novelzi [327] 4.48 Within the Laboratory I
[327] 4.48 Within the Laboratory I
“Can we please get some lights on in here?” Alicia asks as the door locks behind us. “I can’t see my damn hands in front of my eyes.”Chloe answers, having gotten up from my arms about a minute ago. A simple flourish of her hands and a glowing golden sphere appears, then rises until the crown of her hat becomes a makeshift throne for the orb now illumining the passageway.
“Sorry, dear,” Hank says. “This lab is something of a makeshift one I’ve had to throw together after Daryl and Renault ruined our original one. I… I should have foreseen their delusions of rule and domination. Maybe I was just too blinded by our old friendship.”
“Okay, Hank, but what does that have to do with the fact that it’s pitch-black in here?”
“I’m a [Shadowwalker], Alicia. I control and manipulate shadows. Importantly, I can see in the dark as easily as I can in daylight. I hadn’t expected to be flying out to meet you until Monday, and more importantly, I hadn’t had time to finish installing the lights into the facility.”
“I’m not sure which is worse, that you ‘forgot’ to install lights in your little workshop, or that I actually believe you regarding your explanation.”
“I’m sure this is all overwhelming, dear, and it’s not going to get any easier.” We reach the bottom of the stairs and begin down a long hallway. “What I’m about to show you is going to answer some questions, and lead to many more. It won’t be easy for any of you to look at. Sera, you especially…”
I’m fairly confident at what I’m about to see. Mentally, I’d prepared myself for such an outcome ever since everyone started talking about ‘the Seraphina data’, but seeing it for myself imminently is recalling visceral reactions of disgust and revulsion.
Chloe takes my hand and infuses it with a trace of healing magic. My [Health] remains near its maximum, but the gentle, warming sensations that accompany the spell bring a sense of much-needed calm to my raging psyche.
“No matter what happens, I’m here for you. That will never change, no matter what happens going forward.”
The door opens, confirming my suspicions. Near the front of the room, I glance at the transportation pod in question. The combination of Ethertech is wholly impossible for me to even begin to dissect, not that I spare more than a glance before I see the main event. Yet another woman just like me, though older by many years, probably wiser as well. Definitely more experienced, and though it's hard to get a read on her expression, I sense a deep sorrow when I gaze upon her.
I sense no life within her, but the corpse of the original Seraphina still radiates a mysterious power.
It’s calling to me. Something deep within my being resonates with the other version, the original version, the source of ⸢The Anomaly⸥ as far as Earth is concerned.
“Sera, are you okay?” Chloe grabs my arm.
Her words feel distorted and distant, as if she’s calling to me while I’m submerged beneath a thousand leagues of sea. I feel her presence, I sense her warmth, her kindness, her love and affection, and yet, seeing the woman I thought was me and now knowing without a doubt that I’m just a replica forged by earthlings, I feel hollow. I feel empty, wondering what I am and what I’m supposed to be.
“Sera!” Chloe calls to me again. “Talk to me. Please, say something. Let me know you’re okay.”
I don’t answer. Instead I step forward, following the siren song of Seraphina’s body as it beckons me forth. It feels so calming, so relaxing, connecting for the first time with a part of myself that I’ve never known I was missing. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so relaxed in all my life.
“Not too close, Sera,” Hank says, also pulling me back.
But I can’t resist. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel when I came face to face with my original self, the one whose memories I’ve been absorbing thanks to the mysterious power embedded within ⸢The Anomaly⸥. I feel the same sense of grief I did that morning when Chloe and I went to my mother’s gravesite to pay my respects. It’s only fair, considering this Seraphina can be likened to my mother in a way as well.
Tears start flowing down my cheek. Already I was fatigued, fighting off sleep only out of fear and desperation. But with the added grief and the weight of so much responsibility, my knees buckle. My mind starts racing, trying and mostly failing to process all these myriad emotions that I can scarcely even identify.
And the tears won’t stop coming. I cry for my losses, for my failures, for everyone I have failed to save in my weakness, my ignorance, and my fear.
“Why?” I ask. “Why was I given this responsibility?” And what am I, really? If I’m not that Seraphina, the one created to save the universe from the System, then what does that make me? And if she, with all her training, all her resources, all of that knowledge that I lack, still failed, then how can I possibly hope to succeed?
Chloe’s gentle hand rubbing my back and her quiet voice permeating my mind are the last things I feel before consciousness slips away.
I awaken to find myself lying on a small bed in the middle of a room little bigger than Chloe’s and my bathroom back home. I’m curled up in the fetal position, my pillow clenched tightly in my arms. Maybe I was having a nightmare as I slept; if I was, at least I was given the small mercy of not remembering.
The room is dimly lit, only a tiny mote of light on the tip of Chloe’s finger as she reads through what appears to be her father’s research notes. She looks up at me with a somber smile.
“Are you feeling any better?” she asks.
No headache, no urge to bawl my eyes out. The bodily fatigue, at least, is gone, though a lingering dread still lies deep within my core. “Physically, yes,” I say. Mentally, I’m not sure yet.” I pause. “How long was I out?”
“About four hours. Dad wanted to see us when we were both awake and ready, but he said that we should wait rather than rush.”
“Chloe? Can you come lie down with me for just a few minutes?”
She does so without missing a beat. Her small glowing orb is replaced by golden Etheric wings which wrap around my body and bathe me in a radiant veil. For several seconds we stay like this, no movement or sound beyond those of our breaths and our hearts beating as one. The world outside this tiny room is still there, the tribulations and perils still there, growing by the day, but for these brief moments, there is only us, only Chloe and me and our love, unvarnished by the need for us to express it in mere words.
Chloe’s hand strokes my arm. Her head nuzzles into my chest. She clings to me as desperately as I need her. No space lies between us, and for some amount of time, the two of us exist as one.
I take a breath and slowly sit up. “Have you been around the lab much?”
“No. Dad showed us to a room, gave me some notes to read over, and headed back to his room to reconnect with Mom. Fortunately, I haven’t heard from them since.” She grins. “Dad might not have had time to install any lights, but he did have time to inscribe the soundproofing.”
“You think they’re going to be much longer?”
Chloe shrugs. “I’m trying not to think about it, thank you very much.”
“Fair enough. So, to change the subject, what are the research notes about?”
“It’s a timeline of the early days of Project Seraphina. He wanted us both to see it. It seems that he was a graduate student in electrical engineering back twenty-two years ago— I didn’t even know that’s what he went to school for. But anyway, one night, while going hiking along a nature trail a couple dozen miles outside of the city where he was living at the time.”
“Which was?” I asked.
“He didn’t say. Apparently the site is classified even now. Which, I think is a load of crap, seeing as though he seems to care about the government and classification and confidentiality as much as you do. Maybe less.”
“I don’t know about less. That’s a stretch.”
“Yeah, maybe. Personally, I just think he’s embarrassed to tell us where he went to grad school. But anyway, one night, he was startled by a glowing golden flash and, being about as curious and reckless as you are–”
“Hey!” I shake my head. “No, wait, that’s completely accurate. Sorry, love, continue.”
“You know I still love you, Sera.”
I smile and feel all warm and fuzzy inside every time I hear it. “And I, you.”
“So, anyway, he headed down there and, after searching the area for a little bit— it was late— he found the pod where the original Seraphina was. Apparently, at the time, she was still clinging to life.”
“She’s a fusion of biology and incredibly advanced Etheric nanotech. I’m guessing the latter couldn’t survive in the absence of the System and the Ether generated by it. That, or, just the strain of piercing through every layer of reality to leave hers and access ours. Just slipping into subspace tears us apart. How horrible must it be to exist in the void between entire universes, even for a brief moment?”
“Anyway,” Chloe continues, “with her dying words, the original Seraphina said that something called the System would one day come, and that he— and by extension, the people of the Earth— needed to prepare themselves for that eventuality. Dad, of course, tried to save her life, but ultimately, she was pronounced dead before emergency personnel could arrive.”
“I’m a little surprised, though. I figured that, once emergency services were called, the government would have confiscated all the technology and shut him up with threats and maybe a small bribe, and then disposed of him. How did he and his former friends end up getting involved with the project?”
“I’m surprised you didn’t instead ask how he managed to get someone in the government to actually believe in the potential of this project, as opposed to some sort of hoax. They were funded, to the tune of tens of millions a year, all on a project that might not have ever paid dividends.”
“Well, that too, but–”
Before Chloe can answer, a knock comes from the door, followed by Hank’s voice. “Girls, are you both decent in there? Can I come in?”
Chloe turns to me; I nod. “Come in, Dad,” she says.
The door opens. “Are you feeling any better, Sera?” he asks.
“Yes. A lot better now; thanks for asking. I think it was mostly that I didn’t get much sleep last night, and then seeing that threw me over the edge.”
“Understandable. I understand from Chloe that the both of you had quite the long day yesterday and last night.”
I nod. “Yeah. I’m sorry for worrying you.”
“It’s of no concern. And, since I hadn’t had a chance to say so earlier, thank you for rescuing Alicia.”
“Of course,” I say. “She’s our mother; of course we would do anything we could to rescue her and bring her back home safely.”
“Indeed. Anyway, I heard through the walls that you were wondering about how I managed to get myself embedded into the work of what would eventually become Project Seraphina. As it turns out, that’s actually what I wanted to come here to talk about, especially after you said that you had begun to assimilate memories of the original Seraphina through the data embedded within you.”
“What’s that?”
“Sera, does the name Madison Mazerie mean anything to you?”
I freeze in place and my heart skips a beat. “How… How do you know that name?”
“I assume from your reaction that it does.”
“She was one of the two principal researchers on the development of the original Project Seraphina. But, how do you know her?”
“Come with me to the conference room. I have a feeling you’ll want to see this.”