This is much easier than I thought it would be.

Myc and I had been staking out Martin Vedastus’ house and frequented hotspots for nearly a week now. I was starting to get his basic routine, although to be fair I had only ever done this once before.

When I was younger, I suspected some asshole neighbor who had previously kicked our dog for attempting to poison her. My old dog, Luna, was a little Yorkshire terrier who liked to bark and play with his big Rottweiler next door through the fence. So when she started having problems I immediately accused him, and after a few days of scouting the neighbor. It turned out that Luna had just been dug a hole under the fence behind the house and eating random plants she found in the woods.

So, I was sort of new to this whole stalking thing. “So he usually comes home drunk and or high most days of the week. Unfortunately there are usually people there on the weekend. Luckily the guy also told everyone who would listen that he was planning on going on a trip on his new yacht over the next week. This meant he wouldn’t be home, it also meant that someone was probably going to be house sitting. Someone less familiar with the security system and therefore more careful.”

So we had to do this sooner rather than later, the security system he had was expensive. Although like most security systems it was mostly for show, big lights and loud sirens. With a nice little plaque here, there, and everywhere to stop people from attempting to break in the first place.

After hanging out in some of the less redeemable places I overheard how much Martin liked to keep on hand. Apparently carrying less than 5 grand would mean ‘he wasn’t a real G’. “God this guy is an asshole.”

Anyway, figuring that if he had that much walking around money, he must have had enough in his house to finance Myc’s idea of starting a cult out in the countryside.

Fortunately over the last week of living in my car, with no job and some free time. We were able to test out the limits of my biology and Myc’s control. This meant practical testing of some more strange abilities.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The spitting acid trick was as successful as it was unsuccessful, but it did work. Using new muscles developed around my stomach and the mildly strengthened muscles in my throat and mouth allowed me to push stomach acid up my throat and spit a glob of acid nearly 10 feet. With minimum accuracy due to lack of real practice. The process took a few minutes to take practical effect, without the prep time I would end up burning my throat and mouth.

Although it could be done at a split second notice, the mucus was slow to draw out from the glands. The other down side was that the amount of acid in the stomach was surprisingly small, with only about 100ml or about half a cup naturally occurring.

This meant that it would take even more time to increase the amount of acid, so we had to produce more beforehand, or I had only a couple good shots in the middle of a fight. The last problem was that I couldn’t really just keep it active the entire time, it made my mouth feel like it was full of sludge and it was more than a little difficult to talk.

While it is not perfect, it may be the necessary edge we need if our introduction to a new species turns out poorly. It is also only the second attempt at creating something entirely unhuman within the confines of human limits. At the very least it will give us a distraction to run away.

It was true that we would need practice when it came to trying out these new and improved methods of developing the human body.

The other method that we were trying to accomplish was using bones as weapons or tools. Unfortunately like everything else, it took up specific nutrients to make. Although bones were made up of amino acids like most of the body, it also took calcium and phosphorus. Which meant that we needed a new way to store dense excess of certain chemicals and minerals.

While it worked on the small scale, creating blades in between fingers like scissors, or hooks on my hands to better climb trees. It also took a lot of energy to do something that simple. Minor amounts of bone would flake off during use, and re-dissolving the bones for nutrients didn’t give back 100% of the used materials. Not even mentioning the general energy used to produce the thing in the first place.

I have not had any success in creating my own version of an energy dense cell to replace with some of your own. We may need to find an already discovered cell or worst case we will need to create a hidden pocket within your own system.

“Well, maybe we can find something that has a more efficient system of energy use.” Myc was focusing on the human body and the chemical interactions between them. With an extra eight hours to study and being able to observe nearly every interaction in the body made him nearly an expert on the human body. I was focusing on the more creative aspects of his abilities and attempting to find any animal traits we could use.

However, with the constant need to stake out our wealthy target, the time we could use was cut to a scant few hours when Martin slept. So with what little time we had to prepare, we experimented and studied.

It is nearly time. Martin will be falling asleep soon and there are only a few more days before he leaves town.

“Alright, let's do this.” Looking at the gaudy mansion on top of the hill, I donned a mask and gloves before grabbing an empty bag. It would soon be filled with enough of Martin’s wealth that we could truly start our trip.