32 days until deadlineContinue researching Particle Beam and Reactor
Hydrogen is probably easiest ionized fuel for particle cannon, smaller forces being required for acceleration, ease of acquisition and abundance. In theory your super soldier could employ his personal fission reactor to gather more hydrogen on field, assuming he does have most basic understanding of chemistry, which further promotes its value.
With hydrogen ionized it is matter of accelerating it properly and keeping the beam straight. As short as your accelerator is, that means almost inhumanly precise placement and spacing of electrodes. You had to invent new tools to make it possible, but in the end you think you have pretty decent particle rifle. Definitely war worthy, though effective range is not very great in atmosphere. At hundred meters the beam barely tickles bird's feathers. Or so your math says. Can't test this monster without a lot of power which is why you need to finish the mini reactor quickly, or maybe you could let it charge up for a day or two and then do test firing? You put the prototype into storage for now.
And as it appears, you manage to finish up the reactor core. It has quite heat problem, so you start working with cooling mechanism, as small as it has to be. Gotta be creative here. The reactor has also a small neutron related problem. Too much of those.
spazyak returns from his successful industrial espionage mission near midnight. He proudly brings an USB stick full of stolen technology, claiming nobody noticed anything. Perfectly executed mission.
Research in progress:
Miniature fission reactor
To be researched:
Quantum brain
High density capacitors
EMP hardening
Modular design
Research done:
Armored exoskeleton structure
Artificial muscles
Digital brain copy
Electricity driven cells
Particle beam
Test subjects expired: 19
Use my new multitasking abilities to remotely fly mini drones (that can be exploded on impact) with cameras that send back what it sees to steal the technology and sabotage Everyone else.
Combined espionage and sabotage on different target? Sure. Turns out it was good time to leave the lab. Very good timing. Not suspicious at all.
Some time after midnight you receive a call from the agent asking for your location. After explaining he mentions that they kinda frown upon sabotage. After all they have invested considerable sum of money into these projects. He also mentions how shit went down in the labs after you left. Total massacre, straight from hell. Dr. Ocean was only survivor and was severely wounded.
Finish design on Terrorizer, and begin to record a library of different pains and sensations. We want to try for a few different physical pains, including mere discomfort, existential dread, fear, distrust, paranoia, calm, friendliness, lust, euphoria. Also see if it's possible to cause a general hallucinogenic state, and try recording from coma patients, "just to see what happens". Extensively test these on test subjects, of course.
Very mad indeed. Very.
Transmitter is completed with extreme effort. Recording stuff requires installed MMI, basically. You don't have many subjects with those, you are actively torturing them physically and mentally, then injecting them with various drugs one after another before effects of previous drug has faded, recording their brain whole time. After that you do your best to separate different effects and create a mixtape "Eldritch Ocean". Mix of all kinds of sensations of pain and negative emotions. Another mixtape, "Calm Ocean", is theoretical mix of friendliness, calm, euphoria, possibly mixed with hallucinations. Maybe even fear. It's kinda hard to tell when drug effects overlap so much.
None of your subjects are in coma, so you can't really record that. It could be interesting, or maybe not. You must put someone in artificial coma to try that.
Now then, time to test this mother of all psychological weapons. Ten test subjects are tied up in sturdy chairs in hallway with regular intervals and the transmitter is placed ten meters away from closest subject. Hardened cameras and microphones are placed in areas where they shouldn't be affected by magnetic fields. The device is primed with "Eldritch Ocean" and prepared for remote activation. Doesn't make sense to stand too close it, even if its area of effect is designed to be a directional cone.
You and assistants move to next room and confirm all cameras and mics are recording properly. Then... then you flip the switch.
Next six hours are rather hard to describe. Perhaps it is comparable to being dropped into torture chamber intented for Elder Gods. Perhaps it is good you don't really remember any of it, other than fading memory of infinite anguish not meant for humans to experience. When you finally identify yourself as doctor Ocean, the best supergenius world has seen in last million years, you in really deep shit. Both metaphorically and literally, judging by smell. You can't tell if you are blind or if power is out because it is very dark where you lie, but it sure is great to be you again. Probably power is out. That's only explanation you can think why you are able to comprehend anything.
It's quite silent too, only sounds of dripping viscous fluids with your company. You slowly push yourself up and feel up yourself. Hmm, missing left arm entirely, not bleeding for some reason. Face is full of gashes. Couple of toes missing. Clothes reduced to wet rags. Right testicle gone. Left knee bent backwards and femur shattered in multiple pieces. No pain however. Perhaps whatever you experienced have dulled your sense of pain. Small blessings.
Now, to determine state of the laboratory. You hope that nothing important was lost during this... experience. You pull yourself up, hop forward until you slip near wall on something soft. Touching it confirms it to be very badly damaged human body, chunks of meat missing. That makes you realize your stomach feels very full. Too full. You hold the vomit in as you consider possible explanations and choose to ignore it. Data is more important. Perhaps cameras survived, that would be very nice.
Silence is deafening in the darkness. Only sounds you hear are your own beating heart and what you make by stumbling on ever increasing number of broken corpses. It takes a long hour before you find fuse panel and slowly flip swithces back on one by one. When lights turn on you let out sigh of relief, quickly followed by sigh of dissapointment. Considering lack of depth perception it seems you are missing one eye too. Your clothes are, as you predicted, drenched in blood and other body liquids. Some part of it is no doubt yours. Exposed skin is carved full of weirdly shaped cuts. The arm stump is burned black. Huh, no wonder it doesn't bleed.
The power room has pair of bodies laying in large pools of blood, apparently they were eating each other when they bled dry. One charred corpse by main transformer. That explains loss of power. You suppose you should thank him or her for being stupid. Back out in hallway you are greeted with fun sight. Walls are scribbled all over with blood, ink, and quite few pens have been jammed stuck in walls too. Passages of text that makes no sense, math that's all wrong, very disturbing pictures, handprints on floor, walls and ceiling.
Entire way to your room is filled with scenes straight from nightmares; desecrated bodies, body parts, blood, viscera, shattered glass and broken science equipment and furniture. Every god damn wall has something new on it. Sometimes even doors. Utter and complete destruction everywhere. And not a single thing alive. Your room is too home of chaos, your computer broken pieces, though you think the hard disk is intact. Probably. It's not like you can test it.
Next you focus on calling assistance. You don't know how The Company will react on this, but probably not very well. Hell if you know. Phones are suprisingly hard to find. Intact ones especially, and the ones that are not stuck inside some corpse. By time you find one you find tolerable, you are dead tired. Blood loss must be taking its toll finally. First you call a number saved in phone that is named as "boss". After few call transgers you manage to call your agent, who mobilises his people immediately.
Before you lose your consciouss you think a bit about aptly named Terrorizer. Its effect was supposed to be a cone shaped, yet it very clearly was anything but. The transmitter was way too powerful, you reason, so the effect leaked out despite of shielding. Then how far did the are of effect reach? Hundreds of meters most likely. The lab is few kilometers away from closest city, so you are fairly sure nobody else went crazy. Of course assuming there was nobody else around other than lab personel.
Research in progress:
To be researched:
Mind to machine interface - canine adaptation
Mind merging
Artificial muscles
Exoskeleton
Mind merging
Advanced medical procedures
Optical camouflage
Overclocked biology
Research done:
Stable weapon attachment point and remote aiming designator
Mind to machine interface
Dreamstream
Test subjects expired: 50 (100)
Other victims: 35
((And why did my hive mind research get de-researched?))
More concerned about the subject escaping, really. The protection from the outside is a side effect.
Anyway, after putting the hive mind modules (modified with the Terrible Glory advancements in neuron growth) into five fresh subjects (linked), put them into well-secured conditions and see how it works (standing order if this takes several days) and whether I can interface with the modules remotely through specifically adapted electronics in order to implant thoughts or send messages and data.
Hive mind modules are finished, installed, and coupled with simple chips to make them transmit signals to each other. Modules should bloom into full effect tomorrow or day after that. It largely depends on how fast new cells will grow, which again depends on subject's age and health.
Interfacing modules should be possible, or at least you can read signals sent. No doubt you can send too, but figuring correct format is something you have to experiment with. Perhaps observe and record data traffic for few days and then try to decipher transmitted content. Brute forcing it based only on the design and theory is probably possible, but having actual communication data available makes it much easier.
And that means if you can implant thoughts then so can others. More secure communication between brains may be in order.
Research in progress:
To be researched:
Research done:
Improved coordination
Improved cooperative bonding
Improved learning ability
Improved reaction times II
Terrible Glory
Hive mind
Major Technologies:
NERVOUS SYSTEM DESIGN AND UNDERSTANDING
Test subjects expired: 31
continue.
It's a good day here. Unlike elsewhere. Matter annihilation powerplant is fully functional, if untested. Having so much time left in your hands you work like a madman and even manage to minimize the thing into size that can be reasonably carried to battlefield. It's now size of a large backpack, but it comes with cost of being unable to generate antimatter on its own. You do rig a secure container for matter and antimatter, so it must be refilled every now and then. Like once a year if power consumption is kept reasonable, though it is very possible your super soldier won't understand concept of "reasonable". Not that you are very familiar with it either, being mad scientist and all.
So, wanna test this bad boys? And what's next in research?
Research in progress:
To be researched:
Reverse chemical formulation
Improved exoskeleton
Rail-guns
Improved training speeds
Intelligence increasing treatments
Research done:
Layered lighweight armor
Matter annihilation power plant
Test subjects expired: 6
Mobile holoprojectors sweet! Yes to the microcameras and secure transmissions for scouting.
Give the soldier a control tablet with a library of things for the hologram to appear as.
And keep working on perfecting that camo.
Projector part comes together very nicely. The hologram looks good from away, but close range inspection reveals minor flaws that nothing can overcome. As far as laws of physics go. But those laws are imperfect reflections, so it is possible to improve quality. Maybe. One of the flaws is that the projector needs direct line of sight to all areas it is projecting an image. Any branch or stick on the way makes very obvious hole into projection, so it somewhat limits its usage. The good part is that the projector itself can be inside the projection, effectively hidden.
The projector can project static 2d images, animated images, static 3d models and animated 3d models all the same, so it's potential is very wide. For example it would make a damn awesome replacement for television and basically all display devices. Limit of projection range is a bubble with radius of 2 meters.
Projector puts some requirements for its mobile platform. It must not have anything to block its LoS, so its frame must fit in rather small area. Hover system must be powerful enough to move it around flexibly, battery must be light and have enough energy to power both hover, projector, camera and radio. This means your high density battery comes really in need. Any commercially available battery is either too heavy or doesn't provide power long enough. Anyway, you leave the battery part for later and focus on building the frame.
Right, optical camo. The last part too is finished without too much of hassle. The completed prototype active camouflage cloak works nicely. Assistant wears it and walks around the lab scaring people. You can see it when she moves, but the moment she stops and goes immobile in corner it becomes almost impossible to see her. Only from one meter away your eyes start informing that something's not right there. Counter illumination works well enough when she doesn't move and light source is at least 20 meters away. Any closer and shadows start becoming more obvious. Of course intensity of light matters, so with dim lights the cloak performs decently even closer.
Research in progress:
Mobile holoprojector
To be researched:
High density battery
Brain integrated chips - Improved reaction speed
Brain integrated chips - Imprinted knowledge
Killing emotions
Associate obedience with joy
Researched done:
Reaction time study
Optical camouflage
Test subjects expired: 15
Lets try something different: Arson. Grab a few of my buddies and a couple of timed explosives, and lets do some damage to that lab I found before. We got the good stuff, so shutting them down now will be a huge setback. That fuel stuff my boss found in the USBs sounds like a great target to do some damage.
Two of your old squadmates are available in the country and agree for wanton destruction. Tommorrow you'll meet up, plan and make stuff go boom.
Allow the guy a few irregularities in his classification system guys. Science is "more art than ...science ... right? right?" That sounds right to me.
Anyway, perhaps he wasn't expecting certain other more grandiose ideas from being pursued and all.
Besides, are you checking other players' spoilers? don' do that.
We shall continue limited grey goo research.
Add to that research into a counteragent for the volatile fuel,
and are we curently able to make use of both the myomers and the non-iron alloy in nanobot construction? If not, let's work that way as well.
((Myomers are not really useful for nanobot construction. At least I don't see how they would be relevant. Explain your ideas you have some. The alloy is a bit troublesome, although nanobots would greatly benefit using it as base material. You could put million nanobots to grind a block of it into dust and then use that fine dust to build new stronger nanites.))
Today sucks. All kinds of useless thoughts floating in your head greatly infers with your process. You make a little process on writing limiting program for utilizing runaway nanobot swarm, it's not really that hard, but after a hour of work you lose all your focus.
Research in progress:
Nanobot functions: Limited Edition Gray goo, Corrosion resistance
Nanobot production: Extended raw materials
To be researched:
Nanomachines - diverse materials
Armor
Multibrain control systems
Distributed neural networks
Research done:
Nerve interface
Brain in a jar
Light and strong non-iron alloy
Myomers
Highly volatile fuel
Robotic body
Major Technologies:
Nanomachines
Test subjects expired: 19
Train. Because I'm not sure what my mad scientist is doing and I'm to afraid to ask her. Check the lab for weaknesses. Fix them to the best of my abilities. Be on guard duty.
Something crazy. After jogging past one of the observation rooms you have very hard time keeping your lunch inside. Those poor bastards. Then you extend your pity on them to yourself. You poor bastard, you may have to say goodbye for your humanity. You'll be monster for rest of your pitiable life, shunned by your own mother!
You are starting to have second thoughts about this super soldier stuff. Perhaps the company could reassign you for someone... less weird?
Eh, the lab is fine. Just chain one of those poor test subjects near main door and anyone who walks in will run away screaming. You know you would.
Excellent, these kinds of effects are unprecedented. Now I just have to get things fine-tuned and more controllable...
I continue the great work.
Today Dr. Ivana's house of horrors grows with new additions. More humanoid ones that the ones from yesterday. Runaway mutation causes entire body of one subject grow full of functional fingers, even inside his lungs and guts. This naturally causes his untimely demise. Unfortunate, but all data is good. Another grows limp fleshy stalks in similar manner, but only on outside. This mutation drains all her back muscles for the growth process. Weird and unexpected, but you are starting to understand. Yes. Third one loses bodymass on right side while left side bulges into inhumanly size. Ah, all these beautiful points of data, the secret is starting revealing itself. You are close, so very close understanding this!
On the other news; your assistants informs you that the gorillaman is complaining headaches, suffers from seizures, rapid personality changes, nausea and overall seems to be not be well. After looking blood samples it seems he's suffering multiple types of cancer. Brain tumor, skin tumor, liver tumor, ect. Reason unknown. But sudden wide spread outbreak of cancer is not natural, so cause must be unnatural one. No one else is showing similar symptoms.
Your agent calls you on very late night, well after midnight. He wants to know if you would be willing to use your impressive medical knowhow to repair certain employee of theirs. It would be shame to lose him after investing so much money.
Research in progress:
Fleshcraft
To be researched:
New nerve pathways
Research done:
Targeted hyper cancer
Inline DNA manipulation
Artificial Siamese Twins
Monster maker
Rapid healing
Extra bodypart attachments
Panacea - Immune system replacer
Major Technologies:
?
Test subjects expired: 34
Yeah, a guard might be nice.
Actually, why just one? Isn't the Company providing the funding? Have a small platoon of security personnel stationed around the premises, make sure they have both regular guns and tazers, and imprint upon them the virtues of the "taze first, shoot if tazer ineffective, maybe restrain and ask questions later" mentality in regards to people that wander onto the lab grounds. If there's thieves abound, it would be nice to capture one and see where they're coming from.
Put further work into the molecular simulation engine, with periodic breaks for working on the fuel cells, so as to not get tunnel-visioned and stuck with any one problem.
((I do wonder if whoever was dumb enough to steal my research data also got my personal notes on it, like how much of a pain the fuel mix is to manufacture and transport without the whole thing randomly exploding into flaming poison acid, or how the myomers need cooling to remain functional, and have far less shear strength than tensile strength - which is why wear from regular movement would eventually destroy them, thread by thread, hence the need for ablative wear protection. And I am assuming that since one thief being dumb enough to visit the same place twice is unlikely, someone actually got to my research before the countermeasures. This will require... countermeasures.))
Indeed. I always silently assumed there's a number of guards patrolling around all the time. The research you all are doing is very valuable, and The Company has invested very large sums on you bunch and will invest even more. But yeah, more guards patrolling and staring people.
Distributed simulation is kinda fun to work with, even when programming capable assistants frequently interrupt to inquire about "what does this weirdly named class do?" or "Why you have recursive loop here?". Educating them about finest programming techniques in your repertoire is good too, especially when they are eager to learn. That makes lowered progression rate slightly more tolerable. The program as it currently stands is about halfway done. Another slow day like this will get it done as long as nothing unexpected happens.
Container for your poison fuel is like wise slow process. You figure out base material for structural weave, and narrow down candidates for unreactive lining materials.
While it is a slow day, it far cry from your worst. You are certain somebody somewhere is having much worse day than you are, so after all it's pretty decent day.
Research in progress:
High capacity fuel cell
Molecular simulation
Research to do:
Wear protection
Wetware AI
Research completed:
Structural skeleton
Myomers
Muscle layout
Cooling
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