Rise of the Supermen, Part 2

The middle of the 21st century was a heady time for human enhancement. Advances in all fields were promising – and delivering – improvements to human cognition, health and well-being. There were even those taking the ultimate step into posthumanhood, uploading themselves and becoming something different. The use of machinery was not the only route to improvement however, if the easiest. What was eventually the most infamous of these was originally an attempt to forge such an alternate route that would be more accessible for the poor.

South America was never at the forefront of human augmentation; too many researchers were lured to hotspots north and culturally there was a greater amount of conservatism when dealing with what amounted to sticking a bunch of electronics in your brain. Rejection issues were rare, but they did happen. Plus of course there was the everpresent ‘ick’ factor. Biotechnology offered an alternative to this however.

By culturing specific retrovirals and applying appropriate hormones, it was possible to ‘naturally’ enhance performance. While this was not innovative in and of itself, in much of the West these techniques were hampered by both government regulars and lack of mindshare. However, it was an ideal solution for the poor of Latin America. Several governments seeded money together for just such a project.

Early volunteer trials were successful, but before development could deliver the requisite level of cost-efficiency for government release, it ran into something entirely unexpected: Popularity.