Safe in a deep coma, Dredda felt nothing. She drifted in darkness while her body metamorphosed in its stainless-steel cocoon.
Inside and outside the chamber, the atmosphere was anything but tranquil. Biotech teams in three shifts saw to her considerable life-support needs around the clock. Her normal daily calorie intake was quadrupled, and she received constant electrical stimulation of new nerves and growing muscles.
Early on the morning of the ninth day, sedation was terminated. By 10:00 a.m. Dredda was breathing without a respirator. At 1:00 p.m. she opened her eyes. She was still securely strapped to the bed. Empty gauntlets hung flaccidly from the walls.
“How are you feeling?” said the voice through the intercom.
“I hurt,” she said, her throat hoarse from the respirator tube. “I hurt everywhere.”
“That is entirely normal, I assure you. We’re going to release the restraints now. You need to start moving your arms and legs.”
Technicians slipped into gauntlets on both sides of the chamber. Their gloved hands unfastened the straps, which slithered off her. When she sat up, she nearly bumped her head on the chamber’s low ceiling.
“Please be careful,” the voice warned. “You have grown four inches. You are now five feet eleven inches tall. You have gained sixty-three pounds.”
Dredda looked down at herself. Even though she had known more or less what to expect from computer-morphed projections, she recoiled Her breasts were still there, and the same size and shape, but they looked smaller, flatter because of the expansion of her chest in bone and muscle. The new muscle mass was smooth, quick, not corded or bulked up. Like her breasts, her hips had remained the same size, but they now looked narrow relative to the increased span of her shoulders.
She ran her fingertips over her lips and chin and was relieved to find no sprouting of coarse facial hair. Although her jaw seemed a little heavier, as did her cheekbones and brow, there was no other apparent external masculinization. She had changed into a very tall, very athletic looking female, the tallest, most athletic female the limitations of her existing genetics could produce. Of course, that was just the tip of the iceberg as far as the changes went.
Dredda flexed her right bicep and, despite a twinge of pain in her elbow, was momentarily transfixed by its unfamiliar bulge.
“Based on the previous experiments,” the voice told her, “your lean-muscle mass should continue to increase slightly for a more few days. The new neural connections are already complete, as is bone growth. You aren’t going to get any taller.”
“As you know, some experimental subjects, post-transformation, have displayed outbursts of extreme violence. We have only had combat simulations to work from, but it appears that spending long periods of time in a battlesuit under stress aggravates the problem. If you notice any loss of emotional control, you must start injecting yourself with antipsychotic drugs from the battlesuit medikits at once.”
“What are their side effects?”
“Reduced reaction time and increased fatigue.”
“But that would completely defeat the purpose of the procedure!” Dredda exploded.
The voice didn’t respond.
“If I start dosing myself with these drugs, will I have to take them permanently?”
“I’m sorry, but that is impossible to predict,” the whitecoat told her. “No one knows the long term consequences of the genetic treatment you have been subjected to.”
The slowly simmering anger that had always been part of Dredda’s consciousness was now paired with an entirely different level of agitation, tangible like a hairy-legged insect buzzing, bouncing off the insides of her internal organs. Everything was taking way too long.
“Unseal the door,” she said.
The airlock remained shut, and the faceless white-coat talked faster. As he spoke, his gauntleted hands made emphatic gestures above her head. “The viral agent we’ve used is extremely infectious and prone to rapid mutation and genetic recombination with other, potentially lethal life forms. Understandably, we are very concerned about its containment. We strongly recommend that you spend another three days in Level Four quarantine to make sure it has all passed out of your system.”
The other conglomerates that made up FIVE knew nothing of this lab’s existence, nor were they aware of the genetic-engineering project that Dredda had made herself part of. All research connected to trans-reality and bioweapon technology was subject to the terms of FIVE’S founding treaty—only to be pursued as a joint venture. If the alliance got wind of what she was up to, they would turn on Omnico and subject it to a combined military attack that would make her escape to Shadow World impossible.