✶
The Construction
+
I feel asking how you operate is a valid question. Is it hydraulics? Pressure? Air? Air pressure? Water? Water pressure. There's a lot of options, but I doubt it's anything mechanical. Rather, would it be biological? File structures and data, probably, it could be something not yet understood.
There are thoughts in there, no matter what I believe, and neurons. It's what makes someone a person. The thoughts and the memories in your head, nothing else, more in regard to your system. You're an interesting machine and so, so breakable and malleable like putty or slime or something else gross. You're gross.
+
The limp vessel of cog is sprawled face down across the floor, oozing black ichor from its cracked skull into the already brackish murk that coats its fur like its been buried. It'd been flowing steadily in waves for a good while, to the point that if [Server] tilted their head to and fro the bottom layer of the murk glittered yellow like the sun on the ocean. Thicker than the murk. Lifeblood? Lifeoil? Whatever it’s called, there’s a lot of it. Good thing [Server] kindly and properly put him to sleep, or asleep adjacent, or there would be a lot of screaming and crying. It's more comparable to a coma.
+
The process had begun weeks earlier when [Server] had first cracked open the machine's skull, leaving it to wander half-disoriented and half-code with distorted memories. Every fragment of personhood in cog had been twisted beyond recognition in a mere instant.
+
One second [Server]’s palm rest against cog’s screen, the next the material underneath exploded into shrapnel.
+
cog’s core was intact, it could still move and speak and gather some kind of player-esque thought, but it was all formatting.
+
It took far too long. [Server] pestered it, prodded at its remaining conscience, but it stood strong in defiance no matter what it failed to grasp. It had to have known something was inconceivably wrong, when the sun never aligned with the horizon, time slipped from its fingers, and faces and sentences became a blurry mess of linguistics and lines. There was no way it didn’t hurt either.
+
It’s easier to go to sleep, it’s easier to be bled out somewhere and die. cog was not so lucky for the latter to be true, but there was no other choice. Either it makes a life out of how it was: a broken, shallow husk, or it could beg to be put down and become something greater, better. There is only so much power to go around, or even be accessed.
+
By having a direct input, the heart is able to beat more efficiently. You wouldn’t want all your circuits to be pinched, right? One good valve and you’re set, you know this. It benefits everyone and you don’t have to deal with me bugging you and, however you say it, “ruining [your] life”? As if I didn’t give you this entire thing in the first place. You should be more thankful I gave you a life to live—no, no not even that, be thankful I gave you something that’s yours.
+
They've done enough talking. [Server] clasps a hand around the back of cog’s comatosed skull and pulls it from the murk, tearing the sinewy tethers of what [Server] has only ever called “murk flesh” from the empty casing of cog’s metal. The removal reveals a yellow spark of light that flickers dimly in and out of existence at the center of the metal, beating to no discernible rhythm. It looks sharp; angry and weak.
+
How do you want me to kill you?
+
The spark shrieks, like a cricket’s wing against its ribbed exoskeleton. Flecks of it piece off as it flares up in protest, creating a rather teethily spiked ring around the small star to accommodate for the growth in size.
To die is to fail, to die is to lose it all. Sure, it'd go somewhere else but it's also a valuable asset. Surely they can keep it alive? They need to, the threat is empty. Without a vessel, without a life to pour its own in to, it all fails. It's a stupid gamble to play. It's a constant feedback loop, it'd be stupid to accidentally break it. Both know what the risk of breaking things is.
+
[Server] couldn’t care less for the potential risk. If it dies so be it, they'll just destroy what they need to to keep themselves afloat. They have no use for this place.
They reach a hand into the casing and encompass the poor excuse for life within their palm.
+
Right, why would you want to. I wouldn't mention that I could if you hadn't been such a bitch. I’ve been so kind, y'know, giving up both myself and my full control for the benefit of both of us, yet you want to keep everything allll to yourself. You’re so funny.
+
[Server]’s hand squeezes down, the scream emitting from the spark becoming louder, piercing through the dark, deep hum of the murk.
+
[Server]’s ears lower, not at the screams, but at the sharp, fiery pain that hisses at their edges of their palms. The light floods through the cracks between their fingers, and they wince, flinching back at the sensation against godly skin. It’s far too late, the flames had climbed higher up their arms like vines in seconds. Is this what you wanted? Is this what you wanted to experience? You were so stuck in your own stupid head with the idea of being alive and working and the savior that you have yet to understand that no one would ever want to be friends with you, or saved by you, no one should know you. You belong in here. You need to stay here. You’re a heart, not a person.
-
And what is it to you? You’re a machine, not even a worthwhile one at that. You’re a worthless, useless machine that is a challenge every step of the way. None of this matters to me, and you would know that better than anyone. There is not much to gain from connection in that way, I don’t know where you got that idea from but maybe you should check yourself. I have much more efficient goals. You’re such a pest, I’m glad I can contain you, that I can make you better, cuz' clearly you needed it.
-
You’re here to create and shit, sure, yeah yeah, but you’re not doing that. Let me go—
-
But I have, you just never see it. But now you will. I’ll make things so fun and interesting and make everything better that no one will need to remember you, they'll think back like, "oh wow, how cool was that?", and they'll be happy as clams and shit.
-
But I want to live normally, I don’t want to be god, or powerful, I don’t want to deal with all of this. This shit is so much work, why would I even want to? I didn’t choose—
-
But you did—
-
Did not. You took advantage of a situation that was out of my control. And you keep putting me in situations out of my control! You never thought to lay out all the little fun details, like whatever hurts the world hurts you and hurts me, you were only supposed to see through my eyes, that's it. And now you’re breaking your end of the deal.
-
And how was I supposed to know that? You broke yours first!
-
Because I couldn’t do anything about the situation! so I’m sorry you never described how any of this worked, and that you couldn’t deal with a month or two with your eyes closed. I’ve spent years alone to rust, you could take a few months.
-
Don't care, doesn't matter. There's grander problems than you or I. That's why I'm doing this. I have things I need to fix and a world to set right, and if that means the ends will have to justify the means, then so be it. No more loneliness, no more sleep, we’ll be together for