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His eyes flicker open to see a bright green background with white text scrolling over it, he knows that something has gone very wrong in order for a...
Aiden watches as the eyes grow closer and he puts his hands up slowly forming them into clenched fists, if there is one universal truth he knows it’s that anything you put your fist through will think twice about continuing to fight. As they come within fifty feet of him the eyes start to move upwards forming a giant red circle in the tunnel that ebbs and pulses with the movement of whatever beings those eyes belong to. Just as the things are close enough to touch they stop moving all together, only the blinking of their eyes can be observed, like red stars twinkling in the night. He wonders if they’re afraid of him, if maybe some instinct is unable to deal with prey that doesn’t run. His question is quickly answered.
“Close your eyes Doctor.” came the familiar voice from behind him. Like a ray of light to someone lost within a cave he feels relief wash over him; he smiles hearing Moe’s voice. He exhales sharply and closes his eyes; within seconds a white light so bright that even with his eyes closed it burns invades the area. He can see the blood vessels in his own eyelids, he can hear the high pitched screaming of the creatures, and he can feel the heat of the light source bathing over his body. Finally the light subsides but the screaming goes on, scrambling sounds of claws ripping flesh echo through the tunnel. He opens his eyes to see his heroine. Moe’s figure is glowing a bright white; her synthetic body’s compartments are open. Her arms and legs have partially separated from her body to release black smoke out of her, presuming from whatever high impact operation they just performed.
Her familiar blonde pony tail bounces violently as she begins systematically sending pulse rays into the bodies of the creatures biting at everything around them on the ground, mostly each other and some biting the walls of the tunnel. The glow from her body allows Aiden to see that the creatures are possum sized insectoids which are mostly teeth and legs, where their red eyes once presided were now black burnt out holes with green pus oozing from them. In their blind rage they can no longer distinguish between friend or foe, Moe slowly backs away from any that come close to her, white beams of light shooting forth from the palm of her hand into their heads. As the beam hits them they bounce backwards and then remain still, the beam completely overloading their minds with more information than they can handle, like a filled hard drive the brain effectively dies.
As the last of them fall from the ceiling and Moe kills them she turns to face him, her eyes are completely black for a few seconds before the eyes roll over in their sockets to show her normal eyes, gold hued with the black cross hair lines leading up to the pupils.
“Dr. Jones. Your suit is no longer adequate for the mission, we need to restore it.”
Aiden smirks at her knowingly putting his hands out to his sides as the black sludge continues to drip from his arms
“What is humorous sir? You are in very immediate danger.”
“Thanks for coming to get me Moe. Let’s get this core and move.”
“I do not recommend-“
“We’re compromised, they know I’m here, they’ve already fried my suit once they can do it again. Obviously they’ve figured out what we’re doing, we won’t get another shot at this, the defenses will only be better next time we get here.”
Moe’s synthetic body compartments shut with a loud clicking noise locking into place, she then emits a sharp sealing sound as the pressure within her body is restored to normal operating settings.
“When the mission report is submitted, I will not be omitting this part.”
“I’ll tell the judiciaries myself. C’mon Moe, help me help you.”
With a clenched jaw and narrowed eyes Moe takes heavy steps over to Aiden standing inches from him.
“I like that synthetic body by the way. You didn’t tell me you got a new one.”
“Oh does it catch your fancy indeed? I wonder if you’ll feel differently after this.”
Moe places her hand onto the blue core of Aiden’s suit. The hand begins to sympathetically glow blue and pulse with the core, suddenly electricity like knives running throughout his blood stream make his body start convulsing violently, the pain almost sending him past the point of consciousness. The pain subsides at the point Aiden thinks he can not longer take it, looking down he sees the core has once more disappeared under the black armoring of his suit, the armor is uneven and the layer is much thinner than he is used to, but it is no longer in a liquid state.
“You’ll need to keep your face shield open but you should be able to move around at least. You won’t have any of the usual electronic functionality of the suit, think of it as nothing more than armor right now, admittedly not much of even that. In other terms, I highly recommend a close proximity to this body until further notice.”
“Thank you. Seriously Moe.”
She blinks at him and then turns, her body begins to glow brighter lighting up much more of the tunnel, she breaks into a run down the path and Aiden follows.
His eyes flicker open to see a bright green background with white text scrolling over it, he knows that something has gone very wrong in order for a hard reboot to take place, he can feel the suit around him beginning to slip away from his skin like a slug dragging itself across his body. He jams his finger into the side of the helmet which manually opens his face shield. Sliding the shield upwards He looks down to see the blue core of the suit pulsating like a heart beat, he can see in it’s glow the metallic skeleton of the suit as the rest begins to melt away before his eyes. Lux. How could this happen?
Blackness surrounds him without the aid of his visage, only the humming of his suit’s core attempting to reset breaks the bleak silence. He practically slams open the wrist compartment on his suit, the black armor that once served to protect it is now a sludge that emits a loud “squelch” and spatters onto the floor beside him. The screen has to be wiped clean of sludge as well, finally Dr. Jones sees what he had been dreading, the error on the screen informs him it needs hard recoding which will require his lab back on the pod. He wonders how long his air purifier will hold out. He puts his hand to the side of his head as he tries to stand, the pressure against his brain increasing as he does so, his headache begins to feel so painful his vision clouds somewhat. He can hear the popping and grinding of the suit’s skeletal frame trying to adjust to now being required to support his weight instead of simply distributing power through the suit. He hopes to himself that surely the engineering sector back home had accounted for a system failure like this. Pressing his back against the walls he feels the organic tissue of this place, a leathery and wet texture sends chills down his spine, but he doesn’t care; he knows he has to wake up and get moving.
That’s when he hears them. The clicking and high pitched chirps of something coming his way. Far down the tunnel he finds himself in he can see hundreds of red dots that seem to be scrambling over one another in a fury to get to him. Weaponless, in pain, almost completely immobile, and out of ideas Dr. Aiden Jones begins to laugh at whatever predator has found him. He plans to go down fighting.
—-
Check out my writing journal for the rest of this story if you like it.
I am my biggest fan. When you stop believing in god you realize something. That ever present being that can help you, punish you, love you, and reward you has been there all along. It was you. When I stopped worrying about what others told me to be or caring what someone told me I should look like I was immediately liberated. So because I am the one person who can truly look out for my best interests I decided that was a promise I’d make to myself and keep.
This goes hand and hand with dating. You see I know that I am an amazing person. I’m intelligent, funny, good looking, and considerate to others. I’m about to finish college, I have my whole life ahead of me now. So why would I waste precious time or energy on a woman who will squander it? As you know not everyone is intelligent, or considerate, or compatible with you. I told myself long ago that if I saw she wasn’t worth it, I wouldn’t waste time trying to make a piece fit where it just can’t. For the right woman I am something that merits getting to know. I am a person that as she gains a deeper understanding of me and I of her our lives will improve. Finding this match isn’t easy, but wasting your time on those who are most certainly not matches is much harder in the end.
You owe it to yourself to be open to the right person when they come along. Otherwise you may find yourself telling the girl of your dreams you have a significant other. Eventually, when you find the right one, you’ll know it’s right. Nothing will feel like the rest have, you’ll feel like you’ve found a best friend and someone you’re incredibly attracted to mentally and physically all in one. You’ll accept each other’s flaws willingly, and you’ll enhance each other’s happiness.
I personally feel like I have an extremely good idea of who I need, because I know what type of people don’t work well with me. So I hope you’ll allow yourself to sit down and figure out what it is you really want in love. Because love isn’t simply about financial success or how hot someone is or that they laugh at your jokes. Love isn’t bringing you flowers or staying up hours on the phone. Love isn’t like ANYTHING you’ve experienced yet. And that’s the point. When you fall in love with the person you should marry, it’s going to feel easy and it’s going to feel like coming home. I wish we all took the time to search for the truest beauty we can know on this little dot in space.
I was in a lecture hall. My friend Hilary and I went back in time to see Johnny depp’s dad teach a class. I showed a
Lady my Nintendo ds and I was like see I’m from the future. They were mildly impressed. Depps dad said something controversial and people wanted to leave. Went to a grocery with Hilary but it was more like a Walmart. We saw the people from
Shay Carl there.
Somehow we got to an abandoned insane asylum, this dude who at first wasn’t me but I later became somehow helped me get into it. Oh yeah at some point before that I saw Ellen from tv and asked for tickets to her show, she gave me them then as I walked away some dude stole them. Hilary went back to get more but we never found her again.
Ok so we break into this insane asylum, it’s creepy. We meet a ghost, she says she was a teacher once, there’s a child ghost there she finds annoying. After talking to us for sometime she says she wants to keep Hilary and tells me to get out. I see eyes in the ceiling looming down at me angrily.
I start to leave and as I do I find a plaque on the ground in front of it. It reads “in honor of the six people who died after we heard that scream”. I conclude I must’ve died but then realize again I am not that guy. I go back inside and the ghost lady tells me to get out, Hilary is in bed with the ghost kid. I see the girl from the ring laying on her but she doesn’t notice. I toss the plaque to the lady and say “they’ll want to see this. “. She shows them the plaque and finally samara appears grabbing her shoulder. Hilary tells them
Not to look. Samara says “remember me?” and then the whole room begins to cover in ice. Someone says it’s cold and she says no it isn’t. I walk back outside and slide down the steps covered in thick ice.
writing journal entry #26 (907 words) 08 march 2012
He lowered his eyes to the cultural ebb of the town, the beat of the music below inappropriately upbeat at the moment, he looked in her green eyes and forced a smile.
“Remember when I told you that the only thing that could come between us….was us?” he said.
She laughed lightly recalling the night, they had gone to a fair with friends from school and went on rides all night, he had gotten sick after the gravity twister.
“Yes. Remember when I told you I wouldn’t let that happen to us?” she smiled at him, sensing that something was wrong, but not wanting to show him that. She wanted the full brunt of whatever he had to say, she didn’t want him to hold anything back from her.
“Yeah. Listen…..I’ve kept this from you because it wasn’t a sure thing. I….I’m going to an academy Tay. I can’t-”
“No Jayden! You can’t do that. You seriously hid this from me!?” her voice choked on emotion and cracked as she ended her sentence. She was caught off guard by her own tears, she hated herself and him for it.
“I didn’t think I would get in. I…look we could always talk here. Please just hear me out.” His heart hurt to see her cry, every time he saw her face scrunch up in sadness he could feel his own heart breaking.
“I am doing this for us. You know I have to go, it’s an honor and it’s a chance for both of us to get out of this place, a chance for us to have a better life than constant fear. I was thinking I’d study weapons designs, we’d be able to retire from working after just a few years. Taylor. Can you look at me please?”
“So.” she looked at him with anger in her eyes, quickly wiping tears from under them and crumbling her eye liner between her fingers after each wipe. “I’m expected to wait four years for you right? Be your little girlfriend waiting at home for you and just trust you to come back and everything be the same? Come on Jayden, don’t be naive.”
“No Taylor I don’t want you to be my girlfriend I want you to be my wife.” He slowly knelt down and reached into his pocket pulling out a small black box, he opened it and a silver ring sat floating in a blue translucent light inside. The ring was inscribed with the words “Nothing but us”, his hand was visibly shaking as he looked up at her. She reached forward and closed the box and slowly shook her head.
“You need to decide if you love your career or me more. I love you more than anything, but I can’t be without you that long, and you shouldn’t want to be.” She turned and walked away, her high heels clicking loudly against the marble floors, the last image he remembers of her being her white dress, the sound of her sniffing as she struggled not to cry, and her bright blonde hair curled and bouncing rapidly as she walked away. That night he stood on their balcony for 30 minutes, it was here where he had asked her to be his girlfriend those years ago, it was here he had finally lost her. He clicked open the box and stared at the ring as it spun slowly in front of him, he sighed and let the box drop out of his hand, the clang of the ring hitting the glass ceiling of the commons area of their school was loud and caused several studying students to look curiously upwards.
“Well Jayden. You luxed up this time.”
“YA LUXED UP THIS TIME BOY!” screamed a voice as his childhood memories scattered away, his eyes forcing open once more, he wondered how badly he must be hurt if even opening his eyes was painful. A man was pulling him up by his arm, squeezing it tightly making it feel as if his arm would surely break any second. The man was bald and had tattoos that covered his scalp and face, the man laughed as he put his hand into Jayden’s shirt and pulled out his ID card.
“Ha ha, lookeh ‘ere boys we got uhselves a li’uh rainbow rydah!”
Jayden recognized the derogatory term for those aboard an academy ship, he groggily pulled his right hand up and swung it into the side of the man’s face, it made a soft slapping sound and then fell to his side as the man’s laughter and disgusting breath washed over him.
“I’mmo get me a lot’a chips fa you kid, and I’mmo make you scream while I muss up dat pre’eh li’uh face a yas.” he laughed again as the men around him joined in his laughter. It appeared to Jayden that they had this section of land locked down, for the moment. That was how these proxy wars went, for a day or so one group would hold a segment of land, and then another would move in to take it with more forces. After all his days at the academy Jayden saw these men and their wars as heathen and below himself, he despised their lack of discipline and training, and he wished they would just kill each other off already.
writing journal entry #25 march 4 2012 (1552 words)
A scream escaped his lips involuntarily, he’d only used a sky-breaker twice before, and he needed time to charge, time to plan his route, time to even think. As he rocketed toward the group his limbs flailed wildly through the air, he looked up and saw Nevada, even from underneath the school was beautiful and grand. Falling away from the school, he gathered his composure, not wanting to lose everything that the structure symbolized to him; he pulled his black goggles from his hair down over his eyes.
Sky-breakers were still fairly new teck, a large rocket would in theory form attached to the users rocket mount, provided they did everything right. Under nominal conditions a breaker would calculate the density of the air around him or her self, and then with proper calculation the sky-breaker would borrow ions and molecules from the surrounding atmosphere and construct a rocket with the fuel that it would use to propel it’s self. When plummeting through the air those calculations are slightly harder, lines of data streamed down Jayden’s goggles, he tried not to think about what was rapidly approaching him. He snapped his right wrist, a clear glass keypad tablet appearing in his hand, he rapidly entered his data onto the numbers in the pad and slammed his palm against the “engage” icon. The rumblings of metal exploded around him, his back vibrated violently with the suction motion of the Sky-breaker, this told him he had overestimated the density of the air.
The metal began to squeal as it was quickly formed into place, much faster than recommended, but he didn’t mind it at the moment. He braced himself for death when he heard the welcome sound of fuel igniting, pushing him upwards and slowing his fall, he looked down and realized he was far closer than his inertia would be able to compensate for. The rocket fired hard and he braced for what would surely be at least a few broken limbs when suddenly a crowd’s roar invaded his ears, even louder somehow than the sky-breaker’s engine. A shot fired and hit the sky breaker’s rocket tossing him to the side like a flower’s petal caught in a draft, the sky-breaker’s rocket immediately evaporated into the air as it detected unsafe physicality and he instinctively tucked into a ball. He hit the ground with a loud “thwomp” and lost his breath, but nothing else. As he began to push through the web of dizziness in his mind, the sounds of battle became clear around him, his eyes widened at a huge metal blade sweeping through the air towards him and he rolled to the side letting it connect with the muddy ground beneath him.
Jayden smirked because he knew at least in this place he would be at home, where the rules were much more familiar to him, his goggles began analyzing his opponents fighting style and weaknesses, providing information to him as he dodged away from the man’s clumsy swings. He noticed his white shirt was still hanging half open and torn from where the rocket had pierced it to connect to the sky-breaker, and he also realized how completely out of place he probably looked, he might as well have been a civilian. The man in front of him was fairly large and his muscles testified to the years of battle his body had seen, Jayden’s goggles tinted red to protect his eyes suddenly as a large blast struck in front of him. The man’s eyes widened as his body was pushed into the air and thrown forward over Jayden’s head.
Jayden turned around to see the man disappear over the side of a rocky cliff-face. Down at the bottom of the cliff the battle was raging as well, one small part of the fighting stopped as they all looked over at the body that just created a small crater, after considering his fate for a moment the fight continued. Jayden’s goggles suddenly displayed an image from their rear facing cameras as a man with an automatic rifle rushed at him, even though the image was blurry and filled with intermittent static he could make out the grimace of anger in the fighter’s face. Jayden snapped his wrist again and felt the glass texture of his command tablet in his hand, he entered this command without looking at it, his fingers operating this command from memory. The man in front of him was thin, young, and reckless just like himself. He almost felt bad as the velocity shield went up around him.
Jayden’s clothes and hair suddenly floated upwards exactly as if he was underwater, the soldier began firing on Jayden, the bullets struck the shield around his body instantly losing their speed and spinning wildly within the shield. The bullets began to collect in the air around Jayden, as if floating in an aquarium they swished around his body while he walked towards the soldier, Jayden held his hand out to the young man and spoke to him.
“Stop. I’m a student at Nevada, this is a fight you cannot win, I envoke the rule of Blood-right.”
“Lux off you lying scum! You’re as much as student there as I am a priest! This will fix you!”
The man shot a glowing sphere from his rifle, Jayden cursed himself under his breath as the yellow glow penetrated his shield and hovered in front of him, his hand once again danced over the tablet and the bullets and glowing orb instantly fell to the ground in a heap. Jayden turned to run but his ears were soon ringing and his feet kicking at air while his body was catapulted into the sky and over the very same cliff his angry friend had been sent. The sharp fear of hopelessness gripped his heart as he realized the distance was far too short for another sky-breaker attempt.
His hopelessness was replaced with shock as he approached closer to the ground and saw the muscular man looking up at him, the man’s arm rose slowly and his finger raised to point at him, a stern and thoroughly deranged look on his face. The man’s blood vessels began to appear on his head his breathing becoming louder before his mouth opened and he began to roar, so loudly in fact that it could be heard over the gunfire. Jayden smirked at him seeing his chance and waved, mouthing “Hi” to him.
The man continued screaming and punched out another soldier beside him taking his weapon and turned it on Jayden, wildly spraying into the air while his scream transformed into maniacal laughter. Jayden activated his velocity shield again, the bullets filling the air around him, he sneered and pushed his hands forward screaming the command to his tablet.
“Reverse!”
The bullets floating around him suddenly shot forward at deadly speed, the man shooting exploding into thousands of pieces as bullets struck his body in a uniform fashion, the computer calculating precisely where the bullets needed to strike for both a kill and to slow the fall. Unfortunately for Jayden his tablet’s processor calculated that hitting a cliff was needed to slow the fall, the force from the reversal pushed Jayden backwards into the cliff with a loud smack followed by a popping sound in his back. The world around Jayden blurred and he could just make out the sky and ground spinning in and out of his vision, his mind registering that he was tumbling still before blackness and memories took over.
Chapter II
Balconies and Promises
Jayden had been lucky enough to be chosen to attend the government run academy. Every year in R.O.M. Children from families that applied were chosen through very stringent testing to be one of the few hundreds of children that were not put to forced labor in the service of various merc groups in the lawless lands. The government of R.O.M. Was the lesser of the two evils, but one thing that was guaranteed with them at least was a child’s safety. Jayden studied extremely hard in the field of tech so that he was not deemed unworthy and released back to the lawless lands, while he was attending the academy he fell in love with a girl, as he sat unconscious in the dirt at the foot of the cliff his mind wandered unhindered back to those days. He remembered stifling laughs in class as they sent each other quick notes to their desks from across the room, the tops of the desks having been made entirely of a screen, holding her hand as they walked beneath the oak trees of the campus between classes. He couldn’t fight back the memories of telling her he had been accepted into the secondary education placement system. He remembered standing with her on the white balcony over-looking the small town that was completely under government control. Out in the distance of the night, a small orange hue could still be seen on the horizon, a constant reminder of where you could be sent for not making the grade. He had seen it happen to a few of his own friends, and he swore he would not let it happen to him as his father had.
writing journal entry #24 february 20th 2012 (940 words)
Prologue
In the year of Kapta 430, there was a planet that was named by forgotten kings: “Solborn”.
Those kings along with much of their history had been lost in the war of the Sovereigns. One thing that was not lost was the constant drive to propel technology ever forward, the engines of war pumping always faster and smoother as time lurched on. Once, kings ruled the Sovereigns, now only one Sovereign remains with it’s king, the rest having changed their government to systems of representation. There are four Sovereigns, the largest is the republic of Dyston, a sprawling city state of skyscrapers, where financial corruption lurks like a web in it’s dark corridors. To fight the almost constant war of Sovereigns, Dyston mostly commissions the help of mercenaries or factories to build armies of synthetics, or artificial life.
The second largest is the Kingdom of Galbinas, it is defined by rolling hills of emerald green and unexplored forests, Galbinas’ army is a proud one of men who are constantly at war with both of their neighbors. Their King maintains a strict policy of defensive actions only, working hard at maintaining the centuries old northern boarder, a literal wall of energy maintained by generators. This wall keeps the third largest Sovereign: Xen, at bay. Hardly anything is known about Xen, but the few men who keep watch over the northern boarder whisper of dark figures creeping close to the wall from time to time, and random bombings of great blue energy strike the wall several times throughout the year. Most assume that Xen’s history was lost in the great wars, and most would like to keep it that way, the Galbinians believe the further out of mind Xen is; the better.
Lastly the smallest Sovereign, and neighbor of both Dyston and Galbinas, is The Republic of Mercenaries or R.O.M. colloquially. ROM is the youngest Sovereign at only ninety eight years old, Dyston and Galbinas consider them less of a Sovereign and more of a recruitment pool, but there is a new movement of ROMites, that take pride in their young Sovereign and refuse to hire their services to outsiders. It is assumed Xen hates them, as it would seem they hate everyone, but that is again unknown. It is high above the lands of ROM that our story begins, as a young man begins his first steps towards a night that would change him forever.
Chapter I
Did we always hurt?
Their tongues danced over each other with the passion and recklessness that is only earned through youth and yet to be shattered expectations. Jayden had wanted her since his first year at Nevada, the school for exceptional youths in the sky, what he was doing could get him expelled but at that moment he didn’t care. He wasn’t thinking how honored he had been a short year ago, or how disappointed everyone back home would be if he came back without his Merc collar, he was more concerned with how far he could take this. She tore furiously at his shirt, whipping his body forward and towards her, he smiled through their kiss; apparently she was wondering the same. He could barely contain himself, he knew it was wrong to even be touching her, the daughter of a head instructor and an explicitly untouchable woman. They may as well have branded her forehead with the word “challenge”, because that’s what all boys at Nevada saw the untouchables as.
This girl was rare, even for an untouchable, she was excited by the prospect of breaking her vow just as much as Jayden was to help her do it. Jayden pushed her against the wall of the storage capsule and began unbuttoning her blouse, they could both feel and hear the roar of the giant engines on the other side of the metal wall, those great engines that kept the massive school afloat and provided them some much wanted noise to muffle their activities. He shook in anticipation, he couldn’t undress her fast enough, when suddenly the door to their storage closet slid open with a sharp electric “whirr”; he thought he had locked it.
“and now class you will see here that Mr. Omega is in the process of welcoming a new student to the school.”
Jayden’s heart leaped up into his neck and the sharp stunning pain of fear rushed through his body, he turned around to face what he didn’t want to believe was there, and yet it was. An entire classroom of about fifty students was peering down on him all struggling to see into the frame of the door , giggles and gasps escaping from the group as he turned around, his hand reached up and waved slowly. He forced a smile across his lips and let his white teeth peek slightly through as the rest of his face denied the emotion.
“Oh hi….hey Gabby…Master Cynus.”
The young lady behind him clamored for the buttons on her blouse as her face flushed with blood, her bottom lip beginning to quiver with the origins of an emotional outburst.
“Mr. Omega I see you have graciously volunteered to show the class the proper way to operate a sky-breaker with minimal time to prepare.”
“What? Wait no Mast-”
Before he could get the words out the Master had already pointed a displacement beacon at his feet, the metals beneath his feet moved out from under him, scrunching miniature mountains of metal up on either side of his body as it fell through the newly made hole and into the skies below Nevada.
writing journal entry #23 12 february 2012 (676 words)
“Lyssa oh my god….I’m so so sorry.”
“Aiden I’m just happy I get to see you again. You don’t know how….important this is to me.”
“How do you tell someone they’re not real gadget?” he tests the pet name on her, like a rodent trapped within a cage, he is testing the barriers of this false reality.
“What?”
“Where did we have our first kiss?”
“What’re you doing babe?”
“Answer the question.”
“…the parking lot of Jett’s after karaoke night. You sang umm…. ‘piano man’ and went outside for a smoke. I followed you out and-“
“Alright. What year is it?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happens here tonight?”
“Well this is either our first date or you’re proposing to me.”
Dr. Jones’ hands begin to shake slightly and he feels her cool skin grip tighter over his own.
“Hey. It’s fine. It’s fine.” She reassures him unconsciously nodding slowly and biting her lower lip.
“This isn’t a memory recall. You’re here. This isn’t right. Who did this? What kind of simulation is this? You’re a damn A.I. aren’t you?”
He tries to rip his hands away but Lyssa holds firm to his hands gripping them even tighter, her upper body is thrust forward from the force of his pull and the table jumps upwards. The talking slowly dies down for a few seconds as the customers uncomfortably look over at them, distracted and annoyed, before returning to their conversations.
“No Aiden wait don’t shut me out I need to tell you some things!”
A tray loudly slaps down on their table holding two large ceramic coffee mugs filled with steaming brown liquid, it smells like vanilla. Suddenly everyone in the restaurant freezes in place including Lyssa. Aiden sees pale white hands grip the cups and lift each one up to place them directly in front of him and his dead wife. Aiden’s blue eyes trace along the person’s arm upwards until he is looking into the face of Moe, her blonde hair is pulled back in a pony tail and her lips still painted blue. She smiles at him and then leans down to whisper softly to him.
“Good evening Dr. We’re dealing with a Predicate dualism anomaly situation, otherwise known colloquially as a Ghost in the Machine. Statistically the odds of such an occurrence are forty seven million to one however I am disinclined to accredit this simply to adventitious forces, currently running a trace.”
“Moe. Where is my body?”
“Currently suffering a pulmonary arrest, that should be solved momentarily, I am performing a hard reboot of the suit, brain damage should be minimal. As for your wife….unscientific analysis would indicate this is not an A.I. Her responses are advanced and her physiological habits appear intact; the complication will come with finding where this signal is coming from and how she has managed to materialize. Enjoy your coffee Dr.”
Moe slings the oval tray with cork lining under her arm, smiles at them with a slight nod and then turns to walk back to the front of the shop.
As soon as she is out of sight the restaurant comes back to life.
“Tell me then.” He looks back into her eyes.
Lyssa’s expression becomes confused as she notices the coffee in front of them that seemingly appeared from thin air. She lets go of his hands and grips the handle of the cup, bringing it to her lips. Aiden arches a brow as she audibly moans when the liquid passes into her mouth, she parses her lips together closing her eyes for a moment, as if lost in thought then seems to remember where she is and quickly tries to explain.
“I’m still alive Aiden. Kind of. But listen, they know you’re coming and they’re trying to use me against you, you need to get out of here. You need to leave babe.”
“I’m not going anywhere. I made a promise. I said I’d stick it out no matter what, and that’s exact-“
The restaurant suddenly disappears and blackness coats his vision once more.
writing journal entry #22 08 February 2012 (353 words)
This house is haunted
I am undaunted
Doors open at 7 am
It’s all been said, let’s say it again
So impossibly confronted by your own alibi?
Just take my eyes, you’ll begin to see the reasons why
My face itself seems surprised and I’m beginning to appreciate the lies
Beautiful in their boldness, yet mistaken they are wise
The dance among the raging wars lost out
Keep them coming sir yes I still have some clout
I can’t pretend the dust wont hold your smell
But I can’t pretend your room feels anything like a cell
There’s pictures on the walls where hands had gently clasped
There will be figments in my memory of questions never asked
I struck the blow that took our life to save it misery
After we drug it through the streets, its pain for all to see
The sky will fill the house again, with dark blue sparkling lights
And eight hundred and forty eight days, will wither from my sight.
I hope I did, in some contour, refine your love of life
Goodbye my friend, I believe this is your knife
Growing like there’s no tomorrow
Stumbling from a yesterday
Always had a knack, for a great cliche
and you’ve got to admit I’m losing face
but summer just invigorates
My sunglasses reflect of you
protecting me from servitude
My fingers bleed from strings
A speaker’s heart to wring
A promise that became a waste
nothing more than pocket ace
Her hair hits the wind rushing on to me
a whisper through the tree
Her smile will break your heart
She has made a battle start
I’m Hanging my white flag high
Kiss my pride goodbye
And did you expect…..
To find yourself in text?
The signs were faded, scratched, detached
Your heart in key and latch?
The road was besieged by oak trees
black and sooty holding secret reprieves
A secret kiss upon my lips
I feel my hard heart slip
Is a miracle out there beyond your eye’s reach?
An iron hearted ghost daring us into the breach?
Take my hand and lets see.
