Stepping past them, I moved to the lab. I had some work to do. With Paul and Brett out of the picture for the moment, it was up to Mason and I for leadership. As I was doing all of my research in the labs, I learned something really interesting. The PEA units were not part of the Next Stage of the cyborg evolution, but they played a great role in the success of the clan. It made sense as their birth needed so many prerequisites. PEP units needed to do enough missions to earn the big sexual upgrade and install it. Then they needed to go out into the world and find a PEP unit with the opposite sexual upgrade installed in them. At that point, the pregnant PEP had to wait 9 weeks for the child to be born. All while dodging suspicion from the government, scrappers and reprogrammers. That was a tall order specifically for game balance. In the early game, Players at level 1 would be hard pressed to go against the level 15 units. Even the low tier ones with massive faults could still easily kill a newbie. That was why they had to go around and look carefully to spot and stop cyborgs from progressing.
The PEA units were no different. Before we made them nearly obsolete by rushing the mid game, PEA units were supposed to be the big clan commandos that got called up when the PEP units were not enough. They were the cleaners and enforcers of their own transmission hub. Through studying 05-003's body, I learned something very important. Thought we had thought that the line ended with the PEA units, we were wrong. Or, we were not getting the bigger picture. PEP units were prototypes. They had a large range of appearances to better capture the true tastes of the humans they would be infiltrating. Their offspring were the PEA units. PEA units did not go make any new type of unit. However, they were rewarded for their great service, nonetheless. It was just a few functions within 05-003 that could be overlooked, but I saw the ones that were for them. "PEA memory chip" was a folder buried deep. It seemed that the PEA and AEP units were reverse compatible. In a symbiotic way, they worked together to enhance themselves. They would simply mate among themselves to just do it.
PEA units, after 15 successful missions, could get their sexual upgrade. Once they did it, they could have sex with an AEP unit. There was a 5% chance it would work on the first try. Their "genetic material" was actually just a special type of nanite that carried their personal data and personality. Every completed mission rose the odds by just 2%. It was a very desperate race to complete the missions and try again. Once it took hold in the AEP, they could create a personalized chip. That chip would be able to resurrect the fallen PEA unit if they died by putting the chip in a new PEA unit's body. In this way, as long as we had the chip, the units with the best results would be immortalized. Each of the AEP unit had the capacity to support 3 chips. They were also prototypes. I am sure the AEA units would have a large capacity. Still, for each major clan, there were 3 AEP units. That meant that each region on the continent would have at least 9 if the PEA units were able to complete enough missions. That made it a race among their own. That was why they all were antsy every time I saw them.
