Muscles - Chemtech Experimentation

An orc born in captivity, the results of decades of selective breeding among their populace to be gifted with superior genetics of strength, height and raw muscle mass.The child was never given a name, dubbed only EX03A, just another clandestine line of experimentation for Baldur’s scientists working in secret labs across the kingdom. Four concrete walls was all he knew, never the feel of the sun batting against his eyes, nor the touch of grass coursing through his feet. Cold, cruel concrete was his home for twenty years, fed a gruel-like paste with high concentrations of shredded meat and chemicals, intended to further bolster his form. By the time fourteen summers had passed for him, he stood near eight-feet tall. He had never developed the capacity to speak beyond basic, rudimentary phrases and single words, though he could understand commands employed by his keepers. Having thought them to be his friends and parents once upon a time, particularly the man called Dr. Cartwright by others, he learned over the years that they were not his friends, but his captors and tormentors. Dr. Cartwright would read pulp stories to the young orc, believing instilling some form of imagination and empathy in the creature might be the key to controlling and humanizing him, yet all it did was beset the boy with a myriad of questions to raise to the Doctor. Eventually Dr. Cartwright stopped visiting him, and the theory of experimentation to nurture a sense of empathy in the child was dropped, resulting in future scientists simply treating him like a beast, prodding him, sedating him, hitting him and scolding him at any minor sign of misbehaviour. When they first injected EX03A with the Velgaryn Solution (VS), he responded with an instant, crazed violence. The experimenter’s head was ripped from its socket like a doll, and it took twelve tranquilizer rounds to bring him down. The scientists deliberated terminating the experiment and simply disposing of it, though others believed they had made remarkable progress as the Solution caused the experiment to undergo rapid engorgement of musclemass and bone density, growing nearly two feet in the span of a week as well. What was instead devised was a means of recycling the Solution through him, creating a tank which could naturally synthesize the Solution from particles present in his bloodstream before pumping it back into him. It resulted in a safer means of applying the Solution, and deemed the experiment even more successful if EX03A was nigh-consistently at its peak form. Though the matter of aggression still persisted: EX03A was intended to be a malleable and obedient bioweapon against Baldur’s enemies, the Solution one day intended to be adopted into specialist soldiers to enhance their martial abilities for a short time. The experiments with EX03A concluded that it may not be viable if the soldiers fall into a state of rabid aggression. So they made one last attempt to deduce if the aggression was innate, or if the experiment had simply grown to hate and wish violence upon the experimenters. A goblin slave assistant they ironically dubbed “Brains” was sent into EX03A’s pen, alongside a handful of confederates; humans forced into menial labour in the labs, workers indebted to Baldur’s Indentured Labour Services. All were destroyed in a fit of rage by the experiment, save for Brains, who the experiment was more fascinated and curious by, seeing the tiny goblin as some kind of brethren. Brains spoke to EX03A for a time, calling him Muscles, the first time he had ever been called anything other than his experimental label. Eventually, Brains was able to break Muscles free from his captivity, shooting them out into the swamps with an experimental portal device. For the first time, Muscles had travelled beyond the four concrete walls that enclosed him. He felt the squelch of mud beneath his foot, the bottlebrushes caressing his legs and the sun warming his bare skin. Yet they were lost, and the swamps proved a hostile and deadly place: they were forced to fight back undead each night, only fire halting their relentless march, whilst their captors desperately searched for them. Gathering wind of this, Lumens sent his own crew, composed of Jacquie Sparks and a half dozen Simulacrums into the swamps where rumours pointed to these supposed escapees. The pair were found, and brought back. While Muscles had little trust of this group, Brains told him that it may just be a temporary thing, and they should appreciate the shelter until they can find a way to make it on their own, or wait for the heat on their back to trail off. Until then, they’ll do whatever is needed to solidify their place among the group.