Chapter 3 : The Singularity and The Void

Scyllas are neither organic nor even material.

They do not need to eat nor do they need to sleep.

If a painter had to describe them, he would only say that they are a mass of light and darkness intertwined between themselves.

If a poet had to describe them, he would say that they are only the shadow of their own light.

The Scyllas themselves consider that their existence results from a collision between 2 planes, which created the Singularity and linked them to it. Their birth is just the consequence of an event that even they themselves can't understand.

They only exist thanks to this so-called "Singularity", which is a dimension superimposing the 4 dimensions already known to the humans : namely the 3 spatial axes and the time.

While this Singularity can be considered a 5th dimension, it is also the point of contact between two different realities, between two different universes co-existing on two different planes. Like a bridge would connect two pieces of land.

The Scyllas cannot cross the Singularity, but their zealous cult prompts them to believe that a matriarch is guarding the Singularity. They worship her under the name of the Singularity Revered Mother, and the dark matter they take away from the 5th dimension for their experiments is considered to be her Holy Children.

In a circle-shaped room, several scyllas are flattening themselves, giving the impression of kneeling, in front of their leader Primus One.

"My lord, the second protocol 'Fusion' just ended."

"How many survived for this species?"

"17 my lord, but the results are… not what we were expecting."

"Explain."

"They all failed to complete their fusion, except one individual. But even this specimen made a non-conventional fusion."

"What do you mean by non-conventional?"

"The 16 humans that failed got partially absorbed by their symbiont from 24% for the best one to 96% for the worst one. The last one, however, successfully merged with his symbiont, my lord.

The problem was when his body and mind started absorbing its symbiont on its own, just after the fusion. We estimate his negative absorption rate to -37% currently, and we had to temporarily cryogenize him to stop the process, before his body fully assimilates the Holy Child."

"I see…"

"What should we do my lord ? We exhausted most of the intelligent species we stocked during the last millenniums, and those we completed almost all got killed in action during the last invasions. If things continue to move in this direction we will soon be unable to defeat the Void Legions anymore."

"I know, brother. I feel the connection with the Singularity getting weaker century by century, that is why we couldn't wait anymore to try the protocols with these lowly humans. Even if they are a weak life-form, their genes pool is one of the most versatile in the whole universe. Compared to us who do not have a genome at all because of our existence being intangible and phantasmic, these organic humans have a versatile gene pool that makes them a solid choice to fuse with the Singularity Holy Children.

It is just disappointing that not even twenty of them survived the second protocol. Despite having amazing genetic materials, their bodies are weak and their mind didn't evolve for ages. They might have more intellect than those lifeforms they called 'animals' on their main world, but in the end they share the same level of mental strength as them."

After saying this, Primus One slowly stood up from its etheric throne and flew to the middle of the room, where a gigantic sphere was floating, a sphere as dark as a black hole.

"I expected them to be more resilient to the Singularity Children… We cannot wait any more, we are already too close to definitively losing contact with the Singularity, and our Revered Mother wouldn't forgive us for failing her again, we already lost too many specimens during the previous invasions. Our time is running out."

Turning itself to face its brothers, Primus thought for a while before asking.

"Legatus, how many usable specimens do we have left ? Whatever their species. Chose only those who achieved the second protocol without anomalies, with a battle power of 10 minimum"

"310, my Lord."

If Primus One had a human face, he probably would have made a horrible face when he heard that answer.

"The last human specimen that completed the fusion, get him out of the cryogenic capsule. He won't live for long anyway, so if he's gonna die we better use him as best as we can to improve the protocols for the next batch."

"Do I have to prepare an excursion my Lord ?"

"Not yet, make the human specimens go through the last protocol first. Once they are done and they got their Consciousness, evaluate their lethality factor, calculate their battle power and send them with all of the other specimens to the Void Rift.

I'm afraid they are the last batch we can sacrifice to finish adjusting our parameters. We are already close to finalizing the third protocol, to finally reach our goal of creating an army of perfectly fused specimens."

"Your wish is my command, my Lord."

__

"Wake up, human!"

Upon opening my eyes, I heard a weird voice inside my head urging me to wake up.

I didn't remember what happened after I last closed my eyes, but I do remember what I will never be able to forget. Moreover, since the moment when the weird black matter reacted, I started feeling hazy, and slowly some memories have resurfaced in my mind.

"Jeanne..."

I now understand why losing you pained me so much.

She was my wife back on earth. I'm still uncomfortable with my own feelings and memories flooding back to my head, it feels like it belongs to 'another' me.

I won't be able to understand why you made that choice, Jeanne, but after seeing all those people still dying even after keeping their eyes open, I won't resent you for choosing this way. At least, you parted in a peaceful way.

I will never know if you did remember me before your last moments, but do not worry. I might feel different, I might be another version of myself, I might have forgotten a big part of my past, but even though I won't betray my feelings.

Our life together will not leave my heart, remembering you were what made me take conscience of myself, even if I don't feel like the real owner of this body anymore, I won't betray my previous feelings and I will keep you a place in my heart.

In the end, they didn't truly erase our memories. They just destroyed them so much that our mind was unable to process them anymore, reducing us to a vegetative state by the same occasion. I don't know why I can now remember parts of what I lost, but I know that it is linked to this black matter that was moving in my chest before I blackout.

"B213-84. That is now your new name. Questions ?"

I was so absorbed in my thoughts that I didn't even care about my surroundings. I woke up in a sort of capsule glued to the wall by many wires and black metals. A shadow, or should I say a Scylla, was floating right in front of me.

I couldn't put a visage on these living beings, it was weird to even look at them. It felt like our whole soul would be absorbed by these disgusting beings if we stare at them for too long. However, I could somehow feel that this Scylla had a much lower status than Primus One. I don't know how the hierarchy works in their organization, but this one doesn't give me the same oppressive vibe when gazing at me.

It felt similar than when I had that particular feeling of being watched by Primus One, without the heavy and tyrannical atmosphere around it.

The first thing that came to my mind when I checked the room where I was standing, was the scene in the movie Matrix, where all those billions of odd-looking capsules were next to each other with naked humans covered by a sticky liquid inside, exploited by crazy machines as livestock of organic resources. Except that here it was real, however, the capsules are oriented vertically rather than horizontally like in the movie and the Scyllas replaced the machines as the 'farmer'.

I guess having my memories slowly coming back is a good thing, I don't know if these guys excepted us to regain our memories as the Primus One clearly said that they are supposed to be forever gone. I should be careful and conceal that I'm not as dumb as they expect me to be.

"Who are you guys ?"

My first question was probably a bit weird or abnormal for this Scylla, seeing the time it took to respond.

"We are now your Masters. Nothing more needs to be known from you, lowly ape. I knew you were the biggest failure of your batch, but I didn't expect you to be able to speak so soon."

Ignoring its childish curse, I decided to ask another question.

"What do you need us for ?"

From the first answer it gave me, I knew that it would be pointless to ask them 'how did you do all of that' or 'why did you kill everyone'. He wouldn't answer me honestly, and I'm not even sure that I want to know why they truly did it.

Using the excuse of the 'humans are bad and needed to be eradicated' wouldn't work anymore on me, especially since I got parts of my memories back. I'm not a retarded sheep anymore and it doesn't require to be a genius to understand that they didn't really care about our civilization, they probably observed us while waiting for the time we would be ready to be collected as a resource. Like a stockbreeder would wait for its livestock to grow before fully exploiting it.

No matter their real reasons, even if it was to save the fucking universe, I wouldn't forgive them and I would give it my all to make their job harder than it should have been.

"I've no time to waste answering you, but because you got separated from your brethren and didn't get briefed, I'll at least explain what you need to know to operate.

We need you to fight for us in another dimension, called The Void. The Void is the antagonistic place of The Singularity, both were created after the same event : the collision of 2 major planes.

While the Singularity act as an etheric bridge between those two planes and is guarded by the Revered Mother, the Void act more like a dimensional backdoor made of pure chaos and destruction."

"So you guys are telling me that… you are the good side ? Let me guess ; no matter the magnitude of the genocide or extermination, as long as it serves your interest to defend this "Singularity" it doesn't matter ?"

"Coming from a lowly being, made of flesh and bones, living only to follow its desires and greed, it is quite arrogant to talk about what matters or not. Yes. We are the 'good' side, as long as good means pure balance and Equilibrium. Without us, your small solar system would have been wiped out of the galaxy a long time ago already"

In the end I wasn't that far from the truth, these fanatics are really thinking that they are the good guys fighting the dark force to save the Universe. I've no clue of what these Singularity and Void are, but I know for sure that I'm neither a hero nor one of their slave, I would rather fight for the enemy side if it gives me a chance to delete these Scyllas myself from this plane, even it means becoming a monster once and for all.

"What happened to the other humans ? Why was I sleeping alone in a capsule ? Are they..all dead ?"

After taking time to think again, the Scylla finally answered.

"You are 17 humans to have survived, you included. If you woke up alone, it is because you are deficient. None of you lowly humans have completed your second protocol as it should have been, so we can say that all of you are failures.

But in your case, it's even worst. Instead of either fusing to reach a perfect Equilibrium, or being absorbed by your symbiont and still getting a part of the Holy Children's power and strength, your body cells absorbed the symbiont cells on their own, and your mind accepted the symbiont mind as its own as well.

This means that even though your connection and synergy with your symbiont are stronger than any of your partially completed comrades, you will never be able to produce the result excepted from a complete fusion, and your comrades will always outclass you in terms of speed, physical strength, reaction time, thinking process, or any other battle oriented characteristics.

Any of the 16 other humans, or should I say Rifters now, even the ones with the worst absorption rate, would be able to kill you before you even being aware of it."

So if I'm not wrong, they use 'inferior' life-form such as humans to fuse us with a kind of weird black matter coming straight from a bad sci-fi movie, and after different experimental phases called protocols, they intend to make us stronger in order to fight in their stead.

Why don't they fight themselves though ? They were powerful enough to eradicate our whole civilization, so why do they waste time using us as specimens if they are way stronger than we possibly could be ?

I might be missing something important...

While I was trying to understand the answer from the Scylla, I lowered my gaze to look at my chest and this weird black matter.

'So these symbols ar.… WHAT IS THAT ?!'

'I should have checked my body while waking up, what the hell happened ?!'

The symbols were nowhere to be seen, I still had no cloth on me and despite the fact that I was supposed to be naked, my whole body was covered by a thin layer of black matter. It looked like a mix between leather and steel but super stretchy, the oddest part being that I could feel my surroundings as if it was my own skin.

'Wait, did I… mutate ?'