What's up guys, its Myyddraal here
Prepare yourself for another chapter of Jurassic Galaxy Chronicles: Erathem Mind
As always, anything that is recognizable from other outlets and sources do not belong to me. This is for fun, not money.
Colony of Shanxi, City of New Taiyuan, Network Tunnels.
May 20th 2157, 12:40 A.M.
For the average civilian, sewers are known for many things. Being the nests of drug addicts, gangs, black market dealers, and covered in waste and filth. What they wouldn't know is how the underground tunnels interact with sound. Unlike in open air places, where the sound can travel out in numerous ways, sound created in the tunnels bounce around them, making it nearly impossible to determine their original location and disorient the hearer. Solack, however, had lived numerous years of his life in underground locations such as this, wasn't nearly effected as most people would.
'The smell of this place, though, is something I never have and never will get use to.' Solack thought, grimacing to himself as he skirted around a growing pool of sewage from a broken pipeline in the wall. When the aliens had attacked the city, they did a major amount of damage to the network. Pipelines everywhere were burst or damaged, filing the tunnels with toxic, explosive fumes or drowning them in sewage. Other sections had just completely collapsed, preventing anyone from going down them. What was worse than that was it had stirred up all of the feral Ultraraptors and compys into a frenzy, though they were little match for Solack's biotics. Finishing off this terrible situation was that the lights in most of the Network was now offline.
'Now then, what tunnel am I in again...'Solack thought as he continued down the tunnels, carrying the M.I.U. he had taken from his now destroyed, and soon to be non-existent, lab. His body was safely sheathed in a powerful biotic shield, protecting him from harm while also giving him a light source. After what felt like hours, Solack was beginning to feel the creeping dread that he might be lost. Which could prove disastrous to him, because while his Biotics can last for a while, the battery on the M.I.U. will not.
As Solack silently contemplated his situation, he heard what was unmistakably the sound of footsteps and conversations, followed by gunfire and roars ahead. Solack paused at this, and quickly shut off his biotics, plunging him into darkness as he quietly crept towards the source of all the noise. As he neared the where the sounds originated from, he heard a rapid pounding of footsteps coming his way, and several distinctive calls. Solack would know those sound from anywhere, he had spent years around them. His biotics flared up, lighting up the tunnel he was in and temporarily blinding the charging pack of I-Rexes. What happened next would be a memory to chuckle at.
The I-Rexes where totally unprepared for the dramatic increase in light, blinding them and caused the larger three, which appear to have a very large amount Majungasaurus, Allosaurus, and Carnotaurus DNA to trip over themselves and crush two of the smaller I-Rexes, Dilophosaurus variant's by the look of the frills. The Carnotaurus and Allosaurus Variant smash into the wall, while the Majungasaurus falls right towards Solack. Seeing this, Solack sends out a massive biotic push at the Majungasaurus Variant, sending it flying as well as the rest of the I-Rex pack. Surprisingly, an Ultraraptor variant manages to make it through attack, still standing and hissing in defiance at Solack. Solack hisses a warning back, his body further flaring with biotic power as a powerful barrier wraps around him. The Ultraraptor Variant refuses to stand down, and lunges at Solack, intent on ripping out his throat.
Solack counters this by biotically grabbing it in mid-air, completely stopping the Ultraraptor Variant's momentum. Solack then proceeds to smash it repeatedly smash it against the both walls several times before chucking it at the head of the now standing Carnotaurus Variant. It bounces of the pale white titan's head, earning a roar of what Solack assumed was indignation, before coming to a rest down the tunnel. Even after all that abuse, it quickly picks itself back up and hisses at Solack. However, a deftly evaded warp that destroys the wall next to it quiets it down. Taking another look at Solack, it decides that the risk simply wasn't worth the reward it would get from attacking him, and takes off down the tunnel.
"One down, five to go..." Solack clacks, his biotics at the ready. By now the other I-Rexes are standing and have recovered, even the Dilophosaurus Variants didn't look too worse for wear even after being crushed by their large pack mates. The Carnotaurus Variants roar at him, shaking the very air and tunnel, and charge, mouths wide open, with the Majungasaurus close behind. Solack watches them charge dispassionately while he attaches the M.I.U. to a magnetic clamp on his back, before dropping into a crouch with a wild expression on his face. Biotic power gathers around him, coalescing into six spheres slowing orbiting him. Solack then springs upward, leaping onto the charging Carnotaurus Variant's back and slashes forward with his in a x-like manner, launching the six, now fully formed warps at the Majungasaurus Variant. The Variant is completely unable to dodge the attack, roaring in pain and fear as it's mercilessly pounded at away by the expanding balls of power.
"It seems you have forgotten just who is in charge here, allow me to remind," Solack screeches as he jumps off the confused Carnotaurus Variant, then darts to the left as he dodges the venomous spit attack from the two Dilophosaurus Variants. The two Variants were actually jumping and darting about, timing their shots so that they could keep a constant stream at him. 'Crafty little things, they've never shown this level of teamwork and planning before, well lets see how you like this!'
After dodging another volley of Venomous lugies, Solack aims himself at one of the Dilophosaurus and executes a powerful Biotic Charge. The Variant screeches in alarm, and tries to jump out of the way, but Solack manages to smash into its hips. The force of the attack was like getting hit by a large truck, and it sends the Variant careening and indenting itself into the wall. It was still alive, but it was severely dazed and was definitely out for the count.
After successfully charging the Dilophosaurus Variant, Solack turns to confront the other variant, but is met by the rapidly approaching jaws of the Allosaurus Variant. Unable to think, Solack reacts on pure instinct reflexively reduce his mass to near zero before jumping out of the way of the Variants jaws. The pale white beast barrels past Solack like a freight train, and struggles to correct its course, not having expected the saurian to be able to escape. Solack's arm snake out and he biotically grabs the beasts legs, and pulls. The Allosaurus Variant plummets to the ground with a crash, and awkwardly struggles to get up because it legs are laying straight behind it and its arms are completely incapable of pushing it up. Seeing that the Allosaurus Variant wasn't moving anytime soon, Solack breathed a sigh of relief before hearing the claws lightly scraping the ground behind him.
Whirling around, he launched a Biotic grab at the Dilophosaurus Variant that was trying to attack him from behind. He lifts the variant up and repeatedly smashes the Variant into the ground, when he hear a low growl. Solack looked across the tunnel and faintly sees the outline of the Carnotaurus Variant at the edge of his biotic light. Deciding that he has wasted enough time on this fight, Solack perform an overhanded throw at the Carnotaurus Variant, launching the Dilophosaurus Variant at it like a lance. However, the Carnotaurus was beginning to pick up on his movements and jerks it head out of the way of the thrown Dilophosaurus Variant.
'So this one seems to be the smartest one of the bunch,' Solack muses to himself as he and the Carnotaurus Variant square off on one another. Solack begins concentrating his biotic powers, the bright blue of his barrier turning slowly turning to navy blue to dark purple. Seeing this as its chance, the Carnotaurus variant charges, its jaws wide open for the kill. As it comes closer and closer to Solack, the color of Solack's continues to grow darker, until something that theoretically shouldn't be able to happen... well... happens. Solack's barrier turns pitch black, leaving a black outline of himself that is still somehow giving off light, and just as the Carnotaurus Variant is about to clamp its jaws down on Solack, the barrier explodes. Caught by the surprise by the sudden turn of events, the Carnotaurus Variant is sent flying down tunnel by the super-charged Nova blast. The other variants, having finally picked themselves and were general unfazed, were also sent flying.
'Let's see what they think of me now,' Musing to himself, he checks to see if the M.I.U. is still on his back. The device is still attached and reports no anomalies with in, which gives the Doctor some relief, though the battery saying he has eight hours left reminds him he is still on the clock. Solack begins walking down the tunnel to where the Variants originally came from, which he had been keeping track of he whole time he was fighting. As he passed by the Allosaurus, Majungasaurus, and Dilophosaurus Variants, they edge back and give low, sedated growls to him, recognizing his dominance. Their enhanced intelligence tells them that this small creature is dangerous and willing to fight back, and was most likely not even fighting seriously, like an adult dog play fighting with pups. Solack hisses at them in a aggressive manner, and they quickly scurry off down the way Solack came.
'Perhaps they will make it to the surface, there undoubtedly was quite a few tunnels I passed by' Solack thinks before stopping to survey the carnage that lay before him. There were cracks in the tunnel walls, roof, and floor, several large craters from where a Variant had been smashed into, and saurian sized hole in the wall from where a full powered warp shredded it. Solack couldn't help but be impressed and slightly shocked by the effectiveness of biotics in combat. Today most of the Alliance's top researchers and scientists believed it to be a simple scientific curiosity and the Military wasn't exactly interested in what they called "blue space magic". Still, they had decided to implant him with a working amp found in the Prothean Ruins on Mars to see if biotic were truly effective. Fearing what happen if he truly displayed his abilities, Solack deliberately performed poorly in the tests to trick the officials and get the scrutiny of his back. After all, the test and equipment they had back then wasn't very accurate or sensitive to catch him in his act.
Ever since he fled the Alliance, Solack had devoted a very large amount of time when he wasn't performing genetic research to biotics. His research and results, which could easily rock the Alliance and change warfare if they found out, contained performance models, implant prototypes based off the original Prothean one, theorized and confirmed upper limits of Biotic Potential based on species and Variant, and finally potential combat, medical, and industrial uses for biotics. This research now lies in one of the hard drives Solack carries with him.
"HA HA HA, I can't wait to see how the Alliance reacts to knowledge that Biotics are useful" Solack chortles out loud, as he make his down the tunnel to a maintenance room filled with shredded bodies, some recent, some not so much. One corpse in particular was a fat, orange saurian lying in a suspicious puddle ,where the upper portion looked like it had been crushed by a giant foot. What caught his attention though was that the corpse was wearing an Alliance Military uniform. Off to the side was another tunnel with a pair of battered metal doors. 'Hm, seems these escapees went for a little hunting first, but what would have caused them to flee...' Thinking back to the noises he heard when walking down the tunnels, he suddenly remembered one. The acoustics of the tunnels had muddled them, but Solack realizes that it originated from one of the Ultrashells.
"Looks like those things are still running around" Solack chirps thoughtfully, before cackling to himself ," Those aliens are going to be in for one hell a surprise." Solack makes his down the tunnel and passes through the ruined doors. Inside seems to be an office of sorts, and by the contents of the papers Solack picks up, a Red Sand Cartel to be more specific. That would mean the majority of the bodies outside were probably the cartel members, defending their turf. Well, it would seem they weren't very successful. As Solack looks around he notices a ladder hanging down one side of the room, which seems to be normally covered by a sliding wall.
'Well, quite interesting, seems like these guys had a few more brain cells than the average drug runners' Solack shakes his head at the novelty of it, then heads towards the ladder. Looking up, he can hear the sounds of music and faint gunfire filtering down from the top.
'Finally, a way out of this cursed sewer. I really must think about setting up somewhere nicer...' Thinking to himself as he climbs the ladder, Solack finally emerges from the Network after years of hiding. He wasn't very surprised that the ladder lead up to a night club, the two shady business' worked quite well together. As he wandered around the club, he took stock of what looked liked a firefight had taken place here. Bullets holes were everywhere, scorch marks told him that grenades had been thrown around, as well as... Solack stopped to sniff the air and chuckled. It would seems that the Alliance soldiers got creative in their fight with the Invaders.
Speaking of Invaders, he final comes face-to-face... or face-to-corpse with aliens that of caused him so much grief. Overall, he wasn't impressed by what they looked like. They looked like thin, metallic, bird-men, their appearance though was marred by the fact that they were riddled with bullets, slightly scorched and one even looked like its face had been burned off. While he, may have been disappointed by their appearance, the next emotion that came upon from in an instant was rage. These aliens, these creatures, have ruined so much of his, nearly cost him his life's work, and almost lead to his death. He still wonders how the escaped Ultrashells didn't decide to chow down on him. Anger and rage took over, and as his biotics flared, Solack snapped. Biotically grabbed the corpse, he flung them into the a wall. He threw the corpses with such force that they literally became blue grease stains on the side of the wall.
'So these are the creatures that have ruined everything, I will make them pay for what they have done!' Solack rages in his mind, his face twisted unnaturally in fury, while his biotics were flaring to the point that, if anyone was looking at the moment, the light could have been seen from blocks away. As he continues to rage, he doesn't notice his Omni-tool chirping at him. When it begins to making far louder and more urgent beeps, does Solack finally take notice of the message he recieved.
"I swear, if this from one of those gangs, I will..." Solack began to rage, but quieted instantly when he saw who the sender was. It was Mr. H, the elusive and secretive saurian who is one of his primary benefactors in return for eggs, D.N.A., and data from his experiments relating to the I-Rex. To him, and the other saurian he has agreements with, Mr. L, he was The Alchemist. Solack remembered sending a notice them earlier before the invasion had started, but why would they be contacting him now. Still slightly confused, he opened it and read.
Alchemist
I have a proposal for you, something you would find very interesting. The meeting point is specified down below.
Also, I have included information on a potential subject-of-interest for your personal research.
I will see you there.
Mr. H.
As he walked out of the club and down the road, Solack scrolled down the message, revealing the meeting location was to be New Taiyuan's Prime Center Hospital, the largest hospital in the city. Frowning, Solack began to wonder why he would be meeting in a hospital, and this one in particular. Since it was the largest on the planet, it took in a majority of the injured and sick the colony had to offer, including an entire wing dedicated to Alliance military personnel. Going there would be tantamount to walking into a Alliance Base. With the fact that he still has capture order on his head, he is not very keen on doing such a thing.
'Why would he want me to go there...!' Solack wondered, as he stepped passed by a ruined building, the broken sign hanging forlornly from a pole identifying it as grocery store, when it realization hit him. The hospital would be over flowing with patients, and almost no-one would be paying attention to a single saurian! Adding in the fact that the military has more urgent problems to worry about, Solack would have almost nothing to worry about. Chuckling to himself, Solack made a note to compliment Mr. H. on his choice of location before scrolling down again. What was displayed was a full medical report of a saurian soldier, a Corporal Carver N. Varden. Born in Montgomery, Mars, single child to two parents, and enlisted when he was 21 years old. Solack skimmed over the young saurian background and history, and finally came to a medical report, which caught his full attention. He has an evolutionary hiccup that has caused him to be significantly smaller than other saurian, the report also goes onto to detail an in-proportionate amount of strength for someone his size. By this Solack, was already beginning to shake with glee at the report, recognizing numerous traits he has been looking for. When he finally hit the bottom of the report, it showed a Carver's genetic map, which is stated to be an anomaly.
'It can't be!' Solack hissed, and dug out the hard drive containing the data for his previous I-Rex tests. Darting inside a collapsed building, he uploaded the most recent test, as well Carver's and compared them to the extremely complex map of the Original I-Rex.
One of the major crimes the Alliance accuses of Solack was his attempt to steal the complete template of the I-Rex, however, he was only able to make it out of there with a general genetic map. The general genetic map he had taken held no specifications and details to what the Original I-Rex was made of, but could still be used to compare how close a you are to the original. When the results came back, it knocked the wind out of Solack, and forced him to sit down. He unclipped the egg he had with him, Test Group 53-C, and held it before him, before he began to clacking his jaws in amusement. He soon was cackling madly, schemes and plans already beginning to whirl about in his mind.
Test Group 53-C had a potential synchronization rate of 80%.
Carver's Genetic Map had a potential synchronization rate of 95%.
As Solack slowly began to calm himself, a vicious smile grew across the saurian's face. Once he had meet with Mr. H and L., he would be paying Carver a visit. Whether he wanted it or not.