Heroic

by H D Forth

  When I had first arrived in the bedroom, I was stuck with a hard choice. Kani was still wearing her greasy overalls, and she clearly hadn't taken a shower since she finished the frame. I could let her onto the bed staining everything and making me clean it up later. But something within me, something within me rebelled at the idea of staining a set of perfectly good sheets.

  She had thought likewise because I could quite clearly see that she hadn't been sleeping on the bed, nor on the couch. She must have slept on the floor.

  I tried to wake her up enough for her to take a shower, but after 5 minutes I realized that that wouldn't be happening anytime soon. Instead, I grabbed my overcoat, from downstairs, and laid her on that. I hadn't been stained since I had taken it off before she got downstairs, but it was longer than her and big enough to wrap her up in, then she wouldn't stain anything.

  Just to be sure I put a blanket onto the bed, before laying her down wrapped up in my coat.

  Then I went out to find where she had been sleeping when I arrived. It didn't take long. I soon found some stains on the floor that reminded me of the ones on my shirt and now on my jacket.

  I didn't take a lot of hard work, cleaning the stains out of the wood boards. I’d had a lot of practice, doing such things before, seeing as I was the one that kept the first floor clean. I was currently inside a cleaning robot after all.

  A few hours later, that I had spent reading an autobiography by a hero, and catching a little nap myself and I heard Kani stir in the bedroom. I checked the clock, two am.

  I winced. It was going to be a hell of a day back to work. It was two in the morning, and I hadn't yet slept, only catching a small nap. I had gotten up pretty early too, around 10 am yesterday, that was early for me, before the whole hero thing.

  “Good Morning!” I greeted cheerily, as a creature that can only vaguely be described as human stepped out of the bedroom.

  I had taken Kani's hair out of her ponytail, which had resulted in it, tangling around her head in a mad crown of intricate designs. IT would be a nightmare to brush out. Her bloodshot eyes landed on me with a sullen scowl, before she wrapped the coat tighter around her and staggered into the bathroom.

  Soon the water started running, I heard her yowl and screech as she presumably fixed her hair up some.

  20 minutes after a vaguely humanoid creature entered the bathroom, Kani left it. She only let out a single word as she looked at me.

  "Coffee." I smiled at her, lifting the travel cup I had prepared for her. She pounced on it, I had rarely seen someone move so predatory, yet so slowly. It was literally like watching a cat hunt a rat but in slow motion.

  "There's more in the pot." I nodded downstairs, as she downed a massive gulp of steaming hot liquid.

  "Ah ah ah!" She cried out as she burned her tongue, then she took another way too large gulp. She cried out again, repeating the process a few more times before she was finished with the cup.

  Not much later, we were downstairs. Kani was making a last check on a list she had brought up from the Web. Apparently, the whole design hadn't been her idea. When I had asked her, she told me.

  "I might be an engineer, but I can only work so much. I still have a full-time job to keep up. I couldn't also take the time to design and prepare your frame. Not within the given time frame."

  Which sounded fair enough I supposed, I didn't really know much better. I didn't have a higher education, and Kani was much smarter than I.

  "Alright," She said, sipping from a cup of cold water. After her second cup of coffee, I had convinced her to drink some water. And she obviously took delight in the cold water touching her scorched tongue. "I believe everything is ready." She ran her eyes along with the list once more, before turning to me. "I'll have to turn that form off to remove all the parts and install them in this one."

  “That’s fine,” I told her. “So long as I can watch from the camera.” I pointed towards the inbuilt camera of her laptop. She readily agreed.

  10 minutes later, she had opened me up and started taking parts out of me and putting them into… new me, I guess. That’s a weird feeling.

  "HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE FOR A NEW SKIN GROWTH?" I asked her, through the laptop's speakers. I had gotten out of practice using such poor quality speakers that it sounded both like someone was yelling, but it was no louder than a normal man talking. It was disconcerting, even to me and I was the one doing it. I'd had to transfer my entire consciousness into the laptop since I couldn't be in the hard drive when she removed all the power.

  It had actually hurt quite a bit, though I suspected that it was more from loss of sensation and my mind filling in the blanks than it was anything else.

  Kani smiled at the sound of my voice. She mumbled something under her breath, before turning to me, the laptop. "A few hours." She pursed her lips for a moment, accentuating her luscious lips. "You probably won't have full coverage, by the time you go into work, but you should have enough to pass as human."

  “ACCEPTABLE!” I replied.

  ***

  I fuzzed the view out my eyes for a moment, then zoomed in on the ceiling. "It looks like everything's working fine," I told Kani, sitting up on the table. She looked at me with a gleam in her eyes.

  I checked my Foundation to find it ruins. Emptiness showed through huge arm width cracks that trailed all over the walls, floor, and ceiling. It looked more like an ancient ruin than the bunker I had initially been forged during my younger years. Swallowing my frustration as best I could, I pushed off the table.

  I landed heavily on my feet. I was Heavy, with a capital H.

  I had been surprisingly light before, even compared to the standard human body. It was partly the few actual electronics that I contained. Except for the Power Core and the Nerve Module, everything else was relatively lightweight. Even the frame, especially the frame. As it was made out of an aluminum composite, that allowed for higher tensile strength. Though it wasn't as strong as high-grade carbon steel, it had still been more effective than bones.

  Now I weighed a lot more, according to Kani, I now weighed in the neighborhood of 200 kg.

  The difference was immediately noticeable, the moment my feet landed on the floor. Instead of the light thump of metal on wood, it was the heavy thud of steel, hitting wood. Luckily the flooring didn't crack, I didn't think I could handle another lashing from Val about damaging her hardwood floor.

  I did a few experimental movements. While they weren't as smooth as the ones in my old body, they should be sufficient, granted my newly raised toughness. I raised my arms, the movement was oddly off-putting.

  I continued to move until I figured out what it was. I was slower. I was used to running on a lower power drain, and now that I had gotten denser, that power drain ended up making me slower.

  “So?” Kani asked, tension in her voice. “How is it?”

  "It's…" I started to say, searching for the right words. "Different, I guess. It's hard to explain."

  I upped the power drain by a small margin, I continued until it felt relatively close to my old movements speed. I wouldn't actively drain power from the core to move at this speed, but passive recharging would be almost non-existent.

  I looked around the room until my eyes alighted on something hanging in the corner. A punching bag. "Let's try it out," I said, my eyes alight with excitement.

  There are generally two ways to increase the amount of kinetic force you can deliver. It’s a pretty simple equation, velocity times mass equals the kinetic energy output. This meant if I wanted to hit harder, there were two ways I could do it. I could increase the speed at which I hit, like a bullet. Or, I could increase the mass, the weight with which I hit, think impact with a car.

  The aluminum composite was about three times lighter than my current carbon steel frame. That’s three times more weight per punch, which means I hit with that much more force.

  I hadn't actually done the calculations when I reared back, ready to hit the punching bag. Judging
from the way Kani’s eyes widened, then let out a screech, covered her face and jumped away, I realized she might’ve. At that point however it was already too late.

  With a deep hollow sounding thud, my fist slammed full force through the bag. As my punch dug right through, I hit the bag with my entire weight, causing it to rip further, before suddenly holding my weight. Until with a loud ripping sound, the socket the bag hang in ripped out of the ceiling.

  The punching bag, landed heavily on the floor, the innards spilling onto the ground. I stared in surprise as dust fell from the four holes left from the screws in the ceiling.

  “Oops.”

  ***

  Needless to say, I spend the rest of the night looking up how to fix the ceiling, actually fixing it and made my best attempt at sowing the bag up again. By the time I was finished the sun had risen, and Kani came down from the bedroom, where she had been sleeping.

  “Ahh, you got it up again,” She said, her voice groggy.

  “Yeah,” I replied, making sure that the huge patch I’d made was facing away from any entrances, in hopes that Val wouldn’t notice immediately. “Just in time to go to work too.”

  She nodded at me, “Good luck.”

  Chapter Ninety-Four

  At first I waited downstairs, hoping that a few more hours of sleep would do her some good. I was reasonably certain that Kani had worked through the night and most of the day. Then she’d called me to tell me she had a surprise for me. She had tried to stay awake for my arrival, but had obviously been too tired and gone upstairs to sleep.

  When I had first arrived at the bedroom I was stuck between a hard choice. Kani was still wearing her greasy overalls, and she clearly hadn't taken a shower since she finished the frame. I could let her onto the bed staining everything, and making me clean it up later. But something within me, something within me rebelled at the idea of staining a set of perfectly good sheets.

  She had thought like wise, because I could quite clearly see that she hadn't been sleeping on the bed, nor on the couch. She must have slept on the floor.

  I tried to waker her up enough for her to take a shower, but after 5 minutes I realized that that wouldn't be happening anytime soon. Instead I grabbed my over coat, from downstairs, and laid her on that. I hadn’t been stained, since I had taken it off before she got downstairs, but it was longer than her and big enough to wrap her up in, then she wouldn't stain anything.

  Just to be sure I put a blanket onto the bed, before lying her down wrapped up in my coat.

  Then I went out to find where she had been sleeping when I arrived. It didn't take long. I soon found some stains on the floor that reminded me of the ones on my shirt and now on my jacket.

  I didn't take a lot of hard work, cleaning the stains out of the wood boards. I’d had a lot of practice, doing such things before, seeing as I was the one that kept the first floor clean. I was currently inside a cleaning robot after all.

  A few hours later, that I had spent reading an autobiography by a hero, and catching a little nap myself and I heard Kani stir in the bedroom. I checked the clock, two am.

  I winced. It was going to be a hell of a day back to work. It was two in the morning and I hadn't yet slept, only catching a small nap. I had gotten up pretty early too, around 10 am yesterday, that was early for me, before the whole hero thing.

  “Good Morning!” I greeted cheerily, as a creature that can only vaguely be described as human stepped out of the bedroom.

  I had taken Kani’s hair out of her pony tail, which had resulted in it, tangling around her head in a mad crown of intricate designs. IT would be a nightmare to brush out. Her bloodshot eyes landed on me with a sullen scowl, before she wrapped the coat tighter around her and staggered into the bathroom.

  Soon the water started running, I heard her yowl and screech as she presumably fixed her hair up some.

  20 minutes after a vaguely humanoid creature entered the bathroom, Kani left it. She only let out a single word as she looked at me.

  “Coffee.” I smiled at her, lifting the travel cup I had prepared for her. She pounced on it, I had rarely seen someone move so predatory, yet so slowly. It was literally like watching a cat hunt a rat, but it slow motion.

  “There’s more in the pot.” I nodded downstairs, as she downed a huge gulp of steaming hot liquid.

  “Ah ah ah,” She cried out as she burned her tongue, then she took another way too large gulp. She cried out again, repeating the process a few more times, before she was finished with the cup.

  Not much later, we were downstairs. She was making a last check on a list she had brought up from the Internet. Apparently the whole design hadn’t been her idea. When I had asked her she told me.

  “I might be an engineer, but I can only work so much. I still have a full time job to keep up. I couldn't also take the time to design and prepare your frame. Not within the given time frame.”

  Which sounded fair enough I supposed, I didn't really know much better. I didn't have a higher education, and she was smarter than me.

  “Alright,” She said, sipping from a cup of cold water. After her second cup of coffee, I had convinced her to drink some water. And she obviously took delight in the cold water touching her scorched tongue. “I believe everything is ready.” She ran her eyes along the list once more, before turning to me. “I’ll have to turn that form off to remove all the parts and install them in this one.”

  “That’s fine,” I told her. “So long as I can watch from the camera.” I pointed towards the inbuilt camera of her laptop. She readily agreed.

  10 minutes later, she had opened me up and started taking parts out of me and putting them into… new me, I guess. That’s a weird feeling.

  “HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE FOR A NEW SKIN GROWTH?” I asked her, through the laptop’s speakers. I had gotten out of practice using such poor quality speakers that it sounded both like someone was yelling but it was no louder than a normal man talking. It was disconcerting, even to me and I was the one doing it. I’d had to transfer my entire consciousness into the laptop, since I couldn't be in the hard drive, when she removed all the power.

  It had actually hurt quite a bit, though I suspected that it was more from loss of sensation and my mind filling in the blanks than it was anything else.

  Kani smiled at the sound of my voice. She mumbled something under her breath, before turning to me, the laptop. “A few hours.” She pursed her lips for a moment, accentuating her luscious mouth. “You probably wont have full coverage, by the time you go into work, but you should have enough to pass as human.”

  “ACCEPTABLE!” I replied.

  ***

  I fuzzed the view out my eyes for a moment, then zoomed in on the ceiling. “It looks like everything’s working fine.” I told her sitting up on the table. She looked at me with a gleam in her eyes.

  I checked my Foundation to find it ruins. Emptiness showed through huge arm width cracks that trailed all over the walls, floor, and ceiling. It looked more like an ancient ruin than the bunker I had originally forged during my younger years. Swallowing my frustration as best I could, I pushed off the table.

  I landed heavily on my feet. I was Heavy, with a capital H.

  I had been surprisingly light before, even compared to the standard human body. It was partly the few actual electronics that I contained. With the exception of the Power Core, and the Nerve Module, everything else was relatively light weight. Even the frame, especially the frame. As it was made out of a aluminum composite, that allowed for a higher tensile strength. Even though it wasn't as strong as high grade carbon steel, it had still been more effective than bones.

  Now I weighed a lot more, according to Kani I weighed in the neighborhood of 200 kg.

  The difference was immediately noticeable, the moment my feet landed on the floor. Instead of light thump of metal on wood, it was the heavy thud of steel, hitting wood. Luckily the floor didn't crack, I didn't think I could handle another lashing from Val about damagin
g her hardwood floor.

  I did a few experimental movements. While they weren't as smooth as the ones in my old body, they should be sufficient granted my newly raised toughness. I raised my arms, the movement was oddly off putting.

  I continued to move, until I figured out what it was. I was slower. I was used to running on a lower power drain, and now that I had gotten heavier, that power drain ended up making me slower.

  “So?” Kani asked, tension in her voice. “How is it?”

  “Its…” I started to say, searching for the right words. “Different, I guess. Its hard to explain.”

  I upped the power drain by a small margin, I continued until it felt relatively close to my old movements speed. I wouldn't actively drain power from the core to move at this speed, but passive recharging would be almost non existent.