Ouroboros

Cracking

     The days following the incident dragged by like years, yet somehow still blurred together in an indescribable soup of half-formed recollections and half-waking dreams. Despite the haze in his mind, Coda-9994 was painfully aware of one thing. He was losing his grip. His sanity was starting to crack.

     They had deactivated his computer, his CCIT, and even his earpieces. With communication forbidden to him, he was cut off from the world beyond his tank. Occasionally, someone would come in to feed or hydrate him, but without any way to communicate, it was no more interesting to him than the walls of his tank. He had no idea where Jim was, or if he would ever see him again.

     He sank to the bottom of his pool. When he let his head rest against the wall, the clunk of metal on concrete startled him a little. Without being allowed to use them, he loathed his cybernetics even more than before. Jim had designed them with utmost care and consideration to be as uninvasive as possible, but they remained a burden. Even if they allowed him to communicate with humans, use his computer and camera, monitor his own vital signs, or any other function they had not yet taught him, he could not deny how they weighed his head down.

     "Hey there, pal. I know you've been curious about the nature of the project, so I've come to tell you. It might sound scary, but bear with me."

     Jim's voice. He didn't want to hear it. Why he was reliving the incident from the year prior, he didn't know. All he knew was that he wanted it to stop.

     "A while back, the space exploration program discovered an oceanic exoplanet we call Ouroboros, like the self-cannibalizing serpent. As you may know, Earth's ocean is no longer habitable. If humanity is to survive in the distant future, we're going to need a new planet with a new ocean."

     Damn it, Jim! SHUT UP!

     "We're sending you there in order to assess its habitability for humans. You are the future of humanity, Coda-9994. This is what you were made for."

      Well then, I'm sorry I was made!

     "Why do you look so upset? You'll be our savior. Our hero, Coda. And you won't have to stay in this miserable tank any longer."

     And if it's not habitable, what happens to me? Please, Jim...I don't want to go...don't want to go...

      "Coda, we can't..."

     I DON'T WANT TO GO!

     Coda sped up to the surface with a single, powerful kick of his flukes. He breached, leaping out of the water and crashing back down with a heavy splash. The impact seemed to clear his head. He knew he was spiraling into insanity, but any slowing of the descent was time well spent.

     He oriented himself vertically in the water and tried to doze off. He had slept a great deal in his time alone, but had always woken up feeling more exhausted. As he drifted into the dark escape of sleep, he hoped for an ocean dream. Those were the best dreams.

     Yet the best dreams were always the worst to wake up from.

.........

     As Amelia walked down the hall, the sound of Coda's screaming shook through the walls. She covered her ears and ran into her office, slamming the door perhaps a little too loudly. She got on the intercom and sent a message out to the whole facility. "All persons within danger radius of Coda-9994 must wear hearing protection until further notice. Thank you."

     After sending the message, she reached for her noise-cancelling headphones and put them on. The silence was a profound relief, but the walls still thrummed with the whale's lunatic raging. It would be a difficult day for everyone, herself least of all. She almost wanted to try and console Coda, but she knew it was too dangerous to go within his sight, and that it probably would only upset him more.