A Case of Time-Travelling Shorts

Not To Be [SFSD-X]

Dedicated to @PipSqueeks88 for her fantastic help and guidance on this one. You go Pip!

This offering is written in the Bardpunk genre; a futuristic take on Shakespeare's plays. But don't be scared off by that! The challenge was to create a sequel for Hamlet, inspired by Puddle of Mudd's song, Bring Me Down. Hope you enjoy! =)

The machines observing my body blare warnings: spiking blood pressure, rapidly escalating heart rate, bloodstream approaching hazardous levels of cortisol. I leave them behind as I stumble towards the control room. Horatio's footsteps thunder close behind. I run, weighed down by my synthetic body. It has been so long that gravity feels alien against my limbs. This retro silver-paneled craft has been our home since we fled DenCorp - all those years ago. It's an independent research unit, designed to drift effortlessly through space, and it suits us perfectly. It will make the perfect missile to crash into the massive NorTech cruiser.

"Hamlet! Stop!" Horatio yells.

I won't let him bring me down. This has to be done. The control room door has just come into view when a strong pair of arms wrap around my waist. The weight behind them knocks me to the ground.

The world seeped into focus and a familiar face took shape: Horatio. Fragments of light curved across the oil-stained panes of his face. He smiled. Shock shot through me when my face refused to return the gesture. Something was very wrong. My lips refused to open, my jaw stubbornly remained shut. Panic pulsed through me when I realized I had no mouth. Horatio's reassurances passed over me. I had no arms. No torso. No body! Where was I? What was this? The lack of sensation was unending; light burnt my eyes and I had no power to close them. There was too much world; filled with too much light and too much sound. "I can fix you," he reassured me. I screamed noiselessly into the void, unable to shut the overwhelming sensations out. A switch clicked and Horatio's face melted into blackness.

Later, the realization dawned on me. I had died.

I land heavily on the cold floor. This body is new and unused to such action. Pain lances through my side as Horatio's weight lands atop me.

"I won't let you do this," he says, desperation shining in his eyes. "I'll tie you down if necessary."

I snarl. "You've been tying me into this existence for almost a year now," I snarl,; "trying to stitch life into a neuro-scan. I'm a previous save file, Horatio. A shadow of what I should be, of what you deserve. So I'm going to crash this ship into NorTech. This research needs to be destroyed."

He seems taken aback. "This research?"

"Sentient storage has always been theoretical," I say quietly, "You weren't meant to bring me back. This existence, it haunts me."

His face falls and my heart wrenches in my chest. However true the words are, they still hurt him.

My thoughts, the blackness, and the noises from Horatio's laboratory did not make good company for one another. "Hold on! I can fix this!" Horatio cried, stress cracking his voice. Dead! I had died. The raging panic swept his reassurances away. Scenarios preyed on my mind. Murder. Poisoning. Assassination.

Afraid of the burning light, I measured time by the sounds around me; Horatio's frantic typing on the touch boards, his familiar, sleeping breaths. On the third day he cried; great wracking sobs filled the air. It pained me to hear them. I was unable to do anything. I had no vocal chords, no electronic speech converter. Nothing to let him know that I was there. I dared to look at him. The light no longer burnt, but my helplessness haunted me. Some hours later, he resumed that frantic typing.