"Aww, you do care," Anna said flashing a grin. "You even built me a proper bed and grew me some food so I don't have to eat chopped-up rapist wannabe."
"With another guest, it seemed best to expand the facilities. Do not give into your own hubris. I tried to make a list of everything special about you, but found I couldn't save an empty file," I said.
"How is she working out?" Anna asked.
I brought up a monitor. Hot Stuff was currently trying to navigate a maze of levitating platforms. She had yet to figure out that she needed to burn through the floor beneath her at set points. I'd have to make my verbal barbs a bit more clue-heavy for her.
"I've gotten an impressive amount of data from her already. There is some continued gain from the testing process and I do love the testing. I have room for you too, if you'd like to become useful," I said.
"You and I both know I'd be in one now, if I weren't useful already. Let's talk next step. Those targets I told you about still stand, or we can go for someone new," Anna said.
I didn't like her feeling too useful, and yet she had a point.
"I elected to further expand my research facilities and I'm constructing a genetics lab. I'm running into issues with supplies of building materials, and the labor to do anything," I said.
Anna watched sprinklers spray over a few cabbages that were growing in the new agriculture section in Hydroponics.
"Mechos, maybe. You and he have a lot in common," Anna said.
"Does he find you frightfully mundane as well?"
"Mechos is an upgrader. He can enhance and modify himself and his tools. He leads a group of cyborgs, who he has modified to the point they all have some version of the talent themselves," Anna said.
"You think he would work with us?"
Anna considered that and shook her head. "He is jumpy. They are all jumpy. Those like him and yourself are considered parasites by a lot of the other Powered. You can drain a part of what makes them unique and add it to yourself. We try getting diplomatic, he's only going to get scared and run."
That made sense. I was also not the best at diplomacy. For some reason people didn't seem to like me very much. Perhaps humans were always afraid of their betters.
"Then we trap him," I said.
"If you can bundle together an assortment of technology, I can get him here. Say I scavenged it in a ruin, sell it to him, and say I know the location for more—here," Anna said.
I noted how easily the idea of selling me out came to her.
"You do seem like the sort too stupid to keep such a treasure for yourself. They should believe this tale," I said.
Anna gave me a dark look and said, "This one will be tough for you. They're versatile, which means you don't know exactly what they'll be coming at you with. And if you come at them with too much of any one thing, they're likely to adapt themselves to defend against it."
Dealing with Hot Stuff, it was the sheer outlier nature of her ability that had almost overwhelmed me. Versatility, I could manage.
Most of my traps on the upper level were designed to be fatal. Spikes, saws, crushing walls.
Again, I'd spring my main trap on the Hydroponics level. Aside from the agriculture, it was a lot of space going unused and I could re-portion most of that into a maze filled with trickery.
I'd lure them there, seal them in and arm the traps above. Any who tried to escape would perish. Those who continued through the labyrinth and tried to get below would encounter non-lethal traps and I could take them alive.
Sleeping gas, concussive rounds, timed asphyxiation chambers. I'd load things with puzzles and riddles, and make certain to taunt them. I didn't have to get complex with my traps, I just had to make my victims screw up once.
Fall to one of these and they would be out of it—and become my test subjects.
I harvested a small assortment of technology for Anna to take with her. A part of the watering system and a nutritional monitor from Hydroponics, and a bit of the foam bedding from the Residential unit.
When I presented all of this to Anna she looked in the bag and grimaced. "I thought you'd give me something flashier to sell them."
I'd considered it, but then I thought of the Wasteland out there.
"From all that you have told me, the world finds them very nearly as unlikable as it probably finds you. Show them this and they'll see a place with farming equipment, beds, a place to hide away from it all," I said. "That's better than any technology."
"They won't just come to scavenge. They'll come in force looking for a new home," Anna said with grudging respect. "This will do. I'll be gone a few weeks."
"You won't be missed," I said. It was true. I had lots of construction to do in the meantime.
13
It took Anna three weeks to return—time enough for me to have set the traps and arrange the labyrinth. I was ready for my latest guests.
I also completed the genetics lab. It made me glad to have Anna back, I'd been wanting to test it out and see how it could perform on a real subject.
"They took the bait," Anna said, setting aside a small pile of guns. She was more armed than when she'd left, she must have traded for upgraded weaponry.
"Your foolishness was beyond their ability to question. Get undressed and report to the genetics lab," I said.
"Is this where you finally reveal your long-held plans to dissect me?" Anna asked.
"When you are still alive it is called a vivisection. If you are dead, I can't test my capabilities at upgrading you."
Anna actually did as she was told. Perhaps she was becoming more obedient, or perhaps she simply wanted the upgrades.
That I did vivisect her seemed to come as something of a surprise. Still, it was nothing that couldn't be undone and I got to test out the new restraints.
Anna
Age: 23
Height: 127.7 cm
Weight: 64.4 kg
Physical Stats
Values out of 10
5=Average
Allure: 8
Endurance:6
Strength: 4
Agility: 6
Health
Subject shows signs of recent malnutrition and elemental exposure.
Subject is upgradeable
You have 5 core points available.
Physical stats can be upgraded at a cost of 0.1 per point up to 10.
You also have the following options based on research.
Fire Matrix 0.5 points.
Temperature Regulating Virus 0.2 points.
Those were some intriguing options. I didn't have the points to install a Fire Matrix in Anna, and I wasn't sure that I wanted to anyway. For all that it had made Hot Stuff and her companions very dangerous, it also came with some major disadvantages. The tendency to incinerate clothing meant armor wasn't an option, and their power was rather obvious.
I ultimately settled for giving her the temperature regulating virus and upgrading her strength by one point. The results were immediate, her mass increased to 64.7 kg with the addition of new muscle tissue.
With that done I put her organs back inside of her and sealed Anna back up. It took a few hours before, looking pissed, Anna could storm out of the genetics lab.
"You dissected me!" Anna screamed.
"Vivisected," I said.
"You didn't even bother with anesthetic."
Really, she could be so very whiny. It was unbecoming. After all, I'd just used some of my precious points to make her better.
I'd been using my environmental controls in the hall to play with the temperature. I took it to fifty-one Celsius and then down to zero.