Test

Wake up blared through the halls of the campus so loud at 0600 that the windows rattled and Tip rolled right off the top bunk. Once she hit the floor she didn't bother righting herself, simply rolling across the room to her dresser and taking out the day's uniform. She wouldn't be attending classes today, but there were two other things on her schedule that required she get a bit dirty, and that was what the uniform was for.

Lian rolled over and went back to sleep, used to sleeping through such blaring alarms coming from the military base city of Sonapa. Fogrest however, was a small town in the remnants of what was Central America, so Bugs had no reason to not even blink an eye open like Lian had at the noise.

For all of 10 seconds, Xander debated leaving them there to rot, to stew in their actions as they regretted ever sleeping in, and then she remembered that she was going to be sharing a room with these girls for the foreseeable future, and thought better of her actions.

" If you don't get up now you're going to miss breakfast, and I can't bring you any later, because I have a test to take and a paper to present."

It was obvious that Lian rolled over and woke up when Tip mentioned her test, but it was even more obvious Bugs only rolled over at the mention of food because the first word out of her mouth was,

" Torrijas!"

Tip chuckled as she closed the door behind herself, and headed for the cafeteria for breakfast. At some point, the other two must have run to meet her, because right as she was entering the caf they pulled up beside her out of breath, and yelling at her to slow down so they could catch their breath. Tip laughed softly as she pushed the doors open and headed for the line, the other two whining behind her about how unfair it was she didn't wake them up.

" Not my job."

" It should be if you're the only one that actually hears the wake-up blare."

" You heard it."

" But I didn't! I was sleepin."

" Then you can wake each other up since Lian can hear it and roll out of bed."

" Nah, too much work!"

They laughed as they got their food and made their way out to the courtyard where the sun was just peeking over the vast tree line to warm the world with its presence.

After breakfast was finished, Tip invited her two roommates over for the first dirty objective of the day, morning exercise. They looked surprised when she told them what she was getting up to early in the morning like this, but they didn't disagree since part of the pilot program was a fitness test they had to pass bi-monthly in order to test combat readiness.

She made her way to the outdoor track and started to stretch, limbering up before she started her morning run as a warmup to the heavier exercise she'd be doing later. She unzipped the top of her coveralls and tied the sleeves around her waist, having forgotten her tank top this morning though, there was only her sports bra under. She didn't really mind, she had spent a good portion of her teen years being yelled at by her dad about casual half nudity since she'd often show up to the workshop in shorts and a sports bra since it was hot as all hell, and the only people on the track with her were her roommates, who would inevitably see her naked form. She looked up and they didn't seem to mind so she went about her stretching as normal, more doing yoga with how she was bending than actual stretches.

Her limbs loosened and heated, telling her she was ready for more, and so she got to work. Tip is proud to say her 4-minute mile barely made her break a sweat, and that her immediate transfer into a core and lower body workout didn't strain any muscles at all. She was really starting to feel the burn when her upper body routine came round though, and the smile she had on her face displayed all of the sharp teeth in her round face.

When she got up, Bugs was actively chugging a whole water bottle, facing away from Tip. Lian was looking Tip up and down in a way she wasn't familiar with, eyes wide and head nodding. Tip tilted her head, eyebrow raised as the two weirdos decidedly didn't look her in the eye, making her laugh. She knew it was bizarre for pilots to see mechanics in this light, but they didn't think the machines lifted themselves, did they?

They hit the showers right before lunch, heading in to grab food before making their way to Phoenix Lab 7, where the test for the two pilot spots was going to be held.

For the most part, the lab was empty. Besides the two Lamps that stood in the middle of the floor, which sparked joy and nostalgia in Tip.

" Hey, you two wanna do something fun?"

" Can we eat first?"

" We can eat after we take our seats, come on," Tip jetted off over the floor, the other two following behind her confusedly.

Tip looked around for a moment before she spotted what she was looking for. After she made sure they were truly alone, she pounced on the access ladder they hadn't taken off the leg of the Lamp on the right. The other two made a noise as she started climbing.

" What are you doing?"

" You ever had food on the shoulders of a Lamp?"

It was something she had done many times, sitting beside her father and his friends as they laughed and threw jokes and food around, content with their lives and the joy in which they had wrapped themselves. In Tips oh so humble opinion, food tasted better on the shoulder of a Lamp. The other two followed her up, and then were confused when the ladder ended at the junction where the hip met the rest of the torso, Tip, however, was unphased.

Gripping her tray tight, she used her right hand to take hold of the part of the exo that she liked to call the rib cover, and pulled. She relished the flex of unused muscle and she all but launched herself onto the exo's ribs, using them like pull-up bars as she scampered up the side of the Lamp and onto its chest. From there she grabbed onto the protrusions where the armor made connection with the body and threw herself over. In the little pocket there, she sat criss-cross and waited for the other two to follow her path. When they finally made it up, they looked at her like she had two heads, still being weird about her apparent fitness.

" I thought Luminoes didn't have to pass strength tests?"

" We don't, but if you think hauling around heavy ass equipment doesn't build muscle, you have truly never seen how fucking huge these goddamn machines are."

They laughed as they dug into their lunch, which sadly wasn't tamales as Bugs had so adamantly hoped. As they sat in the little shoulder pocket and ate, bodies started to drift into the room. Tip recognized them as the school board, a couple of professors, the man who was supposed to grade her test to pass the basics class, the monitor who spotted the problem, and beside him and a group of unknowns, the General.

They weren't spotted immediately as they were covered by the armor plating on the Lamp, so they continued to eat. Besides, all these people were early.

They took 15 minutes to finish their lunch and then scared the shit out of a few people when they popped up from the shoulder hideaway. Tip showed the other two how to get down and then they threw their trash away. The pilot duo wished her luck before heading up to the spectator area to watch.

" Good morning everyone, today we have a student wanting to try her luck at fixing two Lamps fast enough to have them both operational for combat at the same time."

There were laughs in the crowd around her, doubters thinking she had no idea what she was doing, but also among them were looks of intrigue, interest she didn't know whether to be flattered or disgusted by.

" Repair time is 30 minutes each since the standard for one is an hour. Failure of completion will result in an immediate expulsion for all three participants. Your time starts in 3...2...1!"

The repairs were simple enough for both Lamps, only really daunting in the face of a first year with no practical application: chips in the armor, missing gears, and in the case of the Lamp on the left, a rotator cuff in the shoulder that would stall the motor and make the whole arm non-functional. With the list in her head complete, Tip set off for the fabricator to input the needed chipped armor repairs so she could let that run while she ripped that arm to pieces to replace and fabricate the needed parts. She heard aghast noises in the audience when she walked away from the fabricator, but they were unimportant as she hauled herself up the side of the Lamp and onto its shoulder.

She looked over her tool belt for her saw and then saw it on the ground, where she had picked up the belt. Who left a saw off the belt? Especially during a timed test! Sabotage! You know what, fuck it.

She got her hands under the neck plating to anchor herself, then she planted her feet in the crevice between the arm and shoulder and pushed. It took a few tries, but she eventually popped it off. It hit the ground with a resounding bang, tearing up the floor and making a few people jump. She clipped her harness attached to the belt onto the service hooks and hung herself over the edge, sending a request from her watch to the parts and service bot, who handed her the rotator she needed, some oil because this bitch was creaky as fuck, and a laser welder because there was no way any of this was done properly.

As she was yanking the rotator out the fabricator went off, signalling that the armor chips on the right one were finished and it was starting on the right ones, just as the thirty-minute mark was hit. She was making good time, but she wanted to make better. Once the cuff was set properly, she sent the claw to retrieve the arm on the ground to be replaced. She heard the murmurs about how the arm was useless now, having hit the floor like that, but it was probably just dented, and it would be a waste to use new parts on these two bots.

Tip finished repairs with 15 minutes to spare, and a couple of people looked suitably impressed, and a couple looked particularly perturbed. She just smiled her sharp smile at them as she made her way over to the General, two beaming little pilots on either side of her, nearly jumping in their excitement to have their positions confirmed.

The General had a smile on her old face, eyes squinted in a pleasure she had not felt in some time. The three in front of her saluted and all throughout, the smug little smile on the mechanic's face never dropped.

" Well done cadet, that was quite the impressive show you put on," from the crowd, one of the unknowns with a sour look on their face raised their voice to be heard over the constant murmur of the others in the room.

" Aren't you going to test function, the task was to make them operational after all."

Tip laughed by herself before she realized they weren't joking, and then she laughed at them because that would be stupid.

" That scrap metal won't be moving today, or anytime soon. Functional in this case is external only, after all, it would take far more than an hour to make unmovings operational."

The two Lamps on the floor had probably been unusable for far longer than Tip had existed, and an hour was only the max time for basic function and cosmetic repair, a commonly known fact even among pilots. She dismissed the fool who had asked such a stupid question and turned back to the general.

" Speaking of, may I have those?"

The old woman looked taken aback as she processed the request made by the young woman in front of her.

" What would a freshman need scrap metal for?"

This, much to Tip's later dismay, was how she ended up pitching her personal Lamp design to the director and board.