Martian Navy Project Darwin

TW: Surgery and swearing.

“Your legend precedes you, Thao.” Admiral Randal Jacques smiled the smile of a transparent sociopath. He waved his hand to the sturdy metal chair in front of his desk.

“I’ve heard plenty about you as well,” she said with a similar show of teeth.

“Good, then we don’t have to waste any more time with niceties. I want you to join me.” All hints of pleasantry were gone. He gave her the stare a butcher gives a slab of meat as they raise the knife.

“For?” Her invitation had been vague. Be part of Mars’ future.

A file labeled TOP SECRET slid across the desk. Leaning back in his newly upholstered armchair, Randal watched her with hawkish eyes. PROJECT DARWIN printed in black on grey paper that had been recycled a million times, as was the way on Mars.

Photographs of corpses decorated every other page of the macabre file. She recognised some of them from demonstrations of Deus ex Sapiens. There was a photograph of Lord Banks before and after his beheading.

“I was upset about that one,” Randal says, nodding to Banks. “He would have been a treasure trove of information. “We’re doing our best now but Earth has the advantage. Everything he used to make Deus ex Sapiens was there. We got the products, they got the labs. Probably most of his notes as well.

“You’re going to continue his work?” Thao asked, her lip curled in disgust.

“Knowledge should never go to waste, my dear.” Randal’s Arab-French accent was tinged with the private school elocution that betrayed his social status more than anything. “Mankind might not have left Earth for decades after world war two if not for Operation Paperclip. There’s no such thing as bad information. It’s all about the way we use it. You shouldn’t need me to tell you that.”

Thao Minh had gone by many names. Mayko. Belle. Mary. Some names had hung around her neck for years, others only days. Decades of changing identities taught her to think of herself as I. It was the only constant. She was herself. Nothing more. Certainly nothing less. It was the smallest handhold to cling to on an overhang of rock with a painful death far below. Thao clung hard.

“How much of my history do you know?” she asked, still reading the aims of Project Darwin.

“Probably more than you do. Let’s not waste time though.” He closed the folder. Blue eyes scoured hers. “Are you in or out?”

“What are my chances of survival for the procedures?”

Admiral Jacques smiled, shrugged and shook his head. “You’ll be among the first. A pioneer. That’s why I’m giving you the choice. We already know your body handles stress well. DNA recoding is a traumatic experience for the body, and yet.” He waved his hand at her.

“I should be dead already,” Thao agreed.

“Exactly.” He held out his hand, assuming she had made up her mind. After a split second’s hesitation, she shook it. Her deal with the devil. A devil at least. “Excellent.” Using sleight of hand a magician would be proud of, he pulled a tablet from beneath his desk with his free hand, slapped it down and shoved her hand on it, sealing a contract.

“Sneaky,” said Thao, far from surprised. He winked.

“Come, let’s get started.” He stood up with the haste of a far younger man.

Past frosted glass down the hall, Thao entered a pristine nightmare. An operating theater with restraints on the tables looked brand new. Plastic sheets lined the walls, confirming that the room had been repurposed recently.

“These droids have been prepared to do all of the surgical procedures. They will be with you around the clock giving you the best care possible.” He waved a hand lazily at four silver painted combat droids which likewise had clearly seen battle and been remade.

“Batter than Arthas’ spectrum droid?” Thao asked, referring to Randal’s son and the robot that went everywhere with him.

The admiral rolled his eyes and ignored the question. “You’re going to be the most advanced being humanity has ever known. Getting there will be hell. It might kill you. Too bad you already signed.” He spoke the words the way a doctor diagnoses someone with cancer.

“Saying it like that makes it sound like you tricked me. Don’t be foolish enough to think I’m here against my will, or that you could keep me.” She gave him her poker face smile. Her heart was beating faster no matter how much she wanted to be cool. I want this, she told herself. I want this.

With a nod that became a bow, he left her.

“Do you have names?” she asked.

“Medical Droid One.” It bowed to her, white surgical scrubs showing metal cleavage.

“M.D. Two,” said the second.

“M.D. Three.”

“And four.”

“No,” said Thao. She shook her head. Ridiculous. She pointed to them in turn. “One, you are now Tam. Two is McCoy.” She pointed to three and four. “Cottle and Zoidberg. Clear?”

“Understood,” said the quartet as one.

The door opened behind her. A brawny man ducked under the doorframe and sideways. Thao wondered if giants were real after all.

After him came another woman with buzz cut black hair, a nose stud and fierce brown eyes. She reached up to touch the doorframe, giving Thao a smile.

“I’m Mike,” said the man-mountain in a gravelly voice that seemed to echo up from a granite cave deep within him.

“Nephertiti,” said the woman. Thao nodded, noting the similarities of the woman’s face to the ancient bust of the Egyptian Queen. “If I like you, you can call me Neffy.” Her voice had a suitably regal Martian background. Thao wouldn’t be surprised to learn that Neffy had attended the same private schools as Admiral Jacques’ sons.

“Now that you have introduced yourselves, I, Tam, am ready to begin the first procedure. Please lie on the operating tables and prepare to be strapped in.” The droid gestured to a metal bed covered with a thin layer of padding.

“No time like the present huh?” Mike swung a leg up onto his operating table, ending with his ankles hanging off the end. “Why did I get a kiddie bed?”

Ignoring him, the women lay down either side of him as Mike was strapped in with Velcro restraints. The droids strapped breathing masks over their faces, dosing them with sedatives.

Thao’s world blurred and darkened. Nightmares punctuated by agony that tore through the veil of unconsciousness had Thao twisting and jerking in her restraints.

The room had been decontaminated as they slept. Metal hands had already cut away the top of her skull for easy access to her brain. Nano surgeons were hard at work, reshaping the three minds to improve neural conductivity. Agonising reflex tests showed the droids the results of their alterations. Through mere electrical interference the hands of the three subjects could be told to go through the motions of hand signals they had never known.

Thao, Mike, and Nephertiti’s hands were moving faster than muscles could cope. Fingers began to swell from internal damage. The droids set to work repairing torn muscles with nanite treatments. With their hands in casts, the subjects were set upright, still strapped to their beds. Arms and legs worked at ever more inhuman speeds, causing as much damage to the rest of their bodies. Tam, Cottle, McCoy and Zoidberg continued with their work unphased.

“How is it progressing?” Randal asked, looking down at the cut and ripped bodies of the test subjects.

“All of the subjects have improved reflexes. Testing has caused tissue damage that requires a further seventy two hours of healing.”

“Even with the nano surgeons?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Then I’ll see you in three days,” huffed Randal.

“Thank you, Admiral Jacques.” Tam saluted as the old soldier left the room.

Everything itched as Thao woke. It was hard to discern the difference between the body she had known when she fell asleep and the new one she woke to. Her fingers felt tighter over her bones. Clenching required more effort than it had before. The innate knowledge of her increased strength had her staring at the fingers as they flexed. An hour later the new muscle fibers were as flexible as they had ever been.

“You two feel funny?” Mike asked, flexing his arm. “Not quite yourself?” He stood and stretched. His muscles were over inflated balloons.

“Well rested and exhausted at the same time?” Nephertiti asked, “yeah.” She nodded.

“Now that you’re all awake and compos mentis, it is time for the real tests.” Tam clapped his hands together with a metallic ring. The white scrubs of the droids had turned a dull brownish orange having been stained by blood and laundered continuously.

They were led to a firing range in the basement of the Martian Navy’s Headquarters. Mike’s grin seeing the gun and ammunition was childlike. Nephertiti admired her gun, running an appreciative hand over a pistol.

“You two have gun fetishes?” Thao asked. Mike didn’t even hear her because he was already losing shots downrange.

Nephertiti in the middle shrugged. “I always feel safer when I’m packing. Don’t you?” The chestnut skinned warrior spun the pistol in her hand, catching the handle then aiming at a target five hundred meters away.

Looking at the gunslingers, Thao frowned. “Am I supposed to compete with those two?” She asked, nodding to them as she looked at the droid dubbed McCoy.

“You’re not here to compete against anyone, Miss Thao. You are to be measured for personal growth. We have your scores from MSA self defense training. Your improvements will be measured against those results.” The steel robot stared at her blankly. Multiple lenses on its spherical head whirred as they focused and refocused on her, searching their behavior diagnostic software. Being judged, even so passively, was unsettling.

“You requisitioned my old test results?” Thao asked in disapproval.

“Yes.”

“That’s invasive.”

“We have requisitioned the test results of all subjects in Project Darwin.”

“So in your defence, you violated everyone’s privacy?” Thao’s words caught Nephertiti’s attention. The buzz cut reincarnated Egyptian Queen lookalike stopped to listen. Mike was hyper focused on his task, emptying magazine after magazine at the targets downrange.

“Martian Navy Project Darwin gathered all required data before beginning the test phase.” The droid brought up the contract she had hand printed with Randal’s help. “You gave your permission when you signed this with your palm. The data will be held with top secret restrictions. It will remain classified for the next two hundred years.” Thao’s frown glowered back at her from the biggest lens on its shiny head.

Grinding her teeth, she picked up the gun on the counter before her and checked the chamber and the magazine. Might as well do my best then. She set the distance of the target back to one kilometre. Normally the spec of a thing would have been too small for her to hit at such a distance, but her instincts bragged that she could do it.

Exhaling with her arms extended, she squeezed gently. A sarcastic voice in her head mocked her, bad miss. Someone thinks too much of herself it seems. She rubbed her forehead where her frown and anger were giving her a headache.

Calm. Steady breath in. Exhale and fire. The shot didn’t hit the man on the target board, but it did hit the board.

Fire. Miss.

Fire. On the board, above the right shoulder.

Fire. On the board, left of the head.

Fire. Left arm.

Fire. Between the left arm and abdomen.

Fire. Left arm at the elbow.

With every shot she felt the recoil and blinked as the explosion propelled the bullet from the muzzle.

“This is not about long range accuracy, Miss Minh. This is a test of reflexes. How quickly you can hit a target at five hundred metres, reload and hit it again. Please recall the target to close range.” The monotonous voice scolded her like a child.

Thao’s arm clenched. I should hammer it’s little head in. Slapping the range reduction button next to her she watched the target zip towards her. As it went the damaged cover was replaced by a new sheet of paper with an unwounded androgynous biped stamped across it.

Emptying the rest of her magazine into the target without even aiming, she released the spent magazine and slammed in a new one. Her finger squeezed the sensitive trigger again and again as fast as it could until all twelve rounds were spent. Empty casings littered the ground at her feet.

“Thank you,” Zoidberg said with an amplified voice. “That is all of the data we require. “Your performance today will be used as the new baseline for testing improvement. Mike, your improvement in reaction time is measured at approximately four percent. Nephertiti, yours was up by seven percent.” The short haired woman bowed mockingly to the giant. “Thao. You improved by eleven percent. Thank you. Now we will return to the surgical theatre.”

Nephertiti feigned prostration to Thao, smiling widely. “Either you got a whole lot better,” she grinned at Mike, “or she was shit to begin with?”

The Goliath smirked and winked to Thao. “Hard to improve on my old scores, I’ve always been awesome.”

“That makes sense,” Thao nodded. “At least your ego is in proportion with everything else.”

The plastic on the walls of the room they had been sleeping in during surgeries had been replaced with huge metal panels. The smell of the sealant between the plates of polished steel filled the former spy’s nostrils. A larger bed for Mike sat in the middle of the three.

“That’s better,” nodded the brute. “No more kiddy sized bed for me.” Leaping on, he strapped himself in.

“You’re keen,” Thao noted.

“Let’s just say this is a better deal for me than prison.” He lay back, letting the droids strap him in.

“Why would you be in prison otherwise?” Nephertiti asked.

“Just politics,” he said and inhaled sedative as McCoy pulled a mask down over his nose and mouth.

Nephertiti gave the man a long hard look before climbing onto her own bed.

Moments after her own inhaler was fitted, vital signs on a monitor showed Nephertiti was sleeping. Four droids turned to Thao. Tam gestured to her waiting bed.

“Why would Mike be in prison if he wasn’t here?”

“That is not for us to disclose,” answered the four as one.

“Why are there four of you and three of us?” Even as she said it she realised that it was in fact four to one in that moment. “Am I safe?”

“We are pioneering surgical techniques that have never been used before. It comes with risks,” said Tam. “You have nothing to fear from Mike. We can protect subjects from each other and themselves. It is in the interests of Project Darwin to keep its subjects alive and well.”

“Calling us subjects sounds creepy.”

“Noted,” said the four in unison.

“Talking from four places at once is also creepy.”

“We apologise,” said Tam on their behalf. “Please, Miss Thao. There’s no time like the present.”

She turned to the door then back to the bed. Lying down as they strapped her in, Thao tried to ignore the feeling that she’d made a terrible mistake.