Fitz groaned as he pulled off his VR helmet massaging his scalp. He looked around his room finding nothing out of the ordinary that was something at least, nobody had snuck in while he was unconscious, in a dorm full of other teenagers it was not a rare occurrence, especially when most of them were here because of behavioral issues or learning disabilities, they tended to make quite poor decisions. His room was full of desks three, in fact, all traded for with other students who did care enough about schoolwork to need one. Each was dedicated to a certain task one was holding his educational tablet, used mostly for schoolwork. The other one had a real computer with a net connection and everything it was old but still worked enough to use computer-aided design programs, run simulations, and train basic ai. He also used it to the online war games servers to test his designs which is what he had just been doing.
Finally to the left of the other two was the table he used for tinkering, A soldering iron, spare wire, programming jigs, hardware of all sorts, and even a few tools to work with the new solid silicon chips. But dominating the center was his prized possession a 3d printer but not a regular one, no this was completely custom and able to print in PEEK and many other high-end materials, lay carbon fiber stands into the design it produced parts stronger than the steal commonly used before space travel was cheap. Before super alloys were needed to deflect incoming kinetic weapons and turn away energy beams. But most of that was fairly standard albeit much cheaper than any models he had ever seen but, what made his truly special was its AI the printer was run solely by it and was independent of any system, when he wanted to print something he just told it what he wanted, it would search through his computer find the part then import it to is own hard drive, process it decided what material it should be, runs a self-check, dose some tuning, closes all of the vents, then finally get to printing. It did all of that in seconds way faster than it would have taken him.
as he was admiring his room he heard a knock on the door, hurriedly he pushed his headset into its hiding spot in the vent, slammed the lid of the computer closed, and as quickly as he could he navigated the precarious path between his desks, his bed, and the wall final reaching the door he pulled it open to reveal Des with short dark brown hair and light green eyes she was the least unlikeable person he had met so far.
“Hey Fitz how are you”
“Just fine, I am kinda busy right now so what do you want”
“Owch…. Anyway can you help me with chem it doesn't make any sense”
“Fine but I'm just sending you a study guide, no notes, and certainly no answers, everyone can tell when you cheat”
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“But.. last time yo-”
“Sorry, the school doesn't care about how well people are leaning but they certainly do care about cheating. You better leave before a the floor monitor comes by”
“Ok will do”
He shut his door with i sigh of relief, he always hated talking to people especially when they thought he was smart. Most of the other students believed that he was the smartest in the class, this was an incorrect assumption but it got him some credit with the teachers and got people to leave him alone so he didn't feel like correcting them. In reality, he was just the only one that tried all that hard to succeed. He actually had more disabilities than almost everyone there, disabilities including but not limited to dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, ADD, anxiety, depression, limes disease, and an autoimmune disease that causes inflammation in the brain. All in all he had a hard time reading, writing, spelling, mental mathematical calculations, paying attention, remembering things, and had almost constant headaches. The only thing that kept him going was his dream of being one of the best engineers the world had ever seen. And he had almost made it to, he was on track to attend Silicon Valley polytechnic high school but his mother Cathrena had him tested for learning “differences”. The results off that test had dashed his chances at taking part in the actual autonomous wargames competitions. The worst part was that he had already been “on the team” for a few months before high school started, as soon as they found out they laughed at him and banned him from attending the lab and ever applying again. He was so mad that he entirely shut down, he would not be attending SVPT instead, he attended a local public high school as part of the special education program. Normally he could have recovered from this but because he shut down he simply didn't attend, his parents didn't care they had other things to focus on like his sisters. Eventually, the school recommended that he be sent to the California therapeutic school for learning disabilities and mental illness, called CTS by most people. His parents had barely paid attention. signing the papers to send him off without so much a thought. To this day he still hadn't forgotten about that day even after a year.
Since then he had been slowly working to get where he had been before. first getting a computer from an incoming shipment meant for teachers. then slowly building up his printer using it to make parts to build contraband and selling it. finally saving up enough money to purchase a converter that allows his school-issued headset to connect to his computer instead of acting as a link to the school's crippled and isolated net. Useless for almost everything he wanted to do he then started designing the vehicle that had been destroyed today. The Artemis one, designed as a solo scout and hunter he had spent a lot of time getting the sensors just right, the coil guns range and damage tuned, it was silent but deadly covered in a shell of stealth plates it was angular and painted in a mottled dark and light grey camouflage conforming to the most comen urban terrain while still being able to blend in as a large rock in most others. It had been doing alright up till now but he guessed he would have to start over, Build from the ground up. But that was a problem for tomorrow, right now he needed to take his medicine and go to bed