- Doomsday - Volume One: Gods and Monsters

Chapter 89: Consciousness

(AN: Doing a double-feature today, so you can go straight into reading Chapter 90 after this one, since I had originally planned for them to both be in the same chapter but it got overly long. Lucky you, a belated Halloween miracle!)

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They wasted no time diving into [Y/N]'s special 'science projects', which Ray would come to find out was far more complicated than anything either men had ever attempted to comprehend before in their entire lives. The conversation about Brainiac's existence went as well as one would expect, "I've got the consciousness of an incredibly intelligent psychopath who temporarily took over my body and killed many Blackwatch agents before being subdued, trapped within my mind for years. And he'll be the one guiding us along this whole experiment..." The pilot didn't have words, an issue far above his pay grade, simply emoting via a blank stare. Yet, had it been the weirdest thing he'd ever heard? That was up for debate, but unsurprisingly, the vast majority of his weirdest experiences had some connection to the Doomsday, and it had all started to blend together at one point.

And they spent the first week of the Outsider's return to Perth simply collecting supplies. However, this was by far no easy matter, and was the cause of multiple tense moments between the two men and the condescending voice who continually mocked and belittled them, how he could have had it finished within a fortnight and so forth. [Y/N] continually reminded Brainiac that this whole process was to allow him to roam free again, and that silenced much of his condemnation, letting only small jabs every now and then. Ray couldn't help but question the sanity of the person he had chosen to follow, as he not only talked to himself but shouted loudly, like a bickering couple. Hopefully the truth was really as he had been told, dreading a schizophrenic Doomsday running loose...

Perth provided everything they could, giving them essentially open access to their manufacturing sector and resources. It was the least they could do, and the mayor had insisted upon doing more upon learning of the conclusion to the Junker wars across the border, knowing that for now their last bastion of civilization on the western coast would be safe from incursions. [Y/N] had had enough of celebration however, now committed to the task set ahead of him, spending days and nights at work, designing and jotting down notes upon blueprints and organising the transport of supplies necessary to complete their grand project.

Construction was split between two main products, each with smaller and less significant hurdles and challenges, but in the end would yield great results. First, and most challenging, would be the reconstruction of Brainiac's machine that allowed him to transfer his consciousness between different bodies, or vice versa. Yet, the original work had to be redrawn and changed pretty drastically, no longer moving between organic material to organic material, or either consciousness switching places. This time it would be a far more delicate procedure, needing to intricately find the distinction between [Y/N]'s mind and Brainiacs, separating them from one another, and finally inserting it into a robotic husk.

Ray appeared as if he were about to collapse upon hearing the plan, and [Y/N] himself didn't seem at all confident, generally quick and knowledgeable, and with some enhanced intelligence, mechanics and engineering were never a field he dove too heavily into. Brainiac cooed them, making it clear that under his guidance, and only under his guidance, could the contraption be completed, and that if they followed every word to the letter, then there would be no issues. His cold tone did little for his host, but he had already made up his mind. This was the course they had set on and if that meant potential psychological or brain damage, well, they would deal with that when they got there...

The second major creation would be Brainiac's new form. This was surprisingly far easier by comparison, the only major problems being a storage device able to mimic a human's brain, allowing it to hold and house the vacant consciousness. And, if there were any changes needed after that, Brainiac could perform those services upon himself. Simply getting him into the body was their task, which was hard enough already. While [Y/N] catalogued the resources they would need, Ray drew sketches on a tattered note-book, page after page filled with different skeletal-designs, shiny and silver, but thin and spindly. The process took only a night of brainstorming, and after showing the consciousness the final design, the initial preparation phase had finished.