Wrath and Retribution

Preface-5

The rooms were accessible only to the three assigned students, staff, and the professors. Outsiders could not enter the rooms except in emergencies and the double security doors prevented theft and those unscrupulous academically dishonest students sneaking looks from acquiring anything useful.

The older students in his room kept vastly different schedules so Samson rarely saw them, and was never disturbed when they entered. They had their own projects to worry about, beyond their absent 'hello' to a fellow student that probably would never reach their level thanks to the fifty percent annual attrition rate; they treated him with a generally benign disregard. Unless he needed help with a piece of equipment he had never used before and the faculty was not available to help they generally didn't speak to each other.

The penalty for academic dishonesty was immediate and permanent expulsion. Those in Samson's year, who had survived the annual 'halving' of their classes four times at the end of every prior year, were serious about their education and rarely resorted to cheating. The academy's security was too good, and the professors too competent and constantly aware of their surroundings to allow it to slip. On top of the trained aversion to cheating, the penalties were publicly and virulently enforced. Samson didn't even want to associate with people he suspected of cheating. They were below contempt and their taint was contagious.

The project he was working on was simple enough; at least the vague directions were simple.

'Build a weapon system that produces the most devastating effects on the battlefield, using the basic principles of Applied Sciences, learned during the lectures in the first half of this year's class'.

That simple sentence long explanation, scrawled in his assignment pad, formed a simple stick with a weighted end and point at the opposite, and was dashed by the grading criteria. 'The finished project had to be made of only the items in the shop rooms. No external components allowed and would result in disqualification and failure for the term, for academic dishonesty. The device was graded in the categories of: functionality, professional completion of a finished product, effects on the enemy, and the overall number of class concepts included. The deadline was seven working days'.

Frustrated with his face cupped in his hands, while elbows and chest leaned over the work bench, he inventoried the workshop again. There was rope: there was lots of rope, from string diameter to colossal thumb gauge. There was lumber, in various sizes and dimensions, all squared but the upper class candidates had shown him how to use the wood mill and lathes. There were various mismatched gauges of steel bars, but very few of them. There were parts and junk from various industrial machine parts, to primitive heavy metal and electrical motors, to pieces of modern tech that were hardly recognizable with so many of their useful components stripped away.

Every single piece of electronics and all the motors were stripped of their power cables. There was even a ceramic pistol barrel, cracked of course. Some i***t had dropped a huge metal motor on the back half. There were even seven half circle accelerator coil electro magnets. They were all 'of course' stuck firmly to some other metal components, often sticking them together in bizarre chains. They weren't supposed to carry a permanent magnetic charge. But the old ones picked up charges under the constantly applied gauss power supply. These were probably many decades old, at least if not over a century old, and their presence meant that all of the delicate electronics in the bin were fried. Samson idly wondered if the instructors had added those contaminated coils to the electronics just to achieve that purpose, and fry all the electronics and delicate magnetic circuits in the bin to the point of uselessness.

Samson figured that had probably been done on purpose. It matched many of their other tricks and trials they concocted for their students to overcome, like living in a world full of technology and the younger students were forced to write everything by hand in paper notebooks. They were just little ironies that had to be overcome to succeed at the Academy.

There were hammers, but no nails.

There were no screws either, but there were no screw drivers, either mechanical or manual, so that was not an issue.

There were chisels and other wood working products.

There were various bits of cloth and leather and padding from furniture and what appeared to be discarded rags.

There was a gantry system on the ceiling comprised of pulleys and levers for lifting larger loads.

Taking apart the tools in the room to cannibalize them for parts would constitute 'vandalism of academy property' and 'academic dishonesty'. It was harsh but that was the punishment for depriving other students of their ability to work, so he couldn't take those apart for pieces. The Academy focused much of its effort on working to better the individual student in order for them to work more effectively as a team during sporting events and competitions. Screwing his buddies and fellow classmates regardless of their age ranking was a repugnant thought anyway.

Frustrated, he pulled his sketch book from his bag. The arts class was easy and not graded for academy graduation points or class standing. It was a required class for creating well rounded young men and he could use the pad for ideas.

He started drawing the concepts that the 'Applied Sciences' class had studied. The first and most primitive was the 'wheel'. He drew electricity but since there were no power cables that was useless. He drew a hill with the ball on top for potential energy and an arrow with that same ball rolling down for kinetic energy. He doodled torque on an engine into horse power at the base of a wheel, than added the equation they had been taught for the derivation of the horsepower number. He added the arcing ballistics sketch, of the projectile fired falling faster as it slowed and gravity continued to pull. He drew the hydraulic principles that allowed small movements on one fluid to lift a much larger. Samson looked up at the pulleys and sketched that system of the blocks and tackles that allowed a single rope to pass through the system several times reducing the effort needed to lift an object, by allowing the user to divide the work over a longer distance of rope than the distance the load was moved, thus heavy objects were moved with minimal effort by dividing the work over more length of rope. He even remembered the brief discussion of composite and compound materials, that was a short unit but 'layering' materials often made them stronger, that might be a simple way to increase the number of lessons included in his project. He almost forgot levers and angled supports; those were so simple that he didn't even think of them until last.

Samson looked around the room and circled the principles available to him with the working materials.

Electricity and hydraulics were out. There were no power cables and no fluids to use for hydraulics. Water was available but nothing suitable to hold it, unless he planned on carving wooden pipes. That still left most of the first half of the year's lessons available for use.

Samson was almost puzzled to tears as he continued circling the lessons in his sketch book. He absently started drawing lines to connect the pieces and parts. He made two connections followed by a third. The four connected principles tickled memories from his prior year's history class.

He recalled something about ancient earth empires and their tools of war. After all, that was what this project was about ... applying lessons from science to the trade of war that they were all ultimately studying at the 'Guardsmen Academy'. One particular piece of equipment crept into his mind's eye, allowing him to circle and connect more principles.

Samson sighed and shook his head at the impossibility of this project. If he made it really 'small' it would be less impressive and the parts much more difficult to make. If he made it the correct size it would be impressive, functional, and would surely score high marks. But the thing would be huge and lots of work and dangerous ... very dangerous.

While his internal debate raged between building the 'model' or 'full size', he dropped the illustrating pencil on the sketch pad. Standing for the first time in what felt like forever, he stretched. He had no audience but the dramatic sigh was no less impressive. He turned to the small reference terminal by the door, one of the very few electronic devices he was actually allowed to use, and pulled up the relevant information.

Samson pulled up multiple videos, illustrations, and images of the ancient weapon he had in mind. He even found references with detailed schematics and images describing how it was designed and used on ancient Earth long before humanity dreamed of leaving the planet, or even flight.

The device itself was so quaint and simple, yet unbelievably powerful.

As he watched and rewatched the videos of the thing in action he mentally removed parts that he would not have the tools to create. But they were easily substituted with other principles that would earn higher marks for including multiple lessons in the project.

Samson smiled a mischievous grin and chuckled to himself, "This thing is just too cool not to build full size."

The overwhelming magnitude of the project began to sink in, crushing the prior moment's elation. The eleven year old Samson wanted to scream. He didn't want to settle for something second rate, but the deadline, only one week, would make this a very difficult project.

The 'Applied Sciences' class was his seventh hour long block of instruction of the day. His academy class had 'Art Appreciation and Illustration' for their last hour long class every day. His 'Earth History' class was his sixth class of the day. His mandatory graded competitive sports seasons were at an end so he didn't have to worry about that, and his martial arts training was in the early morning before breakfast this year. So he had no physical activities this week to interrupt his work.

The art class was only graded on a pass-fail basis so while the thought of failing such an easy class was revolting on principle, it could be done, and not affect his chances of graduating. The history class was taught by a crotchety old retired Guardsman. He was a tough old man and less forgiving than the concrete floor under Samson's feet.

Samson sighed again, circled the planning stages of his work on the screen, kept it open for later reference, and flipped it over to the side. He called the comm functions and before he thought about what to say he sent a message request to his professor.

Samson had wanted to leave a simple message. Samson wanted to not ask at all.

Samson had no idea the professor had that hour for a break.

Samson was shocked when the old man not only received his message but converted it to a video conference. "To what do I owe the pleasure of your comm, Candidate Rockpoint?"

Samson stammered, "I ... I ... well, I ... ."

His most difficult professor rolled his eyes in frustration, and barked, "Out with it boy!" The retired Guardsman narrowed his eyes briefly, and flicked his right index finger across the side of his side of the screen.

While Samson began to stammer, the professor rapidly played several fingers on his right hand over the screen on his end of the conversation. Samson could see his hand movements briefly captured by the vid camera but could not see what the professor was working on. The retired Guardsman turned professor's eyes narrowed briefly again as he flicked back and forth ignoring Samson's incoherent babblings. He leaned back in his comfortable leather seat. When the left side of the professor's mouth blinked into a half smile and disappeared as quickly as it arrived, Samson finally found his voice. "Professor, Sir ... I have a large project I am working on and I am ... well ... I know that I am junior student in the Academy, but I ... ah ... think, I ... ah, think I need your permission to miss a few classes." Samson finished the last in a nearly squeaked rush, before his terrifying professor could say anything else.