Radioactive Evolution

Chapter 4: Fantastical Creatures

Jared ripped off his shirt, "Oh yea!" The nanites altered his body significantly. Where before he stood just over six feet tall, he now stood at six and a half feet. His arms and legs rippled with muscle and... I have a six-pack...

Jared whipped his head around as he heard a huffing noise from Scarlet. She stared right at him as he admired his body. His face burned with embarrassment and he put his shirt back on.

His body inspected, he quickly realized new clothes were in order. The current ones were much too small and tight now and he wouldn't get very far hiking in them. He had a couple extra shirts and a pair of light wind pants, but they didn't have much protection from the environment. The chances of finding new clothes were rare. After two years exploring, he'd only come across a few items that even resembled clothes. Time, environment, and other explorers stripped anything of value.

"Scarlet, we have got to do that again! It's amazing!" Jared continued to marvel at the physical changes wrought on his body. "This seems like a radical enhancement. How did the changes impact me so much?"

You had a lot of dormant nanites. Since you could not control them before our bonding they only enhanced your body when needed.

"My ability to see in the dark?"

Yes, the nanites enhanced your vision because your survival depended on it.

"The nanites mutated and help humans survive the environment so I suppose it makes sense they would also adapt to increase survival in other areas. Is there a physical limit to the nanites? I don't particularly want to be ten feet tall and I don't want so much muscle it hinders my movement."

There are no limits, but if you gain too much muscle, your movement, dexterity, and speed decrease; you could then increase your height to even it out.

"Wow, okay... I will need to be careful about my selections. I don't want to be a giant, indestructible mutation. Is there a way for me to specify how tall or how much muscle I want? The percentage thing makes it hard to see how much I will gain."

Hm... I think I can do something like that, but it will take me some time to work on the problem. I will see if I can add functionality to the status screen so you can manipulate the image of your body for adjustments to physical augments.

"That would be great, thanks Scarlet. In the meantime, we need to get moving and find a safer place to camp. We can worry about assigning the rest of the nanites later. I bet it will knock me out for several days again based on the amount of nanites to assign."

Jared looked around him for anything of value to stuff into his pack when he remembered the explorer who died here. There may be an extra phase pistol in the rubble and bones. He searched the area where he found the pack, but didn't see the pistol. He searched the other bone piles; the delay was worth it if he could find another one. He kicked over the last pile of bones, "aha!"

He'd found it, but it looked in bad condition and he was unsure if it would fire anymore. The charges were too valuable to waste so he would need to test using live fire at an enemy. The other pistol looked new, and he had no doubts about it working. Two was overkill, but he like the additional firepower and it significantly increased his chances of survival.

"All right, let's go Scarlet. I think we should start by thoroughly exploring these tunnel systems. We can both see in the dark and I know for certain there are creatures we can take out in here. Maybe we can find a place to barricade ourselves in and assign the nanites while we hunt."

"Normally, I would run from any creatures, but since we will fight them, I want to assign the nanites as soon as possible. I have seen many terrifying creatures in the last two years. While they wouldn't pose much of a problem for your mother, they would make short work of us. We will need any advantage we can get."