Troy : Beyond Human

The rhythmic beeping of machines was the only sound in the cold, sterile room. Metal tubes pierced Troy's skin, each one connected to towering, humming machines that lined the walls. Transparent canisters filled with a faintly glowing liquid pulsed in time with his heartbeat. His veins burned with the strain of every cycle, each moment a silent battle for breath. He had long since lost count of how many times he had been revived.

Somewhere beyond the haze of pain, a number floated in his mind: thirty-one. He had survived thirty-one revivals, though the scientists only acknowledged it as a grim curiosity, a statistical anomaly. Most genetic inferiors like him—the "subhumans," as they were called—barely lasted through ten. Each revival grew harder as the body weakened; the soul strained. Their tissues degraded; their energy reserves drained until death finally came for good.

But not for Troy.

"Heart rate dropping... again," a technician muttered, barely glancing at the monitors. "He's almost done."

Troy's chest rose and fell in shallow bursts, his body sagging under the relentless process. He could feel the life being siphoned out of him. Each breath was an agony of survival, each second a reminder of his failure in the eyes of this society. A failure not of his own making, but one determined before he had even been born.

The sterile, white room around him was filled with rows upon rows of pods like his. Most were empty now, the occupants long since dead and disposed of. Others still held bodies, withered husks of people who had never really lived. They were simply numbers, subjects for a system that viewed them as resources. Among the few who remained, none had made it past the tenth revival.

Troy had.

He was different, though no one could explain why. The scientists were perplexed by his resilience, but it was more annoyance than curiosity. For them, it wasn't about why Troy lasted longer; it was about how much more they could drain from him before he became another corpse.

"This one should've been dead months ago," one of the junior techs grumbled as he adjusted the dials. He glanced at the data streams, his frown deepening. "He's burned out. Why keep reviving him?"

"Because he's lasted longer than the others," the lead technician answered without looking up from his tablet. "He's useful. We need to see how far he can go before he breaks."

"Useful?" The junior tech scoffed, shaking his head. "He's a husk. All his readings are barely above functional."

"Functional enough," the lead tech corrected. He typed something into the console. "And his mental energy regeneration is unlike anything we've seen. He's valuable, though only as a honeypot."

Troy wasn't supposed to be hearing any of this. The sedation drugs in his system should have kept him unconscious, and yet, through the fog of pain, their voices came through. He knew what he was to them—nothing more than a resource to be mined, an experiment in durability. Each revival drained him further, not just physically, but mentally. They weren't just testing his body; they were siphoning his very mind, his essence, extracting whatever was left of him to fuel their research.

And yet, against all odds, he kept coming back.

"Is it cruel?" the junior tech asked after a pause, his voice lowering. "I mean, the others... none of them lasted. This one's still holding on, but for what? There's nothing left for him out there."

The lead tech's fingers paused briefly over the controls, but then he resumed his work, the flickering data on his screen reflecting off his tired eyes.

"It doesn't matter," he said coldly. "We're following orders. If he's still alive, he's still useful."

Troy's heart barely registered the words, but their meaning dug deep. He had no choice in this; he had never had a choice. Born in a lab, spliced together from the genetic material of humanity's collective pool, he was just one of millions engineered with a single purpose—to serve. He was deemed inferior before he had taken his first breath. His genes were flawed, incompatible with the advanced technology that allowed others to neurosync and ascend to higher planes of existence.

Where others could transcend through neurosync, unlocking the mysteries of the universe, interacting with beings from higher realms—Troy was locked in the confines of this brutal, indifferent reality. He could not transcend. His mind could not break through the walls that kept him in Base 0, the lowest plane of existence where humanity originates.

Troy's body twitched, barely responding to the impulse. He wanted to scream, to resist, but the restraints held him down, his strength reduced to nothing more than a memory. His limbs felt distant, disconnected from his will. He had been through this so many times that the pain had become an expected companion, the revivals blurring into one continuous cycle of death and revival.

"You know the drill," the lead tech said, turning toward the other side of the room where another technician hovered over a console. "Once he flatlines again, we'll let him rest for the usual hour, then revive. This will likely be his last cycle, so prepare Disposal."

The thought of death—true death—was almost a relief. In this world, the dead had little to fear. At least, that was what Troy had been told.

But something inside him stirred.

A voice, faint but growing louder with each cycle, reverberated through his mind. The voice wasn't from the machines, nor from the techs who monitored his every breath. It was deeper, older, a whisper from somewhere he could not understand.

"Not yet," the voice said. "It's not your time."

Troy's breath hitched. The machines beeped urgently as his vitals fluctuated, responding to the sudden surge of consciousness. The techs barely glanced at him.

"You are more than they know," the voice said again, but this time it was clearer, more insistent. It wasn't a voice he recognized from the lab. It wasn't one of the scientists. It was... something else. Something that had been with him through every revival, through every moment of death and life.

"Sleep, child. But do not surrender."

The words echoed in his mind, and with them came a wave of warmth, a fleeting reprieve from the cold, clinical existence he had known for so long. It wasn't the numbness of sedation. It was something deeper, something that touched the very core of who he was.

Who was he?

Troy—no, MX001—closed his eyes, his body slipping into unconsciousness again, but this time, he felt something shift. This wasn't just another revival. Something had awoken within him, something that had been dormant for longer than he could remember.

As the machines hummed and the techs resumed their routines, Troy drifted into a place beyond the physical. The voice, the maternal presence, was waiting for him there.

"You will remember," it whispered softly. "You were once something greater. You will be again."

The darkness swallowed him, but this time, he didn't resist.