Defy the Worlds (Defy the Stars #2)(101)
But Abel thinks there might be another way to use them.
There was no time for him to teach Simon Shearer what he needed to know; however, Simon may have been able to teach Abel something.
He brings the Persephone in closer to the battle, until the starfighters and mechs are crisscrossing the space around him in every direction. No Queen or Charlie will pay much attention to an unarmed civilian vessel unless it makes overly hostile moves. Remaining motionless is dangerous mostly because stray weapons fire could hit him. The shields are at full power, which will have to be sufficient protection. Abel’s going to need all his concentration for what he does next.
Simon told Abel that he controlled other mechs by being more machine than human. This is strange to Abel, who’s worked so hard to explore his human side. Letting himself be wholly a machine—it would be the equivalent of telling humans to jump off a cliff, trusting that a force field would catch them. All their faith in the force field wouldn’t make that jump easy. He doesn’t want to surrender his human self, even for an hour.
His memories of Haven crystallize, and he sees the broken, battered mechs attacking him in concert, as if they were the limbs of a single organism. Simon learned how to control them as if they were an extension of his mind. The opportunity before Abel is immense.
So is the danger, but he considers it irrelevant. Compared to the risk to Noemi, what he’s attempting is nothing.
He sits at ops and opens one of the interfaces. Then he withdraws an emergency repair edger and slashes across his wrist, reopening the wound he gave himself on Haven. The injury doesn’t bleed as much as it would for a human, but red drops spatter onto the console. As long as it doesn’t ooze into the wiring, this represents no significant problem.
The metal within Abel has been exposed. Simon hadn’t found such hardwiring necessary; that was one of the few advantages he had. While next generations of Inheritors may have the advantages of greater organic content, Abel thinks with satisfaction, they’ll lack the ability to interface directly with older computer systems, like the one that governs his ship.
He withdraws one long, slender rod and pushes the end into a small port. The effect is instantaneous and overwhelming; the full flood of Persephone’s data rushes around and into him, too much for even his brain to process. But he retains enough self-control to block out one core function area, then another, until he’s eliminated enough to think clearly. That lets him focus on communications.
The signals the ship would normally send aren’t on the same frequencies that tether mechs to their Damocles controls. They are, however, extremely close, and now that Abel’s connected with his ship, he thinks he can push that frequency to exactly the right level. Shutting his eyes, he concentrates. The effort feels like static electricity crackling around his brain—
WE ARE HERE.
Abel’s eyes open wide as he connects to every mech fighting for Earth. At first it’s the same overload as when he initially connected to the Persephone, plus nearly five thousand. (4862, to be exact—the combined Vagabond and Genesis forces have already destroyed 138 of the invasion force mechs. He can feel their absence from the whole the way a human might feel the gap of a lost tooth.)
He bears down. Bit by bit, he streamlines the connection until far more information flows out to them than in to him.
Your grandson was able to do this with a human mind, he says to the Mansfield that dwells within his heart, the shadow-father he’ll never stop defending himself against. If he could, that means I can. I’ll wield a kind of control you never even dreamed of.
—I am more than you—
Energy pulses from him, through the circuits of the Persephone, out into space. Every one of his muscles is tensed to the point of spasm, but his physical body has never felt farther away. Abel’s mind is a part of these signals, the ones surging into every single fighter mech and redefining their new targets: one another.
4717. 4321. 3800. The mech signals wink out like snuffed candles. He feels every single death—physically feels it, a dim reflection of the momentary pain he’s discovered even mechs experience at the end. But as their numbers decrease, the level of control he has to exert lowers. He can bear this. He must. Every mech destroyed is another one that can’t hurt Noemi.
2020. 1686. 1037. 548. 215. 99. 47. 10.
Zero.
Abel severs the connection. The concepts in his mind soften, deepen, becoming thoughts instead of data. As he leans back, his muscles quiver as they try to relax from the tension. The immense heaviness he feels at first seems like a malfunction, before he realizes it’s exhaustion, even greater than that he experienced on Haven. He hadn’t given himself sufficient regeneration time, perhaps. A faint sheen of moisture along his facial skin must be sweat. He has never perspired before.
Then he realizes the moisture on his upper lip is in fact blood. Abel puts his hand to his face, pulls it away to see red stains on his fingers. He gave himself a nosebleed, a new experience he swiftly decides he doesn’t like.
He resolves not to try multi-mech control again until he has conducted extensive further study. Even his strength has limits.
While he carefully reassembles his arm and reseals the skin, he watches the domed viewscreen. The few human-commanded ships that accompanied the mechs to this side of the Genesis Gate are already trying to return, with a few ships of the Vagabond fleet in pursuit. Those Earth ships could put up a good fight on their own, but he suspects the people have forgotten how to undertake their own battles. Without the mechs, they’re lost.