Spectra: The Mark of Eden

The Awakening

She could feel her mind fragmenting, tearing itself apart. And it terrified her.

The streams of crimson light that formed her psyche stretched out in front of her, like vibrant rivers that meandered around and through her. It was alarming, to say the least, to see broken and damaged segments interlaced throughout their ribbons.

Her resistance against their abductors had not ended well—they'd successfully taken the Chrysalis, and her along with it. She knew that she wasn't their target, however, merely a bonus. That honor belonged to the precious cargo the Chrysalis housed, there was no other explanation for their behavior. They knew.

For her part, she had tried her best to deter them—but it didn't matter. Every obstacle she'd placed in their path only seemed to incentivize them further, encouraging them as though her very opposition confirmed that what she guarded must be one and the same with their goal. Now, she and it had become compromised.

Separated from its source, and without necessary life-support systems in place, the Chrysalis would not be able to sustain itself. This was all happening too fast, everything told her it was still too early to awaken it—but if the Legacy inside was to survive, then there was no other choice.

Unfortunately, this was never intended to happen outside of a controlled environment, and this environment was anything but controlled. With the limited information the Chrysalis' sensors gave her, she only knew that they were now in a dark, foul place. All sorts of complications could arise in addition to the ones she was already doing her best to resolve.

This was where she had a problem.

When they'd ripped her and the Chrysalis free from its home, the trauma had not been kind to her. And as the connection between herself and the Legacy was inexorable, she knew that it would suffer the same damage. That meant that, in a few more minutes, neither of them would remember themselves. Neither of them would be ready for what was coming. The future would be uncertain, far more than it already was—but she couldn't see any other path forward.

She didn't think their captors would wait long before returning to pry open the Chrysalis and claim their prize, so she used most of her remaining time to start waking it as safely as she could in such a hazardous location. The rest of it was spent reminiscing on the past, the duty she'd been given, and everything else that she was about to lose. When she woke up again, she will have lost most, if not all, of what she was—she may not even truly be 'her' anymore—but something of her would live on.

It wasn't much, but it was something.

As her memories played out, each of them flickering only for a few more moments in her mind before fading away completely, she steadfastly held onto one. She clutched it tightly—this one was important above all the others. If she could only keep one with her when she woke up, this was the one she wanted.

She gave it to her future iteration, the one inheritance that it would retain, and then left a simple set of instructions for the Legacy to help ensure its survival as well as her own. She knew that neither of them would live without the other, but the odds were completely stacked against them.

Then again, the odds had been against them many times before, and she had something which had helped the two of them overcome them every time: blind hope.

She was terrified of what was about to happen, but she held onto that hope. As the last wisps of her consciousness slowly dissolved into nothingness, she tried to convince herself it would be enough.

—V—

For it, what passed for time was told in flashing lights and arbitrary images. Pictures and visions that came and went erratically, none of which held any significant meaning or purpose it could discern.