Technohol

Technohol was a concept created by the mysterious and mad genius known only as Mister Brewer. The idea was to create cell-sized devices which possessed the most favorable characteristics of their biological and mechanical components. They would be capable of machine-like precision and computer-like speed, while having the ability to heal and grow, not to mention reproduce on their own.

Years of research saw Mister Brewer bankrupted, and since he was unwilling to resort to crime to fuel the development of his masterpiece, he instead opted to align himself with the bio-tech firm (then) known as Bio-Logic Industries. Acquiring nigh-unlimited funding in exchange for the commercial rights to his creations, Mister Brewer finally had the means to create the technology that haunted his dreams.

And thus, before long, Technohol was realized.

Quickly seeing the limitless profit potential of Mister Brewer's mad notions, particularly after he'd demonstrated a few objects he'd made with the stuff, the company changed direction entirely. Putting itself behind the exploitation of Technohol whole hog, the owners renamed the company Permutational Industries, and poured most of its development budget into Technoholic applications.

Of course, having numerous government contacts and contracts, the leaders of Permutational Industries steered Mister Brewer into producing something even more ambitious. They wanted a batch of Technohol that could be given to ordinary humans, to transform them into living weapons! These would-be super-soldiers would have all the powers that Technohol could provide - and would be under the company's control!

This proved more difficult than expected, however.

It took many iterations of Technoholic development to handle the physical aspects of such a modification to existing humans, and even more to get the mental portions worked out. And then, as he tested out the final Technoholic formulae, Mister Brewer was violently slain by two of his test subjects - who in turn attacked Permutational Industries to stop their Technohol testing on live, unsuspecting human beings.

They destroyed much of Brewer's work in the process, and set the company back years - if not decades - in Technoholic research. However, they do retain enough of Brewer's work to eventually recover from this drastic set-back - along with one or two samples of his early work which weren't on-site at the time of his test subjects' rampage. Thus, the world has not seen the end of this idea... not by a long shot.

Basic Abilities:

In its basic form, Technohol is simply a large amount of cell-sized, organic circuitry. It can be programmed to hold a singular shape if desired, but the true advantage of the material is that it can be reorganized on the fly to serve numerous different purposes. As an independent item, a Technoholic device thus has the power to Shape Change, which it can do with rank value 30 ability.

Its unique basis allows the Technohol to take the form of any mechanical, electronic or biological item - or alternately, any form anywhere in-between. Thus, one could program Technohol to act as a dog, or a chainsaw or even a smartphone. Wielding the 'natural weapons' power stunt of Shape Change, Technoholic devices can use the abilities of the forms it takes, at their normal rank or at up to its own power level.

Whether they do so with an external interface or wirelessly, all Technoholic devices are capable of sharing data. This serves as a powerful, rank value 50 Computer Link, which lets them transmit any information they have, as well as receive new instructions. Thus, even those Technoholic devices which are generally 'locked' into a singular form can update both their hardware and software if necessary.

To control this process, and all of its other functions, the individual 'cells' of Technohol can operate together as a powerful neural network. In other words, each Technoholic device is possessed of Artificial Intelligence (A.I.), though not necessarily sentient. It possesses an Intellect score of 10, which acts according to its programming and, if necessary, the remote dictates of a control center.

Thanks to its partially organic nature, Technohol has the ability to heal. Thanks to its partially mechanical nature, this process has been amplified to a staggering degree. As such, a Technoholic device has the power to Regenerate from almost any harm, assuming enough raw materials are present for it to eventually repair the damage, recovering from injury with rank value 30 ability - three points per turn.

It is important to bear in mind that serious injuries or loss of mass may require raw materials to complete regeneration under certain conditions. This can happen if some of the Technohol is broken off, or even if some of its material is expended in the form of bullets or other projectiles. If the lost mass cannot be recovered, the Technohol may require food (or fuel, etc.) to return to its optimal state.

Advanced Abilities:

When utilized on humans as a part of its super-soldier sleeper program, the Technohol produced by Permutational Industries has numerous additional characteristics. It was augmented to the point that its Shape Change capabilities function at a +1 RS, and it possesses a Willpower score of 30. The latter is used by its on-board A.I. to subjugate the personalities of its hosts upon activation.

This would allow them to take over the human host body when directed to do so, either temporarily or permanently, with the option of blanking their memories of the occurrence. Thus, one could secretly slip a large number of people a dose of Technohol, and have an entire army of super-soldiers ready at the push of a button... and then, when their work was done, put them back wherever they came from, no worse for the wear.

While active, the implanted Technohol could augment its host's inherent abilities considerably. It can make use of enhanced senses, peer into non-visible wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation, and most importantly, grant its abilities to the body it is integrated with. This makes them highly durable and malleable, with each part of their body capable of becoming all manner of useful - or lethal - devices.

Also, the Technohol could be used to manufacture additional equipment when necessary. This would allow a singular Technoholic operative to produce advanced ordnance for a large number of 'mundane' soldiers. This is somewhat stressful on even a Technoholic body however, which meant one would need to heal from the exertion (often with large amounts of protein drinks as fuel) or to convert existing mass for this purpose.

Different doses of 'sleeper' Technohol possessed a few strange quirks. It was produced in sixteen different flavors, each of which was designed to be dispensed to an unsuspecting public as a new line of soft drinks. The Technohol in each would unerringly conform to the color base of its soft drink flavor, thus making users of each much more conspicuous than an 'unbranded' version of Technohol would be.

Furthermore, items made with the super-soldier Technohol, whether inherent to one's body or produced for independent use, would also have a subtle hint of the soft drink's scent. So, for example, a human infested with Technohol 12 would smell of cherries whenever they used their Technoholic abilities, as would any devices they built for use by either themselves or someone else.

Technoholic Quirks:

As stated above, there were sixteen different versions of the Technohol super-soldier sleeper formula concocted by Mister Brewer before his untimely demise. Those at this stage of development had essentially perfected the physical modification technology inherent to the concept, but the mind control portion was still a work in progress. Of course, that only meant he needed to make minute changes as testing progressed.

This problem was compounded by difficulties with the Technohol's Artificial Intellect. Upon being inserted into a human life form, it had a distressing tendency to take on human thought patterns and/or the general morality of its host body. Most of Brewer's modifications from formula to formula involved tweaking the A.I. or the mind control process to work together in tandem, and to make the former tow the line.

As Brewer fixed various problems with the technology, he back-tracked and repaired older formulas while testing the new. Thus, any testing of an earlier formula along with the latest would behave the same, save for the flavor differences. He did save samples of each at an undisclosed location along with those he provided Permutational Industries, but with his death this secret laboratory's location has been lost.

Compounding this was the net failure of the safeguard Brewer made against rogue Technohol operatives for Permutational Industries. Early in the development cycle of the stuff, Brewer concocted a special solvent that would specifically work to dissolve Technoholic machine cells, in the event that they malfunction (or as it turned out, rebel). Technoholic devices are especially susceptible to this compound.

On contact, the Technoholic solvent inflicts rank value 20 AI SD Metabolic damage, meaning one dose is often enough to break a Technoholic device down to its component atoms. However, anything as simple as Saran Wrap ™ is enough to deflect this solvent, making its application tricky at best. This works on malfunctioning Technoholic devices well, but less so on dosed operatives who know to plan for it.

Also, it turned out that enough radiation would cause a 'reboot' in the Technohol's programming. This allowed it to think for itself, and most often choose an agenda for itself or to actively rebel against Brewer and the company. This explained a lot of earlier malfunctions, what with the radiation Brewer used to test the source Technohol with. This problem was repaired with extra shielding immediately before Brewer's demise.

Technoholic Flavors:

Known Technoholic formulations include the following, and function at spec thanks to the last days of Brewer's work:

Extra Goodies:

Technoholic 4C System: Edition 13 Text File Download

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