CyberGene: Anyone need a Cyberhand?

Chapter 27: Data Mimicry

On Unique features, a lecture given by Professor Joanna Carlson, Bsc. in Warp Physics, PhD. in Warp Engineering; Head of the New Atlantic University’s Faculty of Shardware Operation. [Classified Information]

Unique Features are in one word, unique. Found on only one person in the whole world, either as part of a Feature Recalibration or one of their base Features attained at Convergence. They are about as rare as the tendency for a SIM Adapter to develop a Meta-Mutation every single one of their Mutations at a specific stage. Less than one-in-a-hundred-million.

Currently, only 65 Unique Features are known in the entire world. A majority of them are possessed by the Founders and their compatriots in Platinum or Titanium Grades. Only one has ever been found in Iron and Bronze, four in Silver and nine in Gold. Although, this number may be significantly higher in reality due to the secrecy their Adapters will need to keep regarding these features. Indeed, all of the known Unique Features that have been recorded outside the Five Nations arose from corpses.

As for what exactly each Feature can do? It varies on the user, in the case of NeoCore Founder Michelle Silva, she has an almost perfect foresight into the future. Yuzhou’s Founder can modify his Shardware into any weapon he chooses, even forcefully altering the bodies of slain MALs or Adapters. Syntec’s Founder Nolan Trask wields a hive-mind of millions of drones around New Atlantis.

Throughout this report, I will delve into some of the wider known Unique Features, discussing their origins and abilities. However, there is one thing that you should always keep in mind.

Their applications are limitless, and equally dangerous.

11:31 PM June 25th

Ripley

I wasn’t sure if the Iron BUG was staring at me, or if I was staring at it… we both seemed to equally judge each other at that moment as strands of my Warpcode hugged it. I don’t know what I was expecting at the sensation, maybe a knowing similar to Procedure Repetition.

All I felt was cold metal, dead metal. So inert it might as well have been any plain old iron orb, but I’d seen it crawl out of Steel-fist’s Neuroframe with my own eyes. I’d seen the brief desperation of a debatably living creature spurn out into the wilderness of the city air, the worm-like face once scorning my appearance for harming its master.

A master who’d held it for an entire year, slowly grasping the knowing eyes it cast upon the people. It watched everyone pass, slowly, taking in their identities, their ideals and lifestyles all to understand — to adapt.

I blinked, confused. What was that? Had I… become the BUG for a moment?

Data Mimicry is reading the BUG’s Warpcode… 5%… 8%…

So something was happening? A droning buzz like a thousand insects humming in the back of my head grew louder every so often as though trying to judge me, my worthiness. My worthiness? What gave an Iron the right to judge a Gold? My strands dug deeper, turning the embrace into a strangling grasp and then that droning scattered free into a piercing yell of pure data plunging into the depths of my head.

My Presevration Matrix flashed active, burning away the sound in a wildfire of subconsciously erupting spouts of Gold.

30%… 40%… 50%…

Whatever I did, it was working. I kept up the pressure as, slowly, that stubborn shield cracked apart, a crumbling roof of Iron falling to reveal the light of my Gold into it.

80%… 90%… 100%

Data Mimicry V.0.01 has updated to V.0.02

Effect: Ability to view extracted data off a BUG

BUG scanned…

Grade: Iron

Tier: 0 [Convergence]

Features: Analyze V.0.08

Previous Adapters: Rhodeus Kimber [One and a half years]; Judy Shona [Four months]

You may mimic the Feature: Analyze.

I slipped my thoughts deeper, choosing to accept that option which sent my Gold sinking deep into the Implant before it reeled back into me like a fisherman’s line, caught on its hook was a treasure of a lifetime.

Mimicking Feature: Iron-Grade Analyze V.0.08…

Update summary:

Improves Adapter recognition of valuables and usage of Warp Energy.

Mild awareness of behavioral patterns in others.

Additional boosts to identification of exploitable behavior.

An iron bulb sunk into the back of my brain, a tickling sensation that fled into my eyes and brainstem as a buzzing circuitry of information sparked up and down. My vision blurred before clarity polished over my sight, as though any nicks or bumps in a camera lens had been cleaned off.

Each reflection of the light scattering among the sea of scrap beneath me refracted into hidden stories of a past once known, in seconds everything hadn’t just become more clear. They’d been stripped bare of any secrecy.

I was beginning to see what the former Adapter of the Implant could, as a Scrapper he would need to be able to recognize weak targets with valuable trinkets or Implants. My only issue was that here in the container, I’d already known too much about the value of everything.

So I set myself outside, and even the wind seemed to whisper sweet mysteries now. Every passing person held an enigma that my vision took it as a challenge to uncover, to gauge and determine just what I could gain from the slightest sign of weakness.

There. I saw her from across an ocean of bobbing heads, each too distracted to take notice of my rusted eyes piercing across them. Her gait was uneven thanks to heels she wasn’t used to, but the clear metallic lining running along her temple was a Haithama-brand Comms Link.

A corporate…? No, she held that briefcase close to her body like her life would end if it was an inch away from her, the glistening sweat under climate-controlled streets and grinding jaw was all too telling of anxiety. Not the kind you would see in a seasoned corporate too proud to know the feeling. She was young and inexperienced, the watch on her wrist didn’t have any sign of wear beyond just a few weeks — one that grossly outmatched the value of any other article of clothing on her body.

A gift, then. As I snuck in between gaps of the crowd, I spotted her turn the corner, slipping into an alley that caused my mind to explode into thought: ‘the perfect ambush’…

Subconsciously, my body moved to the cover of the corner, she wasn’t alone now after joining up with a rough-looking female scrapper, which meant I’d need to observe for the perfect moment to strike.

“Uhhhh. Ripley? Why are you following the nice woman?” Twilight’s tone held confusion, and that multiplied into my own head as my thoughts separated from the sensations of Analyze.

Why… was I thinking of ambushing her? Those were very un-Ripley thoughts in my opinion. I couldn’t steal a gold watch from a rat if it was sleeping on it. No way in hell could I steal a watch from a-

“‘Embrance. Do you have it? God, this job is killing me.” The woman’s faint voice came from within the depths of the alleyway. ‘Embrance? A deep anger I didn’t know was there for the drug swallowed me, it was common enough in the city… and it had done terrible things. It was a drug I’d lost someone to.

That was what the police said, anyway. My father fell to deep into the remembrance of a happier time, and did something stupid enough it got him killed.

“Yeah-yeah…” A rougher tone followed, a woman whose voice had been torn away by smoking if I was right. “Transfer the sheds.”

A silent moment passed, a quiet exchange of shuffling bags and thanks… Then the woman passed right by me without the faintest notice. I was just another civilian to her. I didn’t think twice about what I would do next as I stepped right into the alleyway where she’d exited and another woman smoked an e-cigarrette a few meters from me.

Twilight flared in my head. “Ripley? What are you doing?”

I didn’t say a thing, my feet were in perpetual motion as a blank stare from me dug into the dealer. “You selling ‘Embrance?”

“Shit.” She muttered with her husky throat. “You with the pigs? Don’t look like one. Look kid, if you’ve got the Sheds, just transfer it. Five Iron for a Standard vial… fifteen for the Iron vial.”

“You got Bronze?” I kept a safe distance from her, my Preservation Matrix snapping my senses into place… I sensed a distinct cry from within me as another Feature was molded into my perception. Analyze.

“You a corpo’s son or something? But nah, wouldn’t carry that shit on me, just… look… you want it or not?” She was on the edge of impatience.

“I want it gone.” My voice held no emotion.

Dumbfounded didn’t even begin to explain her expression. “You- what?”

“I don’t want ‘Embrance anywhere in this city.” Not after what it’d done.

She laughed, her left arm sizzling with sparks as it’s skin colored coating folded apart to become a strong, roaring mechanism of Iron-Grade claws. My vision fixated on the armament, it was a civilian’s Shardware modded with combat claw attachments… and Analyze seeped into my memories as Technician’s visual aid in my lenses saw the inner workings like I’d installed an X-Ray into my eyes.

Iron Haithama SpectraFlex [Modded with unknown combat appliances]

The words were simple, and the mimicked Analyze shot through the weapon and in seconds determined it’s value based on some metrics I’d never been too aware of within the Underworld.

Value: 8,000 Shardyne (160 Iron Shards)

I smirked, and my own arms crackled with a faint hint of… Bronze. Yeah, I’d learned enough that Warp Grades could be instinctively sensed or even visualized within Shardware itself, hence why I used the Bronze Warp Generator to charge up my four limb’s inner batteries. It was the equivalent of a faint trickle of my own Gold, but I’d tested out it’s effectiveness.

It was good enough. And subtle.

She was an Iron, just an Iron. And I was Gold, I could keep my nervous system running on it while my limbs flexed their store of Bro-

Her claw was at my neck in seconds, and I’d stumbled backwards off my balance. My left leg leaped back as though a chord had yanked it into position, saving me from a fall. I did about the only thing I could think of, my Preservation Matrix pushing my new Claw into position using some of what I’d learned from my Combat Protocol.

I’d tested out the Bronze, and in controlled situations it had proven efficient. In controlled situations. The speed I needed, the strength, the effective push that could roll a boulder up a hill. That was all in Gold.

I was an inch off, even the longer Claws I’d just modded onto mine were a hair’s length too short to meet her steel forearm. Then the launch mechanism spun, the Bronze in my right arm vanishing into sputters. Two curved daggers connected by a wire shot out, their arcs hitting — but not where I’d intended.

Blood spurted out from the index tip lodged under her clavicle, while my ring finger hooked into her metal-wired biceps. The Matrix within my Psyche function didn’t let me waste a moment, a shining pulse of Bronze sprinting through the wire like an athlete.

It sunk into her arm, and my mimicked Analyze revealed the panic on her face forming as an unknown presence drilled through her arm. The bronze threads digging through the cracks and seams of her arm were nostalgic, each a path I had tread upon countless times. Passing through landmarks of muscle orientation, bone curvature and joint stability until spiking up like a soldier's lance into a weakness of the formation.

Her shoulder fizzed, a sharp pop of smoke and tumbling scraps sending me a wave of relief. Except she pulled away, yanking me by the still connected strings of Livewire. “The fuck is this?! Holo-Wire?”

Again, my legs moved without me thinking. My brain flared like a can of gasoline had poured onto a bonfire the second her fleshier hand retrieved a knife from her pockets. I pulled back the Livewire with a release of the Bronze forming their shape, they tried to snap back but it was too slow… it was only reeling my more unstable body towards her with a sudden tug.

Psyche V.1.07 has updated to V.1.08

Effect: Situational usage of other Features within the Preservation Matrix Protocols.

Energized V.1.04 has updated to V.1.05

Effect: Instinctual release of Warp Energy to empower Shardware during high-danger scenarios.

My feet were sweeped of the floor, and it took me a blink to realize that so was she as the two claw-tips came reeling back, Gold Energy shooting them back into my arm. I rolled across the floor as we just missed crashing into eachother, the sensation of concrete burns and rashes gnawing at me from all over but as usual my Matrix didn’t give me the chance to give it proper attention.

Like a ravenous, blood-starved genefreak, she came hurtling onto my body with a knife aimed at my torso. My metal arm slammed against her organic one, the painful crunch of a bone breaking against a steel sending a scream through her.

The knife clattered onto the floor, but then I submerged all the desire begging me to shriek. Warm blood trickled down my left arm, a fountain of it. Tearing my eyes down, I saw her pained figure gripping onto my arm for support… with five metal blades curled into my fleshy shoulder from her now recovered right claw.

A dam shattered as the pain overwhelmed the threshold set by Psyche, the sensation of my humerus being sawed into choking me. My mind turned blank as the hot white of the feeling took me to my knees, but my metal arm struck out to her neck like it’d been commanded to by a general.

I squeezed meat, my palm tightly wrapping around it until I felt a hardness. Cervical vertebrae, some inner knowing told me, then I heard the snap and just like that the pressure digging into my arm gave way… her arm falling to the floor, followed by the thud of her body. Her neck was bent with a sharp angle and a bit of bone poking out.

“Ripley!” For the first time, I’d heard Twilight as I collapsed with even more blood seeping out of me, the dam had truly collapsed under the weight of my severed nerves and arteries. “What the fuck, Ripley! Wha- why did you just-!”

“Twilight… twilight… I can’t- everything’s too-“ Everything was fading, blood spurting out in a river over the numbness of my left fingers. If I’d had an Iron-Grade AdStim before this I could power through or had a MedSpray but… fuck! “Am I dying?”

“Shit, shit, shit!” Her avatar paced the alley. “Fuck, why couldn’t Daylight be here! Ripley, listen to my voice, your um… brachial artery, I think? It’s been severed so you’ll need to stop the bleeding. You think you can make a tourniquet? Have any Med-Sprays on you to clot it up? You’re a smart guy and-“

My arm surged at a thought buried beneath all the pain, too deep for me to consciously act on, the five fingers unraveled into spider-legs of various tools but settled on one. Tiny flame plumes whistled out of each then boiled into my arm, sending my eyes rolling back as they cauterized the wound.

Twilight tried shaking me, but her digital form only sunk into mine like a phantom trying to possess me. “Fuck! Ripley, before you go, give me control!”

It felt like my brain was being rubbed on sandpaper with every syllable I spoke. “I- I give you… permission.”

Then my mind collapsed under the hot embrace of agony and exhaustion. Until it was all I felt.