30 Anatomical Arrangements

A week passes with little happening. With Speks out of the picture Ori was forced to ask Judy for another Fixer, which was pretty difficult considering what happened to his last one. Even if the crime was never pinned on him, the mere fact that he was Speks' last contact was a big red flag for most.

Thankfully, Max and Six allowed him to continue working with them, for the time being at least. He'd take a smaller cut, but that was fair considering his lack of experience compared to the two, along with his lesser capabilities.

Their jobs mainly consisted of protection for drug deals, clearing out Scavs and squatters for property owners, even providing makeshift security guards for clubs or VIP's who'd required it at the last minute.

He'd only been in one shootout, even taking no injuries in the process, which was a plus, the rest went ahead as usual. No inconveniences like hat Speks had tossed at him. This, allowed him to build up enough of his dense fat, vitamin, protein, and mineral reserves for the nanites to finally make their first significant upgrade to his body.

The first was to his bonemarrow, he didn't really understand the 'technical-babble' the nanites or even Bats tried to explain to him. But basically, they'd increased the production of red blood cells while decreasing the production of white blood cells.

This wasn't really a problem given that the nanites could target and eradicate any bacteria, virus, parasite, etc, that tried to invade his body. His immune system was of little use when they were present, especially now that they'd vastly increased their own numbers via self-replication.

The billions of nanites had turned into trillions, this may have started to obstruct his bodily systems if they weren't each individually microscopic, smaller than blood cells actually. Their increased numbers massive enhanced Ori's healing capabilities. A small cut was almost instantly healed, while a bullet wound took seconds or minutes depending on its severity.

Ori's only real worry now was getting shot in the head, or his heart... Speaking of which, due to the increased number of red blood cells, his blood had become much thicker, almost viscous in fact. Which leads to the next upgrade the nanites had to make.

His heart, arteries, veins, and capillaries. Each needed to be strengthened to handle the increased blood pressure caused by the thickened blood. Bats was surprised by the sheer efficiency of it all, the nanites had expertly planned the entire thing out and did so categorically, without issue.

If someone were to make an incision into one of Ori's arteries now, only a few spurts of high-pressure blood would make it out before coagulants sealed the wound back up, all without the nanite's intervention... It was a medical marvel, something that could only be matched by quality Cyberware.

With these upgrades Ori's endurance had been massively enhanced, while his muscles weren't yet at that level, he'd almost never get breath again. His resting heart rate was 10bpm, something that was only really matched by creatures in the animal kingdom. It could even go lower, but that was only when Ori's lungs were upgraded, which were planned to be the next thing to receive an upgrade.

It was actually kind of weird for Ori, to feel his new powerful heart beating in his chest like a drum. It felt almost out of place, like someone had taken it out, forced it to benchpress for a year straight then shoved it back in. When Bats checked his heart rate his hand was visibly moving with each pulse...

Of course, all of this came at a cost, his dietary requirements had increased rather drastically, requiring far more vitamins, minerals, and protein than before. The blood production of his bone marrow doubled his required iron intake.

Bats suggested getting various Cyberware to assist with this, but it was actually the nanites who objected. The systems controlling the Cyberware may conflict with their own programming, since they were already 'malfunctioning' as it is, it might actually be dangerous to introduce anything else.

Thankfully, there was another option available to them. Acquiring the NMN Injector and using it to have the nanites assimilate various technology... Though, they'd first need to integrate some sort of tech that'd grant them the ability to break down and refine metals and other sturdy materials. As they are now they could only process the iron and other minerals that were digested by Ori's own body, which obviously wouldn't work externally.

Bats suggested various microscopic heat generators, conduction cores, and other things... But he and the Nanites eventually agreed on one thing... An attachment for the Gorilla Arms Cyberware called 'Thermal Knuckles' that had specialized micro capacitors and insulated conductors which the nanites may be able to integrate into their own design.

If this was actually the case, the nanites would be able to dissimilate actual materials, and when combined with the NMN Injector, deconstruct tech to integrate into Ori, all using the body's resources which would likely stave off any chance of him going Cyberpsycho.

That wasn't the only use however, if this was possible, Ori would literally possess a one-hit kill move by infecting an enemy with nanites, allowing the tiny robots to devour them completely, regardless of whatever defences that may have.

Bats also introduced another avenue of research... The animal kingdom. Did you know a fascinating fact? Chimps on average were four times stronger than a human with similar weight. This was mainly due to the type of muscles they had, which drastically lowered their general dexterity but massively enhanced their speed and strength.

There were other examples like exoskeletons that seemed to interest the nanites, but Ori outright refused anything that might alter his 'human' appearance. After all, he couldn't very well live in society looking like a giant insect person, even if he was made virtually indestructible.

He'd settle for carbon nanotube weaving under his skin for defence. Apparently, this material would make him bulletproof against all but the most powerful weapons...

The nanites also request permission to begin making upgrades to his brain, but he unilaterally refused. His loss of control against Ta'xin made him well aware of the dangers the nanites presented, should they choose, they could take him over with ease, and no one would be able to do anything about it...

For now though, he was satisfied with his current upgrades. Digestive System, Fat Energy Storage, Bone Marrow, Heart and Blood Vessels. Soon he'd be able to move onto bigger, better improvements...