Her breath hurt her chest, and her heart pounded to the point where the sound of warm blood rushing through her body out raced the movement of her feet as the thudded without pause agains the cement. Every so often, though, she could hear the soft whirring of the mechanical pieces inside her as ARC attempted to finda source of pain.
*Permission to scan full body?* The voice was just barely audible to the world around, mostly it was in her mind.
"Declined," she spoke out loud. "I'm fine. Just sore."
*Permission to apply anesthetics?*
"Declined," she repeated, stopping beneath a large oak. "ARC?"
*Awaiting direction.*
"Shut off." which was her nice way of telling it to shut up.
*ARC shut down initiated.*
"Thank god," she breathed and leaned against the rough bark. From her side she pulled a water bottle and drank thoroughly before returning to her run. She'd planned on walking, so ARC's presets weren't accustomed to the sudden burst of activity. It was working hard, probing every inch of her and scanning the fluxuations of the nervous system, worried she would die.
Still... When the gunshot went off, and the appearance of villainous scientists became aware.... Maybe it was typical of her, the host of their booty, to run as if her life depended on it... Then again, they had guns. Maybe it did.
That was enough off her life summed up in a nutshell - trying to be as humanly normal as possible while the ARC thrived within her and aforementioned villainous scientists of all race and religion pursuing her in a never-ceasing battle for it.
ARC. An infallible mechanism that replied automatically to a primate's medical needs in a matter of nanoseconds. A huge lunch in the world of medical technology, to say the least. Though after their experiments with her, it became unlawful to insert them into human minds.
Experiments. The very word put a bad taste in her mouth. Some part of her, driven by the sole purpose of being extraordinary, had accepted the offer to be a beta tester of a new, amazing piece of technology called the ARC. I could save lives, they said. I could be a hero, they said.
But not a hero in the medical field, apparently. The ARC was soon revealed to be designed to affect the control over the body. After enough of ARC's 'life saving' technology, after 50% of her had become accustomed to being mechanical, it would start slipping up, into the back of her skull and over, turning her into a theoretical cyborg.
Her saving grace, a scientist names Keenan Asher, had hacked into ARC before that process even started and reprogrammed it to its original purpose - healing her when she needed healing. It would still replace those parts in need mechanically, so there was still a risk, but it would be slowed ("Unless she broke a bone once a week," he had informed her. He seemed to be seriously concerned, as if he knew how reckless she could be.) The original goal of the ARC would be prolonged enough for her to live and die without interference.
"Though," she muttered to herself. "Living a life condemned to staying safe is boring, and isn't living at all." Even though ARC had shut off, Keenan could probably hear her. He had promised to track her via the ARC's mainframe, or spies, or something.
"Really?" to her surprise, the man himself has hoisted himself into a tree and was grinning down at her. "I told you I'd keep an eye on you."
"I'm pretty sure this qualifies as stalking," she muttered quietly, quite disgruntled. "Did you --"
