Chaos Vector

Rating 3 of 5

Chaos Vector is the sequel to Velocity Weapon

For some reason I did not enjoy Chaos Vector as much as Velocity Weapon.

I think probably its because the book doesn’t have the same sense of discovery at times it feels a bit formulaic. There’s some twists that are fun but I just didn’t enjoy it as much. I think its because Chaos Vector is more of a intrigue mystery novel then Velocity Weapon. The book is still good and I think if you liked Velocity Weapon you will like Chaos Vector, but for some reason the book just isn’t as fresh.

The plot basically follows

• Sanda who goes on an adventure to find out whats at the coordinates in the chip implanted in her skull. Along the way she teams up with Nox (prototype tough guy) and Arden (proto-type computer hacker type) They end up at Rainier Lavaux’s secret hideout. Eventually they get to the other side of a dead gate to discover the alien space ship which I guess was left there by Keeper Kendrick - the dead keeper from the Light of Brosis.

• Biran who tries to create a second gate in the Ada system to help end the war with Icarion. When finished the second gate back fires into the Ada system killing lots of people. Which was a goal of Rainier Lavaux who we learn is an alien AI “with sisters”.

• Nasca Tomas who gets sent to Rainier’s secret station to sniff her out on behalf of the President(?) of the Protectorate Okonkwo. Tomas who’s identity has ben altered is killed by Sanda. However, we learn later he’s actually a synthetic human created in part by the biological agent the made Jules powerful. Rainier brings him back to life so he can go back and murder his boss of the Nazca which he does.

• Jules who has sold out to Rainier in hopes of brining her friend back to life. Eventually she fails to do this and releases the uplift agent on some planet or moon.

• When they find the alien ship which Arden uploads the proto state of the Bero into they’re double crossed by Okonkwo’s Guard core who steals the special egg that has some alien data encoded in it.
  Somehow Okonkwo is part of some secret society with designs of its own?

We learn that every time they create a gate it exterminates all life in the system on the other side of the gate which Rainier finds a travesty.
It seems like Alexandria Ada who was the Elon musk type who created all this was a pretty terrible person and doesn’t care about this. Its sort of some big secret that it was happening, just programmed into the AIs.

I don’t really remember how the book ends. Jules releases the agent on a bunch of unsuspecting people of which many will die. It seems that Biran is on a quest to rebuild their society without the Guardcore who we now know is some crazy tool of repression?

I donno, the book was fun’ish but kind of messy. How many twists do I need? How come everyone has all these motives that are starting to just feel like plot devices? Why is their world so small, really only three star systems are mentioned. Artux, Ada and Ordinal. It all seems a rather small world for so much stuff.

I guess in the end the plot is just becoming too much and its kind of getting a little pulpy. I finished the book but I’m not sure its for me, still a 3/5 but nothing special.