Chapter 1- The year 2062:
Author - Cryptic Edwards
© 2026 Cryptic Edwards. All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the author.
The Deep breaths.
I can feel the air as it rushes in, steady but too fast in a way.
I feel it already Something is wrong.
I can’t remember what happened before this moment, just only that something has replaced it.
My Memory feels torn away, like pages ripped from a book literally.
I’m paralysed.
I know because I can’t move a Single muscle.
Not my fingers. Not my legs. Not even my eyelids.
Will it be okay, I'm sure it will, it's got to be.
My eyes are sealed shut.
I try my very hardest to force them open, to pull myself together, but nothing responds.
I was different before this.
I know I was.
I remember being somewhat happy, safe oh no I have never felt safe in my body that I know.
Somewhere good though but I need this.
It's happening.
Darkness is presses against me as I wake slowly, heart racing.
For a terrifying moment I wonder if I’ve lost my sight.
Have I lost myself?
My Voices break through the void. Muffled. Clinical. Close.
Something or someone touches my head.
Pain blooms its sharp and invasive.
What are they doing to me?
I’m not meant to feel this.
Am I !
I mean I know from what I saw on the leaflet!
I am supposed to be asleep.
Right I mean asleep not on any conscious level what so ever.
I mean how? What? And why?
Cold air brushes across my scalp.
I can sense movement above me, the pressure, precision, metal.
They’re still working on me.
I try to speak but my mouth won’t move.
The only place I can scream is inside my own mind.
How is this happening!
My thoughts echo loudly in the silence of my skull.
Am I meant to be aware of this?
I don't think so, no I know I am not.
But yet there it is!
A strange sensation pulses deep inside my head, like something foreign sliding into place.
Then there it is!
A surge.
Light fractures through the darkness behind my eyelids.
And suddenly yes suddenly I feel it.
Everything.
Noise.
Emotion.
Presence.
Too much.
It’s not just my fear anymore.
It’s everyone’s around me.
Is there something they are not telling me why so I sense worry.
Then there it is!
A flood of something overwhelming crashes through me with pain that isn’t mine, thoughts brushing against my own even how!
It is there humming beneath my skin.
I gasp as my eyes finally force themselves open.
Blurred figures lean over me under harsh surgical lights.
There the Masks. Glass. Metal arms suspended above me.
I feel like I’ve been dragged from one body into another.
That is the only way I can explain this.
Disconnected.
Altered.
Wrong.
Am I still me?
Or has something else taken my place?
But I know I needed this.
I know, my time was running out!
Then there it is.
A voice.
Not from the room.
From inside.
Soft. Mechanical. Calm.
Synchronization complete.
Another voice follows...
But this time it's human this time, distant but real.
“Tara… that’s it. Come round slowly. The procedure is complete. HILDA has been successfully implanted.”
But the voice inside my head speaks again.
And this time well this time let's just say.
It sounds like it’s smiling.
