Careful Not To Break Reality

The sky was still asleep when it's time for the recruits to gather for the Pilotmania briefing. Half dozen recruits from Rydel's building and the ones surrounding it drowsily dragged themselves out of the bed and the recovery devices and slowly charged towards the designated meeting grounds. Contrary to the rest of the Rydel was already there 5 minutes early alongside a handful of other recruits and the briefing officers. He knew there is going to be a hectic rush in the morning, so he just pushed the waking time slightly earlier to beat the morning peak of shower surge followed by the kitchen mayhem. The first few minutes was rough, but surprisingly the previous days of training were mostly recovered thanks to the effects of Aquarian recovery bed. He could never really get use to the soft squishy sensation all around, but have eventually learn to trust the surroundings and not wake up in the middle of the night struggling for his life.

The early mornings at the Absolute Academy is charming on its own right. The cool breeze that lingered around when the night escapes the sun and is rather refreshing for him compared to the homeostaically maintained constant temperature within the accommodation. The sky is a shade of dark blue, with hints of red and orange bleeding from the edge of the horizon. There are never much clouds in the sky, and the occasional space crafts gliding through the sky are the only thing decorating the endless heavens.

Like most terraformed worlds, the basic ecosystem is set up to be minimally effective, with a variety of drones of multiple sizes interacting with plant life in order to carefully create and maintain the delicate balance that is the cycle of life. Once the region is stabilized, then the drones are slowly pulled away while actual wildlife suitable to the climate and environment are introduced bit by bit. The terraforming industry had been an emerging industry ever since the dawn of intergalactic travel, and has now m.a.t.u.r.ed to the point where it's fully integrated into the system of new planet settlement and everybody just takes it for granted.

There seemed to be a particular aesthetic that the founder of the Absolute Academy wants to aim for, but Rydel couldn't quite pin down what it is. There is a mix of various different environments throughout the site as he has seen on both the induction day and through the first two weeks of training, but there are definitely more love being shown to the forests upon the hills, especially one that leads towards the headmaster's living and working quarters. Well maintained and vibrant, as the trees are.

Since people started creeping out from the buildings and began to slowly populate the empty plaza, Rydel have been squinting hard to try to spot the slender figures of Roloni. He last saw the Aquarian in the last piloting class where he showed masterful skill when it comes to water craft piloting and pushed Rydel to the boundaries of vomiting. Thankfully, being the stubborn non-chunderer that Rydel is, he had kept his clean streak of seven years in tact. Though the dizziness certainly spewed over to the next few classes.

'Maybe I should have touched base with Roloni yesterday.' Rydel sighed as he thought back upon all the previous steps he could have taken to make the whole process more streamlined and less stressful, but there isn't much he can do right now.

'Yo!' Suddenly, he felt a firm slap onto his shoulder, and a big hand wrapped itself tightly around Rydel's not-so-shabby shoulder joint. He can feel the firm pressure piercing through the normal clothing he is wearing, a dark colored hoodie with a shirt underneath. He turned around, and a giant looms over him, with a smile. There is a dark dot on his teeth.

It's Edward, and behind his long frame, a dark skinned human female stood somewhat awkwardly behind him. Her name is...

'What's up, big guy! You happened to see Roloni?' Rydel jokingly punched him in the stomach, but his knuckles simply bounced off his well-built mid-section.

'Not today.' The monitoring tower himself spun around 360 degrees, but couldn't spot the guy they are both looking for, and he gave up the search after spinning around for the second time. Then he slowly pivoted around and hovers his giant hand above the female's shoulder and guided her towards Rydel. She hopped forward while keeping a distance between that and his hand and reached her own hand out, 'this is Hannah, by the way.'

'Hi!'

'What's up.' Rydel greeted her too, and got a hint of her firm grip. Then, another thing gripped onto his shoulder, it's his right shoulder this time.

Now he got sneaked up behind two times.

Rydel turned around, and Roloni's face is literally inches away from his own. He realised what's happening after looking into Rydel's eyes for a second or two before both guys ducked back.

'My bad, didn't get a lot of rest last night.' Roloni punched his c.h.e.s.t with one of his arms as he lets go of Rydel's shoulder, 'big night.'

'oooooh~' Edward jabbed Roloni with a finger through a thin part of his exoskeleton and made him jump, 'good hunting?'

'Don't put it like that.' Roloni growled and Hannah slapped Edward on the back, 'it is disrespectful... but yeah it was a good night.'

'Well, let's hope post s.e.x performance for Aquarians follow a similar trend to that of humans.' Rydel rolled his eyes as he turned away from Roloni.

'About that...' Roloni almost chocked on himself, and Rydel genuinely thought that was physiologically impossible, 'I have heard about the details about today's practice from an officer...'

'NOPE!' Rydel stopped him before the De javu continued, 'none of that.'

'Attention recruits and students!' The hologram of the vehicles and piloting department head appeared on the center stage of the plaza everyone gathered around, his voice thundered through the surrounding speakers and grabbed everyone's attention immediately, 'Today is the day of the first Pilotmania in a long time, and we have a group of fresh recruits ready for the challenge. So before we detailed the actual challenge for today, let's lay down some basics.'

'First, the rewards. The winning pair will get unhindered communication access of 90 minutes, this is incredibly valuable, and expensive on our part, but was a highly requested service. Then, you will also get five hundred Wolf Credits. The second place will get a third of that, and the third place will get a third of that. And that's it. You were told about this challenge, so you should have been prepared.'

Some nervous and confused chatter echoed through the crowd, and obviously some are less prepared than the others.

'The actual course will consist of four different courses stringed together, where you have a particular objective for each of them. You would have one hour to prepare, then you should make your way over to the land vehicle base by 0900 standard time and start the competition.'

'Dismissed.'

The massive crowd burst into intense conversation, and Rydel and Roloni just looked at each other and remained silent.

'Apparently, it's all of the recruits that aimed to get through to the nanotechnology enhancement level, and beyond, plus a bunch of trainees sent here from the Grey Wolf, plus a couple of the normal students that will be participating,' Edward's voice came from above, and the trio turned to face him, the black dot on his teeth is gone now. Hannah's probably told him about it.

'So about fifty vehicles?' Rydel scanned around all of the different people standing near them, and a handful of the people standing near the edge of the crowd began to diffuse away as time ticks by.

'Yeah.' said Roloni, 'Simple stuff. I will go clean up, see you in an hour.'

Typically when Rydel was still getting the hang of basic land-based driving, there has never been more than twenty people training in the same session. So seeing a fleet of different vehicles gathering in the no longer spacious preparation area is quite a contrast to the usual sights. Rydel and Roloni are assigned a basic four-wheeled LandRover, and a mission brief is assigned to the projector located within the car itself. When Roloni had rocked up finally, Rydel has already started on some basic preparations and checks.

'You know, Edward and Hannah has definitely got together...' Roloni started adjusting the seat position of the driver's seat, while Rydel is checking the engines, 'I will drive?'

'Yeah, and I will do the fighting...' Rydel replied with a sign, 'never the most confident with my driving skills to begin with. I will be with you in a second.'

'Right.' Roloni yawned and then pop open a small container of caffeine pills, he looked at Rydel waited for him to disappear out of sight before pouring himself three pills. It is going to be a long day, Roloni thought, thankfully his date agreed to share half the caffeine tablets just to make it through the competition.

The car rocked gently as Rydel jumped in, then he opened up the mission brief as Roloni is shaking his head in the driver seat to try to force down the tablets.

'The first part of Pilotmania series: You are to hunt down the vehicle with a series number CC46, and obtain a data core located at the back of their car. That will be how you access your next crafts. At the back of this car, you have a pair of combat armour and protection suits, as well as standard weapons, the usual combat simulation rules apply. Nothing is off limits, and do what you must to win, like you would in real missions. Head to your starting area in due time.'

The paragraph is simple, and it seemed like a location coordinate is going to be provided once the actual competition begins. This seems too easy though, and from Rydel's experience, there is always going to be wrinkle to these kind of drills.

Rydel left his seat and went ahead to change into his suit and methodically wrapped the armor plates around his vitals. Then, he looked to the side at the weapons attached to the walls...

'Ah, I think it's better if I drive.'

The entire course for the land vehicle part of Pilotmania is spread throughout the area starting from the densely packed forest and woodlands towards the beach front and shallow water. Up in the distance on the other side of the 1 kilometer of shallow water is where the base for the water vehicle is located, but right now the systems embedded within the driving system will prevent anyone from entering that area without the possession of the data core. As Rydel brought the pair to the starting point, there is absolutely no one in sight. Worse yet, they are located on the boaraders of the woods and the water. As the timer from the entire competition is shown on the projector located in between Rydel and Roloni slowly reaches the inevitable end, Rydel can't help but keep glancing over at the camera's attached to the steering wheel as well as multiple corners of the car itself.

Rydel would imagine the actual streaming of this competition work in a extremely similar way to how the War Games are being streamed back in the settled regions. All of the audience will be able to view the big picture of the competition through a map of the entire region, and they are able to zoom in to any individual units to see what's happening inside the crafts.

'Stop looking, it would make us seem unnatural, don't tell me you are camera shy.' Roloni said, but the fight against that instinct would only worsen the curiosity. And worse yet, Roloni chose to talk with only one minute left before the start, right when Rydel is the most nervous. A projected map is shown on the front window, as well as an indicator of where their target is and a local scanner.

'Shhhh...' Rydel said as he ducked his head to look around the roof of the car and peaked into the skies before returning his gaze back in front.

Suddenly, their map is updated, and both knew where their targets are.

'So, how does this whole thing work though?' Roloni turned his head to look at Rydel and asked the question as he slammed down the gas. Roloni's head was thrown back into the head rest, but Rydel knew Aquarians aren't too picky with what kind of forces their heads go through, 'the target is five kilometers away, through the bushes.'

'Yeah, I really don't think it just a matter of half the people hunting and half the people running. Or maybe many hunting few...' Rydel let his inner thoughts come out as he focuses on the arrow pointing towards the target, also trusting Roloni to be the guide.

'Or maybe everyone is hunting?' Roloni asked as he freed two arms and readjusted the tightness on his helmet to prevent rocking as Rydel drove the car through the woodlands and the uneven surfaces populated with rocks, roots and small plants, 'but how would that work? Watch out for a pond ahead, swerve right to avoid.'

'Oh I think I get it! We are all chasing each other! So just keep going until we get our prey before they get someone else, or we got taken out by those hunting us!'

Rydel didn't reply, but instead focused on keeping the two of them alive while travelling through the bush. He opened his eyes as wide as he possibly can and tried to catch in every detail he could about the environment as the images flashes before disappearing behind them. To get to the other side of the clearing, they had to go straight through a tight region where the creator decided to put all the trees at. Roloni has marked out a few openings that they may be able to rush through should they have enough speed charging at it when they were first driving through this area to reach their starting point.

The woods are grown in such a way that the thick roots of the trees tangled intensely with each other, forming a thick barricade of wood and leaves like a great wall separating between the loosely grown woodlands of the swamps and the true forest. The wall completely blocked out the line of sight, yet the rumbling of several vehicles and gun fires.

'Shields online.' As Rydel brought the car to going parallel alongside the wall of trees, Roloni flicked on the shield generator and had his hands full with all six of the guns on the car. It almost felt purposeful when Rydel counted the number of weapons attached to the sides of the car, 'first entry in three hundred meters, give me at least fifty kilometers per hour.'

'Understood.' Rydel nodded and took a sharp right turn to create some distance before sharply steering back and fully accelerating towards the tiny gap that Roloni saw before.

It seemed a bit of a stretch for the cars to go through, and Rydel gave Roloni a quick critical glance before trying to kept the car straight through the bumpy ride. The speedometer showed fifty, but Rydel kept on pressing the gas.

Sixty.

Seventy.

The car ripped through the interlinking branches and the trees with the forces of a freight train, spreading the the woods outwards on either side and ejecting the rest out in front. The front side of the vehicle was temporarily clouded by the acc.u.mulation of woody materials and leaves, but Rydel and Roloni can see from the windows that they have somehow managed to charge into the middle of a blood bath.

A few of the vehicles are already severely damaged to the point of uselessness, while another few chased each other across the woody terrain. Some of the recruits are leaning out of the windows with guns blazing hot while those that were forced to abandon the vehicle instead used it as cover and rained down fire at the ones that wronged them. Fire and smoke are everywhere, though it has yet to affect the plant growth around them.

'The target is slowing down three kilometers out! Turn right!' Roloni instructed as the shields began to the withered away by the welcomes sent by the fellow vehicles in the region. Rydel nodded and took them through a sharp turn while Roloni quickly opened the map and checked on his targets.

It turns out Rydel just happened to run through an area of intense skirmishes, and the rest of the area became fairly quiet once you get far enough from it. There is a clear track left behind by the ones they are pursuing, so Rydel would just happily follow the marks they have left behind for a little while. If they don't have to think about the people with guns chasing each other Mad Max style, all of this might even be enjoyable.

'Someone's behind us...' Suddenly Roloni noticed another vehicle tailing them on the map and warned Rydel. They are still quite far away, but their intentions are clear when Rydel tried to cut across the woods through a few different routes, and they are still following closely.

'Yep.' Rydel took a deep breath in, and raised his concentration levels even further. All of the motions became automatic as he enters the zone of pure speed and control. Each movement of the hand and feet is instantaneously coordinated in order to achieve maximal speed.

He need to get to the targets. He had to get to the targets.

The trees whizzing by the semi-open windows sounds like missiles being fired from beside them and it became harder and harder for Roloni to track what's actually happening around. He looked over to see the one man responsible for their speed.

Rydel is fully locked in, and the silvery glove on his left hand glows gently. Orange pulses travels through his body, first through the golden brown arms and then disappeared into the clothing before reappearing once it gets to his neck. His hand and feet movements are fast, unnaturally so. It's so mechanical, and precise.

It felt, inhuman.

Roloni looked back at the map in front of him, and found that their pursuers have either given up, or Rydel simply has shook them. Either way, they are safe for now. They have also closed in on their target, who's only one kilometer away at this point.

'Are we close?' Rydel looked down at the map, up at the back mirror, and back to focusing on the road in front of them.

'Yeah...pretty damn close.' Roloni turned to look at Rydel again, and saw the glove returning to normal and the orange pulses are no longer there. He returned to being normal, as far as Roloni can tell, 'Are you ok?'

'Yeah...' Rydel took a deep breath and licked his dry lips, 'I am just a little tired.'

'Want a caffiene pill?' Roloni slipped the capped bottle from within his exoskeleton and popped one of the white pills out, allowing it to roll across his slightly greasy and dusted hand, 'one should be enough for a human.'