Chapter 96: Struggle
August 27th
Anthony
I took a deep breath as I opened up the package that had been delivered to my doorstep, a special order from Imperium’s International Gene-Clinic group, Spirit Sculpt. Tearing the carton apart, a metallic box not much larger than my hands sat solemnly like a treasure chest lost to time.
Carefully, I lifted up the 80,000 Shardyne box and released the confines it held on the vials inside. Three Bronze-Grade Mutagen Stimulants and a Silver-Grade Mutagen labeled Voice Mimicry. It’d been difficult to acquire, but a flash of my police certification and approval from Special Investigator Wickett had granted me the authorization to buy it.
At the expense of several months of savings.
I could’ve put a down payment on a new car with this expense.
The sun was in its waking hours, barely peeking over the horizon when I stabbed it’s Mutagenic strength into me. If I was lucky I’d gain a new Mutation, if I wasn’t… maybe a few Meta-Mutations, but those were rare for anyone whose name wasn’t Diana Jones. God, how many did she have again? Too many to count.
In the last five years, I’d gotten maybe seven?
The pain hissed up my leg, draining through my SIM-infested blood as a strangling sensation gripped my vocal chords.
Bronze Grade Mutation acquired: Vocal Alteration can allow The Adapter to shift the pitch and frequency of their voice to a much better degree. Meta-Mutation acquired: The Adapter has slightly better memory of other’s vocal profiles. [3%]
Grade is now Bronze V
Coming down from the high, I eased several rough coughs out of my enhanced vocal chords. Staring at my parrots, a small laugh escaped me. Let’s see who’s better at mimicking voices now?
Still, I was a bit peeved that the Mutation had lost it’s Silver-Grade, demoted to Bronze with only a Meta-Mutation that gave it a small benefit of the original Voice Mimicry Mutagen. It was expected, but good fortune could’ve retained all aspects of it.
I’d also jumped up in my Grade now, which was the other main benefit of ingesting a higher-grade Mutagen. Slowly, but surely, I was catching up to my aunt. If I kept up my pace, played my Mutations well and got results, then this September would mean a promotion. I… I deserved it.
Choirmen was right. My Grade and Tier wasn’t fit for a Third-Rank investigator. Hell, I knew Special-Grade Investigators that were at Bronze Tier II. Granted, they were exceptional in their fields and had a better synergy in their Mutagenic choices but the fact was that I was underperforming.
Would I be as skilled as Diana at fighting? Never. She could whoop my ass even at Tier I. My grandfather could literally launch shockwaves from his hands and tear down a building if he put his effort into it. My aunt was… terrifying.
Point is, I could never out-damage either of them. Most of my mutations were scattered without any idea put into them, but now was better than never. Diana wasn’t going to climb alone, she’d have me. Her as a Special Investigator and me as a Sergeant or whatever.
So, as I stared at my Muations, I wasn’t feeling contempt about having them forced onto me for once.
Implant Overview:
Name: Anthony Grazhe
Implant Type: SIM
Tier II: Mutagenesis
Compatibility: 81.3%Development: 32%
Grade: Bronze VII
Integrity: Bronze II
Energy: Bronze IV
Capacity: Bronze V
Gene Overview:
Tier 0 Mutations:
* [B] Hypnotic Voice [Energy]
* [B] Increased Lung Capacity [Alteration]
* [I] Muscular Endurance [Integrity]
* [I] Emotional Sense [Cognition]
Tier I Mutations:
* [B] Emotive-Vocal Synchronisity [Energy/Cognition]
* [B] Strengthened Respiratory System [Alteration]
* [I] Bodily Endurance [Integrity]
* [I] Fatigue Recovery [Metabolism]
* [I] Air Hardening [Energy]
* [I] Alcohol Metabolism [Metabolism]
* [I] Skin Cleanser [Alteration]
Tier II Mutations:
* [S] Soul Whisper [Energy/Cognition] [29%]
* [B] Air Spitting [Alteration/Energy] [38%]
* [I] Strengthened Body [Integrity/Metabolism] [37%]
* [I] Flawless Skin [Alteration] [35%]
* [I] Alcoholic Control [Metabolism/Cognition] [68%]
* [B] Vocal Alteration [Alteration] [3%]
There were definitely some embarrassing choices in here. For one, I’d tried to copy my grandfather and his ability to send shockwaves through the air by once making a spendy splurge on an Air Manipulation Mutagen. Only for it to end up as an Air Hardening Mutation, and at the Iron grade it was hardly the type of thing to be useful.
Reaching into my Bronze core, I summoned it’s gust of copper-shaded wind through my hands and watched as a slight green glow layered over my arm, and gripping it felt like molding extremely weak clay into shape. Not the air-walking, barrier forming, wind slashing Mutation I’d dreamt off.
Except for one nasty change, taking a deep breath… enough that I could probably survive for tens of minutes underwater, I condensed all of the air I’d taken in as one tiny pellet within my chest. Then I shot it at a target on my wall, a quick green bullet splashing into the metal as a force gauge read out a strength reading of Iron IV. The Air Spitting Mutation was pretty useful in clutch moments, I’d remembered using it to clear space between me and Diana when Tonguelasher flipped a car on us.
If aimed right, it could even break a bone or two.
As for everything else, god… cosmetic mutations. Not to mention the thieving Alcohol Metabolism Mutation. Back when I was on the cusp of growing into Tier II, my final push involved the absorption of an extremely potent Iron Tier II Mutagen named Self-Control. The name was misleading, because research showed that the Mutations spawned off the Mutation allowed for a massive boost in cognitive control of your body… it’s way of thinking and even reaction speeds could be magnified.
Except, rather than it going to any other Mutation. It went to my alcoholism. Now, whenever I’m drunk, I have fantastic control over my own limbs and can even use my Vocal Telepathy better. The only issue is I need to be drunk… the more drunk the better.
Other than the police issued bodily enhancement Mutations, there was finally my bread and butter. My ability to mentally control others with my voice. My grandfather had first awakened to his version of the power in Tier II, where it combined a Mutation that made his voice more penetrative with a Telepathic Mutation that created an aura of authority around him.
My aunt, on the other hand, awakened it at Tier I through a convergence of a mutation that allowed her to speak with her mouth closed and a seperate Telepathic mutation that straight up allowed her to connect her nervous system to another via touch. She’d taken a specific sacrifice to let them both combine, by not taking any other Mutagen when she was in Tier 0 it was guaranteed they’d only converge with each other.
Then there was me. Vocal Hypnosis was how I started out. Simply put, if I spoke to a person long enough, then I could cause them to be more receptive to any commands I spoke out. Emotive-Vocal Synchronicity was where my problems first arrived. Through a combination of a relatively weak telepathic Emotive Sense Mutation and my original Vocal Mutation, my control over another would massively increase if I had the same emotions as my target.
Then that grew into Vocal Telepathy.
Imperium’s gene-clinics were top notch. Through a targeted release of a Silver-Grade Mutation Stimulant sponsored by my grandfather, the Mutation had grown into the Silver Grade. Theoretically, it was as potent as my aunt and grandfather’s now.
My body was not. The premise of the mutation was a tad bit more complex, using it allowed me to glimpse into other’s emotions the more I spoke with them, and the further it developed the more I was able to gather specific thoughts. Then, whenever I spoke, it would be profoundly heard within other’s psyches, as though they themselves were thinking it.
That concept, the idea that they were hearing their own thoughts rather than my voice was what made my Mutation so coveted to my aunt. I could theoretically alter a person’s entire way of thinking if I spoke to them long enough. It’s just that it left my own mind as vulnerable, a two-way channel.
Not to mention, it was Silver-Grade. Everytime I would use it, there would be backlash, at best it was just pain and tearing my own vocal chords. At worst it would be…
I’d started out at 93% compatibility. It had dropped.
Just thinking about it made me shudder. Those who went below 50% would begin to lose control over their Mutations, those at 0%… lost themselves. Like…
Like my mother.
I was there as she slipped away. A virus? Really?
Like any virus could cause you to lose your mind, your compatibility, your control over yourself.
Make you lose… your love for your own son.
She died in front of me, but it was clear to everyone that there was something deeper at play. No virus could do what that did to her, not even if it was somehow mutagenically enhanced. Everyone wrote it off, my dad, my grandfather… even my aunt.
Whatever she lost her mind to, it was out there. Lurking. I just didn’t have any way to properly fight it until Diana popped into my life, amidst the gloomy dread I’d been forced to live having the knowledge that my own power was killing me.
And now, the very force she was trapped by… was the same that my mother had been investigating. A part of me detested my father for hiding the truth, for sending Diana into that lion’s den alone. Another part of me was… thankful. It would have killed me, doing it all by myself, especially when I was younger and swept away by every stray emotion in my heart.
I’d grown since then.
Opening up the location to the animal sanctuary, I stared at it.
By any means necessary, I would find her. And she’d probably hate my ass for it, hell, I’d for sure have a flesh wound or two but dammit I’d go to her even if it meant getting captured myself.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Because at least then, we could fight together. I’d take a peek today… just a peek.
———
Diana
My hand lurched forward, gripping the blood-stained fur of an Iron MAL — the same Fangtooth-variant I’d grown so comfortable with — and then my Warp Energy surged into my hand and the beast’s skin. At once, a blinding flash of electricity sparked from where my hand met the beast’s body, a chill air permeating at the contact as the blood froze over and icy drops clung to the matted hair.
The electricity drew back into me, coursing down to my hips which twisted, then into my left leg which snapped open so my hardened heel could crack through a ribcage through which I shot a fatal plume of frying sparks into.
The core exploded as I felt a wave of Iron energy drench through the bubbling corpse. Not even a second later, a second MAL had descended onto me, my mental cognition feeling the approaching surge of activity within their nervous system. Skidding backwards, I called upon the scraps of metal left in the arena from when I fought Stormspinner’s corrupted self.
The electricity I’d left in them brought each to life, stirring them towards me as embers of my Warp Energy scattered towards each metal shard. With my innate sense of electrical currents, it was easy to feel each shards as their own individual pieces. Easy to supply them with specific jobs.
My compatibility was at 99.9%. The Warp Energy within me was synchronous to my thoughts, and that fed into each shard. Two sliced through the Achilles’ tendons, another gouged the MAL’s eyes out. The rest collected to my side as shields to protect me from a third MAL’s onslaught.
I didn’t have enough force yet to barrage them through a MAL’s toughened body, but they served their purpose as winding serpents that could distract and throw off my foe’s advances. The MAL with the slashed tendons fell under their own weight, and I exploited it with a slash of my nails tearing deep into it’s chest.
A chilling burst of coldness pierced the air as a violent wrench of sparks spasmed through the MAL, the frozen organs weak enough that I could crunch right through to drain the core’s Warp Energy. That fiery Iron couldn’t even drain up my shoulder before it was transformed into a spark of electricity that flicked through my fingertips.
A thin strip of silver-blue stabbed into a descending MAL’s open jaw, my aim perfectly locked onto the collection of nervous tissue confined above the palate. A direct shot into whatever organ it used as a brain short-circuited it’s thoughts, allowing me to freely scoop out the core and crush it in my palms.
I took a deep breath, the nicks and flesh-wounds on my body disappearing at the expense of my internal Warp Energy stores. Careful usage of all of my Mutations had kept it from falling too low, but by now these Fangtooths were simple creatures to me.
“A most marvelous sight!” Soul Killer clapped through the speakers, still in the body of Dr. Kaisel. “How it must be to have such a wonderful set of Mutations.
“Shut up.” I muttered under my breath.
“What was that?”
“I said shut up!” I screamed aloud. Too many days had passed by now, I knew that.
Soul Killer then said something that made fear explode through me. “Keep talking like that and I’ll have to pay a visit to your friend who was snooping up above us.”
I bit my lip, hating this stupid situation I was stuck in. Anthony… how did he find this location?
There weren’t many people who could figure it out. The only plausible suspect was the one other person who was outside this bunker and knew of my existence here.
The Dogwhistler. But why would she help me? Unless this was some even deeper elaborate ploy to get me to fall to their whims. I’d spent the last few days thinking about it, about what I would do if it came between me and Anthony and… I still wasn’t sure.
But then I remembered Yvette, and how he was there for me.
I calmed myself down, knowing that in the end this all came down to my individual strength. Soon, I would escape. Just a few more days.
Gene Overview:-
* Electrical Neurogenesis [Cognition] [100%] [6 (5)GC]
* Compact Tissues [Integrity] [94%] [8 GC]
* Mineral Assimilation [Alteration/Integrity] [91%] [12 GC]
* Bioelectrogenesis [Energy/Metabolism] [100%] [6 (5)GC]
* Electromagnetic Vision [Cognition] [93%] [6 (5)GC]
* Mutagenic Drain [Metabolism/Alteration] [83%] [1 GC]
* Kinetic Catalyst [Metabolism] [79%] [7]
* Electromagnetic Telekinesis [Energy] [51%] [9 (8)GC]
* Electrical Flash-Freeze [Energy] [36%] [9 (8)GC]
Integrity [Bronze I]
Energy [Bronze III]
Capacity [Bronze I]
Grade [Gold III]
Gene Capacitance 58/60
Development: 93%
Three Bronze MALs, and nineteen Iron MALs… that’s how many of them I’d killed and absorbed since I received Electrical Flash-Freeze. A Mutation that I was becoming more comfortable with everyday, the ability to convert thermal energy inside a material into electrical energy in a single touch.
It would be a key to my escape as well.
“Another one.” I said aloud, pointing up to the halo of light seeping in the roof far above. “I can fight another round.”
“I’ll make this one tougher.” They teased.
I’d just finished fighting seven Iron MALs, bigger numbers weren’t an issue… what I needed was a Bronze MAL. A Warlock preferably, the variant of MALformed capable of Esper-like control on the world. These Chimeras were getting a bit old.
“Bring it on.” I wrestled my fatigue down, a feast would come soon enough.
When the elevator retrieved my next set of foes, I stifled my anxiety. In number, there were fewer than my recent fight. A total of five Fangtooths.
Four Irons. One Bronze.
The Irons were just as mangy and half-deformed as usual, ravaging like maniacs towards their cages in their rush to hunt me down. The Bronze on the other hand, had a realness, a greater sense of existence in the world with its robust figure and several eyes taking in the arena. It didn’t throw itself at the cage like its lesser kind was, instead, it’s bead-like eyes blinked at me.
Curiously at first, then in wanton desire. The sense of malice was just as permeable if not denser from the Bronze variant, and in a sharp bird-like whistle it brought a calmness to the other Iron-Grade MALformed, bringing them to stare at me with startling unison.
“Ah, how easily is it that they fall to the whims of their superiors?! I wish humans worked like that!” As Soul Killer commented, it made me unnerved by the topic. Soul Killer was practically imitating this leadership effect a higher-grade MAL had on its lesser variants.
“I’m ready.” I raised my hands, prepared to begin the hunt.
The cages fell open, and the difference was absolutely noticeable. For one, they didn’t charge out mindlessly and ruthlessly, they pounced out and circled me in an instant, covering my flanks.
I wasn’t going to let that Bronze live for long, so I charged straight at it, only for the two Iron MALs ahead of me to leap in between me and their leader, offering their bodies to me in exchange. Very well!
As I always had done, I aimed my sights at disabling their mobility before diving for their core. My foot met a crooked knee joint, only for it to- to dodge back. Never once in my fights had a MAL possessed any sense of self-preservation.
And that fault in my thinking instantly became my downfall as the two MALs behind me lunged into action. The normally vociferous MALformed had become silent panthers, only detected by the sudden shift in electrical currents through their bodies. With a pulse of my Gold, I raised a curtain of thin shards between myself and them.
This time they didn’t dodge, they let their body get ripped as they hounded me down, each targeting one half of my body. Not willing to split my focus between them, I released the well of kinetic force charged in my legs to propel me above all four Irons.
The shadow of the Bronze fell over me, my eyes open wide to a hundred jagged teeth nestled in a mane of overflowing black-and-white fur. In a split-second decision, I gripped my Telekinesis Mutation under an inferno of my Warp Energy, commanding it over my own body.
Mineral Assimilation was a slow burn of incremental modifications to my body, building my strength with the nutritional food supplied here had been an unexpected boon. The various deposits of metal through my muscle and bone meant I was significantly tougher and stronger than almost any Tier I even without using Warp Energy.
It also allowed me a slight allowance to manipulate my own body under my Electromagnetic Telekinesis Mutation. Like an airborne ballerina, I twisted enough to avoid a rending from the first claw. It’s gigantic paws on the other hand smacked into me like a wrecking ball of force. I landed and rolled with broken bones, every fiber of my body hurting as the other four Irons came down like a pack of hyenas.
Just as quick as I’d landed, I was back up and this time taking the MAL for surprise. As the first brought its teeth down on me, my arm shot up to the roof of its mouth and jabbed in a violent crunch of lightning that burst its eyes into goo. Blinded, it swatted madly, pounding me to the side where two other of its breed pincered me.
The force of my beating revolted out, my leg snapping through one jaw while my elbow hooked another. Throwing out a fray of sparks, I charged some metal shrapnel in the ground and used it to fend off the remaining attacker. Tendons torn through; I summoned my sharpened nails to charge right into its heart.
The Bronze leapt in my way, my hand failing to break through its toughened anatomy. A terrifying whistle pierced me, the fur on its body tangling my hand into its grip like mossy vines predating on a curious insect. The recovered Iron MALs brought their fury onto me as they charged. Working on instinct, I summoned a freezing chill upon the fur tangling my right arm, using the electricity generated to strike into one Iron and give me just the reaction speed necessary to avoid a crunch from the Bronze.
Still under pressure, I withstood a terrible assault from the chimera that left me wounded and broken with every calculated pounce. Never once had the MAL showed such terrifying efficiency at dismantling me, and each attack from the Bronze drained an hour worth of Warp Energy during my regenerations.
By all means, this could’ve been the end.
I’d lost my fear of going low on Warp Energy several fights ago, allowing the budding core of my stores to explode free made me speedier, rigid and powerful. I was easily approaching Tier II in terms of raw power output and maybe even Tier III in my mental throughput.
Like a dagger in the shadows, I emerged from the side of the Bronze to kick it in its deformed ribs, pushing enough force to lift it off the ground and slam it against a wall. That brief impact was enough for the other Iron MALs to lose their overwhelming synchronicity, and in seconds I’d taken the first one down as I tore it’s jaw open until it could very well have been split into two.
Crunching its core, it was a meager fuel compared to the energy I’d just released. But it was enough to keep me going. Like quicksilver, I flowed between the MALs, my claws gnawing ice into their wounds as they spasmed. Strains of Iron flowed up my veins, and my blood pumped faster than ever as I used their strength against them.
Gripping the core of the next, I flung its lifeless body into the Bronze who’d recovered, the remaining two left defenseless enough that my bare hands could tear into them. In a few seconds, their Energy drained into me, and I released violent serpents of electricity into the metal scraps around me, calling them to me.
They aligned and fused according to the image in my head, a javelin as large as me. The remaining Bronze roared at the death of its lesser kin, the mossy fur tangling up to create a puffy barrier as it charged towards me.
I waited patiently as its powerful body brought impending doom towards me, every wasteful second of my stillness drained into the muscles of my back, right arm and javelin. Only once it dared to open its abdomen-length mouth to gobble me up did I place my weight forward and extend my spear.
Force cannoned out of me, but that only managed to just pierce the bones and viscera of the MAL to my desired depth. Pinning into its throat, I reached through the scraps of metal as teeth crunched down on my arms, threatening to tear them off. Baring through the pain, I felt the resonating sense of my metal shards slipping through its body.
Electromagnetic Telekinesis was simple, the greater the electric current in an object, the more I could control it. And while my physics wasn’t scientist-level, the Cradle had taught me enough that colder objects were less resistive. This entire time I was waiting for the MAL, the javelin had felt like ice in my grip, and that also made it charged with enough electricity to electrocute a Tier I BUG-Adapter to ash.
The supercharged scraps tore into the softer flesh surrounding the core of the Bronze. And once the last thread of flesh was snapped, the MAL’s body went limp. It would only last a second, so allowing my fumes of Energy to heal the bones and muscles in my arm, I reeled the javelin out, a Bronze Core beating on its end.
It was strange, it actually resembled a heart to a degree, the details appearing more refined and purposeful. Except I had no time to take in the beauty of disfigured creatures designed to kill us, so I crushed the meaty sphere in my hand to drain it out.
The depth and quality of Warp Energy was far above anything I’d ever ingested. A Tier II Bronze MAL, I figured.
Absorbing Mutagen…
Mutagen Absorbed:
Tier II:
* [B] Osteogenic Redevelopment
* [B] Muscular Hair
Tier I:
* [B] Fang Sharpening
* [B] Fiber Strengthening
Tier 0:
* [B] Bone Regeneration
* [B] Dermatogenic Regeneration
[Gold] Mutation: Compact Tissues has reached 100% Development. Additional Meta-Mutations have been acquired. Increased effect of compaction across all skin-based tissues; additional increase to the sharpening of nails.
[Gold] Mutation: Mineral Assimilation has acquired additional Meta-Mutations. Increased metal deposition into keratin-based tissues; increased bone density. Development: 97%
[Gold] Mutation: Mutagenic Drain has acquired additional Meta-Mutations. Rate of Warp Energy absorption increases when the Adapter is low on Warp Energy. Development 86%
[Gold] Mutation: Electromagnetic Telekinesis has acquired an additional Meta-Mutation. Slight increase to sharpness of all objects controlled by the Mutation. Development: 58%
[Gold] Mutation: Electrical Flash-Freeze has acquired additional Meta-Mutations. Increased effectiveness on organic tissue; increased effectiveness on objects charged with electricity. Development: 43%
No increase to my Energy Stat this time, the limiting factor in these brawls, it’d taken a Bronze MALformed last time to boost it enough that I could fight this long. Just the tiniest boost could push me enough that I-
Damn… I was so tired. Tired of this constant fighting, of knowing that the people I were talking to here had lost their identity, of feeling so weak. Maybe that’s what Soul Killer was looking for.
For me to lose my own will to fight.
And sometimes, he was winning… but not yet. That thought alone was enough for me to keep pushing. If I struggled a bit more, then with that hope I could…
My legs gave out from under me, my body queasy with the lack of Warp Energy. How many times have I fought in the last few days? What was happening outside? How much more would I…
…struggle?