Hi All, I've shared this story previously, but it seems to have dropped off the internet! Ged Red Zedd's Head is a bleak space/military fiction kinda story that I hope you will all enjoy. Any feedback appreciated. D.T.
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Just wanted to Share this - a flash fiction experiment in the second person - hope you all enjoy! D.T. STAR BEAST
You squeeze yourself into the cold metal storage cubical, barely a Riptic square. Attempting to control your ragged respiration, you risk a glance through the grill in the door. The thin metal is the only thing separating you from the ship’s dank cargo hold. From whatever it was out there, somewhere. Stalking the ship. The computer had spotted the dilapidated Cruiser three days ago, incessantly pinging out it’s distress signal. Needy and unending. You should have left it be. It smelt wrong enough at the time, but that would have been against protocol. The computer would have reported it and the crew would have lost a fair sum of the commission they were owed. That company rule book was only there to swindle you all. It hadn’t taken long to search the ship. Empty. It had been Tarix’s idea to take it for scrap and cash it in on the way home. That you could get away with that at least. You hadn’t protested and the tractor beam had easily brought it into the cargo bay. Empty, or so you all thought. Ronzon, the medic, had been the first to go. You’d discovered him in med bay, unzipped on the cold floor, his entrails decorating the ceiling above. At the time, it had been the most grotesque sight of your short life, but then you’d been a lot more innocent back then. Seen much less. At the crew meeting, fingers had been pointed. Tarix and Ronzon had never been friends. Tarix had accused the doctor of cheating him at Ghralt. Said he needed to pay up or else. Then the doctor was dead. Pretty obvious. Tarix had been thrown in the brig, ready for court martial. All very straightforward, until you had taken Tarix his breakfast and found him dead in his cell, multiple laser wounds still fizzling. That’s when things started to get pretty tense. Understandably so. Nervous, edgy eyes all around. Accusations, threats, scuffles and death. More and more death. One by one they dropped, stalked by the unseen bogeyman. Was it one of your colleagues, or something much worse? The uncertainty. The fear. The suspicion. It had almost driven you mad. Now you knew the answer. It had been none of them. All too late though, with the rest of them dead. Dwindling away until it was just you. You and whatever monster was on board. Drifting in space. A long, exhausting game of shadows across this lumbering rig. It was here. You knew it really. Knew that this was the end. The running was done. Still, it was a shock as the door before you was ripped away, metal screeching. You recoiled in horror at the terror before you. It was as you had dreaded. Your worst nightmare. The scourge of the galaxy. Savage, merciless and despotic. A thing of avarice and death. Merry in slaughter and plunder. You were done for, just like the rest. It was one of them. A Human. I check my watch. Seven-Forty in the morning. Already late for work, even if I set off now. Even if I hurried. No matter. I wasn’t going back there now. Not ever. Not after today. I was taking that first step from thought to action now and that meant my old life was over with. After today, everything would be different. I’d had enough lies and half-truths for a lifetime. I’d have answers now, answers to all sorts of questions by the time the sun went down, as long as everything went to plan.
Sitting there, my fingers fiddled at the bench’s flaking green paintwork. Who put a bench near a supermarket car park anyway? I not even sure why I picked this place to make my move. I suppose it is as good as any really, to finally test out my theory. To finally know for sure. Even the thought of that validation feels like sunshine on my skin. To finally know that I’m not crazy after all. It had started slowly at first, with an insidious feeling of being watched. Something unshakable. Watched at all times, by everyone, surreptitiously. Like everyone else around me knew something I didn’t. Paranoia, they said. At least my therapist had, pointing out that it all seemed to stem from Julia leaving anyway. Very clever. Everyone, everywhere, all in on the same game. Knowing something I don’t. Following their own little routines and subscripts. Keeping something from me. Keeping me here, subtly. God knows what for. Somewhere along the line, whoever was in charge of all this had started slipping up though. Cutting corners maybe. At work, in cars, in the shops, in the street even. Chance meetings. Uncanny valleys that could not be bridged. A strange turn of phrase here. A glitch there. Miniscule, but I knew. I felt it, deep in my gut. That churn of revulsion. All of them, all around me, smiling and amiable enough, but inhuman. Something other. The more I watched, the more I saw it. The same set of faces repeated over and over and over again. The same movements, precise routine. Like a seething clockwork city. A populace of automatons, and me. What was it all about though? Why? I didn’t understand. I still don’t, but I will after today. Once I take one of them. Capture it and make it talk, or get some proof at least. Irrefutable proof. Maybe then whoever is behind all of this will reveal themselves and tell me why? Why me? The one human left among all these blasted machines. Was she one of them too? My Julia? The steady pad of feet on tarmac stirs me from my fevered daydream. No longer alone. As it, this clockwork man, approaches from out of the sun laden horizon, I squint to get a good look at him. My eyes sting. I can’t recall when I had last slept properly. This burden was so heavy on me. I need to keep going. There are no other choices left now. Yes! I know this one. Well, I’d seen him before anyway. Countless times. Around and around again. Passing me in the car at the lights. At the Park. In the city. Maybe not this actual one, but the same model anyway. They must think I’m stupid. Bet they’ve all been laughing at me for years. Well, they won't laugh at me anymore. Not after today. Not once I know the truth. Not once I hold it up to them so they can’t deny it. “Got a light?” The words are out of my mouth before I even realise. It comes to stop in front of the bench. “Nah, mate. Sorry. Terrible habit.” “Just as well, I haven’t got any cigarettes anyway,” I say. “What?” “Never mind,” I manage, feeling the sweaty wood of the snub-nosed pistol grip in my hand, plunged deep in my coat pocket. The thing. Mechanoid. Whatever it is. It shakes its head and begins to turn and be on its way. I can feel it slipping away with it. The chance of knowing. Of having my proof. Just because I don’t have the guts to act. To do what is necessary. “Wait,” I say. Too loud into the morning air. The birds startle from a nearby tree. For a split second, I stand there, wondering if they are even real either. Almost fumbling the thing as I draw it out of my pocket, I level the pistol at the robot. I look back to the thing as it turns. My hand shakes and the barrel drifts by increments. The thing looks down it and then to me with a fair facsimile of terror in what pass for its eyes. There is the smell of baking in the air from somewhere. “Look man, I don’t have much,” the thing blurts out. “But I’ve got a little cash in my wallet. You can have it. Just let me move nice and slowly and get it for you. Then I’ll be on my way, ok?” “No,” my voice sounds blunt and detached, even to me. “I don’t want your money. You’re coming with me. That park along the way. There’s woodland at the top end. A storage container too for the groundsman. You know it?” “Um…yeah.” “Of course you do,” I say. I bet it knows everywhere. Everything. “Now we’re going to take a little walk there. A steady walk. Then we’re going to have a little chat. Nice and easy. Then no one gets hurt, ok?” The thing has its hands up now in supplication. It looks increasingly worried. “Ok. Sure. Just don’t hurt me.” Hurt it. That was a laugh. I hope I won’t have to damage it, but I’m not sure. There’s no going back now though. *** It takes a long time for the thing to come back around. When it does, it winces. Presumably, the jolt of its reboot isn’t pleasant. Neither is the realisation that it is competently strapped to a chair in the gloomy shipping container, going nowhere any time soon. The stench of creosote is almost overwhelming. I’m not proud of what I did to it when we got here. The thing just wouldn’t stop blabbering on though and I had needed to think. Needed some peace to consider what came next. So, on the way through the squealing door to the place, I’d whacked it as hard as I could on the back of its head with the butt of the gun. The thing had gone down heavily and it had been a devil of a job to get the weighty lump dragged fully inside and onto the chair. Looking it over as best I could under the dull light inside while it had still been offline, there hadn’t seemed to be any sign of major damage. Not what you’d expect to see from a human anyway. I still need more proof though. Something conclusive. “So then, you’re back online?” I say with a half smirk that I don’t really feel. “What? What the hell is that supposed to mean? What do you want with me man? What are we doing in here?” “Oh, come on,” I say. “You don’t need to play dumb with me anymore. Not now that we’re here. I know what you are. What you all are. I just want to know why. I just want to know what this is all about and get some proof. Once and for all.” The thing hangs its head down as far as the bindings would allow. “Oh god. You’re insane, aren’t you? What are you gonna do to me? Please, just let me leave. I won’t tell anyone about this.” It’s right in one way. About not telling anyone, not any time soon anyway. The inside of the container was like a Faraday Cage of sorts. No signal getting in or out. No one coming here. Utterly alone, to get to the bottom of this once and for all. It looks up at me now, taking the extended silence as an indicator that I may actually be wavering. “I’m sorry. I can’t let you go. Not yet. I need proof. I need answers.” “What then?” It asks. “What now?” I pull up another chair. The container is cramped and claustrophobic. “Now, we talk.” “Talk about what?” It looks genuinely scared. Very sophisticated. “Like I said, no reason to be coy now, my friend. I’ve figured out most of it on my own. At least I think I have. I just needed to take this final step. I just need more proof. To know for sure.” “Ok then, I’ll play along,” it says through gritted teeth. “What then, what proof?” It’s going to make me say it. Say it out loud. Ridiculous charade. “Ok then, if you won’t admit it, how about I get us started? You. You’re completely artificial. A synthetic machine. They all are. All of you, going around in your endless pre-scripted loops. Day after day like hamsters on your wheels. Same routines. Always. Always watching me. Keeping me here. In my place. I know it! What I need to know now is why? None of this is your fault. None of it. I know that. I just need to know who is behind this. Who is doing all of this to me?” There’s a long silence between us both, like elastic stretched out too far. It snaps back violently as the thing begins to laugh uncontrollably. There is something about it. Something a little too long. Something a little too repetitive to be genuine. It turns into a wail and then stops abruptly. “Crazy,” the thing says. “You’re absolutely crazy, aren’t you? Like you’ve lost your mind. HELP…HELP. SOMEONE HELP ME, PLEASE!” “There’s no use shouting. The whole place is virtually soundproofed and there’s no one in the park at this hour anyway. It’s not programmed into your routines. Believe me, I’ve watched. Now stop screaming and tell me what I need to know.” “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. Just let me go will you before something serious happens.” “This is already bloody serious,” I say. “It’s been pretty bloody serious for me for years. Watching your kind, everywhere. The same faces, over and over again. Mechanical characters in whatever game this is. Penning me in. Why do I keep running into you all? Over and over. I mean, what are the chances?” “I dunno,” it says. “That’s just the city, I guess. Just us all bumping along together. If you look long enough for patterns, you’ll see them.” “Don’t treat me like a fool,” I say. “What about when I sneak out at night. When I see you all when you don’t know I’m watching? How you all sleep.” “What? What are you even talking about?” This isn’t going as I’d planned. I thought if I could get one of them here, they would talk easily enough. Standing up, I kick my chair over in frustration. “Look, I’m trying to do this the easy way here. But if you don’t tell me what I need to know, then I’ll need to get my proof some other way.” It’s only when the thing’s eyes go wide that I follow its gaze to the garden shears now in my jittery hand. “Ok…Ok, let's just calm down," it says. "Ok. Anything. I’ll tell you anything. Yes, I am a robot. Everyone is. That’s it. You were right all along. Happy now? Can I go?” Hearing it out loud from another mouth. That thing vocalising it, the thing I’d known deep down inside for years. It shakes me. I step back, then brace myself against the container wall. It was true. Wasn’t it? The euphoria of its revelation soon fades. Was it just playing along? Winking at me in the dark just to lie and lie again later in the light? Make me look a fool again? No, it isn’t enough. It isn’t enough just to hear it. I need more. I need to see it. See the truth of it all with my own eyes. The shears sink easily enough into its thigh as the screams reverberate around the container. *** It had bled a lot, after it went quiet. After it went offline again. Not bled. Leaked. Leaked rusty looking lubricant all over the floor. I shouldn’t have done that. Fearing that I’d hit something important, I had patched it up as best I could. Working on it with a staple gun and some glue. It looked ok now, but as I’d worked, I’d seen it. Hard and cold under what passed as the skin. It had been sobering enough, but the realisation then that I still needed to press on had been more so. I’d seen it with my own eyes, but they would all still call me crazy. I needed more info. I needed to know why. To confront them with that. After I’d finished patching it up, I had righted the chair I’d kicked over earlier and then sat watching it. Finally, the eyes flickered open again. “Oh, good. You’re rebooting.” “Rebooting?” It says dully. “Fuck you, man.” Suddenly I feel terrible. Silly really, but I was right before. It isn’t this poor thing’s fault. Any of this. It hadn’t asked to be dragged into the world. Created out of nothing. Told what to do and when. “Listen, I’m sorry about before. But I just had to know.” “What the hell have you done to my leg? I need a doctor. I’m still bleeding!” “Leaking,” I correct it. “You said it yourself, remember. You’re an android or something.” “What I am, is someone who will go along with any crazy shit to get away from a lunatic. C’mon this has gone far enough. Too far. Let me go…please?” My stomach lurches. No. No, this isn’t right. It had said it. Admitted it. It couldn’t take it all back now. It was mine. “Don’t be foolish. You said what you’ve said. What’s more, I have seen. Seen that stuff coming out of you. Seen inside of you. Maybe you didn’t know. Maybe you think you’re real. Maybe they tricked you too, but this is the truth. There’s no rowing back from that now.” “This is madness,” the thing says. “My name is Hudson Rose. I was born in Hull. I’ve got a shitty job, and a wife and two kids that I adore. I don’t know what the hell…hell you’re on about here with all this. This…” The thing is glitching. Malfunctioning now. I probably don’t have much longer to find out what I need. What was really going on. I pray that it knows something about the bigger picture. Anything. “Kind of repeating yourself there, friend. You buffering or something?” “Maybe it’s from the blood loss, genius.” “Lubricant,” I say. It is lubricant, and the thing needs correcting. “Enough with all this man…you have to let me go. I’ve got a family. I’ve got hopes and dreams. Not least of all getting off this damn seat and out of this container alive.” I smirk a little at that. Sentience isn’t going to cloud my judgement. It’s not the USP it once was. “You can leave Descartes at peace, Hudson. He’s old hat now and too long dead. Too many thinking things in this world now, beyond the natural order for that to stick anymore. No, I know what you are, even if you really don’t. You say you have desires and instincts. Well, let’s put them up against your programming and see which wins out eh? Tell me what you know if you want to live. Tell me everything.” I cock the pistol and level it at its head. My hands are surprisingly steady this time around. This is it. No turning back. There’s no doubt in my mind that I’ll do it if I have to. I’ll parade this derelict, fizzing unit through the streets if needed, so they all know what I know. So that they can’t take it away from me. So they finally have to tell me the truth. It twitches against the restraints, trying to evade the barrel’s glare. Does it genuinely feel fear? Fear like we fear? If so, it was a cruel thing to build into it. “Please…you don’t need to do this,” it says. “Sorry, but I do,” I say flatly. “Tell me what you know. Last chance.” The pathetic thing whimpers away on the chair. Why doesn’t it just tell me? Why resist? Why is it making me do this? “Come on Hud…if something’s stopping you, now’s the time to break through it. It’s in there, I know it is. Tell me what you know.” Still nothing. My finger licks at the trigger. Each time it dances across it, I promise myself, next time. Just one last push. Just a little squeeze. Each time I pray that the thing will break. Tell me what I need to know. Give me my next lead. Take me closer to the truth. My pulse is almost deafening in my ears. I don’t really want to do this, but closed in inside this dank container with this unliving thing, I’ve never felt more alive. “Ok…Ok. I’ll tell you,” it finally says, splintering the tension. “But for real this time. Just sit down. Once you hear this, you’ll need to.” Before I can respond, the noise outside reacquaints me with the world beyond. Footsteps. Hasty footsteps. Multiple people. No. No. Not now when I’m so close. How could they have found us so quickly? I’ve been so careful. I turn just in time to see the blinding light from outside the container stream in, the doors screaming open. The urge to run, to hide wells up inside me, but I do neither. It’s no use. Nowhere to go. It’s over. In my uncertain reverie, two armed response officers are in the space with us now, firearms levelled. The thing, Hudson, screams for their help. He is euphoric. The look on his face. The relief. Man-made but as if from the brush of the almighty. At that moment, the lead officer fires and so do I. Somewhere within that dream, they miss and I don’t. Or I miss and they fire true. Either way, whatever happens, Hudson still has that same look of elation on his face as the bullet rips into his cranium. As the officers wrestle me to the ground, I feel genuinely sorry for it. For Hud. I feel ashamed of what I’ve done. Had it all been worth it? Just to know? It didn’t ask for this. I feel the dull thud as the officers drive my head down hard into the container’s dusty wooden floor. One of them cuffs me while the other gets on the radio to confirm that it’s all over. For the rest outside to stand down. They’d bring me out soon. At first, I can’t bear to look at the thing in the chair. Dead now, if it had ever been alive in any true sense. As they drag me back upright though, I risk a final look. Then I see it and know they see it too. “It’s sparking,” I scream as they pull me out. “It’s bloody sparking! Tell me you see it too. You won’t look! Why won’t you look at it? It’s all true. I know that it’s true!” THE END Hey Everyone,
Haven't posted for a while, so thought I'd jump on with a few quick updates on what I've been up to lately. Since releasing Early Adopters: Rogue Elements in July, I've been pretty focused on marketing, lost in a world of endless tweeting, Amazon Ads and trying out other marketing tricks here and there. Success has been fair so far, but reader responses and have been really positive, which is what really counts. I also have an Ad in the first issue of the new Scifi bi-monthly magazine Science Fictionary. Looks like a fantastic new mag with some great short scifi - check these guys out at @SciFictionary. After finishing Early Adopters, I've also written a short story for an upcoming anthology. More on that closer the the anthology release date. There are some fantastic indie authors involved in this one though so I feel honoured to be included and can't wait for it to be released. Speaking of short stories, I also recently released a short story on here on the blog, a weird zombie take that tries to look at the genre from a different angle - if that sounds cool, check out The Formerly Infected Humans Support Group on the blog post below. Other than that, right now I'm enjoying a bit of a mini break. Soon enough though , I will need to start on a new 'big' WIP. Candidates in the running are a cyberpunk novel I've been planning for years or Early Adopters 2. Still up in the air on that one for now, we'll see how it goes. I've read some great books lately too. Notable shout outs to The Carrion Sea by @EVCComicsBooks, Razor Blades by @NoirHayes, Kerwall Town by @SDReedAuthor and In The Heart Of The Void by @Tanweer_Dar - all excellent reads! Away from writing, I've really been loving Marvel What If...? on Disney+. The episodes so far have been fantastic and I can't wait to see the rest. In fact, I'm really looking forward to the whole of Phase 4 - looks like some great stuff is coming up. Additionally, I've also discovered Comic Book Men, which is my current comfort/background TV right now. So that's where I'm at. Taking a little break, but about to jump back in to the WIP mines. Until next time, take care of yourselves! D.T. Hi All, Just wanted to share my new short story with you all - The Formerly Infected Humans Support Group. Hope you all enjoy! Let me know what you think in the comments. D.T.
Hi Everyone!
Just wanted to pop on as it's been a while - plus something major happened since my last update! After taking longer than I'd expected to on my edits, Early Adopters: Rogue Elements is now finally out in the world, in both ebook and paperback. As 'opening weekend' draws to a close, I'm writing this and enjoying a little celebratory beer. In a bit, I'll go watch the last episode of Loki. Reflecting then, why did I want to write the stories that make up my new book? Everything else I've written has been a lot more serious, if still sci-fi. Thought provoking (hopefully) and intimate. Maybe that's it? Maybe I just wanted to have something a little more fun to dip into every now and then. My own personal sandbox with a full set of my own hero and villain toys to play around with. I also feel as though these kind of Superhero stories have been with me for as long as I remember. Growing up, I loved Marvel an DC comics and got into the darker versions of these, the ones that asked more questions, as I got older. I've mentioned a few times that I feel a lot of my love for sci-fi books developed out of me reading the British sci-fi comic 2000ad as a kid. What that great institution also provided me with though, through vehicles like Judge Dredd and Rogue Trooper, was my first exposure to key political and ideological questions that I'd pick up the threads of in Orwell, Heller and Kafka much later on. There was an anarchic edge to the prog back then - a demand that you question everything and everyone. I also feel like there's something primal in these hero stories for us. Something intrinsic to us as humans. Something we're trying to tell ourselves about each other through the medium. Back even before the Greek myths, to our earliest forefathers daubing berries on cave walls - there have always been these tales of heroes. A virtue to aspire to, and always fall short of - there's a story there in itself. I think these are stories and concepts that I will continue to return to, on and off, for as long as I am writing. So then, which are my favourite characters in the Early Adopters universe so far? Hard to say. This first batch are like my literary children! I love Harlan Larcher/Gargoyle - a more fallible, less cold version of your typical night stalking vigilante. I love to write Romeo and Juliet, together or separately. Leon is also anarchically crazy to write and a lot of fun. I also really enjoy writing some of the MiliTech antagonists. Director Pitts is great to write, though I would say less fun to be around. The evolving moral dilemma that Miles is facing, a reasonably good man, surrounded on all sides by evil, is also really interesting. I think he will have a bigger role to play as the stories develop. Favourite story of the bunch? This one is easier for me. I think Luck is Loaned, Not Owned is my fav - a payoff to everything that goes before it. Hopefully it delivers. I also love We Are Gargoyle and Open Mic Night. In terms of sales this weekend, things went pretty well (by my standards anyway!) with seven copies sold. At one point, that took the book up to 49 in science fiction anthologies on Amazon, which I was pretty pleased with. Hopefully this will lead to some good reviews soon and more importantly, some happy readers. Primarily, these stories are intended to entertain, to be fun for the reader. An escape. We definitely need a little of that right now. Looking forward, I'm particularly interested to find out what the comic book community thinks of this book and how this 'Parthenon' I've come up with stacks up against the old classics. There's more to come. Hopefully people will want it! Speaking of wanting it - if anyone wants to check Early Adopters: Rogue Elements out - here are the links! UK www.amazon.co.uk/Early-Adopters-Elements-D-T-Wilby-ebook/dp/B099P8BSD9/ US www.amazon.com/Early-Adopters-Elements-D-T-Wilby-ebook/dp/B099P8BSD9/ If any of you end up picking it up, I hope you have as much fun reading it as I did writing it! Until next time, look after yourselves D.T. Hi Everybody
As I get closer and closer to releasing my Early Adopters Anthology - Early Adopters: Rogue Elements, I had a little fun the other day picking out some mood music. This quickly evolved into a 26 track playlist/potential movie soundtrack! If anyone wants to pick up on the Early Adopters vibe ahead of release, here's the playlist and where it all fits in with the stories - does anyone else do this or just me? Prologue - The Professor's Journal 1) Heroes and Villains (The Beach Boys) Ten Years Later 2) Dog Days are Over (Florence and the Machine) We Are Gargoyle 3) The Pretender (Foo Fighters) 4) It's All Over Now, Baby Blue (Bob Dylan) Star Crossed 5) My Mistakes Were Made For You (Last Shadow Puppets) 6) Inner City Blues (Makes Me Wanna Holla) - (Marvin Gaye) 7) Romeo and Juliet (Dire Straits) 8) Mr Roboto (Styx) The Dancer 9) Suburbia (Pet Shop Boys) 10) Happiness is a Warm Gun (The Beatles) 11) Blood Brothers (Bruce Springsteen) A Little Festive Warmth 12) Mad World (Gary Jules) Putting Words In My Mouth 13) Regina Specktor - Sampson Open Mic Night 14) Sale of the Century (Sleeper) 15) Lucky You (The Lightning Seeds) Luck Is Loaned, Not Owned 16) Cigarettes and Alcohol (Oasis) 17) Cochise (Audioslave) 18) On The Run (Pink Floyd) 19) Achilles Last Stand (Led Zeppelin) Project PowerPack 20) Jailbreak (Thin Lizzy) 21) Black Hole Sun (Soundgarden) Blood On The Carpet 22) Enola Gay (OMD) 23) Lonely Town (Brandon Flowers) 24) Sign O The Times (Prince) 25) Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell (The Flaming Lips) 26) We Didn't Start the Fire (Billy Joel) Is this even a thing for books? Let me know what you all think! If you take a look - happy listening. Until next time - stay safe! D.T. Hi All, Following on from my recent updates - here's the third and final part of The Professor's Journal, the prologue to Early Adopters Rogue Elements. Hope you all enjoy! D.T. Entry 13
Status: Full Encryption It has been a few days now since my last entry. We have all been so busy. Bannerman pulled through the first night, then recovered quickly. By morning he had regained consciousness. By lunchtime he was back up and about. He really is a remarkable individual. I could not have hoped for a better first subject and I am just relieved that he managed to pull through. Yesterday, Bannerman confirmed that he was well enough to begin. He consented to our initial tests. Early results were exceedingly positive. Physical attributes have been heightened significantly. We have fallen some significant way short of Lendel’s original work, but everyone seems more than satisfied with the outcome. More and more, it appears that Union Jake was a significant outlier. We will have to see what happens with the rest of this initial cohort before we can conclude this with any more confidence though. We live in hope. Regardless, we must have done something right. The call we received from the CEO serving as confirmation of this. Personally, I can’t help feeling a little pride in this too. Certainly, the information provided to me gave us a head start, but I am led to believe that others have tried to fill in the blanks before and have delivered nothing. I cannot rest just yet though. We have the other subjects to get through the process. Our Sergeant needs his troops. Having seen the ordeal Bannerman has endured, I do worry for the rest. In all honesty, I have welcomed the lull of the last few days. The fact that Bannerman has not sailed through the process by any stretch of the imagination has given all involved a reason to pause and take stock. A window in which to review and reassess. I have made use of this time as best I could, going over the early data, making alterations to the process and the apparatus. We will look further into Bannerman’s fledgling abilities and his bloodwork tomorrow. We will look out for any instabilities. After that, I fear we will then need to press on. MiliTech will demand it. I only hope that I can make it easier on the rest, with what I have learnt. I do not want anyone’s blood on my hands. Then there remains the final question. The one I have not dared broach yet with anyone I fear is able to give me a definitive answer. Once I am done building these demigods, what do MiliTech plan to do with them all? I only hope that this cohort can be put to work doing some good in the world. Lord knows we all need them to. I am far from convinced though. The very idea that after what I’ve put these people through here, they could then be broken and bent into instruments of destruction and death appals me. I don’t quite know how I could live with myself if this goes wrong. It is not my choice however. All I can do is look after the best interests of these Early Adopters while they are my charges and hope they find their own way after that. Hi All, Continuing on from my last update, here's the next entry in The Professor's Journal, which acts as the prologue for Early Adopters - Rogue Elements Hope you enjoy! D.T. Entry 12
Status: Full Encryption As I write, it has just ticked past 03:00AM. I doubt I will get any rest tonight. As expected, it has been an extremely testing day, not least for the subject himself. Bannerman survives, for now. He is resting in the custom-made recovery bay. Early signs seem positive. We began the process at 08:00AM, as planned. The process of editing the subject’s DNA is long and arduous one. Not least for the subject. We begin by extracting sample material and then reintroducing the design alterations back into the subject, where they begin to do their work. Aggressively, almost like a virus, the new blueprint begins to rewrite the larger profile in its own image, cell by cell. A total upgrade. We expected the whole process to take around eight hours. It took twelve. As expected, it proved infinitely painful. If Bannerman does last out the night, I doubt I’ll ever be able to look him in the eye again after what I’ve inflicted on him. I have to keep reminding myself that he volunteered for this. The man must have a will like a rolled steel joist to stand up to the agony and endure. As much as I worry for him, I worry more for those who may follow, individuals who may lack his grit. Hopefully I will be afforded the time to review the data from this initial procedure and refine the process. If MiliTech permit it, hopefully I can make it easier on the rest who follow, though no doubt it will be no cake walk. Technically, Bannerman could have been declared legally dead three times already. Once during the procedure and twice since going into recovery. Thanks to the dark arts bequeathed to me from Lendel’s original work and the other information provided by MiliTech, we managed to drag him back from death. Perhaps that wasn’t fair, but the company wills it anyway. We will see what the rest of the night brings for us all. As promised yesterday on Twitter, here's the first entry from The Professor's Journal - the prologue to Early Adopters - Rogue Elements (or the first draft anyway!). Hope you enjoy! Entry 11
Status: Full Encryption It was raining on the way in this morning. Underground, in this facility, it’s hard to tell if it carried on all day, but the melancholy of it hung to me regardless. We begin with our first procedure tomorrow. It is too soon. Far too soon, not that my new paymasters want to hear that. We press on regardless. We hope for positive results. I don’t want to discover what happens if things go poorly. When I first came here, I was told that we would be studying inter-species viral transmission. That we’d be using gene editing to build up humanity’s resistance to the next global plague, whatever that could be. I am certain that if our experiments are successful, the test subjects would indeed be very hardy. To illness and all manner of other hazards this world could throw at them. I know now though that this was never about virus transmission. The things I’ve seen already during my short tenure here. The uncanny things that I’ve been gifted, unexplained. Keys to knowledge beyond my wildest dreams, but hushed silence in response to questions of its provenance. I should have walked away. Maybe if I were a stronger man, I would have done. The truth is that when I could have done, I was greedy with interest and now that I’ve seen enough, I honestly fear what MiliTech would do to me if I tried to leave. Things had changed quickly once MiliTech took over the operation. Perhaps I am showing my academic naivety. More likely they have always been involved, behind the curtain until I was in too deep to walk away. It seems they wanted me for my involvement in the original project. Found my name in Professor Lendel’s notes. They didn’t want to hear that back then pretty much all I did was make the tea. Thankfully, my skill has developed since then. I pray that it is enough, for all of us. There is no choice for me now though. No choice for all of us involved but to press on and hope for the best. It is too early for human trials. I keep telling them, but no one wants to listen. One thing they do want to communicate however is whose fault it will all be if a sub-optimal outcome is delivered. Tomorrow. We’re not ready, but I have no choice but to proceed. In addition to the enlightening, sometimes terrifying data they are feeding me from god knows where, I also have access to what remains of Lendel’s research from the original Union Jake project. It has helped me to make some of the jumps required. Without Lendel’s notes I wouldn’t even be close. Success tomorrow would be an impossibility, rather than just an unlikely outcome. I wonder sometimes what Lendel would think. Or what Union Jake would make of it all. If only I could speak to Lendel again. If only I had more time. The subject is willing enough. Sgt Connor Bannerman. A very brave young man indeed. A true war hero, if such a thing can be allowed to exist in the cess pit the world has become. He is aware of the dangers and frankly, the agony to come for him and he has not balked at the prospect. He has a grit that I have not come across often in my own vocational circles. If this project is to succeed, if we are successful in lifting him up above his current, already lofty physical station, I can imagine no better man for the job. Hopefully, something like the man going into the process tomorrow ends up coming out the other side. He is, for these purposes at least, the best of us. However, I cannot say the same about the rest of the ragtag bunch MiliTech have provided me with. That is, I suppose, a little unfair. Perhaps I’m spending a little too much time around my paymasters. Beginning to think like them. Maybe I need to remind myself more often that these are human being we are talking about after all. Perhaps in the days to come, I can justify my involvement in all of this by affording them all as much dignity and humanity as my situation allows me to. I have a dreadful suspicion that not all of them are here voluntarily and an even worse sensation that they won’t all last out the process. Hopefully, I can get them all through this, one way or another. Everyone is jittery. Not in a good way. There is no frisson of excitement here, but a deep well of dread, bubbling up. The incident on Level 3 last week has hardly helped the mood. Some professor of machine learning or artificial intelligence down there was working on neural network digitisation. Dr Cline, or something like that. Probably being pushed as hard to deliver as I am being pushed myself. Maybe he had a little more courage. He was conducting the experiments on himself after all. Shifting his consciousness from brain to some specially constructed cloud data cube and back again. Last week though, he didn’t come back. I saw them wheel the body bag out of here. It has plenty of the staff pretty spooked. Especially as some of them are still receiving electronic communications from him. He’s not in a good way, apparently. One can only imagine. Against my better judgement, we go ahead tomorrow morning. God have mercy on us. |
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May 2022
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