Would like opinions on this as the background for a story, and perhaps a role-playing game:
History of Crescendin, the trigger drug.
Total
Human Percent Percent % Percent %
Name Year Trials Deaths* Failures Low Medium High
Crescendin One 1944 35 32 38 25 5 0
Crescendin Two 1944 98 23 28 45 4 0
Crescendin Three 1944 0 75
Crescendin Four 1945 58 15 45 30 9 1
Crescendin B 1945 1 13 Only one human trial, successful.
Crescendin Five 1949 65 10 38 45 15 2
Crescendin Six 1955 50 8 95 5 0 0
Crescendin Seven 1959 15 12 53 40 4 1
Crescendin Eight 1965 20 8 45 20 25 2
Crescendin Nine 1972 10 10 35 30 20 5
Crescendin Ten 1978 12 10 33 42 15 10
Crescendin Eleven 1985 15 10 30 40 15 5
Crescendin Twelve 1993 3 9 35 35 15 10
Crescendin Thirteen 2002 40 8 30 40 15 15
Crescendin C 2008 25 15 20 30 20 15
(yeah, the table is messed up; someone sent me HTML for it but I lost the e-mail)
*Determined from combined animal and human trials. If animal trials revealed a high death rate no human trials were made. Animal trial death rates have proven to be a good predictor of human death rates where sufficient numbers of both received the drug.
In late 1944 Dr. Simon Naggy - a British medical researcher - received approval to try his new drug, Para-Ergot 56, on several criminally insane men. The psychedelic properties of LSD-25 had been discovered by Swiss experimenters just a year earlier, but already people were speculating that it might be useful in treating mental illness. Dr. Naggy - who followed the Edisonian philosophy of trial and error in his work - decided to make his own, better drug. After several months of work he had one which produced symptoms in laboratory animals matching those of LSD-25. However, it also killed nearly a third of them. Interestingly, some of the animals displayed odd physical changes(1). That, however, was not what Dr. Naggy was looking for; he noted the alterations but gave them little thought.
With a war on, and with criminals of all types seen as a burden on the war effort, he received approval to try the drug on a group of condemned men. They were volunteers, who were told that if they survived their sentences would be changed to life in prison. As expected, nearly a third died. Over a third survived with no lasting physiological changes and with nearly half of them deemed "improved."
Just under a third demonstrated the development of fantastic, in some cases superhuman, abilities.
Since only a third of those who were changed showed any improvement in mental or social function, this left the prisons with the problem of what to do with eight murderous individuals who were now gifted with great abilities. Abilities which in one case were distinctly superhuman.
The prison authorities - after losing several guards, having to call five manhunts, and with dozens of innocent civilians killed and injured - threatened criminal proceedings against Dr. Naggy. However, the War Department heard of these events and commandeered the Doctor and his laboratory and personnel. Dr. Naggy was greatly upset by both these turns of events, and at first refused to have anything to do with the government. After being informed that he could either cooperate fully or face charges of aiding and abetting several murders and assaults, he decided to cooperate fully. Para-Ergot 56 was renamed Crescendin One, and the search for a drug to create superhuman soldiers began. (The codename came from the fact that many of those who took the drug later described experiencing a climactic moment. One of them used the word "crescendo" to describe this, and the term stuck.)
Dr. Naggy had been operating under a very small budget, and only had one full-time assistant. Roger Landsworth - later Dr. and eventually Sir - was a brilliant young biochemistry student whose approach was both more intuitive and far more analytical than that of Dr. Naggy. Now the project had a larger budget and a larger staff. However, except for Roger, all the new personnel were acquired by the Directorate of Miscellaneous Weapons Development, with the former part-time staff being summarily dismissed. The DMWD would remain in charge of the project until the end of the war. While the new staff were talented chemists none were medical specialists. This led to some embarrassing gaffs the first few weeks, but with a bit of cramming the lab was soon synthesizing and evaluating dozens of variants per month. All were first tested on laboratory animals. Only one variant which produced a death rate of above twenty-five percent was actually given an Crescendin designation, Three, with all the other failures receiving Para-Ergot designations.
For the first year and a half the laboratory continued to follow Dr. Naggy's preferred method of operation. This despite Roger's suggestions for a more optimized approach. During the first test on humans under the new organization - the second overall - Dr. Naggy spoke of those who gained powers as having been "Triggered." This became the standard term for a successful Crescendo. A drug which could cause Crescendo subsequently became known as a Trigger.
While some success was obtained - at first using non-violent prisoners serving long sentences, and later with military volunteers - during this time the high death rate, high failure rate and general low level of powers - as well as the sheer unpredictability of what powers would be developed and the odd side effects - made the drug undesirable for military application.
The formulas for various Crescendin versions were given to the United States as part of a technical exchange package, but by this time success with conventional forces (along with the development of the Atomic Bomb) was seen by the Americans as the key to winning the war in Europe and no actual trials were performed there. However, once the Americans knew of the drug they became worried that the enemy might be on the same track with Triggered humans. At their suggestion, the Allies organized an effort to sift through both action reports and information from various intelligence sources to determine if the Axis might be attempting to develop literal superhumans.
As the War wound down and Crescendin remained too raw for actual field use, the lab's budget was cut in half. With rumors in the air that it would soon be removed completely, and frustrated by his inability to get his own ideas tested, Roger synthesized a variation of his own formulation, tested it on rabbits and rats, found it to be - as he predicted - much safer than any of the other variations previously tested or under development, and used it on himself. He later described the result as "An interesting experience." As did all human test subjects - and presumably all animal subjects - he experienced a powerful psychedelic effect. He also developed low-level superhuman abilities. In his case, this was a boost to his immune system and ability to heal - the latter now so complete as to replace a pulled tooth and remove all his scars, and roughly eight times faster than normal - and a significant boost to his intelligence.
Dr. Naggy's reaction to this was to fire Roger.
Several of the other workers protested, but the lab was, indeed, being shut down. All work involving Crescendin and Para-Ergot - indeed, even those names and the fact of the drugs' existence - was deemed Most Secret and all surviving participants ordered never to reveal anything about the drug or the project. Interestingly, this meant that those who had gained superhuman abilities were prohibited by law from using them. Which may explain why many of those who didn't go into secret government work turned to crime.
As the Korean War began the project was reformed. Dr. Naggy was hired as a special consultant and allowed to pursue his own vision of the work. However, the main branch of the project was now under the direction of a retired British Army Colonel who had been involved in supervising some of the trials. Possessing a strong technical background and an open mind, Theodore Carstairs was very close to the ideal man for the job.
The first inkling that the secret of Crescendin had escaped came late in the Korean War when the Chinese complained to the international community that the Allies were using "Nazi supermen" in the War. (No Triggered actually saw action in that conflict.) An irate high ranking member of the British government held a press conference in which he violated the Secrets Act by indignantly revealing the entire history of the project.
A mostly successful attempt to cover for this was made, with a spokesman explaining that the tattler was being sent off for "a long rest." However, others - in Britain and outside - soon began talking about Crescendin, and what it could do. Most responsible members of the press took little or no notice - among other reasons, the whole thing seemed so strongly a childish wish fulfillment they couldn't take it seriously, many believing it a bit of leftover propaganda. However, the topic remains popular in the more colorful magazines and papers to this day.
In 1951 the Soviet Union announced the creation of their own super soldiers. The release was supported by numerous photos, many of them obviously faked. In reality, Stalin forbade the creation of superhumans. It was becoming obvious that all governments were understandably leery of the very concept of superhuman soldiers, totalitarian governments all the moreso. Because of the obviously phony evidence, very few reputable papers seriously carried the story.
For the next decade and a half development continued at a slow pace. This was more to have information on the phenomenon in case it was used against Britain and its allies than with the intent to create supersoldiers. The main team created a model which did a fair job of predicting what a particular version of Crescendin would do to humans, though this worked well only for the "main line" of formulas. In large part, the development of this model was the work of Roger Landsworth. There was still much trial and error involved in the creation of new variants, but more and more the team was able to design a molecule with the properties desired. Meanwhile, Dr. Naggy ran tests on over a hundred variants, killing thousands of lab animals in the process. None of his potions were approved for human testing.
With the death of Dr. Naggy in 1959 in a car crash, work slowed even more. The lab was on the verge of shutting down. One reason was that there was still no understanding of how the Crescendo process worked, or even of what made one person Trigger and another just get high. Still, the potential of the successes - especially the very few who had gained great power - was undeniable. Which actually worried those paying the bills. The operation was spared - or, more appropriately, given a stay of execution - when the Vietnam War began growing more active.
In 1965 the last product of the lab - Crescendin Eight - was tried on twenty volunteers. This formulation tied for the lowest death rate to that point, while producing the second highest number of subjects who developed superhuman abilities. Even better, the number with medium- or high-level powers was by far the highest yet.
All twenty of the subjects survived. Eleven of them Triggered. Five of the twenty subjects were actually used in Southeast Asia. However, their application was limited by the fear of failure on the part of their managers. The propaganda windfall if the Vietcong manage to kill or - worse - capture one of them and figure out what they were would have been devastating. All five survived the war, though three with injuries. One was never able to walk unassisted again. Also, there appeared to be a high level of mental instability among all the test subjects.
The lab was shut down in 1968, and all materials ordered destroyed except for a single copy of every record which was placed in secure storage. However, the lab crew still knew their work. Roger Landsworth had quietly amassed a sizable fortune over the previous two decades. He hired most of his coworkers and some of the test subjects and formed Special Resources, Inc.
Forced by the British government to leave the country or be arrested for violating the National Secrets Act in 1970, SRI moved to a privately-owned island in the Caribbean, where its main facilities are still located today.
Crescendin has two components: A core, which is always a potent hallucinogenic; and one or more "Crescendo modules" attached to this. Most commonly today the core is a version of the Para-Ergot molecule which was first developed for Crescendin Three. It is formally known as Para-Ergot 66. This was created after the debacle of the first human test, with Dr. Naggy using the reactions of animals given test doses to choose a variant which produced (in his opinion) a less violent reaction among the rabbits and rats. While Crescendin Three was never tested on humans due to high toxicity, Dr. Naggy knew the problem was the "contaminants" and not Para-Ergot 66. He altered his processes to produce the much safer Crescendin Four for the second human test.
The core of Para-Ergot serves two functions: A carrier for the Crescendo modules to get them into the brain; and an enabler which allows the Crescendo modules to function. Para-Ergot by itself will get someone high, but not trigger any Crescendos. It is much less potent (by size of dose) than LSD and more dangerous. No Crescendo module by itself - or even in conjunction with other Crescendo modules - has caused the development of powers, even in conjunction with methodologies which delivered them to the brain. It was the insight of Roger Landsworth that what had been thought to be trace contaminants were essential to the Crescendo process. He correctly determined that there were two components to the Crescendo effect. The most successful variants of Crescendin to date are developments of his Crescendin B, though the variants developed from his formulation followed the main line of Crescendin designation.
A number of independent projects have also been carried out in the field of Crescendo. Most used Para-Ergot, but a few tried similar molecules or different hallucinogenics entirely. The success rate was smaller for all of them than with Para-Ergot 66. Worse, some formulas caused severe physical and mental alterations, even in those who did not develop powers.
It has been said, with much justification, that third-class Triggered are just explainable via existing animal biology, that second-class Triggered require radical changes to the subject's biochemistry, and that first-class Triggered casually violate the laws of physics. All first- and second-class and many third-class Triggered display alterations to their DNA. Many are no longer genetically compatible with normal humans.
Roger Landsworth is devoted to researching Crescendin and to seeing it used in a beneficial manner. He is no fanatic; he believes - and has seen strong evidence to support his belief - that a small number of carefully selected superhumans can help the world. However, his Triggered brain sees things a little differently from the ways most people do.
(1)Sir Roger has a pet rabbit with a vivid mauve pelt which he claims is a survivor from the days of the original laboratory. A doe, she seems perfectly healthy, and somewhat smarter than most rabbits. All her offspring inherited her odd coloration but none of her other alterations.
Crescendin C was an attempt at a new approach using a different core Para-Ergot molecule, variant 72. It shows promise, but currently has too high a fatality rate for Roger to be comfortable with it. Crescendin Thirteen is the primary version currently used by Special Resources. Crescendin Eight is the primary alternate. Variant Thirteen and Crescendin C both provide Crescendants whose abilities are usually physical, and generally so, rather than focusing on one or a few aspects of physical ability. Variant Eight tends to focus more on specialized enhancements, but includes mental abilities as well as physical. Another factor determining which is used is that Crescendin Thirteen tends to produce a significantly higher rate of adverse effects for blood type B. It was discovering why this is so which led to the development of Crescendin C. Lately Roger has been recommending Crescendin C for those for whom Crescendin Thirteen is contraindicated.
The incidence of adverse effects - mental instability and physical alterations - is higher the greater the level of power the Triggered subject displays. Additionally, the diversion from human norm becomes stronger and more likely with greater levels of power.
Special Resources, Inc. bills itself as a scientific, technical and security consulting agency. Which is the literal truth. What isn't commonly known is that between the efforts of of Roger and a few other Triggered intellects the company has equipment and techniques unique to it. They are - as just one example - capable of doing complete DNA sequencing on any suitable human sample in a quarter the time of any other laboratory, and providing a more detailed analysis to boot. Combine that sort of capacity with the twenty to thirty physically and mentally Triggered field personnel and you have a group which can successfully complete just about any task... if the price is right. However, Roger has final approval of any non-routine tasks. His is the moral compass which led to a British Member of Parliament being forced to resign after he tried to hire Special Resources to arrange for his election to Prime Minister.
Their most high-profile missions involve providing security for public figures. Be they rock stars, politicians, the very wealthy or exiled dictators, if they can pay - and if Roger gives the go-ahead - they are almost certain to remain safe.
The same categories mentioned above also seek out the services of Special Resources for medical attention. Besides treatment of illness and injury, the organization's medical facilities also have the best cosmetic surgeons in the world. More than one person who needed to hide has had a new appearance and life crafted for them at the medical facilities on the isolated Caribbean island.
Officially, only 474 people have taken Crescendin. Adding the known subjects of other trigger drugs raises the number of Triggered to a bit over five hundred. There are currently fewer than two hundred officially known superhumans, with perhaps fifty to a hundred more so far off the radar. It can be argued that there have not been enough test subjects to actually determine the statistical distribution of all trigger drugs together, much less any particular version. Surprises are definitely still in store for those who are continuing to work with the drugs.
