Symbiosis: At World's End

Progress

Dr. Wendell kept groaning inwardly as she tried to explain why her experiments had been slowing down to the council. She had explained numerous times and in many ways that the symbiote was refusing to behave like a symbiote should, that Merrick had provided them with two potential reasons and that the data she had collected pointed that she needed to take a riskier approach.

She was going to offer a human host to the symbiote instead.

She had sent out a transport to collect Runners as they were the closest thing to the symbiote's host without it actually being the symbiote's host. She was confident that she could recreate the conditions Merrick had offered as a host. She just needed to make sure that they could separate the symbiote from the host once they had the data they needed.

She had set up a room with a sonic emitter built into one of the walls which could force the symbiote off of a host without damaging it. All the data and simulations she had run pointed to an answer of yes, but she was still apprehensive.

She finally managed to escape the council's meeting room and made her way to the lab. She had spent the previous day reviewing all of the candidates they had acquired and outfitting them with special instruments connected to their arms to detect a successful bond. Now was the time to introduce them to the test subject.

She made it down to the lab and was unpleasantly surprised to find Medusa waiting in the lab as well.

"What exactly are you doing here?"

"I'm here to watch. Council's orders."

"I just came from the council and they mentioned no such thing."

"It was last minute. They want me to actually see if you're trying to make progress or if you're just having fun with a new toy."

Dr. Wendell resisted the urge to explode with outrage and grudgingly nodded before tapping a few times on her tablet. Indeed, there was a last-minute message that Medusa would be observing her experiments for the remainder of the week. She tapped a few more times, harder than she probably needed to, bringing up a screen with several lines of code and a box with the words "Awaiting signal" written inside.

"Bring in subject 1A."

A door hissed open, and a young man was pushed through by two soldiers. The door snapped shut and the sealed box containing the symbiote rose out of the floor.

"If you can hear me, nod once."

The young man nodded, fear evident in his eyes.

"We are trying to understand the bonding process of symbiotes as part of a plan to destroy them once and for all. To do this, we need to study the bonding process in detail. Do not fear. We can force it off of you when we have what we need."

She pressed another button, causing one side of the box to slide open, allowing the symbiote to crawl out. But it didn't. It continued to just sit there. Dr. Wendell felt a flare of frustration.

"Try approaching it."

The man shook his head vigorously, only for him to clutch his arm in pain. If one looked carefully, they could see something rectangular embedded in his arm. It also had the "Awaiting signal" screen.

"Approach it."

The young man approached it timidly. The symbiote didn't even so much as ripple. It just sat there like a puddle of mud!

"Try touching it."

Understanding that he would be shocked if he disobeyed again, he reached a hand into the box and actually touched it. Or rather he tried to, but the symbiote just moved its mass away from him, like magnetic liquid moving away from a magnet of the same charge. Dr. Wendell grumbled angrily and called for another test subject. They more or less repeated the process, only to receive the same results. Another subject, same result!