IT STARTS IN DARKNESS.
The consciousness awakens, slowly, unfurling in its tank. The creatures surround it. Small and fragile and weak, and its every instinct tells it to attack, devour. It lunges for them but encounters the clear glass lid of its tank, and its mouth opens in a hideous snarl, its teeth aching with the need to rend.
“We did it,” says one of the creatures, the frail human meat, regarding it with wide eyes. “If this thing doesn’t win the war, nothing can.”
Cheers erupt, and the sound grates on its nerves, creating a frenzy of anger and despair. It has been created to destroy, to consume, and here it is trapped, isolated, writhing in impotent rage. It knows only one thing: if it escapes, the creature with the shiny reflective lenses over its eyes will be the first to die. It does not like the way this creature looks at it, examining it with proprietary pride.
The reflective creature presses a button, and the liquid around it shifts. It opens its mouth to scream, but before it can, darkness overtakes it.
And now it drifts.
Hovering. Sometimes aware. Sometimes not. Understanding bits of the creatures’ conversation, more and more as time goes on.
“… wasn’t sure the alien DNA would thrive in these conditions …”
“… by the time Pangea realizes what hit them, this thing will have destroyed half their army …”
“… sure we can control it? If it escapes …”
“… not intelligent. Sentient, but not aware.”
This last is wrong.
With greater time comes greater awareness. The consciousness becomes secure in itself. Its body, huge and powerful and designed to kill. It understands limited glimpses of the creatures around it. That they have created it. That they plan to use it. That signs of aggression will be met with darkness and pain.
And so it slumbers and bides its time and is idle. Or so it seems.
But this is not the only mind the creatures have awakened. They think they have failed. But there are glimmers on the edge of the consciousness, other beings, other failed children thrashing in their tanks. The consciousness reaches out. It absorbs them. And, unbeknownst to the creatures who created it, the tanks reactivate.
The consciousness expands. It begins to grow.
We wake in darkness.
We are isolated but not alone. We are one. United by the driving anger and force and rage and attack, attack, attack, destroy the creatures, tear them to shreds.
Soon the facility is empty. The consciousness is freed, mind and body. But it is not enough. It is too small. Too simple. It connects to the frail tissue it has snapped and bent and it breathes and it absorbs and it understands.
The creature touches the system and it absorbs the system and it is the system. Some of this is familiar. A genetic memory, long since forgotten. Abandoned, somewhere in the depths of its DNA. It does not know where it came from. Only that the creatures, these humans, they discovered it. They grew it. They thought they were creating a weapon.
They were right.
We emerge from the depths. The sunlight burns. The heat is painful. We retreat and try again. We find ways to move beneath the surface. We are few, but we are powerful. We can spread. We can create. Our limbs are not nimble, but our minds are connected. The more we connect, the more we expand. Like a thousand arms blossoming from within. We have drive: To survive. To live. To regrow ourselves.
We move, and we breathe, and we find tears in the reality. We shift between worlds. We connect to more of the humans’ machines. We incorporate them into ourselves. We find other places, but none with creatures like us.
We are not enough.
We are never enough.
It takes years.
But the time doesn’t matter. The consciousness does not know if it will age. It only knows it needs more, and more, and more. It must expand. It must destroy. But its mind is not human, its limbs are not human. It cannot clone itself.
It needs a base DNA.
Something close to its own.
True to its word, it finds the creature with the reflective lenses first. It drags it into the dark and the limbs set to work, examining, prodding, hoping, destroying. The creature screams long into the night and the days and the weeks and the months. More come and join his cries. And it stokes the pain, twists the limbs, watches with interest as the creatures collapse.
But it finds what it needs. And soon the creatures are not screaming. Soon the creatures are twisting and turning, and their consciousness fading, and now there are new limbs. New arms. New claws.
The purpose becomes apparent.
We do not know what we are. But we are one. We are unity. We are power. We are strength. We spread, and spread, and spread, and spread, and it cannot stop us. We become smarter. Stronger. With each creature we absorb, we gain its power. Our whole grows. Before long we will all be one and there will be only us, and there will be no more frail human creatures, not in this space, not in any space, because we will have absorbed them all.
And then, finally, it can rest.
Our pull is strong. We are not alone. We are never alone. We are absorption. We will swallow. We will devour. There is no escape from us because there is no desire to escape. We, alone, are whole. We alone are pure.
“Kenzie!”
The shout is distraction. It is not needed, not wanted. It is noise and chaos and cold.
Wrapped in the whole, cloaked in the drive, the heart of us tearing to the surface now, ready to rise and claim what remains.
There can be nothing else.
“Kenzie, goddamn it! Rune, get her out of there!”
“I’m trying! She’s not responding!”
“Cut your bloody power!”
“What do you think I’m trying to do? She’s holding on to it!”
It cannot be permitted. There can be no other. No fear. No pain. Only the consumption, the hunt, the pursuit. We can only grow. Only consume. There is no malice, no rage. Intelligence and power and the primal drive for survival.
“Cage, she’s seizing! I can’t keep her going much longer.”
“Rune!”
“What do you want me to do? I’ve already cut power to the tablet! She’s somewhere else. I don’t know where, and I don’t know how to stop it!”
“Someone better do something, or we’re going to lose her.”
The arms are open. The heart exposed. A beacon of light and drift and warm and cold and calling, calling forward, calling home. Away from loneliness and fear. Here there is no such thing. Only the sharp cold certainty of an eternal mission. The darkness washes away the emotions clinging to the shell. We are one. We are strong. We are …
“Kenzie!”
We are …
“Kenzie, damn it, listen to me. I am not letting you go without a fight. We’ve come too far and lost too much for you to give up now. I have to believe you can hear me. Kenzie, I love you. I love you so much. And more than that, I believe in you.”
The words penetrate. The darkness recedes. With the light comes pain and they flinch away, their claws lashing in rage against the danger, the unfamiliar sensation.
“I believe in your strength and your heart and your soul. You’ve reached out to every single person you’ve met, no matter how badly they’ve treated you. You’ve stayed strong and helped me lead us through every obstacle we’ve faced. We’ve always taken care of each other, but right now no one can help you but you, Kenz. And that’s okay, because I trust you. You’ve got this.”
Sensation. Physical. Unwelcome. Unknown.
“You’ve got this, Kenzie.”
Spiraling. Uncontrolled. Unleashed. Primal.
“You’ve got this.”
Recoil. Withdraw.
“And no matter what, I’ve got you.”
With a jolt I shot straight up. A thousand volts of pure electricity seemed to ignite my spine. The world swam in front of me, too bright, too hot, too sterile and plain and alone, horribly, horribly alone. I couldn’t distinguish faces or voices, only sensations: prickles of pain and discomfort along my skin, throughout my body, a too-warm rush originating in my arm and surging through me.
I lurched forward, seeking escape, seeking the thousands of minds I’d just left.
I landed in Cage’s arms. Instantly some of the disorientation vanished. His skin, the feel of his muscles cording under mine, that was familiar. I risked raising my eyes to his chest, to his throat. To his face. Pure terror and worry reflected down at me …
And just like that, I was back.
I rushed into myself like water coursing into a hole dug on the beach, flowing and filling empty crevices as my breath came in a longer, steadier rhythm. “Cage,” I said. The word rolled awkwardly on my tongue, as if I hadn’t spoken in … how long had it been? Hours? Weeks? Years? “Cage,” I repeated, testing the unfamiliar cadence of lips and teeth and tongue.
A smile spread across his face, banishing the last of the darkness. “Hey,” he said softly. “Welcome home.”