Aliapanacea
I got lucky. After sending my friend's daughter into the deepest depths of the city, an old fme invited me to visit their rig. I could only watch from a distance as my livelihood was shattered into a million pieces all at o least I had a stalwart shoulder to cry on.
Gee Baker, in a testimony to the Family after the Gehenna Gulf I.***
The elevator dings to a stop as we reach the bottom floor of the Family’s rig, opening to reveal a small seemingly empty harbor house. I step out, looking around with a raised eyebrow at the pletely empty room, nary a boat in sight.
“Uh, Nyvi,” I start, but before I say anything else, she interrupts me.
Yes, I know. You o walk to the far end of the docks, it’ll be more clear then.
I shrug, the moving. As I get a bit farther in, I notice a stack of long crates lining the farthest jetty. I speed up a bit, approag the small colle to find oh a slightly ajar lid. I kick it off to reveal a long white surfboard with what looks like a jet engine on the back.
“That… doesn’t look safe,” I mutter, leaning down to run my hand over its rather smooth surface, “Why are these even here, sidering the rest of the building has been stripped?
Longboard, one of the three samurai residing in New Houstohem here for newer samurai who hem.
“Ah, Grandfather hates that guy.” I grin as I start looking through the different options. “It’s perfect.”
I’d reend the blue o’ll be easier to use while just sitting. You could try to use it the normal way but with y as it is, I’d highly reend otherwise.
“Yeah, that tracks.” I pick up the indicated board, tossing it onto the slightly ing brine before leaping down onto it. It barely even shakes from the impact, so I take the duffel off so I rest my shoulder.
Starting the engine. Do you have a preferred destination?
I sit down, frowning at the growing vibration of the vehicle beh me. It’s ly pleasant. “I guess… to shore? We tact help before ing back.”
Wise decision. Course set for Atntean waters.
I give a little salute as the meical door on the edge of the harbrinds open, to reveal the gigantic kraken still filing around in the distance. I grimace, holding on tight to the edges of the board as it shutters, then sputters to a start. We slide across the water out of the rig, turning towards the north before casually gliding off. While it isly fast, we do end up accelerating a bit as we move. A minute or two ter, New Houston is slowly disappearing behind us.
“How far do we o go to get access to the global work, anyways?” I tap my fingers on the side of the board, nervously keeping watch for any Anti-thesis pursuers.
Not that far, to be fair. While yments are atrocious examples of humanity’s corporate greed, they do have a det e range.
“Fair enough.” I sigh, looking up at the dull starless night sky. “At least I have something useful.”
Don’t sell yourself short, honey. You are actually quite a bit more skilled in bat than many samurai who are initialized.
“Maybe… It feels shallow though,” I whisper, running my hand through the rushing water beh me.
You’d be surprised, I think. Your family is definitely an outlier.
I scoff and shake my head, closing my eyes as I feel the wind move through my hair. That robably an uatement, sidering everything. Actually, it makes me wonder how many families have two samurai in them, I ’t imagi’s very on. Well, blood families, I guess found families would be pretty typical among the Vanguard.
Maybe I find ooo.
I hate to interrupt your rest like this honey, but I’m pig up a faint distress signal a few klicks away.
“Should we-” I blink my eyes open, processing the information. “What even is a klick, anyways? I hear it used all the time but…”
A kilometer, it’s a military term.
I tilt my head, then ask, “Then why not just say kilometer?”
Easier to say and uand once you know the distance.
“Despite what it may seem, that’s one of the things grandfather didn’t insist I learn.” I roll my eyes, then peer out at the horizon. “Anyways, should we go check it out?”
I would reend it, if just to get your hand on the radio equipment. If we jato it, we could perhaps get a message to the Family.
I nod, tapping the harpoon against the top of the board. “We check it out, see if they’re hurt or something.”
Uood, modifying our course.
With a sudden jerk, we start heading farther west then we were inally intending, and it doesn’t take long for the culprit to e into sight. I squint, pointing my on out towards the anomaly. “What even… is that?”
It seems to be a submarine of some sort.
In the distance, a gigantic metal blob, kinda shaped like a weirdly pressed egg slowly crawls in the exact same dire we are moving. As we get a bit closer, I ’t help but noti obtuse entra the side. Over the few seds, I prepare myself as the board roams closer and closer, then crouch down a bit in preparation.
Leaving the duffel on the board, I take a breath, then leap, barely managing to make the jump while nding on my not shattered leg. I grunt as I twist the door’s tch open, pulling it upwards before dropping down onto more solid ground.
The first sight of the egg’s airlock is a roughly welded steel interior, which does not reassure me that this thing is well built. The hatch behind me clicks shut, and the familiar hiss of pressurization starts. A few moments ter, the entrao the interior of the vehicle clicks open to reveal a short hallway with two different doors being to me. A major problem bees clear once I am inside, however.
I flip a swit the side of the harpoon, and almost immediately a heat haze spreads out around the on’s tip. “Nyvi… that’s really bad right?”
Most likely.
Slightly moving vines sprout out from beh the door oern side of the vessel, making it abundantly clear what is oher side. I ch the on in my hand, a couple sarios running through my head.
I should probably warn you, this is most likely a hive, and I’m deteg the biological agent of a model four. It seems to be tained for now, but if you decide to take care of it, there will be fierce resistance. I reend you get the submarine’s helmsman to navigate it to a spot where we get a more experienced-
I shake my head, then sniffle. “No, Nyvi, I should do it myself. There’s the risk of the survivors on bitating the hive enough that it strands them here.”
Just… Please be careful with y. If it gets damaged again, the brace will likely cease funing.
“Noted.” I stab the harpoon into the vine wall, finding that to my pleasant surprise, it moves through the steel like it isn’t even there. Dragging the harpoon along to create a rough circle, it slices through the metal like butter, and finally the metal disk I cut out falls down to reveal what is inside. I blink, then ch my teeth as I leap to the side to dodge a few barbed tentacles that pierces the air where I had just been standing.
Not wasting the opportunity, I dash forward, stabbing my harpoon forwards into a stocky quadruped, its body a mix of bark and tangled vines. It immediately catches afme as it crumples, and I pull back the harpoon just in time to ssh the crude glowial bde hanging from its tip through another vine flying towards me from across the room. I duck through the hole, only to find a room absolutely covered in Antithesis pods cirg around a tral stem, aliens quietly growing within eae.
The most pressing issues aren’t those though- It’s the three aliens just like the ourned into a burning mess, each within a separate er of the room, and two small monkey like Models with six arms which are seemingly extremely agitated at my presence. Fours and tens, if I had to guess.
A wave of tentacles shootout at me, but another sidestep plus a quick parry on oralizes that barrage. I take rge steps as I stride forward towards my first oppo, dug to dodge aab. I leap forward twice, managing to reach the first four. I raise the harpoon for a downward ssh, only to have to reel back, foing the blow to avoid a swing of its arm. I grin at my fortunate read, quickly sshing the monster in half, before vaulting over its body to sprint at the arget.
Unfortunately, the monsters don’t stay still, both the fours and one of the tens immediately rushing at me. I take just a moment to calcute, then decide to take a ce. I wait for their strikes, which turn out to be six of the barbed vines going towards my chest and four small bdes for my legs. Thankfully though, they’re disjointed, so I am able to use an upwards strike with my reach advao cut the ten in half, as well as cut through the vines. Unfortunately, I hadn’t ated for the sed ten, which had fnked around to behind me.
Two bdes ssh into my good leg from behind, and though the pain is slightly dulled from the drugs in my system, I still gasp in anguish as I crumple to the ground. As the edges of my vision slowly begin to be dyed crimson, I move the harpoon to my left hand as I reach behih my right to grab the sed ten, then use all my strength to chuck it at the tral spire of the Hive. It rams into it with a siing crack, denting both the stem and the Ten’s chest.
The muscles in my legs don’t seem to be w right, so despite my best efforts I am uo stand up again. While I know she’s trying to speak to me, I find myself uo parse Nyvi’s words past the ay ione. I heave a breath, then push myself in a roll to avoid three more barbs.
“N-Nyvi,” I mao wheeze out as I shift my head to avoid arike, “Something ranged please.”
Right on cue, a ky metal cuff appears on my right wrist, a single rge spherical gem produg a dull white glow. Using the harpoon to quickly reposition myself out of danger again, I raise my arm only to blink in surprise as a beam of incredibly bright rainbow light shoots out, smming right into one of the model fours. I bite my lip at the gigantic aura it leaves behind in my eyes, but I ’t deny the result, a huge sm hole having been burraight through my enemy.
Seeing its range advantage is lost, the final foe takes its d runs at me. I raise my arm, only to find that to my horror no ser shoot outs, so I quickly improvise. g my teeth, I raise the harpoon up into the air, then throw it straight at the rushing model four. It easily pierces through its ter of mass, slowing the pnt just enough so that when it slides towards me, it only barely bumps into my legs.
I reach over to grab my harpoon, and as I take hold of it, the cuff on my arm clicks against my skin. I raise it towards the brain of the Hive with my eyes closed, and after a brief hiss, opeo reveal the stem is truly severed, and the hive and pods arouart quivering for some reason. Nyvi says something again, but I simply ’t seem to uand what.
As I sit there on the ground, my entire body throbbing and my brain ringing, I begin to systematically burn holes through every pod around me, just to be safe. The ser seems to be only avaible for use a fra of a moment every four seds, which is probably unideal, though it did save my life, so it gets a pass.
About halfway through the pod culling, I start getting very light headed, and when I look down at my leg I feel my sciousness waver for a moment at the sight. The wound is worse than I thought, there are two major cuts, one on my ankle and the other on my calf, both deep enough to see the fragments of my shattered bohrough the flowing crimson.
“N-Nyvi,” I gasp, swallowing some stomach acid as I look away from the oozing wounds. “Healing please.”
A ior pops ience beside me, rger thahers I used with a thick blue substahin its vial. Doing my best to take deep breaths, I take it and stab it onto my leg, gasping in disfort as the blue substance splits up through my body. Half of it oozes out through my skin, c the wouirely, while half enters my veins as it moves through my body. The pain numbs pletely, thankfully heavily redug the throbbing I had been experieng. I resume my xeno-pod massacre, taking a few extra seds between shots to try and calm myself a bit. Unfortunately, I only mao do so after I take the final shot.
Well, you’re doh that, are you perhaps able to hear me now?
I give a shaky nod, letting myself fall onto my back, trying my best to ighe antithesis goop mixed with my own blood c everything around me.
For what it’s worth, I think that might have gone as well as it could have. The injured leg is a problem though, your muscles are pletely ruihere was a Hemo-Restore mixed into the nanite gel, so you shouldn’t bleed out thankfully.
Unsure of myself, I y eyes for a few moments. When I open them, I grit my teeth, then use my harpoon to stand as I hobble towards the normal door I had sort of ignored earlier, shakily opening the tch before moving through it.
I’d highly reend you don’t move, to be ho.
I shake my head, my breath heaving as I stumble into the hallway. Using the wall as leverage, I slide over to the other entryway, trying not to cry. Reag over, I try to wrench it open, only to find that it doesn’t budge. I grind my teeth, then sm my fist into the metal a few times. “Open up! It’s safe!”
A shuffling occurs from behind the door before a camera pops down out of the ceiling. Murmured voices I ’t uand begin to discuss something for what feels like ay before a speaker crackles to life. The voice that es out is deep, the rough uones of a smoker within it.
[“Sorry kid, I get you’re a samurai, but this shelter is joint property of Montero-Wisteria Labs and the tral Reef administration.”] The man pauses for a sed. [“I see that you are hurt, but we ’t risk letting you in.”]
I freeze, taking a few moments to process what he just said. “Montero… Wisteria? I didn’t know that moth- I-I mean, that woman and my father had a joint researpany.”
Acc to the records I have access to, they shouldn’t. Be careful, honey.
Obviously taken aback, the man starts coughing through the mic before muttering, [“Your… father? Oh, oh no. Please e in, I didn’t reize you in that outfit, young master.”]
I flinch at the use of ‘young master’, then I wat vexation as the door ks open, a verifiably huge man stepping out to loom over me. He is probably a foot taller than me, his biceps bigger than my head. What the hell were they feeding this guy? Pure steroids?
“I’m not sure we’ve met,” the man says, me a hand, “But I’m the head guard of the b facilities from the twelfth floor, Horace Freezeman.”
I hesitantly shake his hand, then slowly follow as he leads me into the main body of the submarine. Around five doors lihe hallway, and he leads me to the one furthest in. Opening with a k, what I assume has to be the aer of the craft is revealed. The ehing is filled with rather a puters atteo by a bunch of people in b coats. Notig a rather fancy lookiher chair, I immediately move to flop down into it, take a moment to collect myself, then look up to see that everyone in the room has gathered in full military attention before me, Horad a man in a rather fancy suit at the very front.
I pause just for a sed, then take a deep breath, summoning my best impression of my Grandfather as I point the harpoon at the figure beside the guard captain. “Your name?”
pletely stiff, the man stutters out, “J-Jeremiah Greenwood, Head Stist, Sir!”
I nod while grimag internally, then with my best facade of authority, and: “Okay, one of you two, give me a briefing ouation.”
Horace clicks his foot on the ground, then salutes as he loudly states, “Sir! The ‘Davy Jones’ project has gone pletely out of hand! We evacuated early with the administration as pnned, but an out of trol fire in the bs caused the twelfth floor to be entirely destroyed!”
Oh, that’s not good.
Doing my best to not make a face at the knowledge that a lot of people probably died because of that, I tap the harpoon against my hand as I ask, “And how exactly did it get out of hand?”
Jeremiah is the oo ahis time, rapidly expining: “The modified Model-Sevens were released into the water supply as intended, but we failed to at for the speed at which they could replicate.”
Oh hohat's…
Biting down on my tongue hard, I take a deep breath. Scowling, I sm the bottom of the harpoon into the floor then screech, “You fools! How could you let su important project fail like this?! You even grew a hive in the rear of this vessel! What if you were hurt?!”
Everyone else in the room freezes, and Horace’s hand begins to slowly roam to the holster on his hip. I immediately raise my hand, pointing my bracelet at the giant guard. What did I say? I don’t see how my words would have-
ht. Human capital. I fug hate corporate culture.
“Don’t do it.” I decre, tapping my on against the cuff. “This will go off before you eve out of the holster. Go into more detail on this project.”
For a tense few seds, nothing happens. The stists nervously shift in pce, many of them showing signs of panic. Jeremiah, who is as tense as the rest of them, suddenly rexes as he sighs. He sticks his hand into his pocket, then turns to the people behind him, chug before morosely saying:
“Sorry everyo was good w with you.”
What does that even-
A loud clies from the head stist, and everything goes to hell.
Every single person in the room besides me colpses to the ground, my heart stopping for a moment at the sight of the sudden pile of corpses in front of me. All of the puters in the room fsh red for a moment right before every single light in the room turns off. I start to stand to figure out what the fuck just happened, only for a sudden lurch apanied by a weightless feeling knocks me on my ass.
“Nyvi,” I groan as I try to push myself up to no avail, “What’s going on?”
The submarine is desding rapidly. We don’t have much time, there is no way you will be able to mao get to the exit before it is at lethal pressure levels outside. You o choose something that will let you survive the failure of this vessel. Here’s what you have to work with.
Points Update!
Starting Total: 40 Points
Targets Eliminated!
4x: Model 4
Reward: 60 points
2x: Model 10
Reward: 2 points
Small Hive destroyed!
Reward: 500 points, 1 token
Total Points Awarded: 562 points, 1 token
New Purchases!
1x: Css-I Hemorestore
Cost: 5 Points
1x: PLCP Cuff MK-1
Cost: 50 points
1x: Css-I Multi-purpose Gel Brace
Cost: 10 points
Total Cost of Items: 65 Points
Final Total: 537 points, 1 token
I pale, anxiously falling back to look at the steel ceiling as I frantically ask, “W-what are my optioly?”
You have enough points to have some options. I’d typically reend a det EVA suit, si would provide a multitude of bonuses as well as armor, but it might be impossible to get into with the state of ys. Thankfully, there are a lot of other methods that we could use. The most important questiht now is, do you want something specialized for subaquatic operations, or something menerally useful otherwise?
I bite my lip, sidering the dilemma a bit before I murmur, “Let’s do subaquatic, I get meneral stuff ter.”
Do you have any qualms about messing with your body?
I groan, taking a deep breath as Grandfather’s body runs through my mind. “No cyberic augmentations please, I’ve seen what obsessing over that do to people.”
What about biological modification? ging your body to fit what you need?
I gingerly pce my hand on my chest, taking itle butterfly in my heart. “M-maybe? What would that entail?”
There are many options at our current budget, including but not limited to bionic impnts, symbiotitities that bond to you at the cellur level, iions to modify your body chemistry, drugs that enable you to ignore pressure ges…
As Nyvi goes on and on with my options, I frown, then interrupt her. “Is there nothing that ge me… almost entirely? Everything you’re listing seems either temporary or small.”
At this price range for that scale. you have exactly oion. It’s actually from one of the other catalogs taining teology from the Axonfin, the extraterrestrial species whose teology catalog you already purchased, but I didn’t mention it because… the method is highly risky, so it isn’t allowed to be reended unless it is the only option avaible to suit a request. It would cost 100 points for the catalog, but the item itself would cost three times that much, while also using the token you just obtained from clearing that .
“That’s… strange.” I mutter, tapping my fingers against my chest. “E-Expin it to me?”
The purchase is a set of microscopic biologiahat, after psychically eg with your brain, forcibly takes trol of all the biological material and energy it access before mutating your body to suit you and the enviro you are in. They’re incredibly votile in the ges they make, sihey affect all species differently; if used irresponsibly, they irreparably damage yeic code. In additioher of us would have any trol over what the nanites do nor be able to stop it. As no human has taken the risk to use them yet, the scale of the ges it make are unknown.
“W-What the hell?” I chuckle unassuredly, disfort ing in my stomach. “ould you ever use that?”
Let me put it into perspective for you, hohe race that ihe cept, the Axonfin, is a species that inates upon a p covered nearly y-nine pert by o. They were one of the few lifeforms on the p ted to both the world above and below, but were only able to exist in the warmer parts of the p as a result. When poputioy became a real issue, they worked for a tury to create a solutioually ending up with this version of the Bionites. Specialized for them, it allowed them to gh and ize the ey of their world, free from the restraints of their biology.
If the story ehere, it’d be less tragic. You see, the story of Vanguards doomed to aable death to enviroal circumstances with few points to try and survive, like you are now, is one as old as time. It’s incredibly rare that a Vanguard in that situation ends up purchasing the bionites, but when they do, it has always resulted in one of two different outes- Either the Vanguard thrives magnifitly with the ges, or succumbs to the effects that the Bionites inflicts upon them, falling into the depths of history. This is why the Bionites are so cheap, yet also cost a token to buy.
Moving my hand, I cover my eyes as I find myself seriously sidering something so… ludicrous. All it’d take is me getting one of the other things she listed to be fine, but my dumb brain refuses to sider anything else. Who knows what the hell it could do to me, the potential for a dangerous oute is defihere. What if I lost the ability to breathe, to think rationally?
Wait but-
“N-Nyvi, what did you mean by it mutating to suit me?” I run my tongue over my teeth, trying to prehend what that means. “D-Does that mean I do have a say in it?”
Teically no. To put it pinly, that fun’s a fragment of the creators of the bionites, as the Axonfin are a race able to tap into their tent psionic power. They utilized this in the bionites, allowing them to trol the ges themselves through the e. Unfortunately, humans are not that lucky, so the bionites would instead sift through the user’s subscious to decide on some ges to make, good or bad.
“S-so what, I’d go deaf, again? B-Be able to see faces? N-Not stutter anymore?” I chuckle, finding a small grin ing onto my face as I tinue. “S-Stop being seen as a-”
My smile disappears and I freeze, my heart doing about three flips as I process the words I was about to say. A weight falls off my shoulder, only to be repced by a small anvil falling where it had just been sitting. Undeniably shellshocked, I ’t help but murmur:
“Stop being seen as a boy…”
Ah, I was w when you’d realize that. Please don’t-
I interrupt my AI, deg, “Nyvi, I want the bionites.”
Haa… Let me finish, honey. Please don’t let the potential ce of not being a boy anymore be why you buy this item. You buy a guaranteed and frankly far, far less dangerous method of transitioning for just a few thousand points, which is not much at all in the grand scheme of things.
I bite my lip, then gasp as the submarine shudders a bit before it tilts, sending me sliding across the ground into a corpse. I then pathetically fil until I mao get into a less morbid position.
We really don’t have much time, hohat’s a really bad sign, I think we might have caught the attention of a rger Antithesis. Should I make a few ideal suggestions for the situation?
I grit my teeth, then gather all of the resolve I muster. I stick my hand out, f a smile on my face. “I think it’s worth it. Nyvi, please.”
In order to make this purchase I need you to repeat this statement: I uand the risks, and wish to purchase the EA-Bionite Suite V-Beta for three hundred points and my token.
I clear my throat then loudly decre:
“I uand the risks, and wish to purchase the EA-Bionite Suite V-Beta for three hundred points and my token.”
Catalog Unlocked!
Css-I Axonfin Ecological Teology
Price: 100 Points
New Purchase!
1x EA-Bionite Suite V-Beta
Price: 300 Points, 1 Token
Remaining Total: 137 points
As the submarine around me begins to creak, the handle of the weighty purchase drops into my hand, a rather rge der with an ominous spike on the end. I mull over it for a moment, running my hand over its rather shiny bluish gray metal cover, the chill of which makes my fiingle. I take a deep breath, only for a disturbing crack to echo from around me.
Stab yourself in the chest, RIGHT NOW!
Not b tue, I ram the spike right in the middle of my breast, beside where my heart would be. A huge spike of pure pain pierces into my brain, and I scream as everything seemingly s around me. With a resounding impact, the submarine sms into the o floor, causing two different things to happen. First, something behind me explodes, theal shell of the vessel cracks away to reveal a wall of water rushing towards me like a runaway train.
That’s the st thing I see, however, before my world ges entirely.
Aliapanacea
