Chapter 16 Invitation
Somewhere quite far away. Inside a bunker like structure underground, sat a young man on the floor. He looked no older than 23 and was in the prime of his youth. He sat on the floor tinkering with some kind of device that was tens of years ahead of the technology on earth before “god’s” wrath. His eyes were not human, they had many overlapping rings and odd shapes inside them, like a camera lens. Constricting and opening as he focused on his new project.
His room was quite bare, with just a bed, a messy desk with lots of different kinds of electronical appliances, some bookshelves and in the middle of the room a cylindrical object about a foot tall. His name was Adam Wong. “Wong the wonder boy” they used to call him. At the young age of 17 he had graduated MIT summa cum laude. Although he had never taken an IQ test, many guesstimated that he had at least 150 IQ. After graduating he had worked as a researcher for a couple years, but his career path had been cut short by “god’s” wrath.
However, back then just when he though all hope was lost, someone reached out to him and offered a job. A job that paid an astronomical sum. Adam decided to accept this opportunity immediately. When he started working at this underground facility just a scant few months after “god’s” wrath, It had just been built, all the equipment was top notch and state of the art. Adam was overjoyed that he accepted this job. He couldn’t wait to see what they wanted him to research, since they hadn’t said so in the job offer.
Adam was thoroughly disappointed when they told him, he and his coworkers would be trying to disprove tried and tested theories and even laws of nature. Of course, Adam wasn’t a dunce. He understood that whoever had hired him wanted to get a head start. Even though “god” had said one year, these people were trying to see what could have changed now.
Although disappointed, Adam would have no problem with doing stupid things for the amount of money they were paying. However, as the team of researchers started their work, after just a few months of work, they found lots of things that were different. Things that shouldn’t work, started working. In no time, they had solved the problem with quantum tunneling and created the first quantum computer.
Yet, it didn’t stop there. They managed to translate nerve signals into readable electrical signals. This was Adams field of expertize. Using this new technology, Adam started in secrecy to make cybernetic enhancements. Which turned out a magnificent success. Bit by bit, Adam was replacing his old body of flesh, with a new one made from metal.
Adam used advanced sophisticated robots that would work using brain impulses, with this he was able to replace most of his body by himself. Using high-tech super alloys that could mimicked skin, that someone else had come up with in another research facility, he managed to keep his new enhancements completely undetected by the others. This was Adams dream, almost every night when he was younger he would dream of cybernetic enhancements. It helped a lot that unless something big was going on, he would only see other people once a week, giving him plenty of time to do what he wanted.
A couple months before “god” turned everything upside down, Adam was pretty well informed on who his employers were. They were the super elite of the old world. The richest of the rich, the 1%. They didn’t like what “god’s” announcement implied, so they did the one thing all their money could; research. They had funded research into the most important fields of science. They also started rapidly building bunkers, underground retreats, research facilities, everything one could think of. They poured billions of dollars into staying a head. They had realized that “god” had knowingly or un-knowingly given them a grace period of one year, where their precious money would be worth something. Many of these 1% had had the same thoughts and had banded together to help each other. Each one of them funding and watching the progress of a single field of research.
However, it didn’t take long before whoever hired Adam was dissatisfied. Even though they had managed to transform brainwaves and nerve impulses, the other researchers were quite inept at this field and were unable to create robotics that could rival human appendages. Who knows how angry he would have been, had he know that Adam was only 20% meat and bones at this point in time.
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One day, the money simply stopped coming, but Adam didn’t care. He was too busy with his own work, as long as he had his old reserve of money and there was power in the facility, he would continue working. Adam was so embroiled in his work he simply forgot about the days.
However, this day he would never forget about. Adam felt a wave of power surging over him. It was “god’s” evolution. He could feel the slightly clumsy cybernetic enhancement he had made on himself were melding together with his remaining flesh. Previously his senses had been dull and somewhat unprecise, at the time he hadn’t really cared about that in his excitement. However, now he could feel everything, his hearing got better, he could see clearer. It was like he was a new person. Looking in the mirror, Adam noticed his pupils had changed. He wasn’t dumb enough to start removing his eyes, this was not his work.
Adam had stayed in that bunker for a few more weeks, lucky for him, he could create electricity. Using his fellow coworkers as test subject, he started experimenting, until he eventually created the perfect being. Adam never liked humans, actually he detested them, they were annoying, complicated and untrustworthy. He removed all their feelings, their freewill and made them into unthinking, unfeeling androids, that only listened to commands. until one day a burly man with a large smile had broken in through the front door. “We have been looking for you” he said smiling.
John sat in his refurbished apartment that had been given to him by Kyle. He was thinking about all this new encounter he had had, just a day ago. Although getting kidnapped in his own backyard was bad, that wasn’t what was bothering him. It was that man with the sword. Besides that creature in the forest, he was the most powerful person he had ever met. It scared him. If he had meet that man inside the facility he would have no choice but to fight, and with Luna out cold, John wasn’t sure whether he could take him on.
John had considered giving his bloodline to someone else several times, but he was afraid of forcing it. When he had transformed Luna, it had been the bloodline that almost forced him. He didn’t want to force himself and end up doing something stupid. If his bloodline insisted on doing it, he would but unless such a situation appeared he would most likely not give it to someone else. Besides, when it had happened, his bloodline did all of the work. John wasn’t even sure how too transmit his bloodline, he had no control over that globule in his chest. The third thing being, when he transformed Luna, his personal power took a huge dip. John had the feeling that this would only escalate with the amount of times a bloodline was transmitted.
His only other option was to eat more hearts. However, the things that went bumping in the night, scared John a hell of a lot more then that swordsman. He could only find more hearts very carefully. Although finding regular hearts was no big deal, they gave him almost no benefit, he could probably eat a 1000 of them and not even gain 1% of strength. So, eating normal hearts were mostly for recreational sake. Even the purple hearts had drastically less effect on him and Luna after they evolved, however the purple creatures also got a lot easier to kill.
John walked around town with Luna in tow, looking at different things. Eventually they made their way over to Dave. However, when they reached him, John noticed something was different. “Hey Dave, say is your hammer bigger and on fire?” John asked a bit perplexed. “Aye, its pretty Skookum ain’t it? Right after you two went on your little trip I managed to beat the last piece of information out of my new mystery metal and boom, hammers on fire” Dave responded with a gleeful smile. “You managed to evolve from just beating a piece of metal?” John asked with a bittersweet tone. “Hehe, seems that way” Dave answered. John got a slight bitter taste in his mouth, all that shit he had been through and this guy just casually evolves from beating metals.
Dave was about to say something else, when suddenly Kyle came over. “John, come with me there is someone asking for you” Kyle said. Finding John in a crowd wasn’t to hard, considering his above average height and the massive wolf by his side. John thanked Kyle for saving him from Dave, he could bare listen to him gloat.
Kyle lead John to the entrance of bullet town, when they got there the two guards were standing with their guns at the ready. Right in front of the gate to bullet town sat a well-built man on a motorcycle. “Who are you and what do you want with me?” John asked a bit skeptical. “I am just the messenger, this is for you” the cyclist said as he tossed a letter over. “What is it?” John couldn’t refrain from asking. “An invitation” he answered before, revving his bike and shooting off.