None of the Marrick who were being piled up around the ritual were in the best of shape; and when he got a good look at the equipment that the Jernal had brought along, he found it even harder to care. Each of the devices was a simple electric spike; every single one of the locals.. a species considered so inferior they didn't even have a name in the Republic catalogue, simply because they weren't humanoid... had been executed with one of the blades in the pile before him.
It would be placed against the chrysalis the children formed, as they developed into an adult, around the brain area, triggered; and puncture the brain, killing the creature instantly, when it was done properly. They might have been sedated for some time beforehand; not to prevent suffering, but to prevent them from 'hatching' while they were waiting for the freezers full of silk and meat to be emptied into arriving container ships.
Eyeball had seen the images, though; quite a few of them had multiple injuries; a single glancing blow done to a torso, or puncturing the silk protective layer without hitting the brain at all. For those who were taken in fresh, it would have meant some unknown time of terrible agony before death.
Each of these devices had been used to butcher thousands, hundreds of thousands, of sentient creatures. The Jernal watched in confusion as Eyeball arranged them into a neat pile; and a set of Pale Ones; clearly mind-controlled Marrick victims; stepped forward, wearing light powered armor, carrying the far denser, more durable, heavy armor helmets in hand...
As an anti-armor plasma 'Peeler' was used on the pile of tools, starting to melt them down, Dobrey was even more shocked. They had expected them to be used to slaughter the Marrick. Seeing them simply destroyed, melted down; the irregular mass of various sorts of metal and internal electronics components forming a multi-layered, yellow-hot soup of molten materials that would be too hot for the unarmored to touch; and scooped up with the helmets as if they were buckets.
The Pale Ones then walked around the large, intricate symbol, pouring the metal with a strange precision considering the improvised tools being used; hissing and popping as what little moisture remained in the dry dirt sizzled away on contact with the metal, splattering droplets of it on the armored forms.
There were too many of the tools; too much of the metal. By the time the symbol was fully cast, each intricate part filled with that hot, steaming material, there were still several buckets full remaining in the central pile. The machine turned to Dobrey.
"I am about to begin bleeding the Marrick and using their blood to cool the metal. There will be quite a bit of splatter at extreme temperatures, and it may cause some deformation if not done properly. If there are any you particularly hate, you may go ahead and kill them yourself; it is their blood we will be using for this purpose, and so long as they die in this immediate vicinity, it will work properly."
It looked... insane. Like these ridiculously advanced alien creatures were performing the sort of ritual that would be in old storybooks, of ideas long debunked and considered absurd in Jernal society. But... they were killing the Marrick for it, not anyone who mattered, so he would leave them to it. If the aliens wanted to play foolish barbarian and paint their faces in the blood of their enemies, so be it.
***
Ascension was reasonably certain there was at least some magic involved in it's own creation. Converting a human mind into a digital format, much less enhancing it, was far beyond the science of the soviet era, and the mad genius responsible had likely used a variety of sources for his work; and its drones were more energy-efficient and capable than they should be.
Was Ascension essentially a conscious enchantment placed on a processor, bound to a computer program? Or perhaps a soul bound to a machine? Or just a copy, minus the memories?
As it studied the ritual, it considered whether it would be possible to create another duplicate of itself; to use, for example, Ripper or Eyeball to copy and create an entirely separate AI. Or, less likely, one of these local sentients. Would using a ritual like this make it more competent? Or perhaps turn it into a hate-filled monster?
It speculated as to what would happen when it was complete, as it received updates from its other drones; more of them were being finished now, and it had actually scavenged over one hundred and twelve artificial limbs from various medical bays in passenger vessels, the cruiser, and the starport to create an additional twenty improvised drones; albeit ones not yet capable of significant combat roles. For now, they could assist in construction and scavenging work; and if they needed to be involved in combat before proper drones could be built, Ascension could simply load them into armor suits.
As it considered the best way to handle the remaining civilians, something happened. A brilliant flash of orange-red light; Ascension focused on Eyeball at the center of the circle.
At some point, obscured by the lights and strange energy fields this symbol seemed to be generating, he'd... lowered the artificial arm... and submerged it in the leftover mass of semi-molten metal. The metal surrounding him started to contract, lifting up from the dirt; forming what seemed to be an intricated dome of blood-red wires, glowing with a vicious malevolence.
It contracted; steadily shrinking from a few dozen meters across to become an almost solid sphere surrounding the circle Eyeball had left at the center; and as he lifted the false arm into the air, visibly glowing red-hot... the sphere congealed into what appeared to be a single glowing red orb not much smaller than a softball, covered with rings of intricate runes; which he gently raised up that hand; and allowed it to simply float into position, landing in his grip.
Strangely, despite being far too dense for the size it already had... it continued to shrink in his grip. After a few more seconds, it was barely perceptible. A tiny bead in the artificial palm.
Eyeball dropped down to his knees... and seemed lost for a moment, looking through the dirt of the clearing.. and stopped, taking... a bullet that had been laying atop a rock; reorienting it... and placing the tiny orb in its tip.
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"There we go. Alright. We'll see what that does when it hits a gas giant. Probably just before we leave; don't want to trap ourselves in the system."
***
When Eyeball awoke the next morning; or at least as far as the days they had adopted on the 8AD; one of Ascension's drones was waiting outside the bedroom; watching the hallways. He studied it for a moment as he rose, and started to get cleaned up; starting off, as usual, by shaving; including his head, as, despite not caring that much about looks, wearing a helmet constantly made long hair extremely problematic; before stepping into a shower so that the loose hair would wash off of his body. He felt... incredible.
The artificial arm looked... different. It was smooth, and a dull red in color; and it felt almost as real as his actual arm now. "So. What sort of picture are we looking at when we leave the system? I know we've got another several light-years before we get to the front lines of the war, and then further to reach 'safety'. If this works, and we make the system out of reach for warp travel for a while, what will it look like?"
The machine continued facing the hallway; but Ascension's voice filled the room, audible over the running water. "My drone count has increased dramatically; I can comfortably leave a few behind to assist the locals in preparing defenses. Two of the Jernal have requested to join your crew; assuming you accept, that will still leave six behind more than willing to assist in killing Republic forces. The locals have begun to hatch from their chrysalis for the first time in years without molestation; they are intelligent, competent, strong-willed; extremely different from their children, and a group of them wish to meet you. Their name for themselves is a serious of clicking noises that translates as 'Gem of Sapphire' for the males and 'Gem of Ruby' for the females, without any name that refers to both as a whole."
Eyeball sighed; shutting off the hot water. "Well. What do they call the planet?"
A series of short clicks emerged. "It translates as 'the fourth stage'. Their species typically live for between thirty and three hundred years, depending on coincidence of birth, undergoing three life stages during that process; in the fourth stage, they rejoin the earth; burying themselves and dying."
"Hmm. Maybe Chrysalids, since they enter a chrysalis and change?"
"Those are an existing fictional species from earth science-fiction that are hostile and reproduce by implanting their young in victims. I would recommend against that."
Eyeball blinked as he toweled off. "...Okay then. If the planet is fourth stage, we'll call them four-stagers. Forstagers. Like calling humans terrans, or earthers."
Ascension nodded. "I will implement that in the translator for you, and on their end translate it to 'People of the fourth stage'."
"So... What will we be taking with us when we go?"
He started carefully sliding on a vacuum suit underlayer he would wear under his armor; the skin-tight garment would be uncomfortable at first, but over time grow less so; after wearing it for a few hours, he would barely notice it. A holo-image appeared, projected in front of the drone; showing a vessel with a box-like front, dotted with four large gun barrels; expanding outward in a long, lean shape; only five or six times as wide at the end as the front.
"The external structure has been roughly put together, and it will be ready for departure within the next two hours; drones are constantly loading everything that can be fit into the extradimensional space. We currently have all saleable cargo from the ships, all foodstuffs good for anyone but the locals, over one thousand two hundred light Republic powered armor suits, mostly somewhat damaged, twenty of their heavy power armor suits, fifty-three drones of dramatically differing capabilities, and over one thousand Pale Ones; though their corpses are decaying rapidly, faster than human ones. The four main guns are, fired in concert, able to penetrate the shielding of and deal damage to any Republic vessel I have specifications for; which is most of them. With you as a pilot, I would bet on it against any Republic warship, including one of their Battleships; though redundant systems would require two or even three separate strikes."
Eyeball nodded slowly. "I need a one-shot kill on those. Killing one in a few volleys impressive. But if I want to scare a fleet enough to make an impact..." He started attaching the armor plates to each other, forming the light armor back together. He stopped for a moment. "This.... looks different." He held up a black armored boot. "Are these... jets? They seem a bit big for normal vacuum application."
"I took the liberty of including a flight system. In four hours, there will be an extradimensional storage space for your armor to provide fuel and ammo storage."
Eyeball sighed. "I appreciate the thought, but this... feels wrong. Not sure why, but it'll cause me problems. I'll work out my own gear once we're en route, but this will do for now. So. We need to decide what to do with our civilians, and then meet the Forstagers. How many tier zeroes, ones, twos?"
The hologram shifted; showing the stripped-down remains of the station, and the various starships scattered about; all in various states of disassembly. "All planetbound civilians are deceased at this time unless they have been converted to Pale Ones. In orbit, over seven hundred survivors. Two tier zero, forty-seven tier one, and the remaining six hundred and ninety are tier two. No tier three are present."
One of the craft was highlighted in gold. "With the exception of the Heavyworlder ship, the rest are operating on emergency power, and will be inert within the next forty-eight hours; some already are. The heavyworlders have repaired their ship; mostly. To avoid drawing attention, they have yet to hook up the engines, and seem to be waiting for us to ignore them."
Eyeball nodded. "Sort them out. The tier zeroes and tier ones go to the surface. The Jernal can have them. The tier twos can go with the heavies; go ahead and tell them they can hook up the engines so long as they take on refugees. If you think any might actually be down to help the locals... we'll chat."
As Eyeball finished getting his armor back together; checking out the different ports for the jets and shaking his head. as he did so, Ascension's drone gave a small nod.
"Understood. We will comply. Will this be standard practice going forward?"
Eyeball shrugged. "Tier ones and zeroes know the whole thing is bullshit. That the Founders didn't create all life, and that people like the Forstagers didn't murder some local founder-created life to prosper. Anyone above Tier Two in the Republic that flies a ship or picks up a gun can be assumed worthless. Sort everything out up in orbit. As soon as we let the Forstagers have their word in edgewise... we blow the gas giant, and get the hell out."
The machine opened the door; revealing the open cargo bay of the assault transport, and a space that had, once, been occupied by several strike teams of Marrick soldiers. As he looked over the bunks, made for a few dozen men to sleep on during transit, it gave him nostalgic feelings for time spent riding navy ships on the long, slow route to bring armored divisions overseas.
As he settled his helmet into place, double-checking the seals, the drone took up pace with him; following him out into the open... and towards the Hive that his helmet had tagged as a nav-point.
Ascension stepped ahead, opening one of the numerous side-doors; "What, exactly, will that projectile do to the gas giant while we run away?"
"...Honestly, not sure. But it felt right to make it that way. So I suspect the Republic won't like it."