The room was empty of people as far as I could tell, instead rife with the sounds of whining motors and faintly screeching metal. The smell of oil and burnt metal pervaded the space, but quickly fell into the background as Cleo approached one of the unused machines, sat in front of it until it turned on seemingly of its own accord, and moved to the next. As they continued along the row, they called out, {when each of the machines are finished, take the part over to one of the workbenches. You’ll roughly assemble the parts into each component- you only need a few fasteners per part, just to make sure it doesn’t fall apart. For now, we will let the nanites do the wiring and other intricate processes, but in the future it would be best if you were able to also do that. The more you’re able to assemble the more efficient you can be with your tokens both initially and with repairs.}

Waiting in front of the first machine, I asked, “How long do you think this will take?”

{All the parts should be finished within the next hour, your assembly will probably take about as long, and the final nanite bath will be under ten minutes. If you are concerned about having your escape figured out, I’d guess that they won’t be expecting you up until fairly late in the morning.}

“Yeah, yesterday was rough. Under normal circumstances, I would have liked to sleep until ten or eleven- so if we go a little more conservative, no one should be expecting us until like nine? Although, that probably doesn’t matter anyway as I’ll be walking around with clearly new augments stuck on me. Assuming that they don’t forget to make me disable any perks I have running when I’m officially interviewed.” Then in a more pointedly questioning voice, I asked, “do you think I should bother trying to change my story of what happened yesterday? I’ll be honest: while their initial treatment of me wasn’t superb, it was also super fucking early and I was wiped out anyway. If you didn’t see anything that made you not want to be here, I think this place is kinda nice- even with the definite military oversight.”

From somewhere a few rows over, Cleo responded, {from what I have seen, this place operates like an accelerated college combined with an MG training camp. Additionally, while it might be heavily pushed, no one is required to sign on to any group when they're done here- at most they might require you to let them contact you if an emergency comes up.}

“While annoying, that is reasonable. And from your complaints towards the end of my fighting yesterday, I could probably use some help figuring out how all that works. Side note: are there any cybersecurity perks I could take to make sure these prosthetics are super secure?”

In a clearly ‘no shit’ voice, they said, {There are many that could be reached with a few branches off your skills. In general they are pretty cheap because the perks are both unpopular and bending digital rules is much easier than physical ones.}

Interrupting them during their pause before they started listing things, I asked, “I get increasing the cost of high-impact perks, but why does popularity matter?”

{Making more commonly taken perks more expensive encourages diversity in what a population of MGs are capable of. Such a system prevents more authoritarian attempts at regulating or standardizing MGs. Anyway, as far as cybersecurity goes, do you only want it for security, or do you want to take a perk that would allow for attacks as well?}

“Definitely one that helps offensively as well. I have some general knowledge about how that stuff works, but nothing that would actually let me do anything.”

After a moment of silence, Cleo said, {With that in mind, I would recommend taking [Digital Weapons Proficiency], then [Computer Systems Knowledge (Humans 1)] off of [Makeshift Weapons Proficiency]. That would cost a total of 11 experience. If you want more than that, [Covert Requisitioning] has a branch called [Magical Hacking] which itself branches off into [RAT King], [(Trojan) Horse Whisperer], and [Early Worm], to name a few.}

In disbelief I laughed, “There’s no way those last three are names of real perks.”

In a smug tone, they replied, {There are a theoretically infinite number of perks, so naming them all in a consistent or logical way falls apart fairly fast. For that reason when a specific perk is first taken in each language, the familiar is allowed to name it whatever they want. I personally felt that perks could use some humor in their names.}

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“Alright, how much for all of that.”

{[Magical Hacking] is 10, [RAT King] is 6, [(Trojan) Horse Whisperer] is 11, and [Early Worm] is 8.}

“I’ll just take Digital Weapons Proficiency, Computer Systems Knowledge, Magical Hacking, and Rat King,” I said. “That should put me at… 44 remaining?”

A few minutes after all the perks had been applied, the first batch of parts started to finish. With Cleo’s help I was able to slowly stick things together and grab the few parts that were supplied pre-built. Apparently, the electronics for most of the designs created by the computer were standardized, so in a place like this an MG could simply grab the necessary part instead of ordering it from wherever custom computer components were manufactured. The horns were fairly simple for me to assemble, just being an outer shell and a circuit board- everything else was too delicate or fine for me to do by hand. It was slightly nauseating realizing that they were going to be stuck through my skull, but I brushed that aside by starting on the tail.

It was also more simple than I expected magical-tech to be, but took far longer as there were a whole lot more pieces. After a little under fifty minutes of careful assembly, I was done and slumped in my chair. So far no one had come in to claim any of the finished pieces- most of which were in metal 3d-printers. Upon my questioning, Cleo told me they could do a lot more intricate geometry than a mill or lathe, but took a lot longer- making them a worse choice for what I wanted. I had also not heard any alarms or announcements over the facility-wide intercom about a missing or escaped patient- so that was nice.

As one final octuple-check before heading to the nanite bath, I pushed ULE into the finished prosthetics so I could actually sense what they looked like. The horns were nice and simple: a slightly backswept cone with an elongated-teardrop base that would stick about four inches out of my skull. All stark white with a small ring of shiny metal around the base. All the bits that would be touching my brain would be constructed in place by the nanites. The tail was a similarly simple collection of sixteen near-identical segments. Each segment was about four inches long and a slightly oblong cylinder, getting smaller as they reached the tip. The tip itself was unique looking, taking a slight spade shape with a glass-like bulb in the middle. It also contained a self-shaping plug and port that would take whatever form was needed to interface with other electronics- although that would also be built by the nanites. Between each segment, a small sphere of metal acted as a universal joint with a set of wires running between them to allow the assembly to bend and twist with the assistance of motors and magic.

After I had collected the parts and taken a few deep breaths to calm myself, I followed Cleo to the nanite baths. They were each given a separate room and looked like a normal bathtub with a large tank feeding into the spout. At Cleo’s further direction, I stripped, stuck the prosthetics approximately where they would be with some provided glue, put on a mask that had a tube running out of the bath so I could be fully submerged and not drown, and laid down on the cold surface- only shivering a little.

After one last encouraging comment from Cleo, I blinked and heard them say, {everything looks good. The process only took a little over nine minutes, so I also had the nanites give you a thorough cleaning, fix up your clothes, and freshen you up with some accelerated sleep. All of that was sorely needed.}

Now much more refreshed, I climbed out and redressed in new-looking clothes- the pants having a slit for my tail. After I was situated, we started the initialization process. The horns were first, bringing everything into a much sharper focus at a greater range than what I could previously perceive. Instead of everything going even more fuzzy at around thirty feet, nothing beyond fifty was rendered in my mind. Even within the fifty-foot radius I could perceive, only a forty foot radius* centered wherever I wanted was highly detailed. The rest of the area I could make out was depicted in simple wireframes; enough so that I was aware of everything, but not too much as to overload my brain with information.

The next thing to get turned on was the nerves and controls in everything. That was the weirdest part of the whole process. I didn’t even know I would be able to feel the tail or horns, nor did Cleo give me warning that they were enabling them- throwing me for a loop as the new stimulation of my tail resting on the cold ground caused me to think I was laying down. Luckily some muscle memory had been installed, so when I started falling over from balancing wrong, the tail whipped out and stabilized me.

Lastly, the glass bulb on the tail was lit up with a thought from me. Doing so partially blinded my manasight to everything behind it, but increased the distance I could move my detailed perception out to a full 400 feet. The experience almost made me forget I had a body until I fell over and landed hard on the floor. The pain disrupted my concentration on keeping the lantern lit, pulling my perception back to my body.

Getting back up and deciding to keep my range limited until I was used to functioning in a mind-boggling mix of first and third person- while not quite being either- I rhetorically asked, “Shall we get going back to the room before someone suspects anything is wrong?”