File 3: The Touch of the Goddess

Two reploids were hanging out in a park, talking to each other. One of them picked up a box and pulled out a white chip. "You want one?"

"Ah, no thanks," the other said. "I'd really like to, but I'd better not."

He shrugged and put the chip into his arm reader. "Your loss." He sat back for a moment and said nothing, so his friend looked out over the park. Another reploid was walking their way.

The walker stopped by them. "Are you followers of the Goddess?"

He nodded. "Certainly."

He glanced aside. "You have the chips?"

"Sure." He snatched the chip box from his friend's hand and opened it. "Good ones too. You looking?"

"Sure… what's the rate now?"

"50 per chip."

"50? I got some for 35 the other day."

"The other day how long ago?"

"A month."

"Well, you see, demand has gone up and the Goddess only puts out so many chips. Supply and demand, basic business practice, you see."

"Right, then." He pulled out his debit card. "I want ten."

"Sure thing." He swiped the card on his mobile IC. The customer handed over a small box with blank chips. The dealer took the empties and began placing the programmed chips in. "You know, if you become a follower, you don't have to pay full price for the Goddess chips."

"But you guys are radicals."

"Propaganda from the media, my friend. We are devoted to the happiness and spiritual development of the reploid race. Come in and we will open your mind fully to the philosophy of the goddess."

"I don't know. I have a job and all of you are so dedicated. I don't know if I have the time for that."

"If you wish. Your loss though. But if you wish to change your mind, just tell any of us and we will give you the appropriate information for induction." He handed over the chip box.

He immediately hid it in his armor pocket. "Yeah, well, thanks for the chips."

"See you again."

His partner giggled. "He'll be in shortly. He's considering it."

"It's only a matter of time."

"So why aren't you on the chip now? Or are you?"

"I'm not," he said, slightly irritated. "I got orders from Vile."

"Whoa, direct from the Prophet?"

"Yeah, he came himself. Said I need to be at an important meeting, but that I have to be clean for it. I've had to fast for the past three days."

The other put his hand on his knee. "Sorry man. That's gotta be hell."

"It is. Three days without the touch of the Goddess… oh, ****, that meeting's in an hour. I have to go."

"Keep your chin up Sting Chameleon," his friend said. "Hopefully you'll be honored for your dedication to our cause."

Sting smiled. "I hope so. Later."

"Later man."


The room was dim and smoky; the AC unit was acting up again, but there were no humans in the building to complain about it. If there were, they'd really be complaining, about the lights and the smoke. It added some ambience, yes, but who could work in such an environment?

But the building was owned by reploids. Not that any humans would know about that. The reploid owners took special care not to be known. If the humans knew the Cult of the Goddess even existed, all members would cease to operate. They didn't want that to happen, not before they made their first move.

Sting opened the door, just in time. The dim and smoky room was currently holding eight other members of The Cult. Spark Mandrill and Launch Octopus were attempting to repair the smoking AC unit, just for something to do. "I think it needs more oil," Octopus said.

"No, no, the coolant needs replacing. It's thickened up. See?" Mandrill dipped a wire into the coolant tube and pulled out a gooey mess.

"Ew, is that a hair?" Boomer Kuwanger asked. He wasn't interested in fixing the unit; too messy. "The humans need to pay more attention to what they're doing."

"No kidding," Flame Mammoth said, right before sneezing again. He sneezed gooey tar. Thus, Boomer was keeping as far away from the large reploid as possible. "If they would, I wouldn't be so stuffed up all the time."

"Watch it with that tar," Octopus said while handling AC parts. "You'll start a fire if you don't."

"That's the point," he snuffled. "Stupid military humans."

"And they shouldn't lie," Chill Penguin said from next to the open window. "Especially about certain things."

"Oh ***, not again," Sting heard Boomer mutter.

"What happened to you?" Octopus said.

"Well, I was working in the Arctic Circle," Penguin started, rubbing his flipper hands together. "I was studying ice sheet conditions and such when some human told me about Santa Claus." He looked starry eyed. "It was such a lovely vision of generosity and love. He was supposed to be at the North Pole, so I looked for the toy factory. For five years. And I found nothing! Nothing at all. I searched every frozen inch of the Arctic tundra and he wasn't there. Why do humans have stories like that about? It's such a tease." By now, he was bawling.

"Quiet down," Armored Armadillo mumbled. "I'm trying to sleep. If I can't have the touch, I need sleep."

"And then I got transferred to Antarctica," Penguin went on. "And Santa Claus wasn't there either!"

"Shut up!" Mandrill said. "You're bugging the hell out of me."

"I miss the Goddess touch," Armadillo mumbled.

"I hate this **** fasting. Crazy Vile," Octopus agreed. "Makes you want to shut down permanently."

"I just keep saying I'll get it back after this **** meeting," Sting said. "Even though my mind's all fuzzed up. And I was on sales duty this afternoon! Maybe I'll go out and kill some idiot human later. That'll make me feel better."

"That's bad strategy," Storm Eagle said. "We're supposed to be in hiding."

"It'll all work out shortly," Byte said, eerily calm.

The others all glared at Byte. "Why the hell are you so calm when we're all two turns close to crazy?" Mandrill accused. "Did you even follow the fast?"

Byte shrugged. "I did, for a while."

"Weakling," Penguin sniffed. "I had to drop back into depression again and you slipped up? Horrible."

Octopus, having the longest reach, grabbed hold of Byte. "You've got two minutes to tell us why we shouldn't tear you apart for not following the Prophet's orders!"

But before they turned on him, Vile threw open the door. "Will you lot stop messing around? The noise is distracting the Goddess."

Three Cult members immediately stood to attention. Sting was already standing, so he saluted. Armadillo stood up sleepily. Mandrill and Octopus hastily closed the AC unit and then stood to attention. Byte was dropped to the floor, but stood up. Storm Eagle stood, but rather on the slow side. Vile glared at them until they were proper.

"Hail Prophet!" Not exactly in chorus yet, but that would be seen to.

"Hail fellows," he said, keeping his voice even. "What's causing problems here?"

"Byte didn't follow the fast," Mandrill said. "We were going to kill him."

"There's no need to kill him. Byte, leave immediately. When you learn of what has passed today, you will be shamed enough."

"Yes sir," he said, and left the room.

Vile shook his head. "At any rate, it's time. Come with me."


They went down a long hallway, passing up many doors. This used to be a factory for making plastic boxes for packing things in, boxes that looked pretty but were near impossible to open for all the tape, stickers, latches, magnets, and such. The architect had been obsessed with doors and put in far too many; it made getting around just as hard as opening the pretty boxes. That is, unless you had a keycard like Vile carried at all times.

The last member of the group kept up, but only enough to not get shut in a door. Storm Eagle was finding The Cult to be less exciting than expected. He was in charge of a flight battalion in the Global Force militia. He and his men protected the skies from terrorists. He heard of The Cult much as anyone else had, whispered about in the library stacks, in unknown bars, in the less popular human hangouts where reploids had begun to make their own social scene. The Cult of the Goddess promised to open the minds and eyes of those who joined, to make one more powerful, to develop the reploid culture, and to teach obscure knowledge. They also made the Goddess chips.

They were strange little things. White and unadorned, they packed a powerful program capable of making a reploid happy, calm, and open to the spiritual world. Eagle had found several of his men using the program on days off. They claimed it was harmless and safe, so he went ahead and tried one. It did all as promised, but with a small price. The program only lasted ten hours. Then the chip would self-delete. The user stayed in the calm blissful state for a while, but once it wore off, the reploid became irritable and sometimes even depressed.

Thus you would become addicted. Once addicted, joining the Cult was the easiest way to support the habit. However, there were rumors flying about the chips, about long-term effects just now being noticed in older Cultists. Inability to focus, nervous tics and habits, substantial paranoia, shortened tempers, delusional behaviors, decreased effectiveness of the chip, hallucinations, and sometimes, the rumors went, sometimes the chip user died while under the touch. Not that it was a bad death. But it was still death.

Vile finally began speaking when they started climbing some stairs. "You have been specially chosen among The Cult for an important task."

Oh great, not this again, Storm Eagle thought. He'd only come because he was curious. He didn't want to be preached at again.

"We have, for a long time, spoken of rising against the humans, but due to our lack of numbers and professional warriors, we have restrained ourselves from doing so. But we are now acquiring new members daily, and you eight have proven yourselves to have the potential to be great leaders in our group."

Now this was interesting. Vile had everyone's attention as they got to yet another door. This one was a massive double hung steel door. Vile swiped his card, entered a password, and lead them into the factory's work floor. It was a huge open space, with a small enclosed area in the center back. He led them that way.

"We are still in the planning phase, though. This will be nothing like the small random strikes we've been doing so far. Those have been mere individual acts that have attracted no attention from the humans; after this begins, they will not be able to ignore us any longer."

"What about the Maverick Hunters?" Boomer asked. "We've all been harassed by them in recent times."

"We are not a recognized force yet," Vile waved off. "And we can and will strike before the Hunters realize it. When the time comes, they will be of little effect."

"What about the debilitating side effects?" Eagle asked testily. "Every one of us knows it. That little program of yours has created a weakness in all of us. And now there's word that long time users are becoming mentally unstable and even dangerous to everyone. You can't deny that."

"Have you ever met with the Goddess?"

"With the Goddess herself? No."

Vile glared at him dangerously, and he stopped despite himself. Vile may have been short, but he was rumored to be an excellent warrior. "Those cases often prove to be defects within the reploids themselves. I have been in the presence of the Goddess and I don't have any problems. Since you have been chosen to lead, it has been decided that all of you will meet with her. So you should have no problems either."

"We're meeting with the Goddess?" Sting asked in disbelief.

Everyone else became either nervous or anxious to go on. The prophet had long talked about 'the Goddess' as being the source of the chip programming, some mysterious reploid that was their true leader. She was hidden away from the humans at all times, reportedly because she couldn't stand to be around them. Few Cult members had ever met with her.

Storm Eagle was both nervous and anxious. He had a number of questions he'd wanted to ask their true leader for a long time, about the humans and why reploids were around in the first place. Certainly someone like the Goddess, wise and intelligent enough to hold back a revolution from starting too weak, certainly she would know the answers. Then again, rumors were that the Goddess could alter another reploid's programming simply by looking at them funny. That could not be good.

Vile was smiling, confident in his Goddess. "Yes, you will be, probably many times after today while we train you for your missions. She believes in you all, and will answer any doubts that remain within yourselves." He started entering a complicated password into the small room. "I will forewarn you. She may startle or shock you at first. It is merely her ways, and you will grow used to them in time."

The small room was carpeted in pastel green and held tacky orange and yellow furniture left over from the time of the factory. There were pastoral watercolors on the wall, probably bought for three bucks a piece in a cheap art warehouse. There were various computers, files, and small office equipment lying about. A single clock on the wall kept time to itself. It wasn't the sort of place one would expect to meet a Goddess, Eagle reflected.

There was one reploid in the room, an odd model that he'd never seen the like of before. He wasn't sure if he was looking at an athletic female or an effeminate male. The stranger had red armor in the most unusual style, as well as long corn blond hair; he was playing 'Stairway to Heaven' on a guitar. But there was no one else in there, so was that the Goddess?

"This is our Goddess," Vile said. "Zero, I've brought the chosen to you today. One has failed to meet our requirements already."

Zero looked mildly puzzled at none of them, then shrugged. "Far from the hyclonite you might say. Go bugger that manager."

What the hell?

"I know they're not up to your standards, m'lady," Vile answered as if that statement had made sense. "We'll be training them thoroughly, I promise."

"Do we have any koi?" she asked. "There's a far-fetched dog on the other side."

"That's the Goddess?" Octopus asked, rather disappointed.

"She's operating far beyond our abilities to understand," Vile answered.

"No she isn't," Eagle answered angrily. He was disappointed, especially since they'd all had to stay off the chip for three days. "She's freaking malfunctioning, you fool! If she's our real leader, then you're all fools and I won't stay any longer."

"Tetris!" Zero said to no one in particular.

Vile grabbed him. "She is not malfunctioning! Her mind is far better than any other on the planet. Why don't you find out for yourself?"

With that, he threw him at Zero, who tried to move out of the way, but wound up falling off her couch. Storm Eagle tried to get up and leave, but was stopped when the Goddess put her hand on his shoulder.

And her eyes turned scarlet red.

His systems analysis put him on high alert for a second before falling totally silent. All the numbers and letters of his programming felt electrified. It was frightening, unlike when he'd taken the chips. But then the familiar peace washed over him and he felt incredibly happy. The Goddess chips were nothing compared to the touch of the true Goddess. Perhaps Zero's ramblings made more sense when one was like this.

"Our purpose is to destroy the human overlords," Zero seemed to be saying, not out loud, but inside his own head. "We will not stop until we have total control, however that must take place. Nothing else matters to you. Nothing at all."

Nothing mattered, not even logic and reputation. Which is why the Goddess acted the way she did. She knew only one thing mattered. Storm Eagle was awed.

"Well?" Vile said, once he came back to the moment.

"She is the Goddess," he replied. "She will control the world and we won't stop until she does."

"Good," he said with a smile. "You understand her now. You're next."


Most of the 'files' of this fic are short, so I'll be posting 2 or 3 a week because I can. And here we meet the Cultists who replace the viral Mavericks we know and love.