Back at the Dorm

It was already dark when Tony walked back into his dorm room, his mind still spinning. He'd already started making plans to fabricate some more of the ****, while he was still alert. He couldn't do much in his dorm room of course, but he'd need access to materials, tools, and time. Plus, he considered the fact that his new employer would probably look unkindly on his manufacture of their compound on the sly. He'd need to be secret about it, careful. He had to minimize who knew about his scheme.

He also had the matter of testing it. He wasn't foolish enough to take two days of anecdotal testing by his coworkers as total proof of safety (even if he had felt differently earlier). Nor was he sure he could replicate it exactly by himself, using only the notes he had memorized. The notes could even have had intentional errors in them to prevent theft, DaVinci style. For all Tony knew, following the notes could lead to poisoning himself.

Then again, he wouldn't exactly be able to conduct clinical trials to remove all of the risk. And testing it on anyone besides himself posed the risk of discovery, or worse, newly cognitively enhanced adversaries. He considered getting more info from Mark or Dana directly, but that could be seen through easily so long as either of them were augmented. That left the cleanest alternative.

Animal testing.

At risk of reenacting The Secret of NIMH, lab rats seemed like an obvious choice. Genetically similar enough to humans, easy to get a hold of, inexpensive, and unimportant enough to evade attention.

So, on the way home to the dorm, Tony had stopped by the pet store and bought a pair of rats, with a sizeable cage and supplies. Pets weren't exactly... allowed, in the dorms, but Tony's RA had looked past plenty of infractions in the past. He was one of those "cool" ones. Plus, Louis wouldn't mind.

Pet store rats we're a bit of a different breed than traditional lab rats. Lab rats were a bit smarter at the baseline, and more predictable; the side effect of their unique lives and geneaology compared to those of most rats. Nonetheless, Tony hoped the ones he had would at least pass toxicity testing. Hopefully intelligence testing too. The small sample size worried him for both, but it'd with good probability be better than nothing.

He set them on him bedtime table, squeaking quietly. Louis was out somewhere, though he wouldn't mind the rodents. Now, Tony just had to figure out where to get supplies.

While everything in the serum could be broken down into simple organic molecules, some of them would be a pain to synthesize with the rudimentary learning flasks and machines. The school had limited chemical supplies, but they were also all accounted for, tracked. He could probably find a way to buy some chemicals and glassware, but he'd also need to carve out time to use the school's own labs. Perhaps at night? Surely nobody was in them then, even if some reactions we're prepping for classes sometimes. He'd have to make sure. Also, the campus buildings surely locked at night, maybe security systems activated. He'd need to survey that during the day.

Lots of questions yet to answer, but... plans were in motion. Before long, he'd start building something special, unique. And it'd be all his.