The Restoration of Flaws (The Phantom of the Earth Book 5)
Page 36
Citizen: Rueben Variscan
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 200.5 centimeters (6’ 7”) WEIGHT: 103.5 kilograms (228 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Brownish-red EYE COLOR: Deep blue BIRTH YEAR: 135 AR
AUCTION YEAR: N/A
DEVELOPER: House Dunamis BIRTHPLACE: Livelle city-state ETERNAL PARTNER: Eulalie Variscan LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: First Ward, Palaestra City, Palaestra, Underground Northeast OFFSPRING: Evony Variscan, Hateya Variscan, Zazu Variscan ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: Constructed uficilin, synthetic Bacillus subtilis that rapidly restored transhuman cells; later variants could also induce a soothing sensation throughout the transhuman body NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): Former RDD scientist; Harpoon developer THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Citizen: Markus Venatici
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 195 centimeters (6’ 5”) WEIGHT: 112 kilograms (247 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Green, silver EYE COLOR: Reddish-blue BIRTH YEAR: 367 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 368 AR (First Trimester) DEVELOPER: House Lissette BIRTHPLACE: Kiplorea City, Kiplorea, Underground North ETERNAL PARTNER: N/A
LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: Second Ward, Palaestra City, Palaestra, Underground Northeast OFFSPRING: N/A
ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): RDD scientist THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Citizen: Jocelyn Vertulli
SEX: Female
HEIGHT: 127 centimeters (4’ 2”) WEIGHT: 38 kilograms (84 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Auburn
EYE COLOR: Lilac
BIRTH YEAR: 358 AR
AUCTION YEAR: N/A
DEVELOPER: Murray Olyorna (deceased) BIRTHPLACE: Gaia City, Gaia, Underground West ETERNAL PARTNER: N/A LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: Seventh Ward, Gaia City, Gaia, Underground West OFFSPRING: N/A
ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: No NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): BP spy THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): Five
Citizen: Urillina Volans
SEX: Female
HEIGHT: 183 centimeters (6’ 0”) WEIGHT: 90 kilograms (198 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Reddish-violet EYE COLOR: Blackish-orange BIRTH YEAR: 262 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 269 AR
DEVELOPER: House Rige BIRTHPLACE: Peanowera City, Peanowera, Underground East ETERNAL PARTNER: Euros Jzhakovia LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: Peanowera Citadel, Peanowera City, Peanowera, Underground East OFFSPRING: N/A
ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): Former Tucana Consortium chief engineering officer; minister of Peanowera Territory, Underground East; Supreme Scientific Board member THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Citizen: Gage Voss
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 193.5 centimeters (6’ 4”) WEIGHT: 95.5 kilograms (211 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Brownish-blue EYE COLOR: Brownish-gold BIRTH YEAR: 286 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 292 AR
DEVELOPER: House Callovi BIRTHPLACE: Gaia City, Gaia, Underground West ETERNAL PARTNER: Brooklyn Harper LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: First Ward, Silkscape City, Lovereal, Underground West OFFSPRING: Kapono Voss (deceased), Fala Voss (deceased), Crwys Voss ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: No NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): Former Famennian Consortium engineer; BP spy THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): Five
Citizen: Svana Wenelow
SEX: Female
HEIGHT: 178 centimeters (5’ 10”) WEIGHT: 65 kilograms (143 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Reddish-blue
EYE COLOR: Violet, hazel
BIRTH YEAR: 250 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 255 AR
DEVELOPER: House Consueornos BIRTHPLACE: Cineris City, Cineris, Underground Central ETERNAL PARTNER: Orsino Algol LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: Second Ward, City in the Vale, Cineris, Underground Central OFFSPRING: Tahlia Algol, Dryden Algol ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes
NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): Albian Consortium Granville sky engineer THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Citizen: Dahlia Weztna
SEX: Female
HEIGHT: 182 centimeters (6’ 0”) WEIGHT: 65 kilograms (143 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Light violet EYE COLOR: Violet, red BIRTH YEAR: 277 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 281 AR
DEVELOPER: House Aelena BIRTHPLACE: Alpinia City, Marshlands, Underground East ETERNAL PARTNER: N/A
LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: First Ward, Palaestra City, Palaestra, Underground Northeast OFFSPRING: N/A
ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: Collected air samples from Jupiter NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): Strike team aera THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Citizen: Maurice Yealoronoaros
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 199 centimeters (6’ 6”) WEIGHT: 97 kilograms (214 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Red, green
EYE COLOR: Brownish-silver BIRTH YEAR: 322 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 323 AR (Second Half) DEVELOPER: House Beteldia BIRTHPLACE: Farino City, Farino, Underground North ETERNAL PARTNER: N/A
LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: Santonian Cavern, Santonian Village, Xerean, Underground North OFFSPRING: N/A
ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): Executive of Santonian Village, Xerean Territory, Underground North THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Citizen: Antosha Zereoue
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 198 centimeters (6’ 6”) WEIGHT: 96 kilograms (212 lbs.) HAIR COLOR: Black, silver EYE COLOR: Snowflake obsidian BIRTH YEAR: 315 AR
AUCTION YEAR: 317 AR (Second Half) DEVELOPER: House Adao
BIRTHPLACE: Palaestra City, Palaestra, Underground Northeast ETERNAL PARTNER: Previous: Haleya Decca (deceased); Present: N/A LAST KNOWN RESIDENCE: First Ward, Palaestra City, Palaestra, Underground Northeast OFFSPRING: N/A
ATHANASIA-QUALIFIED: Yes NOTABLE PROPER CONVERSION: Constructed E. sustenance, a synism that produced a wonder protein containing the exact ratio of essential amino acids needed in the daily transhuman diet NOTABLE SIGNIFICANT CONVERSION: N/A NOTABLE OCCUPATION(S): RDD scientist; supervisor of the Mission to the Earth’s Core; supervisor of the Timescape Mission THREAT LEVEL (ONE TO FIVE): One
Appendix 1
Thirty Precepts of the Commonwealth
Henceforth, there shall be thirty precepts by which thirty territories of a Great Commonwealth of Beimeni shall live.
—Atticus Masimovian, 168 AR
Precept 1: Serve Beimeni. Live forever.
Precept 2: Suffering is questioning. Questioning is destructive. Destruction is never inevitable.
Precept 3: Jealousy is treachery. Treachery is culpable. Culpability is never questioned.
Precept 4: Abuse or misuse of official insignia of the commonwealth is forbidden.
Precept 5: Citizen heirs of the chancellor are a blessing. They are also property of the Office of the Chancellor. All pregnancies must be reported to the nearest medical facility and all citizens must be registered with the government at the time of birth, prior to development.
Precept 6: Excursions to the surface of the Earth are forbidden unless sanctioned by the Office of the Chancellor.
Precept 7: Citizens should be honored to serve their chancellor, including in the Lower Level.
Precept 8: The Harpoon Auction shall serve as the primary arbiter of commonwealth function.
Precept 9: Exile to the Lower Level is not immutable, unless as determined by the Harpoon Auction or the Office of the Judiciary.
Precept 10: No Beimenian in the upper territories shall be permitted to the Lower Level, unless as determined by the Harpoon Auction or the Offices of the Judiciary or the Chancellor.
Precept 11: The Judiciary shall act in stewardship of the chancellor and in the best interest of the citizenry.
Precept 12: The chancellor shall be the ultimate arbiter in matters that involve the Office of the Judiciary.
Precept 13: To speak against the chancellor is to speak against the
Twin Gods of the Cosmos.
Precept 14: Unauthorized exposure to forsaken and foreign lands is forbidden.
Precept 15: A commonwealth mission is honorable. Beimenians who fail to uphold such missions are dishonorable.
Precept 16: Unlimited expansion throughout Earth is the right of all Beimenians. Construction privileges shall be granted via the Department of Communications and Commonwealth Relations.
Precept 17: Ownership of weapons, including but not limited to pulse rifles, pulse guns, and pulse grenades, is forbidden.
Precept 18: Beimenians shall live in harmony, serve, and live together. Everyone belongs to each other.
Precept 19: Fountain Square access shall be granted for service and conversion or as designated by the Office of the Chancellor.
Precept 20: Private ownership of apartment units is encouraged. Private ownership of goods and services is especially encouraged.
Precept 21: Abundant celebrations are encouraged by the Office of the Chancellor.
Precept 22: All images, thoughts, messages, and other neural impulses held within the cerebral network are the property of the Department of Communications and Commonwealth Relations.
Precept 23: The Beimeni monetary unit, the benari, henceforth is defined as coins manufactured by the official mint, comprised of a proprietary blend of silver, gold, and platinum.
Precept 24: The Departments of Peace and Communications shall ensure tranquility and harmony within the borders of Beimeni under the authority of the Office of the Chancellor.
Precept 25: The Department of Space shall ensure technological advancement for departure from the commonwealth and safe passage to foreign or hostile lands, including, but not limited to, the Earth’s surface.
Precept 26: The Research & Development Department is tasked with providing all the resources Beimenians require for survival.
Precept 27: The people of Beimeni have the right to freely elect territorial representatives to serve as ministers within the Office of the Chancellor.
Precept 28: The people of Beimeni have the right to bring any and all complaints to the Office of the Judiciary.
Precept 29: Criminal acts with a possible sentencing to the Lower Level shall be arbitrated by the Department of Peace and the Office of the Judiciary at the discretion of the Office of the Chancellor.
Precept 30: A chancellor’s rule is infinite as determined by the Twin Gods of the Cosmos and the Beimenian people. In the event of death or incapacitation, and until an election can be arranged, the prime minister of Beimeni shall assume leadership. Beneath the prime minister, the rule of the free peoples of Beimeni shall fall to the supreme scientist tasked with Reassortment.
Appendix 2
Terraforming the Underground
The Earth contains species capable of living in extreme conditions. We need only convert these adaptations to the transhuman genome to ensure our survival at depths never before possible in the history of man.
—Atticus Masimovian, 168 AR
The following is the transcript of Supreme Scientist Jeremiah Selendia’s guest lecture to a Harpoon class in 233 AR. Though its central topic was underground terraforming and engineering, the lecture also covered subjects such as the Reassortment Atmospheric Anomaly, the Death Wave, the Reassortment Strain, Livelle city-state, the Beimeni zone, and the Age of Masimovian, among others. It was required reading for Harpoon candidates and knowledge of the points covered in the lecture was tested during the first half multiple choice section of the exams until Jeremiah’s demotion from Project Reassortment in 283 AR. The transcript is stored in Marstone’s Database and is considered classified government property.
To thoroughly understand the process by which we terraformed the Beimeni zone of the underground, a brief overview of the circumstances that led to its necessity is required. The Reassortment Atmospheric Anomaly and resultant Death Wave concluded the Second Hundred Years’ War fought between the Eastern and Western Hegemonies. The paucity of data that survived in Livelle Laboratory after the zeropoint attack at the end of the war suggests the Reassortment Strain may have escaped containment from Hengill Laboratory, built 200 meters below the surface of Iceland. From there we suspect it mutated in unexpected ways, transforming into the modern killer of transhumans. We also believe the end must have been swift, and terrifying, based on our own experience with it: no transhuman has survived exposure to it.
The lone survivors of the extinction event organized a civilization within the contained and sustained Livelle Laboratory some 50 meters below Antelope Canyon. Noriel Livelle, the chief administrator for the lab, proposed the formation of a new government, consisting of a democratically-elected chancellor and 10 ministers (for 10 districts) to rule over a new city-state. The city-state would include the centrally located laboratory and its surrounding village with a population of about 15,000—the presumed last of the transhuman race.
Noriel Livelle was elected the first chancellor in a landslide victory; with the approval of the ministry, he named the new city-state after himself. He and the ministry requested a group of scientists known as the Elders—transhumans highly skilled with the zeropoint field—to formulate a strategy to protect Livellans from structural collapses and Reassortment breaches. The Elders created strategic expedition (strike) teams with a separate mission from the Livelle Guard, which protected the central government apparatus and provided security throughout the city-state.
The strike teams were instead given complete autonomy under a designated strike team commander, with the understanding their sole mission was to respond to structural collapses and Reassortment breaches in Livelle. The Elders suspected either the strain was designed to diffuse into the Earth—presumably to disrupt or kill scientists who worked in subterranean synbio labs—or did so by other means because they’d lost contact with the Western Hegemony, including the underground facilities. So the first volunteers for the strike teams understood their mission was a suicidal one; no biomat suit could then protect transhumans from Reassortment exposure in the shallower parts of the underground or upon the surface.
Concurrent with the creation of the strike teams, the chancellor called on his confidant, Ruslan Masimovian, to form the Reassortment research team to focus on developing Reassortment-resistant biomats and a cure. Masimo, as Ruslan was known, first sought to unfreeze the League of Scientists—the 340 scientists frozen near absolute zero as required by the initiation of Operation Preservation—who many believed could hold the key to immunity to the Reassortment Strain. (Some even suspected they could have Reassortment-resistant genes.)
Masimo killed five scientists before he realized the methodologies outlined by the league for awakenings would not work; neither he, nor anyone else, could find a way to repair the cells fast enough to revive the scientists held in stasis. Chancellor Livelle ordered the remaining 335 scientists be stored in a special containment chamber called the Cryo Room within the city-state’s Science District, at the lowermost level of the laboratory, which lay beneath the village.
Existing synbio labs merged and new labs formed, combining with new and existing consortiums (including mechanical, nuclear, biological, civil, materials, computer, electrical, and zeropoint field engineers, among others) focused on obtaining energy and producing synisms, raw materials, and sustenance to ensure humanity’s survival in the underground. Livelle’s sophisticated power plant had been built prior to the extinction event, and became the basis for the design of power plants used throughout the Great Commonwealth of Beimeni.
All power plants, with the exception of solar panels, hydroelectric, and wind turbines, are the same: water is converted to steam in a boiler (or pressure vessel), the steam is used to spin a turbine, the turbine spins a generator that produces electricity, and the waste steam is condensed back into water before being redirected back into the boiler. The only difference between various types of power plants is the fuel that heats the boiler, which includes nuclear, coal, oil, or natural gas, among other so
urces.
Engineers designed a pressure vessel that sat in a pool of magma. The magma transferred its heat to the vessel, which boiled the water. As a result, the magma cooled and became denser than the hotter magma beneath it. The cool magma sank, was warmed by the Earth, then rose and was cooled by the boiler, and the process repeated. The idea was to create a current within the magma called natural convection; it was the driving force behind Livelle’s power plant design. The problem: magma didn’t exist naturally near Livelle Laboratory.