Ren’s Suicide

 

The moment Ren saw the robots outside his home, he knew. He knew all his efforts would unravel from a single, trivial event. He had anticipated this. He had prepared himself. For years, he had been aware of the looming danger. And yet, dreaming of something and experiencing it were two entirely different things.

Everything he had killed for, everything he had risked his life for, had become meaningless. In that moment, Ren was not even human anymore. He felt like a ghost of himself, detached and hollow. The shrill, persistent voice of his wife droned on faintly in the background, scraping at his nerves. Her panic, her pleas, her inability to act, it all grated on him more than he thought possible. He didn’t turn to look at her.

Once he boarded the helicopter, Ren became a prisoner to the emotion he despised most: despair. He no longer had to fight. He no longer had to live. He had already lost.

He knew what awaited him. He would either be killed or have his mind wiped clean, turned into a true Cotox citizen. He thought of Kaede, and the bitterness rose in his chest like bile. She wasn’t resilient, not by any measure. She clung to Ren, dependent and meek, like a shadow afraid to stand alone. She never pressed him when he withheld things. She never asked where he had been or why. Kaede was a woman who loved unconditionally, trusted blindly. And Ren hated her for it. He hated how her blind faith in him made her seem weak, how her constant presence felt like a chain around his neck.

Sometimes, he couldn’t help himself and picked fights over trivial matters, just to break the peace she so desperately tried to preserve. It disgusted him how easily she forgave, how her eyes remained soft even when his words cut deep. In this moment, with the robots marching toward their door, Ren’s disgust crystallized into something sharper. She’d clutched his arm moments earlier, her nails digging into his skin as if her grip could save him.

From the forbidden corners of his mind, a vision emerged. The sound of Kaede’s piano echoed through the house, as it always did. Her music seemed to drag every suppressed emotion from within, crashing over him like a wave hitting the shore. Sometimes, Ren would sit alone upstairs, listening to the mournful melody. Sometimes, his eyes would well up, and he’d think he had reached his limit. But still, he kept going. What else could he do?

Ren wasn’t attached to life. He knew the robots beside him could withstand a missile blast and fire faster than any living creature could react. He took a deep breath, maintaining the calm facade of a man completely at ease. He didn’t look at the robots. He pretended to keep watching the scenery outside. Slowly, his right hand slipped into his pocket. His middle and ring fingers wrapped around the small capsule, while his index and thumb remained open, mimicking the posture of holding nothing. Consciously, he breathed as evenly as a healthy man at rest. Still, he couldn’t control his racing heart.

Feigning thoughtfulness, he brought his two open fingers to his lips. The thought crossed his mind: For Glauberg!

As he pushed the capsule between his slightly parted lips with his pinky finger, a deafening gunshot shattered the moment. Blood splattered across his face. His hand went limp, and the capsule fell to the ground. It lay there, alongside his severed wrist. Pain followed awareness. Clutching the mangled remnants of his arm with his left hand, he realized his wish to die would not be granted today. Letting go of his wrist, he allowed the blood to flow freely. Soon after, he lost consciousness.

He woke in a massive building with gray, moldy walls that bore no resemblance to Kaede’s pristine home. Surrounded by countless guard robots and electromagnetic wires, the facility was isolated, a barren wasteland devoid of plants or structures for miles. Far from the city, Ren had been taken to a place where his life, and his mind, were no longer his own.

His captors treated him, but only just enough to keep him alive. His arm, which could have been easily reattached with the medical technology of the time, was ignored. They cared not for his body but for what lay within his mind. They had captured one of the leaders of the resistance, and with his memories, finding the rest would be child’s play.

Ren was strapped to a bed inclined at the waist. His bleeding was stanched, and his arm crudely stitched to prevent further blood loss. The facility and its inhabitants seemed relics of a bygone era. Perhaps they were. After all, such measures hadn’t been necessary for nearly a century.

A figure loomed over him, sipping an almost undiluted coffee concentrate from a tiny glass, Dr. Morgan Leonhardt. One of the few remaining humans still actively employed in a country where even the leadership was delegated to robots. She was an expert in psychoanalysis, medicine, and chemistry. Expertise had become trivial in this era, but what set her apart was her clinically diagnosed psychopathy. She was utterly unshaken, devoid of concern. Even as a child, Morgan had been handpicked for roles such as this.

From her office chair, Morgan barked orders while adjusting settings on an ancient-looking quantum computer.

“Administer two doses of Hypnocorine to the subject. Shave his head completely. Examine him thoroughly, inside and out, and dress him in standard hospital garments!” Two slender, steel-bodied assistant robots silently carried out the instructions.

When the doctor finished her work on the computer, she adjusted her chair to get closer to Ren. Gloved hands deftly operated a SPECT scanner, and she examined the results. No implant. Morgan almost seemed pleased.

Using her feet to leverage the office chair, she pulled down a device suspended from the ceiling. Wires snaked out from the device, which the doctor carefully attached to Ren’s now-bald scalp. Though adhesive options were available, Morgan preferred the ones that pierced the skin.

As the machine hummed to life, the doctor spun a scalpel in her fingers like a toy. Without a word, she occasionally drew shallow cuts along Ren’s shoulder, almost rhythmically. Perhaps Morgan couldn’t work without the sight of blood.

Returning to her computer, she opened a folder labeled "The Most Important" as if accessing a mundane collection of desktop files. While the device copied Ren’s memories, images began projecting onto a smooth wall. Morgan selected a particularly intriguing memory and leaned back to watch without any expression.