probably get started on that. Up to 3 points.
Psychic Training (What kind of training?): There are lots of mentors available to challenge you, just have to pick an area of focus.
Military Theory: There's got to be more books out there like the Ranger's Handbook. A solid grounding in military theory will surely help with the whole military thing. Anything from Small Unit Tactics to Land Navigation to Air Assault. There's a book for everything.
Write-in:
Personal Options:
Socializing!:
Reading for Fun:
Visiting Family for the Holidays:
Write-in:
AN: I got pretty distracted by some issues that I wanted to correct instead of actually writing, I get pretty single-minded at times. Sorry! The good news is that I've worked out the geostrategic situation of the Coalition States pretty well, and it is worse than I expected. Nice?
In regards to the Quest, questions are always welcome.
Also, option organization is currently subpar. If anyone has advice for better organization, that would be cool, too.
Current Skill Options: Examples for categories
Communication Category: Creative Writing, Advanced English, Other Language (Basic), Performance, Public Speaking, Radio (using radios, not how they operate), Music (Singing, Strings, etc)
Lore Category: Supernatural Lore (North America), Pre-apocalypse History, Post-apocalypse History (Last 100 years), Animal Lore, Magical Lore, Psionic Theory, Religious Lore, lots of lore
Domestic Category: Cooking, Dancing, Sewing, etc
Electronics Category: Computer Repair, Electrical Engineering, Advanced Electrical Theory
Mechanics Category: Advanced Mechanical Engineering, Weapons Engineering
Medical Category: First Aid, Paramedic (First Aid+), Field Surgery, Cybermedicine, Forensics, etc
Military Skills: Military Etiquette, Small Unit Tactics, Company Tactics, Naval Tactics, Mechanized Unit Tactics, Campaign Guide, Battle Strategy and Doctrine, Combined Arms and Tactics, Staff and Leadership, Air Assault and Coordination, Combined Arms, etc
Academic Category: Basic Mathematics, Astronomy, Navigation, Biology, Chemistry, Philosophy, Research, etc
Technical Category: Computer Operations, Computer Programming, General Repair and Maintenance, etc
There's also a bunch of piloting skills but you're 11. Gonna have to wait a bit. Examples above are just examples.
