Learning

Ch 11 (E)

--

The next day started similar to the first, bugles sounded. Packed halls, although much more orderly this time.

Making their way to homeroom Allison still stuck to Lucas like glue, refusing to let up even for a second.

There was no assigned seating, so they sat in a different spot than yesterday. But overall, it was much the same.

"What do you think we'll learn today?" Allison giddily asked,

"Probably more about tardigrades or something" He responded, equally as excited but refusing to show it.

Allison quickly stood, nearly knocking over her chair. Lucas jumped in his seat as he looked at what she was staring at.

"Lucas!" Peter barged into the room making his way toward the third row.

Aliyah hid behind Peter; she looked like she was shaking but Lucas couldn't accurately tell.

Finally getting close to them Peter lowed his head,

"I'd like to apologize. Aliyah explained to me what happened and- and I feel ashamed of my outburst yesterday" Peter's solemn tone reflected his regret.

"Umm..It's really fine, I can understand how you felt at the time," Lucas said, picking his words very carefully.

"No!, it's not. It was unacceptable and I truly apologize" Peter yelled as the others in the class began to eavesdrop.

"…"

"I don't have as much experience with this kind of thing so let's just call it even," Lucas said, Not wanting to be the center of attention any longer.

Peter sat down in the chair next to Lucas as Aliyah took the fourth in the row.

Mr.Brill walked through the door, holding the same tablet from yesterday, Interrupting the conversation.

"We can talk about it later," Peter whispered.

"Good morning class, I hope you all slept well."

"Okay, for the early half of today I will get you up to speed on the true history of the war," Brill rapidly got the attention of everyone in the class.

"Nice, you guys seem to be very interested in that." He flicked on the screen, displaying a map of the Earth.

"So real quick review first since the borders are constantly changing. NATO has control over these continents," Brill said as a laser pointer hovered over north America, western Europe, and Oceania, turning these sections blue.

"Now when it comes to South America and Africa along with small portions of the middle east it's sort of a toss-up. These regions are neither our territory nor the axis's," These plots of land then turned gray.

"The opposing forces control, well. All of Asia and the eastern parts of Europe." These places lit up red.

"And these are the places we are currently fighting over." The map zoomed into the Atlantic Ocean as many islands lit up orange along with Japan to signify an active conflict.

"Another region that shares this conflict is, of course, eastern Europe and… the artic ocean," the map moved over to each of these locations highlighting them.

At this point the students were really hooked, the artic conflict region was never discussed.

"Now. I doubt you guys have heard of the Artic Ocean conflicts because of how recent they've become. The region used to be completely impassible due to the safeguards Russia and the US had in place. Up until recently, those were still in place. But now, there's nothing preventing either side from crossing over,"

"We will talk more about this strategical aspect later today as we focus more on the history for right now,"

The image on the screen changed to that of a more peaceful setting, this image was from South Korea, Seoul.

"I warn you in advance this video is graphic as was the one yesterday, but this world does not allow those who are weak to violence to prosper, so get used to it" Brill hit the play button, indifferent to the fact that these recruits were still just kids.

The sound of the city came through the speakers, cars drove past as the stores teemed with life, as average citizens went about their day.

Sirens started to Blair as everyone stopped. Looking to the sky, whoever was operating the camera ran for cover as a loud boom ejected it from his hand.

Screams were heard as hundreds if not thousands of deep impacts rocked the ground. The camera was finally picked up as the unknown individual ran, screaming a language lost to time. Building after building fell around the person until a singular large building fell toward the camera,

This was when the video paused.

"Out of the 15.4 million people living in Seoul, only 20,000 survived. And by the time the army arrived to defend, the Chinese and North Korean tanks and planes dominated the area. It only took them a week to completely take over south Korea, similar events unfolded in places like Taiwan and eastern Europe. The combined might of these three nations was a force to be reckoned with." Brill swapped slides.

"Luckily for us our base in Okinawa helped lessen the direct blow to Japan, preventing them from fully taking over the nation."

"Okinawa's base fell one month after the initial attack due to attrition; it was impossible to reach because of the blockade the axis made around the island. As you all know, Japan is still fighting, and much of the southern continent became a wasteland."

"Now because these nations were in cohorts along with the scale of these operations, all NATO countries declared war. Initiating WW3 as we know it,"

"The war crimes committed in the affected countries are horrendous and leave us with little to no reason as to why these powers feel the need to kill so indiscriminately."

--

Brill discussed different atrocities committed and how they came to be, diving deep into all the Axis had done, truly appalling to Lucas and his classmates.

When they were just kids none of this was as much as a thought. He knew the enemy was bad, but this new information just reinforced that belief.

"Alright, let's leave it here for today. And I remind you guys to come right back here after lunch. No combat class today."

The students filed out towards the canteen.

"Where are we going to sit today?" Peter and Aliyah walked beside Lucas and Allison.

"Probably the same spot as last time genus," Allison said.

"Ooh, yea probably. Haha" Peter scratched his head as Aliyah snuck glances at Lucas.

Every time he would try to reciprocate, she would use Peter as cover and peek through a different angle.

**

They quickly received their lunch and sat down at the table. Today's lunch looked better than yesterday's at least, being a large slice of chicken pot pie with a side of potatoes.

"So I've been meaning to ask, and if this is a sore subject it's fine but. I myself don't really understand how either of us passed out yesterday Aliyah" Lucas was dying to know if his powers somehow affected the both of them.

", that was me, sorry" Aliyah's quiet voice was a little shaky as she responded.

"M-my ability works by siphoning off others' energy and using it for my own, usually I feed off impure heat energy from peter." She spoke,

"Aliyah! We aren't supposed to share that much about our ability," Peter hushed voice showed concerned.

"I-I trust them. Even after what happened, it's still like the energy he has- is calling to me" Her face became calm as she once again felt the energy radiating from Lucas.

"Hey! Snap out of it glutton, your starting to drool. And you got all the energy you need right here," Peter snapped his fingers in front of her face and pointed to himself.

His voice lowered as he said.

"I got plenty to spare," the two shared a sentimental moment as Aliyah snapped out of it.

"…"

"Cough- Well, that's a really interesting ability but why did It also take me out too" Lucas commented.

"hmm, I guess your body was utilizing the energy I tried to take. But I wasn't able to even attempt to absorb the pure energy radiating off of you. To my understanding its…-" She paused as she thought through what she was going to say.

"Just the energy leaving your body as we speak, if siphoned, would likely be able to power this entire facility," Aliyah said.

"only for a couple of seconds but it's still impressive none the less"

"So, when you failed all that power just went into the room," Allison said.

"Now that you mention it, I did feel a little tingly feeling during our skirmish, but I thought that was just a blow to a nerve or something" Peter added.

Lucas was still dumbfounded by the fact that the small amount of energy he felt was that powerful. Aliyah hadn't even connected to the source of his power which was in his brain. If that had happened- Lucas didn't even want to think about what could result.

"The pain you felt yesterday was from the energy?" Lucas asked, still wondering if his ability affected her directly.

"More or less, I guess you could say that my nerves go so overloaded that they became hypersensitive to touch. To the point where it was excruciatingly painful,"

The rest of the group went quiet as each of them mulled over the new information. Overall, this lunch was very informative to Lucas, his outlook on how powerful he was compared to others changed immensely.

'I have all this power and yet have no idea how to harness it' Lucas clenched his fist as they headed back to homeroom.

***

"Okay- ok, I'll let him know." Brill hung up the phone as he looked around, laying his eyes on a small black-haired kid.

"Ahh, Lucas," Brill announced,

"You are to report to the director's office after lesson today," Brill almost looked solemn as he said those words, only raising Lucas's worry.

The entire class focused on him.

'Just my luck' Lucas thought, remembering the vivid image of Commander Eclipse, and how imposing she was.

"Okay, time for the second lesson of today," The screen in the classroom was still on from the previous lesson as he changed files.

"Yesterday we had a combat evaluation and then dismissed you for the remainder of the day, but on a usual day we will have an afternoon lesson and only hold combat lessons three out of the six days a week, you all get Sunday off like usual of course"

"Today being, one of the off days, we will go over what makes Academy 0 so special."

"To be honest, these scientific discoveries were only shed light upon five years ago. And every day we work harder and harder to implement this discovery into reality"

The image on the screen changed to a large brown bear.

"Believe it or not but we humans were stupid enough to think that we were the special ones, blessed with powers and finally locking our position on the top of the food chain. But ooh were we so naive" Brill was still marveling over the image.

A tall kid raised his hand as brill pointed him out.

"Yes?"

"Professor. Are you meaning to imply that animals can also inherit abilities" The boy asked in bewilderment.

"Yes, and they are stronger than we could have ever imagined, each one mutating to be more brutal than the last."

The image on the screen morphed into a spiked creature with brown fur than walked on two legs. The slideshow then commenced as tens of animals morphed into different variants all unique in their own way.

This time Allison raised her hand, hoping to earn brownie points with the teacher.

"You?"

"Yes sir, why haven't we ever seen these beasts then?"

"Excellent question, it's because our cities have become so heavily guarded by our forces that the beasts there have no chance to evolve"

"In order for an animal to improve it feeds off other animals with Radigrades inside of them, making them stronger by proxy"

"They ultimately have unlimited potential. Everyone understand?" Brill asked as everyone typed down the information on their tablets.

Brill then explained how different beast threat levels could accurately determine the combat capability of said animal. These included new, adolescent, adult, elder, and brute. These could be further dissected into low, medium, and high for each class.

"Now that that's over with are you ready for the bombshell class?" the question was redundant as they were far too invested not to know.

"The Radigrades aren't just limited to humans and animals, they can also inhabit genetically engineered organic weapons as long as they are implanted by a specialized team of Rad-Smiths"