Aberrant: Stargate Universe - Lt. Brayden Wolfe

[SkyLion]

[Cross Posted from Olivia Jennings-Izumi]

The man known as Brayden was just typing up the latest report on the state of the artifact repository for his boss, Area 51's chief scientist, Marv Goldman. Despite working at area 51 he was bored. This was not what he'd signed up for. Just because he had top notch security clearance didn't mean he should be rotting away under ground in some secret base, but what was he going to do, it was either this or quit and he couldn't just quit. That wasn't in his nature.

His office door was open so he saw when Marv and the technical writer Olivia went hurrying past. He wondered what was so urgent but dismissed it in favor of getting this report finished. There was never enough time in the day to do all that needed to be done. Marv was so diorganized that Brayden would bet this office would come to a screeching halt if not for all the hard work he put in.

Just then the phone rang. It was an outside line. That was unusual, he never got outside calls here at work. He didn't really have any friends or family to speak of and the ones he did have all knew that everyone said over the line was recorded. He picked up the receiver wondering what it could be about. A high-pitched wine almost like an old fashioned modem could be heard then a single word was spoken. "Domino." Brayden's eyes glazed over for a moment in total confusion.

When the confusion passed it was like the old insignificant Brayden no longer existed. He was clear headed and focused like he had not be since before he became Brayden. He would have chased that thought down and tried to remember who he once was, but that was unimportant in the face of his mission. The mission was everything. He let the phone drop and reaced down under the desk to pull out a small grey object that had been taped there waiting for this day to come. He pocketed the device and made his way out and into the halls following the route so recently taken by Marv and Olivia.

Security didn't even question his presence as he made his way to the room with the new artifact. His orders had been clear. He didn't even remember when he had received them, but it was very clear what needed to be done. He was to plant the small grey device to the artifact. How he would accomplish that remained to be seen.

When he arrived at the room with the device he walked in without knocking. First things first. Separate the doctor and Olivia from the artifact. The doctor would be easy. Olivia not so much, but he could always get rid of her after he planted the locator beacon. Seeing the size of the stone artifact the device he was carrying could only be a locator. He didn't know how they planned to get it out, but that's the only way it could be done. There was no way he would be able to lift it on his own.

The pair paused from examining the big stone when he walked in. He just smiled at the professor, "I hate to disturb you sir, but you are wanted in your office. It is about the artifact and I tried to tell them that there was no way you could have a peliminary report this soon, but you know how the General can be. He want's you five minutes ago." Brayden rolled his eyes in mock sympathy over the impatience of the Military.

Professor Goldman quickly excused himself from Olivia and rushed out the door muttering something unintelligable.

Brayden looked at the artifact and walked around it as if curious moving closer and leaning in as if to examine one of the marks. With a movement that was as smooth as a magician or a pick pocket he planted the grey thing on the artifact. Before he could withdraw however, one of the marks began to glow. He was about to curse his luck when he became mezmerized by it. He could not look away and he could not activate his own subcuteaneous locator beacon to let his superiors know that the device had been placed. The same hand that had just withdrawn moved of it's own accord toward the glowing symbol.

Across the room Olivia noticed what was happening and was just about to shout a warning that touching it could mean death but she too was capivated by the light.

When the man known as Brayden finally made contact both of the rooms occupants were consumed in a burst of white light that filled both the room and their minds. With the light also came pain. Pain in every cell of their bodies. Neither lasted more than fifteen or twenty seconds before mercifully succombing to unconsciousness.

[SkyLion]

The light of a thousand exploding stars engulfed him and the world dissolved into fire. Time dilated and stood still, stretching out into relentless unceasing agony. It burned through his body, through his bones, his mind, searing itself into his soul, inescapable.

The man known to Stargate Command as Brayden Wolfe drifted for an eternity into a sea of pain and light. Within the light, countless voices, alien and incomprehensible whispered, beckoning him, overwhelming his senses. A moment of panic flared within him, so overpowering and all consuming was the torment, the acceleration so sharp and the intensity so great that it threatened the boundaries of his comprehension. Had he been able to summon coherent thought it would have been of Hell and the longing for release into the sweet soothing arms of oblivion.

Then, as if having reached the summit of a mountain, the flood of sensation focused into a single point, the eye of the Storm. His surrender complete, the alien whispers resolved themselves into meaning. A single word repeated over and over until it blasted the veil of fog from his mind: Remember. And the man known as Brayden Wolfe remembered.

His name was not Brayden Wolfe.

Memories streamed, jagged and fragmented from the void in his psyche whence they had been locked and buried. Vague memories and flashes of another life. A homeless shelter. Standing in line at a soup kitchen. Smoking cigarettes bought with begged pocket change. Vaccinations at the free clinic…smiling at the cute young intern leading him to an examination room. The glint of a needle. Darkness…YES! He remembered. And what he remembered chilled him to his marrow.

Awakening, the heady sensation of being upside down, the stifling fabric covering his head…and...Oh GOD! Buckets of water pouring over his face. Fear. Panic. Drowning over and over again. Electrodes attached to his body, every muscles clenching until his tendons tore from his bones. How long had they tortured him? Weeks? Months? Years? In the end it mattered not. Who he was had been shattered and all that remained was a template, a broken body and a malleable mind. Then the training had begun.

Firearms, Martial Arts, Parkour, Stealth. Tactical programming and intimidation techniques to control. The select and measured use of violence for terror, assassination and sabotage. The gun in his hand. An unknown man bound and hooded. The order to kill. His unhesitating action. The horror of a broken mind mending itself back together.

A name. Project Fenris. A wolf in sheep’s clothing. A simple unassuming civilian identity. A spotless if rather bland history. The insertion into his assignment. All of the deadly training fading into the background, hypnotically sealed away, buried beneath a fabrication and awaiting the right trigger to call him forward to his true purpose.

The Light dissolved him, atom by quantum atom, burning away the fog that had kept him from the truth. Pain upon Pain until finally, mercifully, cool darkness enshrouded him once more.

***

Armed guards had rushed into the room. Olivia lay motionless while the other man, identified by his security tag as a research assistant was gripped in the throes of an intense seizure. A small device was still in his hand, being crushed by the intensity of his muscle contractions. He did not seem to be conscious. It took several men to pick him up and restrain him into a gurney so he could be wheeled to the infirmary. A nurse checked his eyes for pupil response and immediately jumped back in fear…the man’s eyes were clouded over and milky as if with severe cataracts. Closer examination showed them to be crystallizing, but no further tests could be done, so severe was his thrashing.

General O’Neill, summoned by the commotion, had ordered him thrown into a secure cell when he realized that the crushed device held in the man’s hand was an NID transport beacon. If he survived, there would be hell to pay…

Over the next 24 hours Brayden was observed in awe by several of the facility doctors and scientists. His body drenched itself in sweat as his muscles continued to spasm in waves, each time thickening and bulging as he struggled unconsciously in his restraints. Soon he ripped through them and crushed part of the gurney. He lay, convulsing on the floor as his body thickened and bulged until finally he lay still, breathing slowly on the hard concrete.

[SkyLion]

***

After he had lain still for an hour, the chief medical officer deemed it safe for them to come in and examine the prisoner. The man was barely recognizable. His raven hair had grown long, his features chiseled from stone and his body…well that was something else. His arms alone were easily 20 inches around and compacted onto a 5’6” frame. Everything seemed perfectly proportional however, his agonist groups immaculately balanced, like the fusion between a powerlifter and a gymnast.

Two soldiers went to pick him up…and he barely budged. His body felt almost like stone, so solid were the muscles and so heavy! 2 more men were summoned to help. Once in the med lab, the escorting soldiers gratefully set him on a slab. The doctor, having seen more than one nova with these types of modifications, produced an osmium needle to take a blood sample. The results were shocking and went straight to the General: Heavy concentration of Naquadah in his bloodstream. Normally this would mean only one thing…a Goa’uld infiltrator, and special protocols were by necessity in effect. First heavy sedation followed by an advanced medical imaging scan and spectography.

General O’Neill watched personally as the scanner passed over the unconscious nova’s body, with Teal’c nearby. No goddamned snakes were going to find their way into the SGC ever again. O’Neill sighed wearily when the scan came out negative, and Teal’c allowed his tensed shoulders to relax. Then Dr. Lam said her next sentence:

“This man’s entire skeletal structure has been infused with crystalline Naquadah… the mineral has impregnated itself directly into his calcium, in the process becoming an organic molecule. That’s how it’s getting into his bloodstream and that is why he's so dense. He weighs in at nearly 200 kilos..." The General whistled lightly and the Doctor continued. "I’ve never seen anything like it. His bones are for practical purposes, indestructible.”

The general considers that for a moment, exploring the implications.

“Naquadah? The Goa’uld use it to power everything…so what are you saying Doctor…that this man is a living battery?”

Carolyn cocks her head in a qualified affirmative. “Potentially. The crystal seems to be dormant right now so I’m not getting any energy readings.”

“What happened to his eyes?”

“I…have no idea. They are also Naquadah…apparently solid. There does seem to be an internal organization to the lattice, could be a form of optics we haven’t thought of before. A lot of it depends on how his brain will process information…or he might be blind. Perhaps the ‘Taint’ Captain Kudikias mentioned.”

“Anything else Doctor?”

“Nothing so far. He displays the same regenerative abilities of the others as well as dermal reinforcement. And as you can see, his muscle hypertrophy is off the scale. He is positively bursting at the seams with mitochondria which seems to be developing a symbiotic relationship with the Naquadah in his bloodstream. I’m not sure what that means but he is likely as strong as several of the others. Super-soldiers indeed…” Teal’c raised an eyebrow at the Doctor.

General O’Neill frowned and looked at the crushed device. Hell he hated to do it but he needed to know how and why a mole gotten into his Command. He gave the order to a sergeant, “Bring Specialist Donnighal here immediately.” The soldier saluted and obeyed.

[SkyLion]

***

The man who knew his name was not Brayden opened his eyes heavily for the first time since the Light. Everything was still glowing faintly. He blinked in confusion as he looked around him. Everything was transparent. Skeletal figures walked all around him, above and below through neat precise corridors. It was an image like unto Hades…an underworld populated by the spirits of the Dead. This must be a dream…or I am dead and now a haunting specter.

Suddenly a door opens and two figures enter. It is difficult to tell looking through them but by the proportions of their hips and the way they move he guessed female. They seem to stare at him warily before sitting down at the table opposite him. He looks down at his body, noticing the tightness of the pajamas he has been changed into. The women watch as he looks at his own hand, turning it around in front of his face like someone in the throes of hardcore acid trip. He is about to address them when a third figure enters the room, moving with purpose and authority. He sits between the women at the desk giving the proceedings the weight of a tribunal.

General O’Neill walks into the room and sees that everyone else is present and sits down with a harried look on his face. “I’m General Jack O’Neill. Under executive order 11709A I am authorized to interrogate you in special tribunal for suspicion of high treason against the People of Earth.”

The man sitting before them looked haggard, his hair still matted around his face. He would be handsome if not for his disheveled state and those eyes. With no pupils or iris to speak of they gave the appearance of a dead stare...the look of a blind man staring off into nothing…staring right through you.

Olivia quietly grabbed the arms of her chair, trying to remain calm despite those unnerving eyes.

O’Neill set a thin folder on the table. Opening he flipped through the scant contents for a few moments before looking up sharply at Brayden. "So, According to this file your name is Brayden Wolfe.”

“That is not your real name is it?"

The man does not answer but stares mutely at them. To him every nuance is sharpened. The rhythm of their pulse and the echoes of the breath as it reverberates against the transparent glowing surfaces of the cell. Finally he gives a tentative "No."

“Will you tell us your real name?"

He looked around seeming to take in the ceiling, looking down at the floor…all around him seeming very preoccupied with the room or perhaps something else.

The General frowned at the prisoner’s lack of focus. He turned to Kyria at his right. "I hate to do it, but please verify what is being said."

,,

She nodded in response and suddenly in addition to the overwhelming nature of his sensory expansion, Brayden felt an odd pressure in his mind, a feeling of being watched from the inside.

Olivia looked at Kyria, her eyes considering the young telepath.

The man looked immediately and directly at Kyria, seeming to stare right through her. "You...you are in my mind."

O’Neill was not the most patient of men and especially now given the stakes. "Focus please. We are trying to decide what to do with you here. Your help would be appreciated.”

The man just stared at Kyria. "I can feel you..."

The General's frown deepened. "It is alright Kyria, you may stop for now." She shrugged. "Okay.”

The General spoke more forcefully this time. Now…will you tell us your real name?"

,,

"I..." the man stopped, his face twisting upon itself as he struggled to find his identity.

“I...don't know. They took it from me. They took...everything.”

,,

The General nods at this, ""Tell us what you know of your past. How is it that you came to be an employee at the nations second most secret base believing your name was Brayden Wolfe?"

The man spoke as if in a fugue.

"It's all so much to remember. I was captured...kidnapped...taken...tortured. They called it Project Fenris”

"They? Any idea who 'they' might be?

,,

The man's brow furrowed. "...No. It's fuzzy but I am starting to piece things back together. They did terrible things to me. Made me do terrible things! And when they decided I was ready...they made me forget. They hypnotized me, gave me a new name and sent me here to await their signal.”

O’Neill nodded. “We will ask you later to see if you can give us descriptions and possibly even identify from pictures the ones that captured you and did these things.”

,,

"I never saw them. Only voices. Men in masks."

O’Neill sighed.

Olivia looked intrigued despite herself, leaning forward. "What was the signal?"

,,

The man focused on the new voice. "I...I know you. You work with Doctor Goldberg… The signal...it was a codeword. They programmed it into me, but only when activated by a particular sequence of sounds…like a modem. The word was...Domino." He looked with what could only be called intensity at the general.

"What happened to me? Did you drug me? Everything is so acute. People everywhere, like specters. I feel...strange."

“We haven't done anything to you. You did it to yourself actually. And to this woman right here.” The General pointed to Olivia.

He trailed off, "I remember a light...voices…"

,,

"Yeah, you could have killed me," Olivia said, her dark eyes flashing. I'm just damned lucky that I had the right genes...” The general patted her arm gently and looked a little uncomfortable doing it.

O’Neill continued, "You activated an alien device that has altered you genetically. What was your exit plan? How were you going to get out?”

The more lucid and awake the man became the more distraught and emotional he was becoming. “It’s all coming back to me...only fragmented...like a dream…a terrible nightmare…Oh God!" tears start flowing down his face uncontrollably from his alien eyes.

Olivia murmurs, "I'm not sure there was a way out planned for him, sir. Why would they bother?"

Kyria spoke, more coldly than she intended. "Because training someone like that is expensive and takes time. Even if he was useless for the SGC, that doesn't mean they couldn't have reprogrammed him and put him somewhere else. Some people tried to destroy my Earth that way."

The prisoner seemed broken, whispering, "I'm so sorry!" softly over and over again and trailing off into muted sobs.

Olivia looked really uncomfortable as Brayden cried.

General O'Neill looked for confirmation and saw it in the broken man before him. For the first time since entering the room his expression softened.

The man just sobbed. "This can't be real…”

,,

O’Neill cleared his throat. “I'm afraid it is son. You remember that you were working at Area 51 on alien artifacts yes?”

"Y-yes. I remember all of that but it was like being in a waking dream. I didn't realize I was asleep until...until the light."

”Listen son. I do believe you. The question now is what to do with you." He looks a little uncomfortable, "We had to be sure that you would not wake up with super abilities and be triggered again with another codeword so I asked Kyria to scan you telepathically. You are clean now. There are no more hidden jack in the boxes waiting to spring out.”

,,

"Who I was...that person is gone now...I can never go back...even if I could I don’t think there was much of anything to go back to. I think that is why they chose me...my memories are scattered but I remember being on the streets...a junkie, I think. I didn't have any next of kin..."

Again O'Neill looks a little uncomfortable as he adds, "We know that you don’t really have an old life to go back to. We would like to offer you the chance to build a new life helping your country and the world. Are you interested?”

[

Olivia stared at the General, her mouth open slightly.

,,

Kyria gives Olivia a small shrug, as if to say 'you've got me, too'.

The general looked at Olivia sensing her eyes on him. "Olivia, you worked with Brayden for several weeks, did you ever suspect anything?"

"I would now," Olivia said simply, her eyes settling on Brayden. "There were things, little things that went unnoticed then that I'd find off now."

O'Neil nodded. "That's what I thought. Do you hold any grudges against this man?”

The prisoner had stopped crying, seeming to sober up as things became clearer to him, settling into the reality of his new senses. He sniffed, and wiped off his face with his sleeves.

,,

"Grudges?" Her fingernails clicked on the table. Finally she sighed and said, "I'm not going to hold it against him exactly, but I'm still pissed. The odds of me having the right genetics are small, and I should have died. That's hard to forget."

"I didn't know what I was doing,” the man answered. “I didn't mean to hurt you...or at least I don't now. I...I don't know what I would have done if I hadn't been fried by that thing. They made me into a killer."

Kyria arched a brow at 'Brayden', but kept her thoughts to herself.

"I know you didn't mean to hurt anyone,” Olivia continued, “not the you that is you now. But the you that was built, that was false - it decided that I wasn't worth another twenty seconds to try to lie. That you decided to just kill me." Olivia shook her head. "You may not be that you exactly anymore, but it's a part of you. How long did you live with it? Look... just don't be a killer anymore."

O'Neill looked at Olivia evaluating what she said.

"I don't think my intention was to kill you. I think after the device had been transported out...I...I would have taken you hostage and fought my way out...That is what they programmed me to do..."

"Yeah, that's *so* much better," Olivia said, her tone colored with more than a bit of sarcasm.

General O'Neill looked back at Brayden and frowned. "That is in the past now, and that person doesn't exist anymore. I'm speaking to you. I think you are a decent person or I wouldn't make this offer. Will you join us?"

The broken man looked at the General. "How...how does one start over after something like this?”

The General’s frown lessened, “One day at a time. Having a purpose helps though. You've been trained with skills that would make you a valuable asset to us if you were willing to join.

The man lapsed back into thought again for almost a minute, the silence stretching out. The General knew not to rush the answer. He was nothing if not a man of his word and the fragile mind before him needed time to heal.

"If I may General...how do you know? …Even I barely know..."

O’Neill pursed his lips at being questioned.

"Because I do. Because of the way you reacted to all of this. And because I did something I really despise, I asked this girl to look in side your head. It was the only way I had to be sure. Because I value the lives of my people and I couldn't risk their lives without knowing if you were someone I could count on. You might not know it yet, or even recognize it, but I do."

"You're the only one who would know," Olivia added. "You're clean. It's your call now."

The man took a deep breath and sighed with such weariness that the others almost felt as if their own skeleton had been laced with a superdense alien mineral.

"What is it that you would have me do here? And perhaps more accurately...what choice do I have?"

,,

General O'Neill smiled slightly. "You have a choice, you can help us or chose not to. But our job is to protect not just this country but the entire world. We do it regularly. There are alien forces out there that would like to enslave or destroy us. With your new abilities you could be a big help in that.”

The man swallowed hard. "And what exactly is it that you are going to have me do? I don’t ever want to be anyone's thug ever again...”

The general looked sharply at Brayden, "Do we look like thugs and killers? 'We don't operate like those who abducted you."

"No…no sir. Its just...this *is* the military correct? Am I to be enlisted?"

O’Neill answered, “I will consider your position. You can choose to enlist or work as a civilian contractor.”

"Civilians work for the military, too," Olivia said. "I'm a technical writer, remember?"

Kyria raised her hand, saying, "I'm not even a civilian, and they're already putting me to work."

The General smiled at Kyria, "Oh you are a civilian, you just aren't a citizen. Technically you are an illegal alien.

The redheaded teen rolled her eyes at that. "Cute. Really. Adorable."

The mood in the room had improved palpably.

“So you will join us then?”

The man nodded, finally seeming more lucid. "I don’t think I could ever go back to a normal civilian life. I've been through too much..."

Pleased that they were getting somewhere, O’Neill smiled. “Good. You'll be under observation for the next two weeks and under supervision of a pair of Airmen. After that you'll be asked to sign an NDA and we will assign you to an SG team. I know you've signed one before, but that might not be legally binding any more so a new one is in order.”

"SG?" The man asked.

“Stargate. You will have plenty of time to learn about the program after you sign the new NDA.”

General O'Neil stands and looks to Olivia first then to Kyria. "Thank you both for your time and assistance, it was appreciated."

To the man, "The two Airmen outside the door will take you to the mess hall and get you some food then see about finding you some clothes that fit and quarters.

"Thank You General, sir."

“Welcome to the SGC. “O’Neill paused and looked back at Olivia. "Care to join us for coffee?”

Olivia gave Brayden an inscrutable look as she followed O'Neil.

"One last thing..." the man said.

O’Neill paused, one foot out the door, and glanced questioningly at the man.

"My...my name..."

"Is Brayden Wolfe. If you have any desire to change it you will have to do it through legal channels.”

***

[SkyLion]

***

He tossed and turned, unable to sleep. 2 days and nights had passed with no reprieve from the sensory overstimulation. Every noise, even his own breath, rang out like thunder. At least his vision had returned to normal…his talent had made the function of his eyelids superfluous.

His thoughts turned to his work at Area 51. It had been clerical, boring even, although the evidence of extraterrestrials and the top secret "priveledge" of the work had provided a small measure of intellectual satisfaction. It was strange, these memories of himself that were not himself. Brayden Wolfe was a fictitious name for a fictitious person…yet that was who he was now. It begged the question, who are we if not our memories?

His heart pounded like a drum in his chest and his mind reeled like a ship in a storm as it tried to get a grip on reality.

Images of cold-blooded murder, dealt by his own hand flashed through his mind. Memories of terrible pain and torture…but that was the funny thing about pain. When it was gone, when it is only memory it becomes muted. The memory of pain is not pain, yet it holds power over humans. It’s influence pervasive through the scars of memory, yet without the memory even that residue evaporates.

Who am I?

I know I am not who I once was. I am not who they trained me to be. I am not who I thought I was a week ago.

Every lump in his mil-spec mattress poked him uncomfortably.

Who am I now?

Every small adjustment in his body, every firing of every micromuscle registered to his proprioception, increasing his unease and the inability to relax.

Just need to switch off…sleep. Must sleep. Must Sleep. MUST SLEEP!

“Ahhhhhrrrrrrr…” he growled in frustration, finally leaping out of bed. Miscalculation. His muscles responded launching him head first into the ceiling with a loud crack.

“Oooowwwww!” He grumbled, feeling the nauseating discomfort of his skull repairing itself.

He flicked on the light nearby and stared at himself in the mirror, and dabbing at the blood that matted his hair even as the skin closed.

It was hard to believe really. He contracted the muscles in one arm, then the other, watching them respond. Then he contracted every muscle in his body, squeezing everything as tight as he could, breathing deeply in through his nose.

Funny…that actually feels really good!

His body responded to the exertion with a slick sheen of sweat and a flood of endorphins. He clenched his hands hard engaging his forearms, noticing the way it made his veins protrude. A sudden itch along the back of his wrist stole his attention and he scratched it furiously. Without warning, two foot-long blades, composed of clear solid crystal and razor sharp, extended from his forearm bones, slicing him across the forearm.

“FUCK!” He shrieked in pain. Beyond the initial spatter there wasn’t much blood. He watched as the deep cuts sealed themselves as if they had never been. His body responded with an even more potent chemical rush, overwhelming the pain into a throbbing pleasure.

Okay…I’m a freak.

He looked at the blades glinting in the light, refracting it through them onto the floor of his room. The colors were mesmerizing and he tilted his wrist making them dance to the rhythm of the blood in his ears. He turned his hand over and the blades retracted…or rather shrank. They hadn’t unsheathed so much as sprouted from his body. No moving parts. The slits they made closed up over them and he continued to trip out on the contours of his hand and playing isolation with the various muscles of the palm and forearm.

Finally he shook it off, standing up again.

I gotta get out of here. This place is giving me cabin-fever.

He threw on the torn BDU pants and the stretchy tank top that looked like a comical girls baby tee on him, coming down to just below his midriff. He frowned at his appearance but for now there was nothing that could be done. The general had made arrangements for custom clothing that wouldn’t restrict his range of motion.

Moving silently through the halls, the only evidence of the late hour was the scant level of personnel present. He indulged himself, looking through walls and eavesdropping on the sleeping forms of the soldiers and specials. One man looked to be still up, reading a selection from what could only be termed a branch library in his quarters. The sign on the door read Sp. Jones. Reaching out, Brayden gave it a knock.

[Rorx]

"Come" was the only response, although even that was noticeably not in an American accent. British maybe, but if so a regional one, not the typical one from movies and the occasional tv show that made it across the Atlantic.

Brayden ghosted into the room as was his wont these days, he just couldn't get over how much quieter he could be now, another reminder of the many recent changes in his life.

"I said c..oh, hello." The guy in the room, 6' tall and built like a PT instructor, dressed like many others in standard issue t-shirt and BDU pants had started turning towards the door as he spoke and hence spotted Brayden's appearance in the room. He stands and offers his hand to the stranger in his room.

"I guess you're another of the Specialists. Gwyn Jones, how do you do, or with us perhaps I should say what do you do?"

[SkyLion]

The stupendously built man stood a full half foot shorter than Jones but made up for it with stockiness. He regarded the other special with clear expressionless eyes. In some ways less disturbing than Perault's and in some ways more. At least the Seargeant had normal pupils. The first impression was that he was blind, suffering from severe cataracts but more than a moments inspection showed otherwise. He was far from blind.

"Wolfe, Brayden. I find specialist to be an amusing euphamism really...and at the moment I'm preoccupied with what I can't do...namely sleep to save my life. I feel like somebody dosed me with a concentrated hallucinogen..."

Now that he mentions it, he does seem to be slightly distracted by...something. Or maybe it's just that his eyes mask his intent in ways a normal human can't.

"Anyways," he continues, "I noticed you were still up as well. Thought I'd come say hello...get out of my ce...my room for a minute..."

[Rorx]

Gwyn nods at his first comment and waves him over to sit on the bed while turning the desk chair around to face him.

"Yeah, I don't sleep anymore either. Hence I spend the time reading up on anything I can think of that might be relevant. Since I trained as a physicist and engineer I've mainly be expanding on that. I guess it would be best if you could find something to find yourself occupied with at night as well. Do you have any hobbies?"

[SkyLion]

Brayden gives an ironic, almost desperate chuckle.

"Hobbies? No. I was trained to be a spy and a killer and then mindfucked into the most boring person you would have ever met, so you would never suspect me. Hobbies would have made me too...unique...too personable. Lately I've felt like a caged animal. I just feel this intense urge to run and run and run. Even thinking about it makes my new muscles twitch with anticipation but I can't stand the monotony of the treadmil. I think if I don't get some fresh air and sunlight soon I'm going to lose my mind. Even the stars would be a welcome sight..."

Click to reveal..

I edited the first post of this 'chapter' (when he can't sleep) to show that it takes place on the third night after the interrogation. He isn't allowed out yet.

[Rorx]

"Yeah, well all us 'Specialists' are in the same boat there. I don't think any of us are due to get off base until the 2 weeks is up."

Gwyn briefly considers the thickset man in front of him, "Well as far as I can see you've got a couple of choices. You could go and haunt the gym all night, but if you're like me you've probably spent a fair chunk of the day there anyway so you'll be sick of the place in short order. You could raid the library for anything that either strikes your fancy or you think might be useful. That's what I've chosen as you can see. Or I suppose youcould find the TV room and watch whatever you can find on the channels or dvd's they may have here."

"I suppose for a change we could have a spar if you wanted, but we'll have to go over what our new abilities are and what we are going to use."

[SkyLion]

"I don't think I could sit still long enough to read or watch TV. I've spent the last couple days in isolated observation so I haven't seen the gym yet. Sparring sounds fun, I think my new body likes pain actually...it's stimulating."

[Rorx]

"Ouch, I hope that was an accident? Anyway, if you haven't seen the gym yet then I suggest we head down there. Have you been out at all much yet? If not I'll give you a tour of what places I've been to so far."

Gwyn leads the way out and starts off on a brief tour, mainly consisting of the meeting room area, the library, the TV room, the canteen and ending up at the Gym.

"Rather than jump straight in with a sparring session I think it would be safer to go through some ciruits and stuff to find out what you are capable of now. I know that I'm faster, stronger and more agile than I was, and much greater stamina as well. So shall we try the weights first? They only have enough to make up a bar to about 800lbs, say 350kg, and some of the Specialists I've seen working out here have complained that that is too light for them. Me, I used to press about 150kg, and now that is up to about 300kg without kicking in powers I have to trigger. With powers on, then I haven't found enough stuff here to test it properly yet, although they are meant to have some gear on order."

[SkyLion]

He listens as Jones describes the facilities and exposits about the resistance training gear. The man was obviously an intellectual, and much smarter than Brayden. It made him feel...humbled, and he paid attention.

Afterwards he answers, "I feel like I'm strong enough to tear a bear's head off right now." Gwyn noticed that he had begun breathing deeply, his broad chest heaving and his body almost vibrating. A light sheen of sweat appeared on his brow and mighty arms. Had he not known better, Gwyn would have thought the man exhibited signs of methamphetamine use or perhaps phenycyclidine.

[Rorx]

"In which case lets try you with the weights first, just the plain old iron bar, we don't want to risk busting any of the machines the Airmen use. What do you reckon to start with? 100kg and then move up from there? And would sir prefer to start that as a press or as double arm curls?"

As he talks Gwyn moves over to the appropriate area of the gynm and starts putting the weights onto a bar.

[SkyLion]

"Put on all of it," Brayden answers, referring to the weight. He looks serious.

[Rorx]

Gwyn glances at Brayden's heavyset physique and shrugs, "Yeah, you sure look like you got hit with the muscle stick."

He quickly racks it up to the 800lbs limit that the area currently supports [activating DI during it] and passes it over to Brayden one handed.

"How do you want it?"

[SkyLion]

Brayden takes the hand off with ease, also one handed.

"Feels light as a feather," he comments balancing the weighted ends easily. He frowns. "I'm not sure what the point is to resistance training if I can't get enough resistance. Hmmm..."

He looks over to Jones. "You ever wrestle? The best resistance I know of is to push against another person who's working against you... How much do you weigh?"

[Rorx]

"Yeah, thats why they've got some special weights/exercise equipment being built. No, I've never done wrestling, but I've done a little judo and ju-jitsu would that cover what you had in mind? At the moment I weigh about 800kg."Gwyn replies with a smile.

[SkyLion]

"I am also familar with eastern grappling styles but no I don't think they would count. Eastern styles focus more on technique and joint locks. I was thinking more along the lines of greco-roman grappling, pitting strength against strength. It's also some of the best cardio one can do although with the way I've been going, I am sure we could keep up the contest indefinitely."

Brayden gives a long whistle. "That's what almost nine-tenths of an American ton. Mind if I try and lift you?"

[Rorx]

"Yeah, I'm willing to give it a try. With the way you handled that bar I reckon you could probably lift me, but yeah give it a go."

So saying Gwyn puts his arms by his side and goes rigid to be easier to pick up.

[SkyLion]

Brayden walks over to Gwynm considering how he wants to attempt this stunt. Finally he decides just to pick him up at the waist, a leverage-disadvantaged positon. Despite weighing half as much again as the barbell, the Welshman rises into the air easily before being set back on his feet.

"Interesting...that was a noticeable difference in weight, but not quite half of what I feel would be all out. If they intend to keep us around, we are going to need special facilities to challenge us. What about you? What are your Gifts of the Gods?"

[Rorx]

"That was about what I expected from the way you lifted that bar. Hopefully some of the special stuff will start arriving in a couple of weeks or so, but you know what bureaucracy can be like and the need to hid the purpose for some of it might delay things more. My abilities? Well I got a general physical boost, nothing like this strength stuff, thats something else I'll get on to, no just a general increase in strength, speed and agility. My stamina has gone way up though, and as we've already mentioned I don't need to sleep any more. I've alsoo had a mental boost in that I'm smarter than I was, I'm off the end of the online IQ tests that I've had access to, and I notice more details about things than I used to, including where the weak points in structures, procedures and situations are. It even removed the need for my glasses in the process."

He moves back over to the bar and strips some weight off it until it's down to about 200lbs and starts doing curls with it using both arms.

"This is about my regular limit now for this, but I have a couple of what you might call powers, in that I can switch them on and off, and eventually they start wearing me out for a while. The first is that weight thing. If I increase my density like that as well as weighing a lot more I get a LOT stronger. You estimated that you could lift about one and half tons now? Currently we estimate my capacity when I've increased my density to be about 15 tons. Being denser my skin gets tougher as well, but thats more difficult to quantify easily, especially as I don't fancy standing in front of a wall while they try increasingly bigger calibre guns at me. They are rigging up a hydraulic press as a test machine for us strong types, it won't be any use for exercise but should be able to give us some figures for our current capacities."

He puts the bar down and after looking around the gym heads over to a corner where there is some broken chairs and benches.

"Some stuff got broken before I got the density thing properly under control and remembered what I could and couldn't do while using it. Independent of the general density thing I can also make my hands and feet denser and harder until they are virtually like steel, which means my strikes then hit more like an axe or sledgehammer, so I need to be rather careful about that during sparring. When we were being rescued from the NID base I kicked a guy not knowing that power was on or what it would do and it burst his head like a melon and went a couple of inches into the concrete wall he was up against."

So saying he picks up a couple of broken legs of chairs and one after the other chops his way through them with his barehand in the classic karate chop position. But rather than the sort of broken edged effect left by a martial artist demonstrating breaking this he does holding it in mid-air with one hand and chopping it with the other with a result very much like that of a sword or sharp axe. He tosses a few over to Brayden for him to look at.

"My favourite however I've saved until last. I can fly! [huge grin] Not very fast at the moment, but I'll work on it when I can get out somewhere I can practise it properly."

As he talks Gwyn lifts off the ground in the Gym and in the restricted size and height of the room still manages to do a loop the loop and circle around the perimeter of the room before coming back to 'land' in front of Brayden and start walking around him.

"There hasn't been room to get an accurate reading of my top speed down here, but we think it is a bit over 100mph. More importantly I think the main use of the flight will be at very low speeds in confined place. Basically I've been usingit to practise simulating walking, because when I boost up to 800kg not all floors are going to take it as well as the god knows how many feet thick the rock floors are here."

It's when he says that that Brayden notices that Gwyn has stopped moving his legs and revealed that when he was 'walking' around Brayden he had been floating a cm or so off the ground. He floats back around in front of Brayden and putting their heads at the same height he pulls his legs up into the lotus position.

"So that's my alterations as far as I'm currently aware of them, how about you?"

[SkyLion]

Brayeden tracks the movements of Gwyn as he flies around much like a cat following a moth. "Wow. Flight. That's pretty much the best super power ever. X-ray vision isn't as cool as we thought it would be as kids..." he says with his signature grin.

"The first thing I noticed was being able to see through walls and people. At first I was surrounded by walking talking skeletons until I figured out how to turn it off. The next thing was the physical changes. I'm a lot heavier now. The docs say my bones are made of the same stuff as the Stargate, making them pretty much indestructable, not to mention heavy. It is also the foundation of the prodigious strength but can't account for all of it. Something about the Nak...Nalk...that mineral stuff supercharging the mitochondria in my muscles. Just before I knocked on your door I discovered the ginsu knives I mentioned earlier and that my body takes damage pretty well."

Braydon flexes his wrist downward and the crystal blades pop out, glittering wickedly.

"They seem to be growing directly out of my forearm bones. What do you make of them?" he carefully allows Gwyn to inspect them.

[Rorx]

Gwyn takes a careful look at they appear to be extremely sharp.

"Nasty things to be on the recieving end of. I think you need to get a lot of practise in keeping them under control while training and sparring as I don't think many, if any, others have your regenerative ability."

Gwyn straightens from his examination, "Well unless you want to do circuits or something I think we are finished here, did you want some suggestions in the Library or see what they have in the video library?"