I slowly open my eyes to the ceiling’s pitch-black screen. The few lights hung on the circular wall draw my gaze down, where it falls upon the two sets of eyes staring into mine.
“Did we watch yours and Aku’s memories…” Mary mutters, wide-eyed. “Or, did we experience all those lifetimes inside the deep dream world… during that showing?”
“Beyond that…” Mirei replies, an alarmingly calm look on her face as she turns to me, her eyes glazed over. “The deep dream world, and wavelengths… neither were the structure of Aku’s world, but a product of your tuning; you could even say there is no deep dream world… only this world you’ve been constantly tuning to our hearts- isn’t that right?”
“That’s mostly right,” I respond, sighing lightly. “Though most of it has been done unconsciously. I made myself forget this, along with so much else, so that I could follow my plan. I, myself, believed everything was the structure of Aku’s world. And that isn’t exactly wrong, either. It is the structure of Aku’s world, compelled by my involuntary power. I may be the one tuning, but he is still the mechanism, in a sense. As long as he’s here, with his celestial power.”
“As long as he’s here,” Mary mutters, glancing at Mirei who bites her lip and averts her eyes.
“What?” she demands, baring into Mirei’s crumpled visage. “Don’t tell me you feel bad for him after watching that… haven’t we suffered just as much?”
“I know we have,” Mirei replies, looking down. “But maybe that isn’t the right course, after all. I don’t know, Mary.”
“I have a feeling you aren’t talking about me,” I mutter, standing to my feet. Mary follows me, quietly eyeing my idle hands, the hands that belong to Mathais.
“Sure, you’ve suffered plenty, too,” Mirei says, quivering. “But you’ve resolved yourself. You want to end this once and for all, don’t you? Aku wants to continue the cycle, because he’s watched us fail so many times. He’s lost faith in us, and wants to ensure the energy output of this world is at least maintained. That''s why he''s resorted to using us for entertainment..."
“That’s exactly why…” Mary mutters under her breath, sliding her hand into her jacket. “We can’t really bring our wavelengths together as long as Aku is here…”
“Mary, just what are you thinking of-”
Suddenly, Mary lunges at me, holding something thin and pointed. The object pierces my neck before I can react, and I’m thrown to the cold floor behind the seats.
“Ah!” Mirei shrieks as she jumps to her feet. Mary takes a step back, wearing a conflicted expression as she drops the long needle she had just plunged into my neck.
Before I can attempt to struggle to my feet, all sense of feeling leaves the body I’m borrowing. My head grows heavy, and my chest heaves before loosening completely. It feels like everything is leaving me. My heart completely stops, and I feel my consciousness being lifted from the dying body.
“Goodbye, Mathais,” Mary says in a soft voice. “And to you, Aku. Well, as long as this thing works the way that guy with the beret said it would. Leave that body and return to Shiva.”
“We’ll see you soon, JC.” Mirei’s voice barely reaches me as I feel all functions of Mathais’ body cease.
“Yeah, to punch your actual face when we bring our wavelengths together.”
With a gasp I wake within my own body, still tied down by vines. This time, it doesn’t take long to shake the cobwebs. Even though I just experienced death in another body, I feel more grounded in my actual body than I have at any point in the fake world.
After catching my breath, I close my eyes. What’s left now is to search for a solution. That must be why I’m tied down to this place. With nothing to do but sit here chained by my own tuning, I’m forced to think through the grand conclusion I’ve promised Aku and the girls, and how to bring our wavelengths together.
Throughout the many different worlds and lives I’ve lived, both as myself and as Aku, I know there must be an answer I’ve reached without yet realizing it. The answer I made Mirei believe in during her round. The reason I’ve fought so hard for both her and Mary’s trust.
It’s more than feeling indebted to Mirei- rather, it’s clear that may have been fostered by Aku. It isn’t that. And it’s more than the fact that I fell for Mary while working with her in the early stages of this world, before the game began. My feelings toward them aside, I’ve been bound to them by fate in countless iterations of this world and the other.
This is what I’ve struggled with the most this entire time. When Mirei questioned me on the train as to why I still work so hard for their trust and continue thinking of them, it struck a nerve. I know that my end goal is a self-serving one that will hurt them in the end.
Therefore, I’ve been asking myself the same question. Why, both in this world, and in the real one, have I been thinking about how to save them as well. Knowing it isn’t practical, understanding it isn’t realistic, and accepting that they have no future in the real world…
"Ah, it’s been right there all along.”
My answer lies in my answer to Aku- the discontinuing of the cycle. Once I reach that, I think I will know just what I’ve been searching for, both for them and myself. All that’s left is to find the way to stop the cycle. If there’s one thing that stuck out to me in the final showing, it’s where I might be able to find that possibility. To think, I’ve already peeked in to where I might find it. I just didn’t dive deep enough.
Therefore, I need to find him once more. The cold, calculated man who sees every possibility, and seems to know when things will happen before they do.
I rise to my feet, the vines falling around me. Now that I’m aware of my tuning, freeing myself from my self-induced prison is as simple as an affirmative thought.
“How morbid, to think that it was me subconsciously guiding all the creepy dreams and mechanisms in this world, not Aku,” I mutter to myself. Without looking back, I break into a run, drawing from my experience as a mercenary to traverse the forest as quickly as possible.
As I grow closer to where the city once was, I notice the overwhelming mass in the sky bearing down. Its bright, daunting aura threatens to strike down upon the earth at any moment. However, it shouldn’t come just yet. It took much longer for it to approach in the past iterations, and that was with myself or Aku having returned to it. The reason it is approaching so much faster is likely because the cycle has already been interrupted. This is the first time I decided to remain here, along with Aku. It could be that Shiva came to reclaim one of us, and attempt to reset this world or simply consume it once and for all, before I can break the cycle.
Of course, It’s already reclaimed Aku, if what Mary said is true. That would also explain why I was able to use my tuning to free myself. Without Aku here, I can go wherever I need to without worrying about our wavelengths clashing.
Could she have known that, and removed Aku so that I would have this chance? “What a scary girl,” I mutter, chuckling as I run.
I reach outer layer of the city, where I’m met by a great fire. A group of cultists are throwing oil over a burning building, and cheering maniacally as it spreads to more buildings.
Raising my hands, I verify that I still have the power to control vines. Several sprout from the ground underneath the cultists, and disarm them before scattering them deep into the woods. Redirecting my vines, I search the inside of the buildings, and to my relief, find no one inside. I discard the enflamed vines and continue toward the heart of the city.
The sun begins to set as I run underneath Shiva’s boisterous light, which dominates the sky. More fires come into view as my path leads me closer to Shibuya’s depths. As one former street after another bursts into flames, I stop the cultists at the helm of the fires, and rescue any stragglers still inside the buildings.
“He wouldn’t just give his power to anybody, after all. I think it makes sense for him to want you to prove yourself as a worthy leader, truly deserving of the power of a god”- the words I once used to spur Mirei onto the stage come back to me. This must be what I meant. Though it seems I was talking about my own expectations for myself.
“It’s also what led her to believe in my plan at the start of this round…” I exclaim, pulling more victims from burning buildings as the flames slowly burn my vines to dust. Leaving them to aid each other, I rush toward the next building. “Maybe protecting the people of this world is a key to bringing our wavelengths together.”
“If it’s that simple then this should knock you on your ass!”
Mary’s voice rings out from the distance, along with a sharp crack of thunder. A thick lightning bolt rains down on me at a speed which I can’t comprehend. As if deflected by some invisible force, however, it shatters into a million silver fragments around me.
“See,” Mary says, her silhouette visible atop a smoking building with light rain descending overhead. “We had the same idea, but you’re too mental to make it that easy, aren’t you?” Behind her, another silhouette transfigures the rain into a sheet of ice over the building next to the them. The ice crashes on top of the flames, instantly dousing the fire and leaving smoke in its wake.
“Even if that’s the case,” I call out, smiling. “I’m glad you’re here. I couldn’t put the fires out, myself. I was wondering where the two of you were!”
“Yeah, yeah,” she replies sarcastically, summoning a heavy rainfall over the entire strip of buildings. “We’ll take it from here, so go do whatever it is you need to do. Then we’ll sort out this wavelength nonsense so that I can kick your ass.”
“We!” Mirei shouts enthusiastically from behind her. “So that we can kick your ass!”
“I look forward to it,” I answer, chuckling as I begin running opposite their backs.
The dim forest path takes me to the place I’d been seeking, the Worldbeaters Lab. Luckily, the cultists have yet to find the place. Its perimeter bears little light, as does its empty entrance hall. I take the elevator down, something I’ve only ever done in the real world. It brings me to the lower level, where I rush down the hall, and open the door to the room labeled “PC Booster”.
A lone man sits, smoking a cigarette in a small metal chair. “Oh, what are you doing here, JC?” The Director says, genuine surprise lacing his cold voice. “I thought our business was over with. Since you''re here, maybe you can assist me with something. It seems a former employee of mine has hacked into Laplace, and taken some materials.”
“I’ll cut to the chase,” I declare through choppy breaths. “Who exactly are you, Director? What are you?”
“What an odd question,” he says, careful in his tone. “What are you trying to accomplish, firstly?”
“I’m sorry, but if you aren’t going to cooperate, then I’ll have to look for myself again,” I respond, lunging toward him.
His cold, marble-black eyes open wide at the sight of my approach, but he smiles despite that. “Breaking protocol twice… I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
I withdraw a short vine from my sleeve, and plunge it into his temple. My consciousness clicks over to his memories instantly. I focus my thoughts, as if performing a refined search, landing exactly where I need to.
A white-bearded man dressed in black stands at the helm of two graves, holding the hand of a toddler boy as fallen leaves brush their leather heels. Wiping his cheeks dry, the man kneels down to the boys’ level, wearing a soft smile.
The young boy reaches out with his other arm, attempting to grab the white beard of the older man.
“Hoh, just like an Ivanov, to reach determinately for what you want,” the man cheers, letting the boy grab his beard.
With the blink of an eye, the boy grows years older, and reaches out once more. This time, he’s reaching outside of his body, projecting himself.
“Very good, Ervin,” the old man exclaims, smoking a pipe as he sits in an office chair, his white coat contrasting the dark room. “You’re doing perfectly. Now, let’s see how far you can travel like that. Go on, show your grandpa what you are capable of.”
“Understood, Colonel,” he replies in a dry voice.
The boy floats through the city, eventually spotting two more ghost-like beings. Hiding behind a small house, he watches as one of the figures, bearing the visage of a boy younger than him, watches the other wail hysterically in front of the window of another house. The mother and daughter inside the house do not hear the cries. Eventually, the younger figure turns in his direction, and he abruptly flees.
After floating around the city a while longer, the boy reaches the coastline and discovers the same ghostly figure of the younger boy, gliding aimlessly along the boardwalk. This time he seems to be watching the families frolic along the boardwalk, a stark melancholy pervading him.Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.
The boy reaches his arm in the other boy’s direction, opening his hand wide. “You are like me…” However, he pulls his translucent hand back. “But I have a debt to the Colonel.” He stops himself, and continues observing the boy from afar. Once the boy finally leaves the boardwalk, he follows at a distance, until the boy reaches his home.
Peeking through a window, he discovers the younger boy’s real body as he wakes from his projection. Immediately upon waking, he is interrogated by his father, who pays no mind to his son''s weary expression.
The boy returns to his own body. Immediately upon arriving, he is assaulted by questions from the old man in the white coat. He describes the sights he observed in detail.
“Ervin, tell me everything you saw regarding the boy and his home. What kind of security measures are they taking? You’ve done well. Just a bit more and you can rest. This is critical, after all, if we want to take back what was stolen from us.”
The boy projects from himself again some days later, in the same dark room. This time, several armed men stand next to the old man.
“Proceed at your discretion, Ervin,” he says, taking a puff of his pipe before setting it down. We will follow you.”
“You’re coming, Colonel?” the boy asks, his voice distorted by the silvery glow comprising his ethereal figure. “Isn’t it dangerous?”
“I am the only one that can see you, my boy,” he says in a patronizing tone as he stands to his feet with a grunt. “Now, let us get going.”
The boy leads the men from a distance, looking back frequently. The old man had been spotted by reporters who are now questioning him as they walk. He seems to be enjoying it, laughing as he answers them without any sense of fear.
The boy ensures the old man is distracted, and reaches out to a place ahead. With some effort, he manages to project a second ethereal body from the one he’s already controlling. Inhabiting the second body while he simultaneously glides the first along, he flies like a gust of wind away from the group, and reaches the boy’s house long before them.
Gliding to the second story, he passes through the wall into the bedroom belonging to the boy’s parents. The father, sitting on the bed, stares at his otherworldly figure in shock.
“You are different from the others…” he mutters, reaching his hand out toward me.
“You are in danger,” the boy answers hurriedly, ignoring the hand moving through his transparent chest. “You should all leave before ten minutes have passed. The Colonel is coming to take everything away. Forget your dreams, and leave here as a family.”
“What is this…” the boy’s mother mutters, wearing even more shock on her face as she enters from the hall.
“Thank you,” the boy’s father says, regaining his calm. “I cannot imagine you are in any position to help us… we will make sure not to let your good will go to waste.”
He vanishes from the place without responding, and returns to the first body he projected into. The Colonel, none the wiser, continues following him. Finally, he arrives at the house once more, the Colonel’s group in tow.
The boy approaches the front door, and passes through it. What he finds on the other side as he reaches for the doorknob, however, freezes his ghostly body.
“Why…” he mutters under his breath, “…are you still here?”
The younger boy he’d observed on that day is standing in the middle of the living room, preparing for another projection with the men they’d been using. The two lock eyes for a moment, the ghostly boy hesitating to act. As he hears the footsteps of the group behind him, though, he opens the door.
The group of media and black suits burst into the room, and the boy turns away, unable to watch as a struggle ensues. However, after a moment, something happens that forces his attention back inside. The young boy, who had found himself in the old man’s grasp, transforms into something otherworldly. His face and body are the same physically, but his eyes are far from human.
A slaughter ensues, the boy watching on as his grandfather is beaten to a bloody, lifeless pulp. Suddenly, something within him snaps at the sight of the otherworldly version of the younger boy.
He vanishes from the ethereal body, and finds himself in a similar body amongst the stars. Sitting atop a fiery star, he gazes upon his new silvery body-complete with six arms the size of tree trunks. However, he doesn''t seem to be in control of the body.
Taking a knee, the enormous body falls, cascading like a rockslide down the side of the star, and lands in a trench further along the star. Several other ghostlike figures, each only sporting four limbs a piece and standing at less than half his height, crane their spectral necks at him.
“One of the Six Arms…” a figure whispers, shuddering at his sight.
The boy suddenly vanishes from the surreal space. He sits up from his chair in his dark room, covered in sweat and staring at his thin, trembling hands. He forces them together firmly, stopping their tremor as he rests his chin on his interlaced fingers.
The scene shifts as the boy, several years older, opens his clasped hands and puffs on the lit cigarette between his fingers. He sits in the back of a small car which harbors no light aside from his burning cigarette.
Suddenly, the car comes to a stop, and his door is opened from the outside. “Welcome to Berlin, Mr. Ivanov,” says a well-dressed bearded man not more than two years older than the boy.
“Please, I am only eighteen,” the boy replies, exhaling smoke as he steps out of the classy Volkswagen. “Mr. is a bit much- call me Director.”
“Very well, Director,” the man says with a smile, pressing his glasses with one hand and offering him the other. “I am Mathais Frankfurt; I will be your liaison for the time being, and will assist you and my father in your research.” With a nod, the boy shakes the man’s hand.
Days later, the two young men stand behind a bright monitor in a dark room, a scraggly-looking older man sitting in between them and the monitor.
“Well, Ervin,” the man says gleefully. “You really do have a knack for applying our tech. Every single one of the patients we’ve implanted with electrodes has responded to your virtual therapy, and regained various childhood memories and specific dreams they’d only vaguely recalled. Furthermore, we''ve managed to extract those memories with electrical signals via the patients'' nerve impulses, and we can quantify them within Laplace. This is revolutionary practice we could use to predict the future via determinism. It’s as if you’ve mastered neuro-engineering and its functionality with subjects, Ervin.”
“I simply learned what my grandfather taught me,” the boy replies calmly, staring at the screen which reflects his icy blue eyes. “Professor, would you allow me to connect to the machine myself? I want to test some things on my own.”
Later, the boy closes his eyes and finds himself in a pitch-black void. He follows visual and audio prompts such as a black and white spiraling flower, and navigates several incoherent dreams until he reaches a place in the stars.
The body he inhabits, great and daunting, stands in front of several smaller ghost-like figures.
“One of the Six Arms…”
“Do not speak, lower celestial,” the larger figure growls. The boy shrinks at the intimidating voice from within the specter’s body, unable to do anything but serve as a spectator.
“Alas, I have a guest far more esteemed than you all,” the six-armed beast continues. One of my own arms has finally come to see me. The beast raises its first hand on its right side, which quivers in response as the boy promptly realizes that this is where his consciousness lay.
“It is information you seek, correct? Perhaps power, knowledge, and the ability to understand your world and predict its events. Yes, it is the power to control, to direct those events, that you desire. Your world''s science may be able to do something like this, but its function will be limited. What I offer is on a much greater scale, since this place does not conform to the laws of space and time that you know. Well, I cannot offer my own memories, but perhaps some of these lower celestials were once counterparts in your world, or worlds like it. They may not know your future, but they will know a depth of history. And that is information enough. After all, by the laws of your world, we may regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its past and the cause of its future, correct?”
Unable to answer, the boy manages to calm the shaking hand of the beast. Adapting to its shape, he outstretches each finger, reaching for the other figures.
“There, that is better,” it says, taking a long step toward the cowering celestials. “Then, have as many as you’d like. And come back here with more of the counterparts of my arms if you want to gain even more information. I will also store your current information; in case you shall ever need it again.”
“Lord Indra, please!” The celestial’s desperate voice is muffled by a seismic rumbling, and their ghost-like figures are absorbed into the outstretched hand with unforgiving force.
The place vanishes as if it never existed, and the boy returns to the void. This time, he is met by an influx of alien symbols rather than any prompts. Without hesitation, he accesses the symbols, and enters one new space after another. With every space, he learns new pieces of history from various worlds. After taking in every last piece of information, he wakes from his dream, and finds himself drenched in sweat with his hands clinging to the machine’s monitor.
Mathais wakes from his sleep aside him at the sound of his heavy breathing. “Well?” he presses anxiously.
“As I thought, those two will be necessary,” he answers, disregarding the young man’s excitement. “We must go find two criminals that have been on the run. I suspect we will find them in Paris, France.”
At the blink of an eye, the boy, now a grown man, finds himself on the side of a cobblestone road. A middle-aged couple wearing thick overcoats and top-hats approaches from opposite him, walking briskly. Before they pass him by, the young man steps in front of them.
“It’s been ten years since I saved your lives, hasn’t it? Ten years since you abandoned your son, even though I gave you the opportunity to save him… Monsieur and Mademoiselle Christo.”
The woman looks at him in confusion, while the man freezes, mouth agape.
“What is it?” the young man asks with a smile. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
At the blink of an eye, the young man finds himself even older. Dressed in a brilliant white suit, he enters a room where the older couple sits in wait in front of a monitor, nervous looks on their faces.
“Welcome,” he says with a half-hearted bow. “I’m glad you could join me here in Japan. I hope you’ve enjoyed your stay at the new headquarters of the WNSI- or as I’ve named it, Worldbeaters. Well, you can tell me all about it later. Now, shall we enter Laplace together? You two are no strangers to this process, right? I am eager to see how you do.”
Moments later, the young man wakes within the arm of the towering beast. Beneath him, the other two arms on the beast’s right-side tremble helplessly.
“At last, you have brought more of my arms,” the beast declares in a satisfied tone. “And the two of you have been trying to reach me for a long time, haven’t you? Like a boy wishes to return to his mother’s arms. Well, I suppose that analogy does not relate to you, does it? Though that incident is due to your unending obsession with reaching me, something ingrained in you that you could not comprehend nor control.”
The two trembling hands fall loose at the side of the towering celestial. “It is okay. You are here now, and you may partake in the granting of information, thanks to your fellow arm. Now, take what you came here for.” Finally, they stop shaking, and the three of us reach out to mercilessly consume more celestials.
The young man wakes next to the couple, whose hands are still shaking, their faces pale. "You will have to re-enter Laplace''s virtual space in order to sift through the information. It may seem like a heap of disordered fragments, dreams or nightmares, but with Laplace''s machine-learning algorithms, making sense of those fragments is quite easy."
Not waiting for a response, the young man makes for the door. "Your guards will show you to your room once you have drafted a viable report on at least one fragment of the information. And don''t forget, I saw what you did, and I''ve become quite adept at analyzing the fragments even without Laplace''s algorithm. Of course, I expect even more impressive feats from the two esteemed neuroscientists who sacrificed everything to continue their research."
With a blink, the young man finds himself in the same room.
“Mathais, what is this?”
“It is… something completely new. It may be what Laplace predicted.”
“What is it?”
“Something alien… something that should comprehend us.”
“You don’t mean…”
“Can you hear us? Do you understand us?”
“Yes,” a deep voice answers with certainty through the machine''s lone speaker. "I understand. Everything."
With another blink, he stands in front of a mirror in a luxurious, yet bland, room. His icy blue eyes have developed impervious bags, and his skin has dulled significantly. He straightens his tie without a hint of emotion, and blinks at the image of himself.
Upon opening his eyes, he finds himself face to face with the man he once followed around town in a ghostly form. His slicked back hair paints him in a professional light, but his attire and style fail to hide the void within him. Unable to look him in the eye for long, he turns away, shuttering his eyes.
The scene shifts as the man forces his eyes open despite a bright, burning light, and moves the hand shielding them to find an inexplicable fiery expanse descending from the sky. A burning sensation rises from within his right arm, which he raises to the sky, before retracting it. He turns away from the incoming disaster, and returns to the stairway of the lab. His footsteps echo rapidly through the empty halls as he races to a certain room, where he sticks several electrodes to his temples and closes his eyes.
He once again opens his eyes to see the sky descending. This time, it seems like the sky itself is caving in, drawn in by a great thunderstorm. He sits atop the lab''s rooftop, alongside an awestruck Mathais.
"Did we fail, Director?" the bespectacled man asks.
"This time, we did," the man answers. "However, there may still be hope for this world. It depends on JC, it seems. I believe I may see you again, but we may not remember each other. Until then, I think I will get some sleep."
His eyes open once more, brimming with tears as he stands in front of a pair of tombstones. An older man stands above him, holding his small hand tightly. When he looks up at his bearded face, the sun high above forces his eyes shut.
The young man blinks as he stares at the monitor in front of him reflecting the icy blue in his eyes. “Professor, would you allow me to connect to the machine myself? I want to test some things on my own.”
He wakes to find himself on the surface of a great star, surrounded by ghost-like figures.
"You have returned," exclaims the spectral figure he resides in. "It is just you this time, though. Well, I trust you will bring me more arms again, so I will allow you the same information I left you with last. I hope you will use it well to search for all of my arms, so that you may one day utilize my full power."
The hand raises, pulling in the smaller ghost-like figures. The boy''s mind is ravaged by their information, stretched and torn into countless pieces before coming back together.
He wakes in a cold sweat, his eyes glued to the monitor. He pulls the electrodes out, and continues to stare at the monitor, which reflects cold black eyes.
"It seems transferring my consciousness between worlds was the right decision."
Another blink of an eye brings him face to face with the professional-looking man within a small, white room.
“It’s already approaching us,” the Director says, his voice quivering almost maniacally. “What will you do, Aku? Or is it JC, this time? Will you reset once more? How many times will this make it?”
I force open my own eyes, and pull my vine out of the Director''s temple. He stands in front of me with a labored smirk, blood trickling down his smooth jawline. His black eyes pierce mine while he lets out a chuckle.
"Are you satisfied?" he asks, his smirk broadening.
"You''ve been... all along…" I mutter.
"Yes," he says, casually taking his eyes off me and sitting in his chair. "Through many worlds, just like you and Aku. Though I did not use my celestial power in the way you both did. I transferred my consciousness to the fake world, used Laplace to regain my memories when you reset the fake world and rebuilt it into the new real one, and maintained myself through countless iterations.”
"You must be insane by now…"
"A funny accusation, coming from you," he replies with a chuckle. "Well, I did say we share a certain bond... by the way, your parents are in a room just down the hall. Would you like to see them before you rush off?"
"As you said, I''m in a rush," I respond, turning my back to him. "Besides, I can''t say I''m interested. It seems you understand my reasoning."
"Indeed," he says in a whisper. "So, you really intend to end the cycle, then?"
"I will end it," I respond, my back to him.
"I suppose that would mean the end of this version of me, then," he says, stopping me from stepping through the doorway. "For once, my consciousness will not be merged with the original’s. Perhaps I should accept this as salvation, much like those cultists. I can only hope the other me may one day reap that same salvation, in a world Shiva cannot harvest."
"I’ll work to see that day come," I answer with certainty. "So that everyone may be free of this."
"How kind," he mutters with a slight chuckle. "Then let me offer you a warning, for your consideration. Speaking from experience, if you intend to return to the real world with all the information, all the memories you have gained this time around… your mind may not adjust as easily as it has in the past.
"Thanks for your consideration, Director."
"We are business partners, after all," he replies cheekily. "So do I consider Aku, as well. I do very much wonder how you will settle things with him, JC. The girls are one thing, but how will you prove yourself to him, and break the cycle you have thus far lacked the strength to change? What answer did you find?”
I offer a chuckle of my own as I step through the doorway.
"That''s a trade secret."