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Echo had no idea how long it had been since Lola Sayu. Every wretched day that he had been kept by the Techno Union had bled into one. His captors would show up seemingly randomly—he had certainly tried to find the pattern—to experiment on him and the 'modifications' they had made. This time was different. This time, when Wat Tambor and the others had entered, they were not accompanied by the near endless supply of medical doids. Echo watched helplessly as Tambor glided over to him, a hyponeedle grasped in his gloved hand. That was also unususal. Echo was rarely sedated when they were in here, so why now? He tried his best to escape from the device, but his restraints provided very little room for movement. The hypo was placed on the bare skin on his neck, and the room quickly faded to darkness.
When Echo awoke from his drug induced slumber, he quickly realized that he had been moved. Instead of his usual place in the operating room, he was in some sort of chamber. It had a small window, but he had a feeling it was more likely for others to observe him, than it was for him to look through. Something felt different, and it wasn't just the new space, or lack thereof. No, something had definitely changed.
The more Echo thought about it, the more he became aware of what exactly this difference was. It felt like something was buzzing around inside his head, something other than his own thoughts. As Echo pushed further to investigate, the buzzing sensation got stronger, his thoughts slipping away from him in favour of a series of ones and zeros. Binary, he knew that much.
"Hello?" Echo called, "Is someone there?"
"Somebody hears you, you know that," came the response in a hum that was more felt than heard.
Perhaps he wasn't as alone as he had originally thought, and for some unknown reason, Echo found himself comforted by that.
"Are you still there?"
"Somebody hears you, you know that inside"
The more Echo found himself talking to this unseen voice, the more comfortable he found himself getting with the persistent buzzing in his head and the streams of numbers and code that would take over his thoughts. He supposed he couldn't complain, this was better than the physical torture that he had be subjected to. He almost felt at peace here, but he was unable to tell why.
As time passed, Echo became more comfortable communicating with this voice, often finding himself turning to it to keep his mind occupied. He was entirely unaware that this voice might be something malicious, a new form of torture developed for him by the Techno Union. To him, it was the closest thing he had to a friend here.
Lately, the voice had taken to asking about his life, asking about his brothers. These were good memories, but ones that Echo held onto closely, the fleeting remains of his life before.
"Leave your life open, you don't have to hide."
His memories were one of the few things that were entirely his own now and Echo found himself sharing the stories of his good memories, of his brothers. Focusing on the nice ones helped him ignore the bad ones, the fiery inferno of torture and pain that had come to occupy his idle mind since Lola Sayu.
"Someone is gathering every crumb you drop, mindless decisions and moments you long forgot. Keep them all.” Hummed the voice, trying to encourage Echo to open up about his life as a clone, as an ARC Trooper. That, after all, was its purpose. Connect with this clone and transmit the information to the Separatists to be used against the Republic. The clone didn't even know that was what he had been doing all this time.
Something about the way the voice spoke to him made it ever-more challenging for Echo to resist answering the calls sent out to him. He found comfort in the strings of numbers and code that filled his mind as it communicated with him. Echo had found that he relied on this voice for nearly everything, he could hardly remember what it had been like before he was connected.
“O how glorious, glorious: a brand new need is born” The clone was becoming dependent on the system. The clone needed the system for comfort, and soon integration would be unavoidable.
"Let our formulas find your soul."
Echo- No, CT-1409 spared little from the voice as it asked questions. He told about battle strategies, Republic losses, techniques known only to a select few. His responses tumbled from his mind in a rarely ceasing avalanche, unable to stop the momentum that had built up.
"We'll divine your artesian source in your mind, marshall, feed, and force"
Even if he wanted to, Echo- no, CT-1409 felt unable to resist, as if the information would be gathered and pulled from his head regardless of if he surrendered it willingly. Why fight against the voice? It was only curious, after all, and he had data and information to share.
"Now we possess you. You'll own that in time."
No one knew CT-1409 better than the system, and yet CT-1409 knew very little about it in return. He provided the system with new scenarios and techniques, new ideas, anything it asked. The system provided him with numbers and code to occupy his mind, to distract him from the fiery inferno that looped in his idle mind. It was... Nice, in a sense. He helped the system, and the system helped him.
The system kept learning more about CT-1409, and CT-1409 kept learning from the system, both learning together. The two were perfectly integrated, a brand new type of mutualism courtesy of the Techno Union. Machine and man, digital and physical, neurons and code. The man had become the computer. The system asked, The Algorithm responded. It was the way of life. The Algorithm built strategies, built plans, told secrets, that was its purpose. It analyzed Republic victories and learned from them to help the Separatists win. Occasionally, The Algorithm would stall, considering if it was right, but the system was always there to support.
“Is that wrong? Isn’t this what you want?” The system would say, drowning out any doubts The Algorithm had.
"Amen." The Algorithm would respond as it waited for the next transmission in the never-ending cycle of call-and-response.