New Era's Dawn

Chapter 2

There was a whisper in my ear, so soft, so tantalizing, reaching from a hungering void of nothingness. It murmurs, it coos, as I float weightlessly in a vast corridor that stretches as far as the eye could see on either side. The silvery hall was devoid of all signs of life besides flickering lights placed at regular intervals.

The intelligible whispers echo off the walls, beckoning me forward to its source. Without so much as the twitch of a muscle, I begin to drift down the corridor passing door after door; unnamed plaques nestled beside them. They were but insignificant flies compared to the whispers.

Oh, the whispers.

How I wanted them, how I craved them.

As time passes, I begin to search more and more desperatly. The secrets those whisper's could tell... the stories they cradled within their soothing arms...

The whispers become frantic and disorganized, ricocheting around the endless passage with increasing tempo. 

I begin to panic.

I had to find them.

Closer, closer... closer... I thought. 

I was now running; my breath raking through my lungs in labored gulps. I knew, I knew, that they were so close, that in one of these doors lie the whispers and their comforts. Just a bit farther, and they would be there. I knew it...

And then with one misstep, I was plummeting into a chilly vat of thick liquid. It pulls at my arms and legs,  sucking me down into its merciless depths. I scream, but no sound escapes as the liquid rushes in to fill my lungs. I struggle as wires and straps begin to dance around my body, restraining me.

A distorted, pitiless face peers at me through the goop; observing me with empty, writhing black eyes.

His lips begin to move slowly and he whispers to me...

"We will save you. We will redeem you...

...You will be made anew."

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I wake up gasping and shivering. 

I thrust myself upright only to topple over as the world dips and bows around me unnaturally; a wave of nausea soon follows forcing my body to convulse, but nothing makes an appearance.

"Ah, finally she wakes." A chilly hand places itself squarely on my back. "There, there... take deep breaths my friend, your body will readjust itself."

"What the hell did you do to me?" I rest my forehead against the polished silvery surface beneath me, glancing to my left and my right. We were still in the cafeteria; I simply had been lifted to one of the tables with a very thin cloth sprawled across it.

"I told you precisely what I did." He states in vexation. "However, I do not believe I articulated properly the ensuing consequences. What is done, is done. We must not dawdle on the past but instead look to the future."

I lick my lips taking note of the ache deep within my esophagus and prop myself up on my elbows. Despite some shakiness in my limbs, they seem to hold their own just fine. I slide my arms until the palms of my hands rest on the tabletop and, slowly, I begin to push up into a sitting position. 

The robot watches my every move with a very intense attentiveness. 

Once I was up he presents me with a small plastic cup. "I am sure you are hungry."