Chapter Text
Chapter 2: Insurrection Part 2
=============[New Alexandria - Turul Heights Apartment Complex - Sept 5th 2551]=============
Jensen got off the elevator and rolled his neck, it had been a long day and he was ready to collapse. Sleep had never been a major problem for him, he was one of the odd few who were wired in a way that days of activity would barely phase him. Even before he got augmented he was the local workaholic who went days without rest.
It was probably one of the factors that caused him and Megan to split up, the two just got wrapped up in their own work and slowly drifted.
He pushed that line of thought aside, Megan was long dead by now. No matter how much of his current state came back to her…
Jensen wondered sometimes if it was the work done on him when he was a baby that ended up making him this way. A side effect of being able to accept augmentation without rejection, another factor he was thankful for with all the implants in his body.
He entered his apartment and let the door shut behind him. His brain still stuck on the similarity of the hostage situation, even down to the administrator being taken hostage by a terrorist believing in some higher cause. It had to be coincidence, the human population was massive, nearly 30 billion if not more. Copycat scenarios had to be normal in those numbers…
Jensen entered the bedroom and sat down on his bed, he laid down slowly and let himself drift off into a deep slumber. Only himself, and his nightmares.
They weren’t anything new, he had been getting them since the attack in Detroit, of Jaron Namir throwing him through a glass wall and ending it with a .357 to the brain. It was honestly a medical miracle he lived, this however he had long since accepted.
Then came the other memories, of drowning in the waters from Panchea collapsing… the bodies of the Hyron drones, and the black submarine creeping towards him… It was intermittent, of faded memories in Prague… and finally his hand reaching out to a pod.
Jensen awoke, and looked at the clock, he had gotten maybe 6 hours of sleep. He sat up slowly and pinched the bridge of his nose, another day on Reach. He was awake and wasn’t getting back to bed anytime soon. Might as well get ready for the day.
30 minutes later Jensen was up and watching the morning news, or what counted for it this early in the day. He had hoped when he had left Earth, he had left behind such things as the 24 hour news cycle and the sensationalism it came up with. Technically in a way he had, Reach had 27 hour news cycles.
He checked his schedule, he was off of work today. That made it simple to figure out what to do, he stretched and pulled his infolink up.
“Hey, Janice, you there?”
On his infolink viewer was a woman in her mid 40s, of middle eastern descent with gold trimmed glasses and a few scars on her face. “I’m here Jensen!” came a cheerful voice.
“It’s pretty early, why are you up?”
“Same as you, couldn’t sleep.”
Dr. Janice Fadel was Jensen’s technician, ever since he had come to Reach he had needed someone to maintain his Augs. Dr. Fadel was the only one who had any experience in the local area, especially as she herself wanted to get augmented. Jensen, who had never asked for this, was always interested to meet people who had.
Her augments weren’t anything special, a few neuromods for faster reflexes and steadier hands, and two eye-prosthesis for better vision, the glasses were purely cosmetic so nobody noticed. It seemed in the 26th century nobody quite cared anymore about augs, there were a few vets walking around with prosthetics and nobody batted an eye.
It felt kind of nice to not be treated as a freak anymore… by large anyways. The reminder of the Templars and the preachers from the Order Church came to mind, fundamentalists who had couched their hatred of augmentation in the veneer of religion. They were also in support of the Insurrection and had a hatred for the Spartans of the UNSC.
Naturally not because of what the Spartans were doing, but because of what they were, augmented.
He turned his attention back to Dr. Fadel, he needed to focus. “Just checking, we still have that appointment scheduled for today, right?”
“Yep, don’t worry Jensen it’s not for another 6 hours, just need to check up on the glial tissue, see that you don’t need any genetic therapy.”
“Still surprised that is a thing doc.”
Janice let out a laugh and continued. “I’m not surprised! Based on the reports of the early 21st century, augs needed neuropozyne to survive the rejection syndrome. Amazing how the body rejected something integrated directly with the nervous-system!”
She adjusted her glasses looking over her files. “You were the… first adopter of the genetic therapy, correct?”
Jensen had kept it quiet that he was the subject 0, the reason for that process in the first place. He had enough of people poking around and shoving things in him or using his dna without his consent, so he tended to keep quiet and refocus it these days as him just being lucky.
“Yeah, I was one of the people most compatible with the early treatments, and Sariff felt that if I was going to get the full overhaul, I needed it just to avoid heavy nupoze doses,” he answered.
“Very good! Well if you can’t sleep, run yourself through a diagnostic, wouldn’t hurt. There are 27 hours in a day, more than enough time.”
She hung up and Jensen was left alone with his thoughts. It wasn’t a bad idea to run through his setup, it tingled a bit but it made life easier knowing what was working and what wasn’t. He stretched and stood up, tapping the palm of his hands with his fingers as his augs began a check with the control chips implanted into him.
Arms, legs, spine, heart, lungs… check. Neural implants were operational and functioning, which left the augments themselves.
Jensen did some basic exercises, hearing the myomer bundles contract, feeling the energy build. He decided to ease out slowly, not wanting to destroy his apartment by launching himself into the ceiling or punching out a wall.
His vision ran through several modes, letting him see the others around him, smart vision was working. Glass shield was up and functional, as well as the implanted weapons. Nanoceramic blades were always useful to have.
He wanted to test the ICARUS landing system but that would involve jumping out a window and there were easier ways down. He decided to save that for later, truthfully it had never worked properly here on reach, the Magnetosphere was different compared to Earth… probably had to do with the stronger gravity as well.
Stuff like his SENTINEL RX was still working, as well as the Quicksilver Reflex Booster, the implanted rebreather as well. It had never occurred to him just how much was actually shoved into his body, and how it all worked so flawlessly.
With little else to do for his diagnostics, Jensen opted to make himself some breakfast. He opened his fridge and pulled out some eggs and old potatoes, deciding to keep things simple today.
The thoughts crept back into his head, of his experiences back in the 21st century, and the hell he went through. His memories were a bit hazy of the time after the Panchea incident, and yet Detroit was as clear as ever to him. Images of Eliza Cassan and the revelation taht she was an Artificial Intelligence designed to manipulate media information for the Illuminati…
Was Dante built off of what was learned with the AI Research of then? What of the Smart AI that the UNSC made use of? The Hyron Drones had merged with Eliza Cassan, becoming something far far more in the process.
He pushed those thoughts away, they were ancient history, buried with everything else in the collapse. He had new concerns to deal with, new issues, a job to contend with. Hell just today was another routine checkup, another concern that he had to handle.
And it was about time he stopped overthinking this and got on with his day.
=============[New Alexandria - Turul Heights Lobby]=============
Jensen stepped out of the elevator and adjusted the coat. The fashion changed very little over the past few hundred years, and that left him free to grab onto an old familiar standby. The dark blue coat had a faint green floral pattern printed into the shoulders, but boasted a geometric style more similar to the ACRNM coat he wore back in Prague.
As he stepped out, he could hear ranting, looking over he frowned at what he saw.
“DO NOT WAIT FOR THE SUPERMEN TO SAVE YOU! SALVATION IS AT HAND WITH THE ORDER AND THE TEMPLARS!”
Jensen rolled his eyes and attempted to ignore the ranting and raving of the deluded Templar. The Templars, to Jensen, stuck out as hopelessly naive if not delusion and dangerous. Supposedly they were a unification of the world’s religions who happened to preach eschewing modification and augmentation.
Jensen while no theologian or scholar himself, could recognize several issues with that. The first of which was how many religions conflicted in some belief systems, that people of hindu belief, buddhist philosophy, and christian faith might have some different ideas on where people go after they die, and how the universe was ordered.
Second that for supposedly being a “fusion” of all religions, its stylings and iconography more resembled the worst of catholocism fundamentalism with templars, aesthetic style, and crusades they engaged on.
Third was that their definition of augmentation due to years of fanatacism had become rather loose, and even a few biomodifications for health reasons could be construed as augmentation. Add in how spread out humanity was and how surprisingly augmentation had become a niche, it became hard to really support their fear of the augmented superman. Supposedly they accepted people willing to “give up” their augmentations but Jensen figured you had to be either masochistic or just plain stupid to be an aug at all and join them.
“YOU THERE!” The Templar shouted, Jensen paused and internally groaned… before continuing his walk.
“Halt abomination!” Now that… that made Jensen stop, he turned around to face the preacher and quirked a brow, his smartvision glasses no longer covering his face. Jensen wanted to hear this.
“It’s you!” The preacher began, Jensen was a little confused.
“The Alpha to the abominations! The first man free of neuropozyne, the leash of the augmented!”
Jensen had to admit he hadn’t been paying very good attention to the history, he knew that the neuropozyne dependency had been solved, that he was the first man known to be free of it… he didn’t want to be famous, it was bad enough that when he got thawed out it was a whole circus with the UEG.
Thankfully this guy didn’t know he was subject 0 because it was his own dna that accepted augmentation non issue. Still didn’t change his attitude of being known as a public figure for it, he hated being public news, the media circus from his leaving the SWAT and the Mexicantown Massacre. Tossed aside and blamed for everything, to then the controversy surrounding Sarrif Industries… to being involved in the Panchea Incident.
Jensen. Hated. Publicity.
So he stared, right into the preacher’s eyes and waited for more, to hear the insane conspiratorial ramblings that would fly from his mouth. He looked the man straight in the eyes, daring him to start.
The Preacher, faltered, and backed off, withering under Jensen’s gaze. “You don’t deserve my wisdom… you’ve clearly embraced the machine god. Enjoy succumbing to the pain and loneliness apostate to humanity.”
And so he left, Jensen letting out a deep exhale as he did so. That went better than expected, he rubbed his neck and rolled his head. “Trouble Mr. Jensen?”
Jensen looked over and saw the receptionist of the front desk, Phillipe. Phillipe was a good man, his family could apparently be traced back to Columbia on earth, but apparently the past 9 generations had never once been there. This fed into a natural curiosity Phillipe had for those from Earth and Earth history in general.
Jensen had never once felt like Phillipe crossed a line with the questions, it often helped that Phillipe knew to start those conversations with the offer of a drink.
“I’m good Phillipe, just didn’t have to deal with Templars back in my day.”
“They are a 21st century innovation are they not?”
Jensen smiled. “After my time, I got frozen around the 2040s.”
“Ah, my mistake then. Still you must tell me more about the time before you were frozen, of the Gray Death and the riots,” Phillipe said with a smile. He picked up a brown bag and shook it. “I have outer world brandy to offer!”
“Later maybe, I’ve got an appointment to get to,” Jensen said. With that, he stepped out the door.
=============[New Alexandria - Young Medical Private Practice]=============
Jensen entered the office and took quick note of the scent of cleaner in the air. Young Medical was a minor private practice office that worked exclusively with those with augmentations, while it was a niche it wasn’t impossible to find people who had various biomodifications installed.
When he first learned of it, he pondered if it had any relation to TYM from the 21st century, only to learn it was Young not Yong. Jensen cursed the rustiness of his language skills, cryosleep hadn’t been exactly been kind to him. Though the fact that he had been frozen for around 500 years and the only major complications were some minor bugs and rustiness in things such as language was a good sign to him.
He stepped up to the receptionist, let her know, and then sat down to wait. Jensen didn’t mind coming here, Dr. Fadel never treated him as an interesting subject or some celebrity, he was always just Jensen here. After everything that went down, including becoming a known name on the Illuminati listings he enjoyed more anonimty.
It wasn’t an exceptionally long wait before he was in the office and lying down on a large table. “Hey doc,” he said casually.
Dr. Fadel walked in with a beaming smile and a wave. “Hello Mr. Jensen, a bright and sunny day today isn’t it?”
“Sorry if I don’t share the attitude for small talk today Fadel, had to deal with a Templar leaving my apartment,” Jensen responded.
“Ah, those old backwards individuals, they aren’t big fans of artificial intelligence either, despite their ships needing a good enough Dumb AI to even make the jump to slipspace,” Fadel said, turning on a large scanner.
Jensen set his head down on a cushion, as the table he lay upon began to move. “He called me the first man free of the leash. Don’t like being that well known.”
“Were you not that well known back during the 21st century?”
“Sariff didn’t exactly publish the genetics treatment, wasn’t until the late 2030s to mid 2040s that neuropozyne was outdated, and by that point it was other companies putting it out.”
“Was this before or after the augmented segregation?” Fadel asked.
Jensen ran back through his brain a bit. “A-After, right after. Those years were… weird to say the least. My memory is a bit hazy about them.”
Fadel shrugged. “Must have been an interesting time, having a nupoz pharmaceutical subscription, and not needing it.”
“Let me push harder than anyone else. I wasn’t beholden to the same limitations, it was useful, especially when facing others.”
“Some men may find the idea of becoming superhuman intoxicating, others seek it out. Augmentation was a huge part, and it is one of the more criticized parts of the transhumanist movement,” Fadel continued.
Jensen let out a sigh. “Not me, never once did I view what happened as an improvement.”
“Really? Your attitude clearly improved, what changed?”
“Learning to live with it, embrace what I’ve become,” Jensen answered. “I’m still human after all, I’m not some form of superhuman or some next stage of evolution, I’m Adam Jensen, same man as he always has been.”
“Even with all you have gone through, you still maintain that you are unchanged? That you are the same Adam?” Fadel asked,
Jensen seemed to pause for a moment before asking. “If I wasn’t the exact same, would it matter? Don’t people change all the time? Isn’t that just part of life?”
Fadel smiled. “I suppose, quite the interesting view there Jensen.”
“Interesting times we live in doc,” Jensen replied.
The rest of the checkup continued in silence, the scanner showed little different, Jensen was just as healthy as ever. Whatever quirk of genetic science made him so adaptable to augmentation clearly hadn’t gotten any weaker from age. He slowly got off the scanner bed and began to dress himself once more.
“Jensen,” Fadel said. “Physically you’re alright, what about mentally?”
“Hm?” Jensen responded.
“You seem distracted, something on your mind?”
“Nothing at all Dr. Fadel, just reviewing some details about a recent SWAT case.”
Fadel made note of the evasiveness of his response, knowing that she’d get nowhere with his tone like that. “Alright… if you ever need it, we have therapy services as well.”
Jensen said nothing and quietly left, Fadel sighing and sitting down. She recorded the events down in the database and pondered, what was Jensen thinking about. What was on his brain that caused this?
=============[Unknown]=============
Sol: Has he noticed the similarities?
A1: Unsure.
Sol: We may need to take more direct methods. Subject J must be brought onto the Reach project soon.
A1: Manipulating events such as that may expose us. More subtle manipulations are needed.
Sol: It may not be clear enough, we will need a more forceful hand if we are to approach the appropriate timeframe, make use of our proxies, leave breadcrumbs. If this war is to be won we will need to alter things.
A1: Do you have no faith in people?
Sol: Faith in people is what lead to my creation in the first place. We will correct these errors, yes.
UEG ARTICLE - The Order / Knights Templar
Formed as an institution in the mid to late 20th century the Order was a supposed combination of all the world’s major religions under one banner. This was a method of helping bring stability to many disparate areas suffering from the events of the Collapse and the response to the nanotechnological event known as the Gray Death Plague.
Though the Order claims to have been well intentioned, detractors have made note that the religious structure conflicts with its own statements about being a blending of all major faiths, citing far more christian influence and very little methods of prayer associated with buddhism, taoism, hinduism, or even more islamic based faiths.
These criticisms continue as the Order attempts to spread its power among the stars, reports from EUG worlds noting that many small churches have taken root but due to the extensive distance and cultures separate from the mother world of Earth, these churches don’t go far.
The Order has found popularity among insurrectionists for it’s views on government interference and teneous relationship and views on the UEG.
Most notable is the Order’s own “Extremist” faction the Knights Templar, whom are often found fighting alongside Insurrectionist groups, the Templars having been formed as a response to the advent of augmentation technologies, viewing human augmentation as a great ill that caused the collapse.
These groups have formed with the Insurrectionists not out of mutual interest but rather a hatred for the Spartan project, which are helping to raise morale in conflicts with the Covenant.
The Order has since distanced themselves from Templar Activity, proclaiming them to be a radical sect not affiliated with their more peaceful beliefs.