A New Day, A New Beast

[Laira Darkhold]

It only took Veira a few minutes to do a quick diagnositics scan on the Dantari. He and I were pretty close in height and weight; he was a bit heavier, and he lacked any noticeable defects or diseases that would compromise him during the testing phase. She injected him with a liquid form of coma gas and I loaded him up on the speeder bike. It would be slower going with three people aboard it, but it was technically possible. He was loaded across the saddle bags, she sat in front of me and I sat as far back on the saddle as I could and still reach all the controls. The old BARC bike roared to life and powered away, significantly slower than its maximum speed. Even still without having to stop and do wide angle sensor sweeps we were able to get back to the ship just after nightfall. We were fairly lucky that we made it in time as we could here howling in the distance when we arrived at the ship. I secured the Dantari in the brink, leaving him cuffed for the short journey back to Jabiim. Veira was quite pleased with herself, feeling that she had been integral to the rapid success of our mission. Whether that was true or not didn’t really matter to me, only that we had succeeded and I had a good time over the last couple of days.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

The trip back to Jabiim was uneventful, at least in terms of pirates and other such terms. It was a short two days back to the stormy planet and our cargo was unconscious for a little over thirty hours from the coma toxin Veira had injected him with. I was surprised that it was that effective, but it did give us some peace and quiet without having a hooting and hollering creature making as much noise as was possible. I had to stun him a couple of times to get him to be quiet, and then if he heard strange noises he would hoot from his cell. I really needed to get sound proofing, but for the time being just walking back to the cell made him hush up for fear of being stunned again. When we approached the stormy planet, I flicked on the comm system and reached out to Jabiim customs, “This is vessel YT2400807 requesting permission to land.” I called over the comm channel.

A few short seconds later the comm buzzed, “Roger that YT2400807, what is your current haul?” the customs officer asked.

I took a second to respond, almost instinctively saying personal items, “Two passengers is all.” I responded awaiting clearance.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

It took a second for the scan to complete, “Clearance granted ArmaTech Freighter YT2400807. Continue on current course into restricted air space.” The voice said. Good, no questions about the passengers. I wasn’t completely sure that Jabiim laws allowed what we were doing, but it had been agreed that it was a necessary evil part of the design process. We would complete the action with as little pain and suffering to the creature as we could, but it would not be perfect and was not without risk. The ship settled on the landing pad and I turned to Veira, “Why don’t you get your things while I go and unload our guest.” I more or less ordered.

“Okay,” was her short reply and she went back to the cabin and starting grabbing her things to take back into the headquarters building. I had to stun the Dantari again to put him in the proper cage, but he was back and awake within minutes, and I hadn’t even gotten the chance to unload him from the ship before he was back to growling at me and struggling against the cuffs. Pulling the repulsor cart I had loaded the relatively large cage onto was fairly easy seeing as he wasn’t able to reach out yet, but I hefted him into the building and placed him in a detention cell within the building.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

We had our test subject and Doctor Brand, Benji, and Kira had refined the design and were prepared to fabricate it. It was hundreds of small parts, reinforcing every joint, ligament, and tendon on the body, and would have to be fabricated specifically for each recipient, rather than bulk created. This was because no two bodies were the same and the minor differences could result in painful or disadvantageous side effects, such as bowing of the skeletal reinforcements. A full scan had to be taken of the poor dantari we captured and the set custom built for him. It meant that any attempts to mass produce the system would fail miserably, but that had never been the goal. Even a limited production model wasn’t the goal in question. The goal in question was to make a single system as potent as possible. As the fabrication began, really only Benji and Veira were needed through the process, the rest of us sat around or in Doctor Brand’s case micromanaged as much as she could. The creation of hundreds of small carbon nano-tubes, synthnet mesh, cybernetic joints, and proper anchors for the cybernetics took several days, and the key component, the spinal reinforcement took two days just by itself, making the process of fabricating the system take the better part of a week.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

The initial installation process was much longer, as the system had to be surgically implemented into the creature, taking numerous surgeries. I stayed out of this part of the process as I can’t help with any medical procedure, but Veira and Doctor Brand pulled four hour shifts with a two hour or so break every day, overseen by Benji who would not let this stage go unsupervised. His paranoia and disdain for cybernetics most evident at this point. He might be going along with the group but he was clearly uncomfortable with what was happening. Seven straight days of surgery, with nights spent in a bacta tank were wearing on the dantari, and although the spinal reinforcement and the entirety of the upper body surgeries were completed, he was technically only about half done, and it didn’t look like he was going to be able to handle another seven days nonstop without a good lengthy pause to recuperate. Given just that information, I was having some second thoughts. He wasn’t holding up well anymore and his vital signs had steadily decreased over the past seven days. I wasn’t the only one worried about this issue, pretty much everyone was bothered by it. Everyone was fairly emotionally involved with the project, so this bad news was being taken poorly.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

It was decided to allow the dantari to recuperate in a bacta tank for several days before attempting to continue the arduous process of installing the system. This was twofold, as it allowed the test subject to physically recuperate and allowed Doctor Brand and Veira time to themselves for a few days, necessary days to relax and get some well-deserved r&r before attempting to continue the series of surgeries. It brought to light several issues with the installation process. Also keeping him under for so long may be causing minor muscle degeneration due to his lack of movement or consciousness. I wouldn’t suffer from all of those issues when we installed the finished product on me, but it was still a concern that needed to be addressed.

After three days, other than his muscular system all his vital signs had returned to normal, with his extensive cybernetic enhancements seeming to have taken and been covered by his flesh. That was a good sign, as it reduced the possibility of a violent immune-response from his body. He had been given some immunoblockers but the fact that he wasn’t covered in infections was still a good sign. Another four days of surgeries, left his legs properly reinforced and assisted. The only thing left was the abdomen, the most dangerous and difficult implementation process.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Two more days of slicing open the poor dantari led to promising results. I full biometric scan of the creature showed his complete array of skeletal, joint, and muscle reinforcements, as well as the intricate series of cybernetic joint assist servos. Once he recooperated for a few days in a bacta tank testing could begin. Mainly the base line we had already taken for him would be tested by having him be forced to lift things in order to progress through a maze, where food awaited him on the opposite side of each obstacle. He wouldn’t understand why he was capable of lifting more or jumping further, only that he could. And after a month of observation we could decide whether the system was heavily detrimental to him or not. His brain waves and vital signs would be heavily catalogued over the next several weeks. With any luck he could be back on Dantooine without issues to his long term health, but that was with luck. Most likely we had reduced his life span by several years due to the extensive surgeries he had already suffered through, and with another round to remove the system he would probably suffer from risks for the rest of his short life.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

The initial testing went well, and the subject had a significant increase in strength and speed. The noticeable increase was hard to judge specifics in this stage of testing and monitoring, but it was supposed that the increase pushed the body to known human limitations. That was pretty much exactly what we had hoped for, so it was considered a success. Four weeks of testing, monitoring, and observation left us with only a few questions about the system’s capabilities and it was time to discuss refinement and true installation. “Well I believe we are just about done with the poor guy. Pulling all that stuff out of him is going to be risky, and he might be better off if we leave it all in him.” Doctor Brand said. She wasn’t wrong, installation had taken the better part of three weeks and had originally done a number on him and left him in need of serious recovery.

Benji spoke up in disagreement, “We agreed on removing it and placing the subject back in its natural habitat. That’s what we are going to do.” He said adamantly.

Veira finally weighed in on the subject, “I don’t think he can survive removing the system right now. Maybe given several more weeks of recovery or a few more nights in a bacta tank and a week of open space to get his muscles back, but as it stands, pulling everything out of him is a death sentence.” She retorted.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

With it decided that the test subject would require several weeks of recovery before undergoing the removal process, which itself would take weeks, we moved on with the project. Refining the systems, making them sleeker, and more aesthetically pleasing was easy, but making the system more efficient and more protected against EMP and Ion weaponry, which was entering into new territory. Doctor Brand had some ideas, but they were untested, “We can connect the power supply to the body’s natural bio-electrical system, allowing it to feed power directly from the body. It won’t increase your strength by much without a secondary power supply, but it will increase it somewhat.” She said.

It’s not a bad plan as it will insulate the system from becoming a significant detriment when affected by EMP weaponry. “Sounds good. How would you go about doing that?” I asked the woman.

“Simple. When installing the system I connect wiring from the power feed to your spinal cord. It will draw power from there, and shouldn’t be draining on your body due to the secondary power supply.” She replied. Good, it seemed like everything was coming together nicely. “And besides, it will be hidden under armor most of the time. If it becomes a significant problem we can redesign your armor to include a faraday cage.”

 

[Laira Darkhold]

The idea of walking around in a faraday cage wasn’t a bad idea, but I had yet to be struck with any electromagnetic or ion weaponry, so it was an unnecessary redesign at the moment. “Is there anything else we need before we get this show on the road?” I asked the group.

They looked through notes and datapads for a few minutes before any of them tried to respond, “It could use with a few fine tunings, but I am sure we can do that after the initial installation and fabrication.” Said Doctor Brand. It was a simple concept of do now, fix minor problems as they arise.

Benji floundered with some papers and a datapad, but refrained from speaking yet. Veira spoke up instead, “We need a full biometric scan before we begin working on fabricating the pieces, but other than that, I think we can call this project done. Except for the two or so weeks it takes to install the system into someone.” She said.

Kira nodded in agreement, “all the programming is there and ready to go, so my part is done.”

Benji waited until he was the last to respond, obviously still somewhat uneasy about the nature of the project. “We could run more test, do more observation, but it ain’t going to lead us anywhere usefull. Once we get the system built and installed into you we can measure baseline and combat enhanced statistics to go properly with the system and fine tune it from there.” He said, nodding in agreement. “Let’s finish this thing up.”