Shaking my head I pulled my gaze away from the view of the city. I had noticed gathering storm clouds and couldn’t help but feel they were rather fitting all things considered.
Slowly I made my way to the elevator. I needed to speak to Michael about these cyber dragons, the changes he made to my communication systems and who knows what else without telling me. I had known about the dragon breeding but this was something else entirely.
The elevator pinged as I arrived at the underground lab, its doors opening to a narrow steel hall with faintly visible lights running along them leading up to a set of extremely thick solid doors made of an unknown material that seemed to hiss open slowly as I approached.
I ignored the various scientists and lab technicians as I walked through, making my way to the back area where I could see Emy and Michael. She seemed to be trying to console him. I could faintly make out her rubbing his back and faintly hear his muttering about how he will no doubt be reprimanded for it.
He wasn’t wrong as I soon stood directly in front of him, my gaze firm, watching Emy go silent and a shiver run through him as he locked his gaze with mine. “Care to explain to me about these various extra projects you have been working on without my knowledge or permission? Cyber dragons and this ‘spike of humanity’? How about the alterations to our communication systems?” I listed off one by one. “I am also rather curious about what else you’ve done without telling me and why I should keep indulging you. Even if I see a lot of myself in you, I do, in fact, have a limit on how much I am willing to tolerate Michael.” I warned him.
“I did promise you some surprises.” He told me half-jokingly with hints of a challenge. My response was to hit his leg with my cane before doing the same against his arm hard enough to knock him over, Emy rushing to his side as he tried to glare at me.
“Care to try again? I could aim for your face this time.” I threatened, making it clear I was in no mood for his usual bite and snark.
Getting back up with Emy’s help his glare softened somewhat and he sighed. “In regards to the communication stuff I had to change it. I did the same with almost all the ships’ nav-gear and even radars. On the outside they still look exactly the same but I gutted them, literally in some cases. I found out a few things you and the others overlooked or just didn’t notice. Hell, I wouldn’t have even noticed if not for my new assistants. Follow me and I’ll show you what I mean.” He didn’t allow me a chance to demand he tell me, instead rushing to a second elevator at the back of the lab. It wasn’t to some secret lab I had no knowledge of; rather it led to a rail cart that would send us to the breeding and testing grounds, a secure area outside of the city.
The trip was short, far too short to say anything. I had to restrain myself and feel rather proud that I hadn’t, in fact, hit him again. The reason was partly due to Emy seeming rather tense, sharing a worried look as she constantly turned her gaze between us, clearly wanting to say something but holding herself back as well.
He rushed out as soon as the doors opened, heading to what I realized was the rail car. As I approached the cart with Emy at my side I couldn’t keep the frown off my face at how it looked. It was so different when compared to how I remembered it. It used to look sleek and modern, like a bullet train with smooth lines along its side but now it looked like a box car, its door being slid to the side by Michael revealing its rather bare interior to us.
“I had to gut this entire thing as well but for different reasons but I did manage to keep the dampeners though. It also moves a lot faster now because of it. I adjusted the magnetic tracks to ensure it. We will get to our main lab in about five minutes now rather than fifteen. It will give me a chance to explain things since I don’t want to be hit again and I know you will do it if I keep you waiting. I also don’t want to be sitting with you in silence the entire trip.” He quipped with a cocky grin. Clearly his old attitude was returning and I was wondering if maybe I should have hit his head rather than his arm as I stepped into the cart with him.
As soon as it began to move his grin turned into a serious frown. He straightened up and met my gaze. “It was using our own systems against us.” He said, confusing me.
“The assistants I mentioned are the three specially grown dragons. They managed to see things my way as I forced them through rapid maturity. I took some risky shortcuts but they proved to pay off. It was through them I learnt what I did, why I made those extra measures and hadn’t told you about them. I shared what has already been made and works. I didn’t share the various other projects still in their experimental phase or I feel are a last resort.” He continued.
“You have just told me nothing of real importance. At most you confirmed more secret projects and how you’re trusting dragons with important matters, something I never expected from you.” I said rather sourly. I myself may speak a lot, drag things out or even omit various parts but that didn’t mean I enjoyed when others did it to me.
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“You’re right. Okay let me start at the beginning. Those three showed higher than usual brain activity. There was originally five but I had one dissected early and its brain studied. That then allowed me to modify the other four, implanting special microchips and bio-wires to a linking port and from there I repeatedly fed them human history over and over but something still seemed off so I took a risk. I started giving them the un-edited version of history. Through various programs I simulated every aspect you shared with me. One of them suffered a rejection so I had them terminated but the other three seemed to sympathize with us and through them I learnt some rather upsetting facts.” He told me. I nodded slowly, doing my best to keep my anger contained at him admitting to increasing dragons’ intelligence.
“And why did you feel it was a good idea? How do you know they aren’t just waiting to strike? To become another Leviathan from within our own base!” I snapped, my tone hard and cold but he could clearly tell I was holding back my rage. Even Emy seemed to flinch slightly at it.
“Because of the programming I told you about. They even insisted on a kill switch in their minds in the event they were compromised. They also brought many other things to my attention; things I’ve been working my damn ass off to fix over the six months between my original projects and other ones I began to counter it!” He said back irritated.
“And what would that be? What could possibly justify working with bloody intelligent dragons!”
“Genetic memories and psionic communications under certain conditions!” He shouted back at me making me freeze and narrow my eyes. “Explain.”
“Now you’re willing to listen? It started when I was looking into your curse. You and I both know it’s not some kind of bullshit magic even if your fellow council of idiots think otherwise and the smart assistants I made filled in the missing pieces. Leviathan isn’t some random new and smart dragon; it’s the god’s damn original leader just in a shiny new body just like what happens with you and the others. You mentioned taking slightly longer each cycle to assimilate right? It’s because of the memories needing to integrate into the host. What it did was somehow share that ability with you and the others. I don’t know all the details though so it’s mostly guess work but it seems like it was going to try and go full body snatcher on you while having the others ready to have the same happen with what I would guess to be whoever he found and could trust.” His words caused my blood to run cold. It made far too much sense if that was indeed what it had tried to do.
“But that doesn’t explai—” “How you and the others randomly end up in new bodies? You said it spat some kind of smoke or something at you and the others. It was a damn virus of some sort. When you all won the war, it spread to every person you came in contact with. It then spread from them to others till every single person was infected. I also managed to learn it works on a genetic level.” He told me, cutting me off.
“That’s why he can give true death; he removes or blocks whatever the virus has changed in the host and that keeps the person from coming back.” I said putting the pieces together making Emy gasp and Michael nod grimly.
“And that’s not the worst of it or how it might have even shared that 'gift' with others. While the genetic memories of the leader transfer over it doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen with the rest of them. Most are just slaughtered before the memories can properly settle since dragons live or have lived so much longer than humans. We think they’re domesticated but all we've done is kill them before the memories assimilate the host while those who live long enough to start their cycle, those who regain those memories are mostly content to keep living and pretending to be mindless beasts due to laziness or seeing how convenient everything is now for them, while except for those who have gone under his banner, who still want revenge for what happened to their race or feel they deserve to rule humans.” He continued, each word causing the pieces to fall further into place. “The missing dragons, and all this also leads into the psionic communications part?” I heard Emy finally say before asking the second part, her voice barely above a whisper before seeing him nod.
“Exactly, and it links to the psionic element because that’s how they communicate without words, why some dragons are considered runts or others are thought to be more intelligent than others. Those runts and smarter ones tend to act as amplifiers, living replay towers that boost what’s already there. That’s why using a bit of their brain linked up to optic nerves and a dragon’s eyes lets us have conversations over holo-vids with the barest of tech added to them while only needing to be set to the right frequency. Why an eye on the top of a ship linked to the radar systems is able to give such accurate details about what’s around them again with only a few bits of technology blended into it to make it work. Now let me ask you this, if all you need is the right frequency then what’s been stopping the Leviathan from all but wiretapping us? Either personally or by one of his agents?” He questioned, making me realize the answer was absolutely nothing. I had thought it was the frequency and tech part that did let them link together. Christopher was the one who had handled the technological side of the rebuild while I had focused more on the politics and military.
“That’s why I gutted our labs and offices first, then I moved onto the ships working from the highest-ranking captains downwards. It was brought to my attention by my assistants, their way of proving their worth.” He continued. “They hate the Leviathan and their own kind. While they do agree what happened wasn’t fair towards their race they also agree both sides were at fault but they had chosen to blame the entire race for the actions of the few. The leader’s influence was also overpowering them; it was the oldest of them and thus the strongest. Dragons growing stronger with age, rapidly after hatching but slowing after they reach adulthood at two years old when not pumped full of growth hormones and other chemicals. That rapid growth? It was for adaptability and a biological fail-safe of sorts. Rather than survival of the fittest the rapid growth let them change and adapt to whatever environment they were born in or grow in. It’s how we managed to breed lightning dragons for power or various kinds of metal dragons. It’s their biological adaptability and possibly why the Leviathan chose what dragons it did over the years. I’m worried it wasn’t trying to build an army in secret but rather breed an army that can survive in space and possibly be resistant to the bio-weapons everyone has adapted to using.” The last minute was spent in silence between us; Michael didn’t have anything else to say and Emy seemed extremely nervous. As for me? I felt this was further justification, more proof that I was doing what needed to be done. Humanity needed to be prepared now more than ever. We needed to prepare for the second storm but to do so I need to take the mantle of leader; to sit upon the throne of humanity and have them all listen and follow my commands for only I knew what is truly best, have seen the threats they ignore and refuse to accept our current stagnation. But to do that I need to wake humanity up, have us regain our fangs. I am justified; I am doing the right thing regardless of what the damn whispers say. There is no path to peace, no choice in the matter or other ways to do this.
