The seemingly simple subject I asked ended up being an in depth topic of its own right.
Between genetically engineered organs with a more efficient digestive and waste management system, there were many factors that could muddle the frequency of a transhuman's need to visit the bathroom.
From Niandra's limited knowledge on the subject matter, a few standard Terran days of not needing to visit the loo was normal for most transhumans. On the extreme end of example, the Vindicare assassins of the Officio Assassinorum, the ultra elite snipers who trained their art of marksmanship to near-perfection, were known to stay still for many days in a single position just to get a chance to eliminate their quarry with a single gunshot.
Another issue to consider were the extra layers of cybernetic enhancements and built in waste management plus recycling systems in advanced suits. For example the Astartes' power armour had built in systems that could sustain a marine's metabolism without needing to stop to eat or drink while taking care of waste management. No one had ever heard of a space marine looking for a washroom in the middle of a warzone, and they were known to be confined in their power armour for months in brutal void warfare where taking one's suit off for a leak was out of the question.
Then there was my case where my physiology was practically state secret. 'I really have no idea.' Niandra said while shaking her head, her long ponytail swinging from side to side.
'The level of engineered organs aside, I have heard of rumours about psykers who can alter bodily functions with the deeper mastery of their powers. When it comes to you, both aspects are of unknown quantifiers.' She looked dead serious when delivering her conclusion.
We returned to the upper floor just as our conversation wrapped up and was received by Herlindya and the rest.
'Preacher Maylin has gone through all the remaining test candidates and the initial results are promising.' Herlindya reported. While that was certainly good news, the sample size was too small and the progress too slow for what we needed.
'Very well. Kindly arrange a fresh batch for tomorrow, add some variety and increase the number of candidates by half. Please look into methods that can increase the efficiency of the whole process.' I said.
'My lady, you are doing this again tomorrow? We have to show it to the world!' Maylin exclaimed, hardly able to contain her excitement. 'I am sure the archdeacon and the rest of the senior clergy would be honoured to witness you performing the Emperor's miracle, may I invite them over?'
Bringing the high hat fella and his gang to watch me work?
I had mixed feelings about Maylin's suggestion, the notion of turning my work into religious propaganda just did not sit right with me. But as an outsider I had to concede due to my limited knowledge of the local politics, the pros and cons of such an action was beyond me.
It was time to consult the professionals.
I looked at Herlindya with puppy eyes, she quickly got the hint and dropped the conditions for Maylin's request. 'Esteemed members of Adeptus Ministorum are welcome to witness Lady Syrine performing her work, but due to special circumstances every visitor has to be vetted by the Inquisition beforehand and no recordings will be allowed.'
Against my expectation, Maylin did not protest about the imposed conditions, instead she quickly sorted out the details with Herlindya and promptly excused herself to inform the Church. I had Niandra talk to Alicya on the arrangements needed for our little training session later and before I knew it, lunch time had arrived.
Non-militant members of Adepta Sororitas usually eat two meals a day, lunch around noon and dinner in the evening. Not feeling hungry at all, I declined the offer of lunch and ended up killing time at the library inside the monastery with Welminah by my side while waiting for Niandra to get ready.
Like almost everything in the Imperium, the monastery library was huge, imposing and a sight to behold. Made up of two floors, the library was housed in a grand ornate chamber complete with high ceilings, wall murals, intricate carvings and stained-glass windows that cast a natural glow on the many shelves of manuscripts and heavy tomes.
The air inside was cool and thick with the scent of aged parchment and leather bindings, sounds of rustling pages mixed with cogitator stations' muted beeps and whispered conversations created a serene, scholarly atmosphere. Well, it would have been perfectly serene if not for the presence of many cherubs.
God damned creepy cherubs.
These things were … basically undead and genderless babies with decorative feathery wings. Their primary means of movement was by floating around with their built in anti-grav generators, the same principle utilised by servo-skulls.
Despite knowing the existence of these bio-sculpted homunculi beforehand, I had severely underestimated their grotesqueness in real life. With my typical civilian worldview from the twenty-first century, coming face to face with these constructs proved to be deeply disturbing, like witnessing a Halloween joke that went too far. Whoever thought of having these things hovering around in a place of study was a good idea really possessed a skewed sense of morbid aesthetics.
It took me a while to get used to and ignore the many creepy cybernetic undead infants that were randomly floating about. A glance of the shelves informed me most of the books here were about topics of religious, historical and cultural significance. In essence, none of them looked interesting to me. But since I was already here, I might as well make my time productive.
I reached out, retrieved a tome titled "Chronicles of Nusquam" and started flipping. To my surprise, I was able to thoroughly read and comprehend the contents just by casually glancing at the pages while turning them. Amazed, I continued to flip through the pages thinking this incredible instant information absorption would stop at some point, but I was sorely mistaken.
It just went on and on, page after page of text was fully read and comprehended at a supernatural speed until I freaked out and slammed the thick book shut. My sudden action made Welminah, who had been following me around like a lost puppy, look over with curiosity in her eyes. Did I read half the book just like that?
Time to put that strange notion to the test, I passed the tome to her. 'Help me test something. Try reading any line in this book before page one hundred fifty.'
Welminah obliged, she opened the book to a random page and started reading. 'The discovery of Nusquam as an exo-planet with Holy Terra's almost exact specifications is nothing short of a miraculous occurrence…'
'That is on page ten, first paragraph. Am I correct?'
'Let me see… you are correct!'
'Try another page.'
'Please hold on. Alright, here we go. May we always remember the miracle of this discovery that founded our home and marvel at the… '
I held up a hand stopping her before continuing where she let off on the page, '... the divine plan laid down by the God-Emperor that guides us all. Praise be to the Master of Mankind. Page eighty three, fifth paragraph.'
'Correct again. Wait, did you memorise all that just by flipping through it?' Welminah asked, astonished.
A primarch's base line abilities are IMBA as hell.
'Seems so. If only I could recall my lost memories like that.' I managed a vague response. So the saying of a primarch never forgets was true, in the lore Horus the Warmaster once noticed there was a strange lapse in his memory, leading him to investigate and later discovering a big secret.
On the note of never forgetting, I recalled promising Welminah a piece of my wardrobe after the war was over. It seemed like that promise was overdue. Note to self on sorting that out later today. Speaking of Welminah, I had been detecting a weird sense of nervousness in her mind, plus the scholar's subtle fidgeting around me had become too obvious to hide.
'Something on your mind?' I asked, sounding my best to be casual.
'Well, Maylin had passed some questionnaires to me and wished that you could answer them as soon as possible, for her to report to the Church.' Welminah answered timidly while taking out her data-slate. Speaking of Maylin, I believed she just entered the library, her recognisable footstep was approaching fast from the other end.
'Alright. I think Maylin is here. Let's answer them when she arrives.' I said.
At that moment a floating cherub got too close for my comfort. Annoyed, in my mind I asked the cyborg baby to bugger off. Shockingly, the cherub turned its head and looked at me before sending me a binaric prompt.
<++Administrative level directive received, please clarify the distance or destination for this unit to relocate.++>
Surprised, I simply pointed to the far end of the library, 'just … move along.' Instead of floating away immediately, the cherub landed onto the floor before giving me a deep bow.
<++Acknowledged, administrator.++>
After completing its flamboyant gesture, it started running towards the spot I pointed with the grace of a three year old and ran past Maylin like a playful child, giggling creepily all the way. So just like that I discovered the cherubs here, like most servo-skulls, responded to my thought commands unquestioningly.
Both the scholar and the preacher had their eyes glued onto the running homunculus, then Maylin turned to me with a puzzled face and a question. 'Lady Syrine, how did you get a cherub to obey you?'
'What do you mean?'
'I had visited this library multiple times, they never obey anyone except for the librarians and the tech-priests.'
Oops.
As I was wondering how to talk my way out of this, Welminah stepped in and explained with a straight face. 'As the Holy Daughter, Lady Syrine's divinity is recognised even by the cherubs residing here.'
'Is that so?' Maylin gasped, 'can you kindly demonstrate again? I need to verify such claims to the Church.'
'That should not be a problem. Am I correct, my lady?' Welminah smiled and gave me a quick wink. I could even read what was on her mind, this is nothing compared to Baneblade tanks.
As one of the inner circle people in the know, Welminah was present all the way from the planning through the execution of the final civil war battle and witnessed it all. Since this was my screw up, I might as well put up a small show to complete the white lie.
'Very well.' I said and mentally ordered another nearby cherub to come over while doing a beckoning gesture to complete the act. The cherub I targeted immediately dropped its routine, hovered over and landed in front of me.
'Do a proper greeting.' I commanded.
It complied, to the delight of both girls and some random sisters peeking from the corners of the library, the cherub formed the Aquila hand sign to the best of its ability and bowed.
'Have a seat.' I ordered again and it did as commanded, dropping its tiny back on the floor while looking at us with its unnerving eyes.
'Fascinating! Is it possible to ask it to do something that we have never seen before?' Maylin asked excitedly, she had the energy of a pilgrim witnessing a miracle and could not wait to see more.
It was then I had a proper look at the cyborg baby, through the transcendent level of intellect residing in me, I got a better understanding of these constructs.
These cherubs were controlled by cybernetically-augmented biological cortexes and nervous systems which allowed them to perform simple tasks. You could say they were a more complex version of servitors with some allowed perimeters for pre-programmed self expressions. The cherubs here were programmed with some preset tasks but otherwise reverted to a sort of holding pattern until they received overriding commands from an accepted figure of authority.
I looked at the girls with their faces of expectation and wondered for a moment what would impress them. Then a ridiculous idea crossed my mind. Many many years ago when Holy Terra was a happier place, in the primordial days of its internet, a video featuring an animated dancing baby had once become a trending phenomenon.
Activating thought acceleration, I first analysed the rough movements of the dancing baby in the video inside my mind. That done, I imprinted the movement sequence to the cherub via my connection to it and let its internal system sort out the details.
<++Affirmative.++> It replied.
'Alright little fella, what is the best dance routine you've hidden from the world? Show them what you got.' I said to the cherub, which was a purely theatrical display for my audience, then dropped my mental command.
<++Complying.++> The cherub stood up and started the whimsical dance sequence. Just like the viral video, it was soon swinging its arms back and forth with its head bobbing up and down. Moving to the beat of an unheard music, it also bounced up and down on its toes, occasionally taking a step or two to the side while rotating on the spot.
The chubby little bugger spun and twirled, dipped and bounced with all the unbridled enthusiasm a homunculus could muster. For a moment the dancing cherub had become a tornado of motion on the library floor. Completing the package were the cherub's uncanny facial expressions, its eyes were wide open with artificial excitement, its mouth opened in a toothless grin while it repeated the dancing sequence on the spot again and again to the uproar of everyone present.
It still looked darn creepy to me but my audience seemed to disagree with that notion. Their reaction spoke of visceral excitement and joy, like some fangirls witnessing their idol's live performance. Even the previously peeping sisters on corners of the library had come out to check out the little bugger's performance up close.
It was becoming a ruckus and the noise was fast getting out of hand, so I clapped my hands and ordered the cherub to stop. It complied by finishing a last spin before taking a bow and sat down again like nothing ever happened, to the applause of all the ladies nearby.
'That was amazing!' Maylin exclaimed and the others agreed. Some random sisters even went up to the cherub, teasing it to dance again to no avail. The atmosphere was getting lively here.
'Won't the librarian get angry if we made too much noise?' I asked while looking around.
'A librarian is right here.' Said a sister, pointing at Welminah.
Eh? I looked at Welminah, she returned my inquisitive stare with an apologetic smile. 'All members of the Orders Dialogous share responsibility in maintaining the monastery library.'
She then bent down to the cherub and talked to it like speaking to an old friend. 'Eta-55, resume standard routine.' The cyborg baby nodded, stood back up and floated away, ending our little show.
Huh, sisters of the Dialogous Order maintaining huge monastery libraries. How did I miss something so obvious?
*Buzz* Just as the small crowd started to disperse. Welminah's communicator sounded. 'Speaking. Yes she is with me. Very well.' Welminah turned to me. 'Your training session venue is ready, would you like to go now?'
'Yes please.'
'Please follow me.'
Upon knowing I was attending a private training session, Maylin could not hide her disappointment of being unable to attend and observe.
Soon, in a small training hall where only three people were present, my training with the imperial assassin started under the supervision of Veritta. Strangely on a table beside us were two egg trays, one was empty while the other had a dozen eggs on it.
Niandra was demonstrating what she could do with her strength by bending an extra thick metallic rod into a "U" shape. She made it look so easy, without knowing better one would think the rod in question was a piece of modelling clay. She then straightened the rod back effortlessly before passing it to me. 'Here, you try it.'
I held on to the metal rod, felt its significant gravity pull and was suddenly unsure if I could do it. Holding each of the rod's ends with my hands, I imitated her stance and pressed hard. The rod bent but did not go all the way. I pressed and pressed but the piece of stupid rod stubbornly refused to bend further.
Hold on a second, where did my strength go? Didn't I just cut through human flesh with a hand chop?
Niandra cocked her head and crossed her arms, silently observing my helplessness for a while before commenting, 'you … have to go all the way.'
All the way?
transhuman.
'I am fine, only my self confidence is hurt.' I whimpered as Niandra entered my view with her usual unreadable expression.
'That was bad, huh?' I lamented.
'You telegraphed your moves too much. Your movements were fast but rigid and slightly restrained by your attire.' She said matter-of-factly.
'Can I have more sessions like this with you?'
'We will see.'
Throne be damned, I hated the idea of being in a state comparable to a useless goddess so much. Starting from now, I will do whatever I can to gain daily life proficiencies and combat prowess.