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♫ Erik Satie - Gymnopédie No.1
Elsewhere billions of miles away from the Akahar a small dark room, an identical figure made exactly the same sound. She couldn't terminate the experience via software because of the keybond linked demand for 'frankness'. If she'd been in her own room, she would have woken up the entire dorm. This was a research outpost of some sort.
Hands began trembling as they reached along the neural clasp that allowed her to share the experience of her copy in the field - sharp breaths as she tried to stay calm as her body went into shock from the pain - wheezing, cerise eyes wide.
To her horror, it wouldn't come off. It was bonded to the bodysuit she was testing, as a hood and wouldn't deactivate without ending the experience for fear of causing permanent neural damage.
The figure rolled onto her side, flopping from the chair with a thick thud against a metal deck - quivering in a laminated pile of Lmanel - breath tight - her glistening chest rising and falling like a fish fresh out of water in the glow of her volumetric display in the low light. For a few moments, she laid there, trying to think objectively under the assault of foreign sensation on her senses - hands cradling that one ear. She felt her belly ripple, coughing as she began dry-wretching, then forced herself up onto her knees - trying to see through the experience lain over her vision. In this way, she was almost completely blind.
A hand climbed along the desk with a slap against the wood as she met it, crawling, feeling for a power-switch to cut the experience. She winced aloud, sharp sound confined in her throat that served as a catylist into a grunt and them a whimper as her naked thumb met the wrong end of a surgical scalpel. She hissed at her fingertips, trying to feel for the handle. Her blood ran cold as she realized it had fallen on the floor, hearing a ringing tinkle of metal against metal.
She didn't have time to try and find options. She had to get out.
"Ha...Haaah... Hanngh... Ffffff... Fuuuaackkhhhhggh.."
She began exploring along the floor - breath sharp and controlled. In and out. In an out. She grit and bared her teeth, feeling her back arch invoulintarily at the sensation of hands on her hips and then something that made her wretch again. She could feel it.
She didn't have time to think rationally, panic sending a sharp chill through her fingers.
Clutching the scalpel, she yanked at the material about her neck, pulling it away from her skin and began sawing at it as if gutting a fish - the nanomaterial far more resiliant than her skin about the torso but not enough to protect it from the scalpel.
It was then that she felt something else, flinching sharply - the scalpel clipping along her jaw - causing her to yelp. With that, she finally sawed at the back of the thing about her neck - trying so carefully to judge it so she wouldn't cut into her own neck.
Feeling the cold of the blade, she immediately let it go, fingernails digging beneath clasp as if trying to rip out an organ of her own as the scalpel fell and rolled against her thigh. She tugged, ripping and snapping the thing in blind panic, only able to see Hakahn filling her vision - a screech beneath her breath as she panted in terror - those eyes of his boring into the back of her skull.
She could feel the plastic stretching. Cables split and buckled like stretched muscle and ligament, popping wetly as inky black fluid poured down her front from it like blood - sharp metal lashing against her neck. It stank bitterly, like burning tar.
It felt like she was sawing through her own nerve-fibers - only the lack of pain distinguishing the thing from her body as a paralysing numbness tickled from her toes, icy cold as it ran up about her hips and her backside from the cut neural connection - but not the part of her violated behind until the whole assembly finally came away with a pop.
She held the thing in her hand for a moment, gasping for air - hands shaking - smashing the clasp into a mirror in the corner of the room.
She reached for the bucket she kept next to her desk, dry-wretching again. She could still feel after-images of the last sensations in her nervous-system. Aiesu's bloody fingers thumbed through her snowy white hair - marring it with red and the oily black as she felt along the stapled flesh of her ear - sighing in relief to feel everything was as she left it as she tried desperately to catch her breath.
She scented the air - picking up on the warmth running down over her neck. She'd clipped herself with the scalpel along her jaw. Only now was reason slowly returning to her. She reached up slowly, pressing her palm against it - feeling a warm flow against her palm behind a delay as her pulse filled her ears. She'd hit something important - feeling it trying to squeeze out from between her fingertips.
Aiesu struggled shakily to her feet, leaning against her desk - shuffling it forward about an inch closer to the wall - forcing herself up onto her legs now as she held down a button.
"Hey... HEY! Hahhh... Hahhhnn... Miles? MILES? GET DOWN HE-... FFFFFUUKKGHH... HAGH-" the connection went dead as she released the intercom - a bitter cold in her belly. That didn't seem right. It wasn't voulintary. She could feel it like ice, crawling through her arteries, making her thighs grow weak and what little she had of her knees numb. Her training told her this was blood-loss and blood-pressure. She really had hit something important.
Aiesu took slow breaths, forcing herself not to panic (to the best of her ability) pressing both hands firmly against the point on her neck now. Trying to push down the button again, she felt her thick thighs give out, her prosthetic legs no longer supporting her as she collapsed onto a pile, bleeding out onto a rug the Nepleslian turned Yamataian she was trying to contact her had brought her as a gift - the back of her head clipping the headboard on the way down.
In that moment, she realized three things:
1) That the computer though she was really still there, and thusly, that her copy wouldn't be able to make use of any of her neurochemical overrides. That the copy couldn't hide behind morphine or abstractions like she did Keib's surgery. Aiesu had her priorities. Bleeding out, she had to tend to her wounds first.
2) Second, that judging from the rising nausea in her belly, she now likely had concussion to add to the list of things to worry about - most of which she'd performed trying to set herself free in shock - unable to think clearly like a caged animal.
3) And third. That she'd been yelling at Miles, the only other doctor in the complex in Lorath - the one language he didn't speak.
4) That rug was ruined. It was a shame. It really tied the room together.
5) That she had infact realized four things, and now five with this.
She became very still, watching the crisp patterns on the ceiling grow blurry. She remembered the way she had to speak Nepleslian whenever he was around, always mucking up the pronounciation of his name. And for some reason, she smiled.
Miles Gunn resented her. He'd likely view this as jibberish or drunken nonsense on her part or some elaborate prank and just roll over in his bunk and go back to sleep. So that was it. She was on her own.
She could still feel the after-images of Hakahn's abuse on her body, grimacing - wonder if that would be the last thing she ever felt - being defiled by a power-crazed Fyunnen male. She coughed, a whimper in her throat as she timed her breathing carefully now away from her pulse to lower her blood-pressure, making it easier to hold down - though her wrists grew weaker.
In her moment of solitude, she spoke the one and only word she knew in trade.
"Fuck."
♫ Erik Satie - Gymnopédie No.1
Elsewhere billions of miles away from the Akahar a small dark room, an identical figure made exactly the same sound. She couldn't terminate the experience via software because of the keybond linked demand for 'frankness'. If she'd been in her own room, she would have woken up the entire dorm. This was a research outpost of some sort.
Hands began trembling as they reached along the neural clasp that allowed her to share the experience of her copy in the field - sharp breaths as she tried to stay calm as her body went into shock from the pain - wheezing, cerise eyes wide.
To her horror, it wouldn't come off. It was bonded to the bodysuit she was testing, as a hood and wouldn't deactivate without ending the experience for fear of causing permanent neural damage.
The figure rolled onto her side, flopping from the chair with a thick thud against a metal deck - quivering in a laminated pile of Lmanel - breath tight - her glistening chest rising and falling like a fish fresh out of water in the glow of her volumetric display in the low light. For a few moments, she laid there, trying to think objectively under the assault of foreign sensation on her senses - hands cradling that one ear. She felt her belly ripple, coughing as she began dry-wretching, then forced herself up onto her knees - trying to see through the experience lain over her vision. In this way, she was almost completely blind.
A hand climbed along the desk with a slap against the wood as she met it, crawling, feeling for a power-switch to cut the experience. She winced aloud, sharp sound confined in her throat that served as a catylist into a grunt and them a whimper as her naked thumb met the wrong end of a surgical scalpel. She hissed at her fingertips, trying to feel for the handle. Her blood ran cold as she realized it had fallen on the floor, hearing a ringing tinkle of metal against metal.
She didn't have time to try and find options. She had to get out.
"Ha...Haaah... Hanngh... Ffffff... Fuuuaackkhhhhggh.."
She began exploring along the floor - breath sharp and controlled. In and out. In an out. She grit and bared her teeth, feeling her back arch invoulintarily at the sensation of hands on her hips and then something that made her wretch again. She could feel it.
She didn't have time to think rationally, panic sending a sharp chill through her fingers.
Clutching the scalpel, she yanked at the material about her neck, pulling it away from her skin and began sawing at it as if gutting a fish - the nanomaterial far more resiliant than her skin about the torso but not enough to protect it from the scalpel.
It was then that she felt something else, flinching sharply - the scalpel clipping along her jaw - causing her to yelp. With that, she finally sawed at the back of the thing about her neck - trying so carefully to judge it so she wouldn't cut into her own neck.
Feeling the cold of the blade, she immediately let it go, fingernails digging beneath clasp as if trying to rip out an organ of her own as the scalpel fell and rolled against her thigh. She tugged, ripping and snapping the thing in blind panic, only able to see Hakahn filling her vision - a screech beneath her breath as she panted in terror - those eyes of his boring into the back of her skull.
She could feel the plastic stretching. Cables split and buckled like stretched muscle and ligament, popping wetly as inky black fluid poured down her front from it like blood - sharp metal lashing against her neck. It stank bitterly, like burning tar.
It felt like she was sawing through her own nerve-fibers - only the lack of pain distinguishing the thing from her body as a paralysing numbness tickled from her toes, icy cold as it ran up about her hips and her backside from the cut neural connection - but not the part of her violated behind until the whole assembly finally came away with a pop.
She held the thing in her hand for a moment, gasping for air - hands shaking - smashing the clasp into a mirror in the corner of the room.
She reached for the bucket she kept next to her desk, dry-wretching again. She could still feel after-images of the last sensations in her nervous-system. Aiesu's bloody fingers thumbed through her snowy white hair - marring it with red and the oily black as she felt along the stapled flesh of her ear - sighing in relief to feel everything was as she left it as she tried desperately to catch her breath.
She scented the air - picking up on the warmth running down over her neck. She'd clipped herself with the scalpel along her jaw. Only now was reason slowly returning to her. She reached up slowly, pressing her palm against it - feeling a warm flow against her palm behind a delay as her pulse filled her ears. She'd hit something important - feeling it trying to squeeze out from between her fingertips.
Aiesu struggled shakily to her feet, leaning against her desk - shuffling it forward about an inch closer to the wall - forcing herself up onto her legs now as she held down a button.
"Hey... HEY! Hahhh... Hahhhnn... Miles? MILES? GET DOWN HE-... FFFFFUUKKGHH... HAGH-" the connection went dead as she released the intercom - a bitter cold in her belly. That didn't seem right. It wasn't voulintary. She could feel it like ice, crawling through her arteries, making her thighs grow weak and what little she had of her knees numb. Her training told her this was blood-loss and blood-pressure. She really had hit something important.
Aiesu took slow breaths, forcing herself not to panic (to the best of her ability) pressing both hands firmly against the point on her neck now. Trying to push down the button again, she felt her thick thighs give out, her prosthetic legs no longer supporting her as she collapsed onto a pile, bleeding out onto a rug the Nepleslian turned Yamataian she was trying to contact her had brought her as a gift - the back of her head clipping the headboard on the way down.
In that moment, she realized three things:
1) That the computer though she was really still there, and thusly, that her copy wouldn't be able to make use of any of her neurochemical overrides. That the copy couldn't hide behind morphine or abstractions like she did Keib's surgery. Aiesu had her priorities. Bleeding out, she had to tend to her wounds first.
2) Second, that judging from the rising nausea in her belly, she now likely had concussion to add to the list of things to worry about - most of which she'd performed trying to set herself free in shock - unable to think clearly like a caged animal.
3) And third. That she'd been yelling at Miles, the only other doctor in the complex in Lorath - the one language he didn't speak.
4) That rug was ruined. It was a shame. It really tied the room together.
5) That she had infact realized four things, and now five with this.
She became very still, watching the crisp patterns on the ceiling grow blurry. She remembered the way she had to speak Nepleslian whenever he was around, always mucking up the pronounciation of his name. And for some reason, she smiled.
Miles Gunn resented her. He'd likely view this as jibberish or drunken nonsense on her part or some elaborate prank and just roll over in his bunk and go back to sleep. So that was it. She was on her own.
She could still feel the after-images of Hakahn's abuse on her body, grimacing - wonder if that would be the last thing she ever felt - being defiled by a power-crazed Fyunnen male. She coughed, a whimper in her throat as she timed her breathing carefully now away from her pulse to lower her blood-pressure, making it easier to hold down - though her wrists grew weaker.
In her moment of solitude, she spoke the one and only word she knew in trade.
"Fuck."