Stiggs adjusted the laser emitter with steady hands, reading off the measurement once the numbers had stabilised. The result made his face crack into a smile. Perfectly level, just as he and his colleagues had designed it to be. The round ring of the particle accelerator, inlayed right into the lower level of the Engineering deck with only the very top of it peeking out of the floor in order to keep it out of the way, hummed gently at him as it provided the secondary power source to keep the Matter Forge's batteries filled.
Or, should he say, tertiary.
The Matter Forge they had constructed could draw power from its own operations, from the Engine Core that towered out of the hole not seven feet away from where he knelt, or from the accelerator itself.
They were all linked together for added redundance. His own idea, he reminded himself with pride. The elaborate system of transformers configured to load-balance the new sources of power included.
He got to his feet and walked over to the first of their Matter Forges. They had plans to construct a number of them, of course.
But this was their first working model.
It's squat frame, almost like a clay-shapers kiln or a baker's oven, loomed at him from where it sat, partially inset into the wall. It was large enough that its back end had needed remodelling to fit into Engineering. So large, in fact, that its back poked out into the Science Wing on the other side of the wall.
Most of it was thick shielding to keep the tremendous atomic forces being played with at its core from killing everyone in Engineering with the radiation and heat alone.
With a tool such as this, they could build things as yet unknown to the world.
Weapons that could level planets.
Armour that could withstand the colossal forces of a nuclear blast.
Tools that would shape the future.
And the parts needed to construct a more pleasing body for Doctor Dala.
His face reddened at the thought. But that would have to wait. He needed to familiarise himself with some other branches of study before he could even start the process. Hearing the clatter of boots approaching him, he turned to regard the Mechanist, Scott Wollinski, as the dark-skinned engineer crossed the room to stand alongside him.
"She's a beauty, isn't she?"
Stiggs nodded and turned to smile at the Matter Forge once more.
"Yeah, she's a beauty all right. I can't wait to get my first time slot alone with her. With Project Hephaestus crossed off our list, now we get to the really fun stuff."
"So, they finally settled on the official Project name?"
Stiggs snorted, "You'd think it was a matter of life of death, the way they argued over it. Chris wanted to call it Project Vulcan. Lesko wanted to call it Project Cradle, and the Wanderer wanted to call it Filename 01-5."
Scott grinned at the last one. The Wanderer didn't have an artistic bone in his body.
"What finally settled it?"
"Joshua Graham told us that he would be damned before we named the Project after a Roman god and told us to select a different name. Chris wasn't happy, but he decided on Hephaestus as a compromise. Greek, Roman, they're basically the same thing, right?"
Stiggs shrugged at his own statement, as if he didn't care either way.
"But anyway… Chris got his own back. The Augmentation Project is going to be called Project Proeliator."
"What's that mean?"
"It's Latin for Warrior. The whole Science Wing is working on it at the moment. Should keep them occupied for a while. They'll need our help with it. Especially you and Ortal. You're our best coders, and they have a hell of a lot of code to write up for the new implants."
The Mechanist nodded. His long stint as the Head Engineer for Ishmael Ashur's Pitt had given him a wealth of knowledge and experience with efficient automated processes and the scripting necessary to achieve it. And Emily was a wizard with the RobCo OS. The two of them together would have a hard time keeping up with the demands for new code, but they could always call on the Wanderer for help.
Predictably, the Alpha had something of a talent for code.
"And what about you? What does Chris have you working on?"
"Project Ironsides," Stiggs said happily. He grinned impishly and reached into his pants pocket, extracting a piece of black material from the depths. Some kind of cloth or a cut-out section of fabric. He showed it to the Mechanist with an air of glee in his bearing and manner.
"Here, this is something that you and I, as fellow Roboticists, can appreciate."
Scoot studied the black material in his friend's hands. Upon closer inspection it wasn't a bolt of cloth or leather as a casual glance would indicate at first sight. The uniform colour and the lighting in the Engineering Deck had played a trick on his eyes. He reached out and took the material in his hands, running the tips of his fingers over the uneven surface.
It seemed to him as if it was a rubbery substance, pliable to the touch yet extremely tough. He bent it this way and that, studying it and feeling the perceptible groves in its exterior. It felt and looked like hundreds of black tubes, interwoven so closely that they formed a flat mat of material.
They bent and shifted, expanding and contracting as he bent and manipulated it with his hands. Curious, he tried to pry the material apart. It stretched but didn't give in to his strong and calloused workman's grasp.
"This seems familiar," he commented as a memory brushed against the back of his mind, trying to make itself known, "Like I've seen something like it before."
"You have," Stiggs confirmed with another wide grin.
Scott blinked and took another look. Then he realised what it reminded him of.
"The Wanderer."
Stiggs nodded vigorously, his enthusiasm overflowing at the prospect of the project he was now tasked with overseeing for the near future.
"It's a sample of his synthetic muscle fibres. The same stuff he used to make his cybernetic limbs. Its an offshoot of some of the work General Atomics were doing to create newer variations of Robots. This is the heavy-duty stuff they were making for combat models and heavy construction. They never got the project off the ground, though. Too difficult and expensive for mass production."
"What's it made of?"
"Different types of rubber and plastic, coated and interwoven with carbon nanotubing. The nanotubing is what gives it its strength and durability, the rubber is what keeps it pliable enough for use as synthetic muscle. But what really gives it its edge is the way we interweave the fibres. You see?"
He took the material from Scott's hands and tilted it to the light to show off the way the artificial light made the groves and ridges in the synthetic muscle apparent to the naked eye. It was difficult to see, as the muscle was all the same uniform matte black, but with the light hitting it in just the right way…
"It mirrors the structure of normal organic muscle," Scott commented as the patterns registered to him.
"Exactly," Stiggs said triumphantly, grinning at Scott in pleasure at the mans quick grasping of the mechanics behind it. "This is going to be the foundation of the Ironsides Project. We considered using exoskeletons like the power-armour frames to achieve the same effect. Namely, increased strength and speed; but the Wanderer said that a synthetic muscle suit would give almost the same level of strength enhancement without compromising mobility or stealth. Plus, it's more resistant to pulse munitions."
"You seem happy with that. I thought you would have preferred power armour. You were an Enclave mechanic, after all."
Stiggs dismissed the objection as he stroked the small section of synthetic muscle, relishing the perfect cross between synthetic and organic. It was perfection.
He could just imagine an assembly line of modified Assaultrons with trim, powerful hips constructed from this synthetic muscle. It would bend and flex in ways that servos and metal plates by their very nature, just couldn't achieve.
"Power armour is cool," he conceded, eventually, "But it doesn't have the right… feel. I feel like this is something I never knew I wanted, until now."
"Uhh-Ohh, I know that look," Scott said, suddenly clamming up. "This has something to do with Dala, doesn't it?"
"So what if it does?" Stiggs asked casually, still absentmindedly stroking the synthetic muscle fibre with a thumb. "At the moment she's a floating jam jar. Just listening to her talking about 'formography' should be enough to convince you that she doesn't like it. She'd prefer having a more… supple body. This synthetic muscle is the perfect material to work with on something like that."
"We've known her for all of a week and you're going to take it upon yourself to build her a new body? That's…"
Scott trailed off as he tried to think up a way to say it with a bit more grace. But, at his core he was an engineer. Diplomacy was something that happened to other people.
"A bit fucking creepy, right? Overstepping some boundaries? Normal people don't do that."
Stiggs barked out a stream of laughter at his last sentence, throwing his head back and directing his mirth towards the ceiling and walkways far above them, "Creepy? Admit it, you like the idea of Doctor Dala with a humanoid body as much as I do. At the moment she's practically stewing in repressed emotions. Give her a proper body and she'll be insatiable. And since when does Dala care about boundaries. Boundaries are fun. They make this great crunching sound as you drive a Sentry Bot over them."
Scott snorted at the jest but had to admit that Stiggs likely had it correct. He listened to his friend as the former Enclave Robotics Mechanic continued to outline his position.
"And normal people? Mechanist, normal people don't have the ability to do what we do. Build what we build. It's a false analogy. We don't know what a normal person would do, because they've never been presented a choice like this. And finally, what even is normal? Can you define it for me? Quantify it? Measure it?"
'Literally building the body you want to fuck sounds like a good reference point to me,' the Mechanist thought.Scott decided discretion was the better part of valour, however, and simply shook his head. Stiggs held out his hands to the side, as if presenting his argument to the judge and jury. Your honour, I present Exhibit A!
"So screw normal. Now, are you gonna help me build the sexually-repressed robot-lady an aesthetically pleasing body, or not?"
The Mechanist blinked but decided to be noncommittal about it, "What, like right now?"
"No, I've still got work to do. We'll work on it on the side."
They paused for a long moment, looking at the squat Matter Forge as their brains picked at the issue.
"What do you think we should make her look like?" Scott asked, finally. Not that he was actually considering it, of course. That would be creepy.
"Amazonian," Stiggs breathed out excitedly. "Wide hips, over six foot tall with a big chestplate and biceps that can bend steel like rubber!"
Wollinski blinked and gave his friend a piercing Look. Stiggs, for the first time in their short acquaintance, at least had enough shame left in him to blush.
"Don't judge me!"
"I wasn't!"
"Yes, you were! They all do," Stiggs grumbled to himself. "Everyone does. Hell, then, what would you make her look like?"
The Mechanist considered this. He was an eminently practical person, so function was more important to him than form. Not that form wouldn't be a nice plus.
"Dala is a scientist. She works in a lab all day. I think she would prefer a body matched in size to the surroundings. Slim hands and longer fingers to aid in fine motor control. Trim hips, perhaps more akin to a male body than female. Male hips have a mechanical advantage. Female hips are influenced in shape by the need for a birth canal, which in this case is superfluous. Breasts are also superfluous."
"Heresy!"
Scott waved off Stiggs's objections, "And while her body is probably still going to be able to bend steel like rubber, given how much force these synthetic muscle fibres are likely to be capable of generating, I don't think we should optimise her for strength. Think this through for a moment, Stiggs. If she does want to start getting more…. physical with people, which I guess is likely to be the case, it would be better to give her a body she isn't going to accidentally hurt someone with."
He regarded his friend and shrugged, "I mean, do you want to get accidentally crushed to death between a gigantically over-speced robot's hips?"
Scott watched as Stiggs's face took on a different aspect. Something between a grin and a leer.
"On second thought, don't answer that question."
Stiggs's grin widened even further. Scott, knowing how carried away his friend could get, decided to change the subject.
"So, what about those containers that we brought onboard back in Sol System? That base the ghouls found on Mars."
Stiggs and he, as if bowing to some unspoken agreement, both turned away from the Matter Forge and headed towards the ladder they had bolted into place for climbing out of the hole within which the Drive Core stood. Stiggs went first up the ladder, his heavy work-boots causing the ladder to rattle almost imperceptibly in its mountings. The Mechanist followed after him once there was enough space on the ladder.
"The Element Zero stuff that the Matriarch filled us in on? Sure. The physics behind it would give Albert Einstein a heart-attack and the eggheads in the Science Wing are throwing a tantrum trying to explain it, but who cares?"
He grinned at Scott as they set down at their respective workstations overlooking the Drive Core's giant bulk and fired up their respective terminals. Stiggs's smile took on an air of devil-may-care as he picked up a shielded metal container and tossed it up into the air like a small football.
It spiralled in the air then came back down into his waiting hands where he handled it like a basketball, spinning and rolling it between his palms.
"We're engineers," Stiggs declared with the casual self-assurance of a man used to handling dangerous machinery, "Knowing how something works is nice and all, but as long as it does work, I'm happy."
"Less chance of hurting yourself if you know how it works, though," the Mechanist replied.
He didn't really sound like he meant it, however. He just said it as a throw-away comment that wasn't intended to be taken seriously. Wasteland scientists and mechanics didn't tend to care overmuch about safety concerns, beyond what was immediately obvious. How else were you supposed to find out how something worked, besides playing with it until it revealed all of its secrets?
Case and point: Stiggs tossing a container of Element Zero up and down and treating it like an office softball.
"I'm going to have to sit down with Lantaya. Out of all of us, she's the one who knows the most about it. The Wanderer knows a bit, but it's all second-hand knowledge. I'd rather get it from the source," Stiggs supplied, still playing with the reinforced container of Element Zero.
He hadn't even seemed to have heard the Mechanist's comment about safety. Scott didn't spare it a glance, just opened up the folder on his terminal filled with his first-draft schematics for the new Matter Forges, intending to add another few pages related to automation. Ideally, they needed to get the Forges to a point where a command could be sent from an Operator's terminal to construct a certain item, and the process would be carried out by robotic assembly, then delivered to the Engineer's desk.
They only had so many Engineers and Scientists onboard. The more time he could shave off operating the Matters Forges, the more time they would all have for other Projects.
"So, you're planning to integrate Element Zero into Project Ironsides?"
"I'm toying with the idea. It's one of two choices for an integrated personal shielding system. The other is the Zetan equivalent. Here, check this out!"
Stiggs placed his OSHA-violation of a toy on his desk, opened a drawer and fished a pair of flat, disk-like objects from a plastic dish, underneath a sheaf of notes and a loose plasma grenade. He brought them out and showed them to Scott.
"These are the Zetan personal shields. Cute little things, aren't they?"
Wollinski took one of the flat red disks and held it up to the light, turning it over in his hands, looking for discernible markings or access ports for tinkering. Finishing his quick examination, he returned his attention to Stiggs, who seemed eager to discuss the particulars of his assigned Project.
"Now, as far as the numbers go, the Zetan shields are far superior to those based around Element Zero…"
"At least, as far as Lantaya knows of. It's been three-thousand years since she's seen the ones employed by her own people, so there is bound to be some improvements," the Mechanist cut in with an astute observation.
He was assuming that this was where Stiggs had collected the data needed for comparison. They had only just received the first samples of Element Zero for study. He couldn't imagine they would have been able to construct a working prototype in that time.
"True, but they mirror the biotic abilities Lantaya possesses almost exactly. How could they not, they work off the same principles?"
"Which are?"
"Well, as Lantaya described it to me," Stiggs said, sitting forwards and gesturing with his hands in a manner meant to illustrate his thoughts, but in actuality managed nothing of the sort, "In natural biotics like Asari, Element Zero collects in their bodies in-utero and starts forming tiny nodules up and down their nervous system. Self-contained clumps of Element Zero housed within the tissue of their nerves. Usually these nodules are inert, but when Asari concentrate upon them, they can channel natural bioelectricity through their nerves to activate the nodules."
"Element Zero responds to an electrical current by generating Mass Effect fields. That was part of the primer we got from the Wanderer," Scott nodded along as he ingested the information and made sure it jived with what he already knew of the substance, "I'm following you so far."
"Because Element Zero generates Mass Effect fields of a strength and alignment governed by the electrical current it is being subjected to, Asari can generate and manipulate Mass Effect fields as naturally as flexing a muscle. After all, it's all the same thing. Electrical impulses sent up and down their nervous system."
"Theoretically, it would seem to be," Scott agreed before finishing his friends explanation for him, "And presumably, the way a shield system based off the same processes works, is by performing the same trick of exposing Element Zero to a constant electric current within an artificially constructed matrix rather than a biological one."
"Precisely."
"Okay, I understand. Going back to your original point; so the Zetan shields are better?"
"At least on the surface, yes. The effectiveness of the Mass Effect field is proportionate to the Mass of the object triggering it. It needs mass to act upon, since that is the property the field manipulates."
"So, a laser would bypass the shield, because light has negligible mass?"
"Exactly right. So does heat and radiation, to a certain extent."
"With you so far. So the Zetan shields handle these better?"
"Yes, they work off a similar technology to the Matter Forges. They manipulate on a smaller scale than the Mass Effect fields. On the atomic level. It encompasses a broader range of wavelength and frequency on the spectrum, because at their base, everything is just atoms. Even light and heat are just effects born of certain atomic reactions."
The Mechanist listened and approved. The terminology wasn't as precise as he would like, but it made the point. He could see the process in his mind and roughly how it worked.
"So, it would be best to run with the Zetan shields?"
"Not necessarily," Stiggs declared with a grin that said all too plainly, 'I know something you don't. Please ask me to explain it, so I can feel clever!'
Scott obliged.
"Why so, Ohh great one?"
"It's just a thought, but I think I'm onto something…"
"Ohh god, the suspense is killing me," Scott said in the driest and flattest tone possible, as he took a bite out of a half-finished sandwich lying on a plate next to a greasy bench vice. He didn't bother to wash his hands, and which were black with industrial fluids.
"My thought process was like this: The Wanderer's nervous system is all synthetic, right?"
"I assume so."
"And Lantaya can't maintain a biotic barrier for as long as a personal shield, right?"
"I'll take your word for it," Scott said through a mouthful of sandwich with an industrial lubricating oil garnish.
"Of course she can't! Organic nerves can't withstand the electrical current indefinitely. They'd burn out," Stiggs elaborated, irritation plain in his tone.
"Of course. How silly of me," Scott replied, still in the driest tone he could muster. He imagined his voice sounded slightly smoother. The benefits of adding some lube to your diet, he thought offhandedly.
"So, if we hooked the shield matrix definitely into the Wanderer's cybernetics, he could use it in the exact same way that Asari do for biotics, right? And his nervous system would be able to withstand far more use of the biotics than an Asari, because the cybernetics are heavier-duty."
Scott considered this proposition.
"It would make sense," he replied after a while, "The structure of the matrix is exactly the same. I assume that the limiting factor is fine-tuned control? After all, since Asari biotics are tuned to their nervous system, this allows them to use it fluidly. Almost like a second limb."
"Right, that was what Lantaya said. The furthest her people had come to introducing cybernetics into the process are biotic amps. An implant in the back of the skull, hooked into their existing organic nervous system. It contains extra Element Zero and an internal battery. Basically an extra node that acts as a supercharger for natural biotics. They haven't attempted anything more complicated because of the dangers of experimentation."
"I can imagine. It would be the US governments research into Robobrains all over again…."
Scott Wollinski trailed off as his brain carried the thought process through to its logical conclusion. He met Stiggs's eyes, which had crinkled at the edges as he waggled his eyebrows in expectation. The Mechanist leaned forwards and stroked his chin thoughtfully.
"We already have the process of integrating cybernetics and the organic nervous system down to a fine art," he stated, continuing on his thought process out-loud.
"Go on."
"If we installed a shunt similar to that which the Asari employ for biotic amps into a human test subject…" Scott outlined his thought with both hands, one of which was still occupied by his sandwich. Some of the filling slipped out from between the bread and plopped onto the desk. The culinary mishap was overlooked.
"Then we could hook the Shield Matrix directly into the user's nervous system. At which point, it could theoretically be used as an artificial form of biotics."
Stiggs nodded, "Exactly. The organic nervous system would still be the limiting factor, though."
Scott finally noticed the lack of filling in his sandwich and gazed forlornly at his soiled desk. Then another thought struck him.
"Hey, how are we transporting and storing food on this tub? We aren't going to run out halfway through space, are we?"
Stiggs shrugged, unconcerned by the sudden non sequitur, as he refocused himself back on his terminal.
"We're on a ship filled to the brim with cryogenic stasis pods, genius. I'll give you three guesses."