After that bombshell, we spent the afternoon talking around in circles, and eventually, I ordered some dinner. Fresh local fish and chips from 4 Mile Takeaway. Fresh and good. You knew you were in seafood heaven when your fish was caught that morning. We started to get organised with coffee all around, thankfully nice and freshly roasted locally.
We planned to watch the video again and then brainstorm. Overall, there were so many unknowns. We had some big questions, and there was not enough information to be had without contacting my sister. The video was light in detail. Questions she should have answered were what evolution was, where the aliens came from and what we could do. Not that she could answer them herself from the sounds of it. The fact that Amy said they were taking the dose a week before indicated that it might be safe to take it earlier.
We needed a guinea pig to test on, and the timeframe did give us some hope for experimentation. She also mentioned training, which we didn’t know much about, but we had a gym here, and Dallas had already used it and given it his approval. Jean and Dallas were happy to take the lead on the physical training front – funny that. There was also the issue of we had four more doses than we needed for the people here. If it were a case of saving people, I was all for keeping friends around and protecting them if that was what getting a dose did. I was set in terms of friends. My two closest friends were here, and since Amy said she would get a shot, I was all for letting Jean and Dallas have some input.
Dallas was up front, "If this is an invasion, and we are going to be an insurgent force, the underdogs. We need some more competent assets." He looked at Mike, Amy and me, "No offence, we need trained people. Corey, Ryan, Phillip, Jerrod and Rahsaan."
"Comms, Engineering, Scouts, Brawn and Medic. Not bad." Jean nodded. "Think we can get them here?"
They looked at me, "Paid holiday for five more?"
I sighed. I missed flipping my coin, but since all this had started, I was unsure if it was wise to tempt the luck gods or fate or whatever. I needed my sense of luck to focus elsewhere for a bit. "Sure, why not? I’ll keep this one quiet, though, and if it all works out, Amy doesn’t need to know. She hates me paying for crap already. Lawrence will have enough of a heart attack when I talk to him next."
Jean took charge, "We’ll contact them and give you a list of equipment to order online and some to pick up locally. After that, we must decide if we dose and train or …."
Sarah looked concerned, "What do you mean?"
"Train, fitness, coordination, endurance…. "
"No dose then train. Like you want to put that blue stuff in us?"
I said, "We have to decide at some stage. I think the earlier, the better, and if we do it now and run into issues, we can sort them before the countdown runs out. Just a question of who wants to be the guinea pig."
We agreed that someone would dose up the following day once the other five had confirmed that they were happy to have a holiday with some friends and they could make it quickly. Jean had some pull with some people to get special leave swiftly approved. All she said was it was above my pay grade.
With that all decided, we would relax a bit before we got busy. Everyone sat by the pool, drinking beers and wine and listening to music. I had a few more than expected and had a pleasant buzz. I watched as Mike and Jean spent the rest of the evening putting together more planning stuff. It was disgusting, but they were in pig heaven with lists, charts, and timelines. I had a look in and grabbed another beer. Dallas got confirmation that their army buddies were available for short-term leave, and then he hit the gym.
I sat with Sarah on the laptop, ordering many things from Jean's list. I also liquidated most of my stock investments. These were some of the assets that Lawrence had nothing to do with. They were for when the lawyers betrayed me and took my trust; this was supposed to be my future security, but I cashed it out.
I smiled. It seemed the long-term outlook for most of my investments was pretty grim. It was hard, and it took me a couple more beers to get through. By the end of the evening, I had a massive amount of money coming in. I had not realised Dad had been so successful in his investment advice, but I had paid attention to what he taught me while I was younger, and it paid off. It was a pity he got greedy or whatever batshit crazy plan he fell into. Since I was funding this little venture and I was cashed up, I decided to do what Dad never could. I started investing in Port Douglas property and business. In the back of my mind, I knew I would regret this later, but I was pretty zoned out on some quality drinks. I also knew I probably would not have to repay the loans in the long run.
In the morning, I was subdued and low on energy. An unpleasant reminder that I needed to drink more water before bed. I had a vague recollection of most of the evening. Everyone else was mellow and thoughtful. I remembered we were going to dose ourselves up and train. We were all scared. We were waiting for someone to volunteer to go first. No way was I up for it. It was crazy, injecting a tube of alien gloop into your body.
I broke my resolve and started flipping my coin. It was not a nervous habit at all. Heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads, heads,
Sarah stopped me with a smile, placing her hand over mine before I could toss it again.
Ultimately, we decided to draw straws, and despite my usual good luck, I got the short straw.
I reconciled the fact that it was logical to be me. I had the best insurance and the best access to medical. Dallas and Jean had high-level first aid training, with Jean having trained as a combat medic, not quite a nurse or doctor. Enough to save a life in an emergency, they would oversee the process. I trusted Jean more than Dallas. It had nothing to do with the name Jed sounding like a hillbilly.
When it was showtime, everyone stood around and treated me like I was dying, not making eye contact and wishing me luck.
Jean got the injector gun out and loaded a glowing blue tube. It looked just like what I had imagined a future injector should be. I would have been more excited if it were not being injected into me.
Sarah smiled, "Can I?" Jean gave her the gun.
"WTF? No, Jean..." I hated needles with passion. I was borderline phobic. No way was I letting Sarah, who had zero medical training, near me with alien gunk.
Jean laughed, reading my mind, "Relax, it will be fine. None of us has been trained in using these. Have a look at it. It is easy. Press against the skin and depress the button. Easier than an EpiPen. Sarah is as good as I am. It's not as if we have had any practice…and they are designed for an idiot, so even you could use one on yourself if needed." The last bit was said with a worried smile.
"Should I lie down?"
"Good idea. " Jean said, handing the gun to Sarah. I went into my bedroom.
Sarah followed me into the room, and I stripped into my boxers and lay on the bed. I was only slightly embarrassed when Jean, Dallas and Mike followed.
Jean whistled, "You are pretty lean there, Luke. Bulk up some more, and you will be..." as Dallas poked her in the ribs. "Don’t embarrass him too much."
I stopped Sarah. "Here," I flipped her my lucky coin. "Good luck."
She caught it, smiled with an evil glint in her eye, showed me the injector and grinned, "You're the one who is going to need it."
Sarah leaned over me, and before I could enjoy the wonderful scent that her closeness brought, I felt pressure against my neck. I struggled to think of something cool to say as things went woozy. I pin-pointed a beach smell: passionfruit, coconuts, sunscreen, sand, and seawater smell all wrapped up.
Nausea hit me, followed by bone-chilling cold. I started trembling and vomited a foul black and mucous gunk all over myself as my vision went fuzzy.
I blacked out.
The world was replaced by vast emptiness. The blue was so dark it was black.
Blue text that was both readable and instantly known flashed across my vision. Letters the size of skyscrapers. Yet it was not text. The impression of meaning was represented by symbols and unknown glyphs. I didn’t read it as much as I knew what it meant. It passed far faster than I would generally be able to process, although this was just a sense I got, as I had no frames of reference here. I could not tell the colour if it had one. Still, I got a sense of pale blue, similar to the bioluminescence colour of the liquid injected into me. I also understood the text being read by a bad robotic female digital voice, like early-day text-to-speech engines.
Initialization.
System Nanite Interface V2.08a (Beta Earth Human Expansion)
Warning: Incompatible Storage.
Reformat Recommended.
Proceeding with reformat.
All non-essential data will be erased.
I felt pain. Things went black again.
...
... ...
... ... ...
Reformat Complete.
Reboot Required.
Initialization.
System Nanite Interface V2.08b (Beta Earth Human Expansion)
Insufficient Processing Power.
Insufficient Energy.
Emergency Upgrade Required.
Upgrade Pending Approval.
SYSTEM: System Upgrade Approved. Refer to log files.
Safe Mode: Disconnect Sapience for Upgrade.
There was a moment of total dislocation. A flash of vastness. Joy. Happiness. Loss. Emptiness. Pain and pleasure. A bone-chilling fever and a deep muscle massage. Comprehension of everything. Nothing.
Upgrade Complete.
Reboot.
Initialization.
System Nanite Interface V2.09 (Beta Earth Human Expansion)
Nanite Enhancement Protocol engaged.
Security Upgrades are Required (15).
Critical Patches Required (2)
Safe Mode: Disconnect Sapience for Upgrades: Security.
...
... ...
... ... ...
Upgrades 15/15 Complete
Safe Mode: Disconnect Sapience for Critical. Patches 2/2 Complete.
Rebooting.
Primary Backup Initiated.
Backup Complete.
Initialization.
System Nanite Interface V2.09a (Beta Earth Human Expansion)
Firmware Incompatible: No previous racial baseline
Racial Averages Calculated with Insufficient Data.
Calculations Rejected:
Host Species calculated compatibility 82% Below the Galactic Average.
SYSTEM: Race deemed high risk for integration.
High Karmic Bonds were detected.
Race Enhancement Program (REP) Initialized (Beta Earth Human Expansion)
Reboot
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REP: Calculated: Projected 99% Mortality. Rejected.
Ticket Submitted for appeal Case Id 002.
. .
. . .
. . . .
Escalating appeal case.
System Notified, Anomaly detected.
Emergency Enhancement Proceeding.
SYSTEM: WARNING: Any or all changes may be rolled back.
Initialization: Safe Mode Debug Mode: ON.
????: Do you want to live?
Standby for System Intervention.
SYSTEM: System Log Started: Case Id 002. Resolution Pending Successful Integration.
????: Trust your luck.
Error processing Integration. Waiting. Pending System Intervention.
Emergency Enhancement Proceeding.
Do you wish to allocate stats while you wait?
SYSTEM: Adjustments will be made post Initialisation.
Do you wish to allocate stats while you wait? Y/N
Any System Adjustments will be made post Initialisation.
Do you wish to allocate stats while you wait? Y/N
Any System Adjustments will be made post Initialisation.
Sapience Timed out.
No valid response.
Forcing stat allocation.
Using Predictive Algorithm from Beta Earth Human Expansion.
Verbose mode enabled. Senior AI connected.
AI: You may think of the response if you need to respond to a query from System Nanite Interface V2.09a (Beta Earth Human Expansion). All physical interactions have been suspended pending the completion of your enhancement. Use thought of Yes affirmative or No for Negative. Do you understand? (Y/N)
Y
Confirmed. Proceeding with stat allocation.
140 Stat points gained.
You have 140 stat points to allocate.
SYSTEM: + 14 points in compensation for using System Nanite Interface V2.09a (Beta Earth Human Expansion). They are automatically added to base stats.
SYSTEM: + 70 points due to lack of Calculated Racial Adjustments.
Total Points available to allocate: 224
SYSTEM: All Base Stats are raised by 5 due to Legion Field Enhancement (Tier 2)
Substat allocation is available due to Tier 2.
AI: Think stats to see your current allocations.
Stats
Stats:
Luke Hammond EARTH HUMAN (Beta) Tier 1(2 pending) Level 0 Body: 5 (S:5 A: 5 E:5 C: 5) Mind: 5 (I: 5 W:5 P:5 I:5) Spirit: 5 (P:5 W:5 E:5 C:5) Karma: 5 (L: 5, K:5)
Crap, what’s going on?
Unknown response.
SYSTEM: Please refrain from profanity – A negative Karmic Penalty will apply for future violations.
Ok, Sorry. What is going on?
AI: Insufficient data to respond to the query. The recommendation is to consult the documentation and or trainers before undertaking this process. You may not terminate this process until it is complete.
Do you wish to assign stats?
The text and voice were becoming softer, more natural, less formal and slightly more personable. It was definitely less creepy, yet super creepy at the same time. The voice was moving from robotic to more like Siri.
SYSTEM: Your case 002 is at the top of the queue.
SYSTEM: You will be dealt with as soon as possible.
Great. Whatever was happening, I was on hold. The system messages came across as red, angry and intrusive, but that was just the feeling I got. I guess it was reality because they were some constructs in my mind. The creep factor just ratcheted up a notch.
How do I assign stats?
AI: Think about the stat you want to alter and the value. The remainder will be displayed in real time as you assign them.
Can you explain the stats, please?
AI: Your species has four main stats. Body, Mind, Spirit, and Luck. Each is broken into substats.
I waited.
Can you give more detail, please?
AI: The Body stat reflects your physical manifestation. Body is comprised of Strength, Agility, Endurance and Comeliness. The Mind stat is a representation of your supported mental and cognitive capacity. Mind is divided into Intelligence, Wisdom, and Perception and Insight. Spirit measures your interactions with reality and more profound mysteries, Presence, Willpower, Empathy and Charisma. The final stats, meta stats, are Luck, which represents a random element that will benefit you positively and Karma.
This was almost DnD. I should have played more games with Mike. I got most of the stats. I sighed mentally.
Can you explain Comeliness, Insight, Karma, Perception and Luck?
AI: Comeliness measures how close to your ideal physical image you are and positively affects your interactions with compatible species. At higher levels, it can transcend species. Insight can be considered your ability to see the connection between things. Karma creates a buffer for your accumulated Karmic Balance. This reduces penalties and improves resilience against karmic manipulation. Perception is the go-to stat for interacting with reality and beyond. It is your ability to perceive your surroundings and can be used beyond your reality. At higher levels, it draws on the System itself.
I have no clue about some of that, but I’d work it out. I’d played some games where you had to work it out. I was not too fond of character creation. I loved the idea of being super strong and a brawler, but in reality, I didn’t like the idea of sacrificing intelligence for brawn. I wanted to know what was happening, even if I wasn’t in charge.
What is Karmic Balance?
AI: Karmic Balance determines your standing within this energy realm. It measures your affinity towards Chaos. A positive Karmic Balance is imperative for all sapient creatures.
Ok. Can I assign my stats as patterns, and you allocate them for me?
AI: Yes.
Do you have a name?
AI: Is that relevant?
I don’t want to keep referring to you as AI. Do you have a name? What do I call you? I can't just keep thinking of you as a creepy voice. Are you The System?
AI: I am not The System. I do not require you to call me anything. You may think of me as an Artificial Intelligence Entity and have an internal designation. While attached to your sapient core, you do not need to identify me personally.
It doesn’t matter. I’ll call you … Petal. You are starting to seem more natural; it seems rude not to have a name. When I was younger, we had a dog called Petal. She was nice. Although we had a cat called Sprite, too. Sprite could be a bit of a bitch. I was nervous, I had actually hated that cat.
AI: Unknown Response.
SYSTEM: Please refrain from profanity – A negative Karmic Penalty will apply. Penalty Removed. Warning. (Crap, Bitch)
Petal (Pending): I must say that this is quite exciting. I am submitting for re-designation. How would you like your stats assigned?
Could you explain the stats to me again, please, Petal?
Petal (Pending): My re-designation has not been approved, but I will respond to Petal.
Cool, I think.
Petal (Pending): Certainly, Luke. Your main stats are Body, Mind, Spirit and Luck. These are the only ones you will see until you reach level 10. Once you hit level 10 and Tier up or move from Tier 1 to 2, you will start to see the substats. The Body stat is comprised of Strength, Agility, Endurance and Comeliness. Mind is derived from Intelligence, Wisdom, Perception and Insight, while Spirit combines Presence, Willpower, Empathy and Charisma. Karma and Luck are your karmic stats.
Wow, giving the robot voice a name had ramped up the friendliness and made it much more accommodating.
Could you explain the substats for me again, please, Petal?
Petal (Pending): Certainly, Luke. Strength represents your physical power. Think how much you can lift or carry, some does carry over to mental as well, all stats can be interlinked depending on your insight and perception. Agility reflects your ability to move with grace and your hand-eye coordination. Endurance measures how tough and dense your material body is, its resistance to damage and toxins, and how fast you can recover. Comeliness is a measure of your physical perfection to your own and similar species, how you look and present. Intelligence can be thought of as how quickly you can process information. Wisdom relates to making connections between things and contributes to your mana regeneration. Perception is how you perceive your reality, while Insight helps you connect facts and see patterns. Presence is how you impact reality around you, Willpower is your ability to see things through, your spiritual fortitude, and Empathy is how well you understand others. Charisma measures how you interact with other sapience, and Karma measures your impact on reality.
Thanks, that was much better. Add 1 to all my stats from my compensation stats. That should make all the stats 2. I must say that it seems a bit cheap from the System. I would expect more. I take it that I am being treated as a lab rat, Beta Earth Human indeed.
I waited.
Petal (Pending): Done, but you are incorrect. You have an experimental base plus a tier 2 bonus. Your base stats are set to 5 instead of 1 + racial average + training due to the Tier 2 enhancement package. Concerns are noted and attached to your case notes.
Add 5 points to each stat from the 70 racial adjustments or whatever they are for. There are 14 stats, and I have 70 points, so that is like 5 each. Does how I have lived my life affect how my stats develop? If I were a bodybuilder or a professor?
Petal (Pending): Your Current Stats are:
STATS: Luke Hammond Earth Human (Beta) Tier: 1(2) Level: 0 Unskilled.
Body: 11 (S:11 A:11 E:11 C:11)
Mind: 11 (I:11 W:11 P:11 I:11)
Spirit: 11 (P:11 W:11 E:11 C:11
Karma: 11 (L: 11 K:11)
Petal (Pending): Done. Not really. If you were born with a nano-symbiont, your life skills, training and experience would have been calculated and added on. Instead of the number of points you got, being born in the Empire, you would only gain 20 points. Your racial adjustment allows you to become the being you want to be, within reason. It is why this is like a rebirth of sorts.
The responses were increasing in complexity, which was a bit weird.
Do I have to maintain any ratio for stats or balance them?
Petal (Pending): No. Your enhancement package was Tier 2. Beings of Tier 1 and lower will suffer issues. It is not an issue when your stats are out of alignment at Tier 2. Not many people start at Tier 2, and there is not much training documentation around not needing to maintain stats after Tier 2. The recommendation for Tier 1 is to maintain a 3:2:1 ratio between the significant stats so that your highest stat should never be more than three times your lowest. Once they reach the base stat of 10, for most beings, this reduces the issues significantly as your mind and body are sufficiently robust. Keeping them in balance would help, but it is much more generous. You could put all your stats into 1 attribute if you like at Tier 2. However, it is strongly discouraged as your character would become significantly unbalanced regarding skills placement and future potential. You would undoubtedly lock yourself out of some classes' progressions and potentially shorten your life.
Can you explain the last bit?
Petal (Pending): Certainly. Imagine if you put all your stats into Strength and nothing into any other stats. You are strong but lack the agility to move smoothly. You would be abnormally slow. Keeping the balance ensures you have sufficient energy to power your massive strength and the skill to move with grace. The same goes for the other stats. Imagine if you dumped all your stats into Perception; you would lack the Intelligence to process the increase in perceptual data. While a 3:2:1 ratio is not mandated, it is nearly optimal and has been used for generations. More advanced classes expect stats to be close to this ratio. Again, suppose you dumped all your stats into Strength. You may never be offered a leadership class due to a lack of intelligence and Mind in general.
So, the 3:2:1 ratio only affects the Body, Mind and Spirit attributes.
Petal (Pending): Yes
Are all my stats over 10?
Petal (Pending): Yes.
Do I have 100 discretionary points?
Petal (Pending): No, you have 150. I negotiated with the System to give you 10 points as compensation for running the Beta program.
????: Trust your luck.
I'm unsure what was happening, and since all my stats were over 10, I could take the risk. While I had brief delusions of grandeur of being super strong or super smart, I decided to trust the weird notification. It seemed to have more presence and status.
Add all the points to luck.
Petal (Pending): This is not recommended.
But I can do it?
Petal (Pending): My scan of the System’s database on stat allocation indicates that this is a sub-optimal option for you. You would be the second person to do this and the first with this many points. It would take me some time to recover the records about how that individual perished. Still, my calculations indicate that your chances of long-term survival would be minimal. It shows that despite the high level of luck, they were not lucky. Do you wish to wait for me to retrieve the records?
Not really. Can you allocate all points to Luck.?
Petal (Pending): Done. All points allocated. Please confirm. 150 Points assigned to Luck.
Sure.
SYSTEM: Your case has been escalated and is at the top of the queue.
SYSTEM: You will be dealt with as soon as possible.
Points Allocated. Nanites insufficient for Tier (Stat Based Imbalance)
Reboot required.
Reboot.