Bane of the Dead by Jacob Holo

Author:Jacob Holo [Holo, Jacob]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781514236956
Google: u13jsgEACAAJ
Amazon: 1514236958
Publisher: Baen Books
Published: 2023-07-14T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13: Forged in Chaos

From a balcony above the seraph bay, Seth gazed down at the dissected Grendeni archangel. With its internal systems spread out below, the archangel looked even more like a grotesque metal skeleton. Spindly maintenance arms moved in blurs of motion, prying into its systems at Zo Nezrii’s neural commands.

Quennin and Jared both watched the dissection with rapt attention. Once finished, the arms folded into cradles along the bay ceiling.

“So what are we dealing with, Zo?” Seth asked.

“A lot of sloppy engineering, courtesy of our Fallen brothers and sisters,” she said.

Jared pointed at a flexible column pulled from the archangel’s back. Over one hundred spheres wrapped around the column in a rising coil.

“Is that what I think it is?” he asked.

“Yes, unfortunately,” Zo said. “Like pre-Alliance seraphs, the archangels need live neural material for their amplifiers rather than the synthetic mass we currently use. We were able to overcome that requirement by studying Pilot Donolon’s merger and partially replicating it for all seraphs. I can only imagine what we’d be up against if the Grendeni could duplicate current seraph tech.”

“The Grendeni must have a vastly accelerated breeding program,” Seth said. “Given the numbers we’ve faced.”

“Agreed,” Zo said. “Genetic analysis of the, shall we say, unwilling donors leads us to the following conclusions. One, the archangel pilots and amplifier donors are indeed descended from Mezen Daed by roughly ten generations. Two, those generations have repeatedly interbred to produce the desired chaos coefficients.”

“Disgusting,” Quennin breathed.

“The archangels employ several radical design choices,” Zo said. “The pilots actually share a direct physical link to the amplifier. While this increases performance, it also makes buffering out the chaos slaves extremely difficult. This may have contributed to the violent behavior we’ve witnessed.”

“We should destroy this amplifier,” Quennin stated.

“Agreed,” Seth said. “Find out what you can, Zo, and then let those minds rest in peace.”

“Of course.” Zo pointed to a pile of coiled tubing next to the archangel. “There’s another item I’d like to review first. The archangels’ circulatory system actually floods the cockpit with conductor fluid. We abandoned that method long ago because it’s highly detrimental to pilot health.”

“Grendeni concern for their pilots seems rather lacking,” Seth said.

“True,” Zo agreed. “But while pilot life expectancy is severely diminished, performance is increased.”

“Sort of like burning a candle at both ends,” Jared said. “Twice as bright, half as long.”

The three Aktenai pilots turned to Jared. Their neural links looked up the obscure Earth culture reference.

“Oh!” Zo said. “A candle. So that’s what you meant. Yes, something like that.” She tilted her head to the side. “But wouldn’t that be difficult?”

“What do you mean?”

“Burning a candle at both ends,” Zo said. “Wouldn’t you drip wax all over the place?”

“Umm, actually I never thought of it like that.” Jared shrugged an apology. “It’s just a saying. I didn’t make it up.”

“But if you’re going to use a vague cultural reference, shouldn’t you pick one that makes sense?”

“Well, I, uhh …”

“In fact, aren’t you that strange Earth Nation

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