Ravens of Eternity

The Admiral was certain that it would take time and practice to reduce the effects. She too had gone through it, after all.

“It’s like any other muscle in your body,” she told them. “And you’ve strained to the max for the first time ever. Your brains are gonna be a bit sore.”

They found that to be a bit of an understatement. Once they all disconnected, they all felt as though they were experiencing the weirdest hangover of their lives.

They stumbled as they got out of their cores, their inner balance having been disrupted to some degree.

Miko had a really rough time with things, and needed help getting down safely. The Admiral helped her with that, and asked her questions about her state of being as well.

The two of them discussed everything rather clinically and matter-of-factly. It was a conversation both enjoyed greatly, all things considered.

Eva sat down on the ground next to her core, and leaned up on it. Similar to a migraine, she felt her head throbbing as blood pumped furiously through it. However, she didn’t feel any sensitivity to light or sound. Instead, the world around her felt flat and dull.

All of her other senses were completely blunted as well. She tapped her fingers on the floor, but barely felt it on her fingertips. Lights were dimmer, sounds were muffled, and the only thing she could smell was a burnt ozone that only electrical equipment could produce.

.....

After a handful of minutes, their balance returned for the most part, and they were able to walk around again. But their senses were still incredibly dull. They had to rest for a full hour before their minds had restored to normal.

But while they were resting, they relocated to another floor in the lab.

It was designed to be relaxing. There were a number of couches and pillows in the dark room. Instrumental music played lazily in the air.

In the corner were a couple of egg-shaped enclosures, which the Admiral labeled as AniMox pods. They looked incredibly similar to the respawn pods that Eva was reborn in, except these didn’t have transparent canopies.

What they did was simply send various brainwaves to whoever was inside. Those waves regulated and normalized the occupant’s own brainwaves.

“It’s a bit like soaking in a hot tub,” said the Admiral. She noticed how affected the pilots were, and explained the purpose of the AniMox.

They were something that the Admiral herself had started work on long ago. She was perhaps eight or nine when she first sketched out basic designs. Nothing technical, just pure imagination.

And over the years she perfected her design. As she grew and improved, so did the pod. Now that she was in charge of a full-on research facility, she had the ability to make as many of her pods as she wanted.

Even after she considered her pod design to be at its peak, she still spent time to tweak and improve it where she could.

Besides Miko, Merlin was also rather messed up. He was the type to never let himself drown in any sort of intoxicant, and these sensations were completely new to him. Overwhelming, even.

The Admiral suggested that he use one of her pods to help calm his mind. He quickly agreed, and gave her two thumbs up in response.

Then he stumbled a little towards one and carefully sat in it.

The AniMox activated the moment he shut it closed. And unbeknownst to anyone, he fell asleep the second those waves swam through him.

It was as though his brain had been wrapped in a warm, fuzzy blanket. Every tension he held had loosened, then fell away completely.

Eva laid down on one of the pillows and closed her eyes. She took long, even breaths and regulated her body’s systems. As she focused on “massaging” each of her senses, she felt the dullness ebb away faster.

She was vaguely aware that the others had seated themselves near her, the Admiral included. Commander Chase had followed them in as well, purely to monitor their health.

Although he was aware of how much more resilient the refugees were, he still held concern for them. Eva especially.

He wanted to discuss their status with all of them, however his sister prevented him from doing so. Just like them, she had gone through the same thing. Although she had her own physician as well, she didn’t really need him either.

She was certain that they would all recover. Like she had mentioned previously, their brains were receiving so much more stimuli than ever before.

It would take a while for them to acclimate and improve.

What they needed right now was to recover the way they normally would. Over time, they would get better at recovery, too.

And as she promised, over time their senses returned to normal. And as they opened up, so did their sociability.

“Can you imagine what piloting would be like with those cores?” asked Redstar. “I mean, racing’s already ridiculously hectic, you know? Split second decisions matter in that world. There’s a lotta talk going on. Brain to hand to controls to CPU... These new cores cut the fatty bits in the middle right out.”

“Indeed,” replied the Admiral. “The neural interface reduces input lag to nearly zero. It’s a tremendous advantage in any application.”

“Well long haul shippers probably won’t care too much,” mused Eva. “Not like they’ll need that extra response time hauling down lengthy starlanes.”

“I disagree,” said Miko. “They will be able to activate autopilot faster.”

Everyone chuckled. She was normally too straight-laced to even make a joke, and Eva found her momentary goofiness adorable.

“In all seriousness though, the job is hard,” said Commander Chase. “Prometheus would make maneuvering in busy thoroughfares much easier. They’d certainly have far less accidents.”

“Truly, many lives would be significantly improved,” Miko followed up. “Those who pilot on a daily basis will find value with the cores.”

“Can you imagine docking a Cyclops Liner with full 360 awareness?!” exclaimed Eva. “It’d be cake.”

“Don’t forget military pilots,” said Redstar. “Just like in racing, a single split second decision could mean many lives. Saving or destroying. So of course they get them first.”

“It’s only fair,” said the Admiral. “They’re the ones paying for it in the first place. It shouldn’t be a surprise though. Military tech has always driven civilian tech throughout the ages.”

“It’s true,” said Eva. “Duct tape was invented back in World War II to seal ammo boxes from the crazy environments they were normally in. Then they found out they could use the tape to repair weapons, vehicles, everything.”

“The Internet as well,” said Miko. “It was originally called ARPANET and was created by the United States Department of Defense. They wanted to control and communicate between computers regardless of distance. The system eventually fell to scientists and scholars, who evolved it into what we know today as... Er. What we knew of... What has ultimately become SolNet.”

“What the fuck is duck tape?” asked Redstar. “Or an internet? Is that like a smaller SolNet?”

After some time, Merlin rose from his pod completely refreshed. He had recovered much faster than the others, thanks to the Admiral’s AniMox.

As he rejoined the others, the Admiral and her brother looked over the test results on their datapads.

It was generally known that the time it took from a thought turning into action was roughly 150 milliseconds. It could certainly take longer, but the fastest recorded reaction time was right around there.

Of course, considering human’s organic nature, that time was never fixed. Sometimes it was slower, and sometimes it was faster. There were always different conditions that affected how long it took for a body to react to a brain signal.

But as a general rule, 150 ms was the “go to” statistic for anything related to “the speed of thought”.

And this was the number that the Admiral looked at. If it took a regular human 150 ms to act on a thought, then it stood to reason that it applied to mecha operations as well.

So she strove to reach that number as best as she could. When she had the pilots do a stress test, she was most excited to see their scores. They would be incredibly illuminating.

—

Freya: 324 ms

Merlin: 387 ms

Raijin: 413 ms

Redstar: 366 ms

—

According to the numbers in her report, Eva had the fastest scores, but they were still far from her 150 ms benchmark.

She immediately noted down fourteen adjustments she could make to the core’s dynamic neuroprocessor, and six for the synapse tunnels.

But even after her calculations, the changes wouldn’t make a significant difference. Perhaps ten or twenty milliseconds at best.

The Admiral surfaced from out of her thoughts and spoke to the pilots.

“I’m thinking simulations,” she said. “Who else wants to try some simulations?”

“Let’s do it,” said Eva.

~

After another round of testing, but with the added layer of simulations, the pilots tired out even faster than before. Their minds were completely locked after only 45 minutes of heavy activity.

The Admiral got some great data, but realized they couldn’t jump the gun like that any longer. What they needed was time to practice the basics.

So, she called a halt to their testing for the time being, and reorganized her itinerary. While she did so, she had her aide-de-camp show the pilots to their lodgings.

They weren’t too far away, so the hopper ride was relatively short.

It was actually a group of small huts that lined up next to each other in small groups of four. The entire lot had sixteen huts, and not all of them were occupied.

The pilots were taken to the second row, which was completely empty, and were asked to pick whichever one they liked.

So they did, though it didn’t matter much to Eva, and she happily took whatever was left over.

The insides were rather small and spartan. Each hut consisted of two rooms – one for sleeping and eating, and another for personal hygiene.

They were roughly ten meters squared, with the majority of the space taken up by the living space. That simply had a bed, a work desk and chair, and a small kitchenette.

Along the back wall was a doorway to the hygiene room, which consisted of a standing shower and a toilet.

Nothing spectacular at all about them.

Instead of staying in the drab little room, Eva opted to take a walk around the neighborhood.

She found that the area was littered with all manner of plant life. There were trees planted at every corner, and every plot had a small grass garden on it. Some even had flowers.

They were supported by powerful grow lights, and allowed their healthy development despite being in a sunless asteroid.

No wonder the air feels fresh, Eva thought.

She suddenly got an alert in her DI. Her heart leapt a little when she saw the sender’s name pop up. Ever since she spent a little time with him at the sparring gym, she found herself wanting more.

—

.....

Pelli: Hey hey, what’cha up to? Wanna sweat with me a little? Or a lot?

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