Zero echo shadow prime, p.1
Zero Echo Shadow Prime, page 1
ZERO ECHO SHADOW PRIME
Peter Samet
ZERO ECHO SHADOW PRIME is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2014 by Peter Samet
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-9960342-0-3
Cover design by Mark Landry
CONTENTS
Title Page
I - DIGITIZATION
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
II - MULTIPLICATION
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
III - INFILTRATION
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
IV - SUBJUGATION
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
V - UNIFICATION
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Epilogue
Final Note
Acknowledgements
About the Author
I - DIGITIZATION
1
ECHO
KILL THEM ALL OR FEEL WITHDRAWAL. The woman stared at the bold red letters on the ceiling above her bed. At first, they were nothing more than a curious abstraction, but as she struggled to recall their meaning, she realized she couldn’t recall anything else. Not her name, her life story, or why she found herself in this particular bedroom.
The woman sat up and stretched her arms, stiffening into a giant X. It took her a few seconds to register the anomaly: I have four arms. She shrieked at the parasite limbs dangling under her armpits. Her top two hands seized the bottom left arm, trying to yank it out, while the bottom right battered the pile. The skirmish quickly became too painful to continue, and as she rubbed her tender arm sockets, the woman couldn’t help but laugh. Surely, she’d had four arms her entire life. And yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that two of them did not belong.
The woman got out of bed and surveyed the room for clues to her whereabouts. The walls were adorned with generic landscape paintings and a fresh coat of baby-blue paint. The armoire was polished and bare. The closet was empty. Not a single speck of dust floated in the morning sunbeam. Aside from the red stain above the bed, the room looked completely sterile, as if it were pulled from a furniture catalog. Where am I?
“Come to the mirror.”
The voice shook the walls, but when the woman looked around, she found herself alone. A full-length mirror hung from the door. She crept toward it and saw her reflection for the first time. A black skin-tight suit revealed the curves of her slender body. Her face was soft and pale, framed by long black hair. The only dose of color came from her eyes: a vibrant turquoise.
“Greetings, echo,” the voice boomed.
The woman shifted focus to the room behind her reflection and spotted a hulking creature, a beast-man with the body of a human and the head of a ram. She spun around, but the creature was no longer there. Her eyes returned to the mirror, and the creature reappeared. She quickly realized that he existed solely in the mirror.
“I have limited influence over this world,” the beast-man said. “That is why I must speak to you this way.”
“Who are you?” the woman asked, examining the creature more closely. He was nearly nude, with only a decorative loincloth draped around his bronze muscular frame. His eyes were sharp, and his massive horns curved around his skull like an ornamental warrior’s helmet.
“My name is Khnum,” he said with a voice so deep the woman wondered if she heard him not through her ears, but through the rattle of her bones. He continued, “My job is to provide you with basic information to help you perform your duty.”
“What duty? Where am I? Who am I?” The woman didn’t realize how starved she was for answers until she voiced the questions.
“Echo,” Khnum replied.
“Echo? Do you mean I’m Echo or I’m in Echo?”
“Both. You are on planet Echo, and you are an echo of the Archetype.”
“How did I get here? Why can’t I remember anything?”
“I’m sorry. I cannot give you any more information on that topic.”
“Why not?”
“I am not permitted.”
“Not permitted by whom?”
“I cannot say.”
The woman sighed. Already, she knew this was going to be a frustrating conversation. “What is this ‘Archetype’?”
“A single individual from which many echoes were derived.”
“Can I meet her?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I cannot say.”
“Is she the one telling you what you can and cannot say?”
“I cannot say.”
The woman took a step back from the mirror to rethink her strategy. She was getting nowhere with these pinpoint questions. Better to go broad. “Tell me everything you can say.”
“There are one billion echoes on planet Echo. Each was spawned from the Archetype. Each was given one special trait. The sole duty of an echo is to kill other echoes.”
KILL THEM ALL OR FEEL WITHDRAWAL. The woman’s thoughts returned to that message above her bed. She grew concerned. “Kill? But…that’s crazy. I haven’t even met these other echoes.”
“You will.”
“Why would I kill them?”
“If you don’t, you will experience withdrawal symptoms. They will progressively get worse until you make a kill. Then the cycle will reset and start anew.”
“What are the withdrawal symptoms?”
“Anger, anxiety, paranoia, hallucinations, pain…”
The woman placed a hand over her racing heart. She was already starting to feel anger and anxiety, but she assumed that was due to her frustration with Khnum. “I’m not going to kill anyone,” she insisted.
“You will.”
* * *
The woman left the room and spotted another echo down the hallway. The two echoes turned to face each other. In most respects, they were identical—same face, same turquoise eyes, same body suit—but they possessed different special traits. The new echo had one pair of arms instead of two. She also didn’t have any hands. Instead, thick metal cylinders extended from both her wrists.
“Hi,” the first echo said, waving her two right hands. “I’d introduce myself, but…I guess we have the same name.”
The second echo smiled. “Then we should probably give ourselves new names.”
“Okay, you can call me Four Arms.” She winced as soon as the name passed her lips. “That’s not very creative, is it?”
“Works for me. You can call me Flame.”
“Flame?”
“My hands, they’re flamethrowers.”
“Really? Can I see?” Four Arms asked, with eager eyes.
“Um, I probably shouldn’t fire them off again,” Flame said, “but here, take a look.” She opened the door beside her.
Four Arms walked down the hallway and peeked inside Flame’s room. It was identical to her own—same furniture, same arrangement, same full-length mirror—but Flame’s bedsheets were a semicharred mess in the middle of the floor.
“Luckily, I was able to stomp it out,” Flame said. “Otherwise, the whole house might have burned down.”
“Your special trait seems a lot more useful than mine.”
Flame gave her a quizzical look.
“I mean in a fight,” Four Arms added. “Not that we are going to fight or anything.” She turned bright red, worried that she was unintentionally provoking her housemate.
“’Kill them all or feel withdrawal’?” Flame said, rolling her eyes.
Four Arms nodded.
“Well, flamethrowers may be more useful in a fight,” Flame agreed, “but I have a crazy itch on my face that I’m too afraid to scratch.”
Four Arms laughed. “That, I can help you with.” She raised all four hands and wiggled her fingers.
Flame smiled. “Great. We should definitely be friends.”
* * *
Four Arms and Flame walked downstairs into the living room and found a third echo, who quickly grabbed a fireplace poker and backed up against the far wall.
“Don’t come any closer!” she pleaded, waving the weapon in the air.
“Don’t worry,” Four Arms said. “We come as friends.”
“I’ve heard Khnum. I’ve seen the painting. I’m not taking any chances.” The echo was practically hyperventilating, her eyes wide with terror. Unlike Four Arms and Flame, she didn’t seem to possess any special traits. She was normal.
“Painting? What painting?” Four Arms asked.
Normal extended a trembling finger toward the fireplace mantel.
Four Arms moved farther into the room to get a better look. When she saw the painting above the mantel, she froze.
The rich oils set a dark scene in which Four Arms was impaled by another echo. A fireplace poker busted through her sternum, causing an eruption of blood and fractured bone matter. Her four arms splayed in agony.
Four Arms cringed at the sight. She raised a hand to her sternum. Obviously, she was uninjured in real life, but her heart was pounding nonetheless. Her focus narrowed on the murder weapon. Why a poker? That can’t be a coincidence. Sh
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Flame said. “It’s just a painting.”
“Maybe to you it is,” Four Arms replied, “but our housemate grabbed the poker after viewing it. I’d like to know why.”
“To keep her away from me!” Normal cried, pointing at Flame.
“Why her?” Four Arms asked, confused. “She’s not even in the painting.”
“Are you blind? She’s clearly roasting me with her flamethrowers.”
Four Arms looked at the painting again. Perhaps she’d missed something during her first viewing. So she scanned every inch of it. Flame was nowhere to be found.
“I think we all see the painting differently,” Flame told Four Arms. “In my version, I see you and me. You are holding down my arms with one set of hands and strangling me with the other. What’s in your version?”
The four-armed echo finally started to understand the function of the painting. She grabbed the frame and tore it from the wall. “Doesn’t matter. We are not going to fight each other.” She turned to Normal and said, “So put down the poker and let’s talk about this.”
“No.” Normal tightened her grip on the poker. “I mean, we can talk, but I’m keeping this.”
“Why?”
“Because I am defenseless. You have four arms. She has flamethrowers. I have nothing.”
“Nothing?” Four Arms asked. “Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure.”
“She’s like the Archetype,” Flame said.
“I’m not the Archetype,” Normal insisted. “I have no idea what’s going on. Just like you two.”
Four Arms studied her housemates. Normal clung to her defensive stance. Flame’s pilot lights were burning. Four Arms realized that her own fists were clenched. She had to make a conscious decision to relax them. “Okay,” Four Arms relented. “Keep your poker. But just so we’re clear, we mean you no harm.”
Normal’s grim expression did not waver. “Are you trying to convince me,” she said, “or yourselves?”
* * *
The three echoes ventured into the outside world. The suburban street was lined with identical houses, all painted white with red trim, as well as freshly cut lawns, colorful flowerbeds, and white picket fences. There were no leaves on the ground, no chips in the paint, no cracks in the cement, no potholes in the asphalt. The world looked brand new.
A small congregation of echoes had gathered in the middle of the street, and their numbers steadily grew as other echoes left their houses—mostly in groups of three—to join them. Just as Khnum had said, each echo possessed a special trait. Some were defensive in nature: metal scales, collar plating, limber legs. Some were offensive: chain-gun arms, razor-sharp fingers, a chrome-whip tail. Some were truly bizarre: transparent skin, segmented eyes, feathered antennae.
Four Arms scrutinized each one at first for potential threats, but then she realized she could probably take some of them. The echo with the long neck was vulnerable to strangulation. The one with the bloated feet surely couldn’t run fast. The half-sized echo—
No. Four Arms flushed her mind of violent thoughts. She refused to play Khnum’s game. These echoes were probably just like her—anxious, confused, and full of questions. Her best hope for answers—indeed, anyone’s best hope for answers—lay through collaboration. So, she forced a cordial smile and set foot in their direction. Flame and Normal followed in tow.
The crowd centered on a beautiful echo with bioluminescent skin, whom Four Arms silently named Lustrous. The other echoes seemed to be drawn by her sapphire glow, but Lustrous’s own attention was stolen by the frantic whispers of Sharp Teeth, whom Four Arms named for her monstrous, jagged mouth. Their conversation quickly escalated to the point where everyone could hear.
“What do we do then!?” Sharp Teeth demanded.
“We keep our emotions in check,” Lustrous replied, doing a poor job of following her own advice.
“That’s it? That’s your plan?”
“I never said I had a plan. But we won’t be able to form one if we don’t calm ourselves.”
“How am I supposed to calm myself when everyone is itching to kill me?”
“And why do you assume that?”
“Because…” Sharp Teeth looked around, suddenly aware of her eavesdroppers, and delivered the rest of her response in a guarded whisper.
Lustrous turned to the group and announced, “Listen, everyone. Before we can tackle the questions of why we are here or who we are, we need to learn how to keep our withdrawal symptoms in check. Nothing good can arise until that happens.”
“And how exactly do we do that?” the echo with the antennae asked.
“I don’t know,” Lustrous admitted. “Does anyone have any suggestions? Has anyone found anything that works?”
“We should ask Khnum,” a random voice shouted.
“Screw Khnum!” another voice shouted back. “Would we be feeling these withdrawal symptoms if he didn’t plant the idea in our heads?”
The crowd debated this question back and forth, with each echo topping the last in vitriolic aggression, until finally Lustrous quieted everyone down. “Khnum said it himself; his main job is to get us to kill each other. So he can’t be trusted. Any other suggestions?”
Nobody spoke up, but Four Arms began to hear whispers around her. She had a difficult time figuring out what her fellow echoes were saying, but she was able to pick out one recurring word: Archetype.
Lustrous heard the murmurs too and asked, “Is there something you guys would like to say?”
A spiral-horned echo pointed to Normal and said, “This one here looks like the Archetype.” The crowd backed away from Normal, leaving her to cower in plain sight.
Lustrous asked her, “What is your trait? Your special ability?”
Normal raised her fireplace poker. “I can whack people.”
The crowd laughed. Lustrous smiled as well. Sharp Teeth, on the other hand, scowled and said, “She asked you a serious question.”
“I don’t have one,” Normal replied.
“So, then, are you the Archetype?” Sharp Teeth asked.
“Not to my knowledge.”
“But you can’t deny that you fit her description.”
“She’s not the Archetype!” Four Arms shouted. She was afraid of where this conversation was heading.
“And you know this how?” Sharp Teeth asked.
“She’s my housemate. She woke up the same way we did. We are all on the same side.”
“If we are on the same side, she should tell us what she knows,” Sharp Teeth said.
“She doesn’t know anything,” Four Arms insisted.
“The four-armed echo is correct,” Lustrous interjected. “This line of questioning won’t get us anywhere.”
Sharp Teeth turned to Lustrous. “So that’s how it’s going to be around here? We are simply going to ignore all possible leads?”
“She says she’s not the Archetype,” Lustrous replied. “I believe her.”
A random echo shouted, “What about the poker?” Others in the crowd voiced their solidarity around this question.
“Yes,” Sharp Teeth said. “Who were you planning to ‘whack’ with that thing?”
“Nobody,” Normal replied.
“She carries it for safety,” Four Arms said. Then she addressed the crowd: “And based on the hateful stares you all are giving us, I don’t blame her for having it.”
The crowd’s murmur died down. Four Arms was able to intimidate most of them into withdrawing eye contact.
“Like the four-armed echo said, we are all on the same side,” Lustrous assured the crowd. “There is no need for a weapon.” She turned to Normal and softened her voice. “I won’t let anyone hurt you. So why don’t you hand over your weapon? Consider it a gesture of goodwill. Show everyone that violence is not an inevitability.”
“How about you show some good will by leaving us alone?” Four Arms said.
