extracted: naked Hybrids bred especially by the Hexegenic Factories. Naked, yes, and bald, blinded, and bulbously obese. The Corpulites were a particular Organic Materials invention—living beings whose deliberately corrupted gene mechanisms caused grievous obesity. Satchels of fat hungfrom the arms, legs, bellies, and backs of captives. Horned Scythers were quickly dispatched, wielding great flensing blades, which expertly carved slabs of fat from the shrieking contingent. The blades glimmered, each downward flashing arc dividing still more fat from the living bodies of the Corpulites.
Now Favius’s question had been answered. The fat was then passed up to the Pipe Fitters scaling the Inlet and promptly used to grease the fitting seams.
An immense shadow crawled past the perimeter; Favius was not surprised to see Levitators moving in a huge Y-connector.
Magnificent
, he thought. The screams of the butchered Corpulites soared like a thick breeze as Scythers continued to slough off the necessary fat, and when the great seam had been sufficiently greased . . .
Incantations boomed from megaphones, retarding the Levitation Spell and hence lowering the Y-joint perfectly into place, after which the Pipe Fitters amassed to lock down the bolts with their spanners.
Favius understood now—the Y-joint split the direction of catastrophic inflow into dual directions, making dispersion more even and efficient.
When the Fitters were done, they disembarked from the site on Balloon Skiffs, onto their next assignment. The Corpulites, however, were not so lucky. Now bereft of all body fat, they were left to bellow and squirm on the Reservoir’s gritty black floor, knowing that eventually they would become one with whatever manner of filth soon filled this place to the brim.
Another great wonder on another day in Hell
, the Conscript thought.
And I am honored to be a tiny part of it, a tiny part in Lucifer’s plan
.
What greater gift could anyone ask?
(II)
So this is it
, Krilid thought, half-queasy as he gazed down. It was in the mouth of an illegally duplicated Nectoport that he stood, leaning slightly out. The technology amazed him, and it verified rumors he’d heard for years that certain anti-Luciferic sects had engaged their own White Sorcerers to psychically steal the secrets from Lucifer’s own Bio-Wizards and copy them for their own use. A Nectoport could be thought of as an invisible tunnel that, snakelike, covered great distances in seconds because it existed in a different phase-shift and therefore inverted true space—the ultimate achievement in occult science. The “tunnel” was reportedly capable of extending indefinitely, and all that was ever visible of it was the forward Egress and Observation Port.
But even with the security tether, Krilid found little piece of mind; the tether itself could break (causing a fatal fall), while this very assignment, for all he knew, could be bogus. In Hell, information was like character. One never knew what to trust—indeed, if trust even
existed
in this infernal sprawl.
Approximately a mile above the very spot in which Conscript Favius stood on his rampart, Krilid hovered. The spotty black clouds hid him fairly well, yet he could take no chances of detection. The clouds were patrolled now by demonic troops in balloons, and there were always the heinous Gremlins who lived and hunted in these clouds, semi-weightless monsters with saw-teeth and mouths that opened vertically beneath globose, black-veined eyes; not to mention untold flying things and Levatopuses, which were like bedbugs only they lived off the sooty waste in the clouds rather than a sleeper’s blood. Krilid’s direct field commander—the Fallen Angel Ezoriel—had provided not only the Nectoport but also a Hand of Glory, whose flame-tippedfingertips imparted a skirt of invisibility, which prevented unwelcome observers from seeing the Port’s floating green rim of light.
Down there
, he thought, staring at
Now Favius’s question had been answered. The fat was then passed up to the Pipe Fitters scaling the Inlet and promptly used to grease the fitting seams.
An immense shadow crawled past the perimeter; Favius was not surprised to see Levitators moving in a huge Y-connector.
Magnificent
, he thought. The screams of the butchered Corpulites soared like a thick breeze as Scythers continued to slough off the necessary fat, and when the great seam had been sufficiently greased . . .
Incantations boomed from megaphones, retarding the Levitation Spell and hence lowering the Y-joint perfectly into place, after which the Pipe Fitters amassed to lock down the bolts with their spanners.
Favius understood now—the Y-joint split the direction of catastrophic inflow into dual directions, making dispersion more even and efficient.
When the Fitters were done, they disembarked from the site on Balloon Skiffs, onto their next assignment. The Corpulites, however, were not so lucky. Now bereft of all body fat, they were left to bellow and squirm on the Reservoir’s gritty black floor, knowing that eventually they would become one with whatever manner of filth soon filled this place to the brim.
Another great wonder on another day in Hell
, the Conscript thought.
And I am honored to be a tiny part of it, a tiny part in Lucifer’s plan
.
What greater gift could anyone ask?
(II)
So this is it
, Krilid thought, half-queasy as he gazed down. It was in the mouth of an illegally duplicated Nectoport that he stood, leaning slightly out. The technology amazed him, and it verified rumors he’d heard for years that certain anti-Luciferic sects had engaged their own White Sorcerers to psychically steal the secrets from Lucifer’s own Bio-Wizards and copy them for their own use. A Nectoport could be thought of as an invisible tunnel that, snakelike, covered great distances in seconds because it existed in a different phase-shift and therefore inverted true space—the ultimate achievement in occult science. The “tunnel” was reportedly capable of extending indefinitely, and all that was ever visible of it was the forward Egress and Observation Port.
But even with the security tether, Krilid found little piece of mind; the tether itself could break (causing a fatal fall), while this very assignment, for all he knew, could be bogus. In Hell, information was like character. One never knew what to trust—indeed, if trust even
existed
in this infernal sprawl.
Approximately a mile above the very spot in which Conscript Favius stood on his rampart, Krilid hovered. The spotty black clouds hid him fairly well, yet he could take no chances of detection. The clouds were patrolled now by demonic troops in balloons, and there were always the heinous Gremlins who lived and hunted in these clouds, semi-weightless monsters with saw-teeth and mouths that opened vertically beneath globose, black-veined eyes; not to mention untold flying things and Levatopuses, which were like bedbugs only they lived off the sooty waste in the clouds rather than a sleeper’s blood. Krilid’s direct field commander—the Fallen Angel Ezoriel—had provided not only the Nectoport but also a Hand of Glory, whose flame-tippedfingertips imparted a skirt of invisibility, which prevented unwelcome observers from seeing the Port’s floating green rim of light.
Down there
, he thought, staring at
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