"Subject species: homo sapien." said the same automated voice from the probe in Melbourne's brain. "Compatibility positive. Commencing upgrade."
Melbourne Acliate kneeled in painful agony as binary code scrolled in front of his eyes like some kind of computer code being executed. The code eventually changed into more readable coding syntax but Melbourne did not understand C++ as it was an archaic programming language no longer used in this day and age.
Eventually, the screen displayed strangely in his eyelids became more like a GUI that Melbourne automatically understood he could will to dim or go opaque at will. Certain vital statistics seemed to show.
HP: 10/10
ST: 12/12
BE: 5/5
Str: 4
End: 5
Per: 8
Agi: 7
Cyb: 5
"Welcome to G.E.U.D.A. (Galten's Experimental User Diagnostic Augmentation.)." said the voice in Melbourne's head. This is an experimental system created by Professor Galten, head researcher and dean of the Tokyo Institute of Technology in an effort to help our supersoldiers track their health, personal growth and missions. I am your G.E.U.D.A. personal assistant."
Geuda? thought Melbourne in disdain. Not very creative at naming, this Professor Galten.
"I understand." said the assistant. "You may rename your system at any time as well as me if you like. I am a part of you now and you can think of me as your most valuable teammate from here on out. Right now, though, your priority is to disable your attackers. From my analysis, your three enemies outnumber you but are very undisciplined in combat by the way they carry themselves. Your brain seems conditioned to know some rudimentary martial arts. A combination of those skills with my guidance and slight neural enhancement should allow you to win this fight. The capsule surrounded you with a plasma barrier but the electricity available in the capsule isn't enough to sustain your shelter for long. You will be exposed again in about five seconds. It was only enough to give your body enough time to acclimate to the upgrade."
The G.E.U.D.A. assistant was right. Melbourne had a green belt in Sho Gi Gei, a mixture of Karate and Tai Quon Do. It wasn't much experience but it was a little.
The three thugs who had attacked were recovering from a fright as they were slowly backing away from the capsule as Melbourne re-acclimated to his senses which seemed slightly sharper than before.
A popup appeared on Melbourne's G.E.U.D.A. display.
Mission Received: A Chance Ambush
* Defeat Thugs (0/3)
"What?" screamed one of the thugs in terror. "You are a Red Cyber terrorist! The machine is defending you! You must be!"
The lights in the capsule slowly dimmed to a stop as the batteries died and capacitors worked to temporarily keep it online for a few seconds.
"Hey, look, the pod is dying!" exclaimed one of the thugs. "Get him!"
The two other thugs seemed apprehensive. "Are you sure about that?"
"Yeah." said the other. "Aren't those terrorists supposed to be superhuman and hard even for soldiers to beat?"
"Oh c'mon, does this guy look like a superhuman?" asked the original thug. "Doesn't matter, fools, we outnumber him and he looks scrawny. Let's kill this little cyborg!"
The three nodded, morale raised by the apparent leader's words. The three charged and…
Time seemed to slow in the perception of Melbourne Acliate as the G.E.U.D.A. sped up neural activity in certain sections of the brain. Red cursor lines flashed in Melbourne's eyes showing information like enemy lines of attack with multiple branches showing calculated possibilities with dim lines representing lower probability attack vectors.
Melbourne ducked and dodged a stab to his face by the leader and somersaulted behind his assailant.
"You have decent agility for your age." said G.E.U.D.A. "Your strength is relatively low by my estimations though. You will need to strike pressure points that your present neural wiring isn't quite trained to perform yet. Luckily for you I can help guide you in that regard."
Green vector lines appeared with the red warning lines, suggesting Melbourne certain lines of attacks. Each line was neurally wired to dopamine triggering suggestions in certain muscle groups to tell Melbourne what type of attack should follow that vector. While mildly disorienting, it made surprisingly instant sense. This device could literally train him in martial arts on the fly if he so wished.
Following the suggestions of G.E.U.D.A., Melbourne performed a feigning round-house kick towards the thigh of one of the lackeys, causing the thug to protect his side while a swift follow-up jumping front kick struck his groin. The lackey keeled over in pain as Melbourne followed up with a knife hand strike to the temple, dropping his assailant unconscious.
Mission: A Chance Ambush
*Defeat Thugs (1/3)
Another thug attacked with a knife from behind, missing Melbourne's head and only slicing of a lock of hair. Melbourne performed a low roundhouse kick through the legs, knocking his opponent off balance as he grabbed the arm, pushing against the elbow to make him involuntarily drop his weapon.
The final thug, the leader who had given the others the morale to continue their attack, charged as Melbourne picked up the knife, kicking the second disarmed thug to render him unconscious as well.
Mission: A Chance Ambush
*Defeat Thugs (2/3)
"You aren't leaving here a life, little karate kid!" yelled the thug in fury as he saw his two buddies laying defeated upon the cold forest floor.
Melbourne had been too distracted picking up the knife as a rapid fist plunged into his gut and sent him flying backwards into the ground.
HP: 8/10
The translucent video-game like information flashed red and bold for one second in Melbourne's eyes, warning him that he had just been damaged. Out of instinctive curiosity, Melbourne glanced at the other stats.
ST: 8/12
BE: 4/5
Melbourne assumed that ST meant stamina judging by the fact that it tended to go down upon the exertion of physical energy. He was starting to breathe a bit heavily.
"Roll!" commanded the G.E.U.D.A. assistant with urgency.
Melbourne rolled to the side quickly, realizing that he had been distracted from the fight by his curiosity about the GUI system he was seeing. To his side, the last conscious thug had struck his knife into the ground, missing Melbourne by a hairs breadth.
The thug turned instantly and screamed like a madman as he attempted to jump on top of Melbourne like a wild cougar pouncing on its prey.
Red lines showed no line of escape but green lines showed a swiping arc neurologically associated with Melbourne's leg muscles, telling him to do a swiping kick from the laying position through his assailant's legs. Melbourne followed through and brought his opponent falling to the ground to wrestle with him there.
"You little pig!" screamed the thug almost incoherently through his fury as he lashed out with his knife, causing a big gash in Melbourne's arm.
HP: 5/10
The knife attack had dealt significantly more damage to Melbourne than the fist had for obvious reasons.
Melbourne swiftly took the knife he had commandeered from his last opponent and plunged it quickly into the thugs neck.
Mission: A Chance Ambush
*Defeat Thugs (3/3) *Complete
Mission Accomplished. Reward: +10 XP
Level 1
10/100 XP
"Why is this G.E.U.D.A. so much like a game?" asked Melbourne to himself out loud through sharp pain in his arm."
"The system was deliberately designed this way by Professor Galten in 2070 to not only assist soldiers on the Cosmist side of the war but to encourage them to improve themselves by turning self improvement into an addictive sport." said G.E.U.D.A. He firmly believed that the gamification of personal growth could foster greater growth and by extension a stronger army even among those who were already superior in ground-based combat. Unfortunately, Galten never got the chance to test this augmentation and its effectiveness before launching this model into space in a time capsule in that same year so I have no data on former test results if they did happen. The professor launched a model of most of his cybernetic schematics and those augmentations that were extremely portable were even launched with working prototypes such as the one inside of you."
Indignation struck Melbourne suddenly.
"Hey, I thought you agreed not to force the augmentation into me when we met!" yelled Melbourne aloud.
"I did have that directive to respect the choices of sentient beings provided that their lives aren't in danger." said G.E.U.D.A. "Unfortunately, your life was in danger and the sensors of the time capsule were acknowledging the fact. I knew you couldn't handle them as a baseline human in the specific situation so I acted to save your life. I'm sorry, but is possible execution by the government in the future worse then definite termination by a group of murder hungry criminals immediately.
Melbourne took a moment to let his heart rate normalize, a statistic he could see in his display.
I suppose you are right. surrendered Melbourne. Is there any way you can remove yourself and all trace of augmentation from me?
"My apologies, but I fear that is not possible." said G.E.U.D.A. "The serum injected into your cranial is composed of nanorobots that swiftly spread throughout your brain and nervous system to collect vital signs and all relevant data about your neural workings. Trying to remove all of the nanorobots from your system is quite impossible. Luckily, this particular enhancement should be very difficult to detect. You shouldn't have a problem living out a normal life if you keep to yourself and I can possibly help you take advantage of opportunities you never would have noticed without me."
Melbourne was suddenly torn. Working with the G.E.U.D.A. system had been insanely useful in saving his life and if he could hide it from the government and all he encountered then perhaps quality of life could go on and even improve. Should he seek a way to purge the system so that he wouldn't be an illegal cyborg or should he make use of it to become successful in life? Perhaps he could start a successful technology or spacefaring company of his own in the future and become rich and famous? It was an interesting thought.
HP: 4/10
The display flashed warningly.
Melbourne looked down suddenly at his arm in horror as blood gushed out. He was bleeding to death and didn't have a first aid kit in his tiny hiking backpack.
Why don't I feel the pain? thought Melbourne curiously.
"I've disabled the pain receptors in your brain to allow your mind to calmly solve your situation." explained G.E.U.D.A. "The knife wound you incurred will cause you to eventually bleed to death in about an hour if left untreated. Sorry for not being so urgent with you but I needed your heart rate to calm down before I informed you that you're not 'out of the woods yet'."
"An hour?" cried Melbourne in despair. "I can't get back to town in an hour if I run and if I call for paramedics they'll find the artifact and have me arrested and eventually executed later."