A carefully crafted series of events had been leading up to this day. Senator Michael Black had to concentrate to conceal his excitement. As a part of both the Senate's Select Committee on Intelligence and the Committee on Armed Forces, he had been privileged to finally meet the young Dragon-blooded collected by the government for training and testing. The government, of course, had not yet come around to calling them 'Dragon-blooded'. It wasn't technical or scientific enough for them, and only a very few had heard the term, anyway. They preferred terms that Black suspected had been cribbed from a Technocrat somewhere like 'elementally-infused paranormals' or simply 'enhanced humans'. Similarly, they demurred in referring to any such 'enhanced humans' that had appeared in the last several years "Exalted". Such a name implied far more than any government official would be comfortable with.
To the government they were a military asset to be exploited. To the scientists, they were specimens to be studied. Neither had the benefit of direct historical knowledge of what these teenagers were, unlike the young senator from Nevada. Michael Black was very well aware of what these Dragon-blooded teenagers were, what they were capable of, and, most importantly, of what they and their descendants could become over the course of centuries. Not, of course, that he was planning on sharing any of that knowledge with his Senate colleagues or the teenagers themselves.
There was only one person that Michael had heard of that might know as much as he did, and that person would also be in attendance today - another meeting the senator had been looking forward to. That person had Exalted on deployment with the USMC in Afghanistan three years previous and had since become one of the most decorated marines in history. Staff Sergeant Dan Nguyen was that Exalt, a member of the Dawn Caste, and had been assigned to help train some of the teenagers to examine the possibility of synergy between his combat and leadership oriented abilities and the young Dragon-bloods' innate group-oriented abilities. Michael, by virtue of his committee membership, also had it on authority that Sergeant Nguyen was likely to be put on an accelerated officer's program (custom designed for him) soon in order to better exploit his leadership abilities. Both the USMC and the DoD had been at a loss as to what to do with the Exalt for nearly two years, having already promoted him as far as their regulations allowed them to.
The young Exalts were being housed at the Aberdeen Proving Ground, northeast of Baltimore, about halfway to the Delaware/Pennsylvania border. It was close enough to Washington to be convenient but remote enough to keep them out of sight. The base had artillery and gun ranges and other similar facilities that were used to test their abilities and powers. It had a mix of fields and forests with buildings concentrated toward the north end of the base.
His car passed through the gate, he provided his credentials, and was directed to a parking lot. Shortly he was switched to another car that would take him and the other visitors deeper into the base's grounds. His first glimpse of them was in an open field surrounded by trees. Target dummies - really just upright slabs of concrete - had been erected in the field at which a group of five were directing elemental energies. Fire, lightning, torrents of water, shards of rocks, and vines shot from their hands towards the dummies, engulfing them in a punishing torrent. Michael whistled appreciatively. Several had flaring animas, a nimbus of elemental energy radiating from their bodies which scorched their immediate surroundings.
A man in Marine fatigues met the car. Three chevrons and a rocker were stitched on the arm of his uniform. This, combined with his Asian features, was sufficient for Michael to guess that this was Staff Sergeant Nguyen. As the delegation exited the car, the sergeant greeted them.
“Welcome to Aberdeen,” he said. “I’m Staff Sergeant Daniel Nguyen. I’ve been charged with supervising the training of Bravo Company, Platoon 1, who you’ll be meeting today. Sixty of our best and brightest trainees.” He indicated the field the car had just passed. “That’s Squad C, fifteen members arranged in three teams of five. We’ve identified five different elemental aspects, so each team has one member of each to provide balance and diversity.”
As the sergeant had been introducing the delegates to the facility, a few of the teenagers in question had approached. Two had flaring anima banners, fire and wood aspected by the looks of it, and stayed back from the others for safety, even as their elemental animas burned at the grass or caused it to emit poisonous fumes.
Nguyen looked over to see who'd approached and then turned back to the senators. "This is most of Team 2. You'll have to forgive Miss Winters and Mr. McCobb, they can't safely approach until their anima flux dies down - unlike the animas of Solars like myself, their elemental animas are capable of causing severe damage. The effect usually dies down within about," he looked over at the teens to gauge the current strength of their animas; the young lady with the flaming nimbus around her, presumably 'Miss Winters,' offered an exaggerated shrug, "fifteen minutes or so."
"As you can probably tell, Rachel Winters, here, is aspected to Fire," Winters snorted a laugh, "and Clay McCobb is Wood aspected." McCobb threw a casual two-fingered salute. "These two," Nguyen continued, "are Michael Robertson, Earth, and Mateo Garcia, Water. As I said, it is our hope that such diversity on each team will help to increase their overall flexibility. We've noticed some trends in the sorts of skills that each elemental aspect seems to enhance, though our testing indicates that most of them have additional aptitudes outside the norm for their aspect and, additionally, are able to learn many of the powers available to the others given sufficient time and practice."
For the first time, Black spoke up, "Michael Black," he introduced himself so that they'd know how to refer to him, "Incredible, really. I can hardly believe my eyes. Could you provide us an example of the sort of aptitude trends you've discovered?" Of course, he largely knew what to expect already, but he couldn't let on.
"Certainly," said Nguyen and placed a hand on the shoulder of the one he'd introduced as Michael Robertson. "Those aspected to Earth, such as Robertson here, have an aptitude for military strategy and engineering, though these don't always manifest in the same ways. Mike, for example, is a master chess player and, despite our attempts to stop him, video gamer."
Robertson leaned in a little bit conspiratorially, "Grandmaster, actually." He grinned infectiously.
Nguyen visibly restrained himself from rolling his eyes. "Others have manifested these aptitudes with regard to small unit strategy and military campaign planning, rather than merely real-time strategy games," he frowned at young Robertson, who shrugged faux-apologetically. "We also note that those aspected to Earth tend to have sharper senses and resistance to bodily harm. While some of these aptitudes are more clearly thematically linked to their element, many others share no such obvious link, at least not to our modern sensibilities."
"Fantastic," replied Senator Black, "Really, and I mean that quite literally - it's right out of a fantasy. I do note that our reports indicated that there were five elemental aspects. I believe 'air' is missing from this particular team?" This elicited a hastily cut-off laugh from the still-blazing Winters.
The sergeant smiled tightly. "Air Aspected individuals are sometimes," another laugh, "prone to disappearing from time to time. Their elemental alignment predisposes them towards scholarly pursuits and also toward stealthy movement. Miss Cooper, in this case, is no exception. "
"Tori almost never shows up to practice," Winters muttered half-under her breath.
"Air, as you might imagine, is also an element thematically aligned with freedom, and so it is these trainees who frequently have the most trouble adjusting to being stationed here."
You mean imprisoned here, Black mentally retorted. Nevertheless, this was useful intel - if a few of the young Dragon-blooded were frequently leaving the training site, or otherwise disappearing without being missed for hours at a time, that offered Black a number of valuable opportunities.
Demonstrations of some of the Dragon-blooded's powers came next, and the teens seemed to enjoy the chance to show off to the mostly-stunned senators. The combat demonstrations were both armed and unarmed, showcasing the versatility of Dragon-blooded power and their teamwork abilities. Armed demonstrations included firearms, of course, but also more archaic weaponry such as the bow, which McCobb seemed to excel with, and knives and swords. These demonstrations also included the relatively passive effects of some of their anima banners, including Robertson's general imperviousness to low-level harm and Garcia's ability to operate indefinitely underwater without breathing equipment or, apparently, hindrance of any kind.
General power demonstrations over, the teens were dismissed, though Garcia and McCobb followed the senatorial delegation around anyway as they chatted quietly with each other. Nguyen led the delegation on a tour of some of the other facilities on site, including a workshop in which several teens were engaged in projects of their own. Nguyen introduced Lashanda Williams and John Wilson who'd become their platoon's default technical officers, talented in science and engineering. Together they were trying to design tools and weapons capable of standing up to the destructive power of their own anima flux. The concrete floor featured scoring and burns that generally supported the need for such implements. The computers, Black noted, were encased in thick metal boxes to try to prevent permanent harm, though the blackened peripherals and monitors clearly couldn't be entirely protected. Neither Williams nor Wilson was particularly communicative with the delegation and generally behaved as if they hadn't gotten the memo that VIPs would be coming through.
"Uhmmm, no....?" Wilson had replied when Nguyen had asked him if they had anything available for demonstration. He was hurriedly attempting to clean off one of the tables anyway, as if somewhat embarrassed by the mess the pair had made of their work space. "No, uhm, work in progress. Yes?" He looked to Williams, a young black woman, who nodded in response. "Yes. We've got some theories, though, right 'Shanda?" She voiced agreement, "And, uhm," Wilson shoved his hands in his pockets and then immediately removed them to put a piece of computer hardware back in a box, "Uhm..." He looked desperately to his partner.
"...and we're still workin' out how'ta build 'em," Williams finished for him. "I think it's a material problem, you know? I mean, steel's great and all, we've done a lot with it, but we're finding it ain't 'zactly ideal for our needs. And I keep tryin' to get them to order us some more samples of other stuff so we can run some tests and 'speriment a bit, but..." Williams seemed to notice for the first time who her audience was and cleared her throat, changing to tone of her voice a bit deeper. "But if you all could increase our budget a bit, I bet we'd make a bit more progress." She smiled in a way that was not-at-all sincere.
"Right," confirmed Wilson, "In the meantime we've done a lot of software package building - like this camera. It can gauge anima flux and provide a rough energy output estimate in Watts, modulated by aspect, and cooldown time until anima quiescence from more than 300 yards away." He pointed it at his colleague whose anima was currently absent and the camera's display provided the appropriate 0W|0s output, which really didn't demonstrate much. "And... uhm..."
"The car," Williams suggested. "Humvee, whatever. I mean, it's mostly the same-old same-old, but we made some modifications. Port enlargement so you can stick your hand out instead of just a gun-barrel, retractable slots in the floor for us Earthies to have easy-access to the ground, extendable tire-spikes to provide better traction on weird surfaces, and such."
Once they had gotten rolling, the pair was able to list off a number of other inventions they'd come up with, some of dubious practicality. While many of the senators had questions, particularly about the wider military applications of their inventions, Senator Black had only one thing to say: "I'll try to see to it that we get your program some more experimental budget - I can see the value in what you're doing, and I know it's going to take funding to make it happen." He wasn't lying, a rarity for him.
Black's ancient memories included a number of features that were simply absent from the modern world. While many were details he'd gladly live without, a few he found to be pressing concerns. Namely the buildings of concentrated power the ancient Exalts had called manses and the tools those ancients had used, commonly called artifacts. Both, he knew, were great and versatile sources of power that were not within his particular expertise to create. So much the better, then, if he could persuade the US government to arrange for these Dragon-blooded, these children, to re-invent these things for him.
The senators were moved along, meeting members of a few other training platoons and witnessing more demonstrations before their tour was over. Overall, Michael Black came away from the experience intensely satisfied. Meeting the Dragon-blooded for the first time was the culmination of a long-term plan he'd been executing. He'd had to manipulate his way onto just the right committees after his election and then rig the randomized selection of senators that had been sent to Aberdeen. It was also the first step in a different, longer-term plan. Having now met the young Exalts, he'd work on getting to know a few, getting them to trust him and rely on him. He had to be careful, though, oh so careful. They couldn't know of his true nature - not that they'd understand why. To them, he'd just be another Exalt, a weird dark one, but an Exalt. But teens couldn't keep secrets, he knew, and if they let their Sergeant know, or any other Exalt that might have ancient memories able to identify what he was, all of his plans would be ruined.
So, step one: Meet them and greet them. Completed.