A/N: It's my birthday, so here is a gift from me to you. A short chapter! Also, the Meerkat got a slight rebuild thanks to me finally having some concrete rules for the vehicle building. A small change- the engine worked out to be a ton lighter, the standard armor plating was changed to Ferro Fibrous Mk II since by that point in its development all Corean Mechs and Combat Vehicles would come with it as standard, and the Buzzsaw LMG pods were removed because they were a touch redundant with all of the HMGs the vehicle would have anyways.
[Arthur Corean]
[Corean Enterprises]
[New Avalon, New Avalon System, Federated Suns]
[February 12th, 3028]
The Marauders had only been working for less than two months when Hanse asked to 'borrow' them.
Well, them and a Mule filled with two of the regular Battlemech battalions I had leftover; while it didn't have any actual Mechbays, considering who it was going to I figured that the Wolf's Dragoons would be able to provide the repairs for their own machines while they got my machines shot to piss. I decided to toss in a Company of the heavier Royal machines, so spare parts for them, spare Corean weapons, and a heaping helping of the Double Heatsinks I got as part of my shares. Considering the fighting lasted for months, having some spare machines and plenty of better weapons and ammo on hand would do the Dragoons wonders.
Accompanying Mason's Marauders would be a company of 'Mechs from the Crater Cobras and their Union-class Dropship, and two of the handful of Vengeance-class Dropship carriers along with an Overlord to support them; the Leopard, Mule, Union, Vengeance, and Overlord would all be dropped off in system as soon as possible. Hanse didn't give me any further details as I didn't really need to know, nor did I ask, but House Davion compensated me double the worth of the 'Mechs and equipment, and it saved me the trouble of having to find a place to put all of the new Mechs and equipment I had incoming.
Really, I should be paying Hanse, but hey, if he wanted to pay me then who was I to argue with the First Prince?
Regardless, I had little care for how well the Wolf's Dragoons fared; as long as the Mule crew, one of the ships of Countess Corean's enclaves, came back safely, then I could care less of what happened to the maybe/maybe-not Clanners on Misery.
I didn't fear for Mason at all because I knew that the man would be fine, especially since I had all of his 'Mechs upgraded. The 'Freq Hunter' was Mason's shot at 'hunting ComStar', and I happened to agree with the name; however, my naming sense was sort of shit, so maybe the two of us had that in common? This would be my tech's first true test in combat, with Captain Wanko getting to be the first Mechwarrior to field the new VIPR systems in the flesh along with their new ordnance; given we weren't quite ready to begin mass production, Captain Wanko got to have four artisanal VIPR launchers installed into her 'Mech virtually hand-fashioned by yours truly; two VIPR-10s- one in each arm- and two VIPR-5s in each side torso, four Enhanced Medium Lasers, a Guardian ECM and Beagle Active probe pilfered from the stockpiles, and quite a bit extra was added to keep her safe.
Why did I care so much about Captain Wanko? Because, she and Mason had hooked up now, and because of that (and likely my conversations with him over the past few months) Mason was seriously considering taking me up on my offer of a landhold; now that he had something to squeeze and tease, the thoughts of 'what came after' were finally starting to dawn on him.
What happened once the revenge was completed and the dead laid to rest?
So, keeping Captain Yuri Wanko alive and well was partially my ticket to keeping Commander Mason, and with him so close I wasn't going to cut any corners on keeping him and his people alive.
I sighed as I looked over the computer terminal in front of me and rubbed my forehead.
"I've been reading scientific papers for so long I'm starting to monologue like some Saturday morning cartoon villain," I muttered as I hit the 'print' key and stood up from the chair in the secured room while the whirring and clicking of the printer ran in the background.
While the 379-page document printed, I busied myself with getting the hole puncher and three-ring binder ready to receive this monster. With a gentle tune on my lips, I mentally counted off twenty-nine pages- because any more than that the hole puncher stopped making clean, neat holes- and began assembling the first hard copy of 'A Theoretical and Practical Examination on the Effects of Vanadium in Metal Alloys, written by Dr. Marsha Hayes, et al, 2759' to grace the Inner Sphere in centuries.
Vanadium.
No matter how far I dug into the metallurgical fields, almost everything always came back to Vanadium; the Star League had only started seriously digging into research on Vanadium before the Amaris Civil War, and with that disastrous coup the research, much like the Star League itself, died an ignominious death. Funnily enough, the studies that had the most hard evidence on the strength-enhancing properties of Vanadium when alloyed with Titanium, Tungsten, and other metals came from the Periphery- with seventeen smaller White Papers split between universities in the Taurian Concordat and Magistracy of Canopus. However, given the Periphery Uprisings and the centuries of instability after that I think it's pretty clear as to why they never really bothered to continue their lines of research; if it wasn't fearing aggression from their Fed Suns and Capellan neighbors in the Concordat, or their Free Worlds League and Capellan neighbors for the Magistracy, then it was Periphery Pirates.
The Terran Hegemony, however, had tons of theoretical papers, but only three studies I could find within the library core actually had any real meat and potatoes to them; one from 2579, one from 2668, and another one from 2759. That last one was the one I was printing off now, and doing some digging into related articles unveiled some very interesting things, especially in the 2764 Addendum to the paper.
The Star League had looked on and off again at Vanadium for centuries now, but rarely did it go anywhere; this was mainly due to circumstances that the groups studying found themselves in.
In order to actually test their theories regarding the positive effects that Vanadium, Nickel, and other alloys might have, they'd need to conduct large-scale tests. Given these papers mainly focused on Vanadium and Nickel as additives for Germanium Jump Cores, with other positive observations being secondary, they needed to have a Germanium Jump Core to experiment with. The issue was, once alloyed, there would no removing the Vanadium and Nickel from the Germanium, and if the results proved to be less than stellar then the whole core was considered spoiled and written off. Given even a small Jump Core was north of 400 Million C-Bills alone, this was a very tall order for any private firm to cover expense-wise.
What gave me hope was that in their 2764 Addendum, they had conducted a small-scale test under the funding of the SLDF, and after three 2,000-ton failures, they believed that they had stumbled upon what would be the proper formula for the Titanium-Germanium-Vanadium-Nickel ratios. They just needed one more test to prove their suppositions, and then they could commence with the large-scale test on a full-sized Jump Core. However, just two years later, the Amaris Civil War kicked off in 2766, and considering the team was based out of New Earth, working with a small Jumpship firm called 'Lyte Speed Aeronautics' they were as good as dead.
This was fortunate for me because if they had succeeded then all of these records and White Papers would have been pulled by the Hegemony Censors, and to be honest, I don't know how even this much escaped the Censor's eyes because I was learning a whole hell of a lot from just reading these documents... but I guess having had the Core unlocked with the Senior Ranking SLDF General's credentials probably unlocked more than a few doors than what would have happened otherwise. Other than the Lucretia, that special Jumpship that almost completely destroyed the New-Syrtis Ship Yards, and the crazy Super Jump Drive the Blakists made, I hadn't seen anything about anyone making better Jump Cores in the slightest.
This was rather silly because Vanadium, while rare periodically, was rather common in the Inner Sphere. It was a common byproduct of uranium mining, and magnetite production, and was found crystalized during the refinement of heavy hydrocarbons. While it wasn't a 'junk' byproduct like some that were tossed out because they were deemed 'useless', it had its uses. It was a critical element in the creation of High-Speed Tool Steel, and one of its refined derivatives- Vanadium Pentoxide- was an important catalyst in the creation of Sulfuric Acid; Vanadium as metal was rather inexpensive in the Inner Sphere to purchase.
Interestingly enough, thanks to these White Papers, I even learned that Vanadium could be found in ocean algae on multiple different worlds as 'Vanadium Bromoperoxidase' as the center of their active enzymes.
The thought of growing algae and harvesting them in huge clumps for their Vanadium enzymes sort of tickled me, and if the algae could be modified to produce other things like ethanol then two birds could be stuck with a single stone- Vanadium for the Jumpship cores, and ethanol for the petrol-engines of whatever world it was being harvested on.
Still, what piqued my curiosity about Vanadium, and led me on this whole 'Trip down the Rabbit Hole' in the first place, was an obscure science article that I'd read in my past life about Vanadium, when alloyed with Tungsten, being an exceptional radiation shield. Far better than Tungsten Carbide alone, which was the primary shielding for a Fusion Reactor until the SLDF discovered that crystalline polymers could do a similar job if the containment barrier was made thick enough. However, despite days of digging and reading, I had yet to see any peer-reviewed White Papers on Tungsten-Vanadium shielding for radiation or Fusion Engines... which meant that there was a chance that it just hadn't been discovered yet.
However, why would they look into other forms of reactor shielding when they had crystalline polymers that could make XL Engines?
Ooohooohohohohohhohooohohohohohho, XxxxxxLLLllllll Eeeennngggiiinnneeessssss~!
God, such a great idea! Let's find a way to let the enemy kill our 'Mechs faster! Brilliant!
Seriously, the only reason to put an XL engine into a 'Mech design was if it already had shit armor but good mobility, cooling, and weapons; as long as you dedicated a significant portion of the saved tonnage to more armor, especially those side torsos, then objectively you could have a much more durable 'Mech. If you could stomach the costs the XL engine brought... which, let's face it, money was never the issue, it was always Metal.
It was why practically every damn design under the sun post-Helm Memory Core got an XL engine, even when adding said XL engine was objectively a huge downgrade for what was actually done with the saved tonnage.
The moment the last stack of papers was tucked into the rings, I closed up the binder, grabbed the other four binders I'd made, and headed out of the door- the vault door on the Core Room shutting closed behind me.
Nigel Kosmodov was the leading scientist in my Metallurgy department, the thirty-nine-year-old man was one of the many bright minds that NAIS scooped up the day he completed his Doctorate program, but after five years of being forced to sit around on the bench doing nothing, I was able to convince him to come work for Corean Enterprises instead. He was wasted on NAIS, not because NAIS was a terrible place (obviously), but because they simply didn't have any good projects to put him on at the Egg Carton. Endosteel? Ferro Fibrous Armor? Ferro-Alu? All of those things had already existed and we already knew what their compositions were- we just lost the knowledge on how it was all put together, and while he had been on the team trying to re-make Ferro Fibrous- as I had been for a few weeks before summarily getting kicked off- there hadn't been much progress because funding for the program was tight.
"Nigel!" I hollered as I strode up to his desk and placed the stacks of White Paper-filled binders on top of it, "How the hell are you, my guy?"
Black, almond eyes of a Kuritan descendent glared at me as he stirred a small wooden stirrer in his coffee, "Da, I am fine, Mister Corean. However, I am on break. Come back in fifteen minutes."
I sucked in a breath, "Come now, don't be like that-"
"A break you mandate," He smirked lightly, "Unless you want to break your own corporate rules. Hah."
I stared at him.
He stared at me.
I glanced at the chrono.
Then I sighed as I grabbed the top-most binder and took a seat in the chair across from his desk, "Delayed and confounded by the rules I made for the mental health and wellbeing of my employees. Fine. I won't talk to you for the next fifteen minutes, but, give me one of those pens, will ya? The good ones you keep in your desk."
The padded cloth chair creaked as I took a seat and opened up the cover before flipping over to the 179th page in the binder, and when he begrudgingly gave me one of his good pens- not the cheamo ballpoint ones he keeps in the shitty mug on his desk- I started to write my own thoughts and theories on the subject matter in the margins.
He leisurely sipped at his coffee and put on some classical music- Beethoven's 7th (the Rock Orchestral version from 2393)- and nibbled at a scone of some kind.
Once the fifteen minutes were up, the last of the Movement had finished, and Nigel was brushing some crumbs onto a napkin before tossing it into the bin next to his desk. He cracked his neck and rubbed his hands together as he wheeled up to his desk, "Alright, Mister Corean. What science will you have me do?"
"What?" I stopped typing at the terminal in my big, spacious, and now supremely up-armored 'Public' office and looked over to my brother, who was seated on the new couch; may the old couch rest in peace.
Yuri grinned broadly as he kicked off his shoes and laid himself out across it, the young man grabbing his noteputer, connecting it to the flatscreen on the wall, and casting a NewAvNet page onto it, "The Grande Circuit Challenge Series! It's one of the greatest races in the Inner Sphere- almost 150 companies take part in it every year."
Some clips of the race played on the flat screen, showcasing hundreds of vehicles at the starting line before taking off into the grasslands from a New Earth city; almost immediately some vehicles, the faster ones, pulled ahead, quickly turning the furball into a snaking train of vehicles that stretched out for kilometers. The video seemed to fast forward a few hours as the number of vehicles began to dwindle, either from break-downs, course, hazards, or the drivers pulling off to the side to refuel and catch a few minutes of rest before getting back into their vehicles and hauling ass once more.
"It's an endurance race- a 3,000-kilometer long course that stretches from one end of the continent to the other and back again, and it covers a wide variety of terrains from city streets to dirt tracks through dense forests and open grass fields," There was a rather notable excitement in his voice, and his knees were bouncing up and down; I guess without Mason around to occupy his time he was feeling rather antsy.
I mulled the idea over in my head before nodding, "Alright, so what are the rules?"
His eyebrows shot up as he looked at me in surprise.
I stared at him, "What? Do you think that I'm allergic to fun or something?"
Yuri shook his head as he let the race play on the screen in the background, "No, no, not at all, it's just... you usually avoid stuff like pomp, ceremony, and pageantry, Arthur. So while I was hoping that you might be interested in the race, I wasn't going to hold out hope that you'd participate in it. That and you're working far more than you ever have before..."
"Will I build out an Everyman to participate? Of course. Will I directly participate? No. For obvious reasons," I rolled my eyes slightly as I locked out my work terminal and got up off of my chair to head toward the couch; I made sure to swipe one of the Engineering noteputers with the touch screen that I kept nearby whenever I had a brainwave. As I approached my younger brother sat up and made space, and I plopped down next to him, "Alright, so what are the rules for this shindig?"
As it turns out, there were quite a few rules, with more than a handful dedicated toward driver safety which surprised me given how blase the Inner Sphere was with human life. There were numerous categories in the Grande Circuit Challenge Series, with a 'Classic' race that followed the traditional rules of the race, the 'Open' race that allowed for highly customized and finely tuned machines, and there were other categories like 'Dual Wheel' for motorcycles and Adventure bikes and the like. Of all of them, it was the 'Classic' race that I was most interested in, as it fit my needs perfectly.
The race required that the vehicle's mass range from 250 kilograms to 2,500 kilograms, the vehicle must be a production model vehicle (as custom builds fell into the 'Open' category), and it must compete as a Base Model with the only modifications legal being those that were required to run the race or only enhanced what was already there; the race required gel-impact crash panels, a full cage for the driving compartment, and a damn ejector seat. Additional fuel and water tanks (for those engines that utilized water in their combustion) were legal, but since three pit stops with a ground crew were allotted before penalties started kicking in, most chose not to spend the extra weight.
The Outback/Periphery model would be the perfect vehicle for this, as its stock configurations were adeptly suited for the wide variety of terrains that vehicles participating in the race would see; the impact padding and roll cage would add a little bit of weight, and the ejector seat would be a tight squeeze, but explosive bolts to blow the roof section off wouldn't be too hard.
If you can safely eject (most of the time) from the heavily reinforced and up-armored cockpit of a Battlemech, then you could safely eject from a thin-skinned motor vehicle. A centrally located 50kg Andosteel closed cell fuel tank with an extra 44kg of fuel, when combined with the stock fuel tank, would be more than enough to see the driver throughout the entire race without needing a single one of those pit-stops; the only time the racer would have to leave the course would be to handle the business.
They could also go pedal to the metal the whole time.
"Okay then, show me the competition, and let's see what we're working against here," I hummed and booted up my CAD program as I twirled the stylus around my fingers.
Sure, I would be skirting the rules a touch since the Everyman was technically a pre-production model, but as long as the primary features of the vehicle didn't change between when the race was participated in and the first lot of vehicles rolled off of the assembly lines then any placing would stand; I didn't know it at the time, but there had been twelve such instances where competitors were in my shoes, and the New Earth Racing Commission upheld their placings as long as their vehicles remained largely the same.
I didn't exactly expect to win, but as Yuri went down the top ten vehicles that had won the 'Classic' Race I felt something dark well up within my chest- a savage glee at seeing the specifications of all of these premium race vehicles that had been pushed into mass production solely so they could compete in the 'Classic'.
Even in its stock configuration, my Everyman Outback was going to take them to the cleaners- all for one-tenth of the price.
"You know, Yuri?"
"Hmm?"
"I had intended the Everyman to be sort of a 'sleeper hit' within the automotive world. The sort of inexpensive vehicle that everyone ignored but those who had one knew its value... but winning this race?" I held up a hand to the screen as it played a video of Saturnus Automotive's Saturnus III racer, an infocard on the side of the display showcasing its stock specifications, "Winning this race would put CDM on the map. It would generate buzz for the Everyman without me even having to worry about advertising; the talking heads would do all of that for me."
I flicked the stylus around my thumb as Yuri grinned broadly at my words, "Though, I don't think I'd feel right bringing home just one trophy. Let's grab a stock Everyman for the 'Open' race as well and then modify the hell out of it... I didn't see any rules against Cooling Suits, so removing the heater and air conditioning would free up some additional weight... the seats for all but the driver could be removed as well..."
"Bigger tires! Bigger shocks! Bigger turbos!" Yuri whooped as he hopped off of the couch.
"That's the spirit," I chuckled as I swiped over to the Internal Mail application and composed a small email to Mister Dimurot to let him know that we would be throwing out hat into the ring, and once I sent it off a thought occurred to me, "However... I don't even know when the race takes place?"
My younger brother paused with his hands high in the air, and he looked to me with a sheepish grin, "Oh... uh... July 15th?"
I ran the numbers in my head for a moment, "That gives us a little more than two months to get the vehicle ready when taking into consideration travel time..."
Yuri winced, "Is that going to be a problem? I will admit that I hadn't thought about the travel time..."
"Just who the hell do you think I am?" I scoffed with a shrug, "Two weeks? That would be crunch time. Two months? Easy street."
When I arrived back in my den down in the bowels of the Admin Complex, I was surprised to see my littlest sister sprawled out over the couch with a cloth draped over her face.
I closed the door behind me softly and let the locks on the reinforced door engage before quietly slipping off my shoes at the entrance and grabbing my house slippers. An attempt had been made to slide through the living room and into the kitchen without disturbing her, but I knew that was pointless the moment she lifted the cloth off of her face and stared at me with bleary eyes. Not wanting to just stand there awkwardly, I gave her a small nod as I continued into the kitchen, "Tough day?"
I rummaged through the fridge and found the necessary ingredients for a light snack of cured meats and cheeses before setting up the cutting board and getting to work on slicing everything up. The sound of steel on wood filled the silence between us as I loaded up a paper plate with cuts of diced salami, ham, roast beef, turkey, and other deli meats along with some cheddar, swiss, and a handful of other cheeses I didn't know the name of but had a pleasant, pungent odor. The moment I was finished I washed the knife and cutting board off before hanging them up in their respective places and slipped into the living room, placing the plate down before striding over to the coat rack and hanging up my lab coat.
"How do you do it?" Her voice came as a soft whisper, before she cleared her throat and sat up, the teen repeating herself more clearly, "How do you do it?"
"I am afraid that I don't quite understand the question, little sis," I replied as I stuffed a cube of meat and cheese into my mouth and looked at her.
"All of..." She raised her hands up and made a wide variety of nonsensical gestures with them before she huffed and let them fall into her lap, "Everything? School. Work. Studying. Engineering. Running a massive company. Running a Duchy..."
"That's sort of a lot, but having a perfect memory certainly helps. I also couldn't do anything without the hard work of loyal, competent, and trusted subordinates," I popped some more meat and cheese into my gob and chewed while thinking the rest of the question over, "Time management is a key skill, as is knowing when to delegate. I have a lot of very good scientists and engineers on my staff whom I know could get the job done in a certain amount of time, but it comes down to whether or not I feel that certain things can be waited on or if certain things need to be done as soon as possible. I have a few projects that fall into the latter category, so I've been directing most of my personal attention to those while trusting that my people can make sufficient progress with me only stopping by periodically to troubleshoot any stumbling blocks they might have."
Her crystal blue eyes gazed at me as her lips twisted into something that I could only describe as raw, "You make it sound so easy."
I snorted a touch and continued to snack, "It most certainly is not 'easy'. If anything, having to learn how to delegate and trust that people could walk two steps without tripping over their own two feet has been one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. I spent many, many, many years working alone, handling everything myself because the other scientists didn't want me around. After all, I was a threat to their scientific achievements and a potential shot at getting their names in the history books."
I raised a hand up and clenched a fist, "A threat to their chance at achieving greatness not from the cockpit of a Battlemech, but from the humble confines of a laboratory. So when I finally left NAIS and came to work with the research teams that Father had on his payroll? Well, I found myself working not as a single man, but as a part of a team."
I put my hand down and grabbed another cheese cube since I noticed that I had more cheese than meat on the plate, "There are certainly some glory hounds here, and learning how to manage them outside of pulling the 'I'm the Boss' card has been an... interesting experience... but for the most part there is a stark difference in culture between here and NAIS. Whereas NAIS has multiple teams, large and small, working independently towards their own project goals, Corean Enterprises still has multiple teams working toward their own goals but the key difference is that they're not opposed to sharing resources; be it material, research, or personnel. If one team was working on a program and didn't need a Star League V31.1 script writing when they started, but realized that they needed one then, if another program had said scriptwriters that they could loan out then they are loaned out, no questions asked."
I crossed my arms over my chest and leaned fully back into the armchair and sighed, "More to the point, despite being the Boss, I had to learn how to insert myself into those teams without upsetting the balance that they already had; nobody likes a bull in a china shop, even if said bull has the answers to their problems. I had to learn my people, I had to learn the Scientific and Engineering leads in charge of those teams, and I had to learn how to work with them and trust that they could carry on when I wasn't around."
"And you had to learn how to do all of that while simultaneously managing the company once Mom and Dad died..." She sounded sullen, "In the meanwhile, I'm struggling to stay awake in class."
I felt an eyebrow creep up, "Really? From what Yeathers told me you were a pretty smart cookie... graduating two years early from Tertiary School and getting accepted into NAU early isn't something that just anyone can do."
Her face scrunched up and she rolled onto her belly and buried into a pillow, "Mhmmmmmmmmmmmrrraaaggghhhhhhhhh!"
I tilted my head to the side as I scratched at my ear, "That's a funny way to take a compliment..."
When she turned her head toward me, with her cheeks flushed, eyes moist, and a slightly runny nose I felt a strange sense of dread creep up into me. I don't know how to comfort crying women, at all, other than the old standby of rubbing on the back and whispering 'there, there' until they got whatever was in their system out.
"I'm not-!" Her lips clamped shut before she buried her face back into the pillow.
"'You're not', what?" Not knowing what to do with my hands I just folded them into my lap, "This wouldn't have to do with the cold shoulder you've been giving me this whole time, would it? This is the first real conversation we've had since you've gotten here, so why don't we just let everything air out? Get whatever is on your chest off?"
The rigid stiffness in her body went slack, but she remained face down for almost a full minute before she finally turned to me- the young teen rolling onto her side, "I feel like a fraud."
"Hmmm? That sounds like a pretty serious accusation to level against yourself, little sis. Why might you feel like that?" I probably wouldn't be able to psychoanalyze my little sister like a professional, but then again I always felt that most therapists were quacks anyway; any idiot can make you ask yourself all sorts of checklist questions and then say 'how does that make you feel?' over and over again until the timer has run out.
She huffed out a short laugh before rubbing at her eyes with the heels of her palms, "I guess I just don't feel like I earned the early graduation and all of the praise lavished onto me because of it. Not from my fellow students, the teachers the principal... and especially not from Big Sis. She has been so distant these past few years since Mom and Dad passed away, and always so busy when the County and whatever work you pile onto her plate as well. The only times she really paid attention to me was when I got the quarterly report cards from the school, or the emails from the principal..."
"You were always a good student, Julia, or so Yeathers told me," I was sort of fibbing here but this was uncharted territory for me, for the both of us, "So what changed? At what point did you start to feel like you were no longer earning your grades and the praise that came with it?"
Her cheeks puffed up as she angrily pouted, and she was silent for almost another full minute before she blew out a gusting sigh, her lips flapping like a motorboat, "I found all of Yuri's old assignments in his room while snooping through it once he left for here. I knew that the curriculum didn't change at all- it hasn't changed in almost a century other than the updates to the history textbooks and the like... so I started doing a bunch of studying, reading ahead, and knocking out assignments well before I'd even get them. Mainly during the Summer since Yeathers didn't take me out much because of her work."
I did my best not to frown, though I don't think I managed it very well, "That sounds... like a damn blessing."
"What?" The squeak in her voice was kind of cute, though the befuddlement on her face was very cute.
"I would have given up an arm and a leg to have all of the assignments for the years of schooling early. A chance to get the dross out of the way so I could have more personal study time?" I let out a wistful sigh, "That would have been a dream."
Her jaw dropped a little bit as she looked at me warily, "You... don't consider that cheating?"
I snorted and crossed my arms across my chest, "Little Sis, your Big Bro here is the King of cheating. Or do you think having a perfect memory should be considered 'fair' in a highly competitive academic environment? As the old adage goes, 'If you ain't cheating, you ain't trying'. Though you did actually do all of your own work, right? You didn't crib off of Yuri's stuff word for word?"
"W-what!? No!" She spluttered, "I did all of my own work! And it wasn't like I could just memorize his tests anyway- they have multiple versions of each test!"
"So then? What exactly is your major malfunction?" I shrugged my shoulders, "If you did your own work, then what does it matter if you dedicated your Summer Fun time to getting the boring school assignments out of the way early? I can guarantee you that even if most of your peers had the same opportunity they wouldn't have done anything with it."
She narrowed her eyes a touch, "How do you mean?"
"Well? You're in the Upper Crust of society, Julia, so you tell me: Spending their Summer indoors and studying or doing homework that wasn't going to be due until next year or taking the family river skimmer down to the lake and having fun in the sun?"
"Some would have," The red-haired teen mumbled, though she had to hedge her words, "Though most wouldn't have."
"And there you go. Even if they had the chance they wouldn't have taken it- dilemma solved," Logic was most certainly the bane of teenagers, however, "That's not all of it though, is it? There has to be some component linked back to me, or else you wouldn't have treated me as poorly as you did."
Her bare feet- where are your socks, young lady!?- slid along the cushions of the couch as she brought her knees up and grabbed a pillow to cradle against her chest; my sister used the edge of the pillow to hide her lips. "It's stupid..."
I nodded, "Yup. These sorts of things usually are, but that doesn't change the fact that we feel the way we feel about them. I used to be so damn angry at Hanse every year when he kept holding me back at NAU just to keep me 'connected to my peers' or some such tripe. I still am a bit salty over that, and I don't think I'll ever get over it..."
She sniffed and let out a wet laugh, "Yeah... Big Sis would tell me all about the angry letters you'd send to her while you were in school."
"Meh." I shrugged, "I am just going to guess that, and my just fishing here- casting a line out into the waters, so to speak- but I take it that the personal component that links back to me is that... since you were doing so well in school everyone kept comparing you to me?"
"Yes." The pillow in her grasp would likely have been screaming for mercy with how tight she was gripping it, but at least she was forthright about it, "It was... annoying at first. Being compared to you. No. It was flattering, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that I didn't know anything about you. Nothing first hand, or anything. Everything I've ever heard was second-hand, from Big Sis, Yuri, Miss Constance, and some of the teachers. So after all of the work I was putting in to keep ahead of everyone else all anyone would ever do was compare me to you; they were proud, but I never really matched up to 'Mister Graduated Tertiary School at 13'."
Oh yeah, there was the bitterness.
"Woof," I uncrossed my arms and threw one over the back of the armchair as I shifted to the side, "Really feeling the resentment and animosity. I would have thought it would be over me not being present in your life growing up."
Julia rolled her eyes as she huffed, "Even I'm not that banal. There is a lot of distance between us. You had your schooling. Then you had the company and after the assassination attempt on you and Yuri? Any chance that you could have been a part of my life growing up just... wasn't meant to be."
She buried her face into the pillow and sucked in a wet breath, "And now that we're finally together here I am ruining it by being a silly little tart!"
"Welp, you've admitted it. I've forgiven you." I raised up a hand and made the sign of the cross, "Something, something 'Es spirit desanti'. Your sins are forgiven. Go forth and start your life fresh, my little sister."
Glassy blue eyes looked at me, "Aren't you a Blakist though?"
"I played the part of a good little Blakist, Julia, and they still tried to kill me," I scoffed, doing my best to ignore the sting in my chest at being reminded of the hours I wasted at the New Avalon HPG reading from the Book of Blake while engaging their inquisitive minds in titillating discussion on the deeper meanings behind Blessed Blake's teachings; there was one young woman who was a few years my senior, that really caught my attention.
Victoria Sutherland, the third daughter of a minor Baron from the planet of Sylvester. Blonde-haired, blue-eyed, pretty in the face with a fat ass and huge tits that would not be contained by the plain Acolyte robes she wore.
Ugh.
She was just so much in my strike zone that it hurt me physically to find out that she was probably one of the most devout Blakists I'd ever met.
10/10.
A total hottie.
It was she who made the hours I wasted there totally worth it; with my perfect memory, I could clearly recall every day she forgot to wear a bra... the bounciness, shape, and firmness were out of this world.
I wonder where she is now? She should at least be a Demi-Precentor at a Class B station by now, maybe even a Precentor; she was very intelligent, and her knowledge of the Gospel of Blessed Blake was top notch...
I shook my head as Julia nibbled on the back of a knuckle, "So... Yeather's wasn't yanking my chain about ComStar?"
"No. She was not," I leaned forward, "I'm being deadly serious, Julia. Do not trust anyone from ComStar. Not the higher-ups and most certainly not the underlings; they don't know the beast that lies beneath the surface of their friendly, affable veneer, and they'll lead you to your death with a smile on their face because they have no idea what happens behind the scenes. So do not trust them- and if any one of them talks to you or tries to convince you to do anything for them, or go anywhere with them, then you break contact as quickly as you can and contact me and the MIIO agents we have around here."
The pillow was squeezed tighter as she nodded, "Okay. You don't need to tell me twice. I'll be careful."
I nodded, pleased that she seemed to be taking me with the utmost seriousness, "Good. Good. Now... what is this about you having a hard time staying awake in class?"
Her expression immediately dropped into a pout, "You... you really want to go into that now?"
"Why not?" I shrugged diffidently, a small smirk on my lips, "Since we're getting every out into the open and all... and a lot of those shiny privileges you have ride on your good grades."
Julia buried her face into the pillow and let out a long-suffering groan, one that I relished in.
Ahhhhh... the sound of progress.
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A/N: We get some time with Arthur researching things for Science! Some time with Yuri. And we finally unearth the totally teenage feelings that Julia feels. It feels a bit short but I was on a bit of a timer getting this one out. Other things to do for the birthday and all that stuff. Hope you enjoyed! (And also, for those who paid attention to the ComStar sections, a little easter egg.)