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.
Meanwhile, the other Vagabond and Genesis ships swoop and swirl in crazy victory spirals. He wonders which one of the tiny darting lights on that screen is the corsair. Normally he’d focus in tighter to locate it, but he finds he doesn’t yet want to.
He’s… hurting. Not physically, except for the bright line of pain where he cut his arm open. What he feels is more like the absence of something so essential he takes it for granted, maybe similar to what humans experience when they get dizzy or are temporarily deafened by trauma. When he tries to take stock of his condition, he realizes there’s a sort of numb place in his brain—an area he can’t currently probe.
He decides to ignore this for the time being. His organic repair systems may heal it, and if not, he can have Virginia Redbird mend any damage. Currently Abel has higher priorities, such as finding Noemi amid the post-battle chaos, and dealing with the small ship that’s now approaching the Persephone.
A transit pod, he realizes. These aren’t fighters; they’re hardly even ships at all, with very little steering and propulsion. They exist purely to allow humans to move between ships in space when neither vessel can dock with the other. The green-and-white marks on its side reveal that this one was launched from one of the larger, older troop ships of the Genesis fleet.
Abel rises from his chair, surprised to feel his legs shaky beneath him. But he can walk through the corridor without stumbling. Weary as he is, he’s still able to function.
By the time he gets to the launching bay, the air lock is already cycling. Maybe he should’ve demanded communication from the pod before allowing it to dock; maybe he should’ve set the door not to automatically open. Normally he would have done these things, but in his current daze, they’re occurring to him too late. Everything is too fuzzy, too slow. This must be what having a human brain feels like.
The air lock cycle ends. Abel immediately steps inside the bay. He can’t keep this individual from coming on board, but if there’s going to be a confrontation, he intends to get it over with quickly. When the transit pod slides open, however, the visitor appears to be… if not a friend, at least an ally.
“Darius Akide,” he says. “I thought you were a noncombatant.”
Akide nods. “I went into battle to bear witness, and to chronicle this stage of the war for the survivors, if there were any.”
“As you see, survivors are numerous.” Abel waits for praise or gratitude that doesn’t come. The humans may not yet have realized what he did for them. However, other questions are far more important. “Did you see Noemi’s ship? She was flying a red corsair.”
Surprise flickers on Akide’s face as he steps from the pod, his long white robes striking an oddly formal note. “She went into battle? I thought she was required to resign.”
“Nothing could keep her from defending Genesis.” Abel will need to send out a signal to her directly. What if she was one of the few Genesis pilots lost in the early, bloody stage of the fight?
Have faith, he reminds himself. Even if he can’t believe in a deity, he can believe in her.
“What is the purpose of your
