Chapter Nine
Warning, critical failure imminent. Something he didn’t know was noise bothered him. He wanted it to go away.
Darkness, unrelenting darkness. He did not know what it was, did not know it was a colour, but also a boon. It took him under away from the pain and the thing he did not know.
Warning, critical failure.
“Doctor, he’s crashing again.” A voice that was …
He was … something. A being. He didn’t know what he was, but he knew he was doing thinking. He couldn’t do that before. Could he? Was he the darkness? What was he? Pain.
Warning, failure.
Darkness took him to the merciful place.
More awareness. He was a being. Did he have a body or was he made of thought. Terrible pain cutting through him. He knew pain. He was a being of pain. No, a body of pain. Yes, he had a body, made up of pain. The darkness took pity on him again and swallowed him whole.
This time he was aware. Knew he had woken. He was pain, terrible pain. But he was, he knew he was a living being, not just pain.
“I will have to induce another coma.”
The darkness enfolded him.
When he became himself again, he was still pain, but he became aware of life around him. There were things around him. People, yes people. He strained to hear them, to see them but the darkness had him again.
“When will he wake up?”
“Any time now, though it will be better if he stays unconscious. He has a long recovery ahead of him.”
“Will he … will he remember. Will he know who he is?” The voice sounded upset. No, the female, yes, a female was upset. Over him? Was she his light?
The next time he became aware he was still darkness and pain. But he knew his name was Amelagar. And he knew there was a voice always near, a voice that was light to his darkness.
Knowledge came to him. He was a cyborg. He tried to do a diagnostic, but couldn’t. More information came to him. He was a cyborg that had escaped from the enemy. From the clones. He’d gone down to earth to help the humans and now, and now he was only half a head in a regeneration tube. Horror, even bigger than what he’d felt when he’d realized he would be dead or worse on earth consumed him. She had been around him all this time. Had seen him like this. He wanted the darkness to come and get him, it stayed on the edges of his vision, but didn’t take him.
Of all the things he knew again, the biggest knowledge was that after seeing him like this, she will never give him a soul.