Massive Disaster III-4
The helmet pressed against Caleb’s scalp—too tight, too evenly distributed, like someone had measured his head down to the millimeter and then subtracted just enough to make it uncomfortable. His spine ached from sitting in the metal chair for what felt like forever, his lungs catching with that familiar hitch that always showed up when he was nervous. Not the full-blown attack kind of catch, just the your-body-is-garbage-and-wants-you-to-know-it kind. He swallowed it down, tried not to think about his VEST sitting upstairs where it couldn’t help him.
White walls surrounded him, sterile and wrong. Nothing like Zedd’s actual workshop with its hurricane of parts and half-finished projects and sketches pinned up wherever inspiration had struck. This room felt quarantined from the rest of the basement. Felt too much like the isolation rooms back in Greater New York Memorial where they’d stuck him when they couldn’t figure out if what he had was contagious or just another episode of his body trying to kill him.
“Could ya stop… moving around so much?” Zedd’s voice drifted over from where he hunched over his omni, not bothering to look up. “Kinda screws with the, uh… calibration thing.”
“Right, sorry.” Caleb forced his leg to stop bouncing, planted his sneakers flat against the floor. His left palm was sweaty against the metal armrest. He wiped it against his jeans, counted to ten like the breathing exercise his doctor had taught him. The crystalline blue components embedded in the helmet dug into his temples, his skull. They pulsed occasionally with warmth that crawled through his scalp, followed by sharp tingles that made his teeth ache. “Feels weird.”
“S’supposed to.” Zedd’s fingers tapped rapidly across the omnitool interface, completely absorbed.
Screens everywhere. Six? No, seven. One behind him he couldn’t see but felt watching. Each displayed patterns that might as well have been written in alien language. Sort of looked like the brainwave charts he’d seen during his last extended hospital stay, but… wrong. Too complex. Metrics arranged in impossible configurations.
The crystals against his temples suddenly pulsed hot.
“Gah!” He flinched. “Thing’s burning me.”
“No it’s not.” Zedd finally glanced up, face neutral behind those blue aviators he never seemed to take off anymore. “Just seems that way. Neural feedback.”
Caleb swallowed the urge to argue. His scalp said differently, but Zedd was the genius. What did he know about neural anything?
“If you say so.” He shifted again, trying to find a position that didn’t make his spine scream. Three hours sitting here. Three hours of “calibration” and vague explanations and watching Zedd mutter to himself. “So… we testing my brain activity or something?” He’d asked this question twice already since coming down here. Still no real answer.
Zedd tilted his head slightly and stared at him. Something calculating in that look—like Caleb was a problem to solve, not a friend. “Something like that.”
“Look, I’m not complaining, but… I dunno, bossman… I just…” Caleb shifted, trying to find a position that didn’t make every inch of his spine scream in the uncomfortable chair. It was times like this that he realized how reliant he’d gotten on the suit the last few months. Now, the VEST wasn’t here, and he felt downright naked without it. A turtle without a shell all exposed to the elements and expected to be okay with it. “I’m just wondering why me. Why not Dev? Guy’s basically your right-hand man. Or Adele. She’s the one with medical training. Or hell, Kira, ain’t she your conscience?”
The half-smirk that flickered across the inventor’s face was quick, so quick Caleb half-thought he’d imagined it. “You were free.”
That stung a little.
Free.
Everybody else was off doing something important and he was just… the only available choice.
“Calibration’s done.” Zedd looked at him directly now, brown eyes piercing beneath the weird lighting as he raised his aviators to sit on his forehead. “Let’s start. Tell me about the first time you got sick enough to need hospitalization.”
Caleb found himself blinking in confusion as he sat up a bit. “Wait… uh, what? Medical history? I don’t… ” He cleared his throat again, feeling the helmet shift against his scalp. “Thought this was some kinda brain scanner thing.”
“It is.” Zedd tapped his omnitoolap, not elaborating. “Need a baseline. Answer the question.”
Still doesn’t answer anything. But Caleb was here now, and a part of him—the part that had always been desperate to contribute, to prove he wasn’t just the sick kid—wouldn’t let him walk away from whatever this was. Zedd had picked him. That meant something.
“I was six,” he started, the memory floating up from that murky place childhood traumas live. “Pneumonia, but not the normal kind. The kind that comes with complications.” He took a careful breath, letting just enough air in to speak without triggering a cough. “My left lung partially collapsed. Mom found me in bed, lips blue. Thought I was already dead.”
The crystals heated against his skin as he spoke, a steady warmth building. He noticed Zedd’s eyes flick to one of the monitors, then back.
“They stuck me in Greater New York Memorial. Oxygen chamber for eight days.” The chamber’s hiss still haunted some of his dreams—that steady, mechanical breathing that wasn’t his. “Mom cried a lot. Dad kept saying I’d be okay, but his voice did that thing, you know? Where adults try to sound confident but they’re actually scared shitless.”
Zedd made a note on his omnitool. “What about after that? Other hospitalizations?”
Caleb’s fingers twitched, muscle memory reaching for the inhaler he no longer carried—replaced by better meds on New Abraham. “Yeah. Bunch of ’em. Collapsed lung when I was twelve—snapped a rib coughing and it punctured right through. Full respiratory failure at fifteen during finals week.”
He paused, watching Zedd’s face for any reaction, finding none. “Got the test rescheduled though. Still passed.”
“Interesting,” Zedd murmured, though Caleb wasn’t sure what part he found interesting. “You mentioned family history?”
Caleb nodded, feeling the helmet slide slightly. He reached up to steady it, fingers brushing against hot crystal. “Yeah. Had a grandpa with a buncha greats in front of him—Steven something. Guy had everything wrong with him. Scarlet fever, pneumonia, asthma, heart arrhythmia, scoliosis. Died young-ish. Fifty-something. But before that, he was some kinda artist. Did propaganda posters during the Second World War.”
He took another careful breath. “Way my dad explained it, he was like a vorcha DNA-wise. Anything that hit him stuck around, left marks. Only he didn’t get the healing factor that came with it.” Caleb shrugged. “What he had was supposed to be bred out generations ago and fixed with gene therapy, but here I am.”
“Genetic regression,” Zedd noted, not looking up. “Recessive traits reappearing. How did it feel when the doctors told your parents you might not make it that first time?”
The question hit differently. Not medical fact. Emotion. The crystals heated noticeably where they pressed against his skin.
“I was six,” Caleb said, defensive. “Don’t remember much.”
“But you do remember something,” Zedd pressed, his attention unwavering now, focused like a laser. “Emotional responses imprint differently than factual recollection.”
Caleb swallowed. “Scared, I guess. But not like, for me? For them. Mom and Dad.” The memory flickered—antiseptic smell, blue-white lighting, his father’s face arranged in what he thought was a reassuring smile, tension bleeding through every line. “Dad held it together in the room, then I saw him sobbing in the hallway when he thought I was asleep. That scared me more than anything the doctors said.”
Something flickered across Zedd’s face—satisfaction? He made another note. “Tell me about your most recent hospitalization before leaving Earth.”
“Seven months before departure.” Caleb winced as the helmet seemed to constrict slightly, probably just his imagination. “Respiratory infection that spread to my bloodstream. Sepsis. Two weeks in isolation. Missed my acceptance interview for the colonial program—had to do it over vid-call from the hospital bed.”
Zedd looked up, quirking an eyebrow. “That would normally disqualify candidates.”
“Yeah, well.” Caleb managed a smile he hoped was as real as he wanted it to look. “Dad wanted me to be happy so he cashed in some favors. And I’m good with my hands. Colony always needs techs.”
“Hmm.” Zedd’s attention returned to the omnitool on his wrist, the tone of his voice sounding less caring than Caleb was used to. “What would you have done if they’d rejected you?”
“Found another way.” The answer left his lips quicker than he expected and with a lot more force than he had in mind, surprising himself a little. “Look… it’s just… New Abraham was my only shot. Earth was just killing me… All of it, the pollution, the crowds, the constant viral exposures. Couldn’t stay.”
Zedd nodded, another hum escaping his lips.”So desperation, then.”
“No,” he answered back, jaw a little tight as he tried not to get angry. “Determination, bossman. There’s a difference.”
“Is there?” Zedd looked directly at him again, something calculating in his eyes. “You watched your symbiont die. What was it like?”
The question came out of nowhere, making no sense at alll. Caleb blinked, his mouth falling open as he wondered if he’d heard something wrong. “What? What’s a symbiont? I don’t have one of those… I think?.”
“Just checking if you’re paying attention.” Zedd smirked again, the other man winking at him out of nowhere. “You’d be surprised how many people answer questions they don’t understand.”
Weird test, though. Even still, despite not quite getting it, Caleb nodded slowly. “Guess that makes sense.”
“Describe a situation where you felt truly helpless.”
The monitoring equipment pulsed, the screens changing patterns as Caleb fought the urge to fidget.
“Look, what’s this got to do with—”
“Just answer the question, Caleb”, Zedd interrupted, sounding more like a rude doctor every minute. “It’s not that hard, man.”
Caleb inhaled slowly, eyes closed. One, two, three, four…
He let out a long low breath of air. “Fine. I was sixteen, okay. Woke up in the middle of the night… and I couldn’t breathe. Chest was on fire… couldn’t reach my inhaler. Parents were at work, you know night shifts. No one to call for help.” The memory was a hard one, one of the scariest moments in his life, being honesty. “Dragged myself across the floor to the med cabinet. Ending up passing out halfway there. Woke up in the hospital three days later.”
The helmet felt heavier suddenly, the crystals pulsing warm-hot-warm against his skull. One of the monitors beeped loudly.
“You’re upset,” Zedd noted, as if commenting on the weather.
“Yeah, recalling near-death experiences tends to do that.” Caleb couldn’t keep the edge from his voice. “Can we move on?”
“Of course.” Zedd shifted slightly. “You have a reactive defibrillator implant. When did you receive that?”
Caleb blinked, hand instinctively moving to his chest where the small device was embedded beneath his left collarbone. “Seventeen. After three cardiac events in six months.” He frowned. “How’d you know about that? It doesn’t show up on standard scans.”
“Your medical file,” Zedd answered, too smoothly. “Colony medical maintains comprehensive records.”
Bullshit, Caleb thought. He’d asked his colony doc to keep that information private, not wanting to have to deal with any additional restrictions at work. But he let it slide either way. Just like Zedd to know things he shouldn’t.
“Let’s change direction,” Zedd said, glancing up from his omnitool “You’ve described physical experiences. Now I’m interested in ethical perspectives.”
Caleb’s shoulders tensed. “Meaning?”
“A simple scenario.” Zedd leaned forward, elbows on knees, suddenly intense. “You see a turtle on its back in the hot sun. You don’t help. Why not?”
Caleb frowned. “What? I would help it.”
“Interesting.” Zedd made a note. “Describe the benefits of cruelty.”
“There aren’t any.” Caleb’s frown deepened.
“Really? Wake me from a dead sleep and I could give you like five,” Zedd answered back without breaking eye contact.
The frail young man stared in disbelief. “What kind of question is this?”
“The kind that measures empathic response.” Zedd looked up. “You discover a cure for your condition. Complete cure. Normal life expectancy. No limitations. But it requires an illegal procedure. Would you pursue it?”
The crystals buzzed against Caleb’s skin, making his brain feel fuzzy even as his focus seemed to tighten. “Depends what ‘illegal’ means. Tax evasion illegal or hurting people illegal?”
“The procedure itself doesn’t harm anyone,” Zedd clarified, expression blank as he leaned back in his own seat. “But just getting the necessary ingredients and components would involve theft from a research facility.”
The discomfort prickling up his spine didn’t fade, even as he tried to consider the question as best he could. “No one gets hurt? Just… property crime?”
“You are correct.”
“Then… maybe. Probably.” Caleb shifted, the admission making him uncomfortable. “Not proud of it, but yeah.”
Zedd nodded, seemingly satisfied. “What if the components were already being used to treat another patient? Your theft would mean they lose access.”
“That’s different.” Caleb frowned. “They’re already benefiting. I wouldn’t take that away.”
“Even if their condition was less severe than yours?” He raised an eyebrow. “Less immediately life-threatening?”
“Medical treatment is a… it isn’t a competition,” Caleb said, his temples feeling like they were oddly tight. “If it’s already helping someone, it’s theirs.”
“Then what do you consider triage?”
Caleb’s mouth fell open. “I..”
Zedd’s expression didn’t change, but something in his eyes did—a sharpening of focus as he skipped right past that. “You’re in a desert, walking along the sand when you look down and see a tortoise. You reach down and flip it over on its back. The tortoise lies there, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over. But it can’t. Not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why?”
“I… what?” Caleb blinked, thrown by the bizarre scenario. “I just told you I would help a turtle. Why would I flip it over in the first place? That’s messed up.”
“Just answer the hypothetical.”
“The hypothetical doesn’t make sense. I wouldn’t do that.”
Zedd studied him for a moment, then shifted tracks. “What if you could steal someone else’s healthy lungs to replace your failing ones? They’d die, but you’d live a normal life. Would you do it?”
“Jesus Christ, no!” Caleb jerked back like he’d been slapped, the helmet shifting painfully. “What the fuck kind of question is that?”
But even as reflexive horror surged through him, something deep and shameful flickered in the back of his mind—a split-second fantasy of what it would feel like to breathe normally. To run without gasping. To live without fear.
The crystals burned against his skin.
“Just a scenario,” Zedd said mildly, eyes fixed on the monitors. “Let’s try another. You’re offered experimental treatment. Ninety percent chance of full recovery, ten percent chance of death. Do you take it?”
“Yes.” No hesitation there. “Those are good odds.”
“What about eighty-twenty?”
“Still yes.”
“Seventy-thirty?”
Caleb swallowed. “Probably.”
“Fifty-fifty?”
A longer pause. “I don’t know.”
“You come across a child drowning in a pool. You’re wearing an expensive suit. Do you jump in?”
“Of course.” Caleb didn’t understand the purpose of these questions. “What does the suit have to do with anything?”
“Calculating value trade-offs.” Zedd made another note. “What if the treatment has never been tested on humans before? Unknown probability of success. Unknown side effects. But promising results in simulation.”
“I’d want more information.” Caleb’s brow furrowed, the hypotheticals starting to feel less random, more targeted. “What kind of treatment are we talking about?”
Zedd ignored the counter-question. “If you could cure your condition by testing dangerous treatments on unwilling subjects, how many deaths would be acceptable?”
“None.” Caleb didn’t even think, the word just erupted all on its own. His body tensed, heart slamming against his ribs. “What the hell kind of question is that?”
“Everyone’s got a line,” Zedd said, twirling his stylus between his fingers. Not looking up. Too casual. “One life for a thousand, ten for a million. Y’know. Basic trolley problem.”
“That’s completely different.” The monitor betrayed him, beeping faster as his pulse kicked up. Stupid machine. “You’re talking about killing people to fix me. Specifically me.”
“Mmm. Interesting distinction.” Zedd scribbled something on his datapad. Still not looking up. “So what’s your number then? Ten deaths? Five? Just one?”
“Jesus—none!” The chair arms creaked under Caleb’s grip. “Nobody’s worth that. Not worth killing for.”
Zedd’s eyes finally flicked up, studying him for three solid heartbeats. “So you’d rather suffer than hurt somebody else.”
“That’s not—” His chest tightened, the familiar weight settling between his ribs. Words tangled in his head, never coming out right. “It’s not about suffering, man. It’s just basic human decency.”
“What about non-humans?”
Caleb blinked. “What?”
“You okay with treatments tested on aliens? Lab pyjaks? VIs with pain responses?”
The crystals burned against his temples while the pounding in his head intensified. Like someone taking a hammer to his skull from the inside.
“Is there a damn point to all this?” He gestured at the screens with their incomprehensible readings. “This isn’t a brain scan. This is some kinda messed-up psych test.”
“Just collecting data.” Zedd shrugged one shoulder. “You find a kid torturing animals. What do you do?”
“Get them help. Immediately.” The questions were giving him whiplash, each one slamming into him before he could recover from the last. “Everyone knows that’s how you get serial killers.”
“Genetic modification. Permanently fixes your condition, but might change parts of your personality. You in?”
Caleb’s mouth hung open. Nobody had ever offered—it wasn’t even possible as far as he knew. “I… I dunno.”
“Which parts could you lose? Creativity? Sense of humor? Emotional range?”
“Christ, I haven’t—” The question prodded places he’d never looked at, corners he’d bricked up long ago. “Who even thinks about this stuff?”
“More people than you’d think.” Zedd leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. His glasses slipped down, revealing eyes that were too focused, too calculating. “Everyone’s got a price, Caleb.”
“I’m not everyone.” His voice came out tight, strangled by something beyond the usual broken machinery in his chest. “And I’m not some equation.”
“Everything’s an equation.” Zedd’s voice stayed flat, almost bored. “Pain-free existence. Normal lifespan. Enhanced capabilities. What’s your number?”
“What are you really after here?” The question had been building for hours, finally pushed through clenched teeth. “This isn’t random. These questions feel targeted.”
“You’re in a desert.” Zedd ignored him completely. “You see a tortoise on its back—”
“You already asked me that!” Heat flashed through Caleb’s face. “I’d help it. How many different ways can I say it?”
“Different tortoise.” That half-smile again. “What if helping triggers an attack? Middle of nowhere. No meds. No people for miles.”
“I’d still—” He stopped, swallowed. “I’d figure something out. Use my shirt to grab it or whatever.”
“So compromise. Self-preservation with a side of good deed.”
“If that’s how you wanna see it.”
Zedd nodded like Caleb had confirmed something important. “Your ship’s sinking. Lifeboat fits ten. Eleven people left. What do you do?”
“Stay behind.” The answer came without thought. Then he felt weird about how automatic it was. “I mean… probably. Yeah.”
“Why you?”
“Living on borrowed time anyway.” The truth slipped out raw, unfiltered. “Since I was six. We all know it.”
Zedd tilted his head slightly. “Empathy and survival. How d’you see those connecting?”
“They work together,” Caleb said. “People survived by cooperating, looking out for each other.” He shifted in the chair, trying to find a position where his spine didn’t scream at him. “Can’t build anything without that basic trust.”
“Empathy gets you killed in crisis,” Zedd said, tapping something into his omni again. “The guy who stops to help gets eaten by the bear too.”
“Yeah, sometimes.” Caleb’s neck was starting to cramp from the helmet’s weight. “But what’s the point of surviving if we’re all just… animals? Gotta be something worth living for.”
The questions kept coming, one after another. Would he trade years of his life for better quality now? Accept treatment that had killed people in testing? Choose to fix his lungs over his heart, or vice versa? The helmet got hotter against his skin as time passed, monitors tracking every twitch and hesitation.
His chest felt tight. Not attack-tight, but the slow pressure of tension building beneath his ribs.
“Here’s one,” Zedd said, looking up from his notes. “Button on the table. Press it, random person dies, you’re completely cured. Don’t press, nothing changes. What d’you do?”
“Not press it.” The answer came automatically.
“What if they’re terminal? Few days left, lots of pain.”
“Still no.” It took longer this time. “Not my call.”
“They consented. Signed a form. Volunteered specifically.”
“No.” Caleb frowned. “That’s just… passing the buck on suicide.”
“Last question.” Zedd set his pad down. “Treatment exists that’ll fix everything wrong with you. One hundred percent cure. But it came from experiments on unwilling subjects. People died. Already happened though, all in the past. Nothing you do changes that history. You take it?”
Something clicked in Caleb’s head. “Is that what this is?” His voice came out rough. “You building something? Testing it on me?”
“Hypothetical,” Zedd said flatly.
“Bullshit.” The word felt good coming out. Real. “This isn’t just some brain scan. All these questions—” He gestured at the equipment. “What’s really going on here?”
“Just answer.” Zedd’s voice hardened. “Treatment exists. Harm’s already done. Yes or no?”
The pressure in Caleb’s chest burst. “I didn’t drag myself off Earth just to become the kind of person who’d climb over bodies to get better.” The words came from somewhere he hadn’t known existed inside him. “Not then, not now, not ever.”
The helmet went crazy, monitors lighting up. Zedd’s mouth curved just slightly, satisfied, as he made a final note.
“We’re done.” He stood up. “You can go.”
“Just like that?” Caleb stared at him.
“Just like that.” Zedd lifted the helmet off carefully, revealing hot red marks on Caleb’s skin. “Hold still.” He ran a scanner over Caleb’s head, blue light washing over his scalp. “Standard procedure.”
Caleb knew bullshit when he heard it. Nothing standard about any of this.
“What was this really for?” He grabbed Zedd’s wrist as the scanner pulled away.
Zedd looked at him, something flicking behind his eyes. “Brainwaves. Emotional responses. Cognitive patterns.” He gently broke Caleb’s grip. “Nothing to worry about.”
The explanation felt rehearsed. Hollow. But Zedd was already heading for the door.
“Get some rest,” he said without turning around.
Caleb followed him out on unsteady legs, head buzzing with something that wasn’t quite pain. The door opened to reveal the familiar chaos of the main lab.
“Tomorrow, same time?” Zedd asked, suddenly casual.
“You want to do this again?”
Zedd nodded. “Different tests. Similar setup.” He gave Caleb that look, the one that made him feel seen in ways no one else bothered with. “Unless you’d rather not.”
“Yeah, fine. Tomorrow.” Caleb agreed despite the warning voice in his head. Something about being useful, being necessary, being chosen—it felt too good to walk away from.
Even if he had no idea what for.
– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –
Zedd watched the security feed in silence as Caleb made his way through the main lab and up the stairs, tracking his movements until the feed confirmed he’d left the building entirely.
“ADAM, secure the lab. Full blackout protocols.”
“Initiating blackout,” the AI confirmed, the lab’s lighting shifting to a dimmer, blue-tinted setting as security measures activated around the perimeter. “The lab is secure.”
The simple displays Caleb had seen blinked out, replaced by holographic readouts of far greater complexity—detailed psionic measurements, genetic markers, neural pathway mapping. Zedd moved to the center of the room, hands spreading to physically manipulate the floating data, pulling apart sections to compare Caleb’s results against baseline human standards.
The blue crystalline fragments from the helmet lay on a nearby workbench, their true purpose now clear—psionic measurement devices, not the simple brainwave monitors he’d claimed.
“Analysis complete,” ADAM announced. “Subject displays Class C psionic potential. Untrained but naturally occurring.”
“Better than I expected from someone with no prior exposure,” Zedd murmured, focusing on specific data points that showed spikes of activity during the moral questioning. The highest readings had come at the moments of greatest emotional intensity—anger, indignation, that flash of shame when Caleb had momentarily considered the unethical scenario.
Zedd moved to a seemingly blank section of wall, pressing his palm against an unmarked panel. The floor opened silently, revealing a hidden storage compartment containing devices clearly not of his own design—more alien than human, with flowing lines and geometric patterns etched into surfaces that seemed to shift under direct observation.
He reached in, extracting a small device similar to the helmet Caleb had worn, but more compact, more refined. The contact points where crystalline components had pressed against temples were more numerous here, more precisely arranged.
Memory slammed into him as his fingers closed around the device—himself at thirteen, but not himself. Ezekiel Powers, recruited by ADVENT for his “special aptitude,” working in sterile labs with alien tech, learning the fundamentals of psionics, MELD integration, genetic manipulation. The sense of wrongness that accompanied these memories never fully subsided, his mind still struggling to integrate knowledge from a life he’d never actually lived.
“MELD synthesis status,” he said, setting the psionic amplifier on the workbench.
“Currently at 12% efficiency,” ADAM replied. “Cellular rejection remains problematic. Last test batch degraded after 46 hours of stabilization.”
Zedd nodded, unsurprised. The psionic amplifier was functioning, but the MELD synthesis was proving more challenging. “Show me the latest rejection cascade.”
A new hologram materialized—cellular structures breaking down as the orange MELD substance triggered immune responses. The pattern was familiar from previous failures, but with subtle differences that suggested they were moving in the right direction.
“Once again, boss, I have to say that everything you’re planning is patently illegal according to the Citadel and Alliance,” ADAM noted with the particular tone he adopted when delivering unwelcome reminders.
“And that’s why we don’t enter or do business in their territory, ADAM.” Zedd moved to another wall section, activating a hidden panel with a single touch of his palm. The wall slid away, revealing a laboratory space far more advanced than anything he had let Caleb see—a prototype psionic amplifier, more sophisticated than what he’d worn; a MELD synthesis chamber, glowing orange substance contained behind transparent barriers; modified VEST designs incorporating neural interfaces and enhancement systems; and dissected nanomachines under containment fields.
“Project GUARDIAN current status,” ADAM displayed across the main holographic interface, progress reports spreading out beneath the heading:
MELD production at 12% efficiency. Cellular rejection remains problematic.
Psionic amplification successful according to simulations.
Nanomachine integration with biological tissue showing 68% compatibility.
Neural interface degradation at 28 hours—unacceptable for sustainable enhancement.
Zedd studied the reports, frustration building at the specific technical barriers still in their way. “The neural interface degrades too quickly. We need a more stable bonding agent.” He pulled up molecular models, manipulating them with quick gestures. “The MELD should be acting as that agent, but the synthesis is still imperfect.”
His knowledge of human augmentation from multiple sources created unexpected integration challenges—augmentation insight from one base providing the fundamental understanding, but ADVENT technology requiring different implementation methods. The disconnect between what he knew theoretically and what he could practically implement with current materials was maddening.
But Caleb’s results offered a new pathway.
Zedd moved to a secure cabinet at the far end of the hidden lab, pressing his palm against the biometric lock. The door slid open, revealing a series of small vials containing blue liquid—the serum. He removed one carefully, holding it up to the light, studying the molecular structure displayed on a nearby screen. “The serum doesn’t care about genetic compatibility,” he murmured, comparing the blue liquid’s structure to the MELD samples. “It enhances what’s already there.”
The methodologies were complementary in theory, each addressing different aspects of human enhancement:
The serum provided the physical foundation—strength, endurance, healing factor. MELD created the biological interfaces for technological integration. Psionic amplification expanded mental capabilities beyond normal human limits and into something tangible, almost like biotics but on a different plane entirely.
“Combining unknown enhancement vectors presents a 62% chance of fatal rejection,” ADAM said, displaying risk assessments alongside each potential combination.
“With current synthesis methods,” Zedd countered, already pulling up specific technical solutions for each risk factor. “But Caleb’s psionic potential changes the equation. The neural pathways are already primed for enhancement.”
He stood over the holotable, Caleb’s complete profile displayed alongside the serum analysis. The medical scans painted a clear picture—progressive respiratory decline, cardiac complications by mid-thirties, general infirmity by fifty-eight at best.
But he could change that.
The memory of watching Caleb struggle to keep up without his VEST surfaced—the careful way he managed his breathing, the subtle winces when he thought no one was looking, the determination that pushed him to contribute despite physical limitations.
Zedd had the means to not just help Caleb survive, but to thrive. The choice lay before him, explicit in its duality—act or withhold technology that could change a life.
“Shall I begin preparation of enhancement protocols?” ADAM asked, pulling Zedd from his thoughts.
He thought back to the psionic readings—highest during moments of moral conviction. Caleb’s instinctive rejection of harming others even to save himself. His uncompromising ethical stance despite a lifetime of physical suffering.
If anyone deserved this opportunity… Just like Captain America.
“Yes,” Zedd said finally, decision crystallizing. “Add Caleb Lance Rogers to Project GUARDIAN. Designate as Subject One.”
“Acknowledged. Subject One designation confirmed.”
Zedd replaced the serum vial in its container, mind already racing through implementation scenarios, contingency plans, the precise sequence of enhancements that would maximize success rates while minimizing rejection risks.
He wasn’t just giving Caleb a better body. He was creating the first of a new kind of defender for humanity—someone with the physical capabilities of a super soldier, the mental ability of a psionic, and the moral foundation to use those abilities responsibly.
Someone who would never sacrifice others for personal gain.
Someone who could become what his ancestor never had the chance to be.
Zedd closed the cabinet, a rare smile spreading across his face.
Project GUARDIAN had its first subject.