Imposter System

Chapter 99: Berserk Blood [Bonus Chapter]

The next morning, Alexis was given the all clear to move back to her quarters. The doctors were impressed that she recovered so quickly, but were unaware that if not for the timely evolution, she would already be back to top shape. They attested it to her highly active lifestyle and strong body and proceeded to discharge her.

In anticipation for their child, and also in respect to Matthew's promotion, the two were assigned larger quarters on deck seven. Everything was practically the same since the ship design was standard, except that it was about ten percent bigger and had an extra room. Matt wheeled Alexis while she held baby Alex, and they quickly arrived to their quarters from the nearby lift.

Along the way, many people were excited to see another new life on the ship and would give them congratulations and some even had gifts like candies or children's clothing. Many were aware that she had given birth at this point, and those who had been preparing for this occasion were waiting at their quarters.

"Lexi is really tired right now. How about you leave all the gifts here and come by another time?" Matt, using his hypnosis to imply they shouldn't return en masse again. Everyone was more than happy to comply and left their gifts before leaving themselves.

Since being born, Alex had only suckled on breasts once for a short duration. It seemed that the background radiation of space was enough to supplement his needs and so he was less hungry than the average baby. However, this didn't stop him from wanting some of mommy's boobs and began to assert his dominance as a complete dependent once there were no more prying eyes.

Matt attempted to communicate with baby Alex through telepathy but he didn't get any response. It was unfortunate he hadn't unlocked the ability to read minds yet otherwise he would have immediately checked for any orphaned souls in his child's body.

That being said, he did inspect his kid's life force and mental fluctuations. He didn't have anything to compare it to, but Alex's life reading was almost as high as Alexis's. He decided to wait a few days and check again. It may be due to the fact that they were only recently separated from the same source of life.

Alexis was still feeling weak from the evolution, so Matt brought her over to the bed and set her and Alex down next to each other. Alexis quickly fed him for a while and when he started dozing off, she set him down and snuggled him up with a blanket. The baby lied there for a bit and eventually fell asleep. It was the first time he slept since he was first born.

"We're finally at this point." Matt said with a sigh of relief.

"Yeah, its as wonderful as I anticipated. So, what did you find out?" She asked expectantly. Matt sat down next to her and ran his fingers through his hair.

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"Like you saw, he seems to have been born with something special. I think all of the children that were successfully born share that same mutation. This could be the natural progression of humanity toward one that could tame the stars."

"But humans have been in space for at least a hundred years, why is this only showing up now?" She wondered. Although there were issues with birthrate in space, it wasn't nearly as pronounced as the issue in hyper speed. Moon, Mars, Titan, and Europa colonies were thriving fairly easily.

"Maybe it isn't? I'll try to access some files. The ship's database isn't connected to Earth anymore so there are no guarantees, but there could be some sealed files that came over with some high-profile researchers."

After talking for a bit, Matt noticed that Alexis was feeling uncomfortable and so he prepared a bath and carried her to soak for a bit. Because Matt had Perfect Mimicry when he evolved, he was able to puppeteer himself around. However, Alexis just went through severe trauma and also evolved, and didn't have that type of ability.

While Matt sat and watched over little Alex, he was having a conversation with Alexis using telepathy. Ever since he discovered what revealed him to Shepherd, and therefore Willard, Matt went over all of his actions and stifled some bad habits.

One of the worst and most obvious was how the two would communicate with telepathy and seemingly do things for no reason. Now, they only spoke in telepathy when they weren't in line of sight with each other, and hid their actions so that there were comprehensive reasons for what they did.

{My Spawning proficiency went up by twenty-seven after I nurtured Alex. It shouldn't be too difficult for me to advance it from here.} She thought.

{I'll let you navigate through that. However, personally, I would fill up your slots with Wyrmlings. Although they are seemingly useless and weak, once they are nurtured to the limit and finish their growth cycle, they should become very versatile.

{The other two are just too bulky and obvious. I wouldn't recommend nurturing any Tarranaughts or Dracolisks until you evolve Berserk. The next stage should allow for invisibility. In contrast, the fully nurtured basic Wyrmling naturally gets camouflage.}

Matt explained to her the strategies from the game. Not only are the Tank and Ranged modes difficult to hide, but they would allow the other players, or in this case the crewmen, to create countermeasures against the parasites. He would not underestimate human ingenuity, especially after his six months of interrogating scientists that were under Willard in some capacity.

Alexis decided to take his advice and not question the source of his knowledge. She activated the spawning ability and immediately created two Wyrmling eggs in her womb. When she activated them, she could sense that she had some control over where to plant the eggs. Since the other options were rather inconvenient, she decided to pick the designated birthing chamber.

The eggs would take a while to mature and only cost her five evolution points each in order to begin their gestation. She wasn't able to nurture them yet, but sensed that she could reabsorb them and reclaim the points spent. Looking at her proficiency, it had indeed increased by ten, equal to the number of points she had spent on her spawns.

When Alexis explained this all to Matt over telepathy, he started pondering over the strangeness of intercourse in the future. Before he could harm his psyche, he decided to change the subject. With the Secondary Reproduction, Alexis could spread her parasites around much more efficiently than Matt could. This ability was unique to the Hive Queen branch, as both Faceless Devourer and Mind Flayer had Primary Reproduction. The only difference is that for Alexis, since she is a sub-body, her Secondary Reproduction can only create tertiary-bodies.

This means that those she puts under her control can not evolve. They would only grant access to their innate ability as a human if they had one, and DNA absorption to collect evolution Points for the main bodies. They would also experience the same healing and strengthening that came along with the parasite, but that wasn't enough to be considered an ability or skill.

{You're thinking of bringing Alexandria into the fold, I'm guessing?} Alexis thought, directly guessing his intentions.

{She contains a lot of cells from the alien parasite derelict. She is basically one of us already. The only difference is lacking awareness of the truth and being irrecoverably bound to us.} Matt argued. He really had no other intentions. More allies would only benefit them.

{Why not just submit the whole list of women you want me to infect.} Alexis thought sarcastically, but Matt actually pondered it for a moment. However, it was not just women, he began considering the best targets among all of the crew for immediate infecting. {Don't make me come out there and beat you to a pulp! I may be weakened but do you dare retaliate?}

{Haha, my lovely wife, don't joke around like that. Of course, I will retaliate, but you may not like my method of attack. As for the list, I'll think about the best candidates. For now, Alexandria will suffice. Too many infected people may give us away. We need more control over the ship.}

Matt thought about his ability to take over the AI that was available in the Mind Flayer path. He was taking a diverging route and may not receive the same ability, but his instincts told him there would be something even better.

While Matt pondered the future, Alexis began spending her points again. She quickly maxed out her Berserk ability and leveled the Secondary Reproduction. She found the berserk ability to be quite interesting and wondered if it would affect Alex, or only the alien spawns.

[Berserk Lv. 0->3: Cause your spawns to enter into a berserk frenzy. They will become stronger for a short period of time. They will not be able to receive a different command until the berserk ends. If you are attacked during berserk, all spawns will forget their previous command and try to protect you.

]Ability: Frenzy]

[Frenzy: Give a command and stimulate the blood of all spawns. They will attack faster, move faster, and deal more damage based on the factor. However, they will also take more damage based on the factor.

Factor: 1.4

Duration: 3 minutes

Cooldown: 3 hours]