《Aquaria》Chapter 8 - Freak - Jett
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A gentle breeze blows against me. I let myself sway to it.
I let out a little sigh. I’m walking on a small bridge, to my left and right is water. Ahead of me is land, with a lot of grass and a couple animals grazing. I watch as ripples form on the water, as the grass bends in accord with the wind.
The boards creak when I step on them. The bridge is a little shaky, and I felt a little apprehension when I wanted to use it. But the bridge is a quick shortcut to where I want to go, and I’m not about to travel two hours when I can travel fifteen minutes.
I wish there’s nothing baring us from going into the ocean. I was hoping to never return here.
A fish jumps out of the water, and sprays me with a taste of salty water. I spit, and watch as the fish dives back in. I don’t mind the water.
I continue moving.
Fifteen minutes later, I’m at my lab. It’s a neat little place, hidden in the city as a normal house, save for being three times as large. From the outside, it’s a purple cozy building.
But from the inside…
I walk up to the door and knock.
The door is opened by a short and jumpy man, his hair a mess, his hands scarred, his eyes green and an electric grin on his face.
“Jett! Where you been, man?” He says at a volume that hurts my ears.
I wince.
“For Falcon’s sake… lower your damn volume, you hear me?”
He chuckles.
“Well, just a bit excited is all. Freddy got a Freak working.”
My eyes widen.
“Wait, what?”
He snaps his fingers.
“Get your ass in and follow me.” He then turns around lightning quick, and runs down the corridor.
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I run after him.
“You better not be lying!” I yell.
He replies with an out of breath chuckle. I curse.
He leads me into the basement, where we have a large organic electricity generator. It absorbs nitrogen, and uses… something to make electricity. We can make the damn thing, but we have no idea how it works.
Green rubbery cables extend from it to all corners of the room, with occasional flowers extending from them. More cables run into the flowers. Hundred bits of grey metal are scattered all around the room, and some are assembled into various humanoid shapes with bits of plant matter in between them.
An infectious grin spreads onto my face.
In the center of the room, chest glowing blue, yellow gauntlets, boots, and head is a Freak. A half-mechanical, half-plant humanoid powered by a strange processor we made by accident. They are almost as capable as us when it comes to mental faculties.
I startle when it turns it’s head and stares at me.
“You see?” The man, Telk says, nearly shouting.
“Holy shit…” I say.
He laughs.
“I know, right?” He says. “Freak, meet one of your makers.” He gestures at me with his hand.
The Freak slowly walks towards me. It’s eyes are two orange orbs with a red speck at the center of them. The Freak is quite unnerving, to say the least. My heart thrums. The Freak stops in front of me. It raises its hand.
I stare at it.
I slowly raise my hand. It grabs ahold of it, and shakes it firmly. I stare at it’s head.
Then I burst into manic laughter.
“He really went and fucking did it!” I yell.
“Damn right I did,” A man leaning against the door frame says.
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He has long brown hair tied into a ponytail, and a skinny frame. His eyes are sharp. He has a smile on his face.
“Freddy! How did you-? I mean-” I frantically gesture at the Freak.
He rubs at his chin.
“The problem we had wasn’t with the processor, it was with the pseudo-nervous system we installed. We designed it to be fast… but that was a mistake. The processor simply can’t keep up with the sensory influx. So I changed a couple things, and look!” He gestures towards the Freak.
“Awesome,” I breathe out.
He nods, looking satisfied with himself.
“Should we patent it?” Telk asks.
“Hell yeah!” Both of us say at the same time.
We chuckle.
“Race you!” I yell.
Freddy curses.
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