BGC: fear Segment 2 Created by Sean Gaffney, written by Gray Brangwin "You're not your own worst enemy. Because by then, you're not you anymore." --Anonymous ---- At night, the cool darkness enveloped her, seeking her as she sought it -- but still her eyes were wide open. She knew this. Even when what remained of herself, weighed down by the exhaustion of being, fell into slumber -- still her eyes were open. Day, night -- she could hardly tell the difference any more. It didn't matter. She didn't want it to. Oh, how she wished she could just close her eyes... There was a breeze that night. The sole window in her room was always open, to let the air in -- it tended to let the rain in as well, but she did not care. No insects ever entered, though. Perhaps it was because they respected her wishes.. perhaps it was because they feared her, this unmoving fixture that buried so, so much within herself... The breeze caressed her face gently, softly -- as it always did, it's thin whisper sounded in her ears. Once she had heard voices in it, she fancied.. when had that ended?... The darkness belied the closeness of the surveillance. She heard the soft whirr of the security camera in a corner of the room, and the shuffling footsteps of orderlies echoed out in the hallway. She could not see them from where she lay, but the microphones were there. All of this, just to detect the slightest sign of recovery in a patient. They were wasting their time. She could have told them. She didn't care to. It should have been easy, not to care... why was it so very difficult?... They'd come, yesterday... like they had last year. It hurt, seeing them... seeing them so much the same, yet so changed... Linna most of all. And it hurt, too, knowing that it was her fault, knowing that her actions had led to -- No. Don't... think. Don't... remember. Don't... think...... It didn't listen. When had it come to her, she wondered? She did not know.. she only knew that it had come slowly, like a creeping poison -- no, not that. It was not that. More like a cruel enlightenment that you sought for ages upon ages, only to find the whole truth a blade thrust through your heart when you found it. Had she been seeking? She wasn't sure either... But unbidden or not, it had come to her, and it was the truth -- and this was the only solution. She would once have laughed at the irony -- her, the vaunted analytical genius, with no other alternative. But what was to be done, when the problem was herself? The words, the words... words were phantoms, they were... she could hardly remember what Priss had said to her yesterday -- No. That was a lie. She could remember it, every word of it. She always tried to forget, but never succeeded. It preyed on the remains of her consciousness, those words -- how closely they echoed what Priss had said a year ago... what was it? No, don't think.. too late, like always.. *Hiding.* *Pretense.* *Why?* *Why?* *..why?* Broken, disjointed... was she hiding? No, no... the only solution, it was. *Hiding.* Had to be done, had to be done, no alternative... *Stop..* Can't, can't, can't can't can't -- *Wake up.* Won't, won't... *Hiding* NO! And she fled deeper, deeper.. ---- ..had it come to her then, when it had all happened? It was a trigger, she knew... a last straw. Building up for far too long, and then it all broke, all at once.. So long ago.. two years?... Yes... And the thought evoked memory, and memory invoked her... ---- A frantic dodge, the shot nearly clipping her -- somehow she managed to turn it into a forward roll, and then a quick strike that sprayed the viscera of her boomer opponent across the concrete. Over the intercom, Linna's harsh panting could be heard, but it was indistinguishable from her own. But yet the boomers came. And yet they fell, one, then another, one after another... No fear, no panic, no growing despair -- just the determination to continue fighting, to see the mission to it's end. She refused to feel anything before then. "Sylia!" Priss' voice. "We're almost at the laboratory... how's the situation outside?" She had begun to reply, but then Linna's voice -- "Sylia! We've got to get out of here! There's far too many of them!" Ignore her for now. "We can manage, Priss. Just get in there." "OK..." Then the intercom fell silent, and it was back to dodge, slash, retreat, repeat, dodge, slashPAIN!!, retreat, repeat... Periodically, Linna would cry out, in pain, in anger, in fear, she did not know, because she paid no attention to it. To lose focus would be to die, and her mission was not yet complete. She would not die before then. Never. Never. A voice. "Sylia?..." Priss sounding uncertain? Some kind of trouble? "What is it, Priss? Are you at the laboratory yet?" "Yeah, we're inside... it's just that..." "Good. Destroy the biochemical experiments." "Umm.. Sylia..." Nene's voice. "Are you sure you got the right place?... This place seems more like a day-care centre than a secret lab... it's full of children...." She'd foreseen this difficulty. It didn't really help when it came time to face it. "Nene, Priss, those *are* the biochemical experiments. Destroy them." Silence, filled only by her own breathing as she dodged, slashed, retreated. Then a brief burst of static, as if someone were adjusting an intercom. "Sylia? I think that last message got scrambled..." Sweet, innocent Nene. Priss had no such uncertainty. An odd fondness at her realism was what she felt, even as Priss' voice stated slowly, "There wasn't any interference, was there?" "No, there wasn't." More silence. Dodge. Strike. Shoot. "Think of it as a mercy, Priss. They're going to be made into monsters -- cyborgs like... you know who, at the very least. It is better for them to die now than for them to take millions with them." "...." Dodge. Dodge. Shoot shoot SLASH. Nene's voice, frantic, pleading. "Sylia... couldn't we just destroy the computers, and take these kids away or something? There has to be some alternative..." "There is none. Even those have already been modified. Kill them." And that reminded her... "Which reminds me. Destroy both the computers and the personnel. Then set the bomb and get out of there." A moment of stunned silence, then "WHAT?!?" Beat. Beat. Beat. Silence measured by her own heartbeats. A calmer Priss. "Sylia, I'm sure it's enough to destroy the computers and the specimens." A choked-off protest from Nene. "There's no need to kill the scientists as well." "I'm afraid there is, Priss." Dodge. Cold, impersonal voice. Factual. Hers. "Genom employed scientists with eidetic memories for this project. Even if you destroy the specimens, even if you destroy the computers, if even one of them lives the project will merely be delayed, not terminated. It has to be done. It has to be done. Has to be done. Has to be done. Done. Done. Done. More silence, internal struggle, then muted gunshots and screams. She knows it is done before Priss says so. Order the retreat, the mission is done -- but before she can, a long, loud scream, this time of unmistakeable agony -- It is the precursor to everything falling about at once. ---- turning and turning in the widening gyre the falcon cannot hear the falconer Disarray, disarray, jumbled memories of explosions, pain, survival, and Priss carrying a battered green suit like a broken doll, so, so surreal... things fall apart the center cannot hold cannot hold cannot hold cannot hold And then Linna's waking -- the next memory strobe across her consciousness. She does not remember the injuries, or trying to treat them, or finally replacing them -- all she remembers is the growing horror, despair and hate, all on Linna's face when she began to realize, flash flash flash then she turned to look at her and she saw nothing reflected in her eyes.. faster and faster, falling apart A list. A long, scrolling list of green, cubic letters. On a screen. Specifications she could remember, but paid no attention to. Three things only catch her attention. Three phrases. Mechanical eye. Replacement shoulder joint. Prosthetic cybernetic leg. center. cannot. hold. things. fall. apart. Nene's brooding, avoiding her -- she had not cared then, she did not want to care now, but the hurt in those eyes -- she'd ignored it then, now it was too, too much... fall apart. shatter. cannot hold. apart. And then what had come to her finally struck her, that day -- that day when she was planning and Nene was brooding and Linna was going slowly mad and Priss had come into her office and told her that she was leaving the Knight Sabers. She didn't remember why. But she knew. Ohhh, she knew. And the words, the words -- "I won't go against what I believe in, Sylia... not even for you..." fall. apart. fall apart. fall. fall. fall!!! And one day, finding that the mission was done, and not by her hand. Genom had fallen. Not to the law. Not to force. Not to the Knight Sabers. To the economy. Someone. Somewhere. Another genius, and suddenly something far better and far more controllable than the boomer was on the market, and Genom's sabotage attempts all met with complete, utter failure. It was astonishing, how quickly it all collapsed. Three months, and Genom was gone, their last ditch spoilsport attack foiled by the new mechs. Quincy took his own life a month later. She couldn't even remember what they were called. The things that had taken her revenge. The things that had accomplished in three months what she had failed to do for years. And then what had come to her and hit her consumed her. fall.... fall.... fall..... A simple phone call. That was all it took. And then a bottle of pills, and oblivion... ..falling... ..falling... ...for a time. And when she thought to, she cursed the gods who had stolen even her control over her own life from her. So to keep that control, to save everyone from herself, she kept her own control. She could not trust herself anymore, except to do this. ---- Trust. She had trusted four people. Four people had trusted her. She knew who had betrayed who first. Trust. Such a providence. A providence, and so easily gone... Unshed tears glimmered in her eyes, but she dared not shed them. She could not trust herself to. ---- The next morning, she gave her soft answer. No one heard. She made sure of that.