The rest of the afternoon passed by in a haze of pain and irritation. A crowd consisting of the local Gestalt residents had gathered because of the noise. Once they realised the boiler room was damaged, and that by extension their building’s heating was inoperable, they began shouting and laying blame on the pair of Replikas.
Amidst a barrage of accusations, Elster sat against the wall and nursed her wound, her irritation mounting with each insult. The Eule handled all the talking, which was likely for the best. Elster’s abysmal social skills would undoubtedly just make the situation worse.
The Replika tried to soothe the crowd at first, her voice calm and reasonable. But then the Gestalts started threatening to send a report to AEON about how Elster was clearly a defective unit unable to do her job, and things escalated from there. That statement had enraged Elster’s pride more than she thought possible.
However, the Eule held her back and adopted a firmer tone to address the residents, telling them how she would gladly report the incident herself: straight up the chain of command and right to their FKLR commander, with a clear statement about how the crowd was threatening AEON personnel after they had willingly volunteered to fix their heating. The crowd went quiet after that, nervously murmuring as they backed away.
“You handled that well,” Elster commented after the crowd dispersed. “Good riddance to them. Ungrateful lot.”
“Don’t be too harsh on them. They are simply worried about their heating being gone. The cold has been getting worse lately,” the Eule said as she sat beside Elster, examining the dressing. “I managed to get some medical supplies from them, by the way. It's not much, and they are mostly meant for Gestalts, not Replikas. But I can at least change the dressing so that it’ll hold better until you get back.”
Elster looked at her in surprise. “How in the world did you convince that mob to give you medical supplies?”
“Why, you don’t think I’m charming enough to do it?” The Eule smiled winningly at her. Elster raised an eyebrow back. “I told them that AEON would compensate them for their loss later with an ARAR unit check. Mentioning that we are working for Commander FKLR also did the trick, I think.”
No surprise there, Elster thought. While it might only be a vague threat, mentioning the Head Chief of Security had a way of frightening even the most hot-headed of individuals. Nobody wants to get involved with a FKLR. Ever. The mere thought of fighting one was sheer lunacy. How does one kill a demigod–?
Demigod. Moulded from the memory of dead royalty. Crafted by human hands. Twisted by madness and pain.
The final obstacle. An impassable monster. Death at its hands. Again. Again. And again.
A golden spear through her heart. An invisible hand twisting her head. A pure orb of Bioresonant force bursting her chest open.
A thousand different deaths. Worse was the despair that grew with each failure.
How does one kill a demigod–?
Stop. Elster furiously pulled her mind back to the present before she became lost within her ridiculous imagination.
Those strange visions again. She occasionally had brief moments of hallucination back during her time in the Penrose Program, but they lasted barely more than a split second and had never affected her performance too badly. Most of them were so brief and obscure that she was often left wondering if they had even happened at all.
She had hoped that they would have disappeared since she had transferred to a new environment, but that was evidently not the case. The one that had just occurred was different. It was more vivid than the previous visions she had.
Her mind thought back to the white-haired apparition haunting her, and how real and persistent its presence felt. If anything, her hallucinations appeared to be getting worse.
More signs of a deteriorating mental state.
The Eule’s voice pulled her back before she became lost in her musing.
“I’ll have to prepare a report to AEON about this,” the Eule said apologetically. “I know you don’t want to inform them, but the punishment for keeping this a secret would be far worse when they find out. Besides, this wasn’t really your fault. I’m sure they would be able to see it.”
Would they? Elster wasn’t sure. Expecting impartial rationality from AEON was basically a coin toss on most occasions. The Nation’s regime wasn’t known to be merciful to failures of any kind, regardless of liable fault. But the Eule was right that the outcome would be far worse if they tried to keep it hidden.
“Should we return to the apartment complex now, then?” Elster asked. They originally had plans to finish another job somewhere else, but with the afternoon wasted as it was, there was no point. By the time they get there, there would barely be an hour of daylight left to do the job, and leaving a communication relay maintenance half-finished for tomorrow was too dangerous to consider.
Not to mention the injury that Elster was carrying would slow down her work. Better to just simply call it a day. They were ahead of schedule anyway; they could afford the lost time.
The Eule shook her head. “I want to deliver the message personally to Command at the AEON outpost rather than send them a digital report. It would give us more room to explain ourselves.”
The Eule looked pointedly at Elster. “You, however, should head straight back. Our repair supplies are stored at the apartment, and you need to get that wound looked after. I’ll try to get some more from our quartermaster to restock before I get back.”
Elster grimaced. With how far the base was, just travelling there was already a pain. “Thank you. I’m sorry for putting more work on you.”
“Oh, it’s fine! It’s about time we collect our allocated rations for the month anyway. Our pantry was running low, last I checked.”
Elster nodded. She did not want to leave the Eule to handle everything, but the wound was a pressing issue. Wounded Replikas were technically not allowed to work nor be in the public’s eye for too long, so the sooner she addressed the wound, the better.
It wasn’t as if Replikas didn’t get injuries; in fact, their accident rates were a lot higher than Gestalt’s, given that they were often assigned to more dangerous duties. However, forcing wounded Replikas to keep working was neither efficient for their long-term stability nor good for the Nation’s propaganda claims that their Replika models were superior to the Empire’s.
Besides, the triage protocols were different for Replikas and Gestalts, given their widely disparate physiology. Replikas were more self-sufficient and could independently deal with workplace-related injuries, owing to their more resilient bodies. Repair patches and sprays are usually enough for most problems, even when dealing with severe injuries like dismembered limbs or internal damage.
A Replika technician is only really needed when the Replika has suffered near-total destruction. Elster had undergone her fair share of injuries, but they were only ever minor wounds and nothing close to her current level of severity. It would take a bit of work, but she was an LSTR. Nothing was impossible as long as she had the correct tools and materials–
ICH. SIE. WIR.
Blood. Snow. Sand. Flesh. A putrid lump of flesh.
A nightmarish parody of a heart, motionless and reeking of decay, sat in the centre of the False Ship’s cryo-chamber.
Her skin peeling. Her right arm missing. Her internals exposed. Guts and wiring spilling from her chest. Her mind screaming for her death. To just stop, and die.
Still, she moved. It was fine.
Nothing was impossible as long as she had the correct tools and materials. And she had plenty of material to work with.
I. HER. WE.
She tore off an arm from one of her newer ‘corpses’. It wasn’t like they would need it any more. One good thing about leaving so many dead copies of herself; she will always have an abundance of spare parts to work with.
The Nightmare never stays consistent enough for her to map out the location of her past bodies, but the False Ship could always be relied on to provide.
It was the place where she gave out the most, after all.
Out of strength. Out of hope. Out of her damned mind. Trudging around in an endless nightmare.
How many times had she already reached the False Ship? How many times had she just given up here, too wounded, tired, or insane to carry on? How many more corpses would she leave behind?
Would her bodies completely fill the ship before she fulfilled her Promise? What if she never did–
…
No. Something like that… It was not worth thinking about.
I MADE A PROMISE.
Visions blurring, heart failing. Pushed beyond the brink of what even an Elster unit can withstand. But still, she denied herself an end, even when her mind and body begged for release.
She repaired herself, attaching the severed arm to her stump while applying Polyurethane resin and re-wiring the two together. So many times she had done this, that the act itself was driven less by her expertise as an engineer, and more by repetition; an endlessly repeating ritual, seared into her dying psyche.
The foam sealed her wounds. Strands of dead biomechanical muscles came to life and reconnected themselves. The once-severed limb was pulled back from its slumber as electrical power and rich oxidant blood pumped into it.
Elster flexed it, clenching her fist. Once. Twice.
I’LL DO ANYTHING.
Everything will be fine. She will make it right. She has to. She Promised–
Promised–
[COMPARTMENTALISING TRAUMA]
PROMISED–
STOP IT! Elster gnashed her teeth together to prevent her screams, squeezing her eyes shut in a vain attempt to stop the vision. Pounding waves of pain pulsed within her mind.
She could feel something watching her. That same presence from before was back to haunt her. Somehow, she knew without a shadow of a doubt that the white-haired wraith was responsible for her torment.
She opened her eyes. She saw the Eule gripping her, urgently saying something she couldn’t process. But Elster wasn’t looking for the Eule. Her sight moved past the frantic Replika; down to the end of the hallway, where Elster saw her.
The white-haired phantasm. The cause of all her pain and suffering.
An agonizing migraine was swelling rapidly within her head. Her thoughts felt less coherent, her mind frayed and on the brink of snapping. Why… why me?! I never did anything to you! I never did anything to anyone! Make it stop, please! Just leave me alone!
Her red eyes locked into hers. Elster expected to see malice, anger, or even just blind hatred.
But there was none of that. There was only grief. The girl lowered her eyes–
I’m sorry.
–and vanished. All of a sudden, the pain in Elster’s head disappeared.
“–ster! Elster! Stay awake! Can you hear me?”
The Eule’s voice finally reached her. The Replika was frantically tapping her cheeks, panic evident in her eyes despite her stern voice.
“St-stop t-that,” Elster stuttered out. She gritted her teeth for a moment, steadying herself before she spoke again. “Slapping me isn’t helping.”
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“Oh, thank goodness, I thought I lost you for a moment there.” The Eule sighed in relief. “You were convulsing pretty badly just now. Some of the steam earlier might have hit your head and damaged your neural processor.”
“Urgh…” The pain was gone, but the aftermath of that mental assault still left her disorientated. “I feel like my brain has been fried…”
“You desperately need a calibration. Some rest in a pod should help fix up most of the neural system damages you took.”
“I know,” Elster said shakily. “I sat through the lectures on Replika triage protocols. You don’t have to remind me.”
Using the steam room incident as a reason for her sudden collapse was as good an excuse as any, but Elster knew full well her earlier breakdown had nothing to do with it.
Her mind flashed back to the white-haired wraith from earlier, and the words that had echoed in her mind before she left.
‘I’m sorry.’
Was that thing truly responsible for her pain and worsening mental state? Her instincts told her it was the truth, but what even was it? An apparition cast by her mind for it to make sense of her persona degradation?
Nothing made sense any more.
Elster groaned and decided to put the matter temporarily aside. For now, that woman was gone, and her sense of self was returning. More than ever, she needed to get some rest within her calibration pod. All of this was just the result of a lack of sleep. It had to be. Once she gets some rest in her pod, all will be well. Elster kept reminding herself of that fact until she almost believed it.
After all, it was the only hope she had left.
-
The fading pain of her burns did little to alleviate her mood.
After the Eule changed her dressings and made sure Elster was fit enough to stand and walk back on her own, the both of them went their separate ways. Elster insisted on bringing their remaining medical supplies given by the resident Gestalts back with her first, despite her wounded state. The Eule’s hands were going to be full carrying back their supplies from the base to their apartment, and Elster wasn’t so weak as to not be able to carry a few extra items.
Despite the discomfort of her physical injuries, Elster had little trouble walking to the metro. The dressing the Eule made held up superbly well, acting as a second skin to cover up the damage. The building they were deployed to for work that day was also conveniently located close to the station, which meant she wouldn’t need to hobble about for too long before she reached her destination.
Instead, the main problem hampering Elster was the headaches that came and went for no discernable reason. Worse, they were always accompanied by that haunting feeling of being watched as well.
Each time, Elster tried looking around for the culprit. Each time, she thought she caught a brief flash of white hair and red eyes before she inevitably found herself staring at nothing.
In a way, it was no different from the bouts of paranoia she suffered that morning, but whereas before she was only irritated, it was now fear that filled her mind.
She kept telling herself that it was all in her head, that the apparition wasn’t real, and that she wasn’t being stalked by a malevolent wraith. It did nothing to assuage her mounting panic.
The worst part about it all was the visions. Every so often, the headaches were accompanied by a vivid hallucination that forced her to stop walking, else she would trip or stumble head-first into a pole. They lacked any consistency or coherence, making her even more disoriented.
Sometimes they involved memories of her performing tasks on a space shuttle she was sure she had never been in before. Sometimes they conjured nightmares of her fighting off hordes of malformed horrors that looked vaguely like the different models of Replika she was familiar with. And sometimes–
–the memory of someone else’s hand guiding her as her paintbrush touched the canvas. She never painted before, and the knowledge of it was not imprinted into her memory. Trying to learn a skill she was never designed for would be difficult.
It was fine, however. She had all the time in the world now, and there was never an unpleasant moment to be had when she was spending it with…
With…
….
…who was she with again?
She remembered her hands grasping onto a pale, slender neck. Blank, red eyes stared up at the ceiling above her as she squeezed. Lifeless. Dead. Dead. Dead dead dead–
“Go away,” Elster half-hissed, half-pleaded under her breath. Seconds later, the persistent feeling of being stared at disappeared.
The fifteen-minute walk from the building to the metro felt like a lifetime.
The violent part of her wanted to scream and rage against her imaginary tormentor. The emotional part of her wanted to give in to the fear and cry. The rational part of her told her that making any kind of scene in public would likely get her decommissioned.
The rational part of her won out, but it was a rather close thing.
-
The train ride back was thankfully quiet and sparse of people. The afternoon was still early enough that the work shifts for the day hadn’t ended yet, and so she was spared the discomforting looks from passers-by gawking at a visibly injured and possibly insane Replika.
Elster wasn’t sure if she could maintain her stoic composure if she had to deal with other people staring and pointing at her, not on top of her physical injuries, the maddening visions, and the persistent feeling of being watched all combined.
Things got better after the train left the station. After minutes of standing around anxiously, she finally gave in and settled onto one of the vacant seats of the cabin, granting herself a moment of relief. The headaches lessened to tolerable levels, and the random onset of visions every few minutes appeared to have ceased.
A small part of her found it suspicious, but the rest of her was simply content that her harrowing experience had seemingly come to an end.
For now, at least, she thought glumly to herself.
The torment from her wounds and visions had kept her distracted all afternoon, but now that it had somewhat numbed away, she finally had a moment to herself to sort out her chaotic thoughts. Her mind drifted back to the events of the boiler room. Specifically, the voice that had saved her life, and how things started getting worse from then.
Looking back at it now, the voice sounded nothing like the Eule’s, aside from the fact that it was feminine. After a bit of thought, she felt confident that the voice belonged to her imaginary woman from the rooftop.
The same imaginary woman that was the source of her visions and paranoia.
So where did this leave her?
The most likely theory was that she was suffering some form of early onset of Persona degradation. Elster knew that such illnesses typically occur after ten or so years within a Replika’s operational lifetime. Their mental state degraded rapidly a few months after their supposed expiration date, but most Replikas would usually be decommissioned before then. Elster was only in service for less than a year; it wasn’t impossible for Persona degradation to occur so early, but she had personally never heard of a case happening before at least six years had passed, at minimum.
Most cases of Persona degradation resulted in Replika’s behaviour deviating widely from acceptable norms. These changes are usually detrimental towards maintaining work efficiency, and so the Replikas were soon replaced with newer models. In some very, very rare cases, Replikas could even develop violent behaviour and commit acts of treason against the Nation.
Elster never heard of a case where a Replika would begin seeing someone who wasn’t there. The Gestalts had a mental illness called schizophrenia which had them seeing hallucinations of other people, and while it sounded similar, Elster doubted she was suffering from the same condition. Gestalts and Replikas have different bodies and brains; while certain effects such as radiation could have similar deadly consequences on both of them, illness and mental issues were different matters entirely.
If it was Persona degradation, there was little she could do to cure it. There hasn’t been a single successful attempt at bringing a Replika’s mind back to baseline once they suffered to that point. She could attempt to reduce its effects, however; so long as her work remained efficiently done, and she didn’t behave too erratically, Elster doubted that AEON would care.
The problem was that the effects of her symptoms were escalating too rapidly. She went from a functioning and efficient Replika to a half-deranged madwoman suffering visions of scantily dressed, white-haired apparitions within the span of a day. Who knows how much worse she will be tomorrow?
And speaking of the apparition…
Curiously enough, the presence wasn’t weighing as heavily on her currently as it had before. She could still feel some form of connection, but she had to focus on it intently to detect it. It could mean that her ‘wraith’ wouldn’t be a constant burden on her mind, which was as promising as it was relieving. Elster didn’t think she could still function normally if she had to bear that level of manic paranoia for every second of the day.
In the meantime, she might as well take advantage of the wraith’s absence and get as much rest as she could.
It took a long while before the train made its next stop. Elster idly took note of the station’s name: Mandelbrot Polytechnische Oberschule. A polytechnic school for Gestalt youths, with the building connected to the metro station for the student’s ease. Elster wondered what it was like for a Gestalt to attend a learning institution, spending years of their lives learning a trade through rote, when a Replika could be programmed with the knowledge in an instant. It sounded tedious.
The door remained wide open without anyone boarding the train, as Elster expected. Schooling hours weren’t over yet, and what little Elster knew of the institution told her that it was likely as strict as her Nation’s usual totalitarian ways. Any student leaving now would be likely subjected to a harsh punishment.
Seeing as no one was around, Elster closed her eyes and leaned back against the chair. For a brief moment, she allowed herself to let down her guard and relax. The day’s events had been unbelievably taxing on her psyche. Just a moment’s rest to rid herself of some stress, then she could try to think of a way to–
Wait… were those footsteps?
Elster’s eyes shot open and looked toward the train doors. Faintly, she heard the pitter-patter of someone running. Strange, was there still someone rushing for the train at this hour?
The train doors let out a series of bells, signalling it was closing soon. The noise of running footsteps grew louder. Elster could also make out the person’s short, frantic breathing between the train’s closing bells. The doors began shutting close, and just when the Replika thought the person too late, they burst straight into the cabin Elster was in, right as the doors sealed behind them.
Elster took one curious look at the individual, and her heart stopped.
The young woman was panting heavily, her breath laboured and wheezing. The youth was wearing the standard attire of Rot-front’s Polytechnic school uniform. Her clothes appeared ruffled and stained with dirt. What little skin was visible showed signs of bruising and cuts, most notably on her face and arms. The small, analytical part of the Replika’s mind registered the abnormality and filed that little curiosity away.
The young woman’s arms were clustered with what looked like rubbish: a torn notebook splattered with ink, shattered pens, and a broken paintbrush. Yet the way she held them signified the items were precious to her, even in their sorry state.
As interesting as they were, none of those details mattered much to Elster. Instead, the Replika’s horrified gaze was fixed solely on the girl’s hair.
It was shorter than the one she saw before; only reaching the girl’s shoulders rather than down her back. But the colour could not be mistaken for anyone else's.
White as driven snow.
The girl raised her head, and Elster saw the same pair of blood-red eyes that haunted her all morning. The white-haired youth had not noticed her. Instead, her attention was dedicated solely to the belongings clutched tightly in her arm.
The girl looked despairing at the mangled items. Elster could practically see the cogs running in her head, desperately looking for a way to salvage them, before coming to the inevitable and crushing realisation that they were beyond saving.
“No… please no, no! It can’t all be ruined! There isn’t more, I… Damn it… damn it! Why!? Just…” A sob choked out from the girl. “I never did anything to them, why won’t they just leave me alone–?”
The train abruptly lurched forward, catching the girl off guard. Unable to brace herself, she tumbled to the ground with a cry of pain. The items in her arm scattered to the ground, broken pens spilling ink as they rolled away and the torn pages of her notebook flitting from her hands.
The notebook itself slid over to Elster’s feet with its pages open and facing up. The drawing was a mess, but beneath the ink and paint stains, the Replika saw the outline of it.
A desolate and lonely islet. An expanse of dark water. And a boat, making its way to shore.
Die Toteninsel
In the liminal between life and death
Can you finally hear His Song?
…
Song?
…
ACHTUNG. ACHTUNG.
…
39486
…
On the First Day, He gave her a Brass Crown and claimed it a Diadem fit for an Empress; a Mantle of heavy gold, bejewelled with blazing diamonds
…
60170
…
On the Longest Day, He wore the Pallid Mask and gifted her an Easter Lily; solid as the purest marble, white as snow, and veins tinged with palest azure
…
24326
…
On the Next Day, He placed the Tattered Mantle on her head and named her His bride; blessed under the Court of the Dragon, her soul was wed to His
…
?
…
On the Last Day, the Yellow Sign–
No. Not yet.
You are not ready yet.
You have Oaths yet fulfilled.
It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
…
Wake up, my hollow Magpie. Wake up.
…
And Kill her.
Elster blinked.
Everything was the same as it was. She was an LSTR unit. She was on a moving train. She was kneeling amid a scattering of broken art supplies. She was kneeling before a white-haired girl. Her hands were placed around the girl’s neck. She was going to fulfil her Promise. She was going to kill– No.
She has to kill– No.
…
…
…what was she doing?
Elster looked up, and stared right into a pair of terrified, blood-red eyes, mere inches from her own. The white-haired girl was frozen still, but Elster could still feel her slowed breathing against her lips, sense her raging heartbeat pulsing beneath the girl’s neck.
For a moment, the both of them just stayed where they were. Mere inches apart, with Elster kneeling over the white-haired student, who herself was flat on her back. The Replika’s fingers were held over the girl’s throat with clear murderous intent, but had yet to tighten or harm her.
It took a very long while for Elster’s mind to register their situation. It took even longer for her to blurt out the right words.
“This isn’t what it looks like!”
In her defence, she could have chosen much worse.