A Bio-Weapon’s Rhapsody

After deciding on the idea of maybe making a spare body for him, [Vulcanus.exe] confirmed [Elder]'s theories. Both Vulcanus and [Vulcanus.exe] had samples of their former body.

The first one had stored away some samples of his fleshy bits and ensured they remained in a stable environment frozen in time via the use of artifacts that they stole from some first-generation super villain with time-related powers.

[Vulcanus.exe] had said that those apparatuses were highly unstable and he had disposed of them as soon as he got more control over their body. He, for his part, had revealed all the samples that he personally had access to, starting from some samples of brain tissue, some digitized samples of blood and flesh, and he also included some names of people who shared his bloodline.

Both from before they became [Vulcanus] and from after, apparently he artificially created an in vitro baby and threw it into the orphanage system, so [Vulcanus.exe] was a father... Somehow that was not the weirdest thing Ale found from the meeting.

[Vulcanus.exe] was willing to give Ale all of those samples and mentioned that Alexanders may have some extra samples, but he could not confirm that statement, so Ale would need to find about that the hard way, calling Alexanders.

The horror.

"[I wish you the best of lucks Lady Ale.]" [Vulcanus.exe] said as he started powering down all the devices around, "[I'll let the other one to tell you the directives about the mission you will need to take part in Aquila, as he has been starting to become more paranoid about his mental state, and tampering with his mind too much may be an issue. I'll ask that you understand this. I have already sent a query to Master about how to deal with this, and asked if it was possible to get a mind healer to solve his paranoia.]"

"Wouldn't that just... confirm it?" Ale was confused, "I mean, that's kinda their deal isn't it? They will check his mind to see if it is cracked."

"[What do you think they would find if they tried to find out?]" [Vulcanus.exe] asked as the last machine in the room powered down, then his body returned to the same position it had before he took over.

"... A mind split in two?" Ale said tentatively, but she assumed that wouldn't be the actual answer, if it was, then [Vulcanus.exe] wouldn't have asked for that, "...No, they will find a singular mind. Since you aren't really human. So they will only find a human mind... and if they can even perceive the idea of a machine having a mind, then they may find you... But they will not think to search for that."

"[Precisely.]" [Vulcanus.exe] said as his body stopped most of the functions, he had now turned how Vulcanus had been at the start, "[If they believe this possible, then they may find about me, but that will not happen. With that said, I wish you luck. Vulcanus out.]"

Ale focused all of her sensors on [Vulcanus.exe], seeing if she could catch up the moment he fell out and let Vulcanus return.

"[I have-]" Vulcanus started speaking, and then midway he stopped, as if something was wrong, "[-Sorry. Had I not said that before?]"

"You were about to answer my question." Ale said as she did a quick look to the logs of the conversation. Main Core had brought a log of the point where [Vulcanus.exe] had taken over. "You were about to answer my question about if you had a fully organic body. Something about something going on with your logs? And how you would have some issues with getting a fully organic body?"

"[Right,]" Vulcanus said as if he tried to shake something off his mind. Ale was annoyed at the fact that she was not able to perceive his facial expressions, something that was very funny, considering he didn't have one. And yet, before she was able to see them. "[I have some organic parts, not many, and while I do have some degree of liberty about replacing them, not all of my organic pieces are easily replasable. Brain cells regenerate very slowly, and getting a confiable Core User who can accelerate that and whose power is compatible with my body situation is harder than you would think.]"

So he had tried that...

"...If getting a fully organic body is the issue, what about a fake flesh body?" Ale said, scratching her left arm, "I don't know if you have checked it, but [Elder] updated my file."

Ale knew that [Vulcanus.exe] was amenable, but getting the approval of the normal Vulcanus wouldn't be bad, right?

"[... I did see it.]" Vulcanus said in a controlled tone, "[I am grateful for the offer, but I'll have to decline it at the moment.]"

That... she hadn't expected that.

"Why?" Ale asked, "Isn't this what you need? What you want?"

"[...I do think getting a normal body could help my situation.]" Vulcanus said sighing, "[But I will not let you twist the path of your Core Power for my sake.]"

"...Ah." Ale was stunned for a second at that, "Then you don't have to worry about, I am already moving in that direction. I promised to help [Golem] with his bad trigger, so making bodies was already on the list."

Besides, that wouldn't be out of what she wanted to do anyway, it was part of her insurance. She knew that Alexandra had a killer body, so as the middle sister her future was guaranteed. But having a way to ensure that fate followed its path wouldn't be bad.

Besides, androids and synthetic robots were the future. So being able to create that type of body would fit with her path of power. Machine so advanced that the difference between the artificial and the natural becomes blurred.

That didn't sound too bad.

"[I'll take it udner consideration.]" Vulcanus ended up saying as he slowly started powering up the nearby machines, "[I wanted to ensure you knew about my problem. If you notice something off about my behavior, something that compromises the safety of other minions...]"

A small door opened atop the desktop, showing a black box with the emblem of [Haephestus' Forge], an anvil with two gears behind it. Unlike the other variants she had seen (Those with masks of mythical creatures behind) this one had a small triangle at the base and a cross growing from the top of the triangle (⯦).

"[I want you to take that box and give it to SuperForce if possible, if not then give it to Billy.]" Vulcanus hand started trembling at that point, did he have some issues when powering up his body?

Granted he was a human wearing a machine body, so perhaps this happened from time to time.... not. Something was afoot there.

"And if I can't find them? Do I give it to Gabriel Light? To [Eleanore]?" Ale said as she took the small box from the opening and looked it over, it seemed to be... sealed, right now it looked closer to a tungsten cube than anything else.

"[If I am causing problems and putting other lives at risk. Then you are to give it to The Theater Master.]" Vulcanus added, his right arm started moving and went straight for the left, the one that had started trembling before. "[If I have started attacking civilians, call your Brother and tell him about the box. If possible do not bring it near any Saintsworths facility.]"

"...To Alexanders?" Ale was surprised, she hadn't thought he would go to the Saintsworths, "Wouldn't you rather I try to get help from other of the Corpos?"

"[At that point it is not help you are getting.]" Vulcanus right hand managed to calm down the left, "[You are getting someone to put me down.]"

Oh...

"... Let's try to not get to that point." Ale said unsure about what to do with the box, "You know I am leaving to Aquila. Which is filled with Saintsworths facilities."

"[It is of no consequence, you can leave this in any spot you want. Just ensure no one can find it, not even myself. I will not ask you about this box under any circumstances. If I do, assume something happened and then move as instructed.]" Vulcanus then stood up and turned his back to her, "[I will now delete the memory of me giving you that Box, please hide it as best. If your updated profile is to be believed, you should be able to create a dummy of it. I will display the dimensions, weight and all the external data of the black box, please make one to the best of your abilities.]"

And as he said, the data was displayed in one of the monitors in the wall.

"Main Core?" Ale pulled the box into one of her hoodie pockets, it... kinda looked weird, but she didn't have a backpack with her, and the [Banked Storage] was no longer available to her.

[Starting creation of dummy black box.]

[Please place one of your hands in the spot you wish to use.]

Ale did as instructed and felt her mana go down as it started to create the dummy, it was burning Mana like nothing else and before she could stop it almost ten points were burned.

Which didn't sound like much, but that was a fifth of her Mana. In one go, what the hell was that box made out to burn this much mana?

Ale didn't want to know, she would nibble at a piece of it later, but for now, when she was done creating the dummy she removed her hand. The cover of the spot where it had been before slowly started closing, so she moved back and sat once again. Releasing a sigh she hadn't known she was holding.

Her hoodie suffered an alteration too, as Main Core modified it to make it look like it was bigger than it really was, all in an attempt to hide the bulky box that was now stored in her hoodie's front pouch/pocket.

Ale wasn't sure if it would even work, but that was for later.

"[So, as I was saying.]" Vulcanus suddenly started speaking as soon as the cover closed, maybe the fact that he was so liberally tampering with his own memories had been part of the issue of his mental problems?

Ale would make sure to make point of this, she didn't want to have this kind of trouble, so she may as well stop doing that to herself. Not that they had done that much to their own mind?

They had done it... Maybe once or twice? At least twice, the first time Alexandra relieved the implications of whatever the first human they killed had wanted to do to them, and that one time they created a fake persona in a virtual machine to simulate the terror of death...

Well that didn't count that much since they hadn't actually lived it from their point of view... Meaning perhaps she could still tamper a little? Either way, she would try to not do that.

Ale would not mention about the last time she visited Alexa's mindscape, she wasn't sure if any tampering had been done, but the error logs seemed to imply something happened and she didn't want to find out what it was. It did not feel safe to know.

"[Your mission will be to investigate some reports we got about a hidden laboratory within the Saintsworths Crown Gem.]" Vulcanus pointed at one of the screens on the wall, "[As far as intel we have managed to acquire in the last weeks, there are at least between two to five hidden laboratories in this city.]"

More like ten...

"[And while we can't have confirmation, we know each vertix of the star will have a different focus from the data we managed to get out of the recruitments offers sent to Sylph and Golem.]" Vulcanus continued his presentation, "[Skye's vertix is the Aerospacial focused one, Vertix number eight.]"

Vulcanus pointed to... actually, didn't Ale have some data on that?

"We do have some data on this, right Main Core?" Ale prompted inwardly.

[Skye Venti's school is on Lab's 8 domain, that vertix is focused on Robotics, Cybernetic and Engineering according to the Saintsworths Database.]

"[Golem will go to this one that is right next to it.]" Vulcanus then pointed to another vertex on the map he had, "[We suspect that one to be focused on either exosuits or heavy weaponry.]"

[Golem's school is situated within Lab 7's domain, that one is focused on Energy and Resource development according to the Saintsworths Database.]

The guesses were so wrong that it wasn't even funny, well, they would find out at a later date, so that was that.

"[Your school is situated on this vertix, and we don't have enough data to guess what is about, we suspect it is either a pure tourism vertix or some kind of intake area where they examine and then move you to another area.]" Vulcanus pointed to a vertix that was two or three sectors away from Skye and [Golem]'s area, that would be an issue...

[Mistresse Vertix is on Lab 5's area, that one is focused on the PR facilities, Tour facility, and hosts the politic machine of Aquila.]

Great, she was going to school with politics and the like, well... She should have guessed when she had ended up with the most abnormal of all the options.

"[Your actual mission is to investigate the central spire and find out what they are hidding at the very base of it.]" Vulcanus moved the projection to showcase it in a 3D form, with a blinking dot at the bottom of it, "[We have reports that they are hiding some kind of world-ending weapon here.]"

The point that Vulcanus had pointed was the very lowest point, Ale would probably have to spend at least half a day or a couple of days only walking down if the projection was to be believed about how far down it was.

Actually, was it that deep? How the hell could they manage a floating city with something like that hanging down? Was the design okay?

Ale had suspected that the base of it was like a ship of some kind, but this was closer to how a tree was setting roots, only this tree was setting roots in the ocean.

Unless that was some kind of anchor? And it was designed this way to ensure no one suspected the floating city was actually a ship... Surely Alexanders hadn't built this kind of cliche right?

Surely he hadn't done the same thing... right?

"Who gave the intel?" Ale asked trying to not think about what she would do to Alexanders if the asshole had used that cliche when designing Aquila.

"[The Theater Master.]" Vulcanus answered as he turned to look at her again, "[He said that a danger capable of destroying this world and turning it into a burned wasteland was waiting at the lowest point of the Frozen Cursed City of Aquila.]"

"...That city is not frozen, and while I don't know enough to say if it is cursed or not.... How did he know that the city would have something like that go down?" Ale pointed at the schematics that Vulcanus had shown, "If anything I think this would make it unstable when one thinks about the underwater currents."

"[... He has never given us wrong intel.]" Was Vulcanus answer, "[And I sent Gabriel in a mission to verify if the intel they gave us. He will report with confirmation about this data at a later date. For now, prepare for departure.]"

Well, that was that then!

Nothing Ale could do about it at this point. Only hope that this would go okay.

"As you say boss." Ale stood up once again, putting both of her hands into her hoodie's central pouch, more so she could take hold of the stupid box and ensure no one noticed the weird way her hoodie now looked. "I'll go back and prepare for departure then?"

"[Good luck Rhapsody.]" Vulcanus said turning back to his pc, why did he had one? He didn't need one, "[If you manage to create a viable artificial body I'll check the data, so if you truly embark in that... Remember to log your experiments and data.]"

"Will do." Ale answered as she walked out of that office. Time to prepare for departure then?