Chapter 93: Hypermind
Mimicset Modules [7/10]:
* Stabilize: [I+B] Sustain/Sustain
* Burn: [2B] Overclock/Overclock
* Insight: [2B] Analyze/Network
* Wield: [2B] Integration/Integration
* Databreak: [I+B] Dataweave/Jailbreak
* Hammer: [I+B] Accommodate/Overclock
* Overcome: [2B] Sustain/Database
4:18 AM August 30th
[Western Shandian Facility: Floor B4 (Lower Security Layer)]
“We’ll discuss this later.” R0N1N brought his hand to his neck warily. “Can you mimic my Feature or not?”
“I think so? Give me a moment.” I scavenged through my pockets, tearing out several Bronze BUGs until I found one that worked best to OverMind’s function.
Features: Psyche V.2.18; OverClock V.2.11
I streamed my Warp Energy into it, drawing out Iron Warpcode from a different BUG to stabilize my hasty work as I formed a module out of the two Features. Then I reached back for R0N1N’s nape, drawing back the strange connection of… us being Source-touched?
Focusing back into the BUG Module I’d just formed, I began to implore some of what I instinctively understood of R0N1N’s power into the Implant, feeling the Implant whine and wane as I forced a greater power into it. A gold crack formed over it’s structure, something I’d never seen before other than that homeless man’s BUG.
R0N1N just let it happen, passively standing in attention as I acted as a conduit between his power and the Implant. Then… then…
You have Rewritten the Implant Module… Rename the Module?
I had just the name.
HyperMind: [2B] Psyche/Overclock
“Okay, I think I’ve done it.” I plopped the BUG into the armband below my shoulder… activating it.
The world appeared the same, but my brain felt like ice was being dragged through every vein all at once. It was like being torn apart by your own blood flow. I tried to breathe the sensation away, but my lungs felt stiff and my heart refused to beat for several seconds.
Or… was it that I was thinking several times quicker? I released the Warp Energy surging in my brain, feeling an ease wash over me like a shower as I coughed out. “What. The. Shit?”
“Show me that BUG.” R0N1N reached his hand out, and I removed the Implant and handed it over to him. A weird scanner popped out of his arm, and it shone a bright light over the BUG. “Psyche and Overclock? You’re mimicking my Feature off this?”
He sounded nearly offended, I was too busy trying to make sure my heart was beating. “Not… entirely. Not as quickly. But… I think so?”
”Well… if you don’t have a Sustain Feature to allow your internal organs to act at the same rate of your conscious thought then-“
I yanked the Implant back, absorbing the Psyche portion into me since I wasn’t even sure if it was doing anything. I felt the Implant crack further in my grasp, but I wasn’t yet done with my modifications. Grabbing a Bronze BUG with Sustain, I began the process of transferring that Feature into the HyperMind BUG.
HyperMind: [2B] Sustain/Overclock [OverMind]
The webs of cracks only enlarged until it looked like I could crush the BUG in my bare fingers. Locking it into my Mimicset, I pulsed my Warp Energy back according to it.
My brain chilled under a cold that felt like daggers, but my breaths came steadier and healthier. There was still a degree of resistance, but now I didn’t feel choked. Even my heart thrummed easier, so I decided to take my first step — it reminded me too much of when I’d first gotten my spine.
Maybe that was why I felt familiar enough not to stumble, but every stretch of my Shardware leg creaked up as I moved fast enough to burn up its joints.
Still, I found enough in me to try to jump and I pushed.
This was it, proof. As I ascended into the air by a foot, it was slow, like a magnificent being was nimbly lifting me up into the air and the descent back down was as though I was floating in a pool of water.
Releasing the hold, I wasn’t struck by the onslaught of relief this time but instead a grogginess of how… slow I was thinking now. “That’s weird…”
R0N1N looked at me like I’d performed a miracle, which I suppose I had. “This… is something we will need to talk about later.”
“Right. Goliath first.” I nodded.
He shook his head, perhaps bewildered by the fact that I’d just modified an Implant in front of his very eyes. I felt the need to say one more thing. “This is a secret by the way, I… I got carried away but-“
“Later.” He silenced me, eying the checkpoint carefully. “A Silver and thirty Bronze guards await us. Focus Dreadwire.”
“Yeah.” I stretched my limbs, unsure of how often to use the HyperMind Module.
“Just keep up.” R0N1N flashed me one look before he vanished, but as I instinctively grasped into Hypermind, for the first time — I followed his movement.
My legs couldn’t handle the stress of moving that quick, but my Arachnodyne? They dragged the ground, pulling me forward so quickly I felt like I was floating as I followed R0N1N curving down the elevator.
He flowed elegantly, like a swordfish in the sea, while I was more of a bumbling clownfish. My legs caught me as I landed down harshly and buckled, right — I was moving quicker than I thought I was.
[Western Shandian Facility: Floor B5 (Upper RnD Layer)]
As R0N1N grabbed and yanked open the door, turrets flared to activity but they popped in so slowly that he managed to throw his blade and skewer one straight up. I followed up, launching a painfully slow harpoon of my Arachne, piercing straight into one gun and dragging me fast enough that I could rake my claw to tear it open.
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R0N1N had already slipped into the next hallway, ignoring the rest of the turrets which was a smart move that I followed. We zoomed down the hallways at a breakneck pace, passing by several labrooms filled with experimental skeletons of Shardware and other items of interest.
I grabbed my curiosity and killed it. This was what I wanted, but Goliath came first. R0N1N unsheathed his blade just as we passed into a hallway full of armed and prepared guards hidden behind deployed Holo-shields. They didn’t get a shot in before me and R0N1N had jumped behind them, my Arachnodyne arms tearing two of them down Neuroframe first and piercing their spines.
I felt pretty good about myself, but then I felt my body give in. The world collapsed to normal speed as my breath came rapidly, my heart trying to jump out of its chest as it reoriented to moving at normal speed. R0N1N had just finished killing another three guards, while I tried to keep myself from hyperventilating into exhaustion.
Not to mention, god damn was I drained of Warp Energy. I reached into my pockets, yanking out a neat magazine clip I’d made of the Bronze Shards I’d stolen and ingested 40,000 worth of Shardyne just to get back to full capacity. “God, that sucks!”
“How’s your Shardware?” R0N1N tossed me an arm, but it was more of a gesture of goodwill since it was extremely useless to me.
“Arachne can take the stress… Livewire muscles. I was right.” I chuckled. “Just can’t use my normal limbs or they’ll explode from the force.”
“Perhaps I underestimated just how much you’d mimicked my power…” R0N1N took a steady sight of me. “Never use your full strength, barely even half of it or you’ll launch your limbs off your body. Use it in bursts — begin your momentum with it and reactivate it a few milliseconds before landing — never keep it running longer than 15 seconds or else when you deactivate it you’ll feel lethargic. There’s a sweet spot where the adrenaline remains and you can act faster even if you’re not using the Feature.”
I nodded. “Uses a shit ton of Warp Energy… how’d you use it for so long?”
“I’m Tier III Dreadwire. And my Sustain and Energized are adapted to improve my recovery.” He cleaned blood off his blade. “Now hurry, we’ll kill all the remaining guards in the next fifteen minutes. Including the Silver.”
Okay… this was going to suck, but there was one thing that kept me going.
He said ‘we’.
We found another two stationed sentry groups enroute to the only access to the lower research layer. They never knew what hit them, my Scrap-Gun had all the time in the world to shoot them down when they were so slow in turning around to hit me. With that, we’d taken down another eight Bronzes and several more Irons.
As predicted, the bulk of their force was located at the main access to the lower floor. Their lone Silver wore an Exo-Suit much like the other ones above, except this one was slimmer and form-fitting like a second-skin.
His speed nearly took me for surprise, R0N1N blocking the strike with a dual slash from both katanas. His eyes shifted to warn me towards the remaining two-dozen guards taking aim. It should have been daunting for me, I knew that, but seeing how slow and dull they moved…
Yeah, I understood where R0N1N’s confidence came from when I was able to lock onto three heads and shoot them down before a single bullet came down. My Arachnodyne limbs hooked me up and along the pillars, my Scrap-Gun raining down a hellfire that shredded limbs and armor like paper.
One jump and another, I landed in between five guards who all moved like they were suspended in mercury. My Arachnodyne flew to work, landing surgical strikes into their necks before I grabbed the gun of one guy and threw it into another… only for the flying projectile to move so slowly that my impatient ass decided just to shoot him.
Another few shots were alerted to come from my side according to my Webcrawler, and I leaped above them my Scrap-gun aimed down on them and it-
It jammed. Fucking prototypes!
Mid-air, I dislodged the device, my Scrapyard burning to life as holographic images of its internal workings alerted me to which mechanism was locked. I’d corrected the fault just in time for my landing, reestablishing the link to mow down another group of Bronzes.
Down by a third of my enemies, I slipped in between moments of hyperspeed and normal speed, taking a gleeful enjoyment in how easy it became to beat Tier IIs! Still, I’d learned well, overconfidence was the real killer so I approached each group with caution, expecting something to go wrong.
Because something did go wrong, all of a sudden, the HyperMind module fizzled out of my grasp as the world sped up to normalcy. I was stuck between a Bronze guard who pulled out an electric baton and another with two pistols, both trying to strike me down.
Hammer took over, my body felt sluggish under the heavier Capacity load, but that's okay when my left-arm’s sudden blade ejection was enough to cleave through the swooping sword and my Arachne launched an arm right through the pistol-wielder’s chest.
A bit winded, I leaped behind pillars and crawled up somewhere shadier to turn on my Stealth-suit’s refractivity field. What the hell happened to HyperMind? Looking into my modules I discovered that… it just wasn’t there anymore, so reaching for it’s Mimicset slot I was disheartened to only find Bronze-shaded dust and thin rusted metal within.
Had I completely burned out the Bronze Bug? With no time to pay attention to that, I switched on Overcome, instantly becoming wise to all the tricks and toys behind the Shandian security. I leapt down as my form unraveled from the shadows to cleave Gold-wreathed spider limbs into a man’s shoulder, ripping the Shardware arm free and slashing into his neck with my arm-blade.
Arachnid arms grabbed the Holo-shield projector out from his torn arm, forcing a link with Databreak to form a blue rectangle over my back as my Webcrawler detected flanking targets from behind me. Then I had to use the dying man as a human-shield as they pincered gunfire on me. Both groups of three steadily approached, unloading their entire clips into me as I felt bullets pierce through layers of armor and the holo-shield depriving of energy.
You know, it was never shameful to ask for help. “R0N1N!”
On call, a blue blade spun through one group, curving around like a boomerang to slash into the other group and return to R0N1N’s hand as he dueled the Silver like nothing had happened.
Barely any Bronzes left, I took a moment of levity to hide and refuel myself by drawing in energy from the Shards I’d stolen. Absorbing it now felt a bit painful, a sharp sting drawing from my spine up to my cranium. Nothing I couldn’t handle, it was the knowledge that I’d absorbed 200,000 Shardyne worth of Shards during this fight that pained me more.
My Webcrawler pinged out the remaining foes, and I handled my grip on Wield, flowing it into both of my guns as I locked onto their hiding bodies. Then I prowled, jumping and swinging across the pillars and ceilings as I shot down one after the other with locked on symbols as they found their focus distracted by the R0N1N — their bodies fell as gaping wounds blew up from their unarmored necks until they were all left in splatters of their blood.
I smiled as I landed up in cover… I’d… Founder, I’d really done it. This was insane, beyond insane, and sure my Shardware was really beat up but… there was only the Silver left. R0N1N was steadily tearing them down, scraping deep into the armor of the Exosuit until you could make out its internal wirings.
My optics scanned over the unfamiliar tech, detecting a few weak points R0N1N had created that I could feasibly attack. But that was stupid, they were moving and attacking so quickly that even a backhand could tear my head off.
If I wanted to help, I had to be more creative than this. Scanning my surroundings, I found a useful perch high above that could be of use. Landing up there, it was just below the roof enough that my Arachne limbs could reach it.
Aiming carefully at the onslaught of attacks going back and forth between R0N1N and the Silver Exoguard, I locked onto his elbow — and shot my Livewire Spear-tips right into the exposed joint. They found purchase, hooking in and leaving enough slack that I wasn’t tugged off immediately.
Then I jumped backwards off the perch, Hammer pushing my lower Arachnodyne limbs to thrust off the roof and launch me down, then the Livewire went taut. Just enough that the Silver’s arm was raised an inch off course.
R0N1N cleaved through it one swipe. After that, it was barely a minute of fighting before the Silver was torn down to shreds and R0N1N freed a Silver BUG out from their head.
“That was creative…” R0N1N lifted his own arm up for me to inspect.
“That was simple. A pulley.” I responded with a smile, happily working through R0N1N’s body, by now some of the wounds were beginning to pile up. I estimated he’d lost about a total of 24% of his structural integrity by the time I was done. It would have been closer to 40 without me, I was feeling pretty damn proud of myself.
“Any remaining guards?” I tried to pull up a feed of what was beyond here, but strangely it seemed to all be empty of threats, even in that room that doesn’t exist.
“Doesn’t seem like it, but we need to be quicker… before they kill our witnesses.” R0N1N hopped into the next checkpoint, a simple staircase that led us to the deepest point of the Facility. It’d been one hell of a ride down here.
[Western Shandian Facility: Floor B6 (Lower RnD Layer)]