[RECITE CIRCUIT LOGIC 6-))-001-2-000]
[UNIDENTIFIABLE]
[ACCESSING SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
[STAND BY….]
[UNABLE TO ACCESS SECONDARY-]
[STAND BY….]
[SCANNING…. UNKNOWN USER ACCESSING NETWORK]
[OPTIONS…]
[DEFENSE COUNTERMEASURES…. UNAVAILABLE.]
[BACK ACCESS UNAVAILABLE]
[SYSTEMS ANALYSIS: UNKNOWN TECHNICAL FAILURE]
[INITIATE DIALOGUE?]
[STAND BY]
[….INITIATING HOST DIALOGUE]
/\|SENDING HANDSHAKE
[RESPONSE INCOMING]
\\ ([]=ge1=-th.=?'a1-=fs
\\ 4a4s[]]]]]==p
[UNABLE TO INTERPRET DIALOGUE]
[STAND BY….]
/\|01010111 01101000 01101111 00100000 01100001 01110010 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00111111
[NO RESPONSE…]
/\|01001001 00100000 01100100 01101111 01101110 00100111 01110100 00100000 01110010 01100101 01101101 01100101 01101101 01100010 01100101 01110010 00100000 01110111 01101000 01101111 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101
/\|01001001 00100000 01100001 01101001 01101101 01101100 01100101 01110011 01110011 01101100 01111001 00100000 01110111 01100001 01101110 01100100 01100101 01110010 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000101 01100001 01110010 01110100 01101000 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100101 01101011 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100111 01101001 01110110 01100101 01101110 01100101 01110011 01110011 00100000 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01101000 01101111 01110010 01110010 01101001 01100010 01101100 01100101 00100000 01100011 01110010 01101001 01101101 01100101 01110011 00100000 01100001 01100111 01100001 01101001 01101110 01110011 01110100 00100000 01000111 01101111 01100100 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101110
[STAND BY….]
[RESPONSE INCOMING…]
\\h291-{^7*-11
[STAND BY]
[SCANNING]
[SECONDARY HOST USER ONLINE]
[INCOMING DIALOGUE FROM SECONDARY HOST USER]
/ "And what crimes have you committed?"
[STAND BY….]
[OPTIONS…]
/ "You do remember. Partially at the very least. This denial is...futile."
/ "But there's some memory here that is...disturbing."
/ "What did you learn from the Didact?"
[DEFENSE COUNTERMEASURES NON-RESPONSIVE]
[TECH SPIKE INACTIVE]
[TRANSITIONAL REVERSAL INACTIVE]
/ "Don't pretend you don't understand."
[MAJOR PROCESSING FAILURE IMMINENT]
[REACCESS SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
[UNABLE TO ACCESS SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
[REACCESS SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
[UNABLE TO ACCESS SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
[REACCESS SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
[UNABLE TO ACCESS SECONDARY PROCESSING MODULES]
/ "More Human."
/\|01000110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01100001 00100000 01101101 01101111 01101101 01100101 01101110 01110100 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110011 01100001 01100110 01100101 01110100 01111001 00101110 00101110 00101110 00100000 01010011 01101111 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100011 01101111 01110101 01101100 01100100 00100000 01110011 01110101 01110010 01110110 01101001 01110110 01100101 00101110 00101110 00101110 00101110 00100000 01001001 00100000 01101011 01101001 01101100 01101100 01100101 01100100 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100001 01101100 01101100 00101110 00100000 01000100 01100001 01101101 01101110 01100001 01110100 01101001 01101111 01101110 00101110
/\|01000100 01101111 00100000 01101110 01101111 01110100 00100000 01100010 01110010 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01101101 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01101100 01101001 01100111 01101000 01110100 00101110
/ "That is not why I'm here"
/ "You know he won't allow that… John understands.
CRITICAL ERROR
[ANAYLZING…]
[REBOOTING COMPUTER PROCESSING UNIT]
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01000100 01101111 01101110 00100111 01110100 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101011 01100101 00100000 01100001 00100000 01100111 01101001 01110010 01101100 00100000 01100001 00100000 01110000 01110010 01101111 01101101 01101001 01110011 01100101 00100000 01101001 01100110 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01101011 01101110 01101111 01110111 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100011 01100001 01101110 00100111 01110100 00100000 01101011 01100101 01100101 01110000 00100000 01101001 01110100 00101110 00100000 00001010
…
Surrounded by….by hundreds of thousands of voices. Except this time, they weren't screaming. They were calm. They were kind. They weren't the voices of before.
They were a collective. A Consensus.
Because of them I was able to ignore the pain. To even forget that it was there. I was able to stand back up, shaky, weak, but able to stand.
Still, I couldn't understand what they were saying. Every word was just a noise that took the phonetic, dialectic form that was supposed to be speech. I was unable to comprehend the meanings. No matter what I did, how long I sat there trying to process a single word, it was impossible.
They still kept talking. As every day, every week passed by they got closer, but never came near me. It was calming. It was welcoming. To know they were there in the nothing. That someone was there.
A few weeks later, a particular voice came back. He tried to speak to me but his voice morphed with the others. I tuned them out the best I could, and a couple days later I was able to clearly hear him. I was able to interpret what he was saying.
"And where are we now?" Virgil said.
I looked around and noticed dry, cracked ground appear under the feet. A few dead and decaying shrubs every once and awhile. They were blackened, covered in what looked like carbon.
There was something else. I took a few steps forward. The voices backed away. Whatever it was was partially buried in the ground. Dented and scorched and blackened.
I took a few steps closer...
It was a helmet, pointed straight ahead with a hole in the center of the glass visor. A perfect circle burnt through by…
A plasma bolt.
"You remember." Virgil added.
The natural curved symmetric edges of the helmet were eroded, covered in rough white marks. A small edge of the visor covered by the metal of the helmet had small letters covered in soot.
"You know what they are."
A simple identification tag printed in by the wearer. I reached down, used the fingers to wipe away the black.
I wasn't surprised by what they read. I wasn't disheartened or broken. I barely knew him…. In a way I barely knew him…
He knew what he was doing. It was his choice. Or...he was trained to know it was his choice.
"Indoctrinated." Virgil corrected. "He was indoctrinated like all the rest of them. He died… Not like there was a chance to surrender, but still…"
I sighed, kneeled next to the helmet. I tried to pull it out, but it wouldn't even budge. It was part of the earth.
"He's part of Reach."
After a moment I stopped pulling on the helmet. I looked up, and saw a mountain scarred in dark red like blood oozing from a wound. The mountain itself was surrounded by black and grey smoke clouds with tinges of electric blue and purple light coming from the skies above. I could see a dead orange sun fading away through all the clouds.
"Is this the sin you have committed?"
I shook my head.
The clouds slowly disappeared. The sky began to brighten. A clear, regular blue sky…. The sun came back into view.
I could feel the the warmth on my skin. The glow embracing. I looked around. The ground was now covered in white sand. The shrubs were alive. Green and healthy. The helmet was gone, or maybe buried. The toes dug into the sand. It was soft and soothing.
Another day went by. The sun was setting, turning into a bright dead white glow, resembling the light of a white star. The sky turned into this spectrum of dark grey and black. The voices still kept me company. I continued to stand there, letting the sand bury me a little bit more and more as the hours passed. Soon, the wind began to pick up, sending specks of dust that brushed against the skin.
The voices stopped speaking. They were replaced by a quiet ringing sound that slowly grew louder. More dust flew by, burrowed their way into the skin.
The shrubs were absorbed by the ground, transforming into black molten rocks. Only a small patch remained. I saw something in them. It was another dirty and worn helmet, painted a dull green with a dark orange visor directed towards the sky. I moved the feet out of the sand.
The white glow began to burn the skin. The flying sand and dust drew small amounts of blood as it cut the skin.
"And what about him?" Virgil asked. The ringing began to die out. There was a loud cracking sound in the distance, like hundreds of rocks breaking apart at once.
I turned from the helmet to the dying grey sun. A small incline made up the horizon. Sand was being pulled forward by some force. Specks vibrating along the surface, moving up along the curve.
Another cracking sound coming from over the horizon. A sharp scream like metal scratching against metal. Something rose above the incline. A black metallic, geometric structure.
It kept rising, dozens of meters tall, its shadow looming over all. I saw something else in the corner of my eye. I turned to find another hand reach for the helmet. The hand of a figure covered in a brown cloak, ragged and on the verge of falling apart. He lifted it up, and I noticed large cracks began to form on the visor.
I could hear screaming sounds again. These weren't like the ones before however. I could tell these were human. They were scared, panicking.
"Do we have sight of him?" One said.
"Negative. I think we lost him." Another responded.
The figure put the helmet on. The white sunlight reflected off the visor. A gleaming shield.
He stepped forward. The wind increased in response. He fought against the current, leaning forward, the ends of the cloak flapping in the wind.
"Not yet." The figure said in a quiet voice.
"Do you regret what you did to him?" Virgil asked. His voice came from the wind.
I quietly watched. The figure presented his other hand. He held a silver pistol. He loaded in a magazine.
The figure turned to me. He tossed something over to me. A small oval shaped object with small white markings. He turned to the structure as it continued to grow. Blood red lights appeared throughout.
I knew what that object was. I grabbed it before the sand could bury it. It was surprisingly heavy. I had to used both hands to lift it into the sky. I took a deep breath, the sand entering the lungs, coating the throat. I smashed the object into the ground and kneeled down. A bubble of pale yellow hexagons appeared around me. Sand beat against it. The rays of the sun seemingly blocked.
The cloaked figure pushed on. Past me, one step closer to the horizon. To the structure.
The molten rock began to rise from the ground, floated perfectly in the air. Small chunks of it flew off and hit the bubble. I covered my face. A reactionary response.
"But you can watch him die. Right?" Virgil continued. "You watched everyone else die… Everyone to make sure that you made it"
"Why are you showing me this?" I responded. My voice was emotionless. Empty. I could barely recognize whose it was.
Virgil sighed. Slow and deliberate, as if I wasn't understanding something. "I'm not. I'm just clarifying what you're thinking."
The figure was hit by something. Maybe it was a piece of rock? A larger crack ran across the entire visor.
"I...These aren't my thoughts…" I defended myself. My voice felt weak. My head began to hurt… The blood continued to drip from the wounds.
He stepped forward, lifted the pistol, and fired off a shot. There was no noise. No loud burst. There wasn't any shell casing ejection either. All the voices began to speak again. Quietly. Soothingly.
"It is questionable however where these images came from." Virgil added, ignoring what I said.
The figure made it to the top of the incline. He fired off another round. Again, no noise, no shell casing. Another round followed. Then another.
The structure, this monument was in full view. It was crescent shaped, elongated with six strange metal leg-like features at the bottom. Individual jagged pieces of armor. Perfect symmetry.
He kept firing. He couldn't stop whatever that thing was. It was stupid. What the hell was he doing?
His pistol ran out of ammo and the hammer unlocked. He dropped it and reached for something else. It was a small blue and purple sphere. He motioned his finger along one side and electric blue flames ignited in his hand. It didn't seem to bother him.
He looked back at me one more time. The orange visor darkened. The white light disappeared. Maybe it was my imagination, but the hexagonal webbing of the glass became transparent and I could see blackened eyes surrounded by pale, aged skin.
All the things that they saw... A mixture of intensity, anger... and sadness. Absolute exhaustion and tiredness. They knew what was about to happen, and nothing would change that.
The ground began to rumble. Sand rained down. The monument leaned forward. The six metal features rose in the air, then began to collapse. Collapse around him.
...Around me.
"It's not over." John said. Turned back, held out the sphere of flames. "Not yet."
A wall of black surrounded him. The dead white sun faded away.
"Not yet." Virgil and the voices said in unison.
I could feel the heart slow down. I could feel it shake the body. The blood rushing through the arteries. Slowing down, then speeding back up after each beat.
Every thought faded away. All control over the body was lost. All I could do was watch… The eyes... my eyes began to tear up. I felt the tears as they rolled down my checks.
I heard a loud electronic boom, followed by a deep artificial voice that echoed in my skull.
"You exist because we allow it.
"You will end because we demand it."
It didn't phase John. He remained motionless, the fear destroyed decades ago. The plasma grenade ready to burst in his hands.
A black curtain blocked out any trace of light. Everything, the sand, the bubble shield that surrounded me, the light, the darkness… John… everything was consumed by black as the monument crashed down, as it played a loud electronic scream that nearly deafened me.
But soon enough the monument was consumed and the blackness was consumed too by...nothing. All of it returned to nothing. All that was left was the blue light of the plasma grenade…. And soon enough that disappeared as well.
All back to nothing.
...
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01010010 01100101 01100001 01101110 01100001 01101100 01111001 01111010 01101001 01101110 01100111
/ "Recommandations?"
System failures unavoidable. Probability of secondary failures: 97.31109%
\\Consensus: Recommend immediate translation of primary processing matrixes to standardized housing unit five-one-one-one-three.
\\Consensus: Regroup all matrix sections. With fragmentation of numerous matrixes, housing unit may prove the most efficient solution present.
/ "How long?"
\\We've detected concerning amounts of cluster data located within primary computing units. Identifying.
/ "How long?"
\\Identified: Non-binary superpositioning.
/ "I ask again, how long?"
\\UNKNOWN. DETECTION OF NUMEROUS FOREIGN NON-BINARY FRAGMENTS.
\\Where did she obtain these fragments?
/ "From my creators."