The most convincing

[Frost_Titan]

 

I'm going to omit a few details to keep the story somewhat concise.

 

The round started as any other with Tsar Konets, the deranged ancient Soviet Union IPC, starting out in genetics, a simple enough job to occupy time that would otherwise be spent over-engorging on APC power and yelling at staff over radio. So what more could a simulated drunk Soviet metal man do aside from humanize and torture monkeys, naera, and farwa from time to time? The answer is simple, he would discover the most efficient and normal method of incapacitating his genetic subjects, STRANGULATION! This sped up the process of gene modification without the worry of death by radiation, making his day horribly efficient and extremely productive without any event. That is to say, it would be if in fact Konets had ever even made it on station, the creature that took his place would only ever respond to Mr. Zeta, and even then the chances of getting a truth were far too unlikely to even risk; for unbeknownst to the crew, this creature of such ability replicated Konets appearance and form without fault to detail.

 

As Mr. Zeta occupied the work space and continued to strangle newly formed tajaran, unathi, and humans as they were freed from their primitive states, he devised a plan. Something that would occupy the entirety of the station in layers of deceit that even his fellow operatives could not cut through were they to be given a machete made specifically of narrative clarity; that is how complicated and drawn out this scheme was. So Mr. Zeta waited, biding his time patiently over the course of two hours, listening, gathering information and watching for all signs of activity. The first thing to pique his interest was Mr. Nu, he was reaching out for early help because he was an incompetent sod. Mr. Zeta sneered behind his false visage as their private network was utilized for the first time during the shift, a security gamble he had not wanted to take as he heard clearly "I may have been found out, I'll try to be more careful in the future" to which their esteemed associate Mr. Omega retorted with haste "Are you serious? are you the idiot pretending to be root?". None of it mattered to Mr. Zeta though as he calmly collected his thoughts and pushed aside their troubles, working with others was not a gift he possessed in his arsenal, much less one he desired even if it should mean their employer was dissatisfied with his associates.

 

Mr. Zeta continued to monitor the situation with the utmost clarity, taking key moments to drag off a cloned corpse in the maintenance hall and begin siphoning off their genomes for repurposing. This continued over the course of several minutes, he would chide to himself as he focused on the little things first, his chemical sacs would swell internally, disguised as micro-processing equipment while his cells became more adept at producing them at a faster rate, he always hated that part though. an admitted flaw as the tingling offset the cold exterior of his false body. This shell was necessary, though irritating as his internals continued to rearrange in helpful manners. after emerging from a successful "hunt" Mr. Zeta collected himself calmly and shut off the maintenance access, noting that four bodies could easily be accounted for, but no more than that or there would be too many questions to bother with; it was the bother he was particularly focused on as his tasks demanded him to be conscious of every movement until completion.

 

Around this time, a particularly nosey mortician by the name of Jack Boot decided to pry on Tsar Konets, he would deduce that if he watched Konets strangle a cloned genetic dummy, that he could better know how it died; despite having been told exactly how he was going to kill them in the first place, this would later be explained by his mad diving through the maintenance tunnels to scramble for supplies, such as corpses and taser guns, but that is another story. For the remainder of his odd "supervision" jack would chide in with odd commentary while Konets continued to work, all a facade to continue with Mr. Zeta's own evolution in secret. Around the time Mr. Zeta felt his glands repurpose in a manner that could allow nematocysts to form with paralytic venom, our humble mortician decided to take his leave, burdening himself with questions from security and the AI, a convenience Mr. Zeta took to disperse remaining genomes to his failing comrades Mr. Nu and Mr. Omega.

 

As the investigation continued, and the genomes progressed for the others, Mr. Zeta began to enact his plan; starting with recruiting the AI by forced logic. The AI was allowed to be informed of Mr. Zeta's activity in regards to genetic alteration, and led to believe a power was found in the form of matter consumption. This "manifestation" as it were allowed to the AI, was in the form of a probiscus that converted fluids from an organic plasma manner in to a state of lubrication and internalized efficacy. The AI was careful to make examination and record everything as stated by Mr. Zeta to meticulously hold up his plans, even helping it to note that internalized fluids did not contribute to a power supply. After deliberating with the AI on uses and ability Mr. Zeta would then take the opportunity to grab one of his objectives, a task his employer was particularly fond of having completed. For you see, on this humble station was a little blonde dog, by the name of Ian, a dog that had at one point managed to urinate on someones very expensive shoes; this would spur the task that was now at hand, a task that required proof of purging by means of meat chunks.

 

Mr. Zeta set out to procure his task with minor manipulations of a head, and the AI; both provided the assumption that cloning would be done to improve morale, and production of the crew. After an eager acceptance, and a minor situation about being told to bring the dog back alive, Mr. Zeta set off under his guise of productivity. He would fumble and fiddle for a half an hour with the dog, making it known to those in the work area that he had it and was permitted access to him for research, but claimed due to poor conditions and lack of sanitation the dog presented too many inaccuracies and failings in the data. Suggesting to the AI that he would have to be cleaned, Mr. Zeta escorted Ian to the dormitories wash room, cleverly utilizing the washing machine for it's namesake. With a minor giggle and momentary confusion with the AI, Mr. Zeta had clarified that he though a "Washing Machine" was an all purpose cleaning utility, not a rotating death machine; he would gather the meat provided as proof and continue to "test" on it, which would later be confirmed too clean for genetic testing overall. The response to this was having the humble mortician eat the extra two piece of meat while the third was hidden on Mr. Zeta's own person.

 

Around this time, our humble mortician Jack Boot decided to storm genetics with security, and demand testing be done on Mr. Zeta, a surprise indeed but not one that was without expectation by forethought. As the clumsy chief medical officer continued to try and jam Mr. Zeta in the cloning pod for a quick look, he would find that he just didn't fit. Something that Mr. Zeta openly stated as a being with sharp boxy shapes, being pushed into a cramped cylindrical tube. His complaints would fall on deaf ears though as his legs were quickly assaulted with a telescopic baton, they proceeded to attempt cramming him in again to which he appropriately responded with running, yelling back at them to stop, and for others to assist him. This chase would lead the group all through the station, landing precariously at arrivals in which another beating would commence, this time with multiple people assisting the crazed chief medical officer. After having enough time to raise himself, Mr. Zeta would make a decision to commit to his task completely, he had spent nearly the entire shift ignoring his "comrades" due to their inability to act, and he would prove himself a cut above by any means; there was a wild swing for the chief medical officer's crotch, in which he went down. The noises he would emit came like that of a deranged monkey (mostly garbles and spitting). In response with this, the head of security decided to stun and restrain Mr. Zeta, allowing the crew to continuously wail on his torso as the metallic disguise cracked and sparked under the short assault, the damage was very real but also very compromising if he were to let on to the excruciating conditions. While remaining resolute in the face of danger, he decided to restrain his nematocysts and carry on with the engagement; to which they swiftly drug him back to medical for the examination they so desperately wanted.

 

What would follow can only be described as amusement on behalf of Mr. Zeta, as they scratched their heads furiously while forcing him in various machinery to scan for organic cells. The commentary was bland and unimportant to Mr. Zeta as he followed through the motions of his current situation, giving accurate responses to questions like "Why did you run?" with "Because you beat me, several times in fact" but the people would not yield on his innocence for a moment, another thing that was accounted for in his convoluted plan. After all the machinery in medical proved to be useless, they brought Mr. Zeta to security for implantation, a procedure he assured them would not work since it is a neural inhibitor, and he had no nerves to inhibit. This blind bluff was only a half truth, but he knew regardless he could handle a slight "suggestion" for the truth from a loyalty chip, because the truth is such a close neighbor to his current lie. The chief medical officer interrogated him, requesting the AI for verification and recitation of records and logs between "Tsar Konets" and itself, further verifying the truths that Mr. Zeta was stating, even going so far as to question the chief medical officers memory as his answers were all the same as before.

 

In an amusing twist, the medical officer agreed with Mr. Zeta, and implanted himself through the left temple; something sure to do a significant amount of brain damage regardless of who had done it, but something amusing none the less. The proceeding events would lead up to Mr. Zeta arriving back at genetics after a lengthy search for someone willing to repair his mangled torso, the heat was a soothing salve to his false metalloid chest and helped to stimulate the micro-cellular recovery. but his tasks were not complete, the nagging gnaw in the back of his mind kept reminding him that his cohorts were utterly helpless, one of which willingly committed suicide to avoid compromise, an admirable feat were it true. Mr. Omega shared the same doubts as Mr. Zeta though, and carried the task of execution, alerting any and all remaining that Mr. Nu had become a target for compromising the situation. Like a flock of lesser beings parading around him the staff of medical and his associates continued to chew at his mind. Something even the most professional killers have to worry about is remaining calm, something that was quite easy when you remembered that you had no effective face, but it was quite hard to fake emoting as you had to replicate bio-luminescent cells constantly behind a false clear wall of seemingly glass cells. Pretty tricky stuff, but another story for that entirely.

 

At some point the chief medical officer had met his demise, a brain was the only thing that could be salvaged from what he overheard, but this was all unimportant, everything that happened now was unimportant because the objectives were complete, and he was free to board the shuttle. Mr. Zeta through secrecy, and convoluted planning had cleared his name, accounted for all scenarios, planned on swiftly dispatching the ineffective Mr. Nu if it had not already been done; all while boarding the shuttle for an effective escape and rendezvous with his employer, to then later have the irritating little implant removed and continue working. That is to say, how everything should have gone down. What I have neglected to tell you is that our humble mortician Jack Boot, was able to divine information that none of the crew had knowledge to, and deemed himself the only one able to restrain the threat, a vigilante to both reason and justice as he took after the committed Mr. Zeta, someone who had meticulously thought everything out and was perfectly adapted with paralytic bio-toxins to instantly kill this humble man, but had not out of lack of reason. He was quickly stunned with the vigilante's stun gun, and welded into a locker; but the calm could not be so easily lost after so much success in a day, this nosey man would not have the pleasure of breaking Mr. Zetas cool as he calmly stated the situation to the AI and crew. He waited calmly in the locker, deciding to mercifully render this pesky mortician unconscious then leaving once he was able, but the chance never came. He waited for over ten minutes but all he could discern from the locker interior was that the doors were bolted shut by the AI, and that this mortician would not be able to leave here before Mr. Zeta. Feeling particularly bold and proud of himself, the vigilante Jack decided to gloat about his success, and held up a paper stating that the drained bodies died from an organic needle, an act Mr. Zeta was never witnessed doing save for the AI who could not know better.

 

So the standoff continued for a time. and the span of time it took for those two to die was never really understood, some might even say that neither of them really did die, all that can be said is when authorities arrived in to collect the would be do-gooder, there was a locker with a hole expanding outward, and a mummified body in a lab coat nearby with no identification, resting underneath the empty chassis of an IPC dressed in white and green, it took four months for anyone to see it, but right there in the bottom left of what seemed to be the screen, right there on the inside of the monitor was a small inscription later to be discerned of specialized cells that can only be viewed from one side. When they finally noticed it, they posted a bulletin on information regarding a "Mr. Z" but that, is another story...

 

Edited December 21, 2014 by Guest

[Frost_Titan]

 

This is all that NT permitted be shown of the investigation regarding the empty IPC shell.

 

[johannhawk]

nice

[MarkvA]

That's one hell of a story. Thanks for sharing!

[Frost_Titan]

Thanks man, I feel like it's a tad cheesy though