Kanushin (Starweaver's Tapestry #1)

Chapter 21: Emergence

Imi outstretched her arms and tried to wade through the inky, gelatinous void with no success. Every stroke easily parted the liquid matter but the lack of friction and force kept her locked in place, as if she was swimming through a vacuum with nowhere to go. She moved faster, in different directions, and even tried to spin. Nothing worked. The neural synapses embedded in her fired hectically, trying to make sense of the odd sensation. The load of incoming data threatened to overwhelm her mental system. She tried to yell out, but the void carried no sound. Suddenly, a white light began to emanate from below her, building until the entire void was replaced by an endless sea of light. Imi blinked and a new image came into focus.

"Model X2-131, run test program: Delta Echo Charlie Oscar. Synapse system, engage," a familiar voice echoed through the light.

Colors replaced the white and swirled into various shapes and sizes. First, general ones: large squares, small rectangles, a few circles. Then, more detail and features. Shading. Finally, Imi found herself sitting in a padded blue chair in a white-walled room. Computers of every variety were spread across the space, each running unique bits of coding or diagrams. The room was clean, pristine even. Ahead of her stood a young woman of medium-sized build with tanned skin and dark brown hair tied up into a bun. Her chestnut brown eyes were full of warmth as she leaned in closer to Imi. The features of her face resembled Imi's own, just slightly different.

Imi felt a wave wash against her and the synthetic skin that encased her melt away instantly. She sat in the chair, nothing left of her body but a polished silver frame with cobalt highlights. There was a feeling of emptiness and exposure that she had locked away long ago banging at the recesses of her systemic mind.

"Model X2-131, how are you feeling?" The woman asked as she rapidly typed notes into the holographic pad projected in front of her.

Imi lost control of her body as her throat whirred and her jaw clicked open. "Pr-pro-processing speech patterns. Systems aligned. Requesting input: What is this unit's name?"

The woman paused and smiled. "Model X2-131, reconstruct unit name: code Emily."

"Unit name rewritten. I am E-Em-Emily."

"We'll work on those speech patterns some more," the woman beamed. "We're already starting off with amazing progress!"

Imi tried to fight against the motions of her body and the words that forced themselves out of her mouth. She was fully aware of what was going on and who she was with. She didn't want to endure the pain again, especially not as a passenger to her own memory banks. Her mouth snapped back open.

"Query: What is the creator's name?"

"I guess it's bad manners to not introduce myself, right, Emily?" The woman said. "You can call me Nira."

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Diah dropped down into the lower floor of the factory, following the sound of Imi's screams as they erupted from a pulsating purple bubble. She could see the bubble was Kanutic in nature, but was hesitant to find out what it did. Imi's body twitched and shuddered inside, and Diah knew that she had to rescue her companion somehow. She summoned her Kanushin back into two daggers and stabbed the bubble, piercing through its jelly mass and prying it open.

A snap occurred behind Diah and she felt an armored elbow slam into the top of her back. Rhessian laughed and disappeared in a puff of smoke as she whipped around to hit him, appearing again on a pipe above. Particles rose from the bubble and coalesced into four new, identical copies of the Kunar. The remainder of the bubble shifted into a slimy skin-tight layer around Imi's body. The many Rhessians poofed down and encircled Diah, who flipped her daggers around and adopted a battle stance.