Flesh, Code, and Choices
Jackie's eyelids fluttered open. The neon chaos of the VR arena was replaced by the sterile white glow of the recovery chamber. Her right arm—still in pulse cannon form—was bent, the cybernetic hand gripping her shoulder with the fingers inserted into ports along her chest. The normal silver glow of her cybernetics pulsed red and weakly, signaling strain and an unsanctioned evolution.
A soft whisper echoed in her skull—the same voice from the fight.
"Ocular system… recalibrating. Neural integration… stabilizing. Evolution continues…"
Her heart skipped. It wasn't her imagination. Her internal BDJ system had a voice, faint but undeniably present, layered beneath the cold, mechanical commands of the Nexus Directive.
"Subject alert," Nexus intoned, flat and impersonal. "All systems remain critical. Recommended rest period: 120 minutes."
Jackie tried to shift, groaning as pain stabbed through her human side.
Patrick's voice cut in, warm but tense: "Jackie! You survived the SIM. That was… remarkable. You have something the others don't."
Gregor's tone followed, cold and cutting: "No, Patrick. She's unreliable. I've assigned her to the inner city patrols. She needs to be pressed into showing what she can do. Real combat. Real consequences."
Jackie's pulse hammered. Pressed into showing what I can do? Fine.
Her BDJ system whispered again, almost conversationally: "Assessment: untrained combat data incomplete. Recommendation: override limited system commands to stabilize neural response. Warning: potential pain spike in ocular implant."
Jackie mentally commanded: "Override, then. Let's see what this can do."
The pain surged. Her ocular implant whirled, drilling into her mind as the cybernetics absorbed and recalibrated data. Awe flared. Are my mental capabilities changing? Is all of this truly possible?
The system answered instantly: "Mental capacity increasing. Mental system mapping fully engaged. New mental ocular enhancement detected."
The chamber door hissed open. Patrick's face was taut; Gregor's eyes were cold.
"She's going into the inner city," Gregor stated. "Real combat. You follow the Directive, or you fail. Are we clear?"
Jackie nodded stiffly, masking the surge of fear and curiosity. Her system sent tiny pulses through her neural interface: "Observation detected. Two data nodes active. One: Nexus Directive. Two: Unknown. Tracking trajectory and signal integrity. Recommendation: monitor, do not engage."
Unknown? Her pulse quickened. Someone is watching me.
Patrick sighed. "Gregor, she's unique. She could die out there."
"She has no choice," Gregor snapped. "This is about survival. What happens when she spaces out, and your unique Blue Diamond is less than those Black Cyborgs over there?"
Jackie's jaw clenched. Gregor was right. If she died, her family would lose their status and be forced back into the slums of Naya Kasol. She had no choice. She took a deep breath and willed her cannon to retract. Her mind stuttered as pathway information flooded in, but her arm obeyed. The elbow joint clicked into place over the retracted weapon.
Patrick looked at the console, his curiosity winning over his worry. "Your systems are unique, Jackie. Your recovery and learning speeds are unprecedented. Nexus knows this."
Two tall, monochrome Black Cyborgs stepped into the room. They didn't wait; they simply moved.
Transition to Inner City:
They exited the sterile glow of the main government building onto a road circling the front. Neon reflections from the city below shimmered across her visor as they quickly descended into a tunnel leading into the inner city. The noise was immediate: children darting between stalls, vendors shouting over the hum of hovering trucks, the smells of recycled water, metallic sweat, and ozone mingling with cooked algae. The pristine world of the upper levels was instantly gone.
One of the Black Cyborgs looked at her, its eyes blank and distant, its voice rough and gravelly. "Call when you are ready to return. You are scheduled to remain for eight hours."
They disappeared into the crowd, and the inner city's chaos swallowed her.
"Unknown observer: code name detected. Suggestive of resistance or rogue unit. Data integrity maintained. Recommendation: maintain awareness."
Jackie's hand froze in mid-flex. Resistance? Rogue unit? She didn't understand the significance yet, but the system had flagged it. She walked deeper into the congestion, the people pressing against her. Maybe Patrick was right—she wasn't ready.
Her system beeped lightly: "Critical evaluation: potential survival outcomes mapped. Tactical advantage: unknown observer integration incomplete."
Jackie smirked faintly, her teeth catching the red light from her system's critical glow. "Well," she whispered to herself, "let's see what I can really do."
Her pulse thrummed in synchrony with her cybernetics. Her system pulsed lightly, sensing heat, motion, and traces of the unknown observer somewhere above, somewhere close.
The first real test was about to begin.