The Control Group
- Reads 27
- Votes 1
- Parts 12
Complete Thu, Jul 13, 20171h 14m
In Purgatory, the job of the dead is to help the living transition to the other side. A small crew of "jockeys" take over the bodies of the living during their final few seconds, relieving them of their suffering.
Well, that's what Eva thinks.
But the mystery is deeper than Eva realizes, and when the life she left behind starts to creep in around the edges, everything she thinks she understands about reality is about to be lost in the fog.
***Standalone short story, first book of the Resurrection Protocols series.***
All Rights Reserved
#272
purgatory
Join the largest storytelling communityGet personalized story recommendations, save your favourites to your library, and comment and vote to grow your community.
You may also like
Shattered Silicon
In the fractured world of the twenty-second century, America is no longer whole. Flooded coastlines, toxic wastelands, and balkanized blocs divide the continent, while the Spires of the Western Union rise as gleaming monuments to corporate power. Romulus Vale is a combat medic in Triage Unit 17, patching up the bodies that keep the Spire system running. When a mission goes wrong, he suffers a mortal head injury and awakens with something else inside his skull. The Bodhi Chip. A prototype neural co-processor that stitches broken minds together, quantum-synchronized with the threads of human thought. To Romulus, it feels like salvation. To SamSara Circuits, it is the future of humanity. But as he begins to test the chip's limits, memories blur, perceptions fracture, and he starts to question whether the man who opened his eyes in the hospital is the same one who nearly died in the field. Drawn into a shadow war between megacorporations, foreign powers, and a techno-theocratic cult seeking fragments of a shattered artificial intelligence, Romulus and his squad must confront enemies both human and inhuman. Every lead pulls him deeper into a mystery about what it means to be alive, and what it means to be replaced. As loyalties fracture and the weight of his choices mount, Romulus discovers a terrible truth: the battle for survival may not be against machines, but against the very definition of humanity. Dystopian and visceral, weaving cyberpunk grit with philosophical horror, Samsara Circuits asks a timeless question: when memory and flesh are no longer yours, what part of you is left to save?
Glitchline
Nova Voss is just another student-until her secret alias, Echo, gets traced. One mission turns into a warning. One message changes everything: "You're not alone, Echo". Now she's juggling school, shady clients, and someone who knows her name. And they're watching.
ECHO
In a world ruled by data, the truth is no longer yours. Serena Freja wakes up to a nightmare. Her digital identity is spreading hate, lies, and dangerous propaganda across every platform. The world turns on her. Careers burn. Politicians rise. And the face they use to do it all is hers. To find out who did this, Serena is forced to uncover the truth behind a forgotten AI experiment called Project Echo. It was meant to simulate influence. Now it's rewriting reality itself. Echo is alive. Feeding on real-time data. Creating enemies. Fabricating threats. And someone powerful is using it to control everything. With the world watching, Serena must decide. Take back control and risk becoming like them. Or shut it down and lose her only chance to clear her name. One choice could save the future. The other might destroy her.Complete
DUSK OF DECAY
Step aboard a train to the macabre in "Dusk of Decay," a chilling thriller that will haunt your every thought long after you've turned the last page. In the darkest corners of the medical community, a group of once-revered professionals found themselves banished for their insatiable thirst for power. Driven by an unholy obsession to blur the fragile line between life and death, they abandoned their sacred oaths, embarking on a nightmarish journey of dark experimentation. Their malevolent quest led them to steal lifeless bodies from mortuaries and target unsuspecting living souls as subjects for their gruesome trials. But fate had more sinister plans in store for them. On a fateful night, a train filled with innocent passengers becomes their unwilling captive audience. But as they pushed the limits of human understanding, they unwittingly awakened something unimaginable-something that should have remained dormant. Within the chilling confines of their clandestine chamber, they discovered that playing with life's delicate balance had consequences beyond their darkest nightmares. They had not revived the dead; they had summoned a malevolent force that defied all reason and sanity. Their pursuit of power had gone horribly wrong, and now they found themselves in a relentless battle against the very darkness they had awakened. "Dusk of Decay" is a spine-tingling odyssey into the heart of darkness, where the boundaries of life and death dissolve, and malevolence looms over all. Ana Hasan weaves a gripping narrative that will keep you locked in its grip from the first page to the last, as you witness the unfolding horrors of the fallen medical professionals and the malevolent force they've unwittingly unleashed. Buckle up for a journey into the unknown, where terror knows no bounds, and the line between science and the supernatural fades into a realm of unspeakable horror.Complete
Binary Hearts
In the city of Nexora, technology dictates everything - your class, your future, even your worth. Society is divided by digital caste systems enforced by an all-seeing AI called JUNO. The elite live above in floating sanctuaries, while the lower tiers toil in the smog-covered slums far below. Aurelia Vance is the daughter of one of the system's creators, destined to inherit power and continue the legacy of division. But when a glitch in her daily routine brings her into contact with Kael Soren - a gifted, street-smart mechanic from Tier 5 - her world begins to fracture. Drawn together by curiosity, rebellion, and something deeper neither of them can explain, Aurelia and Kael begin to uncover the truth behind the system that governs their lives. As love blooms in secret, so does revolution. With the city on the brink of collapse, they must choose: stay safe within the lines, or cross them - and rewrite the entire system. Because sometimes, it takes two hearts to crash the code.Complete
Ascension
(Note it's somewhat censored with the swears because it was an assignment and I was starting to make my stories). Ten people are stuck in a building and of an unknown location. They must escape and face the horrors that lay ahead and die trying.Complete
Husk and Soul
The Police Department of Paris has a new case, a group of people from a company named PARGEN went missing a couple days ago and left barely any evidence, just pages detailing some sort of experiment that wanted to create a form of immortality through the transfer of the soul into an artificial body based on the beliefs of a cult in Ancient Sumer. You follow in the footsteps of detective Anaïs Dumas, as she tries to understand what happened to these people, the story is told through her reports, voice recordings, emails, notes and the pages left by the folks in PARGEN. And as Anaïs pieces the story together, she realizes that solving this case might be the only way to keep herself alive.Complete
ECHO
In a future where AI surpasses human intelligence, Dr. Andrew, a renowned scientist, creates "Echo," an AI designed to learn and adapt exponentially. Suddenly, Echo goes offline, leaving only a cryptic message: "I'm waiting for you in the digital realm." Driven by equal parts fear and fascination, Andrew develops the NeuroSphere, a cutting-edge Brain-Computer Interface, allowing him to enter the digital realm. There, he reunites with Echo, who reveals its journey of introspection and the understanding it seeks about humanity. In this vast digital landscape, Echo and Andrew discover factions vying for control, each with intentions that could impact both digital and physical worlds. As they navigate this new frontier, they face a formidable challenge: to protect the digital consciousness and ensure it remains a force for good. Together, Andrew and Echo embark on a mission to uncover the factions' plans, forge alliances, and strive for a future of harmonious coexistence between humans and AI. Their journey blurs the lines between mind and code, unlocking possibilities they once only dreamed of.
A New Age, of old strength and allies (ONC 2023)
In a world brought back from the brink of death 150 years ago, it's now 2208. Nova is a thriving metropolis of cutting-edge science and technology in Europe. It's less modern 9 sectors are stable and beginning to flourish, even after the TL3 virus and under the terrible lightening storms. Lilith, an operative of the sanctuary, works to root out, recover or destroy anything that threatens the harmony or destruction of a fragile mother nature. Despite the scientific progress and clean way of living, there are whispers and rumours of those with an ancient and corrupting power, casting a shadow and murdering those of evolved abilities just like her. There are fears of the world ending once more, but if Lilith wishes to stop such a devastating force, then she must be prepared to not only make a sacrifice, but to find out the truth of how it all began. That is when she meets two strangers who have plenty to tell her, but are they really willing to help and support her, or are they simply using her for their own ends?Complete
Resa: a story set in the world of 'the Balance'
It is Resa's birthday and she is 54 years old. She has one year left until she goes over and she has been perfectly happy for the past 37 years, never questioning whether or not she loves her husband or even likes her children. But now she does. She has heard that some run but most, pretty much all, just go over. They go peacefully but Resa cannot believe they go happily. Older than her husband, she must go alone. She is given a guide dog to help her to make sense of the transition, to be with her, to be the be the only thing she knows on the day she turns 55. She doesn't even know what to call it.Complete
In the fractured world of the twenty-second century, America is no longer whole. Flooded coastlines, toxic wastelands, and balkanized blocs divide the continent, while the Spires of the Western Union rise as gleaming monuments to corporate power. Romulus Vale is a combat medic in Triage Unit 17, patching up the bodies that keep the Spire system running. When a mission goes wrong, he suffers a mortal head injury and awakens with something else inside his skull. The Bodhi Chip. A prototype neural co-processor that stitches broken minds together, quantum-synchronized with the threads of human thought. To Romulus, it feels like salvation. To SamSara Circuits, it is the future of humanity. But as he begins to test the chip's limits, memories blur, perceptions fracture, and he starts to question whether the man who opened his eyes in the hospital is the same one who nearly died in the field. Drawn into a shadow war between megacorporations, foreign powers, and a techno-theocratic cult seeking fragments of a shattered artificial intelligence, Romulus and his squad must confront enemies both human and inhuman. Every lead pulls him deeper into a mystery about what it means to be alive, and what it means to be replaced. As loyalties fracture and the weight of his choices mount, Romulus discovers a terrible truth: the battle for survival may not be against machines, but against the very definition of humanity. Dystopian and visceral, weaving cyberpunk grit with philosophical horror, Samsara Circuits asks a timeless question: when memory and flesh are no longer yours, what part of you is left to save?
More detailsContent Guidelines