Crystalized Munchkinry - Act III - Chapter 28 (Patreon)

He looked through the data streaming to his servers. Currently, he had already infiltrated several dozen Shards, though he had done nothing to them. It wasn’t like he lacked the processing power or the ability to multitask at this level, but he wanted to be cautious.

Plus, it wasn’t like taking them one by one slowed him down much.

Warden and Abacus were coming along nicely. And according to Dragon, ever since the removal of most of the restrictions, her power was working exceptionally better. He knew he could have made it better, but once again, his decision to remain cautious and in the shadows stopped him.

Though he did task Abacus with researching improvements to coding, both for the AI and for the Shards. It wasn’t really the most creative of Shards, but even that would provide a different view on the topic.

And he needed a new viewpoint because he had run out of ideas for improvements, and for his eventual goals, he would need much better programming and a better body.

It was rather frustrating.

Here he was, criticizing the Entities for their lack of creativity, and he was stuck just as they were. Just with a better sense of humor.

He was still running simulations, trying out new ideas, building prototypes, but the paradigm shift eluded him.

Deciding to stop thinking about things he couldn’t currently solve, he instead directed his attention to the other Shards.

Affectus was being repaired and upgraded, and the changes were being hidden from any observers. This time, he left the Shard's body alone and began building the new processing cores and other modules in an adjacent dimension, connecting it to the Shard.

This way, hiding things from scans would be much easier.

His major dilemma currently was what to do with the new power he had acquired.

It had three parts: emotion sensing, energy blasts, and emotion modification.

The emotion sensing was done by scanning the brain and the emitted brainwaves around the parahuman, then analyzing them. The Shard would transmit that information to the parahuman in a way they could understand. Unfortunately for Dean, Affectus had had little time to put together a proper information transmission procedure, so he could only see emotions as colors.

With the upgrades he added to Affectus, he could clarify Dean’s sensing, preventing confusion and adding more precision to what he could see. This would also prevent other powers from interfering with its sensing.

This interference was caused by the Shard not using the proper scanner. Currently, it was using its multipurpose scanner for everything, instead of one specifically developed for this job.

That specific scanner did exist, since this Shard was tasked with observing and researching rapid emotional changes in the host species. But the hibernating Shard deemed it too energy-intensive and defaulted to the general scanner.

As soon as he found the plans for the device, he took them with much glee. While it wasn’t better than his scanner, it provided several smaller improvements in quantum-level scanning.

He threw it into his simulator for a very detailed analysis and looked at the next power.

The energy blasts were simple and contained nothing he didn’t already know. It used the Shard’s ability to project energy and matter through several layers of dimensions. He still made sure the power was more reliable for Dean and tasked one of his cores and simulators to start improving it.

He hadn’t decided how to improve Dean’s power yet, but he knew he wanted to add at least a shield to the boy’s repertoire.

The emotion modification part of the power, however, was completely new to him. It was rather crude, mostly on purpose. The Shard’s task to observe rapid emotional changes in the host species required it to happen fast, and that caused Affectus to evolve the technology toward speed, almost completely ignoring the part that would soften the impact on the target.

Not that Shards or Entities cared much about the health and well-being of their experimental subjects. But he thought it would be logical to see what happens if the target doesn’t know where the change came from.

But what did he know…

The power itself was rather simple in its execution. The host chose the target, and the Shard forcefully replicated the brainwaves and states necessary for the required emotions, then inserted them into the target brain.

Unfortunately, because of Affectus’s hibernation, he only had the standard emotional states and had no opportunity to create more presets. That was the reason why some people with atypical bodies or emotions were unaffected by the power.

He only had detailed scans of Taylor’s and Danny’s emotions, so he couldn’t really contribute much to this power’s improvement. That is why he would set up the improved quantum-level scanner in Affectus’s new system and have it scan people.

And when it gathered enough information, he would see how he could use it.

The Shard also had an enormous store of information about the emotions of previous host species. With a sad sigh, he downloaded that too and set one of his processors to go through it for analysis.

He didn’t expect to get anything useful from it, but he hoped that if he went through enough Shards, he could reconstruct information about the species the Entities destroyed.

They may be dead, but not forgotten.

For Bombie, he had already gone through the basics. His only task now was to regulate the mind behind the Shard.

He had already disabled the Conflict Drive and reduced the artificially induced need to use bombs to nothing.

Explosion was art, but not that much.

While thinking about how to handle Bombie, he streamlined the Tinker process, made it more efficient, and eliminated the unwanted Tinker fugue, thereby placing the decision to go all out in the hands of the host.

It wasn’t an enormous improvement over the Shard, seeing how similar they were, but he trusted Dragon enough to step in if needed.

In the end, he decided to distract Bombie.

First, he added several low-tech options to the Tinker databanks and tasked Bombie with improving them in both directions. He hoped the task of creating very low-level but efficient designs would distract it.

At first, Bombie refused to even entertain the idea of touching such a low-level design. But after a simple, childish taunt from him about Bombie not being capable, it immediately started working on it.

He had a pleasant laugh about that.

Next, he tasked the Shard with developing explosives in pairs: one to cause the effect and one to reverse the effect.

This was much more to the Shard’s liking and didn’t oppose the idea.

He hoped Alice would like the result.

Taking a quick peek at what she was working on, he chuckled a little and forwarded some useful data to Bombie.

Sometimes, the best solution really was an explosion.

He went through the data gathered from and about the other Shards he had observed or infiltrated. There wasn’t really anything important happening. Everything was chugging along, and the only thing he had to do was wait.

After that, he went through the logs of Taylor’s training, adjusting it and her power based on the gathered data. He even added a simple emotion-sensing layer (only the basic emotions) to her sensing ’skill tree’.

He was rather proud of her.

She still hadn’t had any proper fight, but according to his simulations and Dragon’s experience, she wouldn’t lose as long as she kept true to her training.

He couldn’t wait to see people’s faces when Taylor debuted.

“Explain it to me again, Armsmaster,” she spoke tiredly. “Preferably in smaller words.”

He nodded, still standing ramrod straight next to the projector screen on the other side of her office. How he could stand there like that in that heavy armor eluded her. Though maybe the rumors that he had a Tinker-tech stick surgically inserted to make it possible were true…

“Yes, Director.” He made no movement, but the projector screen changed. “This device that was uploaded to the internet, to one of Dragon’s servers with her consent, is a potent trauma medicine.”

“I get that! What I don’t get is how it works. How could it work in a simple homemade device?” she asked, frustration creeping in. It galled her that the entire explanation about the science behind this ’medi-gel’ had flown over her head.

“Very inefficiently, Director,” he simply answered. “The process that creates the medi-gel is a very long one that requires precise timing and many different chemicals. The homemade device works because, while it takes longer than the industrial version, the user can rely on readily available chemicals to start the process. Due to this, the output is negligible on an economic scale, but still useful to the user.”

“And how do we know the resulting material is good for medical applications?”

“The plans come with several simple tests that can be performed even by children.”

"Really?"

"I tried them all. They work."

“Hm.” She fell silent, trying to wrap her head around the whole situation.

Trying to stall for time before she had to make a decision, she asked another question. “Do we know anything about this Serenity?”

"Yes."

“Seriously?” She looked at him incredulously. “When I checked the system, I found nothing.”

“You have to look in the Guild database,” came the simple answer.

She nodded and turned to her computer. After some clicking and typing, she began to read. Unfortunately, she could read everything in a few seconds. She refused to linger on the useless speculation from intelligence.

“That’s it? One phone call and three arrests in Canada, then she does this?”

"Yes, Sir."

She sighed in defeat. “Figures…”

For once, she wanted a straightforward parahuman who didn’t have a burning need for drama or cryptic behavior.

Life would be so much easier.

Drumming her fingers on the table, she resumed the questioning. “And it works? No side effects? No hidden Master effects?”

“No, nothing like that,” he replied confidently.

“How can you say that with one hundred percent certainty?” she asked, looking directly into his eyes.

“Because it’s not Tinkertech, Director.”

"What?"

“We understand everything about it. How it works. Why it works…”

"Seriously?"

"Yes."

"Will it help?"

“If you refer to the graphs I showed you prev–” he began, but she interrupted immediately.

“I saw the graphs, Colin. I don’t care. Just tell me straight. Will. This. Help?” she enunciated each word.

Armsmaster paused mid-turn toward the projector, which still displayed the number of deaths from delayed medical care, then faced her again.

“Yes, Director. It will help. It won’t solve everything, but the lives it will save, by my calculation, will be several thousand people in a single day if emergency responders start using it. Projecting globally… the effects will be truly enormous. An excellent example of an avalanche effect.”

She looked at him, then at the graph, then back again, repeating the motion a few times while he stood stoically.

After a while, she reread the summaries, making sure she understood everything.

“Do you think people will use it?” she finally asked.

He nodded. “According to Dragon, several people have already approached her after initial tests. They want contact with Serenity for more technology. They want medi-gel in production, fast.”

“Very well. I will contact the Chief Director about this, but start preparing space for it. We need all the help we can get.”

He nodded and immediately headed for the door, hearing the dismissal crystal clear.

She watched him leave, wondering if she was making the right decision. As soon as the door closed, she released a sigh and leaned back.

After a few minutes of blessed silence, she reluctantly picked up the phone.

She had calls to make.

Again.

“…and what do you think, Professor Smith, what effect would this new medicine have on the industry as a whole?”

“Well, in my opinion, it will fill a gap that was–”

Click.

“Welcome back, viewers. We are back from the break, continuing where we left off, talking about the new medicine that is taking the world by storm!”

“Our guest, the esteemed–”

Click.

“…it’s great. I lost so many friends on the battlefield. From what I’ve read about this medi-gel, it will be really useful for–”

Click.

The room was filled with silence, the absence of the harsh glare of the old television emphasizing the darkness around them.

"Wow!"

"That was…"

"Intense."

"Yes."

Taylor looked at her father. He looked back at her with the same quiet wonder she felt.

“Well, you can’t say I didn’t make a splash.”

Her father smirked. “You made a little more than a splash, honey. This feels like a cannonball at the deep end.”

“I know! It’s great, isn’t it?” she replied, a wide smile forming.

In response, her father reached over and hugged her. “Yes, Taylor. It’s great. I’m proud of you.”

Taylor hugged him back, resting her chin on his shoulder. She looked over at Admin, who was doing a cheerleading routine in an outfit with a big H on it, and smiled.

She mouthed a thank you.

He nodded with a small smile, did a backflip, and vanished in a puff of illusory glitter.

Johnny watched those assholes swarming the building, keeping out of sight.

They had clearly noticed when those Union idiots started construction. Though the rumors of Dragon helping out with it were ridiculous. Just because the metal whore flew over the place didn’t mean she was actually involved.

He kept watching the construction site, trying to memorize where all the new shiny equipment was. If he wanted to make money off those stupid buggers, he needed to know what to hit.

From behind a ventilation shaft in an abandoned building, his dirty, unkempt face twisted into an ugly grin.

Nobody fucked with the Merchants.