Master Nader sent a message summoning Daedo and Vannier, not to her quarters, but topside at Commander Mallet"s offices. When they arrived, she met them outside.
"Follow," Master Nader ordered. She didn"t let them know what was happening which was frustrating Vannier, but Daedo took it in his stride. He speculated it was one of her strategies to test their ability to deal with anxiety by purposely placing them in a situation in which it would build.
Daedo tapped Vannier"s hand, she was extremely tense. Without speaking, he motioned that she take a deep breath. She nodded, smiled at him and followed his advice.
As they entered the foyer on the outside of the Commander"s main office Master Nader indicated a couple of chairs, "wait here until called," she ordered, and she proceeded into a large meeting room.
Daedo could see it was filled with Masters from M1, M2 and M3. More arrived walked past the pair and entered the meeting room. There were five houses, Horus, Shu, Amun-Ra, Osiris and Thoth. Each had a Master for M1, M2 and M3. The room total was fifteen House Masters, Commander Mallet and his a.s.sistant.
The meeting got underway without much sound escaping the large room Daedo and Vannier were at a loss as to the purpose of the meeting. Let alone the purpose of them sitting in the foyer, they were the only cadets present.
After thirty minutes the noise level rose suddenly. Sounds of protest and surprise escaping the room. They could hear one Master"s booming laughter. Another minute pa.s.sed, and Master Nader left the room. She indicated Daedo and Vannier should enter.
As they entered Daedo could see his squad"s results on a large holodisplay. Their scores in the Gauntlet, obstacle course and even the test results of their exos, which informed the AR simulator, were all displayed.
The Commander was standing, where most Masters were sitting around a large oval table.
"Master Nader has proposed entering your squad into the M3 tournament," he announced.
Daedo considered it would have been nice if Master Nader asked first, but he didn"t have an issue.
"This is irregular, but there are no rules against it. It is not unheard of for a talented U2 or M2 squads to go up a level and compete. Are you prepared for this?" The Commander asked.
Daedo did not look at Master Nader, he knew that would be a sign of weakness he merely answered in the positive, "yes Sir."
"They will have to prove themselves against Thoth M3 squad zero and one first," the Thoth M3 Master announced. One of the Osiris Masters laughed bringing a frown to the Thoth Master"s countenance.
The Commander nodded.
"Why are they even here?" the Horus M2 Master enquired rudely. This was something which could have been decided and Thoth squad zero informed later.
"Because Master Hamile, Master Nader correctly a.s.sumed I would want to gauge the cadet"s response personally before allowing this irregularity," Commander Mallet replied and gave the Horus Master a cold stare which conveyed his displeasure at the inappropriate interruption.
"Very well, the schedule will accommodate Thoth squad zero to compete in both the M3 and the M1 tournament," the Commander announced and directed his statement to his a.s.sistant. "Dismissed," he directed at Daedo and Vannier.
The pair left and made their way back to their quarters deciding that if Master Nader wanted them to wait she would have sent them instructions.
"You didn"t even hesitate," Vannier said.
"There was no reason to. We have nothing to lose," Daedo replied.
"But still, M3?" she queried the challenge.
"The only issue I see is the exclusive deal we made with Shu M3," Daedo replied.
"Oh," Vannier said, and then after some thought, she looked up the terms of the deal. "No we are fine, we agreed not to sell or give away exos to other M3 squads. We are M1," she stated the last obvious fact not caring it was redundant information.
"Good, then we really have nothing to worry about," Daedo responded. "We will need to study our new opposition," he said before adding, "there are tonnes of streams we can access from their prior battles."
"Why do you think Master Nader did this?" Vannier asked finally.
Daedo shrugged. Perhaps she wanted to challenge them. Or perhaps she meant it when she said they were preparing for war, so why wait, fight the best squads now. "You can ask her, but I doubt you will get a straight answer," Daedo said.
"You are going to tell the others," Vannier announced suddenly.
Daedo smiled and nodded, "sure." He was the one to agree and knowing Vannier she didn"t want to be yelled at for throwing the squad into the deep end.
Vannier called a meeting and gathered all the squad members in their common room by the time the pair arrived back from the Commander"s offices topside.
"Where have you two been?" Barran asked.
"Topside," Axelzero answered, she knew they had been summoned by Master Nader she was with Vannier before they left.
"We have some news," Vannier announced and looked to Daedo. Everyone was quiet as the mood in the room became heavier because of Vannier"s tone.
"We have been issued a challenge," Daedo began.
Barran thumped their table, "which idiot dares challenge us?"
"Master Nader," Daedo answered succinctly.
Barran stared. The look on his face was priceless.
Axelzero made a sound of clearing her throat as the silence and tension spread.
"Master Nader," Daedo continued, "has pet.i.tioned and was successful with entering our squad to compete in the M3 tournament. In week nine we have matches with Thoth M3 squad zero and squad one. Depending on the results of those matches we will be competing in the M3 tournament in week ten as well as the M1 tournament."
"Holy," Barran exclaimed.
"Geez," Gaumont said, "um. Is this good or bad?"
Mace smiled, "it"s good. We can kick their a.s.s."
"Let"s face it," Picard added, "M1 would have been too easy."
Vannier looked at Axelzero, "what do you think?"
"I"m worried, but it"s exciting at the same time," Axelzero replied.
"Can we do this Daedo?" Barran asked. Barran was always confident, but the idea of taking on M3 squads daunted him.
Daedo shrugged, "let"s find out. We have the exo, and our weapons are coming along. We need to refine our teamwork and tactics. From now on we will have a tactical meeting every night after Arena practice for a full session."
Daedo stood and opened a large holodisplay, upon it was the loadouts of each cadet. "The loadouts for the medium exos is versatile, Axelzero, Mace and myself are now carrying a mix of the medium range railgun, grappler and melee weapon. If needed one or more can switch over to a launcher, but if we all carry traps this may not be necessary. All of the squad will be equipped with a limited use ion shield."
Daedo showed them the image of a fist-sized object and then activated the shield which surrounded the object in blue light which was projected. "The shield will plug into your exo and will draw power from your reactor. It will compete for power with your jumpjets and other equipment so use it wisely."
"What"s the draw?" Mace asked.
"I can be certain until its finished, and the size will affect the draw, but it"s in the ballpark of zero point zero five megajoules per second." There were a few black faces, "the jump jets draw double that point one megajoule per second and our new reactor can generate point one megajoule per second. We now have a total of three megajoules of storage in the lithium plasma."
The cadets had been studying power consumption, heat generation, loads, runtime and the effects of loadouts on their reactor in tech studies. It was the foundation of exo operation and would also be critical to mech operation. Due to the size and type of reactors in mechs heat was an ongoing issue for a mech pilot on top of the power issue. The software behind the HUD would interpret generation, storage and consumption concisely into a bar graph, but it was essential the cadets understood what went into this bar graph and why.
Heat was not a factor in exos due to their size, weight and performance. They merely enhanced a soldiers speed, strength and operated a few pieces of equipment. Where a mech had to move around tonnes of metal under its own power. This difference was the difference between the two pieces of equipment generating a small amount of heat which was converted in an exo, to a large amount of excess heat which needed to be managed and dealt with in a mech. It was possible to design a mech which never generated excess heat, but usually, the temptation was to increase its speed, strength, jumping ability and loadout well above these levels.
Daedo had been adding as much lithium plasma as he could to the exo while staying within the rules and balancing it with the impact on hydraulic and armour components. He found as many unused crevices and pockets as possible connected the power conduit and increased the overall storage capacity of the medium and heavy exos. The cold fusion reactor would run equipment directly and charge the storage which would be accessed in a time of peak demand. Anything over point one megajoule a second which was the new peak generation of the cold fusion reactor Cisse built.
"The loadouts of Picard and Vannier are simple, even though their role is not," Daedo continued. No one"s role was simple if performed at its peak.
"That leaves us with the heavy loadout, which we have three main options to alternate. We need to start rotating these three and practising with them. Barran and Gaumont, create a training plan for my review today and we will start tonight," Daedo finished.
"When will we start to use the heavy shield?" Gaumont asked.
"Now," Daedo answered, "the AR has a standard version you can just carry around the from the mech bay."
"Ok," Barran said, "let me get this straight." He brought up his own holodisplay with dozens of loadout options for his heavy exo.
"The main three are combinations of Gaumont and me using shield, melee weapons, minigun and launcher," Barran continued and highlighted loadouts for himself marked B and Gaumont marked G.
"Why can"t I use the minigun and shield combo?" Gaumont asked.
"Run it in the Gauntlet, and you"ll see," Barran responded. Barran was much stronger than Gaumont, and while the heavy exo increased their strength, Barran was starting from a much higher base. Carrying a minigun in one hand and a shield in the other was something which would probably overwhelm Gaumont and most other cadets.
"What about the plasma shotgun?" Axelzero asked.
"Not unless we improved it," Barran responded, "the minigun outperforms it in versatility, damage per second, range and power drain. It even carries more ammo in terms of s.p.a.ce, weight versus damage."
Daedo nodded, "a project for term two or three."
"Before we break up," Daedo said, "you have another task for the tactical meeting. We will have nine opponents and a few contenders for these spots from each House. Axelzero you have Horus, Mace - Osiris, Barran - Shu and Gaumont - Amun-Ra. Each tactical meeting you will research and present on each of these potential opponent"s characteristics. I will do Thoth M3 and present tonight," Daedo left Vannier out and himself to a degree. They would collate all the information and Vannier would check everyone"s research.
The end of term tournament was a tiered tournament. Every squad would partic.i.p.ate. But only the top two squads per house would partic.i.p.ate in the main event. A round robin with two groups, each squad competed in a survival match versus the other fours squads in their group before progressing to the semis and then final.
The selection of the tier one squads was entirely up to the Master in charge of the year level. Which was probably why Master Nader interrupted the scheduling meeting to introduce M1 Squad zero into the M3 compet.i.tion. This forced the Thoth M3 Master"s hand, he was not able to deny them entry without at least a match against his most elite squads.