old_csat | Starting over? (Reply)

Starting over ...

... and over, and over, and over, and ... Let's just say things don't tend to be very continuous in my life. Except one very, very important thing, that is. *smiles a little* And even he's taken his own wanders from time to time. Well, you can't blame him! 300 years is a long time, and a person needs their own space every now and then.

Starting over. Heh. I wonder how many times I've done that, by this stage? Depends, I suppose. What you're counting. Bodies? Six of those. Jobs ... well, if you count 'lunatic' as a profession, then about ... fourteen or so of those? I mean, my exploring years were pretty full of odd jobs. Places I've lived, on a reasonably permanent basis? Ah, lets see ... twelve, maybe? Only three of consequence, though. Earth and the Asylum, the University, and our moon.

There was a couple of big start-overs, I guess. The Asylum, first. Because ... well, I've nothing left of whatever happened before. Between the Gestalt and the screaming in my own head, I ... it's all gone. Not a thing left. I was all but born there, in Isander's arms.

...

*blushes furiously* You all forget I said that, y'hear! Right this instant!

Anyway. *breathes* Asylum first. Then ... freedom, the years we wandered Earth, as the Gestalt raged. Long, long years. Very long. Couple of decades, I think, but I tend to be shaky around that era. Lost too much of myself. Lost pretty much all of myself, really. Whittled down to the basics, and Isander. Heh. Remember him, alright. It was back then, after we'd won our little bit of freedom, that I convinced him that I loved him. All the way, you understand. In every way, if you follow me. He didn't, by the by. Not at first. I remember convincing him very well.

After that ... the Duality. Some of the ideas bounced around in the Gestalt had pointed to the stars and, well, once humanity had distilled itself back out ... we went there. And we met ... everyone. That changed ... a whole lot of things. For a start, it got Isander infected with the machine version of telepathy, and that gave us some screwy years, I can tell you. I was still only half there myself, you see, and to have Isander in the screaming fits that I'd been in ... it was easier for him, though, a little. We met a machine lady named ... name doesn't translate. But she guided him through it. Tried her level best to help me, too, but ... only 'sander's ever really been able to do that.

Then, around the 80 year mark, my original body started to fail me rather spectacularly, and I got my first body change. To a machine body, since that was all they had back then, especially for loonies like me. They gave it to me as a reward, you know. The Duality Forum. For bringing humanity to the light, as it were. For being patient bloody zero and infecting Earth and setting the Gestalt loose and enduring those nightmares of decades ... *breathes heavily* They gave me a bloody body, for all that. Cheap, off-the-line mechanical. Damn them anyway, bloody csati. But it gave me longer with Isander, with the universe, so I took it and bugger them anyway.

That body lasted me better than anything, though. Gave me over a century, it did. Almost as good as Isander's, though not near so beautiful. Got too bashed to be beautiful, really. I never did figure out that soldering iron. Heh. But it got me through the most of my exploring years, got me my first couple of fortunes, and most importantly, it got me the funding for my lab and the position with the university. It got me into the Integration field, so I could find the way to be with Isander in soul as well as everything else. Damn good body, that.

Failed me, just as I was edging near the answer. My own damn fault. Near fried myself trying the virtual reality approach. Isander almost finished me off his bloody self, after that little misadventure. But my fortunes and his were both pretty substantial by that stage, and we got me a new body. Organic, this time. Near a copy of my first, as it happened. Didn't care much about that, though. Isander ... he left me, for a while there. Almost killing myself didn't sit very well with him.

But he came back. He came back. I went down on my knees, seeing him again, after those few years. Blubbered like a baby, seeing him again. A whole new start, it felt, a whole new life, and then, six months later ... I bloody broke the Integration Question, broke my mind to pieces all over again and ... there he was. Inside my head. Inside my soul. There he was. And it was the Asylum all over again, being reborn in his arms, and so help me but it was wonderful. Scary as hell, but the most wonderful thing I'd ever felt, and worth every damn moment of the years running up to it. Those few months, that year ... it was maybe the most head-rushingly wonderful of my life.

Then the whispers started. Korundai. And things ... broke again. In short order, I lost the lab and the University. Don't want to be seen associating with an Abomination, do you? Respectable place like that? Hell no! Not a chance. Kicked me out right quick, they did. Not that I minded. They'd already given me everything I'd ever wanted, in giving me the time and tools to touch Isander's mind. I didn't care so much.

But then there was that mob. Asked me to come lecture, explain Integration, what I'd done to become a machine. Idiot that I was, I went. And they killed me. Killed me, and shoved me through two bodies as a result, because the emergency body was ... wrong. It was so very wrong. Lasted two weeks in it, and that nearly drove me mad again. Madder again. The fifth body, the one I transferred to after that, was mechanical again.

*rumbles, half laugh, half gasp* Starting over, huh? Dead, dead again, machine again, all in two weeks. Just about killed Isander to watch, too. And really killed their economy, that planet. Five years of illegal and unwarranted plague quarantine, because Isander holds grudges real well. You know, I've noticed a really rapid drop-off in threats since then.

And then ... the last change, so far anyway, the last starting over ... after some years travelling, building up more money, running the hell away from korundai-hunters ... we got enough to build our moon. Well. Buy our moon, build our house. Buy a few other moons too, if we fancied. Between the two of us, we tend to be quite good at picking up fortunes. Got me this body, too, after about forty years in the mechanical one. I just ... I had a yearning for being organic, again. Much as I love being mechanical, I'm a creature of habit, and I like being able to sit on the toilet and contemplate the universe for a while in the morning. Yeah, I know. Isander doesn't get it either.

So. Starting over. How many times, now? At least a dozen, I'd say. Lots, anyway. Too many? Maybe. But when it happens, it happens. You just have to stand back up again, and do what you can. It's ... hard as anything, maybe, but ... well, I've been falling on my face and standing up again for 300 years, now, and you know what?

It gets easier with practise. It really does. Provided it doesn't kill you, of course. Permanently, anyway.

Right. I'll be stopping now, shall I? Heh.