Chapter 14- Preparation

  After lunch, he headed back to his room to make a few more preparations, and then he went out to dinner to meet his last prospective teammate. He went out to a local pub and found Kyle waiting at a table for him.

  Once he saw Jett, he got up and raised his hand.

  “Hey Jett! Thanks for coming out to dinner with me. I wanted to say thank you for saving my butt yesterday.”

  Jett scratched the back of his head and chuckled nervously, “It sounds like it might have been my fault.”

  Kyle scoffed, “There were a dozen things that could’ve been done, but expecting a first-year student to do any of them is ludicrous. If you want, I can reach out to my parents. Accidents happen, but suspending you is going too far.”

  Jett waved it away, “No need to worry. Actually, my sponsor thinks it’s a good chance to sneak away and do a mission.”

  “Man, you are so lucky. I can’t imagine how exciting it must be to go on my first mission.”

  “Do you want to go on a mission?”

  “Yeah! Who doesn’t?”

  “Kyle, I am asking you if you want to go with me.”

  Kyle sat stunned. “Your sponsor would take me on a mission with you? When? Why? Where?”

  Jett held up a hand. “First, it’s my mission, and I would be happy to have you along. I know yesterday was a rush, but you held yourself together. I know I wouldn’t have been half as calm falling into orbit.”

  Kyle shook his head, “I was terrified the whole time.”

  “Yeah, but you didn’t let it stop you from acting. That is harder to train in people than you would think.”

  “I’m not sure I’m ready.”

  “Kyle, I won’t force you go, but let me ask you this. Do you want to go?”

  The question firmed Kyle’s resolve. “Yeah, I want to go.”

  “Alright, then I will see you tomorrow.”

  Jett changed the conversation to Kyle’s knowledge on squad tactics and missions. Jett was surprised to learn Kyle’s depth of familiarity with the concepts from teachers and his own family. He didn’t have hands-on practice, but when Jett asked a few questions about how dragon riders conducted missions, Kyle knew far more than Jett.

  Once dinner was over, Jett headed home to send out messages before going to sleep.

  Early the next morning, Jett was in the training center with the ordered parts he bought. The tier three exosuits, modules, and defense weapons had arrived, but he still needed to do the final adjustment. He planned to have his friends do a few practice scenarios while he installed the modules.

  In the second half of the day, they could rehearse again with the exosuits. His friends would still need to wear the training suits, but exosuits were built to be worn on top of sealed space suits. The training suits would fit underneath without an issue.

  Ashley was the first to arrive. It wasn’t a surprise, as she was the lone morning person of the group.

  “Morning, Jett!”

  “Morning, Ashley,” he replied in a much mellower tone.

  “Whatcha working on?”

  “These are the suits, but they just came in. I am going to install the modules while y’all rehearse the course.”

  Ashley frowned, “Aw… the course again?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What kind of modules are you installing?”

  “A surveillance module, shoulder-mounted turret, scanner augmentation, wrist-mounted cutter, and drones.”

  “Surveillance module and drones?”

  “Yeah, I made a few upgrades to Angie, and she will help watch over us. The surveillance module will allow her to take an in-depth look at your vitals. If anything goes wrong, she will know where you are, and in a worst-case scenario, she can activate a combination of flying and spider drones to get you to safety.”

  Ashley’s eyes went wide. “That sounds intense.”

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  “Most of it is safety. I wanted to add in an override so she could walk you out if you were knocked out, but it would take at least a week, plus another day to install.”

  “Do you think we will need all this? Most of our training has been just rifles.”

  “Better to not need and have. Believe me, there is nothing as nice as knowing you have someone looking over your shoulder who can bail you out.”

  Jett didn’t mention how, when he went on salvaging runs, his own gear needed a fraction of the processing. In fact, most of Angie’s processing would be wrapped up in the suits and with the mini carrier he had purchased. He had originally hoped to use her vastly expanded processing to force hack some of the higher security ships, but that would need to wait for the next mission.

  Next came Bill and Amanda. They waved at Jett. When the door opened again, all eyes turned to find Kyle. Kyle jogged over and waved at Jett’s friends.

  “Hey! I look forward to working with you.”

  Jett noticed his friends were acting strange. They hadn’t moved since Kyle walked in.

  “I guess it's still a bit too early in the morning.” Kyle laughed at his own joke.

  “It’s fine. Why don’t you go change? I want to have a word with my friends before we start.”

  “You got it!” Kyle said with a thumb up before jogging away.

  Jett turned on his friends, “Why are you acting so weird around my friend?”

  “It’s not us who is acting weird. It’s you!” Bill said. “Do you know who that is?”

  “Kyle, my friend from class.”

  Bill sighed, letting his head hang. Amanda walked over to him and put her hands on his shoulders, “Jett, look into my eyes. That man, that dragon rider, is the son of a family of dragon riders. Not son to parents who are dragon riders. Not the sibling of a dragon rider. His entire family tree is dragon riders. His family is among the most renowned and powerful.”

  Jett nodded, “Ok, so his family is full of dragon riders. He’s a guy just like any one of us.”

  Amanda shook her head, “You aren’t getting it. He is practically royalty. His family holds enough wealth and influence that he could make any of us a dragon rider. They literally have a vault with eggs on standby for future members of their house!”

  Jett shrugged, “Sounds like this is your opportunity to find someone who might give you an egg. Just don’t make it weird.”

  “You’re weird!” Amanda screamed in outrage before marching off to the changing room. Jett looked to his other friends for help, but they shook their heads as they too headed off to get changed.

  Once they were back, Jett set them up with shoulder-mounted drones for Angie to monitor them while he worked on their exosuits.

  “Here is the plan. Angie is going to play overwatch. Each of you will take a room, and Angie will help guide you through scenarios.”

  “We are going to be taking orders from a robot?” Bill asked before turning to his drone and mumbling, “No offense.”

  “Angie will be monitoring your vitals, overlaying your scans, and will have fire control over your shoulder turrets. Her primary focus will be on finding threats and getting everyone out alive. To that end, the entire room will be randomized with only Angie knowing the routes in and out, as well as the objectives.”

  “So we just go where Angie tells us?” Ashley asked.

  Jett nodded, “Half right. The key is trusting her guidance while also staying alert for threats. Scans, eyes, and ears can all be fooled. Relying on one is a death sentence. You need to be constantly scanning and aware of your surroundings. Angie will be doing the same.”

  Jett saw the unsure looks of his friends; even Kyle wasn’t sure.

  “Line up! Let’s start!” His friends lined up, and he let Angie guide each of them through. He went back to working on the exosuits as he watched the screen from the corner of his eye. One of Angie’s drones sat nearby.

  He waited until all his friends were in the training area before he asked, “How’s it going?”

  “We only just started,” Angie replied.

  “Please, I helped build you. You started generating profiles as soon as they entered this building.”

  Angie made an audible sigh from her speaker, “Kyle is doing well, but for a dragon rider, well is atrocious. With his reflexes, he should be clearing rooms and bashing doors.”

  “He’s new. I will take slow and steady over fast and reckless every day.”

  “You could have both fast and steady if you got me security bots.”

  Jett ignored the comment, so Angie continued, “Amanda is second best. Her training clearly shines through, and as long as she doesn’t let it go to her head, she should be a solid member of the team.”

  Jett nodded along as Angie continued, “That leaves Bill, who is trying to run when he should walk. He is too eager but doesn’t have the basics down. Then there is Ashley. Her biggest issue, aside from being scared, is that she’s not used to carrying a rifle. It shakes whenever she holds it up, and she struggles to keep it in position.”

  “You think it’s a muscle strength thing?”

  “Yeah, I think she isn’t used to holding and aiming a rifle. They have been drilling it into her, and she hasn’t had the time to build up the strength.”

  Jett smirked, “Then I guess it's good she is getting an exosuit.”

  Since they were going out on a mission the next day, Jett opted to use projections. Instead of getting hit by paint or rubber rounds, a buzzer would sound whenever they were hit. For the first hour, the buzzer went off every five minutes.

  The practice was a lot of hurry up and wait as she coordinated their movements through the hallways. Boredom ground down their friends’ awareness, so when they were issued an order, they didn’t think or scan their surroundings. As time went on, the buzzing became less frequent, and then it was time for lunch.

  It was a quiet affair as everyone was enjoying the rest before going back in. Almost entirely quiet.

  “So what are you going to be doing when we are clearing rooms?” Amanda asked.

  “I will be the team lead. I will be one room ahead, clearing the way. If things go smoothly, you won’t see any danger at all.”

  “So why are we training to take out threats and clear rooms?”

  “You don’t train for the best-case scenarios.” Jett paused as he stretched, “Alright, I got everyone’s suit kitted out. Let’s run the course again.”

  The second half of the day went in a flash. The suits made practice laughably easy. Angie not only had better monitoring, but she could bring up holographic displays and even nudge his friends. She didn’t control the suit, but she could decrease or increase the ease of movement, just enough to let them know what she wanted.

  After practice, everyone was exhausted, so they called it a night. The next morning, they met in the launch port by the carrier. Castledrive and Layla couldn’t warp yet, so everyone except his sponsor and sponsor’s dragon climbed into the carrier.

  Jett noticed the nervous energy as his friends laughed nervously or fidgeted in their seats. Jett took control, easing the carrier out into space and locking in the coordinates.

  “Alright, off we go!” Jett hit the warp drive and felt the familiar shift as the synthetic sun drive kicked in.