Red, A World About to Dawn

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Darkness constricted the person on all sides. The person broke free of memory. The person rose from darkness and death. From that all-encompassing abyss of the past and of the previous existence. The person drifted into the blackness of a warped sky and past the event horizon saw the reflection of their true self. Joben, Ichijo, Kaiya, all concepts unto themselves folded into one. She was. She had been. And she would be again.

She climbed through skies of zero, the fabric of nothingness, tore back the veil that obscured her vision and saw… light. Twelve powerful beams centered on her face. Her eyes swam about finding the source and seeing herself, broken.

A hole in her left breast had formed. She remembered the explosion, the eruption of blood and the scent of fire and smoke. Jaelynn had managed to set one of them off. The little bombs she had promised were littered throughout her new body. Tubes and wires flowed from the opening like a fountain, each one snaking to a new instrument that flickered in the darkness around her.

The lights, hanging from spindly metal arms protruded from walls of wires and tubes. It was the belly of the whale. The metal was flesh and she had been swallowed by it, consumed like the wire-jockey. Beyond the masses of glowing junk and tech she could see nothing. And she realized at last, she couldn’t speak, and she couldn’t move her head.

“That was fast. I thought you’d be out for much longer than that if you ever woke up at all.”

She looked up and beheld a tall feminine figure. They wore nothing to cover the metal exoskeleton they sported. Their hair, a mass of wires swayed as they shifted closer, peering over her exposed chest with glowing eyes of Magenta and white.

“The honeybee.” The person managed to say.

“Is that your nickname for me?” The gunmetal skeleton laughed. “I quite like it, Joben Gima.”

“How do you know that name? That name used to belong to me.”

“Well, it never did in the technical sense. That name still belongs to him.” The honeybee pointed at a monitor to the right. She glanced over and saw a live feed of the inside of Jaelynn Amadeus’s laboratory. In the center of the monitor was the old body still wrapped in the amniotic suit, floating quietly. “I’m not sure if you’re aware. But you are a copy of that brain, not a transplant. By that definition you never were him. You just remembered because his data is part of what made you.”

“I know where my memories came from. That doesn’t change the fact that they are real, and therefore, they belong to me.” The statement seemed to shake the feminine figure who stood back, a slender hand cradling their chin.

“A solid argument. May I ask who are you now?”

“I don’t know.” Came the honest reply. “But there’s somewhere I need to go.” Her body shuddered and waddled about in fits in the seat.

“Hold your horses!” The honeybee clicked a button and the seat adjusted to help her sit upright. “I thought I shut off your motor functions, guess I shouldn’t underestimate a world-renowned hacker.” The honeybee produced a folded seat from one of the walls of wires and sat in it. “Listen, you’re really banged up. I’d like to put you to rights but we’ll need to talk first.”

“About what?”

“Patience.” Her captor begged. “All in good time. For starters let me introduce myself. I am Kuroko. My trade is information and technology and I’ve made a good living out of it. I pride myself on the utmost anonymity and discretion. I sell information and ideas as I see fit to those that need it and in return, I eke out a modest living.” Kuroko straightened in their chair, taking pride in their accomplishments.

“However, you’ve been costing me a lot lately.” They tapped the screen containing the old body. “I kept tabs on you because I was curious but this situation; it’s been difficult to watch. You have to understand I don’t like leaving loose ends and I especially don’t like seeing my clients fall so far.”

“I’m not your client.” The girl said confidently. “I only ever saw you in my shop.”

“And you were disgusted with me weren’t you? While you were Ichijo that is. Don’t you find that strange? A man such as you with so many augmentations seeing another human as digusting?”

She thought back, compiling the Ichijo memories and cross-referencing. “It was almost like-“

“You couldn’t have thought of it yourself, right?” Kuroko touched their chest. “That little detail was me as well. A little insurance in case we met so you wouldn’t accidentally jog something. Rest assured, I didn’t add any other information there. You were actually my best memory work that I can think of.” They sat back in the chair. “I think, repressing memories rather than deleting is more functional on a mind strangely enough. Though, the therapy field would disagree with me on that one I’m sure.” Kuroko chuckled.

Her eyes watered up, overwhelmed. What had she been thinking that she was someone else?

“I’ll ask you again” The honeybee sat forward. “Who are you? What is your name? This is very important.”

The girl thought for a good few minutes. Only one seemed to stick out in her mind. “My name is Kaiya Arakawa.” She decided.

“You sure? You want the name that witch gave you?”

“When I take her down, it’ll be my name because I’ll own her and thereby everything that came from her pretty little head.”

“Wonderful.” The information broker chuckled in their seat. “You’ve always been the best client, whatever you go by. Now, I will say though, I might not be able to put you together for a few months. You understand I’m doing this pro-bono, right?”

“You’re not.” Kaiya decided. “I’m going to pay you handsomely.”

“Oh? Have you been holding out?”

“Have you ever heard of a wet state drive?” The broker sat back contemplatively.

“I have indeed. What of it?”

“Then I must have neglected to mention it. I have one in my possession.”

“Not possible.” Kuroko said flatly. “I searched every nook and cranny on you, I would have found something.”

Kaiya smiled and gestured her head towards the monitor. “The drive isn’t on me, per se. If you don’t consider the continuing memories of Joben Gima to count as the genuine article, fine. But on the genuine article, that’s where you’ll find it.”

“Son of a bitch.” The broker remarked, peering closer at the security feed as though they could see it from there. “So, you want me to raid the headquarters of the Clear Skies Organization’s sneaky secret police to get this back? Oops, I’m sorry, that was information. And it won’t come free either.”

“I’ll pay you back with interest.” Kaiya said. “I’d like you to put me in contact with someone on the surface if you could. Joseph Greenwood is the name, and I can give you his approximate location as well.”

“Ahead of you.” The broker replied pulling out a screen containing Joseph knocking back drinks in a bar. “Now, about my fee…”

“Name your price, Kuroko. And if you don’t mind, I’d like a rush order on this please?”

Kuroko chuckled and wrung their hands. Speedily, they busied themselves about the workshop grabbing bits of bodies and so on. Kaiya wanted one thing, she wanted to go home, now whether that was possible now that she’d assimilated all of Ichijo and Joben remained to be seen. But she would try. She had to try.