I opened my eyes, and the only thing I could see was pure white. Like the blinding white light when you stare straight at the cloudy sky in the afternoon.
I felt numb.
I couldn’t move any of my limbs. I couldn’t even make my eyelids close to shield my eyes from that blinding light. I could only stare dully as the white burned into my retinas.
Then I realized, I felt no pain from it. No matter how long I stared, I felt none of the impulse to cover my eyes, even though it should be making my eyes water at the very least.
I then noticed that I didn’t just not feel pain from my eyes, I felt nothing all over. It felt like I was in stasis, unable to grasp my own existence, suspended in both time and reality.
However, I wouldn’t be lost in my own thoughts. I am certain of my certainty, and any uncertainty of my sense of self is just simply to be met with mockery. I know I’m real, and even if I wasn’t, I wouldn’t give a sh*t because I said I’m real. Nobody can say otherwise.
This however just makes my conundrum more baffling.
As I struggle against my own hazy consciousness, I felt a change. That luminous white color started to fade over. Like watercolor dissolving in the rain, eventually it started to form color and shape. I could now see and distinguish my surroundings, if only barely.
I could see swathes of verdant shades of green, with patches of platinum grey. Then over all these colors is a hue of orange and red.
Slowly but surely, my sight became clearer and I finally understood where I was. I was in a forest, with the shattered debris of my crashed safety pod surrounding me. The hue of orange and red was fire from the burning debris, probably from the friction of the impact, or from the accident itself.
I was however more confused by the fact that I was outside my capsule. Although my sight had returned, it was my only sense. I still felt like I was floating in nothingness. This time I understand that it’s just my mind reeling from shock. Given time I would regain my senses.
I decided to look around. I couldn’t turn my head, or I couldn’t really tell if I was turning my head. Instead I just twisted my eyeballs trying to make sense of my peripherals.
To my right is a few cracked trees leading further into the foliage. When I turned to my left, I saw a boulder stretching behind me. My body was lying on a massive boulder, which probably isn’t the most comfortable spot to lay. Above me are more trees. Some of the tops were on fire, while some carried some of the steel scraps from the capsule.
I finally turned my eyes downward. This time, I saw red. The color was painted everywhere, as if a massive tomato was thrown against a rock. I then realized, I was the tomato thrown against a rock.
During the crash, I was somehow ejected from my capsule and hurtled straight toward this massive stone. My brain, in an attempt to avoid my mind and body from collapsing in shock, suspended my senses. Realizing my situation though may trigger those senses to restart, which they have.
“a, Aa- AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!”
Unbelievable torture struck me in an instant. It felt worse than being boiled alive in hot oil. It felt like every cell of my body was being split in half while being roasted over an open fire. My throat felt like I was grinding it against sandpaper as I screamed in agony.
Every bone in my body had been pulverised. I didn’t feel pain from twisted or displaced joints, because they simply didn’t exist anymore. Indescribable. Inconceivable. I felt my consciousness dissolving due to the trauma, slowly fading into nothing.
«Warning: Critical condition – Mental Capacity Overload. Cause located – Extreme Trauma, Solution: Partial primary sensory shutdown - Hearing(SHUTDOWN). Sight(ACTIVE). Smell(SHUTDOWN). Taste(SHUTDOWN). Touch(SHUTDOWN).; Partial secondary sensory shutdown – Balance(ACTIVE), Consciousness(ACTIVE), Emotion(SHUTDOWN)... Repair completion: 63%., //cycle terminated»
«Warning: Critical condition – Severe body mutilation, Bone structure 23%; Respiratory System 54%; Circulatory system(CRITICAL) 9%; Nervous System(CRITICAL) 14%;... Cerebrum 94%. Body Condition 21%. Death estimated at: 2 hours 14 minutes 6 seconds. Initiating Emergency Life Support. Initiating Emergency Treatment... Treatment complete. Death estimated at 1 day 22 hours 51 minutes 2 seconds. Body condition 34%. //cycle terminated»
«Initiate Program: RESTORE – Loading bank: OLIVER_01_08_2034... Success. Searching environment... ERROR: Unknown species detected, starting troubleshoot........
Notice: In order to ensure expedient and safe recovery, 98% of processing power will be dedicated to medical functions. All active functions will be temporarily disabled while the emergency medical functions are operational. Passive functions will be partially active. Beginning shutdowns.»
...
“Greetings Doctor Cromwell. We are incredibly honoured by your presence once again.”
“Thank you Doctor Sanders. How is the preparation ongoing?”
“It’s going very smoothly thanks to your new procedures. We have already reached stage four and the pulsar will be available for use later at 1900, barring any sudden circumstance.”
“Very good. I will be in laboratory 404.”
“We will contact you when the chamber is ready.”
...
“Was that Professor Cromwell? He’s so young!”
“He’s won the Nobel prize twice! He even won the Kavli prize and Wolf Foundation prize too.”
“I heard that his parents are nobel laureates as well.”
“Didn’t they go missing a few years ago?”
“Keep this secret, but I heard he’s using the pulsar to search for his missing parents. The official statement is that he’s going to be using it to research his new energy source. What was it called? Mana?”
“That’s insane! He’s using hundreds of millions of dollars just for that?”
“He’s the only one who can do that so easily I guess...”
...
<WARNING. ANOMALY DETECTED IN CHAMBER 2. CODE BLACK EMERGENCY.>
“Sh*t! Johan, drop the transistor coils! Doctor Parah, activate the quantum stabiliser! Call for an immediate evacuation to site 14, and where’s Doctor Cromwell!?”
“S-sir, he’s still in chamber 2!”
“Dammit! Oliver get out of there!”
...
<WARNING. ANOMALY DETECTED IN CHAMBER 2. CODE BLACK EMERGENCY.>
«Warning: Activation of the Kirelian Pulsar initiated a cosmic anomaly. Recommended course of action is to immediately evacuate to a distance of: 3.6323e+14 kilometers»
“... Are you suggesting we go to TRAPPIST-1? Initiate containment procedures.”
«Apologies sir. You haven’t yet made containment procedures for entity:Mana. I can provide you with the current data from the pulsars interactions if you wish.»
“... Begin analysis for the data. Dedicate 34% of neural processing to the task. How much longer will it take for a complete cosmic interaction?”
«Orders received. A full cosmic interaction will be completed in four hours. Human annihilation would be highly likely at 99.99999998% probability.»
“Hah. All I wanted was to scan the world and I’d opened Pandora’s box...”
...
“... Jarv*s, activate the Pandora Protocol.”
«I would like to remind young master that my name is not J*rvis. Warning: This is your message to yourself from the past. “This is an incredibly stupid thing to do, future me. But if you’ve reached the point where you would need to use this, you have probably already done something so apocalyptically stupid that it wouldn’t matter anymore. You’re a dumbass.”. Would you like to continue?»
“I really am a dumb*ss. Activate the Pandora protocol, code 04909EL5420.”
«Do you have any last messages to send out sir?»
“... Yeah. Tell Amelia... I’m really sorry... Also I ate all the vanilla ice cream.”
«Well met sir. Are you sure about sending the last part?»
“She can’t kill me if I’m dead. Delete my browser history too.”
«Sorry sir, you require Miss Amelia’s clearance for that.»
“...”
«Initiating program: PNDRPRTCL_000... Success. Ope̛n̢ing P͞a̷nd̨o̴ra̛'s̷ ́B̛ox.̵ ͏. W͠A̵͘͠R̡Ņ̷͘IN̢̛G̡:̛ ̢̧S̨e͏͜v͜e̛̕r̶è̢́ ̸S͏̧͜p̷̷̀a͡ti̴al̶̢҉ A͟n̕o̵͟͠m̶͞a̢l͘̕͢i͟e̷̴s҉̀ ̡͢a̵̶͟rȩ̢͝ ͏o̵cc̸̶u͏͟͡r͢r͠ing̨͡.̴ ҉͘͟. W̆ͪ̊̏͞Ä̦͖̱̝́̊̓́Ř̫͇̿ͫ͜N̲͎̖͂Ị̬ͭ̊̃̅ͩN̢̺̦͕͉͗̑̏̌G̭͎̮̘͔͌̽ͦ̀:ͫ͌ͨ͐ͨ́̚҉͇̯̬̙̪͚̲ ̨̙̳̹̬͍̦̙̒̿ͤͧͪE̢͍̦̺͍̙̙͗̃̅̇̽ͯͤR̺ͫ͛͆̏̑͜R̢̰̲̗ͣ̋͆̂̂ͧ̚0͔̮̣͙̺̠̏̓̑ͭ͢ͅR̹̠̗̘̠͚̔̉̚ͅ,̠̙̱̬͇͉͇ͭ͌̌̄͠ ̼̯̥̝̫̟͎͗S̿̀Y̥͓̤̠͓̭̗̾̐͒ͨ͂̋S҉̱̼̝̱͖T̆̓ͤͤͭͩ̆͏̥͖̻̫-͍̦͇̳ͧ̇̑͜-͎͕̬ͫ̎̎̀ͪ̅̀-̟͙͈̔̿̇͑-͚͎̆̈́̎͛̈́ͯ̀»»»»»»»
.
..
...
... I shall answer thine call, but you best be prepared to pay the price.
