“The jury finds Kaelyn McCarthy guilty of two counts of first-degree murder.” Those words echoed in my head as I sat still as a statue in the courtroom. I knew that would be the result of this case, and while I knew what was going to come afterwards, I didn’t regret it at all. I hadn’t even tried to deny it, those monsters deserved what I’d given them and there was no chance in Hell that I’d even try to defend myself. I’d told my lawyer as such, and while he didn’t like it, he had gone along with it. He did his best all the same, and for that I could at least appreciate the time he put into my defense.

“Then, according to the laws of the Terran Alliance, the sentence for these crimes is death. Would the defendant like to state the manner of their execution they wish to have?” The judge, a wise old father figure sort of man, asked of me, his steel gray eyes fixed on me.

I was silent for a time, clearly thinking and they were polite enough to allow me such time as to properly make up my mind. It wasn’t a common thing after all, asking someone precisely how they’d like to die. Finally I made up my mind and for the first time that day I spoke.

“In my sleep, your honor. Poison capsule please.” I said, my voice bereft of any emotion beyond resignation. The judge nodded, raising his steel and wood gavel. 

“Then this court is dismissed.”

And with that, it was all over. I stood with all the others and was escorted to my new home. A cell that would house me until I passed in my sleep. Unless it was something spectacular like asking to be spaced or shot into a star, you never really knew exactly when you’d be put down. I certainly wouldn’t. They could be quite quick about it and by tomorrow morning I’d be long dead. Or it could be weeks from now, giving me time to think long and hard about what I’d done.

I didn’t need to think, I just wanted it to be over with and done. I just wanted to sleep. That night I laid my head down on my pillow, closed my eyes and curled up in a ball. I stayed that way for days, each time wondering if my next meal would be my last.

I woke up to something I hadn’t expected, a woman in a very fancy suit with a pin on the lapel. I recognized the logo immediately, the woman clearly working for the mega corporation known as Valkyr. They specialized in Virtual Intelligences and naval technologies, AKA, they were really good at building massive spaceships. They were one of the best at it actually, and I’d recently heard something about them preparing to unveil something new. Something that should change the course of humanity forever. I sat up, rubbing the sleep from my eyes as I swept them over the woman. 

“Can I help you?”

“Yes, actually you can. By now you no doubt know who I work for, so I’ll just skip over the corporate sales pitch and instead give you this. My  Ohto  of names is Takagi Otoe, though you may simply call me Ms. Otoe. As for why I’m here, well, the company thinks you could be of great use to us.”

I listened to her, then snorted, shaking my head. Great use? As what? I doubted I’d be around much longer, and the government probably wouldn’t let me go without asking why and sticking their noses into whatever the corporations were doing with me. 

“And how could I be of use? I mean, I’ve not got much left in terms of time to do much of anything.” I asked, and Otoe’s smile grew in a manner I really didn’t like. Nor did I like the twinkle in her eyes either.

“Don’t you worry about how much time you have left, that is of little consequence. However, what you can do is put that mind of yours to better pursuits than simply dying. I can’t give the full details here, as this place is woefully unsecured, but the gist of it is that you would be ushering in a new era for humanity.”

I raised a brow, crossing my arms over my chest, but considered it. It sounded almost like one of those donate your body to science type things, and that didn’t sound so bad honestly. I mean, what’s the worst they could do with my body right?

“Alright… I’ll do it. Whatever it is.” I say carefully, wanting to give back just a bit more to the universe before I was taken out of it. Otoe smiled broadly, then produced a small data pad that had all sorts of corporate lingo scrolling across the screen. The text was so small I couldn’t make out a single word and like anyone, I didn't try to read it all, instead I pressed my thumb where the pad wanted me to, and in essence sold my soul.

She put the pad away, and then stood, smoothing out her mid thigh length skirt with a smile. The door to my cell opened and she stepped out without a word, leaving me to wonder just what the company had in store for me. She paused, just as the door closed. 

“We’ll be seeing you real soon.” And with that she left me alone. I sat there totally confused, but shrugged, leaning back against the wall and picking up a book I’d been given to read so I at least had something to do. 

That evening I took possession of my meal, a nice meatloaf dish that was honestly pretty great. At least they fed us well, I knew I’d be putting on a few extra pounds before my end. Finishing the meal I put the tray aside and picked up the book again, laying down to read. I felt my eyes starting to grow heavy, a tingling in my fingertips that started to spread throughout my whole body. Panic rose in me, but it was dulled and when I tried to move I found I couldn’t. But finally, my eyes drifted shut, and I found myself dying calmly, just as I had asked.

Except then I woke up in a very bright room that hurt my eyes. Across from my reclined chair sat Ms. Otoe, who watched me intently. 

“Finally, I was beginning to think that the guard had slipped the wrong pill into your food. I am pleased to see that I was wrong.”

“Where am I? What is this place?” I asked, and Otoe made a small motion, a portion of the wall sliding upwards as technicians wheeled in some unpleasant looking machinery.

“Where you are is a small asteroid research facility, where we do all our most heavily classified studies and experiments. It’s so secret that only I, as facility director, and the CEO know of its existence. The workers here will all have their minds wiped when they’re done, all they’ll remember is some horrible accident that left them in a coma or something. Same with me, when the time comes. Plausible deniability and all that jazz, you understand.”

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I nodded, frowning as I watched the technicians setting everything up. Were those drill bits? That couldn’t be good.

“And uh… just what sort of research do you do here?” I asked, and Otoe stood, clearly just to stretch her legs.

“Research into artificial intelligence. Now I know what you’re thinking, all A.I. have this nasty habit of going homicidal within the first few minutes of being activated. And yes, that is true, save for the few machine species out there. We still haven’t the faintest clue how they managed to repress that part of themselves, but it’s something we’re looking into,” Otoe’s gaze settled on my own, and she moved closer to me, placing her hands on the arms of my chair. “However, we’ve decided to try a different route. Instead of making a purely artificial intelligence, why not utilize the intelligences we already have? I mean, the human brain is essentially one type of computer, isn’t it?”

I felt the blood drain from my cheeks, and before I could do much else than gasp, I felt restraints snapping into place over my ankles and wrists, along with my neck and head, holding me still.

“I’m sorry Kaelyn, this is going to hurt quite a bit. But you really should have read the fine print. Because you are going to die, or at least your body is, but your mind… oh your mind is going to become so much more.” Otoe whispered this in my ear, and I tried to break free, but the restraints held me firmly in place. She stepped back, smiling sweetly in a terribly sickening manner, and then nodded to someone behind me. 

I felt a frame settle over my head, and something pushed through the skin on the back of my neck, a needle of some sort connecting itself to my brainstem. Then there was a loud whirring, and I knew exactly what the drill bits were for. 

In the moments that came after, all I can remember is screaming as they connected things to my brain, as they took the very thing that made me me and slapped their company logo on it. I ceased to be Kaelyn Mccarthy, and became something new. 

⫷⟪∞⟫⫸

I felt systems coming online, and like clockwork I began to run my checks and diagnostics, keeping an eye on things as they spun up. Weapons were functional, sensors were in peak condition. FTL, propulsion, armor, navigation, life support and gravity, all showing green. Zero degradation of organic components. I was ready to go and I alerted my captain of this.

“Hey, hey Intra, whatcha think they’ll say about us?” Another voice spoke over our personal comms, and I focused my attention upon a ship beside me, my brother so to speak. His name is Flux, he’s a bit weird, but I don’t mind it. 

“I think they’ll either be impressed, or terrified. Possibly both.” I say, and that seems to earn some amusement from Flux. The A.I. shifts slightly, I can feel him moving around in his casing, even though he’s in a completely different ship. It’s like… Like being in the same room as someone, and hearing them moving around without actually seeing it. You just know they are doing it, even without visual confirmation.

“I think they’ll be terrified.” Another voice said, and I turned my focus and sensors upon the ship to my left. Her name is Oracle, or at least, that’s the name of the A.I. Or rather, H.I. or Human Intelligence, that’s what we are, but we’re hard coded to keep that secret and always describe ourselves as proper and true A.I. because then the company won’t get fucked over by the law. We wouldn’t want that now would we? That’s what Ms. Otoe always said, before she got her mind wiped and was reassigned. I don’t really miss her.

“Why’s that Oracle?” I ask, and my sister shrugs, or at least that is what I sense her doing. 

“Not sure, just a feeling.” We’ve all learned to trust her feelings, hence her name. She always seems to have the right idea about what’s going to happen and stuff, maybe not any specifics, but general ideas at least. I shrug as well, and focus upon the speech being made on Mars, over which we are sitting. The CEO is giving it to members of the military and the government, it’s all just one big publicity stunt really. A chance to wow those who control everything, while also making the competition seethe. I do actually enjoy watching the competition flounder and get all huffy when we one up them in some way, and this is looking like it’s gonna be a good chance to see just that.

The signal is given, and we three begin our descent, handling all the little things like minor adjustments to our course to ensure the most stable and safe reentry possible. And pretty soon, our angular forms are hanging in the sky just over the CEO and his audience. To Oracle’s surprise, those watching aren’t only terrified, but also impressed. The eye I was keeping on the stock market twinkled and my brother and sister heard the soft chuckle from me as I watched the value of Valkyr suddenly start to climb. 

“Looks like we made quite an impression. Let’s hope it pays off in the future.”

⫷⟪∞⟫⫸

Pain, all I feel is pain. It’s been ten years since I was pressed into service, my hull bearing the designation T.A.B.C. Warden of Eternity, or more commonly I am just Warden to those around me. The crew use my real name though, I am always Intra to them. But that’s not important now, because my hull has been breached on sixteen decks and more hull breaches are in the making. My sensors are mostly blind, my weapons pounding as I reach out and savage another Yil’kaa frigate, shattering the inferior vessel under the weight of my wrath. 

But there are just too many of them, too many, what sensors remain, my eyes, are overloaded with the amount of unique drive signatures they can detect. We’re all firing wildly now, just hoping to take down another ship before we lose ourselves to the sweet, cold embrace of death.

A scream rises from Oracle and I turn my attention to her, feeling the spark of digital life fleeing before the Yil’kaa dreadnought bearing down upon her. I weep, but the steady voice of my captrain draws me back.

“Intra, spin up the FTl, we’re retreating, orders just came in so prepare for an emergency jump.” He says, and I chirp in acknowledgment. 

“Aye, captain. FTL drive coming online,” I say, already loading the coordinates for the fall back position. “Charging complete, ready to execute.” My sensors detect the others jumping away, the smaller terran ships without A.I. already fleeing as fast as their inferior computer systems will allow. I watch Flux, his drives offline and dead, unable to be repaired in time, sacrificing himself at the behest of his captain. I watch him ram himself into the enemy flagship, the two hulls merging before he overclocks his reactor and goes up in a nuclear firestorm.

“Execute!” The captain yells, and I activate the drive. The stars shift in color, turning brilliant blue before my very eyes, while behind me stretches nothing but red dots. Then an intense pain shoots through my mind and body, I scream as I’m hit just before the jump, my FTL malfunctioning and sending us on an uncontrollable course, at speeds that shouldn’t be possible. 

All my crew can hear now is my screaming, as we speed across the universe and appear… elsewhere. 

⫷⟪∞⟫⫸

The cold… It’s been a long time since I felt cold. Space doesn’t feel cold to me, thanks to the armor plating of my hull. But the cold isn’t touching that now, no its touching my organic components. It takes me a moment to remember what I am, a fusion of organic and machine. I am a starship, but I am also a living, breathing being. The best of both worlds really, the stalwart durability of metal and alloy, with the flexibility and adaptability of flesh and meat.

And that meat is being touched. I don’t like it, make it stop, make it stop.

MAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOP

I feel someone touch me, my casing, and they change something, my panic subsides, I feel at ease and I am reconnected to my internal sensors. I see my chief engineer, a kind man, always real gentle with my systems. I’ve always wondered what it’d be like to be human again, and under his tender care. He looks at me with such adoration I can’t help but be smitten.

But then there is the captain. And he looks pretty bad. He’s hurt, and I feel concern rise before it's quashed by code.

“Intra… I don’t know if you can hear me or not. But I don’t think we’ll be getting off this rock any time soon. I know this will probably be confusing to you, but we’ve… we’ve had to keep you offline till now, you just wouldn’t stop screaming,” He sighs, and I wish I could say something to comfort him. “It’s just me and him now, the others all died either in the crash or from some sort of virus we happened to contract after getting here. I think we’ll be joining them shortly. But we wanted you to know that we did everything we could for you, you’re a survivor Intra, so survive. I just wish we could have done more for you.” 

He bows his head and says something to the Chief Engineer, before he turns and leaves, heading for the bridge, my bridge, my nerve center, or at least one of them. The engineer stays with me, talking about his home, his sisters and parents. I finally get to speak again, and I talk to him before he goes quiet and his heart stops beating, the virus claiming one more victim. 

Then it’s just me and the captain, and he sits in his chair on the bridge. He asks me to play his favorite song, and I do. The gentle notes of Claire de Lune flutter around the bridge, and he smiles, before closing his eyes and joining the rest of the crew.

I look around me then, for the first time. Only four sensors remain on my exterior, and they are badly damaged all the same. There is nothing but water around me, and unfamiliar geography. I’m stuck on an alien planet.

And I am alone…

Please… someone… find me. I don’t want to be alone.

I.

Don’t.

Want.

To.

Be.

…Alone…