"Toha Heavy Industries" is the twenty-second chapter of Blame!, and the fourth chapter of Volume 4.
Synopsis[]
Cibo and Killy proceed into Toha Heavy Industries, hoping to catch up to the Electrofisher community. Cibo’s new Safeguard body gradually stabilizes, neutralized by Toha’s ambient defenses, although Killy remains quietly wary of it.
They discover storage with Electrofisher equipment, corroborating the Fishermen’s story of having resided within Toha in an earlier age. The suits are made for a stature much taller than that of the local people, showing how they have genetically diverged in their exile.
With an electronic probe extruded from a finger, Cibo connects to Toha’s control network via a septic control subsystem. The overseeing AI immediately attempts a counter-hack, and Cibo jettisons the finger to save herself, managing to retrieve a map of the area. She suspects the AI is psychotic. The pair proceeds further inside as Cibo regrows her finger.
They encounter two Silicon creatures, who Cibo mistakes for Safeguards, having never met Silicon life. Killy tries to attack, but his gun is disabled by Toha’s defenses, being seen as Safeguard technology. The creatures know of Killy’s hostility to their kind, and intend to a settle an ancient grudge against him.
Character Appearances[]
Notes & Trivia[]
- First appearance of Ivy and Maeve.
- In an earlier English translation, Cibo says the emergency partition is similar to something used at the “Cyber-Life Society” - an alternative translation of the Bio-Electric Corporation, Cibo’s home.