Selene thought about the question for a moment. She was still grappling with the fact that she was a telepath. What were the odds? In a sector with trillions of people, how many were there? For them to be a myth like this?
"..I heard they hurt people. They're like super secret, super lethal weapons. And no one who ever sees them can prove it. Like ghosts."
The commander shook his head; "It's a diverse field with many different specializations. We don't plan on you being a weapon exactly. We have another project in the works that we'd be delighted for you to be apart of."
"What do you mean? Do you want me to read minds or something? Cause I can't do that-it's more like general vibes."
Desuran ashed his cigar on the tray in his armchair and stood up. Then he adjusted the grey cuffs on his military uniform. "We can get into the specifics after your training... Right now it would only distract you. Can you stand?"
"I think so..." Selene shimmied off the operating table. Her bare feet hit the cold iron floor. Now that her eyes have adjusted she could see that they really didn't care for the aesthetic of this place.
Just dark rough iron.
Pipes and vents like the industrial complex beneath the hangars. It was cold and drafty. Being in a hospital gown didn't help either.
The general held the tiny remote near his face as he pressed a button. "Come in major." he said.
The door swished open and a asian woman with pale skin and black eyes stepped in. She was about 5"4 and she wore a similar grey well-ironed suit as the commander. Without the plethora of random badges on the breast.
"This is Major Masuka. She'll take it from here as I have other very important matters to see to." he held out a hand to shake Selenes.
...She took it haphazardly. His hand was like a baseball mitt but he was surprisingly gentle.
"We expect great things from you young lady. Remember what's at stake.", "So you won't press charges against my dad, right?" she asked flatly. The general glanced at Masuka who didn't seem bothered.
"...No. Your family will be fine." he gave her a raised brow 'don't talk about that' look before leaving the room.
There was an awkward silence between the two remaining women then. Masuka was just starring at her with a plain expression. Selene looked down at her with confusion. She was was kinda cute. Like a little doll.
"So, are you my new boss or something?" Selene asked. "That's Major or Sir to you cadet."
"Oh, sorry... Sir.", "Sir, sorry sir would be the proper DF etiquette."
"Sir, sorry sir." Selene gave a mock salute she'd seen on TV.
Masuka looked her up and down. She smirked and folded her hands behind her back; "You're not capable of being sorry... Yet. But you will be. -I'm responsible for training you, you should be so lucky. Try not to break... Too quickly."
"Uh... What?"
The major grabbed the cuff of her collar and spoke into it; "Send in the cleaners."
The door swished open and the major walked out. Then two guys came in wearing rubber suits dragging thick firehoses. They pointed the hoses and turned on a valve on each of them.
Selene put up to hands to block them; "Wait-wait!"
'PSSSSHHH!'
Selene was blasted into the operating table with two torrents of water.
It was barely below scalding temperature. They hit her with the force of pressure washers.
"Aaah! PUH! Staaahp!"
The majors voice appeared over some intercom; "Raise your arms cadet."
"FUCK YOU!"
One of the hoses splashed her face like a sucker punch.
After the non-consensual hosing, they gave her a set of military fatigues. They were a perfect fit.
Which was weird considering she didn't remember giving them her measurements.
Then they brought her to a small room with a desk and some crusty old dude behind it who asked her questions like:
"If your family was tied to a set of train tracks with an oncoming train, and you were near a lever that diverted to another set of tracks that led to hundreds of people would you pull it?"
Some kind of psyche evaluation.
"I would. Then I would shoot the conductor because what kind of idiot doesn't stop the train at that point?"
By the end of the questioning the wrinkly man was shaking his head. He made a few marks on his tablet.
Then he showed her ink splotches afterwards and asked her what she saw in them. One after another her answers were similar.
"Bug."
"Grasshopper jumping at me trying to bite my face off."
"Two bugs kissing."
He gave her a curious look after that one.
After the evaluation they took her to a track and field room.
It was in a wide open contained room. It must've been at least an acre tall and several acres wide. She was probably on a space station or something but they haven't told her yet.
All she knew so far was that the major told her to run when the buzzer went off.
'EERRR!'
The buzzer went off and she started running down the track. The onlookers who were sitting at the weight lifting area laughed as she slowed to a stop not even a quarter down the track.
"Huh... Huh..." she wiped a sweaty flap of hair from her face. "I think... I'm dying..."
"Are you serious? Keep going cadet." the major said from the starting line. She didn't need to shout from such a short distance.
Selene died in that hangar that day. Eaten by bugs. And this was hell. She was sure of it.
"Don't make me get the cleaners." the major threatened.
Selene limped into a jog barely above walking speed. If she wasn't in hell yet then she would go there after she murdered the major.
After a half hour of running she collapsed from exhaustion.
The major revived her by snapping some pill thing and waving it under her nose. Selene didn't know what it was but it perked her right up again.
Even passing out wouldn't save her from this torment.
From there she was led to one of the weight lifting areas off to the side. She was told to hang from a pullup bar.
"Okay. Do a pullup." the major ordered.
Selenes body flinched for a second.
"Just one pullup." the major said again.
Selene was red faced and dripping with sweat still.
"...That wasn't one?"
She tried pushups, situps, lifting weights. Each activity was more embarrassing than the last.
By the time the major told her to sit down her body felt like rubber. She was all tingly, numb and all floppy when moving around.
She collapsed onto a bench at the edge of the field as the major stood in front of her.
"You're probably the sorriest cadet I've ever had the displeasure of training. Do you know how high my rank is? Don't you think I have better things to do? You should be honored that I'm even here. Your lack of effort is insulting."
"W-water..." she begged.
The major rolled her eyes and waved over one of her distant entourage members. Who jogged over and placed a liter of water on the bench table before jogging back.
Selene drank it. Coughed. Drank some more. Then threw up into the artificial grass.
"You need to work harder than this cadet. Don't you have people relying on you at home?" the majors monotone voice was really starting to grate on Selene.
"Don't you have people relying on you at home?" Selene mocked with a snarky nasally voice. "That's you. That's what you sound like."
The major sighed. Then took a seat on the bench opposite of the table.
"...It's not that you aren't a strong person, mentally. You're stubborn as boot leather with a low fear response. But as your physical strength is concerned... You may as well be a baby panda."
"That means a lot coming from a shorty like you." Selene glared, before gulping down more water.
"You'd have a point if we were regular soldiers. But there's nano-fibers implanted in our muscles." the major tapped her arm. "The density is exponentially higher than natural muscle fiber and doesn't benefit all that much from mass... It's more to do with the nervous and cardiovascular systems. And training the connections and flexibility between the fibers."
"What language was that?" Selene asked, confused about her science talk. Then realized; "Wait, I have something implanted in me? I didn't sign off on becoming a cyborg."
The major nodded. "You really need to start picking up on saying 'sir', or 'major'. I'm not going to overlook breaches in conduct for long, even for cadets. You were given the implants during your short coma. And only a few kinds of operatives ever get them. They're very expensive and the surgery requires a specialist, there's lots of risk involved. If you showed even a modicum of effort, you'd improve much more quickly than you otherwise would. Lifting, running, jumping. You could do things even enforcers couldn't do with their fancy armor... In time."
Selene must've worn her disbelief on her face because the major rolled her eyes.
"Fine, I'll show you." the major said. She stood up and walked over to the weight lifting area. Some of the soldiers noticed her before others and stood at attention. Giving very serious salutes.
"Move." she said to a massive soldier who was bench pressing 450. He looked up at her for a second—then saw the patch on her shoulder.
"Sir, yes sir." he said instantly and rolled off the bench. The major snapped her fingers to one of her attendants and they walked over, producing a towel from their canvas pack. She placed it across the bench and laid down beneath the bar.
Selene's mouth dropped as she began to defy physics lifting the weights as if they were made of Styrofoam.
"What... The...?" she asked as the major walked back over to the bench. Her stride as official and proper as ever. "Pick up your jaw cadet. It really isn't that surprising. You must've heard about this kind of thing, even on your backwater colony."
She had, but that kind of fell into those 'super soldier' stories that no one really believed.
The major waved over an attendant and they produced a tablet. The major slid it across the bench table to Selene.
"Take this. It'll be giving you your orders when I'm not around. From now on here's what you'll do. You'll start saying 'sir' every time you address me. You'll train here. All day every day. And I'll show up every now and then to check up on your progress... Welcome to your new normal cadet."
Selene laid her head against the cool surface of the table.
"Sir, yes sir... (Brat)" she mumbled beneath her breath.
"What was that cadet?", "Sir, nothing sir."
"...Drop and give me.. Two. Cadet."
"Really?? Come on, why are you so-?", "NOW. Cadet!"
Selene grumbled and got into the pushup position. And awkward moment passed then the major spoke again; "..You can start with one cadet."
Selene's face scrunched up in frustration.
"...That wasn't one?"
In the days that followed...
Selene worked out every day. If she didn't the major would show up and annoy her. It was better to have some control in her workouts. And... She improved. Steadily. From no pushups, to one. Then two. Then six. And so on. Day after day.
Usually it would be bad for you to train like that. But they had all kinds of supplements and drugs to make that not the case in the military. Most mixed into her foods. Rarely when she got super tired she'd snap open one of those pills and sniff the vapors.
It didn't get her high or anything.
It wasn't that kind of a drug.
Selene was never the type to seek comfort in controlled substances before. But it took the edge off of the exhaustion she felt.
Meanwhile the side effects of her telepathy continued to annoy her.
Headaches, nosebleeds, and just weird sensations in general. Distortions in her vision, voices, visions, night terrors about those monsters.
Them surrounding her. Closing in. Hunting her... She never seemed to run fast enough. Eventually Selene's doctors gave her supplements to help her sleep as well. Something she could mix with some water.
She managed to make some friends at least. Other cadets and privates who used the field. They asked her what division she was in and when she said she didn't know they all exchanged weird looks and shrugged.
They mostly talked about their lives before the military. No one seemed really enthusiastic to talk about exactly why they were there, not yet anyway. It was just nice to be around other people in a similar position as her.
Her tablet had a little minimap on it that guided her around the station. Up elevators, down stairs, through the maze like halls. To the cafeteria, training field, or where she was staying now.
A small single bedroom apartment.
Complete with a living space, bathroom, and kitchen attached to said living space. Like a smaller version of her house. But with brown carpet and white drywall. Which was fancy. Her house only had boring metal walls. Not paint with an actual texture like this.
There was access to the internet, but the ISP on the station was clearance-based. Access to the public web was restricted to cadets and other low ranked people.
She could order stuff though. There was a store app pre-installed on her P.U.C. tablet that delivered to a little chute in her room. Like a mailbox.
Her account balance was a hefty sum that made her eyes bulge at first. When she told the other cadets about it they warned her against splurging. It was just her sign-on bonus.
She wouldn't get another bonus like that unless she was promoted. So she got a few necessary things while she saved up her biweekly pay.
Like a hair straightener, a new drawing book, some art supplies, and other stuff like that. Life was tolerable now.
Even so, her thoughts kept drifting back to Camden. To dad and his past. How mom and them were coping with her being shipped off to the military. P.U.C. had promised her that her family was doing fine. Better than before even.
Like that was even possible with Selene on a space station a bajillion miles away.
It was difficult to believe them at all given what her and her dad had done on Endelon. Had discovered.
By the end of the second month she still didn't know what commander Desurans plans for her were. She hadn't heard from him since.
She wanted to start her telepathy training so she could learn to manage these symptoms and get some kind of freedom back. And also figure out what they exactly expected of her. Wasn't she in good enough shape by now?
She admired her new six pack in the mirror as she got ready in the morning. The major wasn't lying, her progress would piss off any gym enthusiast on the colony. And she was even stronger than she looked to boot. She was cheating. Without the side effects of steroids. Like magic.
She was going to request a visit from the major soon. There was no way she wasn't ready.
She was surprised and delighted when she'd received a video from her family the night she returned from a long workout session. Along with a notification that said she was being promoted to private.