She growled under her breath. Ariel couldn’t have stopped him from doing what he wanted. It had seemed like a deliberate attack on her reputation: a newbie like him going straight for one of the highest contenders. Her gut writhed, and her tendons jolted as she clenched her hands.
“Objectively speaking, Demetrius had a right to challenge whomever he wanted to,” Manny told Ariel. “You’re not a blademaster yet, but when you do become one—and I have no doubt that you will—the newcomers won’t even dare challenge you until they know they are ready.”
“You’re right,” Ariel said, pulling a book from her bag. “I guess until then, I better challenge him again and actually win this time.” She didn’t let her eyes leave Demetrius, who was still making his way up the steps and now refusing to sign any autographs.
“Here’s what I think,” Manny said, “The two of you can work together. Like Edna and Toby, you can help each other train.”
“I don’t think so,” Ariel replied. A heaviness hung over her, and she added, “The blademaster status is mine alone. I won’t have him get in the way. I can’t trust him.”
“Who then can you trust?” Manny asked, turning to shake hands with Demetrius.
Ariel sat quietly, fully aware of Demetrius lowering himself into the seat beside Manny, but she chose to remain silent. Manny was right. Who could she trust? She still wasn’t entirely sure Marissa wasn’t in league with Manny and Demetrius against her.
With a mass of resentment in her chest, Ariel kept her eyes fixed on Professor Cooper as he arrived. He placed his suitcase on the front desk and clapped to project a hologram of a piece of exposed machinery. Then, like a conductor, he waved his hands to rotate, disassemble, and finally dismiss the image.
“Good morning,” Professor Cooper said, but despite the resonance of his voice, the collective reply was faint. “Let’s try this again,” he muttered to himself. “Good morning, class!”
“Good morning, Professor,” the throng of students moaned like the undead.
“This will be our last lecture,” he said with a dreary gaze at them, “and I know you all must be so…” he added theatrically, “…downcast.”
Everyone let out pretentious sounds of disappointment.
“But fret not,” he continued, brightening up, “because Energy & Core Transfers II will be available in two quarters.” Once again, pretentious applause filled the room. Maybe some of it was real. With outstretched fingers, he pressed down on the air in front of him to calm the nearly two thousand students. “Now, I’m required to briefly introduce and explain to you the two major lines of artificial intelligence that humanity has manipulated in the last three hundred years.” He stopped and smiled at the silence, broken only by a single cough.
The lecture hall darkened, and a holographic, icosahedral object appeared. Black and neon green shaded the object, and it grew as Cooper widened the gap between his palms. “This is a Vox cell, the current nanite powering all the Intelligent Units on Eos. And that includes your nanite skins and armors. The Vox was created in a private lab on Earth. Before… well, we don’t need to get into that.”
Concept Art Vox/Vex Cell
Created with Midjourney
Those were questions still left unanswered. Why were people on Eos? It never sat right with Ariel, this idea that Earth had blown itself into oblivion and that somehow a few had escaped. It made her shiver whenever she thought that someone or something had been responsible.
Professor Cooper rotated the image of the Vox. “Its initial functions were primitive—just a simple drug delivery unit performing basic medical treatment.” He paused. “A decade later, this creepy little unit stole the spotlight.” A spherical cell replaced the previous image. “It showed so much promise but was canceled within four years of its accidental discovery. Does anyone have any idea why?” He squinted, turning his head from one end of the dim semicircular hall to the other.
Ariel pressed the tiny button on her table.
“Anyone?” And upon seeing Ariel’s glowing table, Professor Cooper said, “Yes?”
“A completely autonomous unit,” answered Ariel, “independent of human control.”
“Precisely,” replied the professor. “We call this one a Vex cell; it’s a self-thinking nanite, a derivative of the Vox cell. Quite different from the Vox. While the Vox follows a fixed set of codes, the Vex cell follows a dynamic omnicode that allows for absolute flexibility in its decision-making.”
The Vex cell morphed, taking on the icosahedral shape of the Vox, then transforming into several other geometric shapes before returning to a sphere.
“If it successfully locates an energy source and replicates,” Cooper continued, “then we’re looking at a possible intelligent unit, an IU, developing something of a real conscience—but that’s just conjecture. Its intelligence made it dangerous for drug delivery and medical treatment, or any bodily use. For instance, instead of attacking your astrocytoma, your doctor may find it aiding the cancer to get rid of you.”