You are the last two-headed mutants on earth

[Rossum]

"Oh god... its a ME apocalypse!"

Long Version:

You're not quite sure how it all happened, there had been alot of stuff on the news about terrorists (or possibly aliens but you could never tell what those reporters were saying) and alot of panics as people suddenly became interested in hoarding up whatever supplies they could find.

Then the sky exploded.

The sky lite up like a flaming christmas tree, clouds covered everything and dust fell from the sky. All TV and radios stopped working and just sent out static. Then everybody around you started dying and you blacked out.

You don't know how long you were out but you woke up thirsty and hungrier then you've ever been in your life. You dig through your fridge (power is out and the stuff smells funny but in your delirious state you barely care... it all tastes like saltly saliva anyway) and manage to sate your hunger for a bit.

Getting a better look at the world around you and yourself you see the bodies of people littering the streets, there are quite a few animals as well but the occasional bird chirping or buzzing insect lets you know that not all life is dead... plants are a bit wilted but they seem alive. Then there is the faint gray dust that is drifting through the air but you can see the sun through the clouds so its not a nuclear winder at any rate.

However, you notice that your skin looks bad with the outer layer blackened and flaking off and a pale white color underneith. Your hair is falling out and your mouth is constanly full of some weird ass saliva that melts any organic material you decide to eat. Oh, and you've got a tiny second head growing out of your shoulder.

Assuming you try to tough it out, you spend the next few days really hungry but fortunatly you've gained an iron stomach that doesn't complain if you feed it spoiled food. Also, the second head on your shoulder grows into an exact copy of your regular head and wakes up on the fourth day and starts talking (or screaming).

Apparently your second head has all the memories and personality of your normal head and is just as confused about this as you are.

Over the next four days, your body stretches apart and you feel yourself growing an extra spine and extra arms and legs.

Eight days after you awoke as the last surviving human on Earth, you find yourself staring into the eyes of the only other human(?) on Earth... an exact copy of yourself. An exact copy of your creepily mutated self.

Then eight days after that there are four of you and eight days after that there are eight of you.

What they heck do you do?

Short Version:

As far as you know, everyone else on Earth is dead. You are heavily mutated and now have the ability to survive on pretty much anything no matter how rotten or disease filled it is (though obviously toxic stuff still makes you sick). Even more noticeably, every eight days to split into two identical versions of yourself, each with the same memories and feeling strangely rejuvenated (while its not immediately apparent, you will never die of old age because your constant splitting basically gives you the body of a healthy teenager every time you split). You even get to spend four of those days with an extra head.

As for the Earth, its a bit cloudy but the sun shines through enough to keep it warm. There are particles of gray dust everywhere that you are apparently immune to but you really suspect are responsible for killing every other human on Earth. There is constant static on every radio or TV you can get working but that's hard due to the power plants not working. It doesn't look like any electronic equipment is damaged, its just alot of static in the air. You haven't run into any other survivors but it could be there are people in special sealed off bomb shelters somewhere... maybe they could tell you what happened?

The bodies of the other people are decaying as normal and various scavengers are coming out of the wild to deal with them. You have no idea if there are other survivors or if others were mutated like you. Your copies are all just as free-willed as you are (though due to the budding process you can sort of establish who the 'original' is or who split off from who) and you have no real control over them aside from them sharing pretty much everything in common with you and there being nobody else around to speak to.

The fact that you seem to be replicating exponentially implies that after 80 days there will be 1024 of you, in 160 days there will be over a million of you and in a year... well lets just say that it could get crowded.

What the heck do you do?

[Ilya Muromets]

I wake up, see the dead all around me, recoil in horror, realize what's happened to me, recoil in more horror, realize it's not a dream, recoil in maddened horror, and commit suicide.

[Cykeisme]

Holy shit, Rossum.

This scenario definitely well thought out enough to deserve proper thought and analysis.. but at the moment.. I'm just stunned. Give me some time to think about it to put it some proper input.

Considering just reading about it leaves me shocked for a good couple minutes, if it actually happened in real life I assume that I (and my first few set duplicates) are going to sit around speechless for a good several days.

[Shroom Man 777]

Holy shit. Humanity will be recreated into the likeness of me! SHROOM! If this was a Zor hippothetical scenario randome altarnate realty RAR, the only survivors would be SDnetters and the rate of our duplication or the population cap would be limited/based on our post counts!

Anyway, after the shock and horror wears off, I'd try to rebuild civilization myself. Which is stupid, since I'm an idiot, and I'll probably end up killing a whole bunch of my copies before they kill me. But that aside, we'd probably grab a bunch of radios and supplies and go out on a massive one-man-many-man search party looking for survivors.

[Cykeisme]

What's really interesting is that (at least initially) everyone would have the same experiences and knowledge. While this ensures unity at the start, once it goes a few weeks or months down the road, there might start to be divisions in the population of individuals once they start to move apart. Each area will be getting different experiences that might lead them to have objectives that diverge from the others.
Overpopulation is likely to be a huge driving factor which may lead to conflict despite the initial similarity between members of the population.


It's also notable that since access to education (and even the internet) is no longer available, the knowledge and experience of the original individual in question is very, very important. For example, I'm quite confident in saying that if the survivor was a scientist or engineer, it would have a very drastic effect on the course of events, compared to a dumbass douchebag survivor.

Meanwhile, a doctor, medical researcher or someone involved in biological research of some sort might find a way to control the divisions and prevent overpopulation, whereas a mechanical or civil engineer would be better qualified to get things running again. There are, of course, other fields of specialization that would lead the new population to different paths.


Edit: Come to think of it, if the ever-doubling population issue is not solved, conflict is inevitable unless a way to curb it is found. It really sounds terrible because the new individual will be just like me, but it may be necessary to induce.. err.. "birth control" by destroying the new head-buds at least some of the time.
Once we've established a certain number of us, we can't have every reproducing every eight days. A reduced, properly planned rate of reproduction needs to be instituted.

[Rossum]

Actually, now that I'm not horribly sleep-deprived I see that a replication rate of every eight days would be pretty much unbearable. Maybe the rate is slowed down to once a month with the last eight days being the time where the head-buds start forming.

So, a thirty day month gives you about twenty two days of being pretty much normal with the last eight being in an awkward position due to all the extra limbs and the head. You might be extra hungry during the rest of the month to build up body fat for when you split into two people.

Also, the newly created copy undergoes their 'splitting' about eight days after you did creating them. So the first month you spend hungry getting food and then spend the last eight days slowed down while you split. But the next month when you start splitting then your first copy can help keep guard or scavenge stuff for you while you split. Then once you're done then you help them when they split.

This way, the members of your society who are bedridden due to duplicating themselves aren't in danger of wild animals attacking them because their fellow mutants can keep guard.

Also if the process repeats every eight days then it would be pretty much impossible to wear clothes... you'd probably have to wrap yourself up in a sheet due to the constant change in the number of limbs. If someone else had managed to survive and sees a whole city full of weird near naked two-headed clone things rummaging through the city and happily eating old garbage then they'd probably go completely insane and nothing you could say would convince them that you're a mutated survivor and not an alien or the cause of this disaster.


I'm not quite sure if a female mutant could break into a sperm bank and try adding some genetic diversity to her collective or what the result would be... or if a normal human could even survive in this scenario.

As for the dust... I honestly don't know what its supposed to be. Could be tiny bits of radioactive fallout or it could be some kind of deadly spores (My nose has been running all of yesterday and today... I might have a cold but I tend to get allergies easily. I'm tempted to say these dust things are a biochemical weapon mold that 99.99% of humans are deadly allergic to and your mutation was a result of it plus fallout. I know its total BS but I hate allergies.)


As for me... if I can keep from going nuts then I'd probably declare my house to be a 'holy site' and have all of my duplicates return to it on a regular basis so we can share knowledge. Start rebuilding the surrounding area, get a few copies to study various trades and set up schools to teach the others.

I'm afraid I might take up a policy of eating the bodies of the dead just so they don't attract scavengers... actually forget that, by the time my duplicates are so numerous that we run out of regular food then the bodies would have rotten away. I'm sure cannibalism would bite me in the ass later on (especially considering that when I split then the other guy would have memories of being a cannibal). I will however learn how to use firearms because wild animals would stop being afraid of humans once all the humans turn into tasty chunks of meat on the ground. I guess I'd find a building somewhere and put the bodies in the basement where coyotes can't get them... like hell I'm going to risk throwing my back out digging graves when I am struggling to survive.

[keen320]

War is guaranteed inside of three years if you don't curb population.

By a rough estimate, since this is (now) a monthly cycle, then barring deaths, in 36 months there will be over 34 billion of you. Give or take a few months. At the previous rate this could happen in less than a year. Population density would be something like 230 people per square kilometer, about one acre for every bud person on the planet. Many of these acres would be desert, jungle, or on mountains. Obviously, there is no way this would be sustainable, probably not even for that long. There would either be a war, or starvation.

Of course, if any survivors picked a fight with you, you could pretty well swamp them.

Incidentally, does anyone know how fast cockroaches or rabbits breed? I bet the mutant you can bud even faster than rabbits can breed, maybe even faster than the cockroaches.

[Rabid]

Well, if it was me...

For the few first fission/multiplication, I'd probably be, if not disoriented, at least I wouldn't know how to act. After three generation (so, when I am 8 ), I think I would roughly understand how it works. And this is where I become ruthless.

Understanding that there will be a problem of overpopulation if the matter is not taken in hand, I will rule that, unless I have made a plan to multiply myself, after each fission, the old version will be terminated. Knowing that the new version share the same memory, the same personality, and the same physical traits as the old one, and knowing that I do not believe in the afterlife, I will have little difficulty to choose between this drastic measure and the probable end of all life on earth on the longer term.

So, after having more or less solved the possible overpopulation problem, I will try to restore a semblance of society.

First of all, I'll begin to specialize my Selfs : there will be caste of me, specialized by discipline : Engineer, scientists, technician, hunters, warriors, farmers, etc... If memory and physical characteristics are conserved between generation, then this should work.. This will surely prove useful on the long run.

To partially solve the problem of "how do I find food ?", I'll eat the body of the terminated selfs. That would cover roughly 45-50% of the necessary food for one month, assuming I take measure to conserve the meat (smoking and salting comes to mind). The rest could be farmed. In the meantime, before the first havests, I'll have to scavenge tin cans for food, and do a little of hunting/gathering (just not too much : I don't want an army of me provoking some kind of mass extinction event...).
The first challenge, on the short term, will be to establish a functioning agricultural industry, and to re-establish current or near current agricultural yields.

Here are the challenges I foresee on the longer run :

1 – Keeping Unity : I am One, and I know this. But I can't rule out that one of my Selfs will eventually turn rogue, and will decide that, no, it definitely don't want to be terminated, and no, it don't want to play my “game” anymore. So, I'll have to think of a way to prevent this, or at least, to find a way to minimize the harm such an occurrence of bad luck can cause to the Collective. I'll probably create a Caste of Policemen/Guardians/Keepers of the Rules in order to Police the Collective.

2 – Achieving Progress : I could maybe be able to catch up with the technical and scientific capability of the 21st century one day, after decades, maybe centuries of study, and with the dedication of ten/hundreds of thousands of my Selfs (scavenging & learning), but after that, in an homogeneous society, it will be hard to obtain the same level of scientific progress than today, mostly because there will be mostly only one way to think about problems, and not the hundreds, the thousands that we can achieve today, with all the Individuals we have, each with different backgrounds. So I'll need to promote some kind of diversity and creativity, but in a way that will not put the Unity of the Collective at excessive risk.

3 – Achieving Leadership : Even if I am One, I'll need a way to coordinate all my Selfs. I'll need to find a way for information to flow efficiently inside the Collective, be it from top to down, or the reverse, than horizontally. I'll also need a central Leadership, that will lead the efforts of of all my Selfs toward a common Goal. I think that a collegiate structure occupied by the Heads of the different Caste would do, at least at the beginning. Some sort of Technocracy, maybe...

4 – Keeping Sanity : On the long run, my Selfs will have the memory of having lived centuries, then millenniums, then... I'll need to find a way to stay sane. I think that this will implies
mental Discipline and probably some kind of meditation, to “purge” the unnecessary elements of my memories. This will be the most problematic of these four challenges, as it could cause the collapse of the Collective far more surely on the longer run than any of the above threats.


Any remark ? Does this seems reasonable (apart from the fact that, yes, in a situation like that, I'll be able to terminate myself) ?


I have to add, that in any case I'll have to understand how the heck I'm able to do what I do, so I am prepared to act efficiently should something turn bad.

[Rossum]

Some problems and solutions:

1. Since each copy has the memories of the one they budded from then it could get difficult for each copy to tell eachother (or themselves) apart from the others. I have a bad enough time remembering peoples names without living in a world where pretty much everyone has the same face and memories including me.

Thus: I'd after the first couple copies I'd raid a pet store or the like and get some collars with name tags on them. Then, when a new copy is made then we just put the collar around their neck to tell them apart from the others. I'd start with just numbers (like Rossum 1, Rossum 2, Rossum 3... etc) it doesn't matter who they budded off of, just that everyone has their own name or number. Individuals can select their own names if they can think of one.


2. Since all my copies presumably share my DNA... I have crap for genetic diversity. I assume that the reason I'm not dying right away is because I've mutated so much that viruses and germs haven't adapted to kill me yet. As soon as a few strains of diseases have adapted enough to kill my copies then they will probably rip through our collective like a pack of wolves.

Thus: Try to find some normal human survivors and get them to repopulate the Earth. I know almost zilch about the biochemistry needed to create vaccines or germ-killing stuff so its unlikely that I'd be able to create vaccinations for new diseases. Thus, I'd start out by boiling or cooking all my food to ensure it doesn't have any germs in it to begin with (since my saliva messes with my taste buds then I'm guessing that Rossum Clone cuisine would consist of boiling the heck out of anything plant or animal and finding some other way to disinfect sweet things... maybe pasteurization if I can figure out how to pull it off). Also, I'd separate my clones into distinct groups who make contact with eachother from a distance or at least minimize the contact we make so that quarantines will be easier to enact. Proper hygiene will be stressed by all my copies.

3. As mentioned before, food will become scarce once my population hits a huge number and due to the absurd metabolism needed to replicate like this then my clones will be eating way more than humans did.

Thus: Set up agriculture as soon as possible and set up methods of storing and preserving food. I'm going to say that killing a head-bud before it develops self-awareness (should happen in the first four days of it growing... would probably look like a baby head) would cancel the budding process and not result in a copy. Also, the copys body would probably reabsorb some of the grown bodymass while ejecting the remains. Not pretty but would be necessary.

4. There might be human survivors who try to attack me. Those maniacs blew up the planet and now they think they can just wipe out use hard working mutants who resulted from their hubris!

Thus: Soon after developing an initial more or less self-sustaining society I'll start investigating the military bases and government buildings. The Government has bomb shelters all over the place in the event of nuclear war and its pretty likely that they survived (I mean, they've got all the damn money, manpower, and resources they want. If anyone will be surviving the end of the world it will be the guys in power). So, I'll see about arming myself with whatever weapons or equipment I can find so that I may properly defend myself against the fleshy menace known as mankind. I won't try to kill them mind you, just that ones that try to attack me. Ideally I'll be able to get some sort of agreement going with the survivors to get them to help me rebuild the world.

5. I'm not a people person. Okay, I'm probably a decent guy but I'm pretty sure I've got some psychological problems. Adding the whole "mutated/self replicating/last survivor on Earth/the most likely other survivors are the ones who wrecked the planet" thing would make things pretty awkward. If I did find any survivors then I'd probably envy them for their non-mutated existence or for other reasons. Considering my collective ignorance and weakness (A collection of human survivors would have greater diversity and protection from disease and more diverse ways of thinking... no way can I outsmart a tactical genius or a true scientist if I had to) I and my clones would have reason to fear them while they would fear my inhuman nature and ever-increasing numbers.

Thus: Develop a caste of diplomats in the event of encountering human survivors and work to make sure that they don't try to exterminate me (To be honest, I'm pretty sure if government officials were huddled in bomb shelters waiting to repopulate the Earth after a disaster of this magnitude and found that the surface was being swarmed with an intelligent asexually reproducing mutant then I'm kind of sure they would be 'justified' in trying to exterminate me so that humanity can retake the surface). On the other side, I don't want to be exterminated and neither do my clones. Though considering all the crap we'd have to put up with I'd be worried that some of my own clones might try to 'get back' at those nasty humans who caused this mess.

Since I know about the risk of overpopulation and that diseases might adapt to kill me then I'd probably figure that despite any biological immortality I might have then germs would wipe me out eventually. The ideal solution would be to use my momentary existence to help true humans retake the world... but humans are bastards and there is the very real chance that I might not deem the survivors 'worthy of my help'. Which could get into all sorts of problems.

6. There aren't enough therapists. Considering the stress of everything, I'm sure alot of my copies would have problems and the last thing I want is to have my collective go insane. Wars have started because alot of stupid people had the same ideas and figured the best way to solve them would be through violence.

Thus: Get a caste of psychologists to study psychiatry and logic to help others keep their heads on straight in times of crisis. Since the buds that result from psychologists would have their knowledge them seed them throughout the other groups to help keep everyone sane.

7. Keeping castes would increase efficiency in some areas but make the various groups drift apart.

Thus: Have different groups who handle different tasks for society but move the members around on a regular basis. Thus, the guy who was budded in Security might go join the Education team, and Education might go into Farming, and so on and so forth. Ideally, after a while every one of my copies would have memories of being in all of the various groups so they would all be interchangeable while having different ideas to bring to the table.

8. I might run into rednecks who think this is a zombie apocalypse.

Thus: Have my copies capable of defending themselves and have firearms on hand to shoot/scare off whoever gets violent with us. Again, human survivors are technically more valuable than my mutant copies but if the humans are sufficiently stupid and annoying then it may be a tough call. Should probably see about locating any female survivors and find a way to keep them safe from anyone seeking to harm them.

[Formless]

Holy shit, Rossum. I don't think I've seen a RAR this bizarre in a loooong time, well, ever. Its not so much the imagery that's creepy (MtG did it first) as trying to imagine what it would feel like to grow a second spinal chord.

I'd probably experience that once, and then end up shooting myself out of horror. I mean, the guy who budded off of me. Or would he shoot me? Jeeeezus, this is weird.

[Rabid]

1. Since each copy has the memories of the one they budded from then it could get difficult for each copy to tell eachother (or themselves) apart from the others. I have a bad enough time remembering peoples names without living in a world where pretty much everyone has the same face and memories including me.

Thus: I'd after the first couple copies I'd raid a pet store or the like and get some collars with name tags on them. Then, when a new copy is made then we just put the collar around their neck to tell them apart from the others. I'd start with just numbers (like Rossum 1, Rossum 2, Rossum 3... etc) it doesn't matter who they budded off of, just that everyone has their own name or number. Individuals can select their own names if they can think of one.

On the longer term, you could imagine setting up an identification system based on the lineage, and the ID of the Self into the lineage.

Ex : Bordeaux1-Paris11-Paris10-123 [Soldier] ==> from left to right, the ID of the current lineage (associated to the place of « birth » of the lineage), the father lineage, and the grandfather lineage, the ID of the Self into the Current Lineage, and the role of the individual in the collective as optional. Each lineage is uniquely identified, traced and recorded, as often as it is possible.

A lineage is, well, the lineage originating from a single Self ; each time an older Self is not terminated, and if the newer Self is allowed to live, it create a new lineage through the next duplication of the older Self.

This is the formal identification, but more surely, when a Self is asked “which are you”, he will respond something like “It's Bor-1 123 MISTER Soldier for you bitch, so get out my way !”

2. Since all my copies presumably share my DNA... I have crap for genetic diversity. I assume that the reason I'm not dying right away is because I've mutated so much that viruses and germs haven't adapted to kill me yet. As soon as a few strains of diseases have adapted enough to kill my copies then they will probably rip through our collective like a pack of wolves.

Thus: Try to find some normal human survivors and get them to repopulate the Earth. I know almost zilch about the biochemistry needed to create vaccines or germ-killing stuff so its unlikely that I'd be able to create vaccinations for new diseases. Thus, I'd start out by boiling or cooking all my food to ensure it doesn't have any germs in it to begin with (since my saliva messes with my taste buds then I'm guessing that Rossum Clone cuisine would consist of boiling the heck out of anything plant or animal and finding some other way to disinfect sweet things... maybe pasteurization if I can figure out how to pull it off). Also, I'd separate my clones into distinct groups who make contact with eachother from a distance or at least minimize the contact we make so that quarantines will be easier to enact. Proper hygiene will be stressed by all my copies.

I'd recommend to enact the mandatory port of protective gear as gas masks, bio-hazard combinations, or everything that could fit that role, as much as possible, as a supplementary measure to what is said before
Concerning food, well, cannibalism, given the rate of reproduction, is going to become the first income for protein and animal fat. The problem is that it increase the risk of disease : if you eat beef, what is still living inside is probably not compatible with you ; In the other hand, the virus and bacteria in a human body ARE compatible with another human. So, an extra bit of precaution is to be taken, and possibly it will be necessary to compost the terminated self instead of eating them.

3. As mentioned before, food will become scarce once my population hits a huge number and due to the absurd metabolism needed to replicate like this then my clones will be eating way more than humans did.

Thus: Set up agriculture as soon as possible and set up methods of storing and preserving food. I'm going to say that killing a head-bud before it develops self-awareness (should happen in the first four days of it growing... would probably look like a baby head) would cancel the budding process and not result in a copy. Also, the copys body would probably reabsorb some of the grown bodymass while ejecting the remains. Not pretty but would be necessary.

It should be tried. So, the life expectancy of the Selfs would be of more than one month in this case (in mine, I just terminated the older after each duplications, but there would have been some potential for mental problem, like “I have the potential to live eternally, but I know that, at the End of each Month, I will die, forever. For all Eternity.”)

4. There might be human survivors who try to attack me. Those maniacs blew up the planet and now they think they can just wipe out use hard working mutants who resulted from their hubris!

Thus: Soon after developing an initial more or less self-sustaining society I'll start investigating the military bases and government buildings. The Government has bomb shelters all over the place in the event of nuclear war and its pretty likely that they survived (I mean, they've got all the damn money, manpower, and resources they want. If anyone will be surviving the end of the world it will be the guys in power). So, I'll see about arming myself with whatever weapons or equipment I can find so that I may properly defend myself against the fleshy menace known as mankind. I won't try to kill them mind you, just that ones that try to attack me. Ideally I'll be able to get some sort of agreement going with the survivors to get them to help me rebuild the world.

Indeed. It would maybe be necessary re-create some form of Army. Or at least a Meatgrinder born from the Collective's arses.

That would require to scavenge military bases, depots, and whatever in the first time, and then to launch a new military-industrial complex when the ressources allows it.

At least, it should be good for the collective to know how to create bullets, and the rifles to fire them, even if it shoot like a flying crapper.

5. I'm not a people person. Okay, I'm probably a decent guy but I'm pretty sure I've got some psychological problems. Adding the whole "mutated/self replicating/last survivor on Earth/the most likely other survivors are the ones who wrecked the planet" thing would make things pretty awkward. If I did find any survivors then I'd probably envy them for their non-mutated existence or for other reasons. Considering my collective ignorance and weakness (A collection of human survivors would have greater diversity and protection from disease and more diverse ways of thinking... no way can I outsmart a tactical genius or a true scientist if I had to) I and my clones would have reason to fear them while they would fear my inhuman nature and ever-increasing numbers.

Thus: Develop a caste of diplomats in the event of encountering human survivors and work to make sure that they don't try to exterminate me (To be honest, I'm pretty sure if government officials were huddled in bomb shelters waiting to repopulate the Earth after a disaster of this magnitude and found that the surface was being swarmed with an intelligent asexually reproducing mutant then I'm kind of sure they would be 'justified' in trying to exterminate me so that humanity can retake the surface). On the other side, I don't want to be exterminated and neither do my clones. Though considering all the crap we'd have to put up with I'd be worried that some of my own clones might try to 'get back' at those nasty humans who caused this mess.

Since I know about the risk of overpopulation and that diseases might adapt to kill me then I'd probably figure that despite any biological immortality I might have then germs would wipe me out eventually. The ideal solution would be to use my momentary existence to help true humans retake the world... but humans are bastards and there is the very real chance that I might not deem the survivors 'worthy of my help'. Which could get into all sorts of problems.

As soon as possible, equip each exploring/scavenging team with full military clothing that cover all the body, complete with military grade gas-masks. The goals is to make them unidentifiable as “clones” by hypothetical non-mutated survivors. And if the survivors begin to have doubt, you can try to tell them that you are in fact clones, yes, from a military program, that managed to escape after the Event. After what happened, it is as credible as everything else.
After that, you can try to distillate the truth, and see what happen...
Gather all the help you can for every survivor you find. Do such in a way as they begin to see you a sort of “slave race” : turning you essential (in the sense : “without Me it would take you several centuries or millennium to get back on track”) for their survival and the reconstruction of humanity. And if they shoot, well, let them do as they wishes when necessary. The Selfs, in my case, will welcome the Bliss of Oblivion, and the survivors will see that you are not even defending yourself : So, not a menace.

6. There aren't enough therapists. Considering the stress of everything, I'm sure alot of my copies would have problems and the last thing I want is to have my collective go insane. Wars have started because alot of stupid people had the same ideas and figured the best way to solve them would be through violence.

Thus: Get a caste of psychologists to study psychiatry and logic to help others keep their heads on straight in times of crisis. Since the buds that result from psychologists would have their knowledge them seed them throughout the other groups to help keep everyone sane.

My solution is to terminate the lineages that are terminally ill. The rest will grow stronger through selection and “breeding”. But your solution is good, too. Maybe a mix of the two : Therapists for the manageable cases, termination and the Bliss of Oblivion for the rest.

7. Keeping castes would increase efficiency in some areas but make the various groups drift apart.

Thus: Have different groups who handle different tasks for society but move the members around on a regular basis. Thus, the guy who was budded in Security might go join the Education team, and Education might go into Farming, and so on and so forth. Ideally, after a while every one of my copies would have memories of being in all of the various groups so they would all be interchangeable while having different ideas to bring to the table.

Very good idea !! Let's just hope that the head of 'em will not explode at the end. Ya'know, there could be only so much things inside that fleshy wetware...

8. I might run into rednecks who think this is a zombie apocalypse.

Thus: Have my copies capable of defending themselves and have firearms on hand to shoot/scare off whoever gets violent with us. Again, human survivors are technically more valuable than my mutant copies but if the humans are sufficiently stupid and annoying then it may be a tough call. Should probably see about locating any female survivors and find a way to keep them safe from anyone seeking to harm them.

Good idea for the female. But I don't recommend the Collective to breed with them : too much risks involved, as much hereditary speaking, that we risk to hurt them in, well... ye goode olde breeding process.
See point number 5 : If you dress like a military personnel, and act like that, you will not be seen like a zombie. Instead, you will just look like the army of the New World Order reconquering the ashes of the Earth. In a way or another, there is a good chance the survivors will be of the Crazy Survivalist kind, or Corrupt Politicians and their Clique. In both case, they will probably shoot first.



… Do you mind if I try writing a Fic out of that ?

But DAMN ! There's going to be a major case of Mary Sue with this one !

[Rossum]

Do you mind if I try writing a Fic out of that ?

But DAMN ! There's going to be a major case of Mary Sue with this one !

I wholeheartedly endorse this idea and I'd like to help in whatever way is possible. It could be kind of like the Harry Potter and the Method of Rationality fic in that even if the main character(s) are hyper-rational near-Mary Sue guys then the other survivors of this event could be just as crazy awesome. I mean, the other survivors would probably be government officials, military men, and genius scientists (the very best or at least the ones with the resources/connections/prestige to get into the shelters), the others would probably be survival nuts who actually can live far away from society and support themselves.

Oh, and if the clone guy starts creating an army or whatnot that gets attention from other groups and has his 'men' walking around with gas masks or the like then it should be (somewhat) easy for someone to put on the mask to pretend to be a clone. After all, the clone collective isn't telepathic and their social skills would probaqbly get freaked if everyone is the same.

If the origionaly was a devious mastermind then all his copies would be almost the same and might get ticked at eachother if they interfere with eachothers plans. It would take a really weird psychology to accept that you are just a disposable mutant mook who is exactly like your leader in every way.

Oh, and imagine the clones trying to make their way to another continent so they can look for survivors there.

Also, with the females, obviously they aren't going to try breeding with them Maybe try to find a sperm bank or a male survivor (the Collective would probably turn gay pretty quickly if only out of necessity and sanity).

[Rabid]

Thanks for the approval, and for recommending me the Potter fic. I'll read it, for *cough* reference material.

For the rest, yeah, I might have some funny idea about what to do with it [Why do I have this image of a Deadpool clones spam / zerg rush ? What's wrong me ? I don't even read Marvel comics !! Man!....]

(the Collective would probably turn gay pretty quickly if only out of necessity and sanity)

And yay for weird and kinky masturbation !

… Let's just hope the pious and crazy survivalists never find out about the Collective. The resulting situation could become awkawrd. And shooty. The Collective don't like shooty things.

[Molyneux]

This...is...damn.
Kind of hard to figure out a starting point.

All right: after I get tired of screaming in a corner while curled up in a fetal position, I start stockpiling all the food supplies I can. I also do my best to teach myself to ration it. It's going to get crowded pretty damned quick, and though living room doesn't seem to be too much of an issue, food is going to get pretty pressing - especially as stuff starts rotting away.

The best thing I can think of is to learn to work with myself. The only way to survive longterm is obviously going to be to learn to function as a society - I'm assuming that, on splitting, each of the two new people share memories right up until the time the second head started to grow. That's going to be very helpful, since any training will multiply with the new clones. Clean up the dead, do our best to learn how to manage what equipment is left behind, and see about finding and preserving all of the books we can.

If and when we actually get some semblance of a stable tribe working - something that can survive the first winter - I'll need to spread, pretty damned quick. I think sending out scouting parties will be the best idea, starting with the mainland near me and trying to repopulate the cities, reclaiming their resources. Replenishing numbers lost to injury or animals should be doable, though some weapons training would help avoid the latter.

In the extremely long-term, start working on rebuilding civilization, and get to work figuring out what the hell caused this - and if it's reversible. Do my best to keep all of my clone-lines on good terms with one another, and do my damnedest to stave off the inevitable population squeeze as far as I can - with the eventual aim of figuring out how to prevent splitting when I don't want to.

Hopefully, all of my clone-lines will (sharing my general intellectual make-up and being of at least average intelligence) realize the same, and do their best to help us all survive.

Also, probably the first thing to do once I've got a stable group is to set up funeral shrines for my family and loved ones.

(A final addendum, on the "gay" note - not something that would be THAT traumatic for me, though the super-saliva would make certain activities...problematic.)

[Rossum]

For the saliva... lets say that you are conveniently immune to it. Or maybe your saliva is more of a hyper antibiotic or something (like penicillin, it kills most germs on contact so just chewing your food should disinfect it and licking your wounds will almost always prevent infection) but has an overpowering taste that makes it difficult to tell the flavor of anything that isn't overpoweringly spicy or sweet. If its acidic then it could be a case of vomiting up stomach acid or the like (which hopefully you won't be doing that often... though maybe you could do it at will for one reason or another).

Dog attacking you? Seize up your stomach and projectile-vomit stomach acid into its eye (you're a freaking mutant, you can totally do that if you want to!).

Have to eat something that's really gross? Put it in an acid proof container, fill it with stomach acid, and wait for the germs to die in there before drinking it (mutant again).

I'm just thinking about how completely insane somebody could start acting once they become something so utterly inhuman. Or rather how they can jump off the slippery slope of sanity if they are effectively rendered immortal and in a crumbled world where they could become the major political power on Earth.

Oh, and all their copies have to keep their nature a huge secret if they run into anyone else.

Survivor: You're just giving me these supplies to help me out? Bless you sirs, Bless you. But wait... who are you good people?

Clone#872: Umm... we're a cult! Yes a... militia cult called uhh... Cerberus! Yes, Cerberus the three headed guard dog of the underworld. To ensure that the sons of men are not sent to Hades before their time and that the horrors of death do not invade the world again.

Survivor: Uhh... okay...

Clone#872: Oh don't worry. Its just a little Greek mythology reawakening thing. Gotta give people something to talk about while we rebuild society, right?

Survivor: That sounds nice actually. Greek myths are pretty fun. Do you have a temple set up?

Clone#872: *panics* Oh hell no! I mean... Hades no (Its Hades instead of Hell now). We have to keep you safe and surviving. We'll have plenty of time for pseudo-religious mumbo-jumbo later on. But uh, if anyone else starts up a church anywhere then odds are they are serial rapist cannibals or something and you should warn us.

*Clone#872 heads back to base*

Clone#872: Hey guys, we're going to have to make up a plausible cover story about where we came from and what we're trying to accomplish. Eh, I vote for something relating to Greek Mythology.

Clone#67: *with an extra head growing out of his side* It makes about as much sense as anything!

Clone#86: And to think that just three years ago I repaired bicycles for a living.

Also... maybe the post-apocalyptic environment is filled with the toxic dust that is still deadly to humans. Its lost its potency since the initial attack but its still really bad for peoples lungs. Breathing the dust for over a month will destroy the lining in your lungs. Humans have to always wear rags or gas masks to protect from the dust and it gives decent protection. But your mutant budding ability also regenerates much of your body in the process (maybe causes you to generate stem cells that regrow damaged skin, lung tissues, and organs).

So, you have an advantage in that you can survive in the new environment not so much out of immunity to the deadly effects of it but due to the 'healing factor' that results from the budding. Your lungs regenerate after some time so the long-term exposure isn't fatal for you.

[Tiwaz]

Hmmm...

Huge issue I see is that each and every copy of me is...

Me.

After first division. I think I am me, but my clone thinks he is me. (same memories and all that jazz)
I am no longer me, but us. Though, when thought over there should be some very small differences in memories due to how head pops up.

Would other head have memory of having another head grow on HIS shoulder? At what point would memories differ... "YOU are the one who opened his eyes screaming on my shoulder!" "Oh yeah, true, so I am clone"

If it goes like that, I might (and knowing myself I really doubt it) be able to establish myself as ruling original.

Else, my only hope is lotterycracy. Why? Because I know I damn well do not want the job of being a plumber. So odds are none of my clones want it either. Thus... Drawing lots to determine who gets the shitty job today.

I might be forced to do this anyway since my clones are going to be shitty companions to try to boss around. Each with my inflated ego and laziness.

[Rossum]

I think it should be fairly easy to tell which head is the new one. If the growth is even remotely 'normal' then the new heads would be bald like a baby. The original would be older and probably have more rugged featres or perhaps beards if they don't shave often. So, the 'new' heads would find themselves gorwing on the side of an older body whose head has a beard, it shouldn't be too hard for them to tell which one is the new guy.

And yeah, a lottery or similar method would be the best way to decide what happens.

Though, it could be that the splitting process isn't perfect. New clones might not have the muscle mass of the origional and need to excercise a bit first, or they might have brittle bones or a sensitive nervous system (needing to sleep more often or finding it difficult to concentrate). Thus, the new clones might be better suited to less stressful jobs for a while (like cleaning or scavenging for stuff or doing simple menial tasks) until their bodies grow up more.

They wouldn't be babies exactly, but a freshly budded clone wouldn't be quite as tough as one who has had a month or two to work out and perhaps budded a few clones of their own.