Esoteric Algorithms (or, esoalgs) facilitate all basic capabilities of the ARC. Impregnation with esoalgs serves two functions — firstly, its social function, it demarcates a cadet’s journey through Incoherence to Manhood, allowing those female civilian prospects to successfully ascend into the count of Mankind, reborn as Men. Secondly, its technical function, it allows a soldier of the ARC to operate all manner of technologies, from the most mundane network uplink, to the colossal warmechs, the THRONES. It is a basic mark of inclusion in Mankind, and a functional requirement of successful enlistment in the Advance and Restraint Choirs.
Esoteric Algorithmic Technologies: Operations Manual, Advance and Restraint Choirs Standard Issue, Ninth Edition
ARC McCarthy Base, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Axis Mundi, Earth, UCF 10/04/453
Four days later
The autumn sun has long set over Colorado Springs. The night sky is clear and dark and deep, a great painter’s brush of subtle shifts in blues and blacks. 1,000 feet underground, Flechette Jaydamn and Tanglewire Sidewinder are in their pilots’ bunk, finally back stateside, having a conversation they should’ve had a long time ago.
“You… What? What do you mean you didn’t finish the induction ritual?” Tang looks at Flechette with confusion, disbelief, and, while he attempts to hide it, a bit of hurt.
“I — I wanted to tell you sooner I just — I didn’t know how to do it and, I didn’t really understand what happened, I just, I worked so hard to get to this point and I wanted to be a part of the team and—”
“Slow down, brother. Take it from the top. What are you saying? You’ve been piloting this whole time without induction? You’re saying you’ve been fighting… as a woman?”
“…Yes. I don’t know how it happened. After basic training, we were all lined up for the induction ceremony. I entered the chamber and — it was a blur, I didn’t understand what was happening. The procedure was going correctly, I was getting my implants, but when it came to the algorithmic synchronization I just — alarms started going off, and then I heard something about a sync-fail… I’ve never heard of that happening. It just didn’t take. The system didn’t seem to know what to do with me either. They seemed to have just marked my paperwork with the changed gender marker and — well, nobody asked. So I didn’t tell.”
“Jesus Christ…”
“Yeah no shit.”
“So — wait, how have you been syncing with your THRONE without esoalgs? How’d you manage to do anything here?”
“I honestly don’t know. I figured that our first day in the THRONE foundries would be it for me but — I got in there and it just felt natural. Like the VENUS was a part of me. Like she always had been. I just… can. Syncing with esotech seems to be something I can just… do.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah I… I don’t really understand it.”
A moment of silence drags its teeth over their skin.
“You must have felt real alone, brother.” Somehow Tang always knows how to get to the heart of the thing.
“I… I did. I wished I could tell you but… I didn’t know how you’d react. After… everything.”
“Edge.” Tang clasps Flechette on the shoulder. An electric jolt runs up her spine. “You will always be my Cross. And you will always be my brother.” A deep, gnarled knot inside of Flechette’s gut that she hadn’t even realized had been there all these years just now unwinds itself. She feels inside of her own skin again.
“Tang, I— I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”
“And I’m sorry I didn’t make it clear enough that you can trust me. With anything. I’m your cross, Edge. I’ve got your six. Every time.” His smile is warm like the soil under Waimānalo.
“Every time.”
Squadron 16 of the Mechanized Corps is in chaos. The mission was nominally completed, with the PLAA weapons lab successfully obliterated by the Thanatic charge dropped by the HEAVENSPEAR. But there was the issue of the death of their commanding officer. Flechette’s blood runs icy as she recalls watching Wing Erra reduced to atoms. Gone. Nothing left to bury, nothing to ship home to his family, his wife and their daughters. The ARC afforded him a ritual burial, sending an empty casket, unmarked save for his rank and adorned only with a standard issue officer’s sidearm. Flechette scowls as she watches Wing Erra’s “casket” get loaded onto the back of a troop transport. It wasn’t even his fucking gun. And the more obvious elephant in the room still looms, haunting the Squadron, the entire ARC, with its poisonous knowledge. The PLAA has Thanatic arms.
Flechette doesn’t need to be a military tactician to know this will change the balance of power. That this single technological revolution, so closely guarded for years, marks a shift in the tides of the war. Dozens of members of her own squadron killed by those drone weapons. They would just be the first of countless, she is sure. She marches away from the airfield, unwavering as she is buffeted by the wild winds of the troop transport taking off; and begins her descent through the massive underground complex, towards the debrief session, to which all remaining members of the squadron had been called. Her carefully maintained pilot’s fatigues crease in predictable, precise ways as she walks, the splay of folds an accepted form of controlled disorder. Still, she straightens her tunic, reassuring herself with its familiar roughness on her fingertips.
Flechette enters the small debrief hall. The remaining members of Squadron 16 are scattered around the room. Most of them are sitting silently, not calm, but in firm command of themselves. Light streams in through windowscreens emulating the view aboveground. The hall is characteristically sterile. Dull, unpolished lithosteel flooring, slightly scuffed by years of briefings and debriefings. The same dull grey lithosteel for the walls, adorned only by the windowscreens and a few scattered plaques commemorating long forgotten soldiers of middling prestige. In the front of the room is a raised dais, currently unoccupied. Flechette walks stiffly over to a free chair and sits herself down. She picks at the hem of her tunic, in spite of herself, fiddling with the rough fabric. Frayed nerves after the strike. Who would expect anything less? And yet, mission efficacy comes first. Part of Flechette longs for the familiar feeling of control and relative safety found within the THRONE cockpit… A feeling she’s not sure she can ever regain. Someone clears their throat gently, and Flechette sits upright so hard she almost topples the chair over. She looks up to see Tang smiling apologetically, as he sits down in the chair next to her.
“Glad you made it,” Flechette mutters, embarrassed about her reaction.
“‘Course. I’m only fashionably late.”
“Not sure what to expect. Hate these things. Would rather be behind the throttle.”
“Haha! Indeed, the great warrior Flechette Jaydamn, more ready to face death than face a debrief meeting.”
“At least in combat, everything’s clear. Kill the enemy. Protect your cross. Nothing messy or muddy. It’s clean.”
“…Yeah. Yeah, I guess that’s fair, huh.” Tang looks uncharacteristically distant as he says this, distracted as well. It does nothing for Flechette’s nerves.
“Whatever. I just wish they’d get this thing started alre—”
There’s a gentle whoosh as the door slides open, to reveal an unexpected face.
Seraph. White Meniss is standing, carrying a networked datapad. He nods solemnly at Tang and Flechette, the latter of whom openly scowls at him. He seems somber. A bit resigned. He approaches the dais and hesitates, looking back at the room for a moment, before climbing onto it.
“We can skip the formalities. We’re combat soldiers, I know, and we’re not made for the kind of bureaucratic frivolities some of our betters are more suited to.” Seraph sounds tired. His southern drawl dragging and snagging as it goes.
“I want to acknowledge the realities. First, that we completed our objective. The PLAA weapons facility is nothing but post-Thanatic ash and dust. That’s a genuine success. You all did good work out there.” He offers a half-hearted smile.
“We also lost a lot of good men in that battle. A lot of good men. All men we knew, fought with, shed blood with. May they be ushered to the table of warriors among the Heavenly Host. Amen.”
The room intones with a quiet “amen.”
A moment of silence. Then:
“One of those men was our commanding officer.” Wing Erra was a man to be feared, but most of all, respected.
“Lieutenant Dominion Wing Erra was an incredible soldier. A man of God. One of the count of Mankind. He was the sword by which the enemy was parted in red. The severing edge. To many of us, he was more than that. A mentor, an unreachable ideal. He will surely dine with the Lord tonight.”
Again, a quiet intoning of “amen,” this time with more passion, more earnest respect.
“…Lieutenant Dominion Erra was irreplaceable. Is irreplaceable…”
“…And still, someone must replace him.”
“I have the solemn honor of sharing with you all that I have been offered the position of acting commander of this squadron.” Nods of understanding, murmuring.
“…It would be my honor to serve as your acting commander…” Seraph’s eyes wander over the windowscreens, as if longing to be there, among the clouds, in his magnificent HEAVENSPEAR. Something Flechette can sympathize with.
“But I cannot accept this honor.”
Silence.
“It is my duty as a soldier, first and foremost, to concern myself with the success of the mission. I am not the correct choice for this position. I have served alongside you all, and we have all proven ourselves in battle, in combat and strategy.”
“I know this squadron better than anyone currently living. Which is why I know I am not the one fated for this position.”
“Flechette Jaydamn. You have top statistics, as good as any of us. You have the respect of your squadron — the respect of the team, and my respect. You have an outstanding track record. And most of all, you are the only member of Squadron 16 who succeeded in bringing his cross safely home.” With this, the smallest catch in Seraph’s voice, before he quickly straightens himself out.
“That is something I will never be able to do. To have done. Tank Barricade is dead because I could not bring him home. And I will have to tell his family that.”
“You are the greater pilot among us. You are the greater strategic mind. And, when it comes down to it, you are the greater exemplar of the loyalty needed to lead this squadron.”
“Flechette Jaydamn, callsign EDGE, I formally recommend you for position of acting commander of this squadron. I have here,” he says, lifting his datapad, “the signed approval of ARC High Command, designating Edge as acting commander should he accept.”
Flechette looks down at the datapad, looking shellshocked more than anything else. She looks up at Seraph, who hands off the datapad, and salutes her. “Sir.”
Flechette’s hands are slick. It’s an honor unlike any other. And it also sends the hairs on the back of her neck standing. She will be constantly surveilled, in view of the ARC leadership in a way she never quite has been. It’s a razor’s edge. And she will have to know how to walk it in every moment.
She turns to Tang, hoping for his characteristic warmth, a clap on the back maybe, something to ease this gnawing in her chest. But what she sees is stone-faced solemnity. Tang is not celebrating with her. And maybe he shouldn’t be. He knows her secret now. When she makes eye contact with him, he looks almost as if he’s about to break. He doesn’t nod or shake his head, just holding the gaze, as if to say, this is your choice above all else.
Flechette Jaydamn turns back to face Seraph, who is still holding his salute. She walks forward and ascends the dais, smoothly, without breaking her stride. Turning around, she stands firm, grounded, and faces the room.
“Attention!” All the soldiers in the room stand instantly, saluting her with crisp, mechanical efficacy.
“I will give my body and my soul for this empire. I will give my blood and my sweat. I do solemnly swear to uphold the path of justice and victory for all of us. May we be the sword that cuts away that which is weak, from that which is strong.” She gives the Commander’s Salute, raising her right fist to her forehead, exposing her wrist outwards, I give my blood to this empire.
“SIR YES SIR!” The room is alive with trapped energy.
“HOORAH!” Flechette projects with controlled force.
“HOORAH!”