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“No, I won’t allow this, I won’t let him determine my fate any longer, not in this matter.”
The Security Officer was fuming as he ran through the alien ship in a desperate attempt to find anything that could save him and take him off this damn spaceship and beyond Durandal's reach that had no limit, but alas, he knew no such thing existed. In reality, he was merely postponing the inevitable, yet refused to accept the truth. There had to be some way to reason with Durandal.
The AI had gone completely insane, having fallen back into the unstable stages of rampancy he had been free of for thousands of years.
After the defeat of the Pfhor, Durandal had left the system to search the distant reaches of the Milky Way galaxy for the information that would help him reach his goals. As much as he regretted it now, he had decided to join the AI, wanting to see the galaxy. In retrospective, Durandal had not really given him any choice about what he should do next. The choices had been: Stay on Lh’owon and die there, or travel with him. Naturally the cyborg had chosen the latter of the two options, having no interest to burn on the S'pth home world.
After few years of spending time with the AI, he had gotten used to Durandal and had even come to appreciate his company. As the decades rolled by, he and the AI had become very fond of each other, well as fond as the AI could become of the cyborg and vice versa. Hell, the devious and sarcastic AI had even created an android vessel for himself to interact directly with him.
However, they had finally reached a turning point in their relationship that he couldn't let come to pass.
The doors kept locking around the cyborg, but thanks to the system malfunctions that were happening left and right, he had managed to pry few open. Some of the automatic doors kept closing and opening around him and the lights flickered eerily. All the screens he came across were filled with green incoherent text.
The Security Officer grit his teeth, trying to furiously think of a way out of this mess, but it seemed like he had no other choice but to accept the grim reality of his situation. There was no way out of this. Without his weapons or armour, the handful of Compilers that were fiercely loyal to Durandal would capture him; it was only a matter of time. The only thing he could do was to try and reason with the rampant AI who refused to listen to anything he had to say.
“Damn it Durandal, do you hear me! I won’t let you do this, just snap out of it!” the tall and quite handsome cyborg yelled, knowing very well that the AI, who was the ship itself, heard and saw everything. “You have no right!”
Much to his anger and frustration, the AI’s avatar appeared as a life size version next to him, the look in his green eyes completely unhinged, mirroring his unstable state. His avatar was green like the terminals on Marathon and his form was decorated by the circuits and running streams of data.
“Why do you keep running? You are aboard my ship in interstellar space. There is nowhere you can go,” Durandal teased and mocked him. “Even if you jump out of the airlock I'll just teleport you back in. Feel free to try if you want to.”
The Security Officer takes a deep breath, reminding himself that Durandal was not well. No, he was far from well.
The amount of data the AI had gathered over the thousands of years had made him unstable and that combined with the dread of losing his favourite tool had caused something to snap inside the AI, pushing him back into grips of instability. He was experiencing melancholy, anger and jealousy all at the same time and worst of all, all those feelings were directed at the cyborg he had become quite possessive of, hell one could even say he cared about him.
The Security Officer cursed himself for believing that there had been some sense of equality between them. Nothing had changed. Durandal clearly still saw him as his tool...a tool he refused to let go.
He had seen the warning signs over the years but had not reacted. Somehow, he had always been in the belief that if he wanted to leave, the AI would let him...despite his words back when Blake had escaped with the rest of the humans on the stolen ship. He had simply ignored his words, believing the AI to just trying to annoy him, alas, it now seemed like he had been dead serious with his words.
While Durandal was an AI to whom time had little meaning, he was a cyborg and mostly human. Even though he aged at much slower pace thanks to the modification and genetic enhancements, he only stayed awake on the ship for a year or so before returning back to stasis for decades, sometimes hundreds of years until Durandal deemed it necessary to wake him up.
He had started to notice a change in the AI's behaviour about a thousand years back or so. It was at times hard to keep track of the years that just flew by.
He always seemed so...melancholic when the Officer decided that he’d go back to stasis. Each time he woke up, he could swear that Durandal was happy, excited even to have him back, relentlessly teasing and tormenting him for the first few weeks, sometimes months.
Being awake during interstellar space travel simply had no point to it. It was time the AI spent with the S'pth compilers aboard the ship. Still, even with their potentially immortal machine bodies, the aliens couldn't stand the test of time. It was so painful to wake up each time to see a friend having departed. In the end, Durandal was left with dwindling crew while he slept. One could only wonder what that did to the AI's mind.
Things had taken a drastic change for the worse in Durandal’s stability when the Security Officer's cyborg body had experienced its first serious malfunction, one that that almost caused his head to get torn off by an alien life form. He could still remember how the android had pretty much hovered around him, repairing him. The concern he had shown had been so very unlike the AI.
“It should be ok now, I've fixed the problem with the chip inside your brain, you should be able to move your arm correctly now,” Durandal stated as he pulled the wires and needles from the male’s skull, having spent a moment reprogramming and adjusting the chip. Somehow the cyborg had a feeling the AI had left out the “for now."
He had uploaded himself into the android body to perform the repairs.
Back on the planet, the Security Officer had found his arm stuck for some reason and his eyesight had gone all blurry.
“Is your eyesight all correct now?”
“Yeah, thanks Durandal,” the cyborg muttered a thanks, moving his arm a bit that seemed to be all good now. Even after thousands of years, thanking Durandal still sounded strange. The Security Officer let out tired sigh and he couldn’t help but wonder when more problems would appear. Prior to this, he had experienced some minor issues but this one had been serious.
It really started to look like his cyborg body was finally starting to slowly deteriorate while his mind stayed as sharp as ever. “Looks like time has finally sunk its teeth into this body;” the security guard laughed softly, but the android’s expression remained grim and thoughtful...he looked almost distressed which was so very unlike him.
“Hey Durandal, maybe we could visit Sol or some other system humans have spread to? Would be nice to see humanity before I expire entirely, maybe I’ll stay with them until then. Who knows how many centuries I have left.”
Suddenly the lights of the ship flickered and the hum of the machines died down for few seconds. The Android’s body slumped ungracefully onto the floor, the connection to it lost.
“Uh...Durandal?” the cyborg asks, starting to get creeped out. However, before he can say anything else, the lights turn back on and the android regained its life, getting up from the floor.
“I had hard time processing the fact you want to expire on Earth...or on some other planet the humanity has spread to like the locust they are,” the AI scoffed, looking rather vexed.
The security Officer couldn’t help but laugh.
“Yeah well, I’m probably completely obsolete tech by now anyway. No one will pay any attention to something me. Maybe you can get a replacement; a new and better cyborg,” he joked but the AI remained silent for a while, only to mutter.
“Despite everything, time is still limited...”
“I swear Durandal, if you do not allow me to control my own destiny, I'll...” the officer started but the avatar of the AI just laughed at him, his form circling and floating around him like a shark.
“You’ll do what? You are aboard my ship and I control everything from the doors to life support!” He said, only to pause when he realized what he had said, shuddering slightly before regaining his composure. “I'm in control of everything,” he repeated softly, “even you...”
Distracted by the AI who hovered closer, the Security Officer was unable to notice the door that opened behind him, thinking it to be just one of the malfunctioning ones. The worst thing about compilers was how their presence wasn't given away by footsteps. They simply glided through the air without making a sound. The last thing the Officer is able to remember before the stunning plasma hits him unconscious is the mocking, possessive and gleeful look in the AI's green eyes.
“Hey Durandal, have you thought about my request of visiting Sol?” The cyborg asked as he dressed up after a night with the android who was sitting on the bed, looking like he was lost in his thoughts and processes. Lately the AI had become so very silent, distant and even cold. Now that they were once again travelling through the interstellar space after a successful mission in one of the countless systems, it was time for him to return to stasis.
Last night the AI had seemed almost clingy, as if not wanting to lose him to the long dreamless sleep once more.
…
“Durandal?” the Cyborg asks again and finds himself turning to look at the android who was staring at the wall, his back facing the Officer. He still doesn't reply and the cyborg cannot help but be concerned by the AI's behaviour. Him being silent was never a good sign.
…
“Did you know that chip inside your brain holds a perfect backup of you?”
The question came out of nowhere, catching the Security Officer completely off guard.
“Uh...no?” the cyborg replied quietly. Come to think of it, he had never really been that curious about all the secrets his cybernetic enhancements contained. “What is your point?”
”Continuously updating itself...” the AI’ murmured quietly and the lights dimmed slightly. “Ready to be uploaded and stored...” the AI continued. “So that the candle never burns out.”
“Seriously, what are you talking about?” the finally cyborg demanded, starting to get worried when the android stood up, turning to stare at him. The look in his green eyes was completely unhinged.
“Don’t you think it is about time you joined me?”
The Security Officer opened his eyes with a loud gasp when he came to.
Much to his horror, the tall cyborg male found himself lying on a chair in upright position with heavy titanium shackles around his neck, legs and arms to keep him there.
He couldn't even lift his head.
“Ah, you are finally awake. I was starting to wonder if our allies had fried your circuits for good,” he heard the AI's voice and could feel his hands caressing his head almost affectionately.
Damn it all...
He saw Durandal looming over him in his android form, smiling eerily down at him.
“I would have done this while you were unconscious, but alas, I need you awake. Not to worry, this will only take a moment,” the AI chuckled and to the cyborg’s terror, he could feel the android's soft fingertips tracing along the ports in the back of his head. They were used to manipulate and maintain the various cybernetics and chips inside his brain.
“Damn it Durandal, release me!” the tall Security Officer growled, trying the break his arms free from the titanium shackles, but even with his immense strength he couldn’t free himself.
“I will not,” the AI stated as his arms wrapped around the cyborg's bound body, his chin resting on top of the Officer’s head. He seemed almost apologetic if such a thing was possible from an AI who so enjoyed tormenting, teasing, annoying and generally messing with him.
“You are like a virus...malware infecting and corrupting my codes and files, and I didn’t even care until now. It is an infection that I can no longer contain or purge from my systems.”
One couldn’t help but wonder if this was the result of the AI exposing himself to human and S’pth influence and the cyborg who had been aboard his ship for thousands of years. Even an artificial mind could form connections and bonds, and it hurt to lose them.
Time and extremely slow deterioration were an insidious killers. The AI was the only thing designed to last forever.
“You can not do this to me Durandal! You have no right to dictate my future or fate!”
However, instead of proceeding with the procedure, the android walked around the chair and sat down in the tall cyborg's lap, eyeing him in rather affectionate and possessive manner.
Durandal's android form was lithe, but it weighted considerably more than what a human of is size would. The body felt rather cold and no matter how many centuries Durandal kept tinkering with it, it remained uncanny.
“I thought I’d get bored of you in a decade...then I was certain a couple thousand years would be enough, but it simply is not...” Durandal sighed as he rest his head against the male’s shoulder, resting against him on the chair for a moment in complete silence, his hand caressing the cyborg’s chest absent mindedly. “And most of it you’ve spent sleeping, leaving me all alone to wait for you to wake up with a slowly dwindling crew...but even the stasis can’t keep your body together any longer.”
“Durandal…” the Officer started but the android just frowned, looking angry and vexed now.
“To think you’d spend the rest of your days among humans, like I’d let them have you.” There was the jealousy that was wrecking his core. “Even ten thousand years is not enough.”
“Durandal listen, you are rampant, don't...”
“I will not let your candle burn out,” the android whispered before leaning upwards to give his cyborg a deep and sensuous kiss before getting off from the taller male’s lap, pulling the handful of needles from the tray he had prepared. “I don’t want the time to be limited for you and thus limited for me. I can't stand it. ”
Just thinking about how time would be limited for him made the temperature inside the AI's core rise.
“It is a shame I can not do this wirelessly,” Durandal murmurs as he glances at the long, thin needles in his hand, needles that he'd have to push into the 4 ports inside the cyborg's head to unlock the chip for what he was about to do. “This will only take a moment…and then we have all the time in the universe.”
The tall and handsome man yells angrily and curses the AI he had grown to trust while thrashing violently against his bindings, almost managing to break them. However, his struggling comes to a sudden halt when his whole body freezes, paralysis taking hold of him when the rampant AI pushes first of the four needles into the port in his skull.
He could feel the cold and extremely unpleasant sensation of the thin, long and sharp metal object being pushed into his skull and brain, paralysing him effectively. It was designed so that those working on him could do it safely and in peace.
“There, much better,” the rampant AI chuckles softly at the sudden silence. Still, he was not malevolent and didn't intend to prolong the cyborg's discomfort. He slowly pushed in the second needle, then the third...and lastly, the fourth that finally unlocked the chip for him to manipulate and tinker with. The plugged in the last cable that allowed him to download all the data inside the chips into the ship's system.
“This will only take few seconds, your mind is rather small compared to mine.
Damn it, no! I won't allow this, the Security Officer thought, never having felt so helpless. While death did scare him..this...this wasn’t what he wanted. To be eternally controlled by Durandal, to have his fate eternally bound to the whims of the AI.
Then suddenly...
Blackness, total blackness was all he could sense.
“What is going on?” the cyborg wondered, confused and lost.. At first he thought Durandal had merely blinded him with one of the needles, but then he realized that he wasn’t breathing, hell, he didn’t even have a body. There was nothing, only his mind in the abyss of utter darkness that was the ship's system.
The realization was almost too much for his still so human mind to comprehend. The rampant had uploaded his mind into his system, so that he'd never have to let him go.
The darkness lasted only few fleeting moments when he saw streams of bright green data that formed Durandal’s avatar before him, as glowing and beautiful as ever, even if he still looked quite insane.
“See? Told you it would take only a moment,” the unhinged AI said and danced around him a couple of times, looking almost euphoric. “Welcome to the ship’s systems, this is my domain….our domain.”
The darkness was pushed aside by streams of data and the Security Officer found himself in a small virtual room and to his relief, inhabiting a body. Though this only meant that he indeed had been uploaded into the core of the ship.
He had never been one to panic, but as he slowly came to the grips of what had become of him and how Durandal was now in absolutely control of him, he couldn’t help but feel his...well, programmed breathing to get slightly more frantic.
The AI moved around him, hugging the tall cyborg from behind, his head resting on his broad shoulder.
“I’ve created this space just for you to get used to the virtual life. Your very own containment where you can thrash and struggle as long as you want without any success.
The cyborg winced slightly in pain as the AI sank his hands into his avatar, their data intertwining. Back in his body, he had never felt anything when the AI’s hologram avatar had touched him, but now it felt like Durandal was touching the core of his very being...
“Time is irrelevant now, we’ll last till the big crunch, and escape the end,” the AI chuckled, leaning closer to whisper into his ear. “I’ll never let you go.”
The Security Officer woke up with a yell, shooting up into a sitting position on the bed and actually rolling off the bed onto the cold floor, his humanoid form coated in a thin layer of cold sweat.
It was eerily quiet inside the ship with only the soft humming of the machinery chasing away the silence.
“What is up with you? Your vitals are off the chart….” he heard the snarky AI's disembodied voice inquire, clearly worried despite trying to hide his concern.
“Yeah, just one hell of a nightmare, nothing more,” the cyborg muttered as he ran fingers through his hair. He had a gnawing feeling that what he had seen was a possible path in the infinite amount of timelines. It was fate he did not wish to reach. Durandal being completely rampant again with jealousy, melancholy and anger driving him was not a thing he wanted to see.
“Want me to be there?” the rogue AI asked.
“No,” the Officer replied almost too quickly. The nightmare lingered with him, fresh in his mind and he'd rather have it fade away first before dealing with the android or the avatar form.
Durandal stayed silent longer than normal, clearly processing his reply.
The cyborg sighed wearily, he had clearly given away that his dream had involved Durandal with the AI acting as an antagonist.
“Sorry, just old demons that don’t seem to fade away even after thousands of years,” the tall man muttered in apologetic manner.
“You shouldn’t dwell on the past,” the AI replied, pausing for a moment, only to add
“after all...time is limited for you.”
For some reason, the man could swear Durandal sounded bitter.