Chapter 151: Heavy Metal

Chapter 151: Heavy Metal

Izumi picked up the slightly dented piece of charcoal-colored metal and turned it over in her hands, examining it critically. Someone else might have needed a dozen tools to analyze it properly.  For Izumi her onboard sensor suite was able to do the job, noting everything about the result of their test, down to how many atomic bonds had been broken. A number that was shockingly low, considering that they’d fired a mounted railgun, along with several potent and exotic emitter quirks, at the thick plate of metal. It was damaged, but not to the point of truly losing its integrity.  A testament to just how tough it was. Izumi fed the data from her examination to the terminal in the testing room, even as she returned there with the chunk of metal. As she entered, Momo spoke up from examining the readout of the scans.

“Well, I’d say this certainly qualifies as a success. Though we still need to decide what to call it.”

That the test was a success was a bit of an understatement, but the other part was also true. The metal was, in fact, a modification of the same metals YoRHa androids were made out of. It was something they’d only been able to make at all, and then only in small quantities, once setting up orbital infrastructure. It required both a zero-gravity environment and a fairly thorough understanding of Maso/Quirk Energy. YoRHa may have been extreme elite units, but there had never been all that many of them, precisely because it was hard to create the materials for their combat frames. Not even Momo could mass produce the stuff, as it required more than just atomic-level precision. It also required Maso, which in their case had been concentrated out of the weaker energy that was QE. Momo might have plenty of that, but no one had the precision to control their own QE at the level she’d have needed to for making the stuff. Doubly so since she’d have also needed to focus on the complex atomic structures that were also required.

Up until now, making frames for the androids they had already ‘woken up’ had taken up their entire production ability of the hyper-advanced materials required for an android frame. However, this new metal was a modification of that ‘standard’ YoRHa material. In almost every way it was inferior. Slightly less tough, with a much worse strength-to-weight ratio, you’d never be able to build an android frame out of it. That said, there was a major advantage to go with the downsides. Specifically, that it was much easier to mass produce, at least if you had access to Zero-G environments. With the appropriate orbital infrastructure which they now had increasing access to, they could create enough of it, fast enough, to use for both the skeletal structure and armor plate of a new Mech. Specifically, a Super Heavy/Assault design they were prototyping called the Behemoth.

“Adamatine? Endo-steel? Beskar? Badassium?”

Izumi and Momo both blinked at the unexpected input from Kyoka. She’s been on hand to attempt using upscaled sonic canons against the metal, as one of several exotic damage types they’d tested it against. Momo looked bemused as she spoke up in response to Kyoka’s suggestions.

“Fictional metals aren’t the worst place we could look for inspiration, I suppose. I admit I’m surprised you were able to come up with them so easily, though…”

Kyoka blushed slightly as Momo trailed off, an obvious question in her voice. Their girlfriend twirled one of her jacks around a finger as she half-defensively explained.

“My dad is kinda a nerd? I’ve seen a bunch of old movies and read a few books and comics he has…you know, when I was younger.”

Momo looked delighted. She was, by far, the best read of the three. At least where fiction was concerned. Izumi tended to focus on scientific journals or textbooks. Before Momo could launch into questioning Kyoka’s reading the way she very obviously wanted to, Izumi cleared her throat to bring attention back to the issue at hand.

“Whatever the inspiration, we need to name it. For that matter, we’ve just been using the number chain designator for the metal used in the androids, since YoRHa tended not to actually name things properly. Not even themselves.”

The other two girls immediately winced at that. It was a bit of a weird sticking point that the androids didn’t see any need to pick names, instead just going by their model designations. Izumi personally thought it might change, given enough time and exposure to human culture. It might not, either, though. 2B had never indicated any desire to change her name…but her reasons were more complicated than the other ex-YoRHa androids. After all, 2B had technically been created as 2E. In her very specific case, adopting the designation 2B as hers, even once it no longer mattered, actually was a choice. She wanted to be 2B, not 2E, for important personal reasons.

None of which solved their need to come up with a name for their new metal…

… … …

Aetherite and Black Aetherite. Those had ultimately been the two names they’d settled on for their ‘new’ materials. Aetherite had seemed fitting for the lightweight but incredibly tough metal that YoRHa combat android frames were made of, as the formation process made heavy use of Maso. Not QE, mind you, but Maso. Which had been part of the problem in making very much of it, as you needed to condense QE by a factor of nearly twenty to end up with proper Maso. Something which, on the planet itself, would have lit any site up to attract every Rift Bubble in Japan.

Part of the difference in making Black Aetherite, which made it more practical to create in significant quantities, was a much lower density required of QE. A skeleton part or slab of armor panel made from Black Aetherite needed less than half the condensed QE that one tenth the quantity of proper Aetherite required. Meaning that, for the same QE cost, you could make an equal amount of Black Aetherite for around 5 percent of the QE cost. Considering how much energy was lost in condensing QE in the first place, and cheaper costs for the other materials in Black Aetherite, it was viable to actually make larger amounts of it. Still expensive by almost any measure, but viable, at least.

Which was a seriously good thing, considering why they needed it in the first place.

Specifically, they needed it because the Terran Alliance finally had significant amounts of information on the Zilts themselves. The ruling species of Ziltmach and the Empire of Kurrick had been incredibly illusive until the Terran Alliance started taking Ziltmach cites. Even then, it hadn’t been until the third city, in which local partisans had managed to disable any teleportation out of the city before the Zilts could flee, that they’d actually managed to capture one.

Disturbingly, they were among the most human-looking species in some ways…if only for half of their body.

Zils turned out to be only half-humanoid in form, averaging about 10 ft (305 cm) in total length, but with a significant chunk of that length being a snake-like lower half making them resemble a Naga or Lamia. Their humanoid upper half had pointed ears and small, vestigial horns. Their hands were somewhat clawed, possessing an extra joint on each finger, but only having three fingers and a thumb on each hand overall. Their faces featured a pair of breathing slits instead of a nose, reptilian eyes that ranged from bright red to yellow in color, and their overall skin tones that ranged in color from pale mauve or lavender to near-black violet. Their lower halves were thickly scaled and serpentine, with powerful muscles that could propel them at startling speeds. Only one, out of a half dozen, had been captured alive…but had spilled plenty of information.

More, it had to be said, out of arrogance than fear.

Based on the information they now had, it seemed that the Zilts honestly had a very small population. At least, comparative to all of their servant races. Apparently, the Lizardfolk (who they now knew were properly called the Kazem) had evolved alongside the Zilts, being fully native to Ziltmach. It was the Zilts, however, that had mastered the power of ‘Sorcery’ when it appeared in their world. Sorcery, in this case, being what the monster races called Quirk Energy and YoRHa’s humanity had called Maso. As near as 2B and Izumi could figure, Ziltmach was dimensionally ‘farther away’ from the death of the The Giant, which had happened in 2B’s original home dimension. An event that caused White Chlorination Syndrome in her home dimension’s humanity. Quirked Earth, for lack of something better to call it, had been several dimensions away and less effected than 2B’s home dimension. With the dimensional spread of Maso causing Quirks as humans managed to adapt instead of having their systems overwhelmed.

Ziltmach was even farther away, perhaps near the ‘farthest’ away in the dimensional sea that would have experienced noticeable effects. Unfortunately, there seemed to be an unpredictable degree of time dilation that they were still unable to make heads or tails of. Quirked Earth had been flooded with Maso particles a comparative decade or two before the same point in time that The Giant had died…and Ziltmach had experienced the same wave, albeit weaker, centuries earlier. The end result being that, despite having a much weaker exposure, the Zilts had possessed much longer to master manipulating it. Mastery that had led to them taking over the Kazem, who revered them as ‘touched by the gods.’ Something which had, in turn, let them begin conquering other worlds, once they stumbled upon how to open tunnels through the Dimensional Sea.

As fascinating at the history was, it unfortunately wasn’t the relevant point.

The relevant point was that the vast majority of the Zilts, whose total population was suspected to be under a million, lived in a massive fortress city called simply the Dark Citadel. Which, yes, looked just as much like an Edgelord had built it as you might think from the name. Something that the Terran Alliance knew because the Zilt they’d captured hadn’t hesitated to tauntingly point it out to them. A willingness that they’d attributed to arrogance…at first.

At least until they’d tried to attack it.

The Dark Citadel was on the very edge of territory the Alliance now controlled. Unfortunately, when they’d marched on it with a probing attack, they’d quickly learned that it was an entirely different beast compared to the cities they’d captured so far. Those, it turned out, hadn’t actually been that well defended. Yes, they’d had walls, shields, and garrisons. But those defenses had, apparently, been a case of minimalistic rear-line defenses put in by paranoid conquerors of an earlier era and not really kept updated. Human artillery had outranged any weapons mounted on their walls, and the walls had been reinforced with ‘enchantments’ only to a minimal level.

The Citadel, being the home of the rulers of the Empire, was an entirely different animal, and the probing assault force had been completely wiped out from far beyond the range of anything they’d seen from the enemy so far. Likewise, attempts to attack it from range had failed utterly. The Citadel’s weapons actually outranged most field artillery. Even when hundreds of cruise missiles had been painstakingly moved from Earth in pieces and reassembled on Ziltmach…the Citadel’s air defense had utterly wiped away the aerial bombardment attempt before it got anywhere close to hitting. So far, only lances of Shieldmaiden II – Mod Q’s, supported by YoRHa androids, had survived an attempt to get close. Even that group hadn’t managed to do any serious damage before getting battered badly enough to be forced to retreat.

This was, to put it mildly, a major problem.

Even with significant parts of the Empire now in open revolt, the simple truth of the matter was that the Terran Alliance and humanity as a whole just flat-out didn’t have the numbers to win a long-term war. Post Quirk-Wars and Era of Chaos, humanity barely had a population in excess of three and a half billion, with those numbers dropping even farther during the early Invasion which had killed tens of millions. The Empire of Kurrick, on the other hand, was estimated to have a population in excess of 75 billion, spread over something like fourteen worlds. So far, the only two reasons the weight of numbers hadn’t drowned Earth, were that the Empire couldn’t bring all of those numbers to bare at once…and so far humanity had achieved a high kills to deaths ratio. Even accounting for all the civilians killed, the estimated ratio was five to one in humanity’s favor.

That couldn’t hold up forever. Eventually, sheer weight of numbers and the inability to make enough bullets, would turn the tide against humanity. The only two real chances of managing a win were to either get a large enough percentage of the Empire to rebel…or to decapitate the Empire by wiping out the Zilts. The latter options was, frankly, the better. After all, even if it failed to achieve an immediate victory, it would at minimum drastically increase the number of those revolting across various worlds. Which would, in turn, solve the numbers issue in a different way.

Which, of course, is why the High Command of the Terran Alliance had once again turned to Aegis Inc for a solution. They’d asked for ‘one more miracle,’ and the whole of Aegis that could be spared was shifted to trying to generate just that. All other work had been handed off to secondary teams as Izumi, Momo, and Melissa all focused on creating something that could survive laying siege to the Dark Citadel.

After three months, they were all now watching as the first pieces of their answer to that question was put into place, the very first Behemoth Assault Mech slowly coming together…

… … …

Even as the first Behemoth mech started assembly, a new hire of Aegis Inc cackled over her own work.

“YEESSSSS, MY BABY LIVES! YOU SHALL BRING RUIN ON THE ENEMIES OF HUMANITY, YOU GLORIOUS, SEXY BEAST!”

Nikolai Bunin and Elizabeth Hardy both sighed in exhausted exasperation. When Mei Hatsume had been hired away from her work at UA, to take on the Power Armor projects of Aegis Inc, the pair of them had been assigned to ride herd on her. Mostly Nikolai, it had to be said. With Elizabeth, who was an extremely shy introvert, it had been more a task in surviving while working with the excitable pinkette. Doubly so once Mei had discovered that Elizabeth specialized in weapons systems of all types and stripes.

At least Hera and Hana had both been assigned elsewhere. Putting the twins anywhere near Mei would have been an entire series of Epic War Crimes waiting to happen. As it was, both of them were extremely grateful that 21O was splitting her time between the two projects, and was somewhat able to reign Mei in. Nikolai had enough of a wrestling match just getting the manic inventor to properly standardize things, so that they could mass produce the new power armor that Mei had been working on.

For all their pain and suffering though, they had to admit that getting Hatsume involved with making Power Armor more widely available had been the correct call. Not only had she been behind the PA that the UA Guild was using, but she was an absolute wizard at working with non-electric systems. Her steampunk-come-post-apocalypse design philosophy had meant a greater focus on mechanical systems from the start, and Mei had adapted to QE as a power source far more quickly and completely than others. The original result had been the Mod Q Power Armor that was designed for use in the Rift Bubbles. Those, however, suffered a restriction of not being able to use any electronic parts, and having some hard limits on size to get into the Bubbles before they broke into realspace in the first place.

The current result which she was cackling over were an entirely different beast. Half again the size of the PA-Mod Q, and making use of the modular chips and basic electronics that could be manufactured on Ziltmach now, Mei had created something of a monster. Using QE for power still, but with much more processing power, it was capable of generating an actual energy shield, and had a least a thin layer of the Black Aetherite developed by the Behemoth team as external armor. Combined with a heavy gatling laser that could overcharge to produce a beam weapon, the ‘Doomtreader’ armor had a very serious chance of allowing infantry to get in close to the Dark Citadel. Doubly so as it would be going in behind the Behemoths, using them as cover.

Better yet, with Nikolai riding herd on her to make sure parts were standardized? They could make thousands of these suits in the time it would take to make the two dozen Behemoths that High Command wanted for the assault. All they needed to do now was buckle down and get to work…