Black, The Night That Ends At Last

“Organization Headquarters”, New Kyoto- June 29th 2233

8:13PM

Jaelynn Amadeus paced the monitor room looking for updates. Kaiya’s body was still reading as having dropped somewhere in New Nagoya. 30 hours after she’d pushed the button and still no sign. Sad.

She figured it might be time to scrap the data on that person and start over. After all, that’s what copies are for and she could transplant Joben Gima any number of times she wanted to and still have plenty of bodies left over. That had been the mistake with their last hacker, Skein. He’d flown too close to the sun too often and she had to scrap him.

Similarly enough, she’d yet to find his remains either. While she was far from the kind of person to be paranoid after shooting someone’s head off, she had to wonder what became of him. Jaelynn made a mental note to have Joseph follow up on that detail a bit later as she left the monitor room behind.

She stepped into the hallway and pressed a button to call one of her automatons. Maybe she’d have number 15 princess carry her to lunch. That was always a good feeling. A tall metal behemoth turned down the hallway towards her. She waved, and the automaton kept walking without waving back. What happened to that wave program I installed? Did I delete it last week?

The automaton walked faster, its footsteps growing closer and closer.

“No.” She breathed.

The machine clawed for her, grasping her tablet and crushing it. She slid past the machine and bolted down the hallway. A malfunction? There was no way. Someone must’ve gained access to the system. The hall forked and on either side the other robots were waking up and taking notice of her. She sprinted for the exit, for the way out, barreling across the metal catwalk of the terminal room to the elevator.

The doors swung open revealing Joseph.

“Joseph! Code red, repeat! Code red!” She stepped in the elevator and slammed the close door button. Too late she noticed Joseph placing her in a chokehold. Too late she felt the prick of a needle in her neck as she lost consciousness.

Shit. She thought. I was having such a productive day too…

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She woke up strapped to a metal frame, her body in an amniotic suit with two of her own creations fussing at the straps to keep her still.

“Override, backdoor code: Catarina.” She yelled. No response. “Voice command override, Jaelynn Amadeus!” She yelled, more desperately.

“They won’t hear you.” Came a voice from above. She looked up to see Kaiya Arakawa standing on the catwalk. Her little angel, back together again.

“Kaiya! I didn’t think you’d made it back!” She didn’t respond. Jaelynn noticed her chest had been consumed by metalflesh, her left arm had been replaced by something crude and metal. “Well hey, let’s get you patched up, huh? I’ll need you back in the field soon.”

Kaiya scratched her head and looked down at Jaelynn. “Do you really think that’s going to work for me? Did you think I was so coddled that I wouldn’t try something like this sooner or later?”

“You want the honest answer, yes, Kaiya. I expected you to tow the line and do your job like the rest. I guess I’m a poor judge of character.”

“No, you’re just a fool for not looking closer at the pieces you had on the board.” Kaiya spouted, slamming the railing with her new metal fist.

“In my defense, pawns aren’t known for jumping off the board and taking the player hostage, am I right or am I wrong, Kaiya?” Jaelynn gave her a long pause to think. He didn’t expect Kaiya to change her mind at this stage, she just wanted to twist the knife a bit.

“Enough, raise her in, and prepare the cryogenics.”

“Cryogenics!?” Jaelynn caught herself screaming. “No, no, no. This facility might be able to handle it but for how long? If you don’t follow the proper procedures I could die! Really! There’d be no going back for me, you hear!?”

“But I’ll always have some kind of replacement.” Kaiya noted, “Or did you not notice, Jaelynn?” In his offhand, held by a glove was a solid-brain. The lightbulb went off and she panicked.

“Wait! What is that!?”

“Oh this?” She held up the black mass, with wires hanging off the end. “This is you. Or rather, this is your original, Jaelynn Amadeus. The body you now reside in is merely a copy of the original mind of Jaelynn. Though, given this; thing. I’m assuming you’ve been through this before?”

Jaelynn screamed, she squealed, she cried, a copy? Was she a copy? Was she real? She must have been lying! Why! Why would she? Jaelynn saw her own reflection as the automatons raised the other half of the glass cage to surround her. Her cranium had incisions, her hair had been cut. Surgery must’ve happened. What did she do? What did she?

She stared at the solid brain in Kaiya’s possession and screamed. “Please! Let me out! Or at least kill me I’ll do anything to have that happen!” Kaiya stared back, quietly observing as though she were finally eating a well-deserved meal.

“No. I think I’ll give you ten years to think about it. Now, it will pass quickly for you, but for us on the outside? We have a lot of work to do.” The tube hissed shut and slid into place on the wall. Something cold and wet crept up Jaelynn’s leg as she thrashed and screamed. Slowly, painfully, she lost feeling, lost consciousness and then, lost ten years to a perfect cryogenic preservation.

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Kaiya turned to Joseph. “All right. Time for the big gamble.” She said, tossing him the fake Solid-drive. The bodyguard caught it and stood at attention. He was watching, waiting for her to screw up just like Jaelynn. She wouldn’t. Kaiya had a plan, and it started at the top.