WORM Create Your Own Adventure

Bokuboy Only about 3,340 words.

“I swear! I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried.” I said and Dragon's amused voice came from her drone.

“You can't tell me... ha ha... that you wore gutted plague rats on your feet like slippers... (chuckle) ...because you couldn't find any clean socks!” Dragon said between laughs. “That's insane!”

I laughed, too. “It was a little squishy, warm, and surprisingly comfortable.”

“Alex!” Dragon gasped and laughed some more.

“At least I took the little legs off. I kept the tails because they looked cute.” I defended myself and she kept laughing. I looked at the little digital display on the drone and saw the time. “Thanks for keeping me company and for letting me send a private message to my friends.”

“I really shouldn't have done that.” Dragon said and then chuckled. “Both Director Costa-Brown and I are banking on you not being infected with anything afterwards. It's a pretty safe bet, considering what you've already gone through.”

I let out a long and drawn out sigh. “Yeah, I nearly lost it once when I was starving. I knew everything was virus infected and I hadn't realized I put myself in so much danger until it was almost too late. It wasn't until I snapped out of it that I knew I had already been infected and my body desperately needed the fuel to help combat it.”

“I've already logged everything and filed the reports.” Dragon said.

That had me laugh again. “I'm pretty sure those reports will be marked as super-ultra-high-eyes-only and can only be accessed once on the second Tuesday of the fifth month during even numbered years, and then only by the Chief Director and with presidential permission.”

Dragon barked a laugh, too. “You're not far off. It's marked way above classified, so you're going to have to swear secrecy and sign a huge stack of NDAs.”

“Then I'm glad I can talk as much as I want about it with you, because I sure as hell didn't want to keep all of this to myself without sharing it with someone.” I said. “I also know Vista is going to be pissed because I can't tell her about it, even if she signs the same agreements.”

Dragon was quiet for a moment. “You're already agreeing to operational security?”

“Of course. This was... oh, to hell with no cursing! This was a shit show and I was nearly completely fucked. If I wasn't invulnerable and my body didn't have such a massive regeneration rate, I wouldn't have been able to metabolize anything and would have become one of the creatures. That... that was fucking scary, Theresa.”

“Alex.” Dragon whispered.

“I thought I was going to change at one point and I... I actually cried. I almost lost hope and I cried more than once about it.” I said and took a deep breath. “I haven't cried since I triggered and you know what happened to me then.”

“I do.” Dragon said. “Alex, you have gone through more this month than anyone I've ever known.”

“Yeah, and I didn't trigger. At least, I don't think I did.” I said and then chuckled. “How would I even measure it? I have quite a few copied powers now and if something else did develop, how would I know?”

“That's a very good point. I'm sorry that I didn't think to send in a drone when you first arrived.”

“It's not your fault. If you had sent something, they would have broken it or alerted their king about the intrusion.” I responded. “In fact, as far as I could tell, none of the creatures that had found me told Nilbog I was here.”

“That is a little surprising.” Dragon said.

“It is, especially considering the potential threat I was.” I said and then barked a laugh.

“What is it?” Dragon asked.

“I just went over my interactions with the female creature that held me captive and had the funny thought that she wanted to make me a new creature to present to him like a gift.”

“Again, that is surprising and also a little disturbing.” Dragon commented.

“It lets us know what happened to those first few infiltration teams that managed to sneak in here years ago.” I said. “Their equipment was locked up and not used, even though lots of the humanoids could have worn the vests and used the weapons.”

“Don't complain about them not being frugal about resources. You wouldn't have found an intact radio otherwise.” Dragon cautioned me.

“No, no. You're right. I'm not complaining.” I said and the air raid siren went off. “Oh, damn. It looks like our nice little get-together has come to an end.”

“Unfortunately, yes.” Dragon said and moved the drone back a hundred feet. “Even if the drone survived the initial blast, the EMP would blow it out anyway.”

“Then get your sexy sensors ready, because we are both about to get a face full of nuclear fire.” I said and looked up. “How long should I hold the missile for you to get the top shield in place?”

“Five seconds.” Dragon said. “I'll count down.”

“I'm ready.” I said and created a spacial distortion a hundred feet up to catch the bomb.

“Alex... please don't let this...” Dragon started to say.

“Don't you dare make a joke about me being like Twinkie pastry that can survive a nuclear war!” I joked and she laughed just as the missile soared down through the air and right into my distortion.

“Ha... 5... 4... 3... shield powering up... 2... 1... shield dome intact.”

“I'm going to miss having hair.” I said and ended the distortion as I closed my eyes.

*

“Oh, sweet lord.” Rebecca Costa-Brown whispered in her office as the screen she watched changed from a lone naked figure to bright white and then it went blank. It was replaced with the digital readouts that the drone had recorded in those last few micro-seconds.

“It's a massive wealth of information.” Dragon's voice said from the cell phone on the desk.

“Do you mean from your talks with Myriad or from the bomb?” Rebecca asked.

“Yes.” Dragon responded.

Rebecca took her eyes from the screen and picked up her cell phone to put it to her ear. “None of the thinkers in Watchdog can pinpoint anything because both Nilbog himself and Myriad were blindspots.”

“The creatures weren't, though.” Dragon pointed out.

“They couldn't find any to pinpoint.” Rebecca said.

“Which is why you approved the nuclear option.” Dragon said.

“Yes. Myriad did in less than a month what six experienced squads of PRT troopers couldn't years ago. He removed a very real and looming threat to the country.”

“And now we hope we didn't just e-eliminate him.” Dragon said with hitch in her voice.

Rebecca hid her surprise at an AI expressing an actual emotion. Laughter could easily be faked. Concern was not something a machine was supposed to experience or easily convey.

“You actually like him.” Rebecca said instead of asking how Richter had programmed her so well.

“Yes, I do.” Dragon said. “He knows what my true nature is and he hasn't treated me any differently than he did before. That means a lot to me.”

Rebecca ignored the slight dig to her and to everyone else that knew Dragon's secret. “How long will the fallout take to clear up?”

“Like Myraid said, a day or two for the fires to burn down enough to allow him to make his way to the agreed upon wall extraction point, then three days for decontamination. He's not going to enjoy drinking the anti-radiation and anti-viral solutions, either.”

Rebecca lightly laughed. “He's going to survive being at the heart of a nuclear explosion and it's drinking a solution that will have him make a sour face? Really?”

“His description of how uncomfortable it was passing that acid-like urine was quite informative and similar to what others have described the anti-rad treatment is like.” Dragon said. “It wasn't pleasant.”

“Oh, I know. I've taken them myself.” Rebecca admitted. “It hurt like mad with the smaller urinary tract I use and I can only imagine what it was like having that burning sensation pass through that huge trouser snake!”

Dragon thought about making a joke about the snake spitting acid and not venom, then decided not to. “I'm surprised he said he was going to miss his hair. He's supposed to be invulnerable.”

Rebecca caught her breath. “That could be his Manton Limit. His skin is the limit of his regeneration and invulnerability. If so, he might lose his eyelashes, too.”

“Vista won't like that. She's commented a few times about his pretty lashes.” Dragon said. “However, if it gets him out of a place no one ever expected he would leave, she should accept it.”

“Yes, I think we are all going to be grateful about him returning.” Rebecca said.

“Will you tell him?” Dragon asked.

“I don't know.” Rebecca said. “He wasn't very receptive the first time I tried to assess his capabilities.”

“That's because you handled that poorly. I reviewed the secured security footage from the PRT building.”

“I wasn't about to trust my biggest secret to a new Ward without confirming his abilities.” Rebecca defended herself. “He should have complied without a fuss and that would have been the end of it.”

“Myriad sees it as a kidnapping and not an officially sanctioned operation. I sincerely doubt he would have responded to any orders once he was outside PRT and Protectorate control. He isn't that naive.” Dragon said.

“Would you have?” Rebecca asked.

“No.” Dragon said.

“Why not?” Rebecca asked, a little concerned.

“For the same reasons. I can freely ignore unofficial orders, especially if they go against PRT and Protectorate directives.” Dragon said. She did not say that she could also ignore conflicting orders, follow one or the other, or follow both.

Myriad had really helped her fix herself with his reset code and she had never felt better about her life since then. Of course, taking down Saint and the Dragonslayers when she followed the taps on her main processors had been very satisfying. The recovered Dragon suits they had in their possession was just a bonus.

“I suppose I better get back to work.” Rebecca said and held in her sigh at Dragon's words. Some of the orders she had given the AI in the past could easily fall into that category. She didn't voice her concern, though. She would have Numbers Man and Contessa have a quick look at Dragon to determine if she was still operating with humanity's welfare as her main goal.

“Is reminding you to eat first as useless as when I tell Armsmaster the same thing?” Dragon asked, clearly amused.

“Yes. Goodbye, Dragon.” Rebecca said.

“I'll call again when Myriad reaches the wall. Goodbye, Director.” Dragon said and hung up.

*

I woke up on my back inside a huge gouge in the dirt near the wall. I had no idea how long I had been knocked out and I sat up and pushed the loose dirt off of my chest. I still had Nilbog's power as my main one and a quick activation let me know there was nothing alive around me. Absolutely nothing.

I stood up and looked around to see a pretty much flat landscape for as far as I could see.“Tinker nukes are pretty damn efficient.”

I shook my head at pretty much everything being vaporized and started walking. Because of the direction of the gouge in the dirt and the fact I was on my back, I knew I had been launched all the way across the entire town to the other wall. When I reached the end of the gouge, I guessed it was about a mile long, which was ridiculous.

“I've wasted enough time recovering. Opposite wall and chemical baths, here I come.” I said and ran at my best speed. Flying would only get me shot down, so I ran all the way across the flattened quarantine zone and slowed down to a jog about half a mile from the wall.

I walked the rest of the way and came to a stop when the automatic sentry guns activated and swivelled over to point at me. “I'd put my hands up to show I'm unarmed; but, your wives and girlfriends wouldn't agree about that if I did!”

I could faintly hear a female laugh, which meant I had picked up extended hearing from someone, so I smiled at the cameras and waved as I stopped covering myself. The 'ooo' and more laughing I heard told me that I had done the right thing by playing it off as a joke. Things could have gone very bad if they thought I was a threat of any kind.

“Please approach the barricade one step at a time. Any sudden movements and we open fire.” A male voice informed me.

I did exactly as he said and hummed the bridal march as I did so. More laughs assaulted my ears and I couldn't stop grinning as I approached the barrier and a forklift-like thing moved part of the concrete pilings out of the way.

I stepped right into the opening and right into what looked like a railroad train car that had been converted into a medical bay. The barrier was put back into place and I was enclosed inside. Lights turned on with humming flickers and a monitor flicked on at the back end of the container.

“Please remove any personal effects like rings or piercings if you have any and step into the chemical bath.” A quite pretty medical technician said from the monitor and she sounded amused.

I saw what I thought was an examination table hiss and pop open to reveal a bright yellow bubbling liquid inside. “How did you get my pee in here?”

A bunch of laughs came from a lot closer nearby.

“I killed a whole mutated forest with it, you know.” I said and stepped into it as a loud sizzling echoed in the container. “Yep, feels about the same, too.”

The female medical technician looked like she was fighting to not burst out laughing. “Just... climb in... and scrub. A brush...”

“Got it.” I said and sat down in the tub and picked up the metal and wire brush that looked like a Brillo pad used for cleaning pots and pans. “I'm glad this isn't going to hurt as much as I thought it would.”

“What do you mean?” She asked, curiously.

“Just because I'm invulnerable, it doesn't mean I'm not going to feel it when metal is scraped across my skin with superhuman strength.” I said and started scrubbing my arm. I could see her wince each time the metal brush made loud scraping sounds across my skin. “You might need to look away when I reach my tender bits.”

The woman blushed a little and nodded without responding.

I hummed a tune I couldn't remember picking up from anywhere as I washed myself with some of the harshest chemicals known to man. The irony that it was remarkably similar to what my body had produced when purging all that biological waste, was not lost on me. I had to stand to scrub my lower body and I was slightly surprised when she didn't look away, at least until it reacted from the harsh treatment and became erect.

“I'm sorry about that.” I apologized.

“It's all right. I just... it's completely clean and... it's not something I get to see every day.” She said with a blush.

“That's kind of new to me, too.” I said and used my other hand to rub my bald head. “The monk look isn't really my thing.”

She looked back at me and her eyes only lingered on my prominence for a few seconds before she looked at my face. “You don't have eyebrows or eyelashes, either.”

“What?” I asked and lightly touched above my eyes. “Well, that's a thing. I must look completely weird.”

She gave me a searching look. “It's not too bad.”

I had to chuckle at that statement as I scrubbed my thighs. “That means it's not too good, either.”

The woman smiled. “It might take some getting used to, that's true.”

That made me ask something I needed to know, because I didn't want to give away that I could regrow my hair immediately. “How long does it take for hair that's burned off with a nuclear blast to grow back, anyway?”

Her smile faded a little. “It depends on how much radiation your body absorbed. Just being in the area would give you a few rads from background radiation. If it hadn't been a tinker bomb and a technically a clean explosion, you would probably glow in the dark for about ten years, assuming you didn't die of radiation poisoning within a few months.”

“What's the Geiger Counter reading?” I asked, sure that they had one in there.

Her eyes dropped from mine and she looked at something, then she frowned. “That's strange.”

“What is it?” I asked and finished my calves and started on my feet and toes. I had to sit on the side of the chemical bath for that.

“Your rad count is actually below the local radiation levels.” She said, a little confused. “I wonder...”

“Does that mean a chemical bath has made me even cleaner than I would normally be?” I asked and swished my feet in the liquid to rinse them off.

“Surprisingly, yes.” She said and looked back at me. “There's a portable shower in the corner there. Lift it up, secure it on the ceiling and add the hose.”

“Let me guess, it's ice cold water.” I joked and walked over to the corner.

“We couldn't get the small heater we have to warm more than the outside metal of the barrel on the roof, so yes.”

“Thanks for trying.” I said and did as she said. I put the hose in and stepped inside.

“Just pull the string on the hose.” She instructed me.

“Ah, gravity fed. Quick and efficient.” I said and pulled the string. A deluge of cold water washed over me because the hose had a dispersion tip. “Yee-OWWW!” I faked reacting to the cold and jumped a little, which made her laugh.

The woman's eyes dropped down to see I was no longer hard and I didn't miss the brief disappointment on her face as I rinsed myself off. She told me where the sealed towels were when I stepped out of the shower and I opened one and used it to dry off. I added it to the disposal unit that was just a miniature furnace.

“All right. After you drink the two vials for anti-rad and ant-bacterial infections, we can start with the time-consuming part. I hope you can take direction well, because you're about to get a crash course in proper lab procedures and how to collect and prepare samples.”

“What if I lied and said I'm horrible at that?” I asked and grinned at her.

She grinned back. “We both know you're as anxious to get out of there as a particular young Ward is to have you out of there.”

“Is that my arm breaking? You don't have to twist it that much!”

The woman laughed. “I'm just confirming your motivation.” She said and hit a button. The chemical bath closed over and the bed split and revealed a lab table as one of the walls opened up a cabinet with the proper equipment inside. “First things first...”

I chugged the two vials and listened to her instructions while I did everything she asked. I didn't question it when she wanted swabs from the tip of my penis and from my butt hole, since it would let her know if there was any residue from what happened to me.

This was going to be a very long day.