Target, Delete, Replace, Replicate

The three of them sat in the spacious laboratory in silence for a time, Mr. Abernathy the only man that needed to say much of anything next and the one who appeared least keen on saying much of anything. Perhaps too floored by what he’d just witnessed to be able to see his opinion made into word, the rather heavyset man simply gazed at the sight of the rabbit within the box that still struggled for its freedom, the newfound leg formed by thousands of microscopic robots giving it every opportunity to strain against its prison and bid for the world outside.

Twilight’s gaze flickered between her superior and the panicked rabbit just before him. she bit her lip; he needed to say something soon, or else this sudden march forward was going to screech to a halt and be rendered moot. He didn’t know what sort of issues they’d found with Project Valiant, but who was going to know better than her?

“This project of yours,” he murmured, words arriving slow through a voice rendered hoarse by shock, “when can it be advanced to human trials?”

It was to be her first disappointing statement of the day. “Not yet. And not because of necessary approval.”

“Then why?”

Twilight sighed and took a look over at the rabbit- in fact, all eyes focused on the box that now began to rock violently from the chaos growing within. “You’re about to see why for yourself.”

The hindleg of the snowy rabbit churned and writhed like the seas in a storm, metallic muscle within being formed as new nanites were spawned and replicated in lieu of the cells and sinew had once been, hardening with each passing second. The process was fulfilling itself, tightening its grip and becoming as potent, as mighty as the body demanded it to be- yet stop it did not. Across form, beneath skin was a rippling; waves the shuddering of earth as a quake roiled the land. The rabbit’s wild attempts to flee were becoming more impassioned yet less fruitful as something strained at it from within and halted all efforts. Skin contorted, the animal began to bleat and writhe on the floor of its prison.

“What in the name of God-” Mr. Abernathy breathed, leaning in closer to examine the process.

“Stay back, please!” Twilight insisted. A flash of terror at the thought of the animal actually escaping, what sort of damage it could do in an open space even in a body so small. She moved over to a panel on the nearby wall, a series of switches upon it that operated the metallic floor of the glass box. Specially made for her presentation in mind, just in case the new coding in the nanites failed just as they all had before.

The shriek of the rabbit grew to a crescendo and was halted, only to be replaced by a steely call with every new cry, the vocal cords pushed to damage by the beast’s terror- and quickly replaced as the repair process of the nanite targeted this new flaw. A weakness was found in the eyes and revealed to the trio of observers, the coal-black jewel spurting open as a flood of metal poured through, streaming out from the wound even as the creature fought against the agony. Mind knew what transpired was so wrong, so violating yet could halt it not, its own body beyond even its control now as microcomputers fused itself to every nook and cranny it could find; bones were hardening with each new foundation of metallic parasite, flesh rupturing and being made new by a dark stream of creation and re-creation, the fur and dead skin cells being eaten away and replaced by something far more lethal-

Vanda had seen it once before and had been given full warning that the horrible process might transpire once again. But that had been upon a dead body, months ago during the first trial run; this creature was alive even as it was being eaten and renewed all over again, the nanites unrelenting in their march against the imperfections within the beast. “Kill it, Twilight,” he ordered. “Stop it, get the nanites to stop!”

“I’m trying, sir!” Twilight said, hoping her voice didn’t betray the shame and panic. Her cacophony of miserable emotions saw to it that her fingers fumbled across the controls of the box’s floor, unable to properly grab the dial that commandeered the voltage below. She turned the crank as much as she could, hating how slowly it moved within her grasp-

The sound of metal frying intermingled with the stench of burnt hair and roasting animal skin, the shocks of electricity from the glass box’s floor making their mark- yet not enough to deal the final blow. The rabbit instead writhed and screamed all the more incensed, its synthesized sound terrible to behold; each new wound dealt was being more and more swiftly repaired, the terrible seams of burn scars turned a liquid metallic, every severing of microscopic form soon replaced by another. The beast was desperate to escape the pain and yet was becoming consumed by its with each passing moment-

“It won’t die. My god, it won’t die!” Mr. Abernathy dared to approach the glass box once more, perhaps lured there by awe or revulsion- or instead terror, for the sheer might of this slowly-transforming creature was taking incredible dosages of electricity and still managed to survive. He saw both victim and warrior, impossible to kill and desperate to be defeated all in one body, unkillable and begging for the end-

A shadow across the beast’s form was all it took. The incredible contortions of the suffering beast halted as it sensed the presence of something nearby and upon it did its senses focus; the rabbit’s transmutated eyes and ears promptly fixated on the man’s silhouette on the other side of the glass- and its sharpened teeth were bared in the form of a strange-sounding growl, like the hull of a ship against ice. With the force of a bullet did it strike against the glass, trying to break through and make contact; once, twice, three times over until the sides of its prison truly began to crack. And within its roiling mass that was once fur came shards of glass, sticking to the animal’s form like quills meant to ward away enemies-

“Oh my god-”

“Come on!” Twilight wrenched the dial as far as it would go, hoping that it was not too late-

Lights flickered, a brilliant shock that nearly took out the room’s power supply surged though the flooring of the glass case and struck home; heart and microscopic movement were fused together and stopped instantly, the screeching ring of the rabbit’s metal lungs made to cease. It fell back where it lie, all signs of life made to halt and never rise again.

None moved. Vanda had his eyes squeezed shut, face rueful and perhaps made uneasy at just how close this had come to a nightmare. Twilight’s sweet features were twisted by terror; this was her invention, her work. Just how bad had this gone since she couldn’t manage to halt the process? Every new attempt at coding, at taming this wild new creation that had come to life at her fingertips… all of them had ended in failure! If she didn’t find a way to make it obedient, and do it soon…

Mr. Abernathy, keeping himself against the wall, at first dared not to move. His eyes looked upon the malformed thing that had once been a rabbit and marveled, if not gaped. What did his expression reveal? Shock, of course, disgust was evident. But what else was he thinking? Did he now look upon this young girl as a modern Dr. Frankenstein, some sickened monster given tangible aid to make her horrors come to life? The whole world that was their small room waited in bated breath.

“What… the hell… did I just see?” Abernathy dared to ask.

A death blow. Twilight sighed and said, “That is… Project Valiant’s most glaring defect. Try as we might to halt the process, the nanite is proving difficult to control.”

Mr. Abernathy regarded the still-steaming corpse of mutilated beast and dared to step closer. A look through the broken cracks were glass had once been revealed to him a better view, sight where flesh had been fully replaced by hardened steel and metal of miniature machinery. It was magnificent and yet terrifying. “Why did it eat the rabbit?”

“It’s not eating the rabbit. Not like another animal would,” Twilight answered. “The microcomputer within the nanite is limited by its size. We’ve spent hours upon hours trying to rewrite the code, but we can’t seem to limit it to a singular deficiency within the host. It keeps seeking out every deficiency the host possesses- every flaw, no matter how minor. Even something as simple as a dead skin cell is attacked and treated like a threat to the overall health of the host.”

“It was doing more than just getting rid of dead skin,” Mr. Abernathy muttered.

“Because of the trauma the nanite produces,” Twilight admitted. “The more the host becomes stressed, the more the nanite tries to repair any deficiency it finds- yet its very attempts at eating away at even the most minor of flaws help to create new ones. And since we can’t code an All-Stop order into the hardware, the entire process just keeps going. Project Valiant is trying to render its host invulnerable from all harm by correcting any potential flaw it can find.”

“Invulnerable. My god.” Abernathy was considering the concept and seemed to be just as amazed as it disgusted him. The idea of an invulnerable soldier, constantly self-repairing and healing itself from all wounds- at an accelerated rate! “But you killed it. Halted the process.”

Twilight nodded. “In the early stages of the intended treatment, the nanites are vulnerable. Softer, like they haven’t had a chance to harden. But as you saw, it took an extreme amount of voltage to finally kill the prime nanite within and see all function cease. Today, I had to increase it up to 100,000 volts.”

“The glass in its fur,” Vanda remarked, peering in for a closer inspection and seeing the razor-thin barbs; sharp as a knife’s blade, ringed about its neck to protect vulnerable spots from attack. “What causes that? It was stealing assets from its surroundings.”

“Another thing we’re not sure about,” Twilight admitted. “We think it’s some kind of bug in the code that retrieves material from the nearby area to aid in the replacement/replication process. Perhaps its defense mechanism, something we haven’t quite figured out yet.

“And… the trying to attack me?” Abernathy inquired softly.

The truly sticky part. “Perhaps, because of the body trauma,” she offered weakly, “the aggression levels within the animal are heightened. It might just be lashing out, or… it might be another response to Project Valiant’s lifecycle within the body. It’s just too difficult to know right now.”

Abernathy looked at the young scientist before him, regarding every aspect of her to see if he could find hint of a darkness within. Had she intended to create a weapon instead of an aid for humanity? A maddened mind could see these nanites as a process of human evolution, rendered through cruelty yet tangible all the same. Was this the work of a young sadist, one who wanted to render mankind extinct? He looked for a shadow, yet those soft eyes were only brimming with shame, a body hunched over and weighted by the force of it. She hadn’t intended for any of this to happen.

He breathed slowly, wiping away the beads of sweat that had formed upon his large brow. “What are your next steps for perfecting your project?” He asked. “Since it clearly has not passed animal trials, you’re likely to know what hinders your work.”

“Right- right now?” Twilight stammered. She wasn’t going to get fired on the spot! “It all comes down to the coding within the nanite- and the size of the computer we used to make it. It’s just too simple, it’s not capable of the sort of complex commands we need for it to work properly. It’s going to have to understand specific DNA and RNA patterns, identify cells within the body and know which not to attack- as well as how to stop. Right now, it’s like an ouroboros and just ends up eating itself. But if DARPA’s work on micro-USB’s and computer processing can get refined… then we have something that can store all the data we need.”

“But that’s something that would likely take years. If not decades,” Vanda assumed.

Twilight nodded. “If we’re lucky. We may just be working on the first steps of the technology for the rest of our lives, but… it works. Sort of. It can work properly if we’re given the chance to see it done. We just need time, and- and funding.”

Abernathy nodded, taking in the scene and all the emotions it had rendered of him. “I will… speak to the board of directors on the matter,” he said. “Ionis has been willing to work on projects for years at a time, and this one has impressive potential. But the final say is out of my hands; whatever their verdict is, I can’t say. But I will speak on your behalf.”

A start. Not superb, not a wild success as her deepest imaginings had hoped for, but a start all the same. Twilight allowed herself a small smile and nodded. “Thank you for your time, sir.”

Dr. Vanda and Mr. Abernathy said their goodbyes and departed together, the senior researcher accompanying his charge to wherever they must be needed next. In their absence, the young scientist gave a long and heavy sigh, staring at the husk of dead rabbit and feeling her heart twist. She’d hoped this one would work; they’d tinkered on the code for this new iteration all night, trying to find what made it keep going! She just didn’t know how to halt the flow just yet, despite her very best efforts. And gods above, the thought of it being put to use now-! Unchecked, without the knowledge of how to stop it, and needing to stop it so early after its birth! The very makings of an absolute catastrophe if it were to ever get loose.

Twilight’s eyes fell upon the glass barbs imbedded within the neck and gave a shudder. If she weren’t allowed to continue her research, even if the project was buried and left to rot in the depths of paperwork that lasted decades… what would happen if someone tried to put it to use now?