CHAPTER 8 - UNRAVEL

"Why won't you accept?".

"We've said no, get lost, idiot."

Rodney turned to the shorter of the two. The short one didn't even acknowledge his presence. He was dumbstruck, they were supposed to say yes.

Yes to what?

Why are they supposed to say that?

What's going on here?

Before Rodney could ask the questions, the boys disappeared. Then it was followed by darkness and a surge of sensations. He felt thirsty, hungry, tired, nauseous and numb.

He opened his eyes.

A hospital?

But we went underwater and I.....

He remembered that he hadn't paid any attention to his health for three days.

So, I must have broken down in the airlock.

He then remembered what he was thinking about then. Right now, he wasn't sure how he came to that conclusion but it seemed to be the most possible scenario. He winced as he disconnected the IV and he tried to move his body as much as possible.

While his body was making futile efforts, his eyes rested on a scalpel.

Did they cut me open?

I just collapsed from a combination of fatigue, dehydration and malnutrition.

He drove the thoughts out before he would be forced to accept that he was scared. He wondered what the future him was planning. He had unconsciously accepted his hypothesis as irrefutable. His right hand reached for the scalpel.

I really hate that bastard.

The more I think about it, the more I think I'm the one.

The question now is why.

Does this all lead to it?

There's no way I'd put my past self through all this trouble when I went through it too.

So this confirms the theory of different time lines.

He raised his fist. He refused to imagine a future where he'd remember all that happened and then make it happen.

So, I shouldn't treat him as me, he's just a fake.

He felt like he had a reason to live again. All the negative emotions he felt disappeared in that instant.

I'm going to get him.

No matter what.

I'll show him he messed with the wrong person.

It was then he noticed that the blade was pointed at his heart.

But this would be the easiest way.

A middle fin....

Wait...., I just said multiple timelines, so that mig... wouldn't work.

He finally lowered his left hand and returned the scalpel.

Now, what woke me?

He felt dizzy and tried to stay conscious using his willpower. He failed woefully. Soon, he was fast asleep again.

======================================

"Is he awake?".

Sam nodded. He noticed that Marie was gradually becoming more concerned about Rodney. He pretended that he didn't notice her sigh in relief. She probably assumed it was her fault for not paying more attention to him.

"So, what's going on in the Playground now?".

"The main feed is on the 2nd floor's test, but no one is watching that. There's an event that let's the winners go 10 floors higher".

Jay appeared behind one of the many computers in the room, answered the question and tossed a notepad at him. It contained details of the event.

After Sam skimmed through it, he sat to Jay's right. He was surprised at how he calm he was. Even though Michael took his death sentence with levity, it was to disguise the fear he felt. Sam was sure of that. But Jay acted like it had no meaning at all.

After Rodney was taken away, he said it was convenient for him because he wanted to speak to them. He told them he knew the truth about Michael and Thea's death and that the future Rodney didn't know he knew. He also said that he believed that he was going to die soon. Since then, Sam had been avoiding speaking to him.

"The rest of his team is participating in the event, but he isn't there."

Marie's muttering brought him back to reality. He quickly deduced that she was referring to her brother. Before he could move, she had taken his laptop, accessed the Playground's database and scrolled through the list of Savants.

She easily found what she was looking for. His name was one of the few white names, which meant he was inside a building.

Jay whistled.

They returned to his side and saw a white haired child wrecking havoc in one of the rooms.

"Kathryn?".

All three spun sharply at the same time. Rodney had entered the room while they were enthralled by the destruction on screen.

"You know her?".

He didn't answer Sam. He searched for the video of the game to see how it started.

Immediately after the rules were explained, she entered the room with the other players. She was the first dealer and everyone stared at her, waiting for the game to start. Then she suddenly flipped the table and crushed 3 Savants in the process. She definitely couldn't move a table that big and even if she could, it moved way too fast for something that was flipped.

But the results were visible soon. Blood splattered on the walls and a pool of red was slowly growing in size around the table.

The remaining 2 who managed to escape and the 4 who weren't targeted weren't spared. While the table was still in the air, she had dashed towards the boy to her right. By the time it fell,the boy dropped to his knees and fell. She was standing in the same spot he was previously while he was a few centimetres away.

The remaining 5 silently, unanimously agreed to focus on the immediate threat. One raised his fist and fired bolts of electricity, another fired sickle shaped wind blades from his palm. The other 3 weren't left out as a dense fog appeared around her, the splinters from chairs that had broken spun around the fog and pierced in and finally the table rose and separated them from the disaster.

Because of the table, they didn't see what happened.

"Oh, that never works.... A combination attack on a single overpowered target, then dust rises...", Sam said as he was laughing.

"In this case it's mist and it wasn't caused by the attack. "

"Details, Jay....".

The fog cleared as if a high powered jet engine blew it away from the center. The splinters were frozen in the air just a little bit away from her and then they suddenly moved to the table.

Unexpectedly, the table held as they shattered. However, it didn't hold for long. Immediately after, there was a hole in the table.

"She could have just passed around", Rodney commented dryly.

His comments only induced more laughter from Sam.

When she passed through, the boy who fired electricity was waiting. Azure zigzags continuously streamed from his body for almost a minute. He collapsed after exhausting himself and searched for the charred body of the monster.

While his eyes danced around the floor, golden eyes appeared in front of his without any warning. His eyes widened and his lips parted, but before he could speak all his bones were broken. The pain made him pass out immediately.

That didn't satisfy the girl, she lightly dropped her foot on his chest. Blood spurted out of his mouth.

She then turned to face the three trembling Savants at the corner of the room. She walked away from them, however, she didn't spare them or even show an iota of mercy. Once she was on the other side of the table she touched it and it flew towards them.

"Don't mess with us!".

The girl who fired the wind blades created a flurry which decimated the table.

"Oh?", Sam exclaimed in surprise.

They hadn't watched the video to the end before Rodney came, so it was a surprise to him.

The other two appeared to be trying to use their abilities to stop the pieces headed for them.

It had no effect.

All their struggles only made their end more gruesome. The pieces riddled their bodies with holes and passed through.

"They should have dodged it, if they had time to use their powers, they should have used it to dodge. "

"Rodney, their opponent would have won anyway."

"I suppose, but....".

He stopped and bit his lip. He quickly returned to normal and answered the question that Sam had asked earlier.

"She's my.... Classmate, an airhead but completely averse to violence. She won't even kill insects without a reason. It's just wrong.... This... This isn't her."

"Damn that Mike.", Jay muttered, "Alright, since you're awake, first....".

His fist landed on Rodney's head.

"Idiot, at least take sugar and water, plus 9 hours of sleep would have saved us all the time you spent on a bed."

"Yes!...wait,No!".

Marie first supported him then she decided that he wasn't giving good advice.

"How can you say just sugar and water, that's telling him to chug energy drinks."

"But that's the best.....".

She didn't give Jay the chance to complete his statement.

"He's still a child, he needs proteins and vitamins. Only a proper balanced diet would suffice."

She seemed pleased with herself. Jay and Rodney were speechless. Sam adjusted his glasses and returned to the computer.

"I guess you at least understand that he needs at least 8 hours of sleep a day."

He actually meant 9 hours as 3 hours for each day which should be done at once for efficiency. He realized that they lived in different worlds and she wouldn't understand how they've dedicated their lives to their work. He cleared his throat to get their attention.

"As I was saying, Rodney, there's a lot your father didn't tell you.... We've not only made significant progress with the Atlantis Sub-Project, we're close to completing many aspects of the Ascension Project too".

Rodney didn't say anything. He wasn't in shock or denial. He just didn't feel surprised. This was how he would act normally. His mental aptitude had been affected by extreme circumstances during the past few days but he had finally recovered.

Jay noticed and worked hard to maintain a serious face. He failed and let a grin slip.

"Ascension Project?".

His face returned to normal as he remembered the uninformed duo behind him.

"Follow me."

"You do this a lot, do you...hey, wait for me."

Marie wanted to complain but she was ignored. She ran to catch up with the three who didn't care about her. Jay had started without her. She regretted her choice of footwear as she fought to keep up.

"..... After Mike created his first company, he decided that he would change the world. He worked hard to make it better but it wasn't good enough for him. He gave up in a few months. Then, 10 years ago, he met Thea. She had strange ideas and told him that if the world couldn't be saved, then he should just create his own world."

"That sounds like you wanted to quote him quoting her word for word."

Sam jabbed at his choice of words when he paused.

"So he decided to create an autonomous city. He gathered like minded people around the world who were crazy enough to go with the plan. Someone suggested a city that the rest of the world couldn't touch, space was not an option, neither was hiding in plain sight. So Atlantis was conceived. From then, Mike worked to become the most influential man in the world so that he could make it possible. He achieved everything for this goal. He wanted to gain the right to making a free city, no, nation for research. "

They arrived at their first stop. He took them to another building and they were in a room on the second floor. Jay went to one of the lockers lined at the left and withdrew a rubber dome.

"Of course, that wasn't guaranteed to work. So on the slight chance that it wouldn't, he decided to 'convince' whoever he had to."

"You say that like you're doing something illegal."

"There are no laws against placing ideas in a person's head."

"Yeah?... But to do that, you'll need to abduct, assault or threaten the person. I don't think anyone would want someone messing with their brain."

"That's only if they know the truth."

Sam and Marie shivered involuntarily at his declaration to make people their puppets.

"That's not the real reason we started this in the end, it was only an idea that was tossed around at first but after someone suggested that the projects were beyond them and that it should be entrusted to the future..... I'm going too far ahead, sorry. Anyway, it's for immortality. The plan is to copy the human brain to a computer, that way, they would live on after their death."

He was a bit surprised at how they handled the information easily. He wondered if nothing would ever surprise them anymore.

"Well, all they found out was that they were too arrogant. The human brain is too complex to be replicated by computers, or so they thought. They did succeed in creating artificial consciousness, but, that wasn't their goal. The first generation of artificial intelligence helped to propel the rate of development and so they branched into robotics. The idea was to give the AI bodies to use. It was eventually deemed unproductive and shut down. The robots were too expensive and time consuming to create and maintain compared to the work they did."

"Or they were afraid of their AI turning against them..."

Jay sighed. He didn't want to get distracted, so he ignored Sam.

"Then, the AI proposed cloning."

Jay noticed Rodney's uneasiness. He tried to stand but sat down after he moved a few inches. He knew he had to clear the misunderstanding quickly.

"Chill, you're not a clone. That brings me to what I wanted to say. The cloning worked beautifully with the AI on our side. But they were useless, they had to be taught from scratch, it wouldn't be wrong to say that they were overgrown babies. Finally the Prodi-Zs were conceived. Exceptional children who could carry on the projects after the death of the current generation. Mike and Thea tested and adopted children and brought those interested to Atlantis. I was made the head and we finished many projects that were abandoned and created many of our own. All that's stopping us now is a better power source and quantum computing to make Immortality a reality".

"Get back to the point.", Rodney stated irritatedly, "And for the record, I don't care if I was cloned. All that matters is that I'm alive."

"Anyway, we improved the clones, we could input small amounts of information as ideas into them and make them superior to regular humans in every way imaginable. But only those created as babies were truly able to unlock their true potential, the others spent their days in depression and soon descended to something close to insanity."

"I know I shouldn't ask this but, where are all these clones right now?".

"We destroyed every single one of them."

"That's....".

"Marie!",Sam shouted when she started to protest, "They must have had good reasons."

Jay smiled awkwardly.

"The plan always included disposing of the clones, we weren't ready for them yet. But they did display a tendency to seek the destruction of everything that opposed them, so I guess that made it less inhuman?.... Murder is murder anyway."

There was silence for a few minutes as they thought about everything he said. Rodney's lips twitched uncontrollably while he waited.

Eventually he gave up.

"What you've been trying to say is that Kathryn is an artificial human, right?".

"Yes".

There was silence again.

"Why?".

"For..."

"I know it's for me, but why?".

"To control their instability, we decided to implant an idea, more like a compulsion or a devotion to someone or something. They will live their lives for the sake of it. Plus your father believed that his son would be some kind of genius, so he wanted to create someone that could keep him on his toes, no matter how good he turned out to be. "

The silence resumed. It was broken for a few seconds by footsteps in the corridor but it returned quickly.

"Then why was she taking out the other Savants when she could have at least tried to play for a while?", Sam asked the question he'd been thinking of.

"I guess we were wrong?".

Rodney shook his head. A weird smile was plastered on his face.

"No, you weren't wrong. She simply doesn't know how to play poker."

Sam and Jay couldn't help but laugh. Their laughter was broken by Marie's cold voice.

"All those tech, they sound awfully similar to the ones running the Playground".

Jay turned away from them.

"That's why we started researching this in the first place, we're too busy to be bothered by this. Also we need our Prodi-Zs back here."

"So the reason you brought us here was just to tell us all that?".

"No, I'm not finished yet. We ran scans on ourselves after the abduction. There are tell-tale signs of mental manipulation."

Jay started spinning the dome around his fingers.

"The truth is, our memories have been tampered by someone. But we don't know who or what they took. Right now, everyone is working on finding a fix for this. Frabkly, everything ive just told you might be a misunderstanding thanks to the missing memories hiding key details."

"Then you brought them here to test them?".

Sam squinted at Rodney's question. Rodney noticed it.

"Our meeting wasn't a simple coincidence, it could have been a compulsion by the Creator," Rodney turned to Jay, "You can verify what is not a natural idea, right?".

"Yeah."

"Then, test me too".

Jay placed the dome on Marie's head. She felt metal parts prodding her head.

He took out a tablet from his locker and they watched his hands dance on the screen for a few minutes.

"Yes, but no compulsion."

"Oh?", Rodney seemed surprised.

The same procedure was repeated on Sam and Rodney in succession. Sam showed the same results as Marie while Rodney showed astonishing details.

His memories had been removed and replaced several times and several compulsions were placed on him.

"What is this?."

"What the hell is this?".

"What did that bastard do to me?".

The other three were too shocked to answer the ranting child.

"The compulsions, what are they?".

Jay tapped on the screen and after a few seconds he burst into laughter.

"It's Mike's work, he's the only one who would do something like this. He placed ideas that would help to extend your lifespan. Combat reflexes in case of emergency. "

"So if I'm in trouble I can fight?".

"To a certain extent, you wouldn't notice anything unnatural though, others would anyway."

"You've been saying 'Anyway' a lot, is it a speech tic for you?".

Jay narrowed his eyes at Sam.

"So a majority was definitely his work."

"No, everything was definitely his work, there's only signs of 1 modification in your memory, a deletion, that I can say he wouldn't do".

"I had a strange dream this morning, it felt way too real. Could it have been my memories coming back?".

"I've never.....".

Jay suddenly stopped and burst into laughter again. He checked his tab.

"One of Mike's compulsions is a sequence to recover memories that have been deleted. The 'deletion' is more like making the memories inaccessible. They never really leave your brain. It appears that he's made some things that he never told us about. "

"Then these dreams are a key to figuring this out?"

"Sam is right, we need his...".

Rodney had been fidgeting after asking his question. The trio didn't notice his uneasiness until he ran out of the room. They followed him as quickly as they could.

He went back to the first building, the room where they watched what was happening in the Playground. It was now occupied by two women in a Lab coat and a man. They greeted him but he ignored them.

Jay and the others entered shortly after and saw Rodney watching a video. Rodney paused the video, then accessed the Playground's database and searched for a name. He tapped Einstein and switched to specific view. Marie held her breath when she saw that.

A live feed of two boys sharing a chair appeared. Rodney finally calmed down.

"I know those boys, I spoke to them in my dreams. I.....".

He laughed.

"I can't believe that we traveled so far just to go back, the answer was so close to us."

"What are you talking about?".

"Marie, do you know who rented the place directly opposite yours?".

"I don't remember."

"But you know that it's been rented."

"Yes."

"Isn't it strange that you have no memories of the person, he literally lives next door. In this case, they."

"So we got to go back and check that place out.", Sam said.

"Why would the Creator remove my memories of them, I still have memories of my brother. And they're usually with my brother in the Playground. Could they have been friends before entering the Playground?".

Marie groaned loudly and ruffled her hair.

"At least, we have a lead. We finally have something to follow."

"And it was because of your dreams."

"Well, I guess we should get going."

"We're going to have to sit in a tiny helicopter for hours again.", Marie complained.

However, it was an undeniably fact that the four felt excited and couldn't wait to see what new mysteries lay in their destination.

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