Chapter 131

  Alexander turned the cybernetic arm over in his hand, examining the craftsmanship. The titanium caught the workshop’s overhead lights, gleaming dull silver under the illumination. Every joint moved smoothly under his inspection. Every connection sat flush.

  The work was perfect.

  A small energy cell integrated into the heavily armored shoulder would power basic functions, but the arm’s true design relied on his Electrokinesis. The supercapacitors could store tremendous charge when he channeled power through them, and the entire system was optimized for direct power supply from his ability.

  Above him, thirty-three drones hovered in a loose formation. He’d made excellent use of the fabrication equipment during his time here. As had become normal for them, Droney managed the network of drones, relieving him of the responsibility.

  The arm felt heavier than he’d expected. Denser. The weight distribution would take adjustment once attached, but the housing above the shoulder was exactly as he’d designed it. A space for the cube to slot into. A chamber where it could do its work before the housing was later removed.

  His attention drifted to the cube itself.

  It sat on the workbench nearby, innocuous despite what it represented. Four and a half inches per side, with that strange quality his powers couldn’t quite categorize.

  Droney had stationed himself directly above it, almost protectively.

  Alexander glanced around the workshop. He’d disabled every recording device. One of the fabricating units had even attempted to transmit his designs to an external server when he’d begun, but he’d shut that down instantly.

  With a thought, he reached into every machine in the room. He found the stored blueprints and fabrication logs. He wiped them systematically, overwriting the data multiple times until nothing remained but random noise.

  Nobody would replicate his work.

  He lifted the arm with Metallokinesis, floating it to the center of the room. The cybernetic rotated slowly, shoulder housing facing upward, fingers pointed toward the floor. The housing opening was clearly visible from this angle, waiting to be filled.

  Alexander picked up the cube. His powers brushed against it, as he instinctively tried to understand it for the thousandth time and still failed. Machine and non-machine simultaneously. Metal and something else, maybe a ceramic composite. The contradiction frustrated him by this point.

  He slotted it into the housing.

  The fit was exact. The cube settled into place with a satisfying click, flush with the interior.

  Alexander stepped back.

  The arm continued floating where he’d positioned it. He circled slowly, watching. Waiting.

  Nothing happened.

  His senses extended outward, searching for any change.

  Still nothing.

  Minutes passed. His impatience grew. He’d done everything correctly. The cube was properly seated, flush with the arm. The intentional imperfections were perfectly designed. So why wasn’t it—

  His powers caught something.

  The cube shifted. The sensation was subtle, imperceptible to the naked eye at first. Technopathy registered it as machine activity, except the cube also read as partially inert. Metallokinesis sensed movement in what should have been solid metal, except the material was only partially metallic.

  Then the cube began to flow.

  The surface liquified, except that wasn’t quite right either. More like cold honey or thick syrup, moving with glacial slowness down the arm’s exterior. Alexander watched it crawl across the housing, spreading in all directions at once. The movement was mesmerizing in its deliberateness.

  His powers tracked the flow as it seeped into the arm’s internal structure. The substance moved through the gaps in the plating, flowing into spaces he’d carefully designed. It touched the first microfracture in the frame and stopped.

  Alexander’s awareness narrowed to that single point. The fracture was intentional, one of tens of thousands he’d placed throughout the arm. Spiraled layers of deliberate flaws, hairline fractures that compromised nearly every component. The armor, the structural frame, the actuators and servos, even the delicate internals. All of it pushed to the brink of structural failure without quite crossing over.

  The flowing substance bonded the fracture shut.

  The repair happened at a molecular level, his powers barely able to perceive the process. The two sides of the fracture merged seamlessly, but the process didn’t stop there.

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  It bonded with the surrounding titanium, creating something new. The material shifted subtly where they worked, taking on a darker quality. Blue-black threading through silver-grey. Then the flow continued, finding the next flaw, and the next, leaving that same distinctive coloration in its wake.

  It moved through the internal supercapacitors. Reinforced their delicate internal structures. Through the actuators, bonding hairline cracks in their housings. Through every component he’d intentionally weakened, making each one whole.

  Alexander watched the slow progress with growing fascination. The substance worked its way deeper into the arm, spreading through channels and cavities. The honey-slow movement gave him time to observe every detail, to understand what was happening.

  Understanding washed over him.

  The cube wasn’t a single machine. It was millions of them. Billions. Perhaps more.

  Nanomachines, packed so densely they’d appeared solid. Each one impossibly small, working in concert but individually limited.

  He was familiar with nanites, of course. Mostly for medical applications, though they were also used in some industrial capacities. Earth had been experimenting with the technology for decades. But human nanotech was painfully slow, taking hours to accomplish simple tasks or requiring extremely localized insertion. The limitations made them useless for anything requiring real-time applications.

  These were different. They moved like lightning compared to human equivalents.

  But still so, so slow.

  His attention returned to the arm. The flow had reached the elbow joint, still spreading with the same deliberate pace. The nanites worked their way deeper into the structure. Repairing. Bonding. Reinforcing. Nothing went untouched.

  Alexander waited, circling with equal patience, watching them flow through his creation, transforming it into something better than he could have built alone.

  He’d underestimated the cube’s capabilities. Its function. Allowed assumptions to blind him. And yet, it was still going according to plan.

  Better, even.

  Almost an hour after the process began, Alexander turned the cybernetic arm over in his hand again, admiring machine perfection.

  Then he headed for the exit with determined strides. It was time to see how it felt attached to his body.

  ***

  The Sleipnir’s medbay was easily one of the most expensive rooms on the ship, second only to the drive chamber and engineering bay.

  Talia stood at the main console, her fingers moving across the displays. She’d been reviewing the medbay’s protocols for the past twenty minutes, comparing them to what she knew rather than blindly trusting the systems.

  Felix sat on one of the equipment carts, currently in cat form. His tail swished slowly, the movement betraying his nervous energy.

  Alexander placed the arm on the examination table. The nanites had finished their work, integrating fully into the structure. He’d already disconnected the housing, the cube having dispersed completely throughout the arm’s structure.

  “I looked up cybernetic grafting procedures a few hours ago,” Talia said without looking away from the displays. “Figured you’d want my help rather than trusting station medical.”

  “You were right.”

  She glanced at him. “The procedure is complex. We’re talking about creating a genuine cyber-tech interface, attaching your nervous system directly to a machine. That’s different from a prosthetic, where you’d just be controlling an external tool.”

  “I understand.”

  “Do you?” Talia turned fully toward him. “This means bone integration and vascular connections. The arm has anchor points designed to clamp onto your scapula and clavicle. We’re essentially building a titanium cage around your remaining bone structure.”

  Alexander nodded. He’d installed cybernetics for others before, though only those that had housings already installed, so he knew the broad strokes.

  Talia continued. “The neural interface is the hardest part. Your brachial plexus has tens of thousands of individual nerve fibers organized into major pathways and bundles. Each bundle needs to map to a receptor point in the cybernetic. The medbay can handle the actual work with micron-level accuracy, which is good because I’d need three hands and a microscope to do it manually. But I’ll be configuring the systems and monitoring the process, making adjustments as we go.”

  “What about rejection?”

  “Standard cybernetic rejection is a concern. Your body might try to encapsulate the foreign object in scar tissue, which would interfere with the neural interface.” She gestured toward the cat. “Felix’s healing should prevent that. We’ll also be creating a sealed border where the synthetic tissue layer meets your organic tissue. The arm is self-actuating, meaning it’s not connected to the remaining musculature directly. But we need seamless integration at the interface point.”

  Felix’s tail swished sharply. “Talia said I’ll be healing throughout the procedure, but only when and where she directs it.”

  Talia pulled up a three-dimensional diagram of the arm and its interface components. “Cybernetics is such a fascinating field. This is the neural interface matrix here, where your nerve endings will connect to the control systems. Vascular integration ports here, with artificial capillaries that link to your circulatory system. This prevents tissue death at the border. And this synthetic tissue layer is biocompatible. Your organic tissue can actually grow into it, creating permanent bonds.”

  Alexander studied the diagram. He’d worked with cybernetics for years, repairing, modifying, and handling replacement installations that didn’t require medical work. Talia’s excitement about her recent foray into the field, both technical and medical, was clear, and he had no intention of interrupting.

  “Your nervous system will treat it as an actual limb,” Talia said. “The brain is adaptable. It’ll map the cybernetic into your body schema within hours normally, though I suspect you’ll complete it much faster because of your superhuman attributes and Technopathy. But the calibration needs to be exact. Miss by a millimeter and your attempt to reach for a cup becomes punching through a wall.”

  “How long will the procedure take?”

  “With the medbay automation and Felix’s healing?” Talia considered. “Maybe two hours. Stump removal and preparation will be quick with the automated systems. Bone anchoring is relatively straightforward. The neural mapping will take the longest. Then vascular integration and tissue border creation. Finally, we’ll have to go through initial calibration tests.”

  She met his eyes. “You should be unconscious for this.”

  Alexander held her gaze. “I want to observe the process.”

  “Alexander—”

  “I trust you both.” He glanced at Felix, then back to Talia. “But I really need to see it. Feel it. Not the pain, please. But I need to sense it with my powers as it’s installed.”

  Talia studied his expression for a long moment. Something in her face softened slightly. “I would insist if it were anyone else, Alex, but I can administer nerve blocks at the shoulder. We’ll need to restrain you, though. Even involuntary movements could complicate the procedure.”

  “Then let’s begin.”

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