Not Alone Chapter 1: Alpha
A flash of white light and a splitting crack, louder even then thunder, are all that herald the appearance. Soon following is the swerving and subsequent crashing of several hover vehicles. Laying curled in a ball in the middle of the street in the middle of the largest city, is a boy. The boy is no older then seven years of age. He is curled in the fetal position in a small crater slowly he begins to unfurl. He pushes himself to his feet just as panicking bystanders rush forwards to see if he and those who crashed are okay. Soon he is surrounded by people who are all talking at once, asking him questions and trying to get him to sit down until help arrives. He doesn't understand them however, neither can they understand him. With so many talking over each other and so many grabbing at him the boy begins to panic. He lets out a panicked yell and a strange green field encompasses him and forces the crowd away from him. He runs and doesn't look back, he doesn't see the military aid that had arrived at the scene to help.
He has no clue of the scanning equipment that had picked up his biotic display, nor does he know of the Alliance scientists pitching a fit over his lose. He runs, he runs as fast and as far as he can until he can run no more and never looks back. He doesn't make it long however, by nightfall the Alliance has pictures of his face plastered all over the extranet. Soon enough the boy is captured.
(7 Years Earlier)
A small baby is floating in a pinkish but see through liquid, many eyes watch as the baby occasionally kicks out or twitches one of it's tiny limbs. They had created a life, a single tiny perfect life. However the tiny thing made no sense to them. They had cultured the DNA from ruins they had found on one of the colonies out in space. This was the only one which had survived past the beginning stages of creation. The DNA was unlike anything they had ever seen, and yet here it was nine months later, looking entirely human. A perfectly healthy brain, heart, lungs, all the internal organs of a human. It all looked identical to a human's, everything except it's DNA. The DNA for the tiny life was incredibly complex, but when one really went over it... it was perfect.
This tiny life made no sense, the DNA showed no signs of being exposed to eezo, yet the nodes we associate with biotics were there. They were perfectly formed too, yet the mind of the being showed little to no activity. As if the lights were on but nobody was home. No brain activity, well maybe not no brain activity... just very little. The tiny life had grown at almost the same rate as a human child until nine months later here it was, but with barely half of the brain activity of a normal fetus. Though if you stop to think about it... it isn't really a normal fetus. They keep the scientists on the job on a steady rotation, to many of them want to think of the specimen as a child. It is not a child it is a long lost species of some long lost planet... of a long lost culture. We will learn it's secrets one day.
Until that day however, we will wait. One day the thing will open it's eyes, and when it does, we will be there. We will be there to learn all we can from whatever it is.
(5 Months Later)
Nine months have come and gone and the boy has shown no progress. Brain activity is the same, it shows no signs of waking. We are writing this one up as a failure, but we are keeping the tissue fresh. Just in case we ever feel the need to revisit this subject. We mark down the date – April 11th 2154 – and move on leaving this project 'Project Ascension' unfinished, to gather dust in a lab same where. It's left in a high tech life support lab and we lock it in, don't want anyone taking off with the useless thing.
(5 Years Later)
I stare blankly at the monitor, had I really just seen that? Couldn't have, it's had steady brain activity since it was a fetus! There is no way the brain activity just jumped! It's back to normal now... perhaps I had been seeing things after all. Wait! No!There it is again! Giant spikes in brain activity! On a subject we thought long since lost! Ha! I quickly bring up the video feed for the lab the project is based in. There he is.... Oh! Look at that! Movement! Beautiful movement! It's alive! Whatever it is, it's alive! Not a waste after all! I quickly call up a team to check it out, I also quickly call a replacement for myself... after all 'Ascension' was my project. I reach the room quickly enough only to find my team outside and security in the room where I hear yelling. I rush forwards and into the room.
“What is going on here!?” I shout frantically. It's then I notice the broken glass and the boy, no longer in his life support tube. He is surrounded by a green... green! Biotic field. He looks terrified, the security staff keep yelling at him to lay down on the ground and put his hands on the back of his head. However he doesn't seem to understand and just keeps blasting the security personnel away. There are tears, real tears! Pouring down his face. It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, my biggest project not a failure after all!
“Get away from it you idiots! Stand down! It's a child! Your just scaring it more! Get your guns out of it's face! Imbeciles!” I shout angrily as I watch the child struggle to stay away from security. I take my lab coat off and step around the guards and towards the naked and frightened child.
“Come on my child. I mean you no harm.” I calmly walk forward my hands extended in peace, my lab coat laying limp over one arm. I slowly make my way closer to the sobbing child, noting the almost shoulder length black hair, we'll have to do something about that. The boy is watching me warily a biotic shield around him, but he makes no moves to attack. As I get within a few feet of him, he drops his shields his tiny body shivering in the almost freezing air. I slowly lower my lab coat into my hands holding it out to him. He looks confused but he wipes the tears from his face and reaches his hand out, taking the coat from me and wrapping it around himself.
I hold my hand out to the boy and wriggle my fingers “Come on now, let's get you some clothes little one. We can't have you wandering around in a lab coat.” I give the boy a small smile and watch as confusion creases his brow, but he reaches for my hand. Funnily enough he isn't holding it, he keeps turning it over and over in his own hands. To my surprise he sniffs my hand and glances up at me curiously before lowering our hands and just standing there holding my hand. Clinging to my hand as a small child would. Most would find it odd, that it acts as a normal child. I am not surprised however, I have noticed every child of every species acts similar. I smile at the boy and nod.
“Come along then little one, it's time to go.” I tug his hand and he follows me, without question. My fellow scientists quickly follow me as I lead the boy to the main lab where we quickly call up for some scrubs for the boy to wear. Soon enough he is dressed and sitting at a table with a dozen types of puzzles sitting in front of him. He keeps glancing up at me almost as if asking for my permission each time he picks up a puzzle. I nod and smile each time, he blazes through the puzzles at double the speed of any normal five year old. Hell he blazes through the puzzles faster then most adults I've seen do them. We make him do the puzzles over and over again for hours on end. Each time he completes the puzzles faster then the last time.
We are amazed at how quickly he seems to learn and strategize a quicker way through the puzzles. Finally though he begins to slow and refuses to do anymore puzzles, we try giving him new things to work with but still he refuses. We spend the better part of an hour trying to get him to work on something, until finally in a lull in our conversations we hear it. He's hungry! Ha! We can hear his stomach growling loudly. I chuckle and turn to my assistant “Get him some food Denise, we'll try this again after he's eaten something.”
The others quickly run around to begin monitoring the boy as we change game plans. Soon enough the multitude of wires we had monitoring the boys brain waves are joined by even more wires and pads meant to monitor the rest of his body. While we wait for the food I decide to cut his hair. Soon enough finds a pile of black hair on the ground and the boy running a hand over his now buzzed head. We take the hair for analysis then leave the boy to his own devices as he shortly teaches himself how to use the utensils we provided him with to eat his food. It is certainly an experience to watch.
I turn to my co-workers “We will need to bring in a biotics teacher eventually, to teach him to use his powers... we should recruit the best for this project. We don't want to half a** this, so it's best if we get an Asari or Salarian biotic to teach him.” I take a breathe before I continue “If we pick up a Salarian, they can double as a teacher of sorts for other things as well. The boy picks up things quickly, so it would be perfect.” I finish my little speech to the nods of my fellows.
Slowly however one of my fellow scientists raises their hand “Sir?” he says tentatively. I nod at him to continue “Sir... maybe we should hire an Asari to teach him biotics, a Salarian to teach him tech and espionage, and a Turian to teach him fighting and strategy? That way we cover all our bases, while simultaneously not half assing the project.” He finishes in a mumble as I begin nodding.
“We'll find a way to work that into the budget... speaking of the budget, we need to inform the Alliance of our need for renewed funding... Get on it straight away Johnson.” I wave my hand dismissively as Johnson nods and rushes out of the room.
The next few weeks are spent testing and monitoring everything we can about the boy. Analyzing every bit of data we receive from him. We dub him 'Subject Alpha' for records sake. Alpha runs more efficiently then any alien we have come in contact with thus far. The Alliance has renewed our funding, but it isn't enough. Cerberus has shown an interest, they want to fund us and in return all we have to do is send them research notes. I approve the measure quickly gaining us more funding then we need. Alpha is very good at following orders despite the fact he doesn't seem to understand us, or us him. Alpha's language is uncrackable, he came from his life support pod fully capable of speaking it.
We have spent the better part of two months trying to decode his language, with little luck. We've had even less success decoding the boys DNA, it's so unlike anything we've ever seen. It's unrelated to any species available to our testing, it's so complex. It's not a double helix or even a triple, it's a quadruple helix with unreadable genetic material! We can't even pin point which genome gives the boy black hair.. or for that matter which genome even gives him hair! The teachers we are bringing in for the boy are also scientists... in case they have any input to add to anything we find out about the boy. The boy can speak and perform perfunctory actions so we assume the boy has some form of genetic memory, which includes a very small amount of foreknowledge about his own biotics. His teachers are amazed at his progress, apparently he learns even quicker then their own children.
We tell them he is a genetic experiment from before the Council passed the law that prohibited such projects, and we are studying him. We do not tell them he is an alien or that he was cultivated from DNA we found on the moon. We don't need them growing an army where we had failed. We may have had only one viable subject out of thousands, but they may be able to figure out how to get around that difficulty. Even though they do not approve of genetic manipulation, they agree it would be inhumane to put the boy down. So his use now is to further science an further our understanding of biotics. As lone as we 'No further manipulate' his genetics we are within Council guidelines for our study of Subject Alpha.
Alpha is an amazing piece of work and he seems very eager to please at every turn. Which is good, the harder he tries the more data we can collect. The more data we collect the stronger we can make our own biotics and soldiers. The more data we have, the harder we can push Subject Alpha. The harder we push the stronger he gets. Of course we work both body and mind, Alpha is no use to us if we only work with one aspect of his abilities. Alpha's physical and mental capabilities are far above his age group, but then as an alien species this may be normal for his kind.
We have nothing with which to compare the boy besides the other known species in the system. So we have no idea what he is truly capable of, or for his species he is below, above, or even just plain average. We have no way of telling, but at the same time the boy is advancing us in ways we never thought possible. Alpha was the inspiration for the new L3s even though we cannot instal one in him for he would blow the amp with his first attack. We must teach him control as well as strength if we ever plan to install an amp for his use.
Alpha has strength in spades so we teach him control and precision. He can meditate as easily as any Asari. He's shown abilities even the strongest Asari biotic can't account for, small scale teleportation of objects! Not just telekinesis! Straight up teleportation! Objects disappear and reappear in small flashes of light. Alpha however shows no signs of being able to did with anything organic, he outright refuses to even try. So we assume it will just kill the organic matter or something similar, not that it would be a problem. On the battlefield it could be useful, death and removal of the body clearing the way.
Alpha also shows a resistance to learning our language, making it impossible to get him to answer testing questions. As smart as he is, it goes right over his head when we try to teach him our alphabet and our speech. Almost as if he doesn't understand we are trying to teach him to communicate with us. Alpha is content to speak his own language even though we cannot understand him. Language seems to be of little concern to him as he seems adept at figuring out what we want through action alone most of the time.
Occasionally we bring in other children, older children obviously. Children his own age would barely be a challenge. We test his progress against the other children, all of whom are different species. As far as skill goes, each time he is head and shoulders above the rest of the children. Almost nobody can best him, and if they do he quickly learns how to avoid or counter the move that bested him and does better and better every time. Just like with the puzzles, he never gives in. Also as we go along we teach the boy the simple mechanics of field repairs for an omni-tool.
Alpha shocks us all by not only repairing the omni-tool but making it better then before. So we gather several omni-tools and a box of random computer parts as well as gather all the the tools he needs to build a program. We leave him in a room with it all and just observe. He tears the omni-tool and all it's components apart, we spend three days watching him rebuild the omni-tool. After he completes the first one he completes two more in quick concession. All three are identical in every way, down to every last program.
It will take us years to backwards engineer this! It is way beyond anything we can create on our own! We let Alpha keep one for training purposes but take the other two away. He'd done all the programing on the omni-tools in equations and his own language.... at least we assume it's his language. We barely understand any of it... hence why it will take years to backwards engineer the things. This could be interesting, I wonder what else he can upgrade beyond our capabilities. Even the scientists we recruited from the Council races seem surprised by what a little 'Human' genetic manipulation can bring out in our species. Probably why genetic manipulation was outlawed to begin with.
Simply put the boy is amazing beyond a shadow of a doubt. Nothing could surpass this discovery. We are privileged to be allowed to be allowed to study him. From the study of everything, including his immune system, we have been able to put together cures for not only human diseases but other alien diseases as well. Sadly Alpha is not compatible with any known species, so there is no mating in his future... not that we know when or what will happen with puberty. It's all an unknown, that scares us a bit. We don't even know how long Alpha will live, so we have to study him as much as possible.
The Ascension Project is coming along nicely now. It has been many months, almost a year. We've started up a biotics program at the Grissom Academy, so that we can monitor the children and have something to compare Alpha to. We've outfitted all the biotics with L3s, and they perform admirably. However none of them are even remotely close to being even with Alpha. He is unparalleled, in all categories. Also as we've monitored Alpha we've noticed that he grows and ages at half the rate of a normal human child... perhaps this means he will live longer than the average human.
The boy is six years old now and is surpassing every single one of our hopes and dreams. Our Asari co-worker has suggested we bring in an Asari Justicar to train the boy, she thinks he could survive the training. As fantastic as that would be, we have no wish to risk the boy's life. So we are holding off on a decision in that area, for now anyways. We've brought in several more Turians however, the boy is learning to take on multiple opponents now. Who better to teach him that then the Turians? Perhaps if Alpha lives into his teens we'll pit him against Krogan.
If Alpha can take on a Krogan in hand to hand combat and live, we may very well have a success on our hands. Even though we have made many advances since beginning our study of Alpha, we are as of yet unsure if we consider him a success. After all we have not yet made many advances in the field of biotics. We have studied his biotics and he is beyond stronger then the strongest biotics out there. However he has given us very little in the way of improving our own biotics.
According to our scans he has full access to the rest of his brain, consciously. Unlike any other species, he is far smarter and stronger. If we could find a way to open up the human mind and expand our uses of it... perhaps we could create stronger biotics. Cerberus seems perfectly happy with just the scans and info we have given them in exchange for funding. I'm not sure why, they can't do anything with it. If they find a breakthrough.... I hope they share it. These sorts of advancements in biotics would make mankind prevalent amongst the Council races.
The day we become a Council race will be a brilliant day. Hopefully it is in my lifetime, I would like to see the other paces eat their words about my species. As amusing as that little day dream is... back to work. I glance down at the charts and scans in front of me, Alpha I still increasing at an amazing rate. Stronger then ever, and still growing even stronger. Even if we can never duplicate these results.... Alpha will eventually make a good soldier. Someday many years from now, the Alliance may very well recruit the boy. Someday it may even be something we have to do, his powers will even out eventually and the only way to test him will be in real combat. We should probably begin designing armor that will be effective in combat but send us scans and updates on his powers and condition.
Now that's an idea! We can sell it to the Alliance by telling them it's a way to tell who died on the field a head of time, a way to know who has been injured and needs help! To allow teams to work together better! Knowing what conditions their fellow soldier is in... yes this would work very well. We'll get to work on that right away, so we can have it ready before Alpha begins field training. We can even test the products with Alpha until we get the final product we want to work with! Ha! We should probably begin working on an amp that can handle Alpha's power. This should be fun.
The Asari have offered up an amp for Alpha's use. For now however we will leave him ampless, he seems capable enough without one. If we have nothing in a year we'll amp him with Asari tech. Then the real tests on his biotics can begin.
