Courting Eternity

Doctors and scientists worked tirelessly in a stainless steel hospital room. There were all sorts of machines and advanced equipment throughout the room. The occasional beep from a machine or someone asking for something were the only noises in the normally silent hospital room. What were all these people working on so tirelessly? On saving the life of someone important. After many days and hours, the scientists and doctors had done all they could and left the patient to recover.

The patient opened her eyes, but there was no one to welcome her. Instead the first thing she saw was her left arm connected to a tube and that tube led to a machine that was measuring her vitals. She noticed her arms were more swole and toned than before, which was strange because she wasn’t one who regularly worked out. Suddenly the machine measuring her vitals started to beep loud and fast. Within seconds the room was filled with doctors and scientists, one of which would turn off the machine that was making noise.

“Echo? Do you know where you are?” Asked a scientist.

Echo looked down at her arms and then up at the doctor. Something was wrong but she couldn't tell.

“Underneath your doctor coats, why are all the doctors wearing the same colored button shirts as the scientist?” The four scientists all had the same shirt as the four doctors.

“It’s like you guys hastily put on the doctor coats instead of having them on from the start of your shifts. I can see his collar striking out, the bottom of yours poking out, and the other two have the sleeves poking out.”

Everyone in the room remained in a stunned silence for a moment.

“It’s almost like you’re all wearing the same uniform but for whatever reason decided to make the effort to try and trick me. “ Echo took a moment to wonder why she was suddenly thinking like this. Why was she so observant all of a sudden?

“E-echo we think you’re under a.. sudden stress from such a… traumatic experience.” Said one of the doctors as he walked to her right side.

Echo jumped and sat up straight, “Don’t. Take. Another. Step!” She pointed a finger at him. The doctor froze on the spot. His face was a mix of fear, hope, and curiosity.

“I remember you now. You’re my ex boyfriend!” Her heart was pounding and her eyes raced frantically, as well as her thoughts. “What's going on? Why can I suddenly think waaay more efficiently than ever? And why does my entire body feel tighter?”

Her ex boyfriend stammered. He was caught up in the fact that Echo was alive and talking again, albeit with his modifications. Echo herself got very creepy vibes from the room, on closer inspections everything in the room looked synthetic. Everything was telling her to get out of there. So just before anyone in the room could say another word, Echo pulled off all the tubes connected to her body. She wondered why It didn’t hurt as much as she anticipated.

“E-echo?!” Stammered her ex as he walked backwards in fear.

Echo ignored him and suddenly jumped out of the bed, her cold feet hitting the somewhat dusty floor. For a brief second she wondered why a hospital room would ever be not clean. “Staff clean hospitals multiple times a day anyway”. She thought. Before her, one of the scientists blocked her path. Not once in her life had Echo hit somebody, but today clearly something was odd. Without thinking twice, Echo winded her right arm back, she extended it in a straight forward and twisted her wrist just before the moment of impact. The person she hit was sent literally flying into the wall. The wall came crashing down on impact and it would reveal that they were in a room within a room.

Echo took one last look of rage at her ex before walking through the hole she had created. She had several questions but right now, something was telling her that her best chance of survival was by escaping from wherever she was. Everyone on the other side of the wall was just as surprised to see her as she was to see them. She put her left foot forward, with the top of her right food parallel with the heel of her left. She let her knees relax, had her upper body twisted forward to the left and her arms raised. Her left fist was parallel to her face, with her elbow by her stomach, her right fist was parallel to her left elbow and her right elbow tucked under her right side. She had no idea where or how she knew how to do this. Echo looked like a pro boxer.

“Doctor Nusk, what is the meaning of this!” Yelled a person in front of echo. The man was yelling past her however.

“Please wait, I can explain everything!” From the opening of the hole spoke doctor Nusk.

Suddenly Echo became overwhelmed. Her view of everyone became cluttered with what looked like computer windows emanating from everything and everyone in the room. The windows had listed facts about everything and everyone that one could find via a quick internet search. She fell to her knees by the overwhelming sense of knowing everything. Doctor Nusk would rush to her aid and gently place a loving hand on her shoulder.

Echo shoved his hand off of her. ”WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME?!!” She yelled, her voice mixed in anger, fear, and helplessness.

“Elo please tell me she isn’t who I think she is?” The person from before asked. He was also angry.

“I can see the information of anybody and anything in this room, I’m somehow able to think faster than ever and for some reason I know how to fight..” Echo spoke, still on her knees. She sounded defeated, lost, and confused. She had a blank mile long stare.

“Tell the others, I am very sorry but we have to activate protocol Master B All.” Elo said regrettably. The other man and anyone else within range looked like deer caught in headlights.

The other man nodded. Urgently he grabbed a key tied around his neck. He ran to a wall that had a number panel on it. He typed in a sequence of numbers and put the key into a keyhole. A big red button emerged and he slammed it. Alarms started blaring loudly, all the monitors turned off simultaneously, loud thuds were heard and dozens of laser walls sprang up. Echo was still on her knees trying to figure out how to exist.

“Listen love, I wasn’t prepared for this scenario but I have to be blunt. You’re a r-” Doctor Nusk was interrupted.

“Doctor, headquarters has been alerted, they're sending security over.” Another man put a hand on the doctor's shoulder before speaking.

“Echo you aren’t you! And that’s all I will say for now! Please understand I do this from a place of love!” He said as the doctor Nusk was escorted elsewhere by the man who had his hands on him.

Echo sat on her knees still, her mind a million miles away. The phrase " you aren’t you" echoed in her mind. By now her body was starting to adjust to her new changes. She noticed how veiny and muscular her arms were. Her eyes no longer saw thousands of windows with information. “I’m not me? My current standards of being me are based on what I’m allowed to know and right now, no one is telling me anything!” She said out loud.

Echo put one knee up and then the other, she felt different but in a good way. Her and Elo had broken up ages ago and her assumption of what he said made no sense. She didn’t need his love, she needed to be free. Echo walked forward with purpose and tapped a man's shoulder. She had used her ability to look up information and found out the people in here had published peer reviewed articles on laser technology. The man turned around. “Give me your hidden prototype laser gun, we both know I know it exists.” She said, Everyone else in the area was either frantically trying to get their data back online or had never been trained for this situation.

The man silently nodded and reached into his lab coat, his hand shaking. He pulled out a futuristic weapon and handed it to Echo. She tried using her information lookup but the only thing that came up was how to shoot a normal gun. She figured this worked the same way. The scientists that were in the fake room with her were hindered from moving due to a laser wall and there wasn’t much anyone could do.

“Don’t shoot that!” Yelled someone from behind a laser wall. Echo ignored the cries and held both her arms forward, her right hand on the trigger and her left held the barrel to stabilize. Echo felt like a badass, this really wasn’t like her at all. She liked it though! She aimed for a wall and pulled the trigger. A blue beam shot out faster than the naked eye could see. It made the same noise as a synthesizer. The blast bounced off the wall and ricocheted within the area and only stopped when it hit someone. They yelled in agony and fell backwards, rolling around on the ground. Echo felt sympathy for a bit but quickly started to look for another solution. Gun in one hand, Echo walked to one of the laser walls. She placed her other hand on the metallic ring from where the laser came from and yanked it. She was now holding what was essentially a mini lightsaber.

“No please don’t! You have no idea what you’re about to unleash!” Protested someone on the other side of the laser wall she had just ripped from.

She turned around and slashed the wall she had shot at. This did it! A clean cut had been made. She was pleased with herself and did this a few more times until the hole was large enough for her to walk through. The wall led to another lab room filled with people who were actually armed to deal with her. Without warning, someone fired a laser at Echo. Without thinking however, Echo leaped into the air like a ballerina and gracefully dodged it. Her eyes showed her the exact trajectory she had to make in order to successfully take everyone else in the room out. From where she stood, she had a disadvantage.

Echo swiftly ducked and weaved forward, towards an enemy. Once she was within range, she would throw a straight jab for his private area. He would fall instantly. Remembering the light saber still in her other hand, Echo tossed it at someone standing opposite her. They tried to move out of the way but the weapon fell across their back. Going through their body instantly and the ground instantly. Just as she had seen, the trajectory had led her to her way out. Once again she jumped and landed on the other side of the small gap created by the lightsaber. To make the gap bigger, Echo jumped in place, the others shot at her but she dodged by dancing and jumping about. The men switched the setting on their gun lasers and the lasers that hit the ground Echo was on helped to crumble the ground. “Keep the AI alive.” Said one of the shooters. Another minute of dodging and the gap had grown much larger. So large in fact that the entire section of the building separated and gave out.

“All according to plan.” Echo smiled and thought.

Falling at high speeds towards the ground outside was her way out. The debris and large chunk of building took out anyone under its way, be it cars or people. But it broke Echo’s fall as it had absorbed the impact instead of her. Hundreds of people stood in shock and now so was Echo.

“Hey isn’t that Echo?”

“But the news said..”

“There’s no way!”

“How?”

“Echo?’

“A miracle oh my god!”

Everyone had something to say. One moment people were normally going about on the streets and the next, a person they thought dead had just fallen from the sky holding a futuristic gun.

Someone had their phone open to an article and had it pointed at Echo. Curious to their reactions, she used her lookup to read it from where she stood. “Idol and music artist, Echo, found dead at the age of 27.” Was the title followed by a photo of Echo performing to a crowd at a concert.

Echo stood there. Bewildered. She let her arms drop to her sides and she didn’t know what to feel. She had died, but she had just fought her way out? And Elo. Where had he been taken to? Why did that guy call her an AI?”

Echo got off from the rubble and ran away, covering her face. She was sure no one would catch up to her. She ran and ran until she could tell it was safe. If she could cry, she would. Eventually she found herself next to a dumpster in an alley. She pressed herself up against a brick wall and dropped down to the ground, her knees up to her chin and her head in her hands.

“A solo act, calling out for a duet partner that will never come. It courts eternity with a sound that will never again echo through the world. To be the only one of your species, the only creature that is like you, calling into the void, without even knowing it. What a cruel fate.” Echo thought. She felt small.