Shards of Old

-I want to say about a year later. Can’t tell for sure, it’s been a long time. I was recalled to the MIRE. By the way, I left it right after the experiment ended. A bit forcefully even, they essentially fired me.

-Strange.

-Right? Well, in any case, when they called me, I didn’t have much to say, ro be honest. It was just “We need you. You will be paid.”

-And you agreed?

-They gave me a six digit number. And half of that up front.

-Oh fuck.

-Yeah! I would be stupid to not agree. After confirming the first payout, I went ahead and came back. I kind of wish I didn’t.

-Of course. So, what went down?

-As I predicted, the guy who was the first subject got assimilated.

-Oh boy, who could’ve predicted that?

-I know, right?

-And let me guess, the one who took over was ILMA.

-Again, on point.

-Kind of not hard to figure out.

-Yeah…

-Didn’t you warn them or something?

-Of course. But it’s not like they listened, nor like the one who was the subject was that important.

-Acceptable losses?

-I guess.

Not the first time, I guess.

He nodded, probably understanding what I was thinking.

-Well, anyway… My task was to contain her.

-Wait… she wasn’t contained? What, she was just out in the city?

-More or less. First off, there was no city there, or well, at least not where the experiments were being performed.

-They learned after the first failure, I guess.

-Nah, not really. They didn’t really have many places that could work as research centers after the failure, so we just had been working partially in the ruins and partially in quickly put down garage-boxes that were… well, far from an ideal place to work.

-Damn. I am amazed that you were able to accomplish even that much. Damn.

-Well, it was just at the beginning. Soon we got upgraded, but that’s besides the point. The main problem is, when ILMA took over, there weren't many ways to actually contain her. It’s not like we could just trap her in some random jail, you know.

True. Last time we had a very good containment unit, and even creating that was half-accidental. Just another experiment with Origin Crystal.

-What, you helped them build a cage from Crystal again?

-Nope. Well, that was a plan at the start, but we hit a snag… Not enough materials.

-Ah… right.

Right. Since the crystal was gone, or mostly gone, there was not enough to even try and cover a room to contain her.

They probably could be able to wait for it to grow again, but that would be a very long endeavor.

He read my mind again.

-Yeah. We didn’t have time, or at least that’s what the higher-ups were saying. For me… well, I wasn’t in a hurry, so to speak.

-Why?

-She was not harmful. You know about our safety mechanisms: she was unable to hurt anyone.

-That’s “theoretically”. You know we didn’t predict she would get her hands on an actual body.

-Yeah… I probably should’ve known. It’s not like we were omnipotent… there always could be some instance we didn’t predict when making her…

I couldn’t blame him.

I thought the same, even after seeing her free and acting more like a person than I expected for her to.

I guess we all had a soft spot for her…

-If I knew beforehand… I probably would’ve done things differently… but I doubt that would’ve helped much.

-What do you mean? You had some other ways to contain her?

-No… I mean, I probably would’ve tried a different approach… not just… a forceful one.

-Oh.

That did not sound good.

-”Forceful” how?

-Well… First off, we moved her away. To a place a bit further from any civilization, to not let her be in contact with anything.

-Obvious.

-Yeah… Everything was going great. We managed to establish a base of operation… a bit small at first, but it soon started growing, to accommodate more researchers. Multiple stories, multiple living quarters even.

-Sounds great. Although I can’t imagine that being a good place to live, knowing how dull those places can look.

-You’re not wrong. Especially if you are the one imprisoned there.

-Imprisoned? You meant it literally?

-Of course. How else could I treat a seemingly hazardous and anomalous experiment? Of course we locked her up in the deepest places we could.

He stopped and sighed.

-I thought of her more as a program than anything. I just ordered for her to be locked up in one small cell, never even thought it would make her uncomfortable.

-Wouldn’t that make anyone uncomfortable?

Where’s that “soft spot” for her gone, huh?

-I know! I guess… I just wanted to get away from there! I wanted to leave the place so I could get back to Il!

-She didn’t come with you?

-She wanted to. They didn’t let her. Nor did I, to be honest. I didn’t want them to try and blackmail me or her again.

-I feel like that was a stupid idea. Getting separated is always the problem.

-Mrgn… Of course you say that in hindsight… It’s not like I am some kind of prophet.

You really didn’t have to be one to predict that one…

-I am not going to bother you with the details. Main thing is, she was supposed to be contained, and docile. Hell, we thought she was even cooperating with us. But it was just an act.

-She’s gotten that smart?

-Yes. She literally took advantage of us. Half of the team was… endeared by her. Charmed! Literally!

-You mean magically, or…?

-Hell no! It was just straight up psychological manipulation. Like a cat taking advantage of their owner!

-Pfff…

-You laugh, but that’s what happened! I mean, there’s probably a bit of fault in our staff…

-Oh, don’t switch the blame.

-I am not! It’s just… we weren’t exactly… well staffed. After the catastrophe, there weren't really many older and more experienced employees left. Most of those working were either interns or just very, very old people. Those kinds who fall victim to a random 16-year old’s scam.

-Oof.

-And… I admit, I might have been a bit lulled into a false sense of security as well… I kind of… dismissed her as a threat, just instead of working on her, I just still continued my efforts to get Il’s a new body.

-I thought that was already done?

-Well, the spell was. Not the host.

-What, you needed to kill someone or some shit…?

-Not exactly…

He surprised me with that answer.

What was that supposed to mean?

-I needed a body, true. Probably a random fresh corpse would’ve been fine… - he agreed. - But I couldn’t do that.

-For saying that you would’ve done anything for her, you seem to still have some restraints… - I commented, but immediately regretted that.

-Oh, that was not the problem. I would’ve killed in a heartbeat. I already managed to get my hands on a great way to… vacate a body without damaging it at all…

He stopped, and extended his hand, gripping the air.

For a second, I didn’t understand what he was on about, but a split second later I remembered.

Right, he was part crystal. He could’ve just drained someone like I was doing with anything else…

He nodded, listening to my thoughts.

-Yeah, exactly. I managed to get the hang on that ability and limit the damage to just the mana. It took a few attempts. Failures tended to turn into dust.

Ruthless.

-So, what stopped you? I assume not laws, nor higher-ups.

-Of course not. It was… her. Il herself.

Ah.

Yeah, that checked out. I bet she wouldn’t want to inhibit a body that belonged to someone else before. It would definitely feel… weird.

That also gave me a different thought…

I wonder how my other self felt about using a body that didn’t belong to us?

I mean… we didn’t kill her, so I guess it was fine?

Hell, if I ever get to split again, I’ll try and share that feeling with myself.

Meanwhile, Mike was just looking at me.

He was probably listening in, because he looked… surprised?

Why was he surprised?

Because I was split before? It’s not like he’s not done that himself.

-I see you had your share of adventures when I was out of it…

-You can say that. but get on topic. What happened next?

I was not going to let him leave me in suspense.

And yet, he was still dancing around the subject.

-Well, there’s not much to it. She didn’t want it, end of story. And I even picked a nice target… Never mind that. The main thing is, we agreed on growing the body by ourselves.

-That couldn’t be that easy.

-Of course it wasn’t going to be. I was planning a lot of things, you know… but again, I was approached by the last person I thought was possible.

-ILMA.

-Bingo.

-How the hell does a prisoner even approach someone? What, you were working as a jail warden? You really were that desperate?

-No I was not working as a warden. But yes, I was desperate - he admitted surprisingly quickly and easily. - You know… after a while she wasn’t… really a prisoner any more.

-Excuse me?

-I told you! She managed to endear herself to a lot of them! And… to me too. After a while she was more like a guest there than anything.

-Fucking really?

-What!? You think you’d have done better!?

His sudden outburst made me stop.

Sure, I could talk about that a lot, but I wasn't any better.

-Okay. What did she propose?

-She said that she’ll give me a body for her if I let her out a little bit.

-”Out”? The fuck’s that supposed to mean?

-Fucking guess. Out means out! She was trapped in a sealed complex, she wanted to leave it for an hour or so.

-That’s it?

-Yeah, I knew it seemed too easy. But hey, I thought it was convenient. And not like having her leave the underground would’ve been a problem. We were in a sealed place anyway, so…

-How “sealed” are we talking about?

-As much as we are right now. Well, even better.

He confused me with that answer, but I didn’t interrupt.

-I agreed. Hell, I didn’t even need to convince others. They also seemed to think that having her see outside of that place would be good for her and harmless.

-”Good for her”... It’s like we are talking about the development of a child…

-It sort of was… or we thought that was the case… Anyway, we agreed. But first, I had to get Il back to me.

-Guess you had a harder time with that than ILMA had convincing your whole complex.

-Well… It wasn’t that bad. But I admit, there were issues… In the end, the higher-ups had declared that I can do it, but only if some of their representatives would be available on-site to oversee the whole process. I didn’t see why not, so I agreed.

-Seems… too easy.

-They cut my pay for the next ten years and forced me to work for them without the ability to retire. Ever.

-Oh.

-Yeah… they figured out that since I was immortal, they would essentially have a cheap worker with a lot of experience for the price of just one failed experiment. I guess they also decided that it was a good bargain.

-It probably would be if all went right. Because something went wrong, am I right?

-Eh… yes.

-Il and the “escort” arrives next week - he continued. - There was a lot more of them than I thought, and strangely, not only that they had some mages that I’ve never seen or heard about, but they were really powerful. And I mean REALLY powerful. They rivaled me with their capacity, even though I had Origin Crystal. Maybe not fully developed, but still, that was some serious force.

-I thought that all good mages were gone thanks to the calamity.

-So did I. I had no idea where did they get those people and why weren’t they helping in the project before, but I soon understood.

-Hmm?

-They were only good at offensive magic. What I was facing was the… well, it was just the army. Straight up.

-They were training offensive mages? I guess… I never thought about that.

-Neither did I. I thought our people that worked on elemental spells would be the hard-hitters of the magical world… not some random muscle heads that appeared out of thin air…

-Damn.

-Yeah, well, in the end, it did not matter at all. All of those were… the casualty.

-You keep saying that, yet so far you’ve not told what happened! Can you finally get to the point?

-I am getting to that.

-After the “deal”, so to speak, was struck and everything was ready, she filled us in on how it was going to work.

-Ah. Some new conditions? Did she already try to weasel her way out, since they brought you the reinforcements?

-I wouldn’t really call them “our” reinforcements… They wouldn’t listen to us even if the building was falling down on their heads.

-That loyal?

-You don’t even know. They didn’t even talk if not instructed, ignoring any attempt at communication.

-Are you sure those were even human?

-Don’t be stupid. It’s…

He paused.

For a second, it seemed like he was considering something, but dismissed it after a moment of thought.

Did I guess right?

Not like he was going to tell me.

-Doesn’t matter. Point is, they were following someone else.

-”Someone else”, you mean that one director or some shit?

-It was more like a general. But I don’t think I ever got their name…

I had a guess who that might have been…

But he was right. It did not matter.

-The fact is, before the “deadline” he was already under the influence of ILMA. Meaning, all of the force stationed there was also pacified.

-She did act quick.

-Yeah… Even if their boss wasn’t there, I am pretty sure that she’d be in control anyway. For such powerful mages, they seemed awfully weak-minded.

-That’s unusual.

-Yeah. Such an “elite force” shouldn’t be that easy to manipulate…

-Not so elite then.

-Well, not like any of us were aware at that point. Nor would it matter, all of us were just following ILMA, without us noticing.

-Yeah, what did she want then? You said she told you her plan?

-It’s not a plan, more like requirements for creating what I asked of her.

-And that was…?

-A lot of mana.

-Only that?

-And a bit of open space.

-Is that all? Seems awfully…

-Easy? Of course. But, it was true.

-So she did follow through?

-That she did.

-On that day, we led her out, on the surface. After a quick glance, she quickly found a “place that would be perfect”, as she said.

-Meaning what?

-It didn’t seem like anything. It was just a random place under some kind of a tree.

-A tree…?

Sounds… familiar.

-Well, yes. And you are right, that sounds about right.

-Huh?

-You’ll get it soon enough.

-Okay…?

-She told us to step away and she sat next to the tree. It didn’t seem like anything was happening at all, but I soon could see that she was absorbing an enormous amount of mana from it, yet it was not wilting.

-Really? Some enchanted tree?

-Nope, it was completely mundane. But, what was under was not.

-Under?

-A leyline. Well, not directly under at first. It only started moving when she started her… ritual.

-She moved a leyline!? You can do that?!

-I was surprised as well. And so was our guest.

-I fucking bet.

-It was… astounding. The amount of magic going through her was something to behold… And I still have not seen a larger amount used at once as of now.

-Hm.

That was saying something. He’s been a witness to a lot, as far as I knew.

-She did as she said. She made her a body. Or, grew it. You probably figured that out already, but her body was made out of wood.

Ah. Made sense.

-Honestly, it was pretty good. Amazing even. I couldn’t even dream of making something like that by myself.

-If that’s what I think it was, I am not impressed.

-But you should. I didn’t finish yet. Sure, it was made out of wood, but it didn’t seem like that at all. It was like a perfect replica of human flesh, the only difference was that the color was different.

-You checked? - I asked, grinning.

-Believe me, I wanted to. But I could only see it from afar.

-What, your wife didn’t let you? What…

-Oh, that’s not because of her. It was ILMA.

-...?

-The moment she finished and the new body of Il had stood up, I wanted to get to her and immediately check if everything went alright. But, as I took a step forward, I felt myself unable to move.

-...

-I found myself sunk into the ground. I can’t tell how I didn’t notice it before, especially since I was trapped up to my waist.

-Sloppy…

-I blame my clouded mind for this. And ILMA.

Both were most likely correct.

-The ground, like a swamp, has trapped everyone and had hardened already. The only people who were able to move were ILMA and the new body that had just been created.

-She… worked with her?

-No. I am not sure what happened, but she was definitely not with her. I could still contact her, and she was as confused as we were. She wanted to talk to her, but she was not listening.