"Ask her," Sora said.
Jake looked at Rael.
"The four Hearts running simultaneously at full capacity creates a structural stress on the bond points," Rael said. "If you use them before those bond points stabilize the stress compounds. After three or four cycles of that the instability becomes permanent."
"Permanent meaning what?" Elijah said.
"Meaning he loses consistent control of at least one of them," Rael said. "Permanently. The weakest bond fractures."
The room was quiet.
"Two days," Jake said.
"Two days," Rael said.
"Fine," Jake said.
"Thank you," Sora said.
"Don't thank me," Jake said. "I'm not happy about it."
"That's fine," Sora said. "You don't have to be happy about it."
Elijah put his legs back over the armrest. "I think that went well," he said to Tommy.
"Very smoothly," Tommy said.
"Nobody asked you two," Jake said.
"We're just observing," Elijah said.
***
Marcus called at ten.
