23. Calculated Audacity

Academy Hill, Vidako

Imperium Stellarum
September 27, 2847

“Only twelve years passed between the Wright Flyer and the Fokker Scourge,” Professor DeVault lectured, while Arc continued to make notes on his tablet. Nearly an hour earlier, Iceni had offered to record the entire class for him, and he’d accepted the offer, but he wanted to note his own thoughts and questions along the way.

“Seven years before the first moon landing, the United States of America Airforce drew up plans for Project Orion, the first concrete, theoretically achievable space-based warship, though it was never actually built,” DeVault continued. “No sooner had the first Emperor, Maximilian Ascania, realized the potential of gate technology, than he sent a generation-ship with a disassembled gate back to Terra. War drives innovation—not just technical innovation, but strategic and tactical thinking.”

“At Wolf 1069, the Singularity used their newly developed mechs to overthrow imperial control. It wasn’t until Admiral Nakagami began targeting Singularity control ships, and actually eliminating their pilots, that the war began to turn around,” Devault said. “The shift in the tides of the war achieved an armistice, but the fundamental conditions impelling both sides to conflict have not substantially altered, and we cannot expect the Singularity to leave us the same vulnerability again.”

The professor turned off his screen. “For next time, please read and take notes on the selections from Von Clausewitz—particularly the concept of the fog of war, and his thinking on the intertwined relationship between politics and war. Both remain relevant over a thousand years later. You are dismissed, cadets.”

With the creak of seats and the shuffling of shoes against the lecture hall floor, the other cadets stood and began to make their way to the door. Arc had just folded his tablet and tucked it into the pocket of his tunic when the professor spoke again.

“Not you, Sandhurst. Stay behind a moment.”

Arc paused, glanced to the door, and then back to Professor DeVault. “I have Xenobiology 101, sir,” he said. It wasn’t quite an objection.

“I’ll send a note to Doctor Vogel,” DeVault promised, stepping around his podium to approach Arc. “You’re the cadet who won his spot at the Tacticalis tournament.”

It wasn’t a question, but Arc answered anyway. “Yes, sir.”

At conversational distance, DeVault seemed even taller, almost a looming presence. “I look over the logs of each year’s winner,” he explained. “Partly out of professional curiosity, and partly out of personal interest. Your final match was particularly interesting. You didn’t win through exceptional tactical maneuvering, but by taking advantage of stacking morale penalties. What gave you that idea?”

Arc couldn’t help but digest a bit, being put on the spot. “Gaugamela, sir.”

Professor DeVault narrowed his eyes. “You were thinking of mechs as cavalry.”

“Yes, sir.” Arc nodded. “I used my destroyers and cruisers to pin the enemy forces, and once I found a gap, I rammed a wing of mechs straight through to their flagship. Once they lost that -“

“They failed a succession of morale checks. The Persian army breaking when Darius retreated.” DeVault nodded. “It’s a clever manipulation of the game system, cadet, but there is a very important distinction between Tacticalis and what we do here. Whether you can understand that will be the difference between success and failure, and it is very simple. War—life—is not a game system.”

“Yes, sir,” Arc said.

“The emperor’s game is a clever recruiting tool, a good bit of public relations, and it has found us the occasional diamond in the rough,” DeVault said. “But it doesn’t account for a commander who inspires faith in their soldiers—soldiers who would follow them into the event horizon of a black hole. Your trick wouldn’t work against such a commander.”

“With all due respect, sir, I wouldn’t try it against someone like that,” Arc said. “But I do think cavalry is a promising analog for conceptualizing how to integrate mechs tactically.”

DeVault shrugged. “You’ll have the chance to show me when we get into our simulations. But Sandhurst, even clever tactics don’t make up the whole of what I want from you—what fleet will demand from you. When Napoleon placed Alexander in, as he put it, the first rank of generals, he said that the Macedonian king ‘calculated deeply, carried out audaciously, and managed wisely.”

“If you want to lead a wing, Sandhurst, I need to see that you can win the confidence of your soldiers; that you can keep a cool head in a crisis; and that you can inspire brave action with your own, as Napoleon put it, audacity. That means you need to be able to fight as well as think, which, I suppose, we shall determine in the months to come.”

Arc thought back to the moment in the jungle when he’d looked down that trail of beaten brush, and realized what must be coming. “I think I understand, sir.”

“We shall see if you do. You’re majoring in War Studies, which means you’re one of mine,” DeVault said. “Unless, that is, you wish a transfer to the naval academy at Luna? Commanding from the bridge of a flagship doesn’t require the same sort of personal heroics as leading a wing of mechs. If you do decide to make the transfer, I will write you a recommendation. In all honesty, I’d almost prefer it; the chances of a mech pilot ever making admiral are disappointingly low.”

Once again, that stab of panic pierced Arc’s stomach, that surge of fear that the chance to hunt down the woman who’d murdered his sister might be taken away from him, arbitrarily, by someone in a position of power. “No, sir,” he said, quickly. “I intend to pilot a Kestrel. I’ll be staying right here.”

DeVault looked him in the eye for a long moment. “Very well. Off you go to Xenobiology, then. I expect to hear your thoughts on Von Clausewitz during our next class.”

Arc saluted, then turned and beat a hasty retreat through the doorway before Professor DeVault could change his mind. The moment he was out of the building, he tore off down the paved pathways which crisscrossed the campus at a full sprint. “Give me a map, Iceni,” he gasped, in between panted breaths.

Perhaps it was because he was paying more attention to the map, and the blinker which represented his own position on Academy Hill, that Arc slammed into another cadet as he skidded around the corner and into the final stretch of his route to the science building. Just like on Pinnacle Station, he thought to himself, with a flash of embarrassment.

“I’m sorry,” Arc blurted out, before he’d even seen who he’d run into.

“Watch where you’re going, mole-rat,” Blake Van Camp growled. Then, he looked Arc up and down, and when Arc saw the flicker of recognition in the older cadet’s eyes, he lost all hope of a quick escape.

“You’re that little shit who’s always hanging around the princess,” Van Camp said.

“My apologies, sir. I was rushing to my next class, and I should’ve been looking where I was going. I won’t keep you any longer.” Arc started to move past the other cadet, but it turned out he wasn’t going to be so lucky.

“Wait a moment.” Van Camp stepped so that he could plant himself directly in Arc’s path. “It’s my responsibility as an upperclassman to discipline younger cadets who can’t get to their classes on time. Down on the ground, mole-rat. I want to hear you count your pushups nice and loud, and if I don’t like your form, you’ll be starting over again from nothing.”

“Yes, sir.” Arc kept his face as blank as he could, and dropped right there on the paved path, which was rough and hot beneath his hands. In one sense, he was lucky: by noon, the pavement would be a high enough temperature to burn his skin. He lowered his body, keeping his back straight, and then pushed up again. “One!”

𝝮

By the time Arc made it to class, he’d missed more than half the lecture. When he slipped in the door, every eye in the room turned toward him, including that of the Doctor Vogel, who paused until he’d made his way to an open seat next to Vee and Pika.

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