Okafor waited for everyone to take their seats and to settle. She stood at the front of the classroom, eyeing us all down as we took our seats. I felt her eyes pass over me and had to suppress a shudder.
"Hands up," she said. "How many of you know why the Federation uses mechs?"
Most of the room raised their hands. Okafor nodded.
"Good. Now, keep your hands up if the answer you're about to give me is 'because they're cool.'"
Only one hand remained up; it was Sato's.
"Put your hand down, Sato." She turned to the whiteboard and drew two columns. One was labelled 'DIRECT', the other was labelled 'INDIRECT'. "The Federation has orbital bombardment platforms that can glass a continent from low orbit. Drone swarms that can saturate a battlefield with more firepower than a full mech battalion of D-Grades. Guided munitions that can hit a target from astronomical units away without a single human being present in the engagement zone."
She paused, watching the class all suck in a collective breath.
"So why do we strap sixteen-year-olds into war machines and drop them into direct combat when we could solve most engagements from orbit?"
"Because only direct combat generates XP," Park said.
Okafor pointed at him.
"Correct." She tapped the INDIRECT column. "Any engagement conducted through indirect means, whether it's ships, drone deployment, guided munitions, or weapon emplacements, generates zero experience points. Zero system recognition means zero levelling progress."
She tapped the DIRECT column.
"Direct engagement through system-recognised interfaces — personal combat, mech combat, any form of violence conducted through the pilot's own body or through a system-integrated machine generates experience. The system rewards direct participation. It does NOT acknowledge indirect action."
"You're telling us we fight in mechs because the system won't give us XP for using better weapons?" Someone from Barracks 4 said.
"I'm telling you the system was designed by the Enlightened, and the Enlightened built the reward structure," Okafor explained with a flat cadence. "However, there is a second reason. System credits. Generated through direct combat engagement. System credits fund military operations, infrastructure development, and the acquisition of technology. A single mech engagement against the Buggers or Imperialists generates more ROI than an entire agriculture world's output for an entire week. A large-scale battle anyway."
"So wars are profitable?" A kid called out.
"Wars conducted through direct engagement are profitable." Okafor turned back to the whiteboard. "The Federation uses mechs because the system makes mechs the most economically viable form of warfare. And, whether or not you find it philosophically satisfying, is irrelevant to your survival."
No one spoke.
"And if you think the Buggers care about something as abstract as moral philosophy, you're damned wrong. This galaxy is kill or be killed, so pucker up, snowflakes. You're in for a bumpy ride."
I nodded along. This wasn't new information to me. It was something that had been drilled into my head since day one.
War is profitable.
"Now," Okafor said, uncapping a fresh marker. "Let's talk about how you actually pilot one."
She drew a diagram on the whiteboard, a simplified outline of a humanoid mech with lines connecting to a seated figure inside the cockpit. There were two lines: blue for the neural link, red for manual controls.
"Piloting operates on two channels. The first is the neural interface." She traced the blue lines. "Your body is connected to the mech through a direct mind-machine link. Base motor functions translate automatically — you think step forward' the mech steps forward. You think raise guard, the mech raises guard. The translation is instinctive, handled by your firmware, and operates at the speed of your own neural processing."
"So it's like wearing a really big body?" Sato asked.
"If by a really big body you mean a machine that weighs multiple tonnes of metal and has an input delay between your thought and the machine's response— then yes." Okafor tapped the diagram. "Your physical and mental stats directly affect performance."
She wrote the stats in a column beside the diagram.
STR → How hard your mech can hit.
AGI → How fast your mech can move.
VIT → How much damage your mech can take.
WIL → How long you can stay in the fight.
INT → How many systems you can run at once.
PER → How much data you and your mech can process.
"These translations are direct," Okafor continued. "For example, one point of Agility measurably improves your response time. One point of Perception measurably sharpens your sensor processing. The mech amplifies what you bring to the cockpit. It does not compensate for what you lack."
I stared at the stat translations and cross referenced it with my own stats — Agility 31, Strength 28, Perception 21, Intelligence 17, Willpower 22, Vitality 33, — this meant I possessed a very balanced build: Strong response time from Agility, solid uptime from Willpower, decent sensor integration from the Perception, below-average force amplification from the Strength, middling system management from the Intelligence, and a really strong vitality base to hold it all together.
I'd be a pilot who'd move well, maintain the link through extended engagements, and read sensor data competently, but struggle at damage application and multiple auxiliary system use.
Just what I've been building towards, something that will match my deviation perfectly.
"Second channel," Okafor said, moving to the red lines on her diagram. "Manual control. Your thrusters, weapon systems, defensive countermeasures, communications and auxiliary systems. Everything beyond base motor function is operated through manual inputs. Switches, triggers, throttle controls, and haptic interfaces in the cockpit."
I glanced at Tomás. He was writing furiously. He caught my look and tapped his notebook — a column of numbers I assumed was his stat translation assessment already forming into a model.
She turned back to the classroom, "Any questions?"
"What happens when you lose the neural link?" someone asked.
"The mech stops responding to motor commands and reverts to firmware-controlled safe mode. You're a metal statue until you re-establish the connection.
"Ma'am," Jin said. "How do deviations interact with the mech?"
Okafor nodded. "Good question. Your deviation operates through the neural link the same way your motor functions do. If your deviation is physical, for example, enhanced strength, speed augmentation, reinforced structure, it translates directly through the mech's systems. Let's take your burst acceleration deviation as an example. It would produce a corresponding spike in mech response time and movement speed during activation."
Jin leaned forward slightly.
"If your deviation is ether-based — shields, projections, energy manipulation. It channels through the mech's ether conduits. The mech acts as an amplifier for your ether output, scaling it to the machine's capacity." Okafor paused. "This is where your ether stats become relevant to piloting. Capacity determines how much ether you can channel through the mech per engagement. Sensitivity determines how finely you can calibrate your ether output through the mech's systems and your ability to sense Ether. Control determines your channelling efficiency, how much ether you spend per activation versus how much is lost as waste, and also how fast you are able to activate skills and deviations."
It's a damn shame that I'm basically locked out of my Ether stats. I can only make use of a couple of skills for this.
"For those of you with minimal ether capability," Okafor continued, "The mech's intrinsic systems compensate. Every mech comes equipped with baseline modules — sensor suites, defensive plating, mobility packages, weapon loadouts. These are the mech's own capabilities, independent of the pilot's stats."
She drew a second diagram, a mech outline with labelled compartments.
"Think of the mech as a piece of equipment with its own attributes. A sensor-heavy loadout boosts your effective Perception while connected. The reinforced chassis compensates for lower Strength amplification. Advanced thruster packages enhance response time independent of your Agility. The mech's modules interact with your stats. They stack and they multiply, but they do not replace."
"So the right mech can cover your weaknesses?" Park asked.
"The right mech can mitigate your weaknesses. A Perception 10 pilot in the best sensor suite available is still a worse sensor processor than a Perception 50 pilot in a basic loadout. But the gap narrows." Okafor leaned against her desk. "This is why mech assignment matters. Why firmware matters. Why the sponsors you saw circling after the exhibition care about your stat profiles."
"And maximises their return on investment," Tomás added.
"And maximises their return on investment," Okafor confirmed. "The sponsors are investing in combat packages that generate system credits. A well-matched pilot-mech pairing generates more credits per engagement than a mismatched one. The economics are always present. Get comfortable with it."
"Now for the final element," Okafor said. "Firmware."
She erased the whiteboard again and drew a new diagram — a block between the pilot figure and the mech outline.
"Firmware is the translation protocol. It converts your neural impulses into commands the mech can execute. The base firmware, 'The Aegis-Assist', which you'll all be using in simulation this week, handles the standard translation. Think, move, the mech responds. It's functional, it's generic, but it works for any pilot regardless of stat distribution or combat style."
Okafor tapped the firmware block.
"Specialised firmware — what the sponsors offer, what the corporate frameworks provide optimises the translation for specific stat profiles and combat approaches. A Kepler firmware package optimised for high-Agility pilots reduces the neural lag on movement commands at the cost of sensor processing bandwidth. A Helix framework optimized for high-Strength amplification increases force output at the cost of mental link uptime."
"This week," Okafor said, "you will run simulation hours on the Aegis-Assist. Learn to walk before you learn to fight. Dismissed."
The squad filed out into the corridor, and we each left with a pep in our step and grins on our faces. Tomorrow was the big day, when we finally got to enter Mechs, even if it was just simulated. It meant that we had survived where a large portion of people had failed; we were deemed good enough to be trusted with advanced Federation technology.
"That XP thing," Sato said as we walked. "The whole 'indirect fire generates nothing'. That can't be the only reason why we use Mechs. Surely if we get like a bajillion ships instead of a bunch of mechs that would win more wars and bring more resources."
"Ehh, in the short term, sure, but you're seemingly forgetting just how strong a Rank-4 or even a Rank-5 actually is. Even if there are only a handful of those at the pinnacle, those few can wage wars entirely by themselves." I explained.
"Yeah, I suppose that makes sense, but it seems weird. Why don't they just fight all the wars for us?"
"Well, how do you think we got them in the first place?" I added.
"You are also forgetting something, our dear Rabbit." Tomás started.
"Oh yeah, and what's that?"
"The system was designed by the Enlightened," Tomás said, mimicking Okafor, "The Enlightened built the reward structure. The reward structure shapes how humanity fights. How humanity fights determines how humanity develops. How humanity develops—"
"Determines what the Enlightened get out of us," Jin finished.
"Cool," Sato said. "Cool, cool, cool. So we're just a bunch of suckers in expensive robots."
"Suckers who earn system credits," Park corrected.
"Oh, good, profitable suckers. Much better."
The Enlightened benefit from a stable and motivated society, and also one that wages constant war. Just what the hell are they getting out of us?