We started work on our organisms the next morning after we got the new lab. The conversation started over breakfast, with my two currently unused bodies on autopilot for eating and using the bathroom until the morph closet showed up. The total of four ferrets I’d printed were currently raiding their food bowl over in the corner, while I was poking at some scrambled eggs that the automatic kitchen had whipped up.

I noted “So, we really need to hash out exactly how our organism trio will support and compliment each other in a lot more detail. We’ve already got the basics worked out, but now’s when we need to start working out the kinks and start putting together prototypes to get things working.”

Queen thought for a moment, before she commented “Well, one of the hardest problems will be making sure that my symbiotic microbes both won’t cause an allergic reaction, won’t accidentally cause symptoms in their primary hosts, and won’t leave any exploitable gaps for other pathogens to sneak in through.”

I briefly glanced over to where Wesseck was gorging themselves on ice cream, and waited for a reply. Wesseck simply kept eating their breakfast while gesturing for me to continue.

Fair enough. After a few moments of eating, I noted “Yeah, getting started on that today is important, but we also need to think about what other adaptations we’re going to put in our organisms in order to make sure they can survive on Blackwood. Having nanoweapons ready to deploy is a useful trick, but any creature with only one main trick for survival is going to die really quick on Blackwood.”

There were a few moments of silence as I thought, before noting “Maybe we could fit our squirrels with a multi-purpose quill launcher? That way it has a method to deploy the pathogen at range, and also some other payloads for targets the nanoweapon is ineffective on. An exploding quill to the face isn’t going to be fun for anything whatsoever on the receiving end.”

Wesseck chose that moment to speak up, noting “That’s probably a good idea for the animal, though I’m still trying to figure out what to do for the plant. Fairly obviously we want it to produce some sort of food for our symbiotic animal to eat, but we also want to make sure absolutely nothing else can safely digest that food. Maybe make nuts full of hideously explosive compounds and rig the squirrel’s digestive system to decompose them for energy, while anything else eating them just gets blown up or mind controlled?”

Queen grinned at this, exposing her mouth full of very very sharp teeth as she noted “I have just the bio-synthesis pathway for explosives that you’re looking for. Exactly how much bang do you two want your organisms to be capable of dishing out? And how much are you willing to risk a premature detonation?”

Wesseck and I shared a glance before simultaneously replying “All of it. Preferably with a minimum of premature detonations.”

Queen thought for a moment, noting “One of the more stable nitro explosives is probably the way to go then, though detonation systems seem like they’d be a bit tricky to engineer. Hmmm… strictly speaking we should probably only put the explosives synthesis pathway in the plant or microbe component of our symbiotic trio. Since the squirrel can just get it through its diet.”

I nodded, as I finished my last bite of eggs, savoring it for a moment before I replied “That makes sense. It’s more thermodynamically favorable too, since the squirrel won’t have to spend energy on synthesizing explosive molecules that our plant has already created. Full approval there. Wesseck, thoughts on the plants?”

Our cybernetic arachnid companion tossed their empty ice cream container into the recycler as they remarked “I know quite a bit about photosynthetic pathways already, so I’m pretty sure I can work out an optimal leaf design for production of both conventional energy storage molecules and the explosives. That said I’d really like it if Queen could help me look it over; I’m a lot more specialized in the macro side of things than the micro side.”

As queen finished the last slug of her yogurt, she noted “Sure thing Wesseck, that’s very easily arranged. Anyway, I do believe it’s time for us to actually get to work on some initial prototype organisms.”

As I got up from my seat and started walking towards the stairs leading to the actual lab, I couldn’t help but ask “Curiously, why do you like yogurt and other fermented products so much, Queen?”

Queen followed me as she remarked “I’m so glad you asked! Basically, fermented products let me taste my own work. Fermentation is a process that by and large requires microbial intervention to function, and I decided that I wanted to tinker with custom strains of the microbes used in such. The results have proven quite tasty indeed.”

I filed that piece of information as possibly being relevant later, even as we entered the lab space.

As we entered, Wesseck asked “Yures, could you please do some morphological prototyping on the squirrel to get it moving right? It can be using standard feedstock for right now, since Queen and I will both be working on the cellular-level compatibility stuff.”

I nodded and replied “Sure thing Wesseck!” before making my way to the Computer Assisted Design console. When I got there, I immediately started in on building the basic framework for the squirrel we would be deploying as part of our trio.

The absolute first thing I wanted to do was put together a skeletal structure and attached musculature. Since these critters would be far too small to survive any serious damage from any organism of any significant size, that meant evasion was the absolute number one survival priority for them. To that end, I went all in for fast-twitch muscles. Yes, long-distance running endurance would suffer as a result of that decision, but that sort of endurance only mattered if you didn’t get smashed into paste in the opening salvo.

This fast-twitch muscle also factored into the quill launching capabilities once I figured out how I wanted to implement them. As such, I gave the quill follicles the ability to pivot the quills forwards, before the muscle fibers would contract to pull the quill out and send it on a ballistic trajectory into the target. Since each quill could be independently launched, this also meant that the squirrel could hypothetically fire their entire load of thousands of quills in under a second if they really had to. Piezoelectric materials included in the quill-tips meanwhile would be responsible for detonating the explosives once Queen and Wesseck had that sorted out.

I didn’t spend too much effort on the internal organs right away; I just copied most of what went into the ferrets and adjusted them for the somewhat different dimensions of the body cavity. Soon enough I had something I was willing to send to the printer for initial evaluation and testing, and that’s exactly what I did.

Still, it would take some time for the bio-printer to finish putting that squirrel together, and in the meantime I went to take a look at what Queen and Wesseck were working on. And so I sauntered over and asked “So, how’s it going on your end?”

Wesseck excitedly replied “It’s going great! We’ve already settled on PETN as the explosive of choice for stability reasons, and between the two of us we’ve not only figured out how to make photosynthetic organelles for it, but we’ve also made good progress on the detonator system for the nuts.”

I thought for a moment, before asking “That detonator will still work if the nuts get all chewed up, right?”

Queen nodded as she replied “Yes, since each individual cell of nut has its own detonator. Disarming it requires both a heavily encrypted radio signal, and a very specific signaling molecule in the digestive system. If those criteria aren’t met, and the cells start having their membranes rupture? They explode.”

I nodded, before noting “I’m going to need the details on that molecule by the way, since it should be fairly obvious that having our squirrel explode when they eat the nuts is not what we want to have happen.”

Queen chuckled, before replying “Yes, of course. Anyway, those nuts will also be full of our symbiotic nanoweapon, meaning that even if an unauthorized organism doesn’t explode from eating them, they’re going to get a horrible nanoweapon infection.”

I grinned at the thought, before replying “Sounds great! Curiously, what’s the macro-scale structure of the plant looking like?”

Wesseck immediately replied “Here, take a look.” before gesturing towards the volumetric display he was working on.

Fairly obviously, the plant was a bush. I took a moment to investigate the growth patterns, before something interesting caught my attention. I commented “Huh, if you changed the branch patterns only slightly, each bush would have a perfectly sized and shaped alcove in it for our squirrels to live in.”

Wesseck looked closely at his blueprints before noting “You’re absolutely correct. I’ll get to that in the next revision, but as it stands we should actually print this prototype first to start working out the kinks via real-world testing.”

I shrugged as I replied “Seems like a good idea. So, guess we should send it to the printer?”

Wesseck and Queen both nodded, a button was pressed, and the bio-printers started whirring away on the first iteration of what Wesseck had whimsically named a “boomnut bush”.

As the printers worked, I couldn’t help but note “So… it’s about lunchtime, and the bio-printers are going to be working for a while before they’re done. Queen, could I please try some of that yogurt you make?”

Queen smiled at my interest, replying “I’m so glad you asked, Yures. Follow me.”

When we got back from lunch, Wesseck noted “Looks like the squirrel finished printing at least, though the bush still has a while to go. Um, is it supposed to be completely still like that?”

I nodded as I replied “Yes, yes it is. I haven’t spent any time whatsoever on the cognitive side of things yet aside from basic drivers for all the active systems, so for initial evaluation this prototype is going to be under manual control.”

I turned to retrieve a Mindcast cable from storage, even as Wesseck asked “Isn’t this going to be rather uncomfortable for you? You’re pretty sensitive to what kind of body you’re wearing.”

I shrugged as I replied “I said the squirrel would be under manual control, not that I’d be wearing it. I’m just going to install a remote control program and use that.”

With that sorted out, I used the Mindcast cable to connect the squirrel to the console and set about downloading the remote control program into its brain. As soon as that was done, I disconnected the cable and used the corresponding app on my tablet to order it into one of the terrariums for evaluation.

As soon as the squirrel was in there, I asked Wesseck “Do you know where we left the shooting range targets? They’re not rigged with a payload yet, but I want to make absolutely sure that the quill launching routines are functional.”

Queen provided the round discs immediately as she replied “Here they are.”

I quickly started hanging up the targets on one end of the terrarium, connecting them to a piece of string so that they’d be hanging in place for the squirrel to shoot at.

As soon as that was done I closed the terrarium and sealed it tight to avoid any quills escaping, then used the remote control app to order the squirrel to fire at each target until it scored a bullseye. The next few seconds passed in a blur of flying quills as the squirrel opened fire and missed the vast majority of shots. At the end of the barrage nearly half the squirrel’s quills were resting on the floor of the terrarium and the outer regions of each target were veritable pincushions, with each target having exactly one quill in its center zone.

There were a few moments of silence before Queen noted “Yures, I do believe you need to work on the fire control system, because that level of accuracy is absolutely abysmal.”

Groaning, I agreed “Yes, that’s a fair complaint. I’ll get right on it, but as it stands I think this was a decent proof-of-concept.”

Wesseck took that opportunity to change the topic, noting “Anyway, the plant is almost done printing. We should probably make sure it’s doing ok.”

Queen and I both nodded as we made our way to the active printer, where the bush was currently in its final stages of printing. I watched with interest as the undifferentiated tissue the printer was outputting rapidly reconfigured into the various leaves and branches of the bush, noting “You did an excellent job on it from what I can see so far Wesseck.”

Wesseck glowed at the praise, before noting “Thanks! Just so you know, this prototype isn’t starting with any explosives pre-synthesized. Mostly so that we wouldn’t be in quite as much danger of blowing up our lab, but also so that we can make sure the photosynthetic pathway for PETN is working properly.”

I nodded rapidly as the printer chimed to indicate that it was finished, saying “That’s much appreciated Wesseck. Anyway, let’s get this plant into a terrarium. The really durable one with fifty centimeters of polycarbonate between us and anything exploding inside.”

As I said that the lab drones immediately got to work, hauling the bush to its intended destination and firmly rooting it in the soil of the Terrarium for analysis. We looked over the nutrient uptake of the leaves, roots, and stem for several hours, carefully monitoring the plant’s metabolism to ensure that the photosynthesis of PETN was operating as intended.

As I looked at the carbon black leaves of our boomnut bush, I thought to ask “Curiously, what did you two manage to get the total photosynthetic efficiency to? The PETN levels in this plant are going up quite quickly.”

Wesseck cheerfully replied “About ninety two percent, I think? It’s nothing particularly special by Blackwood’s standards in terms of total energy efficiency, but the direct photosynthesis of PETN without going through a bunch of other indirect synthetic pathways means that the boomnuts will finish maturing a fair bit faster than they otherwise would.”

I briefly had a premonition of shattered lab equipment flying towards me at high velocity and asked “Wesseck, what spectra does the bush not photosynthesize on?”

Wesseck remarked “Infra-red. Why?”

In response I immediately called out “Lighting spectra to infra-red only!” and the automated systems rapidly complied. I quickly set my eyes to the relevant spectra, seeing with relief that the accumulation of PETN in the boomnut bush had stopped. Though there were still several kilograms of explosive material in the terrarium that needed to be disposed of.

I pinched the bridge of my nose, before noting “We need to get better measures for disposing of explosive material set up. I’m going to see about arranging a regular supply of replacement terrariums, and also see if we can get time reserved on a bomb range. Because if we set that off here we’re going to trash our entire lab.”

Wesseck winced at the realization, before apologizing “Sorry, I was just so happy at having gotten the explosives synthesis working that I completely forgot to consider the implications of that.”

Queen shrugged as she said “It happens. You get a bit too excited with a new idea for your latest creation and the next thing you know it’s rampaging through the streets. That’s part of the reason for the tournament; it gives us an outlet for our talents that isn’t quite as inconvenient for everyone else.”

Wesseck cheered up a bit at the reassurances, even as I directed the lab drones to start packing up the boomnut bush for transport to a bomb range.

The next several days of work saw several changes. My morph closet and Queen’s lava tub both arrived and were installed. We got a time slot reserved on a bomb range just outside city limits, and then we started iterating on our designs for the boomnut bush, the archer squirrel, and our symbiotic microbe.

However, we still had ten Megaseconds to go before the deployment time when Queen noted “While we’ve made great progress so far, I think we’re operating off a horrible logical fallacy.”

I looked up from the design console for the latest iteration on the squirrel, and asked “Care to elaborate?”

Queen nodded, before noting “While we’ve done a very good job optimizing our organisms from a simple numerical perspective, the fact of the matter it that we’re not supposed to be playing a pure numbers game. We’re supposed to be optimizing our organisms for survival in a very specific environment, and right now we need a lot more data on said environment before we can verify if our organisms will be able to survive. Especially given that I can’t say whether the nanoweapon will be in any way effective without data on the immune systems it’s going to be up against.”

Wesseck thought for a moment, before noting “I don’t think encyclopedia files are going to be sufficient for this. We’re going to have to do some more direct research, aren’t we?”

I nodded sadly in agreement as I thought of exactly what I was about to say “We’re going to need to send an expedition to Blackwood in order to collect samples of every single relevant organism in the region and transmit the data on them back to our lab. Still, if we’re going to be headed down there let’s make sure we do this correctly; it would be really unfortunate if we got laid up with a nanoweapon infection or something like that.”

Wesseck noted “I vote that we remain in orbit and synchronize with remote-operated bodies on Blackwood’s surface. Yes that’s going to introduce a bit of latency, but it also means that we’ll be able to disconnect immediately if something goes wrong. All in favor?”

I nodded emphatically, replying “Yes, using drone bodies for this is definitely the way to go. Queen?”

The dragon nodded calmly, saying “Yes, I agree. Yures, would you please help me with organizing the preparations for our expedition?”

I hummed, asking “You want to handle getting the physical equipment lined up while I arrange the networking arrangements?”

Queen shrugged and replied “Sure. Is a synthmorph of your current body fine, or do you want a biomorph?”

I thought for a moment, before replying “For this expedition a synthmorph should be fine, thanks.”

With that settled I quickly set about reserving some bandwidth from the array of satellites in close orbit over Blackwood, reserving a two-way channel for several terabits of data per second between the Thundersnow Steppes and our lab here on Bark. Still, the site for reserving network capacity also wanted a specific timeslot. So I called out to Queen “Hey, when’s the next launch window for sending a pod to the Thundersnow Steppes via the loops? I need to know when to reserve our signal time.”

Queen replied almost immediately “Two hundred and four kiloseconds from now.”

I nodded and replied “Thanks, Queen.”

This is about when Wesseck spoke up, noting “So, I’ve decided to make myself useful while you’re getting our equipment and such set up. Namely I’ve downloaded all the encyclopedia files I could find about the ecosystem of the Thundersnow Steppes, so that we’d at least have some clue what we were getting ourselves into when we went down there.”

I smiled at Wesseck’s support, saying “Good job Wesseck, it’s greatly appreciated. Anywhere, a few more moments and I should have the bandwidth request registered.”

Sure enough, shortly afterwards the website confirmed that we had our bandwidth requisition set up at the same time as Queen asked “Yures, is it acceptable if I set your remote body to be androgynous? We don’t know what gender you’ll be during the expedition, so I’d like to minimize your possible discomfort.”

I nodded at Queen’s logic, noting “That’s probably for the best, thank you Queen.”

Queen tapped a few keys on her console, then said “Alright, the order is in and our launch date is set. You know what this means?”

I hazarded a guess “Obsessive virtual reality training for an expedition to Blackwood so that we can actually get some good data before our remote bodies get trashed or our time slot runs out?”

Queen grinned the menacing grin that only someone with a mouth full of very sharp teeth could pull off, even as she replied “That is exactly correct, Yures.”

And so that’s what we did for most of two days, navigating a simulated version of the Thundersnow Steppes as we learned how to handle ourselves on Blackwood’s surface, especially with a quarter second of total latency slowing down our reactions massively.

To put it quite bluntly, we died a lot during our training exercises. The latency made reacting to sudden ambushes effectively impossible, and the creatures we were up against were all too happy to exploit this weakness. So we learned to be cautious, carefully measuring our actions to minimize exposure to the lifeforms of our target biome.

By the point where we’d run out of training time, we’d managed to get a couple runs where we survived for multiple hours despite our handicaps. So, now that we were as ready as we were ever going to be, it was time to get ready for the expedition.

Synchronizing to our bodies in the deployment pod was the work of a few seconds, and I noted over the internal chat client “Everyone all settled in?”

Wesseck and Queen both confirmed, and moments later the pod started accelerating down the launch track built around Bark.

With a kerchunk, we detached from the launch track and started drifting towards Blackwood. After a moment, I thought to ask “Queen, you did shell out for a helicopter, right?”

Queen replied almost immediately “Yes I did; I figured we’d need to get around the Steppes in a hurry, and a helicopter was one of the best options for ensuring we’d be able to do that if we needed to.”

The rest of the trip passed in silence until our pod hit the atmosphere. We experienced around three gees of acceleration as our capsule aerobraked to an effective stand-still, dumping its kinetic energy as heat until it was safe to ditch the fairing. With a pop of explosive bolts the capsule burst open and our helicopter began shifting from its storage configuration to flight mode. The rotors spun up until they reached an indiscernible blur even as our descent halted at around two kilometers of altitude over the Thundersnow Steppes, leaving us inside a storm cloud.

I idly noted the helicopter’s onboard computer sounding out the obligatory “Welcome to Blackwood” message, as there were more important things to worry about.

Case in point, we needed to double check that all our equipment had survived the orbital transfer intact. Quickly we started digging through the storage compartment, verifying the presence of five dart rifles, around two thousand tissue sample darts, dozens of support drones, and a few other miscellaneous pieces of gear we would be extremely glad to have available.

As soon as that was done, it was Wesseck who spoke up, saying “Alright, we’ve got all our equipment and it seems to be in good working order. Now let’s get out of this cloud cover so we can see what’s going on.”

---

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