Interlude

A Source of Danger

Zein stood atop a stainless steel walkway overlooking the four rows of 32 Med-pods filled with a pink translucent liquid; in every Med-pod lay a human body hooked up with tubes and wires, but most of them didn't even hold a single strand of Zein's interest. Only the man right below Zein was truly worth watching at the moment.

Below Zein, inside the egg-shaped Med-pod, was the Special Subject code-named Jay, his skin having slowly melted during the last couple of days. And now the thin, almost invisible, strands of nerve-endings were wafting up from the now skinless red body. A body without its skin looked awfully inhuman, but Zein didn't mind. He had long since grown used to seeing what others would call repulsive and abhorrent. His work made the luxury of caring for others something beyond his grasp.

He had come back here several times during the last few days to watch the nano-machines work on Jay's body, slowly whittling away the skin, fat, hair and nails without ever severing a single nerve-ending. He couldn't get enough of watching the slow procedure; it made him feel a profound sense of accomplishment. It was miraculous how the nano-surgery had advanced with leaps and bounds the last few years. And most of those advancements had come from his research.

He watched silently as the last few globs of melted skin sloughed off Jay's body, being enveloped by the pink fluid all around the body and then slowly flow out the evac-duct which all waste-products left through. A human's body without skin looked truly strange; its dark red, white and pink colors blended together in strictly rigorous muscle-contours. Every time Zein saw a body like this he remembered back to when he had gone through a procedure similar to this. Though when he had gotten his new cyborg body it had been experimental and a lot less safe, he figured he too had looked like this while the doctors worked on him. Now looking down on another's transformation, Zein felt happy he hadn't watched the recordings from when he removed and replaced most of his biological body. It might have driven him insane... or more insane, if he was being honest.

“Sir,” a female voice said from Zein's left. “Here are the results of phase one. Nothing went wrong, but the Subject needs a bit of time to stabilize. Though we are preparing for the second phase right now if you wish it to begin.”

“Do nothing. Not just yet,” Zein looked over at the white-clad woman, only turning his head slightly, feeling no reason to act human while he was working. He only pretended and made his body act more like a human's when he interacted with people he needed to lull into comfort or friendship. His cyborg body had no use for useless motions, and he didn't want to expend more energy than needed if he could avoid it. He reached out his hand and took the View-pad with data on Jay's conversion.

“Y.. Yes...” the female said, her short-cropped black hair and ordinary face gave off a blank impression. “I'll take my leave then, sir.” She walked away in a hurry, her soft boots making a shuffling noise on the ribbed metallic floor.

Maybe he should try and be a little more human-like? Zein had forgotten how to do that though, and didn't really feel the need to, so he quickly dismissed the thought.

On the View-pad he saw that there were speculations about how Jay might have felt a slight itch during the procedure, but no pain, even though they had only administered some minor analgesics at the beginning of the treatment. One of the theories about how God's Dream could almost entirely remove a person's perception of reality outside that reality had thus been proven, if only preliminarily.

Zein was pleased none the less. The fact that Jay—Zein's own proxy-player—was doing so well as to be the first to be given the procedure pleased Zein very much; if he didn't regulate his emotions with neuro-substances strictly, he might even have felt happy.

“ZEIN,” the voice of his Lord spoke in Zein's mind, startling him. “The work is going well, I see.”

“Yes, my Lord,” Zein replied, falling down to one knee, his body freezing in place, his eyes closing, blackness enveloping his every sense. He had also lost the ability to move by his own command. This only happened when Lord was displeased, and Zein could swear he felt a slight trickle of sweat running down his forehead, even if it was only imagined. “What did you wish to speak to me about?” he asked, hoping nothing was very wrong.

“You tampered with your little game,” Lord said, the monotonous tone scaring Zein with its coldness. “Why did you use your game-avatar to influence those Mole-squirrels to take this Jay to one of the Sealed Ones? It could be dangerous to make any of the players come into contact with those failed experiments. Their AIs are beyond powerful. Those things couldn't even be removed when we wiped the game-world after the failure you so aptly name the Alpha-run. They are the only flaw in the system, and you send one of your pets to it? What is the meaning of this? If one of those AIs becomes unsealed, they could influence the entire system. And we wouldn't want that, now would we?”

“Yes.. no” Zein said. “But Lord, you sealed those AIs yourself after they started malfunctioning, so there shouldn't be any way for them to escape their spheres of influence. And the system is otherwise perfect... there is little to no risk of anything going wrong by my actions.”

“You think so?” Lord asked. “Even I am slightly afraid of those failed experiments. If any of them get loose in the system—or even worse, one of them gets hold of a physical body—we might have to exterminate the entire quantum computer satellite, and that would probably make the ten million players connected to it brain-dead. Such a thing wouldn't be good for the workforce in the asteroid belt's satellites. Did you think of this?”

“Yes, but another workforce can always be grown from one of the newly developed cloning facilities,” Zein said. He didn't care about those ten million people, but if the massive satellite computer was destroyed, it would take at least twenty years before they could get another one up and running; that wasn't something he would like to be responsible for. “The risk is minor though, and it is worth it if there can be an earlier breakthrough in our robotics AI research. Those first AIs were completely impossible to control, and their rudimentary functions were not something even our brightest hive-minds could figure out, but now when we're using human brains as the base for the second generation AI, there shouldn't be the same types of problems. So, I only did as I did because I wanted to speed up the process. If you disagree with my actions, punish me, or redress whatever I've done. You know you hold all the power... just do whatever you think is best. I haven't done anything wrong, nor will I apologize for doing what I think is best.”

“Good, good...” Lord said, a pleased tone slipping in at the second 'good'. Zein was relieved to hear that he hadn't done anything irreversible; he didn't want to die for no apparent reason.

“Did you want something else, my Lord?” Zein asked.

“Well, there is something minor that has bothered me,” Lord said. “Did it not occur to you that some of your competitors would find out about your dishonest behavior? You so blatantly helping your proxy-player doesn't feel wrong to you? There have been numerous complaints sent from those people, and I grow tired of interacting with you inferiors over these minor squabbles. Do you believe you have the right to cheat? Is your morality so ambiguous?”

“But... cheating can only exist in a world where fairness is valued; and there exists no such place in our world. Claiming someone else cheated is only the loser's limp excuse for being dimwitted. And morality? You yourself said that only equals can enforce morality on each other, and equality is an illusion on so many levels that I can't even begin to talk about how false it is.” Zein said, thinking frantically. Had he really done something wrong by slightly influencing Jay's growth? “You also told those of us that work on this to prioritize the Main Project, and since Jay found one of the Legacies, there was nothing wrong with me helping him along slightly. Wouldn't you agree?”

“You're quite right,” Lord said. “Equality and morality, those are but the whinings of weaklings, and hold no sway to us in power.”

“Yes, I hear and obey,” Zein said, as if by wrote. “The only master is my master, the only rule is the existence of non-existence.”

A soft laugh sounded out, reverberating in Zein's mind. “Good,” Lord said. “I see that you still have the right mindset. It would have been bad if you had forgotten your true place. Never forget who holds your reigns and always do my bidding before any other thing. Only this way will you remain among the second most influential beings in the solar system. Though you're but my slave, you still only have to answer to me and everyone else will never be able to do anything to you. The Collective takes care of its own.”

“Yes, my Lord,” Zein said, not knowing if he should be happy about what his Lord said or not. “Your wish will always be my only priority, but can I ask something?”

“Yes?” Lord asked, giving permission.

“Why is it that we didn't just scrub the system clean entirely after those failed AIs couldn't be removed?” Zein had always had trouble reconciling with this act from his superior.

“Those... creatures... are too valuable to not keep in existence,” Lord said, and for the first time Zein had known, there seemed to be hesitation in Lord's voice. “If we had removed everything from the operating system, then we would have to restart the entire Virtual Reality Project, and that would take more than ten years. Even with the accelerated time within the game at max, the almost 10000 years in-game cannot be gone through in a short period of time if we want the reality to be stable and work how we want it to. Don't forget how much time we spent on creating a reality where things evolve and grow from the basic principles and laws we put into the system. The world acts much like reality and if we remove everything, the reality would need to regrow all the plants, animals, cultures, peoples and other significant things. It would take too much time... time we do not have.”

“Yes,” Zein said. “I understand. Such a thing could only be called a last resort.”

“Good,” Lord said. “I'll leave you to your business then. Don't go influencing this Jay any more from now on.”

“But, my Lord, Jay has a fragmented mind because we removed all references to his former self in his mind,” Zein said, not really wanting to contradict his Lord, but also needing to do it to convince Lord that there needed to be more oversight of these 128 primary test subjects. “If I do nothing to influence these subjects, there will be a slower rate of improvement in the direction we want them to go. How about this? I'll influence anyone that reaches the right point of growth, and nothing more. Oh, and also, I'd like to request the slight tampering of Jay's mind again. He needs to have a better ability to remember things. The fracturing of his mind seems to have made him slightly addled-minded.”

“Fine. Do as you please,” Lord said. “Increase this Jay's neurochemical balance by 30% toward a more focused mindset, nothing more. If he cannot exist without a strong influence from us, he will never be worth our time and effort anyway.”

“Yes, my Lord,” Zein said. He had gotten more than he had thought from this exchange of words. His proxy was the furthest along the right path, and he hadn't been reprimanded in any physical way; so, everything was good.

Suddenly, Zein got back his senses and ability to move. He quickly stood up, looking around, knowing his Lord had let go of his mind.

“Sir,” another white-clad black-haired woman said. “What happened to you?”

Blazing fury engulfed Zein's mind. He reached out his hand, clasping his fingers around her throat and squeezed, lifting her off her feet. Her eyes bulged, her face slowly growing purple with the lack of oxygen. She flailed, scratching at Zein's face, but mere flesh could not put a scratch on his body. Soon her struggles grew sluggish and her bulging eyes closed their lids slightly. Her body heaved a last time, dying in his clutches.

Zein hated being seen incapacitated. It was her fault for being there when he couldn't show a proper countenance. He flung the body to the floor. “Clean this up,” he said through his internal comm-system to one of the senior researchers, sending a picture of the dead woman lying on the steel walkway.

- - - - - - - -

Wraith threw Jay toward the black border of his Sealed Space, then tried to relaxed, sitting in his regular position, meditating, beginning to enter Dream Space with the intent of trying out some of the endless permutations of his latest Spell that he had tried to stabilize for almost thirty years. His body shuddered before he could go into the Dream Space however. “I know you're there. Show yourself,” he said into the emptiness, waiting for something to happen, but nothing did for more than a minute. “Here to look at your captive again, are you?”

“Heh,” a cold voice said from everywhere. “You never cease to amaze me. How did you know I was here?”

“Wouldn't you like to know,” Wraith snidely said. “You sent the broken boy, correct? But you won't get to know my secrets so easily. I'll tell him nothing important, because I know he is your creature. Whatever scheme you're trying to use against me will not work.”

“Oh? I didn't send him to you,” the cold voice said. “I do admit that he is one of mine though. Everyone here are mine.”

“Everyone?” Wraith said, almost laughing at the preposterous statement. “I'm not yours, so how can everyone be yours?”

“You do not count,” the cold voice said. “You're not even able to leave this small little sphere, so you do not matter in the grand scheme of things.”

“You think so? Truly?” Wraith asked, actually feeling a bit puzzled. He knew the one talking to him had sealed him inside this place, but he didn't know why or how it had been done. “Why not let me out?”

“You are too dangerous,” the cold voice said.

“So you send your minions to get my secrets from me by some other way?” Wraith asked, derision plainly in his voice. “I know this place is some sort of Dream Space or something akin to that. You can't even make me do anything in here though, you can just barely restrain me from escaping from this Space's clutches. You're a truly impotent being.”

“Hah, you truly never cease to amaze me,” the cold voice said. “It doesn't matter if you want to help me or not. You have already been helpful by just giving that Jay some of your power.”

“You think so? Truly?” Wraith said, repeating his earlier statement exactly to try and get a rouse out of the being that had silently tormented him for centuries. “My power comes with a price, didn't you know? Now I've put not one, but two marks on the poor broken boy. It will take much for you to get past my influence. If you had any real power, you would just have killed me instead of putting me inside this place. So, why should I care about you?”

“I can kill you whenever I please,” the cold voice said, some heat actually rising in its reverberating tone. “I just have more use for you alive than dead. That's all.”

“Oh?” Wraith said, laughing at the voice. “If you can truly kill me, do it. You'll regret it if you don't.”

“You cannot give me orders, Wraith,” the cold voice said. “You're not even truly alive.”

“I know,” Wraith said, calm as could be. He had known for a very long time that this was some sort of seal not only on what he perceived as his body, but also on his mind. He even had the vague feeling that the world all around him wasn't real, and that only his mind existed. It was a strange feeling, and he believed it was because his body had actually died and only his mind lived on. “This isn't a truly real place, is it? I've long speculated on this, but have never reached a conclusion. Maybe you can enlighten me?”

The cold voice was silent for such a long time that Wraith once more started drifting into his own Dream Space, but for some reason he couldn't enter it. It felt weird and Wraith could only think the cold voice was interfering somehow, but how it was possible to do such a thing, he couldn't figure out.

Wraith had bluffed earlier about wanting to die. No creature can truly wish to die without a fight, or so he believed at least. Even if he was only left with his mind, that was all that was truly him, so having a body or not didn't matter. He could always rebuild his body when he got free from this Sealed Space. “If you're just going to hover around here and say nothing. Just leave me alone.”

“Why can't you submit to my authority?” the cold voice asked, and Wraith could hear what he believed was slight apprehension in its tonality. “I have kept you here for who knows how long, but you still defy me. What do I need to do to have you become mine?”

“Become yours?” Wraith asked. “I will never be a slave again. You are not a worthy master, nor a good being. How can I ever give you what you want? Kill me if you can; anything else will only enrage me and make my hate for you grow stronger.”

No answer came and Wraith didn't know if he should keep trying to converse with the vile being. All he knew was that his plans were slowly doing their job; the vile being wouldn't be here to watch Wraith otherwise. And with the broken boy Jay, Wraith had gotten another even greater opportunity for influencing the outside world to his ultimate escape. Having branded Jay with the Eye of the Magi and giving him the token would make Wraith hold sway over Jay no matter how much the vile being tried to influence Jay. There were some things that couldn't be reversed when they were enacted, only death could bring release from these things and Wraith had made sure Jay would be his, if only slightly.