He Was Almost Absorbed By The System - Part Two

Epilogue - Part Two

When Artem was nearly fifty, he fell in love with a woman almost twenty years his junior and although at first she denied him as she felt that as a single mother of one, her first priority was her daughter and also that she and Artem came from different backgrounds, eventually he won her around.  They were married a year later and Kelly fell pregnant six months after that.

Kyan held their cute nephew as Kelly poured him a cup of tea.  She was a fan of Fresh Produce over nutrient fluid and had insisted on purchasing goods from Kyan's old friend Chelsea and had learned to cook from scratch.  She was by no means on Dominic's level, but her cooking was still good, her meals were more homely and simple.  Dominic played with Kelly's daughter, carrying the child on his shoulders as he ran about the garden with her.  Kyan smiled, vaguely recalling that he had done much the same with Lily Ann, their adopted daughter from their sixth life.

"Dominic is good with her," Kelly mused aloud and Kyan did not hesitate to agree.  "Have you ever considered starting your own family?"

Kyan was of similar age to Kelly, just a year or so between them, but he admitted that he hadn't considered children in this life.  It was not as if adoption was their only option either, for technology in reality was advanced enough to combine the cells of two men and have the resultant foetus develop in an artificial womb.  But it had always been hard leaving the children behind in the lives they had experienced, whether those children were adopted or close nieces and nephews.  While he was aware that in this life, once it was at an end, he likely would feel nothing whether asleep for eternity or having drunk the water of forgetfulness before entering an unknown afterlife, he remained unable to forget those children of his past.

Dominic felt much the same and it turned out that Orion and Damien were also on this wavelength. 

"I remember raising Jasper like it was yesterday," Orion said in reminisce of his last life in the Archive.  "He was such an obedient child and very bright.  I left his side far too soon.  I would have liked to have seen his children grow, but that was not to be."

"Besides, we have you," Damien said to Kyan.  They may have adopted him during the last years of his childhood, but they felt the same about him as they had for Jasper.  "That is enough for us."

*****

Years slipped into decades and the first century of their marriage past seemingly all too fast.  Dominic was beginning to feel his years, more so when he had to lay both of his parents to rest. 

"It's passing too quickly," he complained as he pressed his face into Kyan's shoulder that night.  Indeed, neither were young and vibrant any more.  Dominic's muscles had softened into fat and Kyan's waist was no longer slim thanks to too many good meals.  Dominic's face had a few lines here and there, while Kyan's tiny wrinkles remained around his pale eyes.

"We have a few decades left in us yet," Kyan moved to kiss his lips to which Dominic responded vigorously.  Their love and attraction to each other had not faded along with the colour of their hair and the older man still brought his husband to a breathless state within a few touches.

"I'm just greedy," Dominic admitted.  "If I could grasp the chance to have another life with you..."

"You are not tired of living, yet?" Kyan asked wryly.  There had been times, when he was feeling particularly low, that he could have fallen asleep and simply let go without regret, but once he was in his husband's arms, all thoughts of such disappeared in a heartbeat.  Dominic completed him.

"Tired of living with you in my life?" Dominic questioned.  "There is no such thing."

*****

Kyan would remember this conversation nearly twenty years later, when watching a weary Orion hovering around his beloved husband after Damien had suffered a health scare. 

Orion and Damien had retired many years beforehand with both men choosing to sell their companies and donate most of the proceeding to charity as their son did not want the money and there were still greedy cousins seeking to get hold of their fortunes rather than work hard on their own.  Future Electronics had been floated on the stock market soon after by its new owner, only for that person to find himself out on the street, clever dealings ousting him from his seat.  The company was not doing so well now, but Orion was not truly bothered about that.  His old employees had mostly moved on and the company was never the same after they had left.  Orion was glad to be rid of it. 

He and Damien had travelled around for a while before moving in with their son and son-in-law.  Their twilight years were now upon them, just as they were on Dominic, while Kyan had perhaps a decade more.

As the four men huddled in the private hospital room, three around the bed bound Damien, Kyan had voiced his feelings through shimmering tears; "I don't wish to be left behind."

"We can't stop time, love," Dominic murmured, holding Kyan firmly in his embrace.

"Didn't you once say that you would live another life with me if you could?"  Kyan feebly punched his chest, his panic evident.

"I did," Dominic admitted, "but in reality, that's not possible."

Orion considered his words for a moment and looked at the ashen and weathered face of his husband.  "What if it was indeed possible?"

*****

A black skinned child with snow white hair and large dark eyes looked over the white board with its numerous white pieces and finally moved the one shaped like a horse.

Opposite him, a white skinned man with jet black hair and thin lines of black marking his face and arms in places, moved the queen piece and declared; "Checkmate!"

"Ah! Master!!"  The child complained in tantrum, crossing his small arms about his chest.

"Another game?" The Master suggested.  After he had overhauled the files, copying the originals in order to retain the information his creators adored, while allowing the sentient data free reign to do as they pleased in the originals, the continued corruption of the files came to an end.  And now, the Master was living a relatively peaceful life in his space with his children, Yang and Yin.

Yang pouted, he did not want to play anymore.  He kept losing. 

At that moment, a girl with soft white skin and glossy black hair entered the space and approached them without hesitation.  "Master, there are some anomalies within the files."

The Master narrowed his eyes and searched through his precious data and then though the sentient worlds until he touched upon four familiar minds.  "I'll allow it," he decided, "this time." 

He owed Orion for saving and storing safely the Archive. 

The Archive's official 'owner' was Orion rather than Future Electronics and it had been sneaked of the warehouse after the company had been sold.  It was now located upon one of Damien's precious ships and at this moment, that ship, under the guidance of Orion's A.I. had launched into space with the Archive and four stasis pods.  Thus the four men played out their final years within the Archive, living that longed for 'one more lifetime' with their most beloved ones. 

But eventually, the stasis pods would stop reading life signs and the lights upon the protective casings would go out one by one,  Perhaps their minds remained inside the Archive, living along side the sentient data or perhaps they did sleep eternally together, amongst the stars.