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To Build a More Perfect Human Votes: 14 43.8%
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A Princess of Alfheim Votes: 17 53.1%
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A Cheap Harry Potter Knockoff Except Instead of Wizards, It's Mummies Or Something Votes: 1 3.1%
Sorry if this chapter is short-ish, but tomorrow's will be pretty long to make up for it - that's just how the story sections split up!
The poll above is being posted in Transfusion, Consequences of Magic, and Visions of Dark & Light, all of which will have chapters published today and tomorrow. This poll will be to decide which previously unreleased story I release next on Scribble Hub, and I'll be pooling all of the votes across six different chapter posts, so be sure to visit all six chapters if you want to be like Al Capone, who advised us to "vote early and vote often." The synopses of the stories are as follows:
To Build a More Perfect Human is a near-future science-fiction story in which a paramedic semi-accidentally treats himself with cutting-edge biomedical technology and, in so doing, accidentally turns himself into the world's first cybernetic superheroine. In this story, I take several current advances at the forefront of biotech and materials science and extrapolate how these might result in full-body transformations and the development of superhuman abilities. In many ways, this is a companion piece to Transfusion, in that it has similar thematic elements and also takes place in the fictional Palmetto City. However, it doesn't have any magical/supernatural elements to it.
A Princess of Alfheim is an isekai fantasy story in which Larry Born, a World War I infantry "doughboy" from Nebraska finds himself transported to the magical land of Alfheim and resurrected into the body of Laeanna, a princess of the fae. Can Larry/Laeanna keep her identity a secret... and does she even have to? Will she manage to seduce her beautiful handmaiden, Meliswe? And/or will she be seduced by Calivar, a fae prince with a secret similar to Laeanna's? Or maybe love will have to wait - Laeanna soon discovers that she's not the only transmigrant from Earth... and she learns that some of them are being used by enemies of the fae to plan an invasion of the peaceful fae realms.
Please leave a comment below if you like this story and please check out my many other free series on Scribble Hub. As always, thanks for reading!
-Ovid
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Back in the Saddle
Being back at work was an interesting experience. Going through her routine at Imaging East was at once reassuringly familiar and a stark reminder of how much Vera had changed. Aside from Dr. Parvolog and Ram, nobody knew that she was the same person as Verne, and she didn't correct them when they assumed she was a new hire with prior experience elsewhere. Thus, Vera's day was peppered with nearly every employee introducing themselves to her – awkward, because she already knew most of them, at least a bit – and then grossly conflating their importance within Imaging East beyond what Vera knew to be true.
For instance: "Hi, I'm Brandon. I'm kind of the go-to guy for the MRI machine, so don’t hesitate to ask if you have any questions... maybe I should give you my number?"
Hard pass. The only thing she'd be going to Brandon for advice on was how to fuck up contrast on half of her thoracic scans. And, for her part, Vera felt weird about lying but didn't want to start the rumor train rolling (did you hear about Verne's sex change operation?), so she came up with an acceptable compromise:
"Oh, I'm not new... I used to work here a while back, so I'm pretty familiar with the setup. Just show me what's recent, and I'm sure I can get back into the swing of things."
And she did get back into the swing of things. Better than back, really. It wasn't intuitively obvious, but having sharper senses and better reaction speed actually helped a lot in tuning scanning machine settings, and being able to hear heart rate, breathing, and more gave her a jump start on taking vitals before the tests. Vera had heard of dogs with tumor-sniffing abilities, and she suspected that she might also be able to do some pretty advanced diagnostics from senses alone. She could also lift and move heavy things, like modular equipment, bins of various clinical liquids and, yes, patients. Heavier patients didn't complain about a petite girl positioning them for scans and she could just pretend that they were helping more than it looked like. But she had to be careful not to let on that she was, by a wide margin, the strongest person on staff.
There were downsides to having vampiric senses, too. For one, she could hear everything. Before turning, Verne's hearing had been pretty good, able to hear whines and squeals that the older staff members were insensate to. But Vera could pick up way, way more. There were all kinds of whines, hums, and shrill whistles that were vanishingly faint or completely inaudible to human ears. She had to stuff cotton swabs in her ears around the PET machine because the high end of the scanning whine was so shrill and piercing that she couldn't concentrate during active scans without some muffling. Strangely enough, the MRI machine was mostly fine - its sound profile didn't quite hit that annoying sweet spot of high, loud, and incessant. And she could smell everything, too. Smelling chlorhexidine, poop, and the samosas from Ram's lunch, all at the same time, was enough to make Vera walk around with stank face. Shit, everybody probably thought she was a bitch.
"You doing okay with... you know... everything?" Ram asked her. "I'm not gonna lie, I thought this might be some kind of weird prank at first. I mean, you don't look anything like Verne... I mean, like you used to look. I thought you'd, at most, look like a girl Verne." He indicated a long and pointed nose with a finger gesture. "But you don't look like that at all... you know, Dr. Parvolog made all of us take a sexual harassment refresher, even her? She didn't say why, but... well... I guess we know now. You're gonna let me know if Brandon gives you shit, right?"
"Don't worry about Brandon," Vera said. "If he gives me shit, I can give back with change to spare."
But Brandon didn't give her too much shit. Three or four times, he dropped hints that he was interested, but Vera never reciprocated, and she could pretend that she didn't hear him muttering bitch under his breath, because totally-normal-human Vera wouldn't have been able to hear that. If he wanted to think she was a bitch, that was fine – he'd still have to follow her lead on teams because she still had rank, and if he couldn't stomach that, he'd get his ass fired.
During her last break of the day, Vera wandered into the little staff dining area while Dr. Parvolog was packing her things for the day. She noticed Vera and smiled, using her foot to push out a chair from the little break room table.
"Got a minute, Vera?"
"Um, sure. What's up, doc?"
"So... I don't want you to think I'm going to snoop every day, because I'm not... hand to God. But it was your first day back as you. As the new you. I was worried that it was too big of a change, that you wouldn't be able to manage... I've seen it before. People undergo major life changes - kids, deaths, divorces - and it just takes something out of them. But you seem to have jumped right back into the flow of things and I couldn't be more pleased." The doctor reached across the table and squeezed Vera's hand – far more intimacy than she'd ever demonstrated toward Verne. "And... I don't want to broach any sensitive medical issues... but you and I have discussed your NVC before..."
"What about it?" Vera pulled her hand away.
"Again, if it's too personal, just tell me to zip it. I'm not your physician and I'm a grown up, so I'll deal. But I wanted to ask whether your NVC had been cured and, if so, whether you'd put any serious thought into your future?" Enough of Dr. Parvolog's smile was forced that Vera got the impression that she'd suddenly found herself in a job interview.
"Um... yeah. It's cured. Like I said before, it's all very complicated, but I think I should live a very long life if all goes well," Vera said. That was an understatement on both fronts – she would live a very, very long life if all went well, and if things didn't go well, they were likely to go very, very, life-shorteningly not-well. "I'm still trying to figure out my personal life. My dad basically disowned me for being trans and now I have to meet with my parents, my girlfriend's parents, and my pastor after work to try to smooth things over... and I am not optimistic."
"Oof," the doctor said. "I'm sorry to hear about that... I didn't want to pry into your personal life. Again... I don’t want you to be uncomfortable here. I was asking more after your professional interests. You once told me that you never pursued university or beyond because you didn't have time for it, that you didn’t want to spend years and years getting ready for life when… what did you say? When NVC is going to pull the ripcord before I've even left the plane… something like that. It seems to me that it might be time to reconsider..."
"That’s a really good point," Vera said. "And good memory, doc. Like I said, things have been crazy. But I hope they won't be for too much longer, and then I'll have to figure out what the fuck... sorry..."
"You can curse. I've heard 'em all."
"I'll have to figure out what the fuck I'm going to do with my life. Maybe I should go back to school."
Dr. Parvolog nodded. "I think you should." She gathered her insulated lunch bag and stood to leave. "Think about it and let me know – fall classes start in another couple weeks. If you want to go to school and keep working here, we can make it work, just like we made it work with your transition. Just keep me in the loop, ok?"
Vera hopped to her feet, probably more quickly than she ought to have, and caught Dr. Parvolog in a hug. The doctor went rigid for a second – she'd squeezed Vera's hand a minute before, but she really wasn't a close person – but eventually she brought her hand up to Vera's back for a there, there pat. "Thanks for being awesome, doc," Vera said.
"You're not so bad, yourself, kid. Now, if I'm not mistaken, you've got two more scans scheduled on the evening. And, for what it's worth, I hope the meeting with your parents and everyone goes well."
+++++
A: <We can't do the meeting any later than 8 pm. You know how early your father has to get up, Vera's mother messaged circa mid-afternoon.
V: <Heaven forbid Vic Vera should inconvenience himself to salvage his relationship with his only surviving child, Vera replied.
V: <Fine. I'll head over right after work.
V: <See u @8, and then added
V: <:hugs: to make sure she wasn't coming across as a bitch.
Vera didn't get off of work until just after seven, which made an eight o'clock rendezvous at her parents' doable if not especially convenient. She definitely didn't have time to go back to the apartment to change. So she was stuck with either her scrubs or what she'd worn to Imaging East that morning. Frankly, the scrubs were the better option: modest, comfortable, and gender-neutral, albeit in a soft lilac color. But she was feeling a little salty and didn't think there was anything wrong with khaki shorts and a breezy peasant blouse. They weren't mom clothes, but they weren't slutty, either.
She got off the S3 at 7:50 and walked the remaining distance, the fading evening light doing absolutely nothing to her skin, even without sunscreen. Working until evening was a great way to avoid the midday sun, and she still got to enjoy the pinks and purples of the sunset from behind her extra dark sunglasses. As she approached her parents' place, Vera spotted Lisa emerging from a now-familiar slate-gray Lexus, licking a spot of blood from her lip. She waved and Lisa skipped over, greeting Vera with a hug and a kiss.
Vera watched the Lexus drive off. "Did you ask Salvador about the thing?"
Lisa nodded happily. "He thinks it should be possible to track the familiars. Other familiars. He needs some money for some..." she checked her phone for the word... "StingRays. It spoofs a cell phone tower so you can figure out where somebody is and intercept their messages if they're nonencrypted. And it would help to know what program they use to communicate. It all sounds really technical, but Salvador is pretty sure he can do it. He's super nice."
"He's super nice because you're super hot," Vera observed, perhaps uncharitably.
Lisa shrugged. "So? He's still super nice. I guess we should go in?"
They stepped inside – or at least Vera did. Lisa stopped at the doorway, waiting, and Vera realized that her girlfriend had never received a proper invitation – she was technically uninvited. Vera made a little bow at the threshold.
"Mi casa es su casa," she said.
"Muchas gracias, muchacha."
First day at work went well and now its time to for Vera to see her parents once again... And her girlfriend's parents. After she was the last one seen with their daughter before she died, came back to life, and disappeared. That'll be a fun family reunion!
Princess of Alfheim seems like an especially enjoyable read. Reminds me that I need to get back into Substitute Hero by Fushigi... stopped posting here after chapter 78 and now its well past 200 on another site!
Substitute Hero sounds like a fun read!
Yeah, the next chapter's going to be a very mixed bag, emotion-wise, and will basically trigger the direction of Vera's development as a vampire. She'll face a tough choice between using her powers for personal advantage and doing what she thinks is right. Maybe there's a workable middle-ground, though?
A Princess of Alfheim is a lot of fun. It's far more whimsical than To Build a More Perfect Human, though I really enjoyed writing both. Actually, I am about to finish writing APoA - I just finished the second to last chapter like 30 minutes ago and will write the final chapter between now and Sunday. TBaMPH is significantly shorter, maybe 80k words versus the 170k words of APoA, so if you're into quantity, then APoA is the one to go for. I think they're both pretty solid, quality-wise... but of course I'd think that. I'm the author.
Hope the meeting with family goes well
Wake of the Ravager has explored this concept of how technological advancement is proportional to how weak a sapient species is compared to its environment. Humans are relatively weak. Sans our brainwork, the only thing we had going for us that makes us capable hunters is our ability to outpace prey animals in a long chase, due to our bipedal gait and ability to sweat. Hunting and gathering like that only yields nutrition at break-even sustenance levels. Now, we're the apex predators of the entire f*cking planet. And we're still weak because we haven't gone extraplanetary yet. We're still only one asteroid impact away from extinction. Thus, technological progress will continue.
If it were up to the vampires, we'd still be in the stone age, or at best the medieval age, because they would have no necessity for invention. Now we have devices that outpace even vampire senses. Good luck imaging the brain like an MRI with your vampiric senses or sensing gravitational waves. Vampires might be able to augment the tech's capabilities and shortcut some steps due to their vampiric senses, but in no way are they superior to the capability of humans to create better sensors.
Though, to be fair, vampires have a vested interest in keeping the human population large and healthy, since that's their food supply. A stone age planet doesn't have nearly the population capacity of one with modern agriculture.
That's a good point, though. In general, vampires have a broader spectrum of low-threshold sensation. But the limiting factor for technology isn't the abilities of the end user so much as the abilities of the technology to take a broader range of inputs and compress them into what the end users can perceive. In this case, it doesn't matter if somebody has a visual range of 400 nm or 800 nm on the spectrum, nor whether their photoreceptors are ten times more sensitive. As long as the device can detect the inputs, the ability to amplify is bound only by the quality of the input and whatever physical constraints limit the ability to get clean data.
Oh joy. The father AND the pastor. I'm sure, this will only lead to good things.
...
not.