FeralHeart Roleplay > Characters

Synwulf, the failed experiment

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Akavariat:
Greetings! So, as it stands, I'm fairly sure I'm not so fit for RPing these days. Yet, it seems like I still have new ideas sometimes. This is one of my recent characters, and I’ve been having quite a bit of fun coming up with a story for it. Here we go!

The backstory

After recent major technological discoveries and advancements in the fields of Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, the dream of building truly sentient robots seemed to be within reach. Yet, all of this was scaring the common folk, those who believed in the inevitable robot rebellion or that they would, possibly, have their loved ones replaced by machines. Exploiting this idea in public would earn the people’s wrath, and chaos could ensue. However, such an opportunity could not be wasted. As such, the world’s major powers created a secret organization whose goal was to be the vanguard of the very first sentient machines, all without the people of the world even knowing about it.

Dubbed the “Synthetic Initiative”, the group was comprised of some of the most brilliant minds in the world, ranging from Mathematicians to Physicists and Computer Scientists, at an undisclosed facility. Their initial goal was to create a fully autonomous android, thus promptly testing their theories with Robotics’ greatest challenge yet: mimicking, or even replicating, human intelligence and self-awareness in a synthetic being. Yet, the organization’s Board of Ethics vetoed such an idea, stating that any sort of malfunction, even minor, in the android would compromise the entire initiative and cause major unrest with the people, as the machine would have to be tested amongst the populace. This effectively halted the scientists’ plans for some months as they looked for alternatives, eventually looking into the animal kingdom for inspiration. And, they found it.

Recent research papers on wolves studied their gregarious nature and hunting habits, their effectiveness and overall modus operandi. This made the scientists decide to create a synthetic wolf, given that testing it would be nowhere as complicated as testing a regular android, and that it’d be possible to study its sociality when faced with other wolves. Named “Project Simulacrum”, whose Latin word stands for “imitation”, the new goal of the organization was not universally accepted – from the onset, groups who did not accept the creation of the mechanical wolf distanced themselves from the project. These rogue scientists would play a much larger role later on.

The wolf’s skeleton was to be made from very resistant metal, such that it’d be extremely difficult for it to be broken. It would also have synthetic tissue with regenerative abilities and fur, as to further resemble a real wolf, as well as synthetic organs to make it seem more like a living being. A side effect from this is that the synthetic wolf would be much faster and stronger than its organic counterpart, facts that were ignored by the Synthetic Initiative as their goal eventually degraded from scientific study and advancement of robotics, to creating the ultimate machine and testing its abilities while also making it as organic as possible, a basis for the terrible events that were to come.

The project’s result was soon unveiled: a very large, almost bear-sized black and grey wolf-like creature, with many LED grids attached to its body for the scientists to monitor its “mental state” – if it was stable, both the LEDs and its eyes would emit a bright green light, otherwise they’d emit a red light. Given the name of “Synwulf”, the wolf was fitted with a new synthetic brain, filled with state-of-the-art Machine Learning algorithms to make it as smart as its organic counterpart, but with the downside being that the machine would need to effectively be taught what it meant to be a wolf – the only way to achieve this would be to put it alongside real wolves.

One day, a small pack of 8 wolves was captured and brought to the facility for the final trial. Synwulf had just been instructed to socialize with the wolves, and it was to have its LED grids removed and eyes replaced with more realistic ones after the trial. It’d also be repainted, as to be more realistic, after the test. However, the rogue scientists, who by this point also had their own personal projects effectively drowned by Project Simulacrum, grew tired of the whole thing and sprung into action. They covertly changed several parts of Synwulf’s reasoning and logic routines, while deleting most of its behavior-based subroutines and filling the empty space with hostile ones, thus sabotaging the entire project. The result was a total disaster – as soon as the machine was placed alongside the other wolves in an enormous glass cage and activated, it mercilessly attacked them, and due to its size, impervious skeleton, enormous strength and unending stamina, it tore them to pieces before the eyes of the horrified members of Project Simulacrum. And it only got worse from here.

As the scientists raced to deactivate Synwulf, it unexpectedly reacted to it as a threat and smashed through the glass cage, proceeding to kill anyone on its way and taking down entire security teams that were sent to disable it. The entire facility was in chaos, as even the rogue scientists didn’t have enough time to escape. Eventually, most of the generators overloaded, as the people operating their systems were slaughtered, and there was a power failure across most of the facility. The only indication of Synwulf’s presence was the screams of its unfortunate victims and the red light emitted from its LED grids and eyes. As the situation was out of control, distress calls were sent to government agents who were charged with protecting the organization from the outside world. They eventually arrived, only to find most of the Synthetic Initiative’s personnel dead and a rampaging machine seeking out those who remained. The agents eventually located Synwulf and used an EMP device to disrupt its electric components, thus forcibly shutting it down, but not before sustaining heavy losses. The chaos was over.

In the weeks that followed, Synthetic Initiative was disbanded, the surviving rogue scientists were tried for their actions and imprisoned, and Synwulf was taken to a secure station under strict governmental control. Most of the personnel there desired its destruction – yet, some of the surviving members of the team behind its creation wished otherwise. Under the guise of cleaning up the code and doing backups, the scientists decided to do their best to restore the machine to what it should’ve been. They changed its code and repaired its systems, thus correcting what the rogue scientists had done. They could not afford, however, to remove its LED grids, replace its eyes with more realistic ones and repaint it with a more natural color scheme. When the agents came to take Synwulf away to be destroyed, one of them, sympathetic to the scientists’ cause, hijacked the truck they were in and drove all the way into the wilderness, where the machine was released. Although not properly knowing what a wolf truly was, or how it’d fit in this place, it was now free from human manipulation. Synwulf would now have to fend for itself in this new world.


Personality and details
Synwulf, during its release into the wild
As a synthetic being, Synwulf’s personality is more complicated to explain than an organic one’s. It was designed to, eventually, have its own likes and dislikes, but with the incident and the alterations to its synthetic brain, it is unlikely that it’ll get to know what belongs to each category for a long time. Overall, however, Synwulf is very curious and is always seeking knowledge, as it wants to understand the world around it. As a self-aware being, it apparently wants to know what is its purpose, especially in a world filled with organics. Synwulf’s socially inept, as the only instance of it meeting with other wolves ended in disaster, and it seems to distrust most humans. Uniquely, its form of communication is fairly basic, but, it learns with each new interaction. As such, Synwulf will become progressively better at interacting with others, to the point where it’ll be difficult to distinguish it from an organic.

Interestingly, this being does not need to eat, sleep or drink, but its primary directive of being a wolf means that it'll do the aforementioned actions quite often. It's also known for spending a lot of time in the same place, often for hours without even moving, but then suddenly moving around for apparently no reason. It often goes back to the same spot it once was. Synwulf also often observes other creatures around it, seemingly studying them, although the reason for doing so is unknown. Synwulf is also incredibly quiet, rarely making any kind of noise despite the weight of its metal skeleton.

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