Did you know I spent several Loops getting to know everyone that lived in my home town? By now, I probably know more about them than they do.
Loop 84 Year 192 Day 123
AI and I are finally finished with the 12-year work. The plans prioritize the ability to quickly build it. The it? A space station. Not just any space station though, a fully sustainable space station. The space station can hold over a thousand people at once, and can sustain them indefinitely.
Now, normally it would take around five years, pre-bombs, to actually build a simple rocket that has the ability to take one to space. With the hacking program it will only take about a week and a half to have most of the world’s resources under my control.
After building the first bot factory, it will only take about six months to have the orbital space station ready. Figuring in the bot factory taking about a month, and getting the money taking two weeks, I will have a ready product in seven and a half months. Of course this skirts a few of the necessary protocols that places like Nasa will have in place, but I don’t really care for my safety too much.
Coincidentally, the whole process has given me new insights on building my vault. Even without hiring any human contractor, I can cut the time down to two and a half months after the restart. I have about ten years before I revert. I am going to continue study on the space station. AI and I are even building bots specifically enhanced to build it.
Loop 84 Year 195 Day 365
I am sitting alone. Going over the vast amounts of data AI is gathering for me. We have an all but perfect space station plan now.
I am reviewing AI’s past week. She now has a body, indistinguishable from a human. It honestly feels as if she is made of flesh. The nerve endings in the human body are replaced with nanites. Each one can send her a signal, faster than actual nerve endings. She can accurately portray pain or pleasure with her facial features and body language. Something she has picked up over the loops of studying test subjects.
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Something in my mind lurches. My body quivers.
Loop 84 Abyss
I am in the abyss again. The versions of my past stand out in the infinite darkness. Now that I know that they exist, I see them. They are like bright stars that give comfort unto the emptiness of nothingness. One is near me. It seems to move. It moves towards me.
It shows itself, pushing its memories on me. Is it trying to be consumed? No. It wants me to consume it? Oh! At least one of them knows I’m the best for all of us.
I surround him easily. He seems ready to let me inherit his entire self. I quickly consume him. Without waiting for the memories to form in my mind, I search for another. My hunger for them seems to overtake my rationality.
My presence forms around another me. He fights. It’s useless. It takes less time than the first other self I consumed, but he fights back. I consume him, my hunger only growing. I look for a third.
Loop 85 Year 1 Day 1
I drop the knife. Damn! All that planning! All of that work! I was going to give Chelsea the best life!
I have to put my emotions aside. Cause of death: unknown.
I force myself to forget my anger. It is time I create the hacking program. I hate that I am back this far, but I will make the best of my situation. I can’t figure out what the reason is until I create AI again.
Loop 85 Year 1 Day 2
I finish the program early in the morning. The moment I release it, I begin to look through the memories from the other two versions of me I consumed. My hunger for them seems to be gone. Maybe it only exists inside that abyss.
I watch as the program does its magic. I have a folder set up on my laptop. The folder lists each of the major companies or governments that I have access to. I go to Walmart. It is four a.m. I go buy the most expensive computers I can afford with the few thousands of dollars I get from the program. It’s only been a few hours since I’ve put the program into place, I don’t expect more than this.
I buy three different computers. They are all the top line that Walmart has. I say they are gifts for triplets. The Walmart clerk makes a snide joke about how lucky they are to have a rich uncle.
I go to a hotel. I can’t be at Chelsea’s while I do this. After setting up the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign, I set up all three computers. It takes almost no effort to highjack the internet access of the hotel. I install the hacking program, and digest the memories of the two others I consumed.
The second one’s memories come first. As with the first time, it only takes a moment to synthesize all of the information from the other me.
He started on 6/24/2015. He saw a sudden vision. I know what it is, but he does not. He is seeing the vision that Original wanted him to see. He has made a meat factory. His vision is filled with people being pushed into the meat grinder, and meat being packaged from it.
His mind is in the Abyss, but he doesn’t remember it. It is like something forces his mind to forget it every instant.
His Era is filled with shuddering deaths. Every Loop has mutilations beyond what I even inflict upon my test subjects. Why? How can it be that the Era is so closely twined around the event before the first loop? The Original obviously knows how the other versions of me think. He is, after all, a version of me that has over a million Eras to derive information from.
The first entity’s memory I have from my previous trip into the Abyss are startling. His first life is normal. He has a flash of memory from the previous Era. It shows him dying of old age at a retirement home. His first life ends up similarly to mine. He dies at the bomb. It’s the second life that changes. His second Loop has it! What I’ve been looking for!
He courts Chelsea. He marries her. THEY HAVE A CHILD! I need this. I kill myself with a knife.