Glassport
Thairon stretched his arms and legs, whistling a merry tune.
"What got you so happy, bro?" Kael asked, throwing a hand over his shoulder.
"The last four days were great," he said. Once his body was in the tank and Nax finished the robotic body, he was free to meet Tomoe. The days blended into desert breaks in cafes, trying new dishes, an entire day spent in an amusement park, and just talking. It was mundane but made him feel better than ever.
No ruptures and no scientific discoveries to worry about, the four days they spent together were great.
"Good for you. By the way, I have a question. Can we get cosmetic changes like yours? I was thinking about red hair, but blood red," Skyler asked, gesturing to his shiny chrome.
"Edge lord!" Kael screamed, bringing his hands near his lips.
Skyler pushed him away. "Shut up."
"Sure," he shrugged, turning to Kael. "You want something too?" Cosmetic changes were simple.
"Please. You can't improve upon perfection," he said, posing with his hands on his waist. Had he not been shaved bald, he certainly would have cut a handsome figure.
Seeing his brothers' dry looks, he dropped his arms. "But I too have a question.
"Go on." Thairon rolled his hand.
"You know I am popular with the ladies. If I accidentally get someone pregnant, not that I don't ever use protection, is there going to be a superpowered baby?"
Thairon blinked repeatedly and slapped his face. The modifications were genetically passable. If there was even the slightest of accidents, they would have to contend with a superpowered child. The second the sperm met the egg, it too would be in temporal stasis, making it nigh-indestructible.
"Shit."
Kael snorted, putting a hand on Thairon's shoulder. "Don't worry, bro, I understand."
"You do?" he asked, wondering what exactly he thought he understood.
"Yeah. I mean, your girlfriend is basically the lab. I get it that sex wouldn't be in your mind."
Thairon took a deep breath and slapped the back of Kael's head. It only caused the prankster to howl, unbothered by the pain.
"What now? Is it off until you figure out a way?" Skyler asked. Kael's popularity with the opposite sex was well known.
Thairon rubbed his temples, kicking the still-laughing Kael on the knee. "Unless you take the nanobots, yes. They'll keep your urges in check so no accidents happen. At least until I devise a solution."
It was a stopgap measure until a more internalized prevention method existed.
"Ah man. Not fair," Kael grumbled, realizing he just dug his own grave.
Skyler stuck his tongue out. "You shouldn't have opened your mouth then." Kael responded by trying to get him in a headlock. Skyler caught his younger brother's hands, and they began to push back and forth.
Thairon pulled them away by the ears, ignoring their cries.
"What will it be? Delay it or go with the nanobots?" he asked, letting go.
Kael rubbed his ear, pursing his lips. "Eh, I don't know how the ladies will survive without me, but sure, let's go."
"Me too," Skyler said, content with a resolute nod.
"Great, take off your clothes and stand in the tank. It will take a week; there is no going back, and just like me, your brain and neural system will be transformed into pure, living energy. "Any questions?" he asked as a last-minute check.
"Nope," Kael muttered, having already taken his clothes off while he was speaking. He rushed to the tank, jumping up and down. Skyler's excitement was less visible. He entered the tank as well, taking his time to steel his nerves.
"Ready?"
They nodded at the same time.
"Proceed," he thought. The top of the tanks split aside, allowing two robotic arms with masks at the end to move down. They automatically latched onto Skyler's and Kael's faces, putting them to sleep while keeping them standing.
Their eyelids dropped, shoulders slouched, knees bent, and finally, heads fell forward. The second phase started immediately. Another arm came down from the hole, carrying helmets. The arms placed the helmets on their heads.
On the inner surface, hundreds of tendrils emerged, thinner than the naked eye could see. They bore through the skull, directly connecting to the brain as he watched from the screen.
Once every tendril was in place, the robotic arm lit up. A slow flow of energy glowed through the blue, transparent lining of the arm. It reached the silver-colored headpiece and, with the tendrils, the brain.
Skyler's and Kael's eyes snapped open, and their slackened bodies went rigid. Their eyes glowed with a radiant blue energy. Each nerve on their body lit up at the same time, creating an eerie sight.
The energy flow cranked up to full power slowly.
The glowing neurons intensified, each one slowly burning away. The brain was the first one to go. The water, fats, proteins, and other particles broke down into electrons, creating a self-contained energy cluster as the tendrils guided the process.
Once the entire neurological system was replaced, the brand-new cognition signs spiked. Without flesh, the anesthetic had no way to keep his brothers numbed to the process.
The helmet retracted, allowing a third arm to extract the consciousness, transporting it to the simulated training room. It was a last-minute idea. During the week their bodies were genetically modified, Skyler and Kael would get a taste of what their new abilities could do. When they were out, they would have a place to start from.
"Man, what the heck? This is so trippy."
"Feels like I've been locked inside a box my whole life and only came out now," Skyler said, his voice quiet.
"The feeling is temporary."
"Get ready," he said. Digital replicas of their bodies covered both as a white, endless plane stretched beneath their feet.
"Nax will guide you through the training. Enjoy."
Kael shrieked with glee, and he had to turn the voice down. His attention turned to the bodies in the tank as the modification process began. The green nutrient-rich liquid flowed into the tanks first while the surge of nanobots kept the organs functioning. The stasis beams activated next, bringing all bodily functions to a full stop.
The nanobots began their work, and all he could do now was to let the process continue.
—
"How do we do this? " he asked, going through the stretching moves. Which were entirely useless here but helped him think clearer.
"I am going to simulate what your powers can do. How it works, what happens when they work, and so on. However, as it is only simulated, you won't get the feeling of what it's like to use them. This is just to give you an idea of what your capabilities are."
"Alright, got it. Can we start with speed first?"
"As you wish."
The white platform contorted first before stretching into an entire city, an exact copy of Retrol, the industrial heart of the Kingdom. The gray, lifeless skyscrapers and the smoke in the distance were impossible to miss.
On the opposite side of the street, his apartment rested on a second floor, one of the few buildings that carried color.
Before him stretched the central road that divided the city into two, bereft of all vehicles.
"What now?"
"Just run; I'll handle everything else."
He took position and, with a deep, simulated breath, ran. The buildings, the people, everything blurred together into a single, undecipherable mural. Next thing he knew, he was in the middle of a forest with a small screen to his left displaying a number.
1034 kilometers.
"How long did that take?"
"A little less than five seconds."
"Holy crap," he muttered, unblinking eyes gazing at the numbers. It was all simulated, he knew, but the reality of what he was about to be capable of slowly began to sink.
"Now, you saw the red energy around you, right? What it does is to accelerate you to hyperspeeds by partially moving you to a different dimension where the physics work differently," Nax explained.
Now that he mentioned it, Skyler did see a tint of red in the blurring landscape.
"In that dimension, the more energy you use, the faster you become. It also stops the nastier side effects from affecting our world."
"What kind of side effects?" he asked. His environment changed without a prompt, bringing him back to the starting point.
"Run again."
"Alright," he muttered, taking position before bolting forward. In five seconds that certainly didn't feel that long, he found himself even further than he was before.
"Look back," Nax said. Skyler turned around, taking a step back as his heart skipped a beat. "What the…" he said, falling silent. A line of destruction was carved, stretching from the finish point back into the city. Entire city blocks and industrial encampments were smashed into rubble. Even from this distance the raging fires could be seen.
The city looked like a warzone.
"Simple physics. Eighty kilograms moving at around two hundred kilometers per second means your each step goes off like a small tactical nuke."
"Unless your purpose is to cause destruction, don't move out of the dimension while running."
"Got it," he squeaked out, shuddering at his intrusive thoughts.
Controlling gravity was simpler. The particles his body would create would grant him the ability to manipulate the gravitational curvature. Once he mastered it, he could fly, manipulate gravity to his will, and find countless other uses.
The idea made him want to squeal like a child.
—
"Alright, Nax old chap, how do we do this?" Kael asked with a light voice, throwing random jabs.
"Aren't you just excited?" Nax asked, creating a platform beneath him.
"Heck yes."
"I assume you want to work on the whole dimensional abilities first?"
Kael nodded, his head bobbing up and down with a smile.
"Let's start with how to teleport then," Nax said. A waypoint appeared ten meters in front of Kael, a triangle moving up and down over a circle.
"Dimensional manipulation is a broad term, as will be your limits. The only restriction will be your control and imagination," he explained, simulating a standard piece of paper in front of Kael's eyes.
"Now, imagine the platform you are on as a paper. When you bend two ends of it until they touch, they actually occupy the same space."
As he explained, the paper folded in half, and a dot appeared near the edge, glowing on both sides.
"Meaning I can teleport," he summarized.
"Exactly."
Kael, pulling on his previous experiences, imagined the space that the waypoint was on folding like the paper example. The bobbing triangle moved towards him, something he knew only he would perceive in real life.
When he was inside the circle, the triangle disappeared, and he stood ten meters ahead of where he used to be.
"The real deal won't be this slow, but the visualization will make it easier for you."
He grinned, disappearing from his spot as Nax read his intent. He appeared high in the sky, starting to fall before appearing back on the ground again. It wasn't this easy with his Displacer Module and certainly wouldn't be with the even cooler-sounding Continuum Strand, but he would enjoy it as much as he could.
He had an entire week all to himself.
—
While his brothers trained, he pondered.
A foolproof, genetic solution to the issue Kael had inadvertently brought to his attention was necessary. One that didn't inhibit sexual desires but controlled them.
Any DNA sample that left the body would self-destruct to prevent it from falling into someone's hands. Sperms were an exemption to that rule. Irritating as it was to admit, he had always kept his sexual desires at the back of his mind. The idea of children or leaving his genetic material during sex had never crossed his mind.
Something Kael would never be permitted to learn.
Another issue was the development of a possible child. The mother would need to undergo genetic modification as well, at least just with the temporal stasis part. His X chromosome was modified to carry the Bioelectricity Segment, and would be ready for any future post-human capabilities he might include. The Y segment, poor in size and genes, only carried the Temporal Segment.
Boys would only have the temporal stasis, while girls would possess the powers without a proper energy source.
His eyes widened, realizing the solution.
One half of the mother's X chromosome would carry the temporal segment, while the other half would carry the powers. That way any possible children would have both pieces of the puzzle.
It also presented the solution to his original problem.
Every lock needed a key. Since the females had more genes to modify, he could give them the key without the need to remake an entire chromosome.
Now he just had to work on it.
—
Thermion
Moonrise Palace
"Nothing once more, Director?" Octavian asked, fingers interlaced under his chin.
The man shook his head, avoiding eye contact. "Unfortunately not, Your Grace. We have exhausted all possible sources. There is nothing tying Prince Thairon to the vigilante nor the mind behind the early warning system."
"Dismissed," he said, ending the call before even waiting for the man's bow.
It was so frustrating to be unable to prove what he knew to be a fact.
"Anything from Skyler and Kael?" he asked his wife.
"Kael was fired from his job. Apparently someone heard the whole mess with the table might have something to do with him."
He shrugged. "Nothing proving it was Thairon?" Their phones were being tapped for any intelligence that might prove Thairon's involvement. So far, there was nothing.
His wife shook her head, causing the stray strands poking out of her intricately braided hair to sway. "No, but there is something else. Skyler left his little protest group, claiming he had something personal to do for the next two weeks, while Kael is nowhere to be seen as well."
"You think he could be doing something?" It could be anything, even a coincidence, yet their inability to obtain even the smallest of hints grated on his nerves.
"Those two disappearing at the same time? Of course he is doing something. We just can't prove it."
"Again," Octavian muttered, groaning, something he was only allowed in private settings.
—
On the other side of the continent, a middle-aged man read the latest, comprehensive report on the rupture that had broken out in Meltral. He stroked his beard, a small smile on his face, one that reached his eyes, as the details painted a vivid picture. There was only so much he could learn from watching the battle records.
Of what the humble hero of the RIC was thinking.
He considered arranging a reward for her, one beyond the RIC's purview, but dismissed the idea quickly.
Tomoe was more likely to spit on it.