NANITE

They stepped into Julia's clinic, but instead of heading for the main room with its modding chair and the glimmering arrays of precision tools, Julia led him down a dim, narrow hallway to an unused storage room at the back. The lights buzzed faintly overhead, casting long, distorted shadows, and dust motes danced in the stale, recycled air.

"We're not doing this near my modding chair," Julia said, her voice dry but serious, her usual professionalism tinged with a new layer of caution. "That gear is too expensive and too sensitive, to risk you accidentally absorbing it."

Ray gave a short, understanding nod and walked into the room, his footsteps echoing slightly on the bare concrete floor. The walls were unadorned. An old, stained medical cot leaned against one corner, and a half-empty crate of worn, forgotten cables sat beside it.

Julia disappeared for a moment and returned holding an old burner phone with a cracked screen, a relic from ages ago.

"You said you can absorb tech and understand it. Try this," she said, tossing it to him. She wore her smart lenses now, activated and glowing faintly green, her pupils dilated as they tracked his every movement, recording, analyzing.

Ray caught the phone, exhaled slowly, and focused his will. Just like with the toothbrush, just like with his old computer. His forearm shifted—the skin darkening, rippling, metal creeping outward in a quiet wave until it wrapped around the device, consuming it.

In seconds, the phone was gone. A cascade of information, precise and overwhelming, bloomed in his mind.

Lithium-polymer battery, ruptured. Capacitor degraded due to moisture exposure. Mainboard oxidation at 47%. ROM chip: intact. Model: K7-Delta. Firmware version: 1.3.7. Last call: unlogged.

He blinked. The flow of data stopped as quickly as it had begun.

Julia didn't say a word. Her lenses zoomed slightly, capturing every detail. Her fingers twitched almost imperceptibly around the datapad she now held—not from fear, not yet, but from the creeping, dawning realization that whatever Ray had become was rewriting every rule she thought she knew about biology and technology.

She turned and stepped out of the room. A few seconds later, she returned with an old electronic scale and set it down on the dusty floor.

"Sit on it," she said curtly, her voice all business.

Ray complied.

68.14 kilograms.

Julia scribbled something on her datapad and walked away again. This time she came back holding a dusty, discarded hair dryer. She held it out. "Try again."

Ray took it, then repeated the process. The hair dryer vanished beneath the now-familiar tide of shifting metal. The room fell silent, the air thick with unspoken questions, as if the very walls were holding their breath.

Julia's voice came quietly from across the room. "Again. On the scale."

Still 68.14 kilograms.

Julia's brows furrowed, and she muttered, almost to herself, "Where does the mass go? It has to go somewhere. Basic physics."

Ray stared at his arm. He couldn't feel the added weight of the absorbed objects. He didn't feel anything except a faint, almost imperceptible warmth beneath the skin, a subtle hum of internal activity. But his interface, the one that had bloomed in his mind, told a different story. The blue bar. It pulsed faintly, rhythmically, like it was alive, like it was… feeding.

"Do you have some batteries? Charged ones?" Ray asked suddenly, an idea sparking in his mind.

Without a word, Julia left and returned with a handful of AA and lithium cells.

He took them. One by one, the batteries vanished under the surface of his hand, each disappearance accompanied by a small, distinct flicker in his blue energy bar. But still, no real measurement, no precise understanding of what it represented.

If only it showed numbers... Ray barely finished the thought when something inside his mind shifted.

The blue bar dissolved. In its place: a number.

97.231%

His eyes widened. His breath caught in his throat, a useless reflex. The room felt suddenly too quiet, the silence amplifying the impossible reality of what was happening to him.

"Something changed," he said, his voice hushed, almost reverent.

Julia snapped her head up, her gaze locking on his face, sharp and intense.

"I have this interface," Ray explained, his voice gaining a slight tremor. "Two bars: one gray, one blue. Just now, I wished the blue one had numbers... and it changed."

Julia's eyes sharpened further, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "The nanites are responding to your thoughts. Directly. That shouldn't be possible. They're designed to follow input protocols, specific command structures, not… intuition. Try more. Change something else. The color, the layout. Like you used to do with your old HUD."

Ray focused, his mind racing. He imagined the bar as red. It turned red. He mentally moved it to the bottom left of his vision. It slid there without delay, perfectly responsive.

"It's working." The interface obeyed not like a tool, but like a limb, an extension of his own being. It responded not to command, but to will. A strange, exhilarating thrill of power, cold and sharp, surged up Ray's spine.

He glanced at the gray bar. It remained still, unchanged. But for the first time, he noticed it pulsed faintly—slow and steady, like a… like a heartbeat. A mechanical, artificial heartbeat that wasn't his own.

Julia didn't respond, her expression unreadable, but her stylus flew across her datapad, noting every detail.

"The main function of nanites is to build, repair, and deconstruct," Julia said, her arms folded, watching him with a quiet, unnerving intensity. "Try doing it. Think about what you absorbed and will it into existence."

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Ray looked at her, eyebrows raised in disbelief.

She shrugged, a small, almost dismissive gesture. "It might work. Or it might not. We're in uncharted territory here, Ray."

Ray's gaze dropped to his left hand. He took a breath, steeling himself, and focused his will.

His hand shimmered, the skin melting, flowing, transforming into a swirling mass of liquid metal—dark grey with a hint of silver sheen. Slowly, with a precision that was both fascinating and horrifying, the shifting mass formed into a perfect, functional replica of the electric toothbrush he had absorbed earlier.

He stared at it for a second, a lump forming in his throat. Then he willed it to activate.

The toothbrush buzzed to life in his hand, the vibrations strong and steady.

Ray flinched at the sensation.

"This is freakish as hell," he whispered, his voice hoarse.

Julia didn't answer. Her eyes narrowed, pupils adjusting behind the soft blue glow of her lenses. Her hands remained steady, but her mind raced, calculating, analyzing, trying to comprehend the impossible. This wasn't just exciting—it was paradigm-shifting. And terrifyingly dangerous. If the wrong people found out, they'd tear him apart to get at the tech.

Ray willed the construct away. His hand dissolved it, the metal flowing back, reforming into flesh as if it had never changed.

Then he did it again—this time forming the burner phone. The screen, now repaired, flickered on, perfectly functional, eyebrows raised in a mixture of disbelief and dawning wonder. Next came the hair dryer, then a single AA battery, each construct clicking into existence with an effortless precision, like muscle memory responding to pure intent.

A chill crept up his spine, colder than any alley rain. They obeyed his thought, obeyed his will. How far did this go? What were the limits? Could he become something... else entirely?

"Try disconnecting it from your body after you form it," Julia said, her voice cutting through his thoughts, stepping closer, her curiosity warring with her caution.

Ray focused, trying to will the newly formed toothbrush to detach, to become a separate object—but no matter how hard he tried, it remained fused to his arm, an extension of his own transformed flesh. The moment he tried to release it, it unraveled, dissolving back into him.

Julia tilted her head, her expression thoughtful. "I wonder what would happen if the construct was forcibly cut off from your body."

Ray met her gaze, his own expression firm, resolute. "Do it."

Julia raised an eyebrow, a flicker of surprise in her eyes. "You sure, Ray? This could be… unpredictable."

"I need to know more about this," he replied, his voice steady, betraying none of the fear that churned within him. There was no room for fear now—only a desperate need for understanding, for control.

Julia nodded slowly, then grabbed a heavy-duty set of insulated pliers from a nearby toolkit. Ray's hand reshaped into the toothbrush again, the plastic and metal gleaming under the dim storage room lights.

With one quick, deliberate motion, Julia snapped the neck of the toothbrush.

The detached piece didn't clatter to the ground. It dissolved midair, turning to a fine, almost invisible dust before it could touch the floor.

Julia crouched, inspecting the faint residue on the concrete with narrowed eyes. A faint, almost imperceptible shimmer clung to the dusty surface.

"Try absorbing it," she said, her voice quiet.

Ray reached down. The dust reabsorbed instantly, flowing into his skin without a trace.

He closed his eyes, focusing inward. "It's the base material—plastic and metal. Nothing else. Just what the toothbrush was made of."

Julia leaned back, one hand on her hip, her expression a mixture of relief and profound unease. "No residual nanites? No unknown particles? No… active components?"

Ray shook his head. "Nothing out of place. Just raw material."

Julia exhaled slowly through her nose, a long, drawn-out breath. She left the room again, returning a moment later with a small, innocuous-looking device that resembled an old-fashioned earplug. She held it out to him.

"This is a broken hearing aid," Julia said, holding out the small, innocuous-looking device. "Try absorbing it. Then try forming it into your ear. Let's see if these nanites can interface directly with your auditory processing."

Ray took the device. It vanished into his palm with the now-familiar, unsettling ripple of his skin. A second later, he focused, picturing the device integrating, becoming part of him. A slight, almost imperceptible hum echoed through his head, a subtle shift in the way the world sounded. He blinked, his senses recalibrating.

"Well?" Julia asked, watching him closely, her smart lenses minutely tracking any change in his expression or posture.

Ray turned toward her—and the change was immediate, startling. Every word she spoke was clearer, crisper, as if a layer of static he hadn't even realized was there had been stripped away. He could hear the soft whisper of her breath between words, the almost silent buzz of the overhead light fixture, even the faint, rhythmic scraping of her heel on the concrete floor as she shifted her weight. The world had sharpened, its auditory details thrown into stark, almost overwhelming relief.

"It works," he said, his voice tinged with a stunned disbelief. "Everything is… louder and clearer."

"I wish we could try it with actual combat mods," Julia muttered, half to herself, her gaze distant as if running complex calculations. She stared into space for a moment, her brow tightening. Then, without warning, a spark of decision in her eyes, she turned and rushed out of the storage room.

Ray stood frozen, unsure whether to follow. The phantom buzz of the integrated hearing aid still lingered in his senses, a faint echo of his ongoing transformation. Every second, his reality felt more alien, more detached from the life he had known.

Julia returned minutes later, her movements quick and purposeful, holding a transparent, sterile plastic bag. Inside was a slim, silver data chip wired with two data ports—an interface mod.

"Julia, I can't—" Ray began, a protest forming on his lips. He couldn't accept it for free.

"Shut up and take it," she snapped. Her voice was sharp, cutting through his hesitation, but not cruel. It was driven by a strange mixture of urgency, scientific fervor, and a fear he couldn't quite decipher. She shoved the interface mod into his hands.

Ray hesitated, the cool metal of the chip an unwelcome weight in his palm. His hand trembled as he accepted it. For a moment, he just stared at the device, he shut his eyes and focused his will.

A cold pulse rippled through the base of his skull. His skin prickled as something slithered beneath it—a sensation like liquid wire threading itself into place. His fingers flew to the back of his head, tracing the skin just behind his right ear. Two smooth, perfectly formed ports had emerged, seamlessly set into his skin as if they had always been there.

His breath caught. "The interface... it's back." The words were a whisper of disbelief and dawning wonder.

Julia handed him a clean data shard. "Use this. It's empty. Let's see if the connection is stable."

Ray slotted it into the newly formed port. A soft, satisfying click. Then—stillness. Silence. And then, a familiar, comforting hum of data alignment filled his mind like an old, half-forgotten melody. The link was clean. Stable and perfect.

He ejected the shard and handed it back to Julia, a sense of profound relief washing over him. Then, reaching into his pocket, he pulled out one of his old data shards, one that still held a small cache of credits. He inserted it. His vision shimmered—and numbers, blessedly familiar, bloomed across his internal HUD. His balance.

Ray exhaled, long and slow. The relief was so potent it was almost painful. It solved so many problems, restored a sliver of normalcy to his fractured world. At least one corner of his existence made sense again.

"Let me run a diagnostic," Julia said, her voice regaining some of its usual clinical composure, though her eyes still held a spark of something unreadable. She was already pulling out another shard—this one tipped with a data cable and a blinking antenna. She plugged it into one of his ports. Her smart lenses lit up, lines of code scrolling rapidly.

"The ID of the mod is the same, specs match the original implant… It's connecting to the main rig... but—" she frowned, her brow furrowing in concentration. "I can't scan deeper. I'm getting blocked somehow."

Ray's eyes narrowed. "Blocked? By what?"

Julia shook her head slowly, a perplexed look on her face. "Something's rerouting my access. It's... the nanites. They're protecting the interface. Protecting you." She tapped a few commands into her lens HUD, her expression grim. "Let's try something else. I'm going to call you."

A soft tone pinged inside Ray's head. An icon, a stylized question mark, blinked at the edge of his vision. Then—Julia's voice, clear and unmistakable, echoed directly in his mind: "Can you hear me?"

"Loud and clear."