Ravens of Eternity

230 The Birth of Kali

One Week Later

Amal walked down the mostly empty hallways of the now-defunct Prophet base. Its power was still on, but running at a bare minimum. Just enough to keep a few of its zones operational, mostly centered around keeping Cloning up and running.

She smiled at the Federation maries as they walked towards her. But instead of continuing in their direction, they instead joined her as she walked.

Her pace hardly slowed despite that.

“Miss Azrael,” said a marine. “Issuing my report for the cycle.”

“You really don’t have to, you know,” she replied. “It’s not like I’m your boss or anything.”

“Commander’s orders, ma’am,” he replied. “Gotta do my duty.”

“I know, I know. Go ahead, I’m listening.”

“Team six discovered a few Prophets hiding in the maintenance tunnels last cycle, and we flushed ’em out this cycle. Seems like they holed up after the attack, snuck around where they could and scavenged whatever food they could find. Which wasn’t much.”

.....

“Did you kill them? Or apprehend them?”

“One of them got a little rowdy, but they were all too weak from starvation to do a damned thing. We more or less locked ’em up with hardly a fight.”

“Want me to take a look at them? Medically speaking, I mean.”

“We’d appreciate that. I had some of my people give them some spare rations in the meantime, too.”

Amal nodded, then stopped in front of a set of secure double doors. It scanned her briefly, then slid the doors open moments after.

“I’ll stop by your desk a little later,” she said. “Say, four hours? And if you have any in your command that need medical attention, have them come too.”

The officer was surprised at her offer, but quickly regained his composure.

“I do have a few,” he replied. “I’ll make sure to let them know.”

He gave her a short salute, then he and his adjutant walked back where they came from.

Amal watched them disappear around the curving hallway. Then she walked through the open doorway. It shut behind her swiftly and silently.

She looked around at all of the pods around her and observed the synthetics inside of them. Most of the reprints were just about complete, and would be done within another cycle. More than a handful had completed and were waiting on a memory upload.

And whatever justice the Federal Navy wanted to perform, first.

Beyond that, all of them had recovered some degree of their individuality, and all of them were varied in appearance. It was a far cry from the homogeneous appearance they held when they were Prophets.

Not only was their skin color incredibly varied, but also their eyes, bone structure, height, weight, everything. Some were the opposite gender completely. A few even turned out to be albinos. They all looked like a mix of regular people, for the most part.

Amal could tell that there were still a few lingering aspects here and there. Some kept their bright blue eyes, or the blond hair, or the square jaws. Some had mottled skin, or outright vitiligo. They looked a bit out of place here and there, but she figured the variation was good, too.

Even if Drenn’s likeness could still be seen in them.

More than their appearance, they still held many aspects that she couldn’t remove, or really had no reason to remove. They were all physically more capable than regular humans, and arguably mentally as well.

She figured that if they ended up blending into society, by whatever miracle, then their genetics would surely improve the gene pool as a whole. It simply needed to happen the regular old way – through generational reproduction.

To Amal, Drenn was the worst kind of visionary. The kind who believed humankind needed to be led towards beauty or growth. She felt that his view and philosophy, nevermind the ego, was the true reason for his project’s failure. To her, the truth of reality was way simpler.

Humanity changed through necessity and survival, never through force of will.

Amal stepped up to Callie’s regeneration pod and looked at the girl as she floated inside. She was the first of all of them to complete their reprint, had her memories completely reuploaded, and was waiting to be awakened yet again.

But Amal still wasn’t sure if she should, if she even had the right. She felt as though she was pressing her own force of will on her. That she forced a life that she might not even want any longer.

In the end, she convinced herself she was doing the right thing, despite the doubts that nagged at her.

She shook her doubts aside as she looked Callie up and down. Amal noted just how much the girl had changed. Or rather, how much her original genetics shone through.

Callie’s skin was a dark olive. Her hair was a lush and dark auburn, and her eyes were also reddish-brown.

Amal noted that their body shape was relatively similar, though Callie was a half dozen centimeters taller – about Claire’s height. Otherwise, both were slim and had slightly wider hips than normal.

She stepped up to the pod’s terminal and reviewed the girl’s readouts.

–

Callie 2.4 General Status

Reprint: Complete

Memory Restoration: Complete

Warning: Genetic deviation above 34% threshold

–

Amal’s heart thundered in her chest as stared at the terminal.

“I really hope you’re ready,” she said.

She hit a few controls on the screen, and initiated Callie’s rebirth.

Inside the pod, Callie’s synthetic umbilical cord separated from her belly and withdrew up and into the tube above. At the same time, medical nanites stitched up her belly button and closed up the wound.

This only took a few moments, after which the entire pod lowered itself down into the recess underneath. The transparent glass dissolved slowly, from the bottom to the top. This allowed the amniotic fluid to flow down smoothly, with Callie nestled within.

Once the fluid filled the recess completely, and the glass had dissolved out of existence, the frame that held the pod lifted up. It slid up into the ceiling and set itself into a recess made specifically for it. Little slats slid shut and sealed the frame in place.

Down below, the amniotic fluid began to drain away slowly, which left Callie laying curled up in a fetal position in the center.

Once all the fluid had drained away, short metallic conduits popped out all along the middle of the recess’ circular wall. They all glowed briefly as a HUM elevated in pitch.

Suddenly, arcs of various energies shot between the conduits, and through Callie. They bathed her in a soup of fundamental forces, albeit at very minute scales.

Her body suddenly shuddered and convulsed as her lungs coughed out the fluid still left in them.

The girl felt a heartbeat, and her eyes shot open suddenly. At the same time, she gasped in huge lungfuls of air, even as she coughed out the last of the amniotic fluid.

She raised herself up on her arms, and marveled at the color of her skin. She rolled onto a seated position, and examined her skin all over her body.

Part of her knew this was right, but another part of her felt that something was off. Not wrong, just missing. Or perhaps, more accurately, that something that was once missing now found its way back.

She couldn’t quite put her feelings together on it.

For the first time the girl finally felt whole. Mostly. It dawned on her that it was that ‘mostly’ that bothered her.

And then her memories came back up to the surface, every single one, as clear as though it all happened just the cycle prior. Only this time, Drenn’s conditioning was barely there.

The memory of her undergoing it was there, but the layers that reinforced it was gone. The weight they had pressed down on her mind was gone. The influence he had on her was also gone.

Mostly.

All that was left were the scars. The wounds of Drenn’s many assaults on her mind and body. The brutal reminders of her past life, of who she was. But the biggest difference was that now she had full agency to choose a whole new path for herself.

Especially now that Drenn was dead.

Amal hopped down into the recess and wrapped up the girl with a towel. She helped her up on her feet, then leaned her up against the edge.

“Welcome back to the living,” said Amal.

“I’m not sure I want to be,” the girl replied.

Amal simply smiled at the girl, and embraced her for a moment. When she withdrew, she dried her hair a bit with the towel.

“It might not be the best life,” she said. “But it’s yours. And it’s a start.”

The girl wrapped the towel around herself, suddenly conscious of her own nakedness. The vulnerability of it made her nervous, mostly because of the memories of her past assault.

As a result, she shrunk inwards a little, and shivered.

“You’re gonna be okay, Callie,” said Amal. “Drenn – your abuser – he’s dead. Very, very dead. You don’t have to be afraid of him any longer, I promise.”

The girl nodded slowly. Of course, she knew he was dead. She saw him die. She killed him herself.

“That’s not my name,” she replied eventually. “That’s some name he gave me, and I don’t want it.”

“So what kinda name do you want, then?” asked Amal. “You could have any you want.”

“I don’t know. How could I know? I don’t even know who I am... All I know is who I used to be, and... I don’t want that. Ever.”

Amal leaned up on the edge of the recess next to the girl, and tilted her head in thought.

“Back where I came from,” she began, “A friend from another country told me a story. She told me about a deva – a benevolent yet devastating one. She represented change through death, through rebirth. She was the slayer of a great demon whose blood, when spilled, made duplicates of itself eternally. They called her Kali, and she was very much loved despite the wrath she was born with.”

“I... I like her,” said Kali. “She sounds like a good person.”

“She is,” Amal replied with a warm smile.