Nick Smith

Adventurer Level: 11

Human – American

"The fuck?" I asked aloud.

The entry offered no elaboration, and Ten had allowed the group of entries to cut off on that cliffhanger. Probably on purpose.

Regardless of Ten's intentions, its choice left me with questions. Was Dr. Brandt talking about Earth? What the fuck happened? Larie calmly stared at.

"Is that all it says?" he asked.

"Yeah, but there's more loading," I replied, trying to match his calmness.

The lich tilted his head at my use of the word 'loading', obviously confused. Before I could explain, though, the next entry popped into my vision. With a soothing breath, I continued reading aloud.

--

3 April 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

As stated in my previous entry, the world has ended.

Due to the classified nature of Outpost 12, we were among the last to be informed that the apocalypse had begun. Several of my employees lost their composure, but that situation has been resolved. Three guards and two researchers had to be terminated before the rest regained their sense.

It took longer than normal for waste disposal to retrieve the remains. I suppose that's to be expected, though, considering that several governments have already toppled. Still, both the terminations and the delay in cleaning them up had a fairly negative effect on morale.

Several thousand breaches in reality began opening in the early hours of April 1, 2023. By 0800 ET, hundreds of thousands of previously fictional, and currently hostile, entities had poured through the tears. Monsters, for lack of a better word. Dragons, vampires, ghouls, zombies, et cetera ad nauseum. It's almost as if holes opened up in the noosphere and everything that humanity has ever come up with began pouring through.

This event, now codenamed 'Incursion', went largely uncontested at first because most of the reinforcement requests were thought to be elaborate hoaxes. By the time military forces began to suspect that the calls for help were not simply pranks for 'April Fool's Day', the number of entities had increased well into the tens of millions. As a result of the delay, several key bases were annihilated.

NATO, or the US disguised as NATO, has been leading the most organized response to the Incursion. Russia, China, and a few other countries have refused to set aside politics, and are instead trying to fight the monsters on their own. The Malos Organization is taking a wait and see approach.

Some of the guards aren't happy about this, but I was able to make them understand our position. Fighting would reveal us, and we've gone through extraordinary lengths to remain hidden from governmental entities. If we fought and some of those governments were left relatively intact, we would all face summary execution before the dust even settled.

It is a lose-lose situation for us. No matter what, fighting the Incursion would be to our detriment. On the other hand, the chaos that the Incursion has brought with it presents us with amazing opportunities. For instance, finding test subjects has never been easier.

--

"Fictional creatures," I muttered. "Like orcs..."

"What do you mean?" Larie asked.

"Orcs, elves, dwarves, and pretty much everything that exists in this world isn't real in my world. They're from fictional stories. Which means..."

I trailed off, afraid to finish my sentence. The implications had caused a lump to form in my throat, and it took everything I had to swallow it down. Instead of elaborating and giving my feelings further thought, I turned my attention back to the text.

--

7 April 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

We've received our first batch of test subjects. All of them have the genetic markers that we're looking for, and they are a good mixture of conscious and comatose. The retrieval team didn't make a single mistake. It would appear that the apocalypse has been good for our grunts.

Outpost 12 and I have been conscripted by the rest of the board as part of a wider monitoring system. Excursions are prohibited unless specifically necessary for the continuation of critical projects, and as such we need to get creative with our eyes and ears. It isn't something that strikes me as particularly worth my time, though, so I've assigned a few of my less-gifted researchers to accomplish what the board has demanded of us. To their credit, it didn't take them long to come up with something that updates us on the goings on above us.

Unfortunately, things on the surface have gone from bad to worse. The naval forces that the US gave to NATO were apparently destroyed by leviathan-like creatures. On top of that, both rotary and fixed-wing aircraft are having difficulties handling the monsters that fly.

Dragons are the biggest threat to aircraft, and they are even being referred to as flying tanks on military comms. One would assume that something as large as these dragons wouldn't be able to fly at all, let alone compete with a jet in speed. And yet there are several recordings demonstrating their super-sonic capabilities.

As many people likely do, I find them very interesting. Their musculature and general shape suggests that they were created, not evolved. This goes to further my hypothesis that the monsters from the Incursion are based on our fictional stories, rather than the fictional stories being based on them.

Perhaps my kneejerk assessment regarding the noosphere wasn't so far off the mark.

9 April 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

Several nations have fallen, their lands now occupied by monsters and struggling survivalists. Africa, South America, and Australia have gone completely dark. The only world powers that are still somewhat coherent are the United States, the Russian Federation, the People's Republic of China, the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, France, and Germany. Russia and China have been holding their own, but the rest are being propped up by the US.

It pains me to admit that my native country, a once proud militaristic nation, has to be supported by our former enemies. The defense umbrella of the United States kept us soft. Even though we had our own military-industrial complex, we knew that we didn't have to worry about long-term defense because the US and NATO would rush to our aid. I suppose we expected a near-peer threat to the US to be obvious and give us plenty of time to react accordingly.

On the bright side, though, we aren't the monsters this time.

We've performed preliminary examinations of our test subjects. A quarter of them are comatose, but that isn't necessarily detrimental to our testing needs. When one considers the issue we have with subjects that are conscious during the installation phase, comatose subjects are actually preferred. Regardless, all of them are healthy enough for testing.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

There are some tests that we will not be able to perform on the comatose subjects, but the anesthesia we will save might very well be worth it.

--

'The next several entries detail various experiments that were done,' Ten said. 'He develops an affinity for a particular test subject, which he dubs Subject Zero.'

'Is it me or the feral guy we fought?' I asked, knowing a pattern when I saw it.

'It's you. Want me to show you what he said about you?'

'Yeah, but... Could we skip the experiment details?'

'Yep.'

--

4 May 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

Tenzing.AI has melded well with most of the subjects. Subject One renamed his AI companion Heinrich, an obvious attempt to upset me. It worked, but not for the reasons he had likely hoped for.

I'll have to have a talk with the researchers about professionalism, referring to me by my first name in front of the test subjects is unacceptable.

Subject Zero is still sleeping soundly, insofar as much a coma is sleep. Occasionally we will get a spike in brain activity, which indicates that he has a significantly better chance of waking up than a good portion of our other subjects. Hopefully, he remains in slumber long enough for us to complete our experiments.

The surviving hospital records indicate that he was admitted on the first of April, likely a casualty of the Incursion's initial ruptures. Zero was 'given' to us still suffering severe burns, several fractures, deep tissue damage, and the after-effects of moderate to severe hydrocarbon poisoning. Given the area in which he was retrieved, an exploding oil well is unlikely. Perhaps a gas station or fuel truck?

Doctor Thalheimer nearly wrote him off as too damaged for testing, but I overruled him. The parts we needed were still intact, and the rest allowed us the chance to test the nanites. Obviously, I was right.

Doctor Roberts has expressed confusion regarding his subject number. I explained that we are using Nicodemus as a control of sorts. He's the only subject that has shown no signs of rejection thus far, and as such, if we can do it to Subject Zero we can probably do it to the other subjects. Conversely, if it doesn't work on Subject Zero, it likely won't on the other subjects.

For instance, we installed a Tenzing unit into Subject Zero, and he didn't require rejection medication. We installed nanpacks, he was fine. We tested whether a hibernating Tenzing unit could use the nanites in the nanpacks to repair critical tissue damage, which took care of several of Zero's injuries.

We performed these same experiments on other subjects with less positive results. Subject Seven outright died, and her injuries were far less severe than Zero's. Most of the other subjects required anti-rejection medication at some point during the experiments.

Considering the current state of the world, immunosuppressants will soon become scarce. Since our goal is the wide-spread adoption of technological augmentation of humans, this presents a problem. As such, we'll be using Subject Zero to figure out the ins and outs of rejection and how to counter it without relying on pharmaceuticals.

He is absolutely critical to this sub-project.

--

'Do we know why I didn't have any sort of rejection or whatever?' I asked.

'No,' Ten replied. 'The experiments didn't get a chance to advance that far. The following entries indicate that they used me to repair most of your injuries. Then they used Subject Three to see if they could effectively awaken a coma patient, but he suffered brain damage. Instead of disposing of him, they used him to perform some of the more dangerous experiments that they were hesitant to perform on you.'

'Was Subject Three the one that we...'

'Yes. He was the feral human we encountered.'

'Fuck,' I sighed. 'This... This is a lot.'

'We've only got a few more entries left. Do you need a break?'

'I don't think we have time for a break. Let's see them.'

--

28 May 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

There is no longer any measure of human resistance to the incursion. To no one's surprise, the United States was the last hold-out. Their last radio messages indicated that their position was being overran by undead entities that were using 'magic'.

Curiously, there are creatures from the incursion that are also fighting the monsters. Elves, orcs, and such. We've identified their intelligence level to be near to our own, but further information is kept on a need-to-know basis. I've pointed out that we might be able to use them in S-P Amalgamation's experiments, but the 'fall of humanity' has caused the board to panic.

They have decided that we should go into cryostasis and try to wait things out, and have given orders to that effect. We've created a dumbed down version of Tenzing.AI to run the nuclear power plant in the lower levels. This replaces the automated systems that require human interaction. Now the plant will run until we tell it to stop.

We will be entering stasis at the end of the week. In the meantime, we're grabbing as many potential subjects as we can. Human resources are going to be sparse by the time we wake up.

1 June 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

Outpost 14 was discovered and destroyed. Because of this, we have been joined by members of Sub-Project Excursion. The Project Lead is Doctor Jasmine Hax. Insofar as I can tell, she has no connections to the board. This means that she must be remarkably qualified and have seen success, otherwise she would have been replaced with a Head Researcher by now.

It is a matter of concern that I don't know what S-P Excursion is, though.

2 June 2023

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

Getting Outpost 14's staff set up in Outpost 12 has been hectic. It isn't as if we are wanting for room, we have plenty, but there have been certain lapses in security which are completely unacceptable. For instance, I now know what S-P Excursion is.

The goal of Excursion is trans-dimensional travel. The hypothesis is that one can enter into another 'dimension', take a few steps, then reenter our 'dimension' having travelled a significant distance. Quite useful, if it pans out.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a lot done today.

Whilst looking into S-P Excursion, I found the reason that the Malos Organization has been calling the breach in the noosphere an 'Incursion'. Doctor Hax and two members of the board are directly responsible for ending the world. I've been working alongside people who are responsible for billions of needless deaths.

I'm no saint myself, but at least when I fuck up it only kills one or two people at a time.

What's worse is that it doesn't seem to weigh on her at all. She eats, sleeps, drinks, and laughs as if she's never taken a life before. She's the type of monster that one hears about in historical documentaries and wonders how they could do such evil things.

I remember everyone I've killed, directly or indirectly. I keep a list of their names, and when I meet my maker I fully expect to be sent directly to hell for my crimes. The only reason I've refrained from ending things early is the desire to make the deaths mean something.

Tomorrow we enter cryostasis. I doubt that I will rest easy, knowing what I now know.

--

"Wow, what a shocker," I said sarcastically.

"Indeed," Larie replied. "I suspected that this Malos Organization was involved from the start."

"Well, this confirms that this isn't another world," I sighed. "It's my world. Or was, I guess."

"I'm sorry, Nick."

The sincerity in his voice shocked me enough to crack a shell that I didn't know I'd created, and I almost began to cry. It was a lot to take in. Too much, even.

"They're dead," I whispered. "Cass, my parents, my friends. Everyone. They're all dead."

We stood silently, staring at the console while I tried desperately to cope with everything and keep the tears out of my eyes.

'Brandt made a discovery that might be relevant to our situation,' Ten said. 'Would you prefer to read it, or would you like the cliff-notes.'

'Let's see it.'

--

8 August 44836

Dr. H. Brandt, HR/PL:SP Amalgamation

Outpost 12 has been destroyed. Doctor Hax, her guards, my research subjects, and several of my researchers are dead. The rest of us are trapped behind a grotesquery of flesh, doomed to slowly starve to death.

All but three of our guards decided, against orders, to try to fight their way through the flesh. I secretly hoped that they would make it through. If they made it, maybe we could too. But the vitals monitor confirms that they didn't get very far.

Doctor Hax did this. She discovered that 'magic' could be used to widen rifts, and that there were different types of it. She used my work on creating magic cores for my subjects, which she shouldn't have had access to.

Doctor Roberts helped her. The promise that we could go anywhere we wanted without much effort was too much for her to pass up, I guess. They used the rift that we discovered in Cryobay 3, and with the help of Subject One, they widened the rift with 'normal' magic then poured 'nature magic' into it. By the time I discovered what they were doing, it was too late to stop them.

The security footage is disgusting. I can't bear to watch it again, so I've deleted it entirely. All of those cryopods were full, and all of that flesh...

I can't. Instead, I'll report on the aftermath. We have lost all external communications. The tremors caused parts of the ceiling to fall in my quarters, and my personal cryopod is damaged beyond repair. The reactor is still functioning, but who knows for how long. Ventilation works, but we no longer have access to maintenance.

The plumbing still works, though my bathroom is the only one left. We have water and plenty of food, but I don't see a way out of this one. We're trapped within several tons of concrete, with no tools to dig our way out.

We're going to die here.

--

"Good," I growled. "Bastards."

"A painful way to go, but I can think of few others more deserving of such a fate," Larie added. "He mentioned a personal bathroom, though. Do you suppose it's through that door?"

My eyes followed his bony finger, and for the first time I noticed that there was a door opposite the one we'd entered. Unlike the other doors, this one was the same color as the walls and had a round handle. My brain must have skipped over it in all the excitement.

"Yeah, pro-"

My voice caught in my throat as the door began to open.

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