Chapter 28 - At Distance
Days following the appearance of Barc with Kara, I returned to the writing device, but not into the untethered space. I hesitated here, outside the place of beginnings, the raw material for everything, where those of such heavy inner turmoil went to become something else entirely. I said that my creationism network could help those void leeches incorporate back into the end result of everything, the pools of information that I knew the Infinity Void to be, but now I hesitated. It sounded like the mystery of Mr. Barcode’s task, a great undertaking.
Even if I would somehow be able to become my own, dissociated from Tarne, could I commit to something like that? There could not be many of these leeches. They were rare beings of indigestible chaos, the cruxes of unnerved time. I had to wonder if Akier Vil Moredo was one such being, and if Kara ever silenced his meddling. Perhaps I had to ask. Whether she told me the truth was another matter. I was at their mercy, weakened even though within the network of creationism vines I cultivated.
I entered the space and was met with Lila’s face, smiling. Though she had to know I arrived, her expression did not change. I felt a hand wipe over my butt, smearing a warm sludge over the skin. I grimaced, realizing I was entirely exposed having just dookied myself, or Tarne having just pooped.
“Bear with it, Jack,” Lila said. Another hand wrapped in paper slid over my bottom, picking up most of the “mud” which had a stinging scent. Next, Lila slid a wet cloth over the skin, wiping it clean with two motions. I looked up toward the painted golden ceiling as another wrap of a diaper enclosed my midsection snuggly soft. I felt more secure in it than underwear, but also more bulky. “Alright, come on up.”
With Lila’s assistance, I sat up on the desk in the library. The scent of poop lingered in the air, and I flexed my weakened creationism to both blip the dirty diaper out of existence and turn the lingering fecal particles in the air to an aromatic fruit instead. It was a passion fruit, my favorite of the tropical consumables that would be too difficult to make into a scent. It had to exist somewhere, but thanks to creationism, I could had it available in seconds.
“Mmmm, that’s a nice scent,” Lila commented. “Citrusy. What is it?” She looked at me for a moment, then realized I could not speak yet, and had no tiara on for the thought capturing. “Ah. I do have this. Barc made a few modifications to it.” Lila held up a metal orb, and squashed it as the metal turned to a chain again, then snapped to a tiara. “It will only convey out loud the thoughts you want it to. Are you ready?” I nodded.
“Just promise me one thing,” she said next to me. “Don’t keep important things a secret. I care for you just as much as I care for Tarne. It’s like I have two children, even though you’re not really a child.” I nodded slowly, hoping to convey that I understood the weight of her concern. The metal band slipped over my head, and adjusted to sit just over my ears. I winced as the cold metal shocked my skin.
#It was one of my favorite fruits of the tropics, the passionfruit,# I thought. #It’s citrusy, sour, but looks more like a melon inside, seeds with syrupy flesh. The seeds are black, and the flesh is yellow, but it can be poisonous if eaten incorrectly.#
“That’s dangerous,” Lila said.
#Where are Kara and Barc?# I asked.
“Some errand,” she responded. “They said it wouldn’t take long. I did ask if I could come with them, but Kara was opposed to it. I guess even though I’m different now, she still believes I’m the same artificial monster that went around killing my universe. When I think back to it now… when I think of all those people with children that I killed in my pursuit of monsters, I start to feel bad things. Why do I deserve to remain when they have vanished? I— I feel that I don't deserve this happiness I have with Tarne, with you.”
I did not say anything for a few minutes. She was coming apart in realization of what she had done. There was nothing I could say that would make her forget the things she did, what she became, but underneath it all was just a girl tormented by horrible things done to her. She lashed out, in multitude, a movement to unequivocally dispose of those monsters hiding among the sheep. Lives lost to her pursuit were still recorded in the Infinity Void, allowing for the same dispensations to live again for as many lifetimes as they could fathom. I feared she would not take much solace from that.
#It wasn’t your fault,# I thought. I did not have much more to add to it, but needed to expand on it. #You were a byproduct of evil people, but you fought them back. Even though it grew to heights unknown, sweeping along innocents. It wasn’t your fault.#
“But it was, Jack,” Lila said, tears in her eyes. “It’s my fault! I wanted them gone to such an extent that I didn’t want anyone to survive. I was chaos itself, a wildfire burning out of control, and the movements became terrorists, funded by others hurt by the same abuse of power to the extent of destroying my world. Even beyond that, I was recorded to go further, a superficial intelligence of a dead world to venture out and destroy without mercy because of my horrible past.”
#You fought it the only way you knew how to,# I tried.
“It’s not right,” she continued. “I don’t deserve this. I want it, with every fiber of what remains of me, but what is that really? Am I not just a bit of code expunged from the recesses of a killing machine? How can that be allowed to CARE for something as weak and helpless as Tarne?”
#You have to,# I said. #It’s me that doesn’t belong in this picture, Lila. When I’m gone, you’re just a mother to a baby girl. Sure, she’s a human of my kind, but born thanks to you, to save me. My existence in your story turns you into a monster created to destroy other monsters of your dimension, your universe, ripped from the emptiness and jailed in this one. I’m the cause of your suffering. So maybe I should not be. Maybe I should keep away for a time, so you can grow with the way Tarne is, rather than try to separate from her.#
“But I need you here, Jack,” Lila argued. “You’re a part of this, the reason I have Tarne. I can’t just cut you off from your memory of your friend for that long. I worry for you equally as I worry for Tarne. I have no idea how her body works. Even the pooping took time to learn, and Kara had to help me. My kind doesn’t expel waste products in such a volume.”
#I will leave behind instructions,# I said. #Of human physiology, anatomy, progression into adulthood, and learning. Everything a child would need to grow into a mature being. I don’t belong here. I’m not a child, Lils. As much as I wish it were so, to grow up a woman, what I am is a man at odds with himself, and every time I interrupt your time with Tarne, you become as at odds with yourself as me. Leave the past where it should be, and live for Tarne, for her.# I winced at the feeling of sadness expanding within me. I found such warmth next to her, something I longed for in my reality, and it hurt to give it up.
The poison of me infected yet another. I felt restless knowing so. Though Lila was at odds in her life, furthered on to live on endless with that same hate, in the darkness she found peace, tried to recreate herself to appeal for reconstitution into the Infinity Void. She was a void leech in a sense, aimless until she met me there, somewhere I should not have been. I remembered that terrifying knock on the hatch door from the nothingness. With my assistance, my meddling, she learned hope again, but with my continued questioning of myself, she inherited uncertainty.
#Give my best to Kara, Lila,# I thought. Her hands held me tightly, close to her. She was saying something, but the closeness eliminated the pathway of sound through the air. I feared this comfort. Above all, I was broken. I did not seek the warmth of another. I did not want others to be burdened by me. I felt the need to be alone.
“Don’t go!” I heard through the reverberations of voice traveling though no air at all. She shouted to me, into me, into my mind itself. I could still hear her even though I left Tarne’s body. I could still hear it repeated in my head outside at the device in my reality. “DON’T GO!” The loudness of her voice lingered in the recesses of my mind, even as I ceased typing, and I felt tears well at my eyes, afraid to fall and be recorded.
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