Chapter 58: L-3. Battle Maids? SERIOUSLY?!

“Maid Squadron! Stand at ATTEN-SHUN!”

As I barked out that order, a collective groan emanated from everyone. Even so, their military instincts took over; when they were ordered to stand at attention, they did so ramrod-straight. All of us were impeccably dressed in short-skirted maid uniforms, with stripes on the shoulders to show our rank.

Yes, you heard that right: myself, Kometka, Miette, Sveta, Maurice, Sabina, Genevi and Vicky were all wearing that very same sexy French maid outfit that had become Vicky’s trademark. Zehra was also clad in a maid outfit, although hers was fringed with gold trimming. Altogether, this was a thoroughly shameful and indecent display, especially within the realm of military discipline.

“Maids of the Revolutionary Army!” Zehra shouted, her best impression of a sergeant being instantly sabotaged by her singsong voice. “Today is a momentous occasion, gao~n! For on this day, we hereby establish the 1st Battle Maid Squadron!”

“Ugh.” I groaned. “I can’t keep a straight face. This is all so ridiculous…”

Zehra stormed over to me and attempted to glare. I looked down on the tiny lion girl making her best war face and rolled my eyes. I’d been chewed out by professional officers; Zehra simply wasn’t up to snuff.

Zehra was not amused by my unspoken flippancy. “Do you have something to say, Maid Lieutenant Lydia Tereshkova?”

“Please don’t prefix ‘Maid’ to ‘Lieutenant’ like it’s an official rank. And aren’t I supposed to be in command here?” I returned her glare with one of my own.

Zehra puffed out her cheeks. “I’m the Prime Maid, gao~n. I was the one who founded the Maid Corps! That means I outrank YOU, gao~n!”

“If we’re going by seniority, Vicky would fill that role as the prototype. And ‘Prime Maid’ isn’t a rank anyway…”

To my right, Vicky was giggling like crazy. To my left, Sveta had a dopey smile on her face. Kometka just looked shell-shocked, and Miette was grinning mischievously. Maurice’s eyes were dead like a fish, and both Sabina and Genevi were blushing furiously.

I sighed deeply and stared at the ceiling. How did I wind up in this absurd situation?

Let’s rewind the clock a bit…

*****

“You see,” said Zehra, motioning grandiosely to the line of white-colored robotic dolls racked on the wall behind her, “the Telepresence Doll uses a combination of robotics and hard-light holography to allow an AI possession of a physical, human-sized body!”

I wasn’t impressed. “Uh-huh, sure. So what’s the point of it?”

“The POINT” Sveta interjected “is to allow AIs to hug!”

“To HUG?!”

“That’s right! We shouldn’t be denied the pleasures of intimate contact simply because we’re computer programs!” Sveta declared proudly.

“Oh boy, here we go…” Vicky’s tone was foreboding, and her expression was grim.

I shook my head in disbelief. “You know, people back on Earth are starving to death. Is this really an effective use of resources?”

Zehra was indignant. “Don’t you start with me, gao~n. Aside from AI and the last four generations of Gravity Frames, I also invented the modern protein vats used to grow plankton en masse. If it weren’t for those, humanity would have starved long ago, gao~n. I’ve done my duty many times over, so don’t tell me I’m not allowed to assemble a few androids if I want to!”

I quickly backpedaled. “Sorry, I wasn’t spoiling for a fight. It’s just… I’ve spent my entire life on the front lines, so I’m sensitive to scarcity. That’s all I’m saying.”

“If you’re not spoiling for a fight, don’t run your mouth, gao~n. I might forgive you if you kneel and praise my glory…”

Ugh. This woman is so difficult to deal with. I thought, rolling my eyes.

In a flash, Sveta dashed between myself and Zehra, and simultaneously delivered forehead flicks to us both. As we reeled, she went into lecture mode. “Cut it out, both of you. Lydia, Zehra is allowed her eccentricities considering everything she’s done for us. Zehra, quit flaunting your ego.”

Zehra pouted. “Mmmurghhh… fineeee….”

I rubbed my forehead. “Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

“Now, shake hands and make up.” Sveta said firmly.

“I don’t wanna, gao~n!”

“Isn’t enough that we’ve stopped fighting?” I said gingerly.

“Nope! This is a harmonious laboratory, and I don’t want any grudges. Now, shake!” She brandished her hands, motioning to flick us again. Despite her small frame, the aura she exuded was matronly.

I reluctantly held out my hand towards Zehra. She glared at me for a moment, before taking it and shaking exactly once.

“There! All better!” Sveta ignored the still-palpable tension and declared a truce.

“You’ve breezed past everything important as usual, Sveta…” Miette groaned.

“Whatever, I’m sure it’s will all turn out fine!” Sveta’s declaration had no basis in reality but she made it anyway, as if the act of speaking her wishes aloud would cause them to manifest.

Miette sighed. “I don’t know whether to find your constant, unrelenting optimism inspiring or annoying.”

Sveta stuck out her tongue. “Hush, Miette. Now, as for Kometka, hurry up and get inside a Telepresence Doll. We’ve got lots of hugging to do!”

“If I must.” Kometka said, going with the flow far better than me. Her words indicated hesitancy, but I detected the slightest undertone of longing in her voice. I looked at her askance, wondering if I had imagined it.

*****

Full credit to the artist, the Telepresence Doll was an impressive piece of equipment. As soon as Kometka had taken control of one, the holographic projectors rendered her as if she were a real-life human being floating in front of me. Instinctively, I reached out a hand towards her bare arm and brushed my fingers against it.

“EEP!” cried out Kometka. As she squealed, her voice was unusually high-pitched.

“Ahh, sorry!” I quickly apologized, pulling my hand back.

“I-It’s fine, I’m just… not used to physical sensation. It’s been six years since I had a body.” she said, quickly regaining her trademark composure. She timidly held out her hand towards me, and I took it. I noticed the faintest tinge of blush spread across her cheeks.

Since when does Kometka blush? Her expression is always so deadpan.

I entwined my fingers with hers, feeling her ‘skin.’ Aside from its cool temperature, it felt exactly like the real thing. It really was an impressive feat of engineering, impracticality aside.

“Credit where credit is due, Doctor.” I said, turning to Zehra. “The craftsmanship on this doll is exquisite. The skin feels absolutely real.”

Zehra’s mood had done a complete 180 from earlier; not a hint of her annoyance remained. She really was a fickle person. “Bwahahahaha, right? You may praise me more, gao~n!”

Komeka, meanwhile, was staring hard at my hand. “Kometka, you alright? Knock knock, you in there?”

“Ah!” She jumped at the sound of my voice directed at her. “S-Sorry, this is a bit overwhelming.”

Sveta sidled up to us, a sly grin on her face. “She’s just getting used to the sense of touch. Even the air pressure being exerted on her skin is overwhelming right now, I’d bet.”

I cast a sidelong glance at her. “You speaking from personal experience?”

“I am. Plus the added sensation of her hand entwined with yours is probably sending her circuits into overlord.” Sveta teased.

“Sister!” Kometka barked, blushing even more.

Ah, so that’s what’s going on. With that bit of information, everything clicked into place. Gripping her hand, I spun Komekta around and pressed her against my body, my arms wrapped around her in a tight hug.

“Wha?”

“The Telepresence Dolls are meant for hugging, right? So I’m hugging.” I explained matter-of-factly. At this point, I was just going with the flow like Kometka had earlier.

“Hooh, nicely done!” Sveta praised me. “You picked up on her feelings immediately!”

I shrugged. “I’ve known her for three years. How could I not?”

“LYDIA!” Kometka cried out. “D-Discussing that in front of everyone is…”

“Oh please, my dear sister, it was obvious from the start.” Sveta’s eyes narrowed, and she looked over to Miette. “Well, some people are more insightful than others, I suppose…”

“Was that remark directed at me?” Miette scowled. “I feel like it was directed at me.”

“Excuse me…” said Kometka, still pressed against me, “the hug is very enjoyable but, it’s kind of awkward to be having a conversation in this position…”

I let my arms drop, but she stayed pressed against me of her own volition. Her words and actions didn’t quite agree, but that was cute in its own way. Sveta watched us and chuckled like a pervy old man.

“Ohohohoho, to be young…” Hearing that come from a girl who looked to be in her teens was disconcerting indeed. Meanwhile, Zehra seemed upset again.

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“Hey, no fair! How come only Lydia gets to hug you, gao~n? Come here, my dear daughter!” Like the lion she was, Zehra pounced.

*****

Eventually, after a round of affectionate hugging from her sister and mother, Kometka settled for clinging to my arm much like Sveta always clung to Miette’s. I’m not sure if she was simply copying her sister, but I didn’t mind in the least. I suppose that the Telepresence Doll, wasteful as it may be, did provide both of us with a deep level of satisfaction from physical contact. Begrudgingly, I admitted to myself it may have been worth it.

With hugs and family reunions out of the way, we had moved on to shop talk. Vicky, her mannerisms as a maid impeccable, supplied us with tea and cookies while we discussed strategy with Kometka’s mad scientist mother.

“I’m prioritizing repairs on Sveta’s armor right now, gao~n. But I still have a lot of Beelzebub chitin to work with, so I’d like to manufacture another SVGF-X23 Lisichka for Kometka to occupy.”

“Hang on.” Kometka interrupted. “The unit’s model name is… Lisichka?”

“A fitting tribute, isn’t it? Miette picked it out, gao~n.” Zehra motioned to Miette, who smiled sheepishly and waved.

“That’s…” Kometka trailed off, seemingly at a loss for words.

I jumped in with a question of my own. “I saw what the X-23 can do on the battlefield, so gaining that capability would be nice. I’ve been operating a Nighthawk for five years, though, so it will take getting used to. Zehra, is this your attempt to ramp up the ‘arms race’ the Captain was talking about?”

“Absolutely, gao~n. We can’t take on that Belphegor with only one X-23, and even two is stretching it. I need to make new weapons and new technologies if we want to stand a chance, gao~n.” Zehra’s pressed her lips together in a thin line, marking her determination.

“Mom,” Sveta interjected, “How many more X-23s could you make using the chitin you have available?”

Zehra tapped her chin. “Maybe four or five more? I’d like to leave a supply of chitin in reserve for repairs as well, gao~n.”

“In that case, why don’t you make one for each member of our squadron?” Sveta suggested. “One each for Lydia, Maurice, Sabina and Genevi.”

“Four units total? Each takes about two weeks to assemble, although I could probably build them simultaneously if I pulled resources away from Velocipede production, gao~n. But there’s a hurdle: the X-23 requires an AI in order to function. Constructing more AI cores isn’t a problem, and Kometka can take that role for Lydia’s unit, but psychoblasting three new AI minds for that purpose would take a good two months.”

“Can’t you just copy or transfer some ship AIs?” I asked.

Zehra shook her head. “Ship AIs are optimized for ships, and colony AIs like the Tektites are optimized for colony administration, gao~n. Re-purposing one with the necessary skill set to operate a Gravity Frame would take more time than psychoblasting one from scratch.”

“Sveta and Kometka were able to operate Frames without much trouble.” Miette said. “I don’t think the AIs are as inflexible as you say. Couldn’t you simply transfer over the applicable algorithms?”

“My daughters are special, gao~n. They were originally human minds, and their neuroplasticity is leagues ahead of a standard AI. In summation, they’re far more adaptive than normal.”

“Weren’t the other AIs created from brain scans of you?” Miette argued. “They’re all originally based on human brain patterns, so what’s the difference?”

Zehra shook her head. “They’re all BASED on me, on the level of simple psychological architecture, but their programming is far more hard-coded than you think. Their designs sacrifice neural plasticity for stability. AIs need to be far more powerful and reliable than human minds and the tradeoff is flexibility, gao~n. A standard AI could never have done that trick Kometka pulled where she added her memories into her machine code, for example.”

“Well, Sveta couldn’t do that either…” Miette murmured. Sveta looked rather stricken at that remark.

“Let me put it this way, gao~n. Over the course of the Timeline Project, I extracted nearly two hundred deceased human consciousnesses from alternate timelines. Of those, only Sveta and Kometka managed to successfully transition to becoming stable AIs, gao~n. The rest were fragmentary and experienced massive cascade failure within microseconds of interdimensional download. That’s a success rate of 0.5%, which should give you some idea of just how special my daughters are, gao~n. They had the force of will to preserve their consciousness after death, and the neuroplasticity to successfully transition from human to AI. Those qualities, more than anything, seems to have contributed to their success at operating Gravity Frames, gao~n.”

“They’re that special, huh?” Miette looked over to Sveta, who had a distant look in her eyes. I glanced at Kometka, who wore her usual neutral expression; I was attuned enough to her moods to discern just a bit of pain behind her unblinking stare. I felt her hands shudder, ever so slightly, and I squeezed her in response.

“Very much so, gao~n. I could use them as a basis to develop AIs specifically optimized for Frame operation, but as I said that would take at least two months. I’m not sure if we have that kind of time, gao~n…” Zehra frowned, still tapping her chin.

Sveta suddenly spoke up. “Don’t worry, I have the perfect solution to that!” We all looked at her.

“Hmm? What might that be, gao~n?” Zehra’s eyes were sparkling; clearly she was anticipating something exciting.

“You know how the Tektites are the same AI, simply copied seven times over and with synchronized memories? I just need to make three copies of myself in the same way! Sveta-2, Sveta-3 and Sveta-4!”

The lab was silent. We all stared at her, mouths agape.

“Multiple Svetas, huh?” Zehra said after a moment. “That’s… just crazy enough to work, gao~n!”

“Wait, hang on!” Miette protested. “Seriously? FOUR Svetas? Is that… is that okay?!”

“How do you mean?” Sveta asked nonchalantly.

“I mean, one Sveta is special, but FOUR? Wouldn’t that lead to a loss of identity or something like that? Would you really be okay with three other copies of you running around?”

“They’d still be the same individual, just running four air-gapped instances, gao~n.” Zehra explained. “Think about how Sveta can hold a conversation with you, and simultaneously meet with Laria via comms. It’s the same principle: the only difference is the other instances would be running on separate AI cores instead of a single one.”

“Still,” Miette said, clearly not convinced, “the thought of someone else piloting you is a bit…”

“DAWWW!” Sveta wrapped herself around Miette joyously. “Don’t worry, dear! You’ll still be my one-and-only! Even if I create a billion copies, that won’t ever change!”

“Muuuurgh…” Miette grumbled, only somewhat placated. Sveta nuzzled her affectionately.

I turned to Kometka. “Was your family always this… batshit crazy?”

Kometka nodded. “With a mad scientist for a mother, and a rambunctious goofball for a sister… yeah, this is about right.” The slightest twinge of a smile lifted her cheeks.

*****

“So you’re proposing four additional X-23 Frames, to be operated by the members of your test squadron plus Lydia? And with Kometka and three copies of Sveta serving as Frame AIs?” Captain Savitskaya asked.

With the details of her and Sveta’s proposal hashed out, Zehra had called up the Captain and Laria on the comms to seek permission. The sight of the Captain’s face sent an involuntary shudder down my spine as I remembered the harsh chewing-out she had given me, and I stayed off to the side and kept my mouth shut.

“That’s right, gao~n. If I freeze Velocipede production, I can construct four X-23s simultaneously, and have them ready in two weeks. In my opinion, this is our best option for matching the Belphegor’s power as quickly as possible, gao~n.”

“With the addition of the Hypernova and Sychrotron to our forces, we’re not hurting for Gravity Frames at the moment. Very well, your request is approved. Please begin immediately.”

Huh? Just like that? She approved it just like that? Just how much faith does the Captain have in Zehra?! I thought in amazement.

“Aye-aye, gao~n!”

“1st Lieutenant Tereshkova?” the Captain said, addressing me.

“YES MA’AM!” I replied, too loudly.

“Captain Vetrov has approved your transfer to 433 Eros. Consider yourself a part of Zehra’s test pilot squadron effective immediately. As soon as the Hypernova docks, please fetch your belongings. You will be bunking in Zehra’s lab with the other test squadron pilots.”

How did she get that done in such a short time? It’s only been a few hours since we spoke! Keeping my astonishment to myself, I saluted sharply. “Yes, ma’am.”

The Captain turned back to Zehra. “This marks a transition of your assigned squadron, Doctor, from Gravity Frame testing to Special Forces. I’m going to formalize your test pilots as the 1st Eros Spetsnaz Squadron under the joint command of the GRU and NKVD, reporting directly to me. Lieutenant Tereshkova, you are hereby promoted to Senior Lieutenant. You will be in command, with 1st Lieutenant Maurice Spiteri as second in command.”

That whirlwind announcement us all by surprise. “Hang on,” I said, temporarily forgetting my apprehension, “I’m in command? Huh?”

“You have the most combat experience compared to everyone else,” the Captain explained, “plus prior command experience in the GRU. That makes you best qualified.” Next, she turned to Vicky. “Technical Specialist Valentina, you are hereby promoted to 2nd Lieutenant. You will serve as logistics staff officer to the new squadron.”

“Huh? What? I’m being reinstated?” Vicky gasped.

“Hrm. Can she still be my maid, gao~n?” Zehra said, clearly displeased at the prospect of losing her source of tea and biscuits.

“Sure.” the Captain shrugged.

“H-Hang on a moment!” Vicky protested.

“Actually, that’s a good thought, gao~n. Captain, I request permission to use maid outfits as the squadron’s official uniform!” Her eyes were aflame that that idea, and everyone else stared at her in horror.

“Fine by me. Dress however you like; I just want to see results.”

“In that case, we’ll be known as the 1st Battle Maid Squadron!” Zehra proclaimed proudly.

The Captain smiled. “So it shall be. Doctor, Lydia and Vicky, please report to the Radiolaria CIC sphere at 0800 hours tomorrow morning to work out the logistics and duty assignments. I’ll have Maurice attend as well.”

“““Aye-aye!””” we all responded, although only Zehra sounded happy.

Before the transmission cut out, Laria bowed deeply. “You have my condolences, all of you. I pray for your glory in battle.”

Very funny. I thought, grinding my teeth and wondering why I was suddenly in command of a squadron of robot-piloting battle maids. Just what have I gotten myself into?!

And that’s the story of how the 1st Battle Maid Squadron of the Revolutionary Army was established. My deceased comrades from Mars were surely looking down on me from heaven and laughing their asses off.

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