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A HERETIC REINCARNATES
> —Ever heard of primordial beings? I bet you won’t. Even so, we, the primordials, will take your legacy— when mankind is divided at its worst, thy realm shalt shattered down—
…
Day 284th, Year 2247. (2 days after exploration)
A new calendar system defined by the world's situation. A fallen world in a disastrous biome, having neither day nor night, only light shines from skyscrapers while leaving scrapers scraping for their own lives. The old civilization was erased along with untold history.
10:13 AM;
Allen woke up in the morning in his room. The only light source for his dawn is only directed from the ceiling. Not even an artificial sun exists here. Citizens live in eternal darkness in this sunless world.
A floating (levitated) vehicle stops. It isn’t an aircraft or an airship; it seems like an ordinary bus with the cargo size of a small train cart. Followed by the signal sound beeping loudly. As the door opened, a strong vaporization occurred due to the temperature difference between the two atmospheres colliding with each other. The vehicle automatically opened a thick sheet of metal, creating an entrance to the warm chamber.
He moved his leg into the transport vehicle. There’s no rail, no cable, and no wheel. The train (wheelless) levitates independently, like no gravity defies it. On the journey, you will see a town covered in grime and clouds; it is an unreal place, or more like another realm. Along with the crowd, there’s a place for Automaton droids to stand separately in their zone; the visual hierarchy is discriminately prominent.
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Automaton(s), as we know, are soulless beings. But not all conscious entities are soulless. Sometimes there’s a question: What is actually a soul? What makes being synthetic, being artificial, and being artificial different? Also being genuine?
If the gods (including primordial ones) bless humans with conscience and autonomy, then what are machines with the ability to think on their own? Gods or any sacred entity do not forbid mortals' ability to think, yet we mortals created ethics for the robots as their retention method.
Emotions and Sins are what artificial intelligence isn't capable of. So do desires and sins make us mortal?—who knows?
Is wildlife capable of being emotionally dramatic in the past? —I guess not. Maybe they never speak, and that’s why we are unable to share relative empathy. Evolution is a fascinating abstract; anything is possible with the desire of a survivor, and one thing that is unknown now in the present is the transferable soul concept.
If an Automata is able to transcend back to living flesh, genetic systems would cry for its million years of work to easily become a pirated copycat job, just like sending emails, or giving away free copies of CDs. Either of the primordial entities would facepalm upon their creation with some hopeless speech: ‘What the heck had I created?’
Even so, immortality is kind of nasty in this era. Imagine being cursed with eternal life, forced to witness the inexorable downfall of humanity, seeing the same corrupting authority maraud generations endlessly. Sarcastically, the utmost nightmare of the capital-citizen is simply those capitalists in its nutshell, a nightmare beyond what you could imagine—a true terror of unwilling immortality consequences.
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… Several minutes later, the train cargo stops.
The vehicle is stationed in front of the bay area, and when I say bay area, it has no water. Besides, it is a blank gap in the city (a space) where you can see down into layers of the floor level of the city stacking each other downward like seeing the deep level of the sea below. Contradictory, on the way up as well, you will witness an endless floor of city layers. Just like God's reaching tower, aka. the Babylon.
A gray market where you can find, you know—both things. Not at a reasonable price but on an affordable network. A place where rarity is in the matter of mints and authority is ‘by the budget product’ relatively. Not Einstein’s Relativity for sure, but who knows?—Money talks, it’s the strongest force on this planet, and no Physic laws are allowed in this business.
Neither the person on the bill nor the concept of tangible currency exist any longer. But the psychological authority behind it still harmonizes up until now with simple civilized humans' primal, everlasting desire: ‘prosperity’. But the civilization of the flourishing age was already over long ago.
Allen stops at one alley after spending half an hour patrolling around the chaotic area. Finally, he found the place for his business. Before Allen even got a chance to greet the first-time-met owner. A muscular man in a bald placed the item in front of the counter.
“Go check it out.” Said the bald owner, the type of man who could ruin your life if you made a bad decision by chance. He also placed a handgun on the counter shortly.
“Don’t mind me, fellas, I’d like my business quick, that’s it.” Careless voice spoken in blunt upon the dead air.
“Well, that’s undeniable.
I will take a little checkup, and then we’re good to go.
..Can I, right?” Surprisingly, he doesn’t seem to intimidate Allen, at least.
"Whatever you do, kid, make it quick.”
“Surely I do.” Allen spent about a minute observing multiple neon vials, which looked like stimulants or unknown substances. A strong one that humans couldn’t resist the side effects of. After inspection, but before he ever got a chance to negotiate, the owner grabbed the package.
“Take it or not?” The owner's sharp word declares the final decision; he ain’t the one who negotiates. Even Allen found some flaws, but the deal is undeniable due to accessibility being considered very rare.
He stares into the store owner’s eyes as he places his transaction.
“Fifty percent more for it, it’s extremely in shortage.” That’s kind of a direct overcharge, but he heard that the owner only minds his business, not the customer's backstory.
“If that helps me keep this anonymous, sure.” In an incontestable condition, Allen willingly accepts the deal. Not even a glimpse from a man before Allen gazed on or questioned his business, which makes it trustworthy enough. He takes his leave as soon as the deal is done, filling himself up along with the random crowd on the big street. Along with the flow of anonymity, every business was driven by its own thirst, feeding on the desire to consume, the most preeminent human desire.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Unlike others, what Allen longs for no longer exists. For sure, what he does has nothing to do with retribution against the Apex.
A parade of random strangers crossed each other, emanating a fume of hot air; visible mist came out of their breath due to underworld’s coldness. Sadly, there’s no snow here; the most unnatural city does not produce any organic environment. People live with the chill, but not frozen, working on their jobs and feeding their families. Just like an industrial machine but in modern days.
Autonomous beings (the human) live in an undeniable prison society, while in contrast, Automatons (the machine) seem to have more freedom, as they’re not bound by what we call ‘life’— or because they don’t feel at all? We never listened to an activist for machines either, they sounded idiotic. Striving for survival is already hard enough.
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As the brightness faded, the town started to get darker and colder. It is a location that Allen revealed his secret hideout, he unraveled the blanket that covered the debris. A humanoid, a doll that looks unconditionally damaged at its worst. What piqued his interest back then was the ornate sigil that was engraved on its hand along with the name ‘Noel’ in its engraving. Fortunately, his dead sister also had the same name; fate, perhaps, will be the right answer. Allen isn’t any saint around, and he rarely takes interest in unrelated affairs, probably because this Apex’s lost and found asset might be worth his time.
After several tries, he knows the mixture of this humanoid power source. It is a highly concentrated chemical, especially as an energy source reactant, and it glows as brightly as a visible photon particle or what we had seen of a radioactive radiant substance in movies. Lethal, toxic, and hazardous. A kind of substance that literally kills any human, perhaps a delicacy to this humanoid. As he finishes setting the ground for his test bench, Allen plunges his meal-cooking-knife (which he uses to stir the mixture) onto the small lab table before handling himself over the dying genderless humanoid.
As he dripped some promising droplets onto its mouth, a tiny wave of radiance emitted in a little circuit pattern. He embraces the humanoid-doll to his shoulder, lying it down a little bit before starting to slowly pour the mixtures.
“I hope this will work.”
As the promising mixture falls all the way down into its opened-mouth, the humanoid starts to grab the clothes nearby densely, seemingly shaking in pain. A dim fluorescence flares emitted and begins to travel around its body in a circuit pattern. Its uncovered body that smudged with blood and ashes began to roast. It seems like its body is now slowly regenerating. He could hear something like an energy wave being transmitted around the doll’s body, its body surged with unstable hot and cold temperatures.
Allen stepped back to grab his little hatchet after all of the vials had been used up with it. The genderless humanoid begins to regain its body shape, which turns out to be a feminine posture. Her hair was shredded, and while her surface is now just filled with bruises and cuts, it used to look like she had been roasted alive before her tissue regenerated. Suddenly the light cut out, leaving her image obscure.
“So you can talk, right?” Allen steps in, as he does not sense any danger after observing the humanoid woman regain her mobility for a while.
“ —Talk?” Her crackling voice represents the incompleteness of her regeneration. Maybe she needed some more time, but Allen had waited long enough.
“Got a name?
Identify yourself, and what are you.” He treats the object in front of him in an Automaton way.
But he got ignored.
The humanoid observes the area around it curiously, then begins to observe her palm, moving it around and flickering fingers one by one.
“Your name.”
“Oh.
—sorry,
My name is Noel, Experiment IV Project-21.” She slightly tilted her head in inhumane behavior while staring at Allen.
“So, what are you? You look like neither a human nor a machine at all, never seen one of these before.” He still carried his weapon behind whilst the humanoid showed no sign of hostility.
“I am — ”
“.....” the humanoid pauses.
..
“Do you live here —alone?”
“Yes.
Now answer my question.” Allen was frustrated that a humanoid randomly changed the question.
“Talk to you later then. See you.” Noel, the humanoid, seems to have no manners at all. She knocks metal plates around in a hurry and looks like she is listening to something before suddenly starting to break Allen’s hideout wall. She ripped a sheet of thin metal with her bare hands, revealing a big vent cover. Her strength seems intimidating.
“What are you doing?—Cleaning out my place for free?”
She turns back, answering shortly: “You had been tracked.”
Then, jumped down the vent unhesitatingly. The last echo from the vent is a diminishingly faded voice telling him to jump down. But he never intended to follow her.
Allen, confusingly stunned, began realizing things. He’s quite sure that no one has been following him around. And don't believe on its weird act—did this humanoid plan an excuse to escape while he was confused?
Before he finishes turning around, his back is contacted with something dull that feels cold like a gun barrel.
“Stand still, Citizen.” A familiar voice, there’s only one unit that uses this terror voice for this android type, at the moment Allen still feels uncertain about it, but..
A shot was fired next to Allen’s ear.
“I said stand still, Citizen.”
A high-powered blast burst the floor tiles into ashes, leaving a piece of reflective fragment as a clue. Allen stole a quick peek over the shattered mirror, revealing the faces of a robot of enormous size veiled by dirty old clothes. As he looks into its face which has glowing blue lights, he is certain that it's a formidable Yaksha-unit definitely. The worst situation that could ever happen to him, facing the Apex’s worst grim reaper.
> The statue of the killing machine. According to the myths it was protector, yet also a destroyer of all. A figure represents both hero and villian in itself, nothing more nothing less. [https://i.postimg.cc/kgdfZgLC/Yaksha.png]
>
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> Image description: [Yaksha {also known as: Yasha, Yacha, Yak}]---The scaled size statue of the killing machine. According to the myths it was protector, yet also a destroyer of all. A figure represents both hero and villian in itself, nothing more nothing less.
The malicious killing machine that rended citizens mercilessly, entitled to be the worst of the worst opponents to face. A shiver of fear surged through him all the way to the ankle, as spine-chilling caught up to his mind, prickling the hairs over his nape. Meanwhile, he also senses that it must be patrolling flying drones from the capital Apex; she—Noel was right back then. This seems to be a full search party. Apex, at all costs, is readied to start a war at any cost.
A creepy sensation, the intense pressure of an unfriendly android with an ominous appearance, Yaksha unit. The first-class executioner android, second to none of Grim’s nightmare, stares fixedly at Allen from behind, trying to trace some evidence on him. This walking jinx of Apex seekers only meant to bring massacre upon his town, Allen feels regret for bringing Noel here.
“I’m s—”
A strong voice shouted from the vent in an instant.
“If you wish to live, there is no better chance than now!”
What comes after is a squad of flying Apex’s drones that swarm up and open fire over Allen's direction rapidly. As he dodged, the drone instead, focused its fire and its bullet hell all over the Yaksha android, creating a gap in time for him to leap down.
Allen grinding his back along the metal tube’s wall all the way down, an explosion occurred from the top which dropped some debris over him shortly. Unluckily, the flying drone's fan blades were one of them—a shuriken-like weapon spinning down with high speed over the vent path spin-stabbed over his shoulder and leg. Gnashing in agony, he did not let any noise come out of his silent mouth until the end of the pit.
He dropped into a blank river in absolute darkness as his consciousness fading away in the contaminated water. Drowning into the depths of the abyss where no one could find him, his blood diluted and the pain cracked up his faded mind due to heavy blood loss. The last place he sleeps might be this unknown abyss.
◤
Over the cloudy darkness, after tides of black liquid, he dreams. He sees the lost one, the lost soul—someone who is welcoming him home..
Home—
He sees his sister, a home welcoming warmth, maybe this is heaven. As Allen touches her hand, his eye opens—seeing the dark place blurry at first sight. A little dancing shadow cast from the small campfire, the blaze helps remind him to redirect his sight over the one who creates it.
And he sees Noel sitting next to him.
It appears to be inside some tunnel out of nowhere.
But..
It’s Noel, his little sister.
She had already been dead for almost a decade. His mind inflicted with shock and nerves, at his last strength, Allen withstands his pain, forcing himself to push himself up from the ground.
“Who are you?” He asked the shadow over his little sister's face who seemed to be already grown up. She started to gleam vivid scarlet lights in her retina with mischievous looks. Like there’s some unprecedented energy behind that smile; it releases a terrifying sensation around him, tensing up his nerves. For a few seconds afterward, she softly replied: “I already told you that we would talk later, aren’t we?” She seems to be someone who kept their promise, except that her identity is unknown.
As Allen reached his hand over his back pocket, she shoved her hand over the pocket next to her, replying: “Looking for this?”
An item that seems to be Allen’s hatchet drawn from that girl.
Through his injury, he starts to lose consciousness, and his strength pales, forcibly pushing his body down to the ground. Struggling to breathe, gasping faintly. Allen will soon enter his slumber in this unknown tunnel.
“Don’t worry, Allen. I’m not your Noel, just another —Noel.
We will have a lot of time to talk.
.. Now, sleep well.”
She sits down in front of his fading vision and places her palm over his head.
“Goodnight sweetheart.”
.. As Allen fades out, one thing he is quite certain of is that he will never speak of his name. But, guess that it doesn’t matter anymore. Because the Grim might already take him on its journey sooner or later.
… “Goodnight.”