Disclaimer: Kirby belongs to Nintendo and HAL Laboratory.
Two days passed. It would only be one more day before Hyness would be finished with preparing the runes. Fransisca was in the middle of studying up on therapy, browsing through the lot of books in her dimensional pocket. To be fair, the ice mage was a bit nervous since she hasn't given therapy before. She figured she'd do ok if she tried her best.
Kirby, Elfilin and Bandee were at the main plaza preparing to depart to explore the ruins of Alivel Mall for a while. Vesa stood at the sidelines of the plaza as the Warp Star floated in the middle. Soon enough, the pink star warrior, the small chinchilla and the Waddle Dee hopped onto the Warp Star.
"Ok," Vesa called, "take care!"
"Poyo!" Kirby waved his arm.
The Warp Star took off. Folding her arms behind her back, Vesa made her way back into Kirby's house. Inside, she found Elfilis sitting on the mattress.
"How are you doing?" she asked them.
"I'm feeling better, I think," Elfilis admitted.
Vesa smiled and sat down next to them. Elfilis softly closed their eyes. The moment continued on in silence until Fransisca entered the house.
"Oh," Vesa waved her hand, "hey, Fransisca."
"Hello," Fransisca replied, "I'm here to attempt therapy. This will mostly be you talking about your feelings and experiences."
Vesa and Elfilis shared glances.
"As in for both of us?" Vesa paused.
"Mainly for Elfilis," Fransisca nodded, quoting her book to a degree, "however, I would imagine that you also have some issues to work out, given your shared experience."
"Only some," Vesa agreed, "but I'll save that for later."
"Well hopefully, I'll be able to help," Fransisca proclaimed, "no promises."
Fransisca sat across from Vesa and Elfilis. The human gently grasped their paw.
"We can start when you're ready," Fransisca offered.
"I," Elfilis stammered, "where should I start?"
"At the beginning," Fransisca answered.
Elfilis nodded and inhaled.
"At the start," Elfilis began, "I had only shown up on the planet to refill on supplies and to carry out my mission. I didn't really have much I was low on, but I didn't think there would be another inhabited planet for a while. I decided it would be a good idea to restock and collect samples from some of the more important life-forms before continuing on my journey. I was hopeful that eventually, I would be able to take on Dark Matter at the rate I was advancing. Once I arrived, everything seemed to be going well. I landed in the middle of an empty field so as not to spook anyone by accident and started taking smaller samples of the local flora. After a couple hours, though, I was approached by the planet's military."
Vesa didn't say anything as she listened.
"I attempted to tell them I meant no harm, but they started to shoot at me right away," Elfilis continued, "that…didn't really do all that much, even the tank shells didn't really matter as I snatched them out of the air. They tried this for about half an hour before they noticed it wasn't working and tried diplomacy instead. I was told to surrender from afar with a loudspeaker. I had been overconfident. I decided I was powerful enough to stop anything they tried and surrendered myself to them. As soon as I tried to speak to one of the scientists they brought along for the trip, they injected me with something. I tried to force it out of my body, but at that point, it was too late and I wasn't able to do anything other than struggle."
Vesa frowned.
"Elfilis," she whispered.
"I'm not sure how long I was unconscious after that, but I was quickly taken to a nearby lab. For several days, they tried to take samples," Elfilis added, "at the time, I was too strong for them to breach my skin easily, before they had used a kind of substance that was contact based so it didn't need to breach the skin. Eventually, they just slowly turned up the acidity of the fluid they kept me in, until I was 'soft' enough for them to take samples. It was agonizing for the first few weeks, but I eventually got used to the pain the acid they used caused. Although, my body didn't adapt to it at all. They kept me in the same kind of acid for a long time. Even after they were gone, machines still automatically produced it and filled my tank with it."
Fransisca nodded while a serious expression glistened in her eyes.
"They took samples for a few weeks before finally deciding to move me to a more permanent location where I could be studied further," Elfilis continued, "some scientists argued for testing me much like other animals or species they do tests on, mostly for social behaviors and more humane testing. They shot them behind the building several hours after that. I was apparently at that point a 'top secret' project and there was no room for moral quandary—anyone caught trying to test for intelligence or trying to make things more comfortable for me didn't show up for work the next day. The other scientists quickly caught on, and stopped trying to empathize with me; the ones who weren't there originally bought into the phony stories that I was an alien invader."
Vesa sighed and lowered her head.
"After that, I was sent to the lab where Vesa met me and stayed there for the next 30 years, going through the same routine until they permitted testing with you. And then they tested their new invention that split my soul into 2 pieces…myself getting the half containing my memories of the experience, trauma, and emotional damage…and Elfilin getting my childhood innocence, trusting nature, and most of my positive emotions."
Vesa and Elfilis exchanged glances.
"After the split, my memories became hazier," Elfilis added, "they made me into an attraction for human entertainment. People gathered around to see the alien invader who tried to wipe out humanity, they would say. I wasn't awake most of the time, having sustained too much damage to my soul. Elfilin got lucky and recovered quickly due to being much smaller physically, and not having a large amount of my soul, he was able to escape before they could contain him properly. I imagine that his own memory was fairly hazy and after he escaped, he probably hunkered down somewhere for a few hundred years as his soul finished healing and he became his own entity. I got the dubious pleasure of being trapped and psychologically tortured instead, being forced to listen to the same speech over and over again for centuries."
Elfilis closed their eyes for a brief moment.
"I can't bear to repeat the words myself," they confessed, "but I could show you what I remember about how the tour would go."
Vesa took a deep breath and stiffened her spine.
"Go ahead," Fransisca nodded.
Upon cue, Elfilis flicked their hand. The interior of Kirby's house seemed to shift while Vesa stood up. She and the ice mage scanned their surroundings as the scenery changed into a projection of an elevator, where a crowd of eager tourists stood in anticipation as the elevator made its ascent. Vesa shuddered as music blasted from the speaker.
"Welcome, visitors, to the Dream Discoveries Tour of our science facility, Lab Discovera! On this thrilling tour, you'll be introduced to the ultimate life-form, Specimen ID-F86! From the moment ID-F86 arrived on our planet, it began a campaign of destruction that threatened the native wildlife of our entire world. Luckily, our research team managed to capture it before it could complete its invasion. Once it was contained, our lab began studying ID-F86's spatial teleportation ability—research that laid the groundwork for the planetary warp technology we enjoy today!"
Vesa gritted her teeth and clenched her fists, knowing full well that story the lab made up wasn't true.
"However, 30 years after our research began, a "warp-experiment incident" occurred in this facility. A new life-form, separated from the main specimen, escaped in the aftermath. That new subspecimen has yet to be recovered. In the time since, ID-F86 has shown no signs of activity. It is now kept in a state of permanent stasis within the custom-made Eternal Capsule here on the top level of Lab Discovera."
The elevator came to a complete stop, and the doors slid open.
"And here we are! Let's meet the ultimate life-form: Specimen ID-F86!"
Fransisca and Vesa hesitated while the tourists left the elevator. Before the last tourist could disembark, the vision projection fizzed out and they were back in Kirby's house. The human sighed in relief as she sat back down. The ice mage took a moment to process the information before she jotted down some notes. Elfilis lowered their gaze to the floor, doing their best not to experience another panic attack, clamping it down with their mental control and innate resistance.
"Well," Vesa said, "you didn't deserve any of this."
"I certainly didn't think so. I still don't think so. I didn't get much of a say in things," Elfilis sighed sadly, "I no longer have a primary directive. Dark Matter is defeated, my mission was a failure."
Vesa placed her hand on Elfilis's shoulder. Tears welled up in their eyes.
"My training, planning and growth of power is now for naught. I-I am what you might call an artificial life-form. I was made for a purpose, with directives," they fretted, "I was made with the instruction to defeat Dark Matter, to preserve life in the universe in my body so after its defeat we could rebuild. Because of humanity, most of that DNA has been stripped away, corrupted or just destroyed, the species I could've brought back are permanently extinct. I was trapped, and hundreds of years went by, and Dark Matter was defeated without me."
Fransisca let out a soft sigh.
"My prime directive cannot be changed. Despite the fact it was defeated, I will never feel satisfaction that I have finished my mission until I defeat Dark Matter, and yet, such a thing is impossible now. My thoughts are in a constant feedback loop. I always find myself thinking what's the next step. What new skill should I learn to fight against Dark Matter? I remember it was defeated without me, and that someone else completed my mission. I will always have these thoughts. I will be…incomplete."
Fransisca stood up and approached Elfilis, who looked up.
"Well, you did say this was outside your control," Fransisca replied.
"I know that. But, I cannot rebel against my programming," Elfilis reminded, "I cannot resist it if I wanted to. Now I have no direction, just this need to destroy Dark Matter. I was supposed to be the hope of the universe, an end to a dark age. Now I am purposeless. To describe the feeling would be akin to the worst of human depression. Except, I don't feel the need to take my life, I'm just merely upset."
For a moment, Fransisca thought about Gooey and figured maybe she should keep Elfilis away from him. The ice mage and Vesa shared glances.
"Well," Fransisca told Elfilis, "I'm glad you opened up about what you dealt with. That's all that matters right now."
"Thank you," Elfilis let out a relieved sigh.
Vesa stood up and nodded at Fransisca.
"You're doing great with listening to my friend's problems," Vesa assured Fransisca.
"Well, they are my sibling. I wish I could do more," Fransisca replied, "unfortunately, it doesn't seem like the core of their issues will improve anytime soon. I feel like their panic attacks and PTSD will fade or even vanish entirely with time, but they're right. They were made to destroy Dark Matter, and they likely won't be satisfied until they do so."
"About that," Vesa blurted, "I have a few questions."
Vesa glanced over her shoulder and pet Elfilis's head.
"It'll be a moment."
Vesa and Fransisca stepped outside the house, the human closing the door behind her.
"Do you know if all of Dark Matter has been eradicated completely?" Vesa asked.
"Well," Fransisca shrugged, "apparently fragments of it have popped up several times over the years, small parts of the greater whole that it once was. Most of it is just gone though. If I knew where to search for fragments of it I would tell you, but I haven't a clue."
Vesa took in a deep breath through her nose, straightened her back and closed her eyes, recalling this piece of advice from her father…a technique which helped her cope whenever she was rushed to the emergency room.
"Maybe if we do discover a fragment of Dark Matter or two," Vesa offered, "I say we let Elfilis pitch in?"
"Well," Fransisca fixated her gaze on Vesa, "ideally that would work, but the universe is vast and expansive. The chances of finding Dark Matter, if any of it still remains, are rather slim unless it reveals itself and starts causing problems."
Vesa held up her left hand and crossed her fingers.
"For that," Vesa replied, "let's keep our fingers crossed."
"I find it hard to hope that Dark Matter still exists in the universe, but if only for my sibling's sake, I will hope there is some left."
Once Fransisca climbed back onto the roof of Kirby's house, Elfilis set foot outside. Vesa invited them to relax near the fishing pond.
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