The Imagineer's Bloodline: Ascendant Earth Chronicles – Book 1

by J. J. Lorden

  So, it was possible a work-order had accidentally or intentionally looped his pods into getting upgraded with the mist. Easy enough to check, he realized. Austin turned away from his friends, walking back to the maintenance terminal just inside the door.

  “Hey, where you going?” Matty asked.

  “I’m checking the maintenance logs. Maybe I can find an answer there.” Not wanting to sit, Austin pulled the terminal up and out so he could work standing up.

  The entry he was looking for was right at the top.

  RSM Code: Special

  Effective Date: 05-08-64

  Next RSM Due: NA

  Technician Notes: For use by AVT, RCR and MTO only

  Technician: ITW

  Okay, it was done with system clearance. That’s good, and the tech noted us specifically, also good. But who the hell is ITW?

  Every other log entry was signed with AVT, his initials, or LTK undersigned by JMH for work done by Lance on Jerry’s authority.

  This was the first time he had ever seen work signed off by an ITW. And without being undersigned, meaning ITW had administrator privileges equal to his own. After a moment of quiet contemplation, he addressed the lab QI, “Alice, please connect me with Jerry’s office.”

  “Immediately, Austin. Connecting now,” Alice replied.

  Austin grabbed an earbud from the maintenance workstation and stuck it in his ear. His friends had been cleared to know about the tech surrounding his project and the pods, but Austin was cleared for much more and Jerry knew that. He could bring up any number of things his friends weren’t cleared for. It was best to be cautious.

  Jerry was the head of the Texier nanitics department and the only one other than Bendik and himself to have access rights to his personal lab on sublevel 37.

  “Yep. Go ahead,” Jerry answered a moment later.

  “Hey, Jerry, It’s Austin.”

  “What’s going on bud? Heard from your dad by any chance?” Jerry spoke around a mouth full of something. Austin thought it was probably a cheesesteak. The guy ate them continuously; how he’d been losing weight recently was remarkable, if slightly suspicious.

  “Nope, no word from Bendik, not since the last time you asked, or the time before that, or for the last two and half years.”

  “Right, Okay. Well, he’ll turn up soon enough. He’s got to eventually. What’d you need, bud?” Jerry’s tone was mildly distressed or distracted. Austin couldn’t tell which, but he decided to play off the man’s unfocused state.

  “Jerry, how’s work on the gene-specific nanite mist coming along?”

  “Well, hell, Austin. That’s why I need Bendik to show the eff up. Integrating the damn gene sequencing… wait…” Jerry trailed off. “Damn it all, Austin, don’t screw me around. You shouldn’t know about that. You are talking with him, aren’t you! Goddamnit, son. I need to talk to him. He’s the only one that gets how to manipulate these carbon states to work with the aminos so that the mitochondria will play ball with the nanites!”

  “Soooo... you don’t have a functional nanite mist yet?”

  Jerry groaned into the link. “No. We’re stuck. I need your old man. I don’t have his breadth of knowledge, and Jack over in genetics is like some kind of alien. He’s damned impossible to get straight answers out of. I need Bendik to bridge the gaps.”

  Austin had what he wanted. His pods hadn’t been upgraded by Jerry, continuing the conversation would just get uncomfortable now. He wasn’t in touch with Bendik, nobody was, except maybe Pete, who was also MIA.

  However, now that he’d let on knowing about the mist, trying to convince Jerry of that fact would be… troublesome.

  Worse, if he revealed his pods were upgraded with a fully functional nanite mist system, the department head would probably set up camp in his lab, possibly even confiscate one of his pods.

  That was one headache Austin definitely wanted to avoid.

  So, he decided to roll with Jerry’s assumption. “Okay, Jerry, no problem. I’ll send your request along. No promises though, you know how he is.”

  “I know, I know... But what’s with all this cloak-and-dagger shit, anyhow?”

  “No idea, man, it’s a mystery to all of us. Thanks, Jerry. I gotta run. Good luck with those carbon states, bud.” He disconnected without waiting for an answer.

  “Alice, please remove Jerry from the access list for my lab. And take messages for all calls until I tell you otherwise.”

  “It is done, Austin.” Alice replied in her silky, soothing voice.

  “Good. And that leaves just me and Bendik with access, correct?”

  “That is correct, Austin.”

  “Alice, the last maintenance entry on my pods was authorized by ITW. Who is that?”

  “That identifier is not known to me, Austin.”

  He scowled. “Why not, Alice? Don’t you have a full personnel file on everyone who works at this facility?”

  “Yes, I do. However, the file on ITW is empty.”

  Empty? he echoed silently. “Do you have any other empty files, Alice? And also, when was ITW hired?”

  “I have no other empty personnel files and the ITW file was generated on the 8th of May 2064.”

  “Five days ago?” Austin muttered to himself.

  “Yes. Five days, 11 hours and 33 minutes.” Alice replied.

  “Thank you, Alice. That’ll be all for now.” Austin returned to brooding on the information, beginning to suspect he knew who ITW was.

  If Jerry was struggling with the nanite mist, then nobody in the building had this tech yet. That, however, didn’t mean that nobody at Texier Quantum had a functional nanite mist system.

  Within the company, there was one person who, when interested, would secretly run parallel development efforts beside the top teams.

  One person who had a history of showing up with a working prototype well before the assigned team had something functional. That history combined with the limited access to his lab, could lead Austin to only one conclusion–it had to be Bendik.

  Austin exhaled a long rumbling hum, the noise and gentle vibration helped settle his mind.

  He felt Matty and Racheal staring at him. Turning to them, he was surprised by their relaxed posture, communicating a lack of concern. Matty even wore a smirk, he had probably suspected the truth before Austin called Jerry.

  Austin nodded to him as he tossed the earpiece back onto the workstation. “You’re right, bud. This is an unbelievable upgrade. The smart gel material, the nanites stabilized to function in both liquid and the air, and with the ability to work with our natural bodily functions–it’s genius-level incredible. Still, that’s all stuff that Jerry probably has worked out. What he’s struggling with is integrating genetic markers into the carbon nanites.”

  As he said it, Austin realized something significant–gene specific–that implied the potential for genetic manipulation. Without digging into the details, he knew intuitively that this new nanite mist system had significant epigenetic possibilities.

  Epigenetics was one of Bendik’s most fervent passions, and it had become one of Austin’s. The allure of improving your own genetic structure was undeniable. However, up till now, epigenetic shifts were only achieved via low tech methods. Meditation, having supportive family and friends, practicing forgiveness and gratitude, eating healthy, and taking supplements were basically the whole thing.

  Even so, these simple actions, if practiced across generations, promised to unlock accelerated healing, broad immunities, denser fast-twitch musculature, and even telepathic communication. However, if genetically-matched nanites could directly affect a person’s DNA…

  He’d been quiet for too long again, and Racheal and Matty were both watching him–Racheal with one eyebrow tilted and Matty with arms crossed and a hand over his mouth.

  “Sorry… I ahhh… I just had a thought about my dad. The gene-specific bit is a pretty big deal. Jerry doesn’t have that figured out. Combine that with this upgrade being done
here, where Jerry and my dad were the only other ones with access. It’s Bendik–it has to be. This has his name written all over it.”

  Talk about his father was something they avoided most of the time, and now his statement landed like something forbidden–his friends didn’t respond immediately.

  Seeing this, he nodded and affirmed, “It has to be my father, no one else could have done this.”

  Matty blew out an audible sigh of relief. “Man, I love that dude.” Turning back to the pod control panel, he paused briefly then nodded to himself. “Okay, then. We can trust it.” And he reset the Athelon back to its ready screen.

  Austin couldn’t help but realize his father might have been here, in this room, a few days ago. It hurt a bit. Bendik never did anything without good reason, but still, he missed him.

  As nostalgia washed over Austin, Matty and Racheal bumped fists. Their energy brought him back. His melancholy vanished and excitement reasserted itself.

  It was time to log in.

  “Alright, you guys ready?” Austin said.

  “Do sheep have nipples?” Matty said. “Fuck yeah I’m ready.”

  “What he said,” Racheal quipped with a smile.

  “No idea about sheep. No idea why you know that, and I don’t care either. Let’s load in. We’ve got a 4000-year-old magical playground to explore.”

  Grinning, they spread out to their respective pods.

  Each Athelon was biometrically keyed to its user. Austin had unlocked his already as it was first of the three and the one Matty had read from. He raised the lid, creating a privacy wall, and unceremoniously stripped to pull on his immersion suit. Within moments both Matty and Racheal had done the same.

  Austin noticed his suit also felt a bit different. Looking closely, he could see hundreds of tiny curving lines in the fabric that followed the contours of his body.

  “Looks like the ol’ boy also upgraded our suits,” Racheal intoned from the far pod.

  “Makes sense,” Matty responded. “The new mist system probably uses channels in the suits to stimulate parts of our body while we’re under.”

  “Clever fucking bastard. Ya gotta love that guy,” Racheal said.

  Austin climbed into his Athelon. The conforming gel adapted to support his head, lower back, and knees. Then a new sensation began crawling up the back of his neck.

  He tensed slightly but exhaled his nerves. Gentle pressure wrapped the base of his skull, then slid up the back of his head. Goosebumps spread down his chest and arms and he released a small shiver as the smart material continued to cover his ears and over the top of his head. That’s where it stopped.

  Where’s the front? He wondered.

  A quarter-sized hole opened in the lid and a clear tendril, like a fat jelly-fish arm emerged. Austin felt his lips pull tight as he envisioned it trying to force itself down his throat.

  As it descended, the end expanded, forming a familiar triangular shape. His anxiety faded.

  The mask settled on his chin and nose, and immediately he felt a cool sensation spreading over his cheekbones, around his jaw, and down his neck. He strained to see as it crept toward his eyes.

  The gel’s movement reminded him of how the first versions of adaptive graphene armor had acted before its mobility factor was improved. The correlation helped ease any lingering tension.

  As the gel arched over his eyes, he heard a muffled cry that sounded like Matty. Austin smirked thinking that he was probably seeing the tentacle. Moments later he could just make out, “Never mind. I’m fine.”

  The gel covered his eyes, leaving enough space to blink, then the coolness then swept up his brow, encasing his entire head.

  Wondering if the two parts had fused, he felt for the seam. There wasn’t one–they had merged. He was wearing a helmet.

  There was a gentle hiss. The nanites, he realized, catching his breath. But Austin only hesitated for an instant before inhaling deeply. At first, he didn’t feel anything, it was like breathing fog. After inhaling a third lung full, his nose, tongue, and throat tingled. After a fifth, his body rippled with alertness.

  He felt acutely present, but completely relaxed; it was fantastic.

  His mask turned black, then dialog began to scroll:

  Scanning…

  Latent nanite clusters found, activating…

  Parsing unique player neural paths…

  Synchronizing player perception to neural net…

  Loading avatar creation framework…

  The system messages blinked out. Within a few moments, Austin felt the pull of gravity fade and disappear. He didn’t black out; he was just weightless. This is different. Never felt like this in the trainer with Elle.

  He tried to move his arms, then realized he had no arms. He had no body at all. He was nothing but his awareness. An awareness that beheld only darkness.

  Slowly, light began to glow around the edges of the darkness, warming it and then growing across the black toward the center. Turning his head, the view didn’t shift. It was almost as if he was wearing a mask.

  I suppose I am, aren’t I. But he had no awareness of his mask or the pod. His consciousness was simply floating in space.

  The spreading light had left a triangular area, low in the center, that was a bit darker. Narrow at the top and wide at the bottom, the view felt familiar. Like I’m lying on the beach with my eyes closed. Wait–

  Austin opened his eyes, finding himself prone and floating.

  He stood up. And his perspective rotated, as if he was on a gimbal. Now that was strange.

  Looking around, he discovered a large clearing paved with huge stone blocks and surrounded by a verdant, towering wood. Above, the sun shone bright in a cloudless sky at a slight declination, a familiar angle, like he saw at home facing south.

  Suspended in the center of the clearing, hung a copy of his body clothed in linen shorts. Below the other him, inlayed into the stone in pearlescent black was an intricate circular seal. More than just a seal, it was several nested rings, each densely packed with foreign runes.

  Turning to look around, Austin realized he could sense his body again. Moving to touch his face, he watched a swirl of mist rise and pass through his vision. Okay then, what’s going on? It feels like I have a body.

  He experimented, moving his incorporeal hands to touch his face, his chest and each other. Each time he touched some part of his body, they passed right through, not slowing or even feeling anything at all. Poking a hand straight through mist that felt like his chest was the end of his experiments.

  “Damn, that is so weird.” The words reverberated ever so slightly. “Hey, I can talk. That’s something. Helloo?”

  A monkish-looking fellow, wearing loose white robes, stepped from the forest and approached. The man wore the slenderest smile. It was so trivial that it wasn’t even a smile, just a look of perpetual ease and well-being that shaped his features as to give the impression of smiling.

  His feet scuffed the stone in little whispers, but his robes made no noise. Austin watched him in a trance as he enjoyed a sensation of accomplishment. After years of work, he was within the framework of a universe of his own design. His new life was beginning.

  The monk stopped next to the clone and dipped his head to Austin, he smiled. “Welcome, Austin. I am Ink.”

  10

  Rapists, The General, and Leghoppers

  Texier Quantum Labs Research Facility and Q-Core Node Host, Lobby

  Thirty minutes south of Bethel, Maine

  May 14, 2064—World Seed plus 7 days, 2 hours, 23 minutes

  Oliver Ward waited, laying with his hands folded behind his head, on a bench in the pitch-black lobby of the Texier Labs research building. Through the transparent roof he viewed the night sky.

  But Olli wasn’t contemplating the stars; his thoughts focused on the see-through material, the nanite-infused Grak. That is some seriously tough shit, he thought, recalling the day Bendik and he had tested it with enough firepower to le
vel a city block.

  One of the most advanced materials on the planet, just hiding in plain sight. He shook his head. “Ha!” The rough laugh faded into the cavernous space. “Ol’ End never plays by the rules.”

  He found himself pitying those standing in opposition to his boss. Gods, he’d be an absolute nightmare to fight against. Thankfully, that would never be an issue he’d have to confront. If anything, it made his job so much easier.

  Job. The word sounded hollow in his head–a cheap comparison. Olli no more felt as if he had a job than fish felt like swimming was optional. Texier was his home and Bendik, Austin, and his people were his extended family. He hadn’t held a job for fifteen years.

  Bendik had initially hired Olli shortly after leaving his previous employer–a military contracting firm more closely related to pond scum than an organization of decent humans.

  In that gig, he’d led a platoon of privateers tasked with protecting a high-value target during the Tanzanian presidential elections.

  A pair of his men had raped a local girl, then beaten the shit out of her brother and father when they tried to intervene. When he confronted them, they didn’t even deny the charges, one going as far as to insinuate it was the girl’s fault because she was “Asking for it.”

  Olli remembered the silence in his office after those words–he remembered the thump of his heart and rush of blood in his ears. What he couldn’t recall was crossing his desk or tackling the man and pinning his arms beneath his knees.

  What next thing he could recall was the satisfying thwack of his fist hammering into the shithead’s face and the hollow noise his skull made when it bounced off the concrete floor–again and again. Recalling those sounds made him smile.

  Eventually, the second piece-of-shit and a couple other fuck-nuts managed to pull him off, which was probably good, he would have happily killed the rapist, but he didn’t want that on his record.

  Those three other assholes got a small slice of his wrath for their effort, a couple elbows and a fist, those had felt good too.

  After cooling off and having gathered his anger into a more manageable and directed fury, he had the rapists bound, gagged, and thrown into a dark cell–because fuck civil rights. He’d been in Tanzania, dealing with animals only pretending to be men.