1.1 - Let There Be Sight

  Before I could settle into yet another panic-fueled existential spiral, the situation changed. Namely, by the abrupt end of the 'Rejoice' message and sudden arrival of vision.

  Silence...and I could see!

  And what I could see was...metal?

  A metal floor. Or wall maybe. Hard to tell. Definitely metal though. Probably. It was grey colored, steel-like. Maybe titanium?

  Apparently among those topics I knew about, but didn't personally remember? Yeah, metallurgy was not one of them.

  I could definitely say the metal was reflective, in that there was a gleam of light in one part of it. Not...actually...all that exciting to look at, really. Just a blank, metal, slightly reflective surface, taking up all my visual frame.

  Still. I could see! So great!

  After what felt like hours of just staring at the same thing, the novelty of returning sight began to wear off. Great, a metal wall/floor! Big deal.

  Plus, something occurred to me after I'd been staring for long enough. The flatness of the image in front of me was more than structural. My depth perception was off. After about ten or so minutes, I understood why. Whatever I was looking through, I was seeing only one image. Only through one eye.

  Or one camera?

  Right...a camera. Made sense. Obviously, since I couldn't swivel it around when I 'turned my head', it was a stationary camera too.

  Maybe I was an uploaded brain inside a robot body? No, robots have two eyes, don't they? Well, the human shaped ones do. Maybe I was a different kind of robot? Or something else?

  Ugh! Where’s an instruction manual or kindly old scientist when you need one?

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  The frustration of my ignorance was more upsetting than anything else at this point. Weird, but true. Apparently frustration was among the stronger feelings I was able to emote at this point.

  Still, even frustration runs out eventually. I kept staring at the wall, staring and thinking, then staring and not thinking, then totally zoning out.

  Just before boredom was about to make me wish for another sermon about my status as an abomination, something new happened. Movement! I was moving!

  Moving very, very, very slowly.

  The metal surface slid downward, and to the right. It took me a second to understand, because I couldn't feel anything, but then I got it.

  I was being lifted, and turned. Turned...to the left!

  Everything happened very slowly, minutes passing before any real progress was made. But, after so long with nothing else to experience, I was enraptured.

  Then, another something new!

  The sudden reveal of...something...next to me. Very exciting. Well, relatively exciting. Interesting at least.

  It was...wait for it...a sphere? No, half a sphere. A dome. With a flattened black tip at the end. Minutes later, as I continued turning further, I realized the dome was just the end cap of a longer cylindrical shape extending farther to my left. Odd bumps and lines and flickering lights along the cylindrical shape gave the...device...machine...whatever it was a functional, hi-tech look to it. It was held up by a set of grasping brackets, all attached to a rack or mount bolted to the floor.

  As I was lifted higher, I saw more of these objects, a row of them extending toward the far end of the large room I could now tell I was currently in. The depth perception issues made it tricky to judge distances, but I counted around nine in total, each lifted up off the floor by a rack, each rack separated from the next by gap of maybe a few feet. Or a few yards. Meters. Whatever. Without ruler sitting around nearby for size comparison, it was tough to tell.

  I had stopped rising and spinning, but now I was sliding to my left. Still in slow motion, but...yes, I was moving slightly faster now.

  I was being carried over to an aisle. I could see the other end of the cylindrical objects now, and the flaring nozzle at the very end, with smaller apertures surrounding it, all screamed 'missile' to me. There was another row of missiles on racks on the other side of the aisle. Nine, like on my side.

  No, ten. There was an empty rack, just in the corner of my 'eye’, passing out of view as I started gliding toward the opposite end of this room.

  Strange, nine on one side, nine on the other plus one empty rack. Then I saw the crane on the other side of the room, gliding back towards my end, two gripping claws ready to snatch and lift. It must have taken the missing missile over there from the empty rack.

  Nine full racks on my side but no empty rack on my side. Not one I could see. Was it behind me?

  No, it…it was…it must…

  Oh no. Oh jeez, oh no, oh shit, I'm fucked times two!

  It’s me.

  They uploaded me into a fucking missile!