章 298: fd4
Arc 1: Arrival
Part 4: Proteus
As I sat at the low bar in the diner and slowly chewed my steak I contemplated the mysteries that had been waiting in the corners of my mind since my arrival.
Just how had I gotten here? Besides the fact that this world was supposedly somewhere behind my own temporally, it also had glaring differences.
I glanced down at the book I was holding in my hand. I'd pulled it off the bookstand in the gas station the night before, but had been hesitant to read it. Leftover newspapers I'd found in one of the hotel rooms indicated that the global outbreak had occurred sometime in 2010. That meant I was about five years in the past relative to my world. Yet I held in my hands a paperback copy of Morning Star by Pierce Brown.
"This book wasn't scheduled to be released until after Christmas." I muttered to myself, staring at the cover. "And though it's not the best example, I saw no sign of zombie or zombie related literature in the book selection. It's as if the concept of this kind of horror never occurred to the people of this Earth before."
Engaging Conscious Control::Releasing Proteus Control InterlocksShep whined beside me, scrabbling at the floor near me and whimpering.
"What is it girl?" I ask, setting the book down.
I reach out to scratch her behind the ears to calm her down and freeze are her ears go back and she backs up. But I am not staring at my dog. I'm staring at what I can see forming around my forearm, unbidden.
For the briefest of moments I think that I have somehow triggered a function of my omni-tool by accident. But I know that isn't the truth. Because I recognize what I am seeing, even though it has never been real before.
I've seen it depicted in cartoons and movies, imagined it as I read words on a page, contemplated the potential benefits and dangers both.
Floating around my forearm is a cloud of particles, individually so microscopic as to be irrelevant, but together forming sufficient mass to reflect visible light. Each a tiny agent of destruction and creation.
"Nanomachines…" I breathed, a mixture of awe and fear going through me as I watched the particles dance in waves around my forearm. "This has to be what created my armor...but where did they come from? WHY did they do this?"
I said a silent prayer of thanks to any deity that may actually be listening that the nanoscopic machines didn't appear to be endlessly replicating monsters. That was the real nightmare of nanotechnology.
Almost as if they were reacting to my thoughts (and frankly given how my armor came to be maybe they were) the waves of particles seemed to condense above the surface of my forearm. Within seconds they had formed some sort of fragile lattice, glowing with energy. I held my arm up to take a closer look at it.
"Holy Hannah." I muttered.
At my side Shep approached now, no longer whining. Instead my dog was watching my arm with curiosity as she sat on her haunches.
Clearly the fact that I was showing no distress was reassuring Shep. Animals, so simple, they lack the concept of advanced technology needed to be afraid, yet something about the nanomachines had spooked her initially. Magnetic fields, maybe? Perhaps just the frequency of whatever they used to communicate.
"I wonder…" I reached out to touch the lattice with my fork. "Holy crap."
The lattice suddenly shifted and projected a flat field of energy above it. It took a second for me to realize it was nothing dangerous. Instead, it was projecting a revolving icon of a circle split down the center by a letter Z, one shaped oddly like a lightning bolt.
Tentatively I put the fork down and touched the projected 'screen' with my finger.
"Whoah…"
Absentmindedly I lowered my hand to Shep's head and scratched her behind the ears as the screen changed. Gone was the graphic of the floating disc. In its place was a display, like something out of a video game.
"What the fuck is Quanta?" I muttered to myself, looking at what was before me.
The first thing I noted was the mention of Quanta and a regeneration rate. When I noticed the reference to Quantum Energy Generators it became mildly clearer.
"Ok...so Quanta must be the term for whatever energy is used by these nanomachines. Term for it in general or just for the units used to measure it?" I mused to myself, examining the display. "More likely for the units. So that woud mean these numbers next to everything below must be the cost."
I felt something within me release, causing me to relax when I noticed an entry which apparently produced edible food.
"Well, at least I won't starve as long as I can boil water."
I continued reading over the displayed entries, registering the reference to a Tier 1 which implied there must be more tiers to what can be made, as well as finding grayed out entries for my armor and my pistol.
"Well, that confirms that theory. These little buggers, whatever this Proteus System is, they made the armor."
I thought about it for a moment. How the armor had formed around me when I was desperately wishing for protection of some kind. How I kept catching sight of the nanomachines hovering around my arms, but nowhere else around me. How they seemed to react to my thoughts and desires-
"Holy fucking christ!" I said, throwing my arm away from me and stumbling up out of my seat.
"WOOF! WOOF!!!" Shep barked at me as I stumbled away from the bar.
"Holy fucking christ on a pogo stick, these things are inside me!" I cried out.
Desperately I looked for a mirror, finding one near the entrance. I hurried over to it and began to take a closer look at my face, moving my hair and looking for any signs of technology attached to me or scars on my head.
No dice.
"Fuck." I muttered as I finally backed away from the mirror. I looked down at Shep. "Well girl, no way to know for sure, but apparently I have matter manipulation technology literally implanted in me."
After Shep looked up at me curiously for a few moments before barking happily at me I just reached down and scratched her head, smiling.
"You stupid dog. You have no idea what I said, do you? All you care about is food, water, and shelter from those zombies."
I laughed again as I returned to my seat at the bar, the remains of my steak cooling on my plate. I ignored it as I looked at my forearm again.
"Yup." I muttered to myself. "Still there."
The display was still active above my arm. Good, maybe I could test it and see if it would actually let me make something.
"Okay, so what to do first?"
Looking at it, more and more it was reminding me of a tech tree from a video game. It felt like a mixture between what I had encountered in various civilization style games or 4x games, and what I had encountered in RPGs.
I was stuck in this world as far as I knew, and if I wanted to survive long term I should remember what I had learned about the systems in games like that.
First rule was, invest in infrastructure as much as you could early on without sacrificing security. In video games, that translated as investing in resource production options and multipliers as early as possible. The earlier invested, the more resources you gathered for any given unit of time.
Which meant that Quantum Energy Generator at the top, despite costing almost a third of my current resources, was probably the single best choice I could make right now.
"Well, it's not like I'm pressing the big red button…" I muttered to myself as I tentatively pressed my finger to the option on the screen. Immediately a dialogue box appeared in the center of the screen.
Selecting: Quantum Energy Generator: Confirm {y}{n}?
"Oh, definitely."
I pressed yes.
The screen disappeared, and the nanomachines around my forearm began to glow with an intense light. I had to cover my eyes with my free hand until the light died down, it was like looking into the sun for a few moments.
When the light and the spots it caused had faded from my vision I looked back at my left forearm.
Nothing looked any different, but the Quantum Regeneration Rate and Quantum Energy Generators boxes read 50/day and 2 respectively. The Quanta box read 525.
"Well...that apparently worked."
I scratched Shep behind the ears, getting a happy sound from her.
"So...looks like I can make a few basic items, some omni-gel and medi-gel, and do some research."
As a test I attempted to press on one of the greyed out icons, for an Hammer I sniper rifle. There was no reaction.
"So, greyed out means it's unable to produce it. Maybe because the nanomachines are missing something for it? Or maybe just don't have the details organized."
I looked at the research options, since I had no need for handcuffs, rope or rice at the moment.
"Tier 2 research, multiple available. That seems self-explanatory. Mass Effect Tier 1 research though, hmm, I guess that will unlock the entire category?"
I decided it was worth a shot. I pressed the button.
The screen flashed blue briefly after the expected confirmation, and when it cleared the Mass Effect column was no longer greyed out.
"Well, not that I need weapons or a light armor anymore, but the omni-gel and medi-gel will probably be useful."
I looked out the window at the slowly setting sun.
"Of course...if I actually find survivors I can trust to band up with...it might be nice to have these options open."
I looked back down at the screen.
"So, the question now is, do I conserve resources for possible emergencies, or do I research technologies that might be useful?"
Idly touching the screen a dialogue box comes up. I blink as I realize that I now have more detailed information on one of the items.
Oooh…"
Suddenly the non-mass effect technologies are more than abstract ideas. I take a closer look at the list.
"Fuel convertor, auto-repair system, AI driving system, water recycling system… This thing can make half the technologies needed to make a more or less self-sustaining enclosed environment inside a vehicle."
I look out the window at the various vehicles in parking lots.
"O-kay…I'm going to need to think on this."
Remembering what the fuel convertor details tab had said, I quickly researched it before wondering how to close the screen. It was starting to get late, and I wanted to be back indoors and secure before night came. Just in case a zombie herd showed up.
Or, you know, other survivors. Ones with guns. And not-so-nice personalities.
As if responding to my thoughts (and again, didn't that freak me out that there was active nanotechnology I didn't understand somehow up inside my brain) the screen closed back out to the icon of the spinning disc before disappearing. The nanomachine lattice broke up and after a few moments the floating waves of nanomachines appeared to disappear.
"WOOF!" Shep barked, panting beside the bar.
I looked down at where Shep was focused, at my cold steak. With a sigh, and no longer having the appetite for it, I dropped it to the floor as I carried the plate into the kitchen to wash.
"Enjoy, girl. We're going to get some sleep after this."
As I began to clean up from cooking dinner I mused over what the nanomachines were apparently capable of. I could create weapons and armor, and other items. Just what more would become available at tier two I had to wonder.
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