[wavehawk]

(SCREAMS) Why the hell is my writing not working?!?!?!? WHY U NO WORK BRAIN?!? My story's long overdue and you're just hanging there in midsentence!

@#$%!#$. So gonna rewrite this when the chapter's all done. Lack of sleep and overload of stress is also a factor. How the hell do legitimate book authors make a living from writing and not drop dead? Seriously!?

"Ten units airborne, ma'am."

There was little hint of the mess hall's original purpose as it had been covered
on every table and space by computers and other electronic equipment. The hall was
well-lit, and each console was staffed. At the centre of the activity was Chien,
overseeing the operation with unfeeling eyes.

The intelligence officer looked at five coffin-shaped units laid to one side,
sealed from the rest of the group.

Each of the repose pits had a single airman lying inside them, controlling the
drone aircraft in the skies. The workload was light, each pilot only controlled
two at a time. At full capacity, one repose pit could fly four drones at once. The
fully immersive virtual reality interface and completely closed inner environment
ensure they could focus on their work without outside interruption. The experience
of using the repose pits was jarring, as pilots felt like they were split into two
different places at once. They were necessary as the Twenty-fifth operated RQ-210
drones, which the rest of the USAF were yet to know existed, much less have access
to. The stealthy drones took positions over the skies. Slow-moving, loitering
about the airspace over Providence. They would only be in the sky until dawn, then
return.

"Pull up the input from the repose pits."

Not even a nod as the screens lit up. Real-time feed from the landscape. Each of
the RQ drones were equipped with three camera eyes, and the men and women in the
room saw what the pilots in the repose pits saw. The units were undetectable even
to friendly local and military radar, and flew silently above the community. Each
one was armed, for both air and ground targets which the pilots could pick out
with precision. It was an abnormal amount of firepower for their apparent mission:

The official statement was that they were looking for the test unit lost the other
night.

The truth was, Chien and the rest of the Twenty-Fifth couldn't care less about the
lost unit. It was bait for the real catch.

Chien was still as a statue. "Now, we wait."

The night was silent until the dawn, but the Twenty-Fifth knew the work had just
begun.

<--------------->

H+

The virtual blackboard had only that word or symbol on it.

"H Plus." The man up front smiled. Professor Haldane tended to drone on about
philosophy, but was far more likable than most teachers in school. "The leactures
we've been having all schoolyear lead up to this."

Ange leaned on her desk, only marginally paying attention to the lecture. She
found Haldane and his talks on ethics and humanism amusing at best and boring at
worst. Stark also wondered whether his popularity was because he was one of the
few male teachers at Macallister, or because his squabbles with Professor Pollock
were so well-documented. Haldane was young for a professor, and at his heart he
was an idealist. The cranky Pollock had constantly attempted to have him removed
from the school, which was always the source of gossip among students.

"Transhumanism. The theory that human beings will eventually become a completely
new organism, with extremely expanded abilities, by the application of
technology." Haldane gestured as if writing. The virtual board interpreted his
shorthand into text visible to all. "You're probably wondering what that has to do
with ethics."

I'm wondering why I have to even attend this class, Ange scowled, as she
felt this was time better spent actually doing fun stuff. 'Fun' in her vocabulary
meaning taking an actual IS to pieces and reassembling it at the quantum level.
Stark looked at Shay, who appeared engrossed in the lecture. Yeah, it's just
the kind of boring stuff you'd go for.

"The Infinite Stratos is a high-end exoskeleton. Essentially, it is a human
enhancement tool. It provides the pilot with enhanced strength and senses, as well
as the capacity to fly or be able to move faster than ordinary human muscles can
propel you." The professor coughed a bit, solely for show. Haldane smirks. "Can
you not say that being connected to the IS actually makes a person transhuman or
posthuman?"

"It's not different from driving a car," one student scoffed. "Or looking through
a telescope."

"But anyone can drive a car. Not everyone can use an IS. Men can't pilot it, and
there are also women out there who are incompatible."

"But a male IS pilot exists!" another student, pointing out the obvious.

"Yes. One. An exception to the rule." Haldane nodded agreement. Most people in the
world had at least heard of the exception, a japanese teenager who was the sole
existing male pilot of an IS. Theories were rampant about how this was possible,
but no one actually had access to that person. "But besides that, the IS provides
technologies that were unheard of prior to their adoption. Technologies most of
you seem to take for granted. Think about it: Only fifty years ago, the idea of
carrying a telephone in your pocket was unheard of."

Much snickering, and Ange smiled. She couldn't believe humanity had gotten
anywhere past the stone age before mobile phones or wireless internet
connectivity. She turned to look at the redhead--Brogan. The latter seemed to be
diligently taking notes. Oh, so you're playing the good student? Stark grimaced.

"These are all human enhancment techologies. They're not surgically grafted to us
like in the movies, true. It's not like someone was cloned and bred solely to use
a mobile phone or communication tablet." A breath. "But who's to say that someone
out there isn't physiologically, mentally, and genetically suited to pilot an IS?"
Haldane spoke as if he personally knew such a pilot. "And who's to say that
someone--maybe even Shinonono Tabane herself--might have used the IS technology
she developed to enhance her own physical body?"

"That's crazy!" the first student responded, almost violently.

"It's dangerous. It's unheard of. And it's potentially unethical. Which is the
gist of this lecture." Haldane folded his arms inward. "It's basically human
experimentation. The technology that the IS presents, what it opens up for those
like you who are planning to study and work with it? The ethical impacts of this
technology, that's what we'll discuss."

By this time, Ange had switched off her attention. Her mind was thinking of
finishing up on her IS.