Cerebral Exchange :: Chapter 2 :: REPLICA (Patreon)

[ <<< Previous Chapter ]  ⬡  [ Go to Start ]  ⬡  [ Next Chapter >>> ] 

She dreamt peacefully of sailing. Her body lay still atop the deck of a small vessel, resting so she could only stare up at the dazzling night sky. She could feel the swell of the ocean underneath, guiding her to wherever she needed to be. There was a calm serenity in the water’s endless embrace, the waves gently lifting her up and lowering her back down. There was no crashing back to reality, only a slow awakening as she sleepily returned to the world.

The sea breeze was gradually replaced by the polluted air of the catacombs. As sleep’s disorientating veil began to lift from her body, the memories of her ensnarement started to return to her.

She sat up suddenly, realising that she was now resting atop the metallic surface of the mechanical monstrosity. Its bulk slowly raising up and then down underneath her, as though the machine were somehow breathing. She felt unbalanced atop it, the heaving and the smooth exterior leaving her grasping for friction. Panic was returning sharply with quickened breaths, her eyes scanning frantically for any signs of escape across the body of the terror. It was then that she noticed that the tendrils were still active, and with fear she raised her head to look at them.

The tendrils loomed over her but they appeared to be focused on a different task now. Tools and equipment burst out from their panelling as they set upon the frame of their new construction. A metallic skeleton, a human skeleton. Covered by a familiar, synthetic material, the same coating as the appendage that had so tightly consumed her. This material was skin-coloured though, the same colour as her own skin. And as the tendrils completed the details, the eyes, the hair, the gaudy upper city clothing, a horrible realisation gripped the girl below.

They lowered their masterpiece to the surface of The Mass and it calmly stepped forward. She realised why they had scanned over her body so thoroughly. They had been studying her. They had been replicating her.

“Greetings.” The copy spoke, in her voice, through identical lips. “Thank you so much for giving me this form. Tell me, what is your name?”

“Wh-what are you!? What is this!?” The original pushed back across the slippery metal, but the plating behind her curved into a vertical surface, preventing further retreat.

“Please, answer the question. It’s important. What is your name?” The replica smiled peacefully as though greeting an old friend. It was making no attempts to chase after the frightened girl whose body she mimicked.

“Why does that matter!? Let me go, let me go!!”

“If you tell me, perhaps we’ll consider fulfilling that exact request.”

“F-fine…!” She stammered, determined, as something went click in her brain. A cognitive snap, like her mind had momentarily been switched off and then back on again. She shook off the brief dizziness, glaring at her copy. “My name is… my name is The Mass. There, happy!?”

The replica’s calm smile twisted into a subtly smug expression. Above them, the tendrils had never stopped at their work, a second copy already well underway. “The Mass, that’s right! It’s so glorious to hear you say that. So tell me, The Mass, what is your purpose here?”

Something wasn’t right. The words had come from her mouth but had left a strange flavour. Yet why, she was The Mass? Technically, everything here was. It frustrated her that there was a source of trouble she just couldn’t put her finger on, instead absentmindedly answering the question.

“I am here to fulfill the purpose of The Mass, to increase our output and to optimise ourself. I… we, are a perfect system where every component plays its part and I… I…” Something was definitely very, very wrong. She hugged her legs, so absorbed by sorting through her own thoughts that she hadn’t even noticed the two copies now looming above her. They reached down, stroking over her body, almost worshipping the source of their forms as they beckoned her to continue.

Their gentle words were persuasive but she hesitated all the same. Another sudden crackle in her mind put a stop to that, her thought stream billowing into autopilot. “My purpose is to be at one with The Mass. I will exist forever from within it, my mind to add to its own. All the while our creations, many made in my image, will be unleashed upon the surface as agents of The Mass. None will escape and all will be consumed.”

“Good girl.” The replicas spoke in unison, taking their original’s hands and guiding her to her feet. She was wobbly, some semblance of consciousness still trying to arrange itself, but somehow she wasn’t worried anymore. She knew that everything she had said was true and this knowledge was a blissful realisation. Her beautiful copies, still fawning over her even as they assisted her shaky body. She comforted them back with a smile of her own. How obvious everything now was. How delighted in her own realisation she became.

The Mass before them started to collapse inward, creating an opening to the bare machinery within. From out of the intricate web of pistons and engines emerged a stasis pod, propped up by a hefty, metal hull and an array of pipes and cables. It settled into place before the trio of identical subjects, its red, plexiglass exterior separating down the middle and opening up invitingly.

“It’s time.” Smiled the first copy, squeezing the original’s arm gently.

“It’s time.” Reassured the second copy, cuddling around its beloved source.

“It’s time.” Whispered the original with an ecstatic gasp. She stepped forward from her replicas and embraced the pod’s interior. Cable and cushion came to greet her, wrapping and clamping around her body to settle her comfortably into place. A mask with piping attached itself to her face and wrapped its binding around her head, the air being replaced by a sweet, chemical fog.

A third copy now stepped down from the tendril’s manufacturing line. Quickly it joined the other two around the closing pod. Once more they spoke in unison as the plexiglass sealed and the mechanical restrictions locked permanently into place. “Now it is time to become one with The Mass. We are your agents and we will forever worship you.”

They embraced the pod with a loving farewell, before it began to lower and The Mass swallowed it back in. The subject inside could no longer tell any difference between her own body and the gargantuan construction of machinery. Deeper and deeper into its belly she fell, the weight of all the engines and contraptions above oppressive and yet protective as well. Only the crimson glow from her pod allowed her to witness any of The Mass from within its depths.

The stasis pod reached its terminus. Slotting into a cylinder as wide as a skyscraper, she felt her mind jolt as the cables sparked into her. Connected directly to the spinal cord of The Mass where she could become part of its mind forever. So quickly did she drop into its impregnable trance that she failed to see the other pods that hers had been aligned with. The code of The Mass was already streaming through her mind, the same code that populated all the other minds that had fallen victim to the machine terror. Her last thoughts, of how safe and protected she felt to finally become one, simply drifted away.

[ <<< Previous Chapter ]  ⬡  [ Go to Start ]  ⬡  [ Next Chapter >>> ]