Technocracy: AETHER, Part 3

Saera, Marin, Ardo, Terry one by one could feel

Pricking over all their bodies, something subtle, small,

But it grew, as time went on. It came into their hearts

Then spread through their chests, their limbs, their spines, their heads, their brains,

Bringing all of them ever so slowly out of sleep,

Tickling them with the faintest hints of cruelest pain,

Breaking them from slumber. They awoke, each one by one.

Saera slowly opened up her gleaming silver eyes...

But then they bulged hugely. She was not inside her room.

Saera felt the crawling terror racing up her back

As a world of black and red emerged before her eyes.

Saera saw huge shadows of deep black come into view,

And the lighting everywhere was hellish neon red.

“Wha? What?” Saera mumbled, as her mind emerged from sleep,

And then suddenly she realized she was very cold,

And she glanced down—she was naked! She had no clothes on!

And she realized she was also hung up in the air,

Off the ground, suspended, with black fixtures on her hands,

Something grasping, sucking at her hands and at her wrists,

At her feet as well! She glanced down, then from side to side,

Seeing things both black and viscous holding her in place,

Things that were pitch black, and gleamed like metal, but were soft,

Soft and wet and looked like something slimy and alive.

Saera screamed in terror and she tried her best to move

Her pale legs to cover up her naked, exposed form.

But it was no use! The black things held her tight in place.

So her silver eyes in panic looked off to the left,

Where she saw “Marin!” she cried aloud. “Marin! Wake up!”

Marin drifted into focus, coming full awake.

“Ah! EEK!!” Marin screamed, to see the world around her now.

They were in a chamber that was high and that was domed,

Domed in deepest black, with rings of light of neon red,

And a light of general neon red suffused the space,

Lighting it, yet somehow the red light was sharp, and clear,

So that the red glow seemed bright harsh white at the same time,

Casting a cold, clinical gleam onto everything.

So Marin could clearly glance in horror at herself,

See herself completely nude and bound at hands and feet.

She was hung, suspended, by the black metallic stuff,

Her arms stretched to either side of her, her feet stitched up,

Wrapped and bound by that slick, soft, organic metal, black,

Metal that seemed so alive! That seemed a living thing.

Marin upwards glanced to see the origins of what

Bound her now: the metal grew in stalks that hung down from

The high ceiling, as though they were hanging jungle vines.

In her panic her sapphire blue eyes swept around

To behold the floor, where many people milled about.

Some of them were walking, while some floated off the ground,

Floated to and fro, their boots’ soles glowing neon red.

“AH!! AHH! SOMEONE HELP ME!” Marin shrieked, an awful sound.

In her panic, she looked to her left, and there she saw:

“Ardo! Ardo! Wake up! We’re in trouble!” she exclaimed.

“Uhh, uhn,” Ardo grunted, as he slowly came awake.

“What the FUCK,” he growled, and struggled. He cried: “WHAT THE FUCK?!”

Ardo was bound, hands and wrists and feet, just like the girls.

He was also naked, like the two of them both were.

Ardo glanced about in panic, terror, and in fear.

He felt the slick slime of the black gooey metal stuff,

As it clutched him, as it gripped his hands and wrists and feet

Binding him like iron slurry, strong like firm concrete.

Binding him with arms stretched out and with his feet tied up.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?” he shouted, eyes flaring bright red,

Bright red neon, and the neon flames their corners licked.

But this neon red was not quite the same neon red

As the neon red that was around them, shining now.

THAT red, the red neon around them now, somehow was

Colder, crueler, seeming wicked in ways his was not.

Ardo struggled, writhed, and squirmed within his blackened bonds.

He glanced downward, panicking, and saw the space below.

It was filled with men and women, milling to and fro,

Every one of them wearing a robe of heavy black,

Robes that swathed them, in the manner of robes of a monk.

But these robes were black as pitch. Their boots were black as well.

And the ones that floated, their boots’ soles glowed neon red.

There were tattoos on their heads that glowed bright red as well,

At each of their temples: curving lines of neon red.

Ardo’s ruby red eyes bulged, and almost were in tears.

He glanced to the left and saw, “TERRY!” he cried aloud.

“Terry, wake up! Dude, wake up! What the FUCK’S going on?”

Terry grunted softly, and he came awake as well.

“Uhn,” he groaned—but then his copper eyes opened and bulged.

“Ahh! Ah! What is this?” he shouted, shivering with fear.

Shivering with cold as well—his nude body was cool.

Terry felt exposed, like he was chained up in a zoo.

He winced and he tried his best to hide his naked form.

He could feel the slick and slimy black metal that held

Him so firmly—slick and wet, yet hard as iron bands.

But Terry did not panic as quickly, or as much,

As the other three—he kept his wits about him some.

So he fought his panic and his irrational fear,

And he looked about, surveying with his copper eyes.

He saw all the space, with its black, and its neon red.

He saw the strange people, with their blackened, monkish robes.

He saw that some of them walked, while others of them flew.

And he looked about now at the glowing things around

The black-robéd men and women. They floated about,

Neon red displays that floated, visible to all.

They contained various things: numbers on some of them,

Others of them had diagrams, and long lines of text.

Others readouts had on which the human body was

Displayed, and there also were displays of human bones

And of human organs, all laid out in neon red.

“Data readouts,” Terry whispered underneath his breath.

“Data, diagrams and charts,” he whispered. “But what for?”

He glanced back off to the right then, and he saw them all,

Saw his three friends, all suspended, all completely nude.

“Saera!” he shouted across the line to her just then.

“Saera!” he said. “Saera! Marin! Ardo! How do you

Feel?” he cried. “I feel fine!” Saera shouted back at him.

“Me too!” Marin shouted. “But what’s going on?!” she cried.

“Yeah!” cried Ardo. “What the fuck is this? Just where ARE we?”

“Ah, you are awake! I wondered how long you would sleep.”

Saera, Marin, Ardo, Terry all as one glanced down.

Someone now was floating upwards from the floor to them,

Hovering up on his boots, whose soles glowed neon red.

His black robe’s train was ragged and ripped, unlike the rest,

And his sleeves were longer than the ones on those below.

He floated up to them, until he their level reached,

And he floated there, with both his hands behind his back.

And he smiled at them, but that smile was not kind.

“Welcome, welcome, Elementals,” he said unto them.

“Welcome. It is good to meet you, finally, at last.”

All four of them stared hard at the man before them now.

He was thin, but not too thin; he seemed healthy enough,

And he was a tall man, clearly of impressive height.

His skin was quite pale, and his head was completely bald.

Whether he had balded, or he’d shaved, they could not tell.

He seemed not too old, and neither did he seem too young.

He was of a middle age that seemed quite nebulous.

His features were regal, noble, aristocratic.

He smiled at them, but something in that smile it was cruel.

Saera felt a tremor up her spine as he turned to

Her particularly, for his eyes now met hers—and

His eyes were SILVER, a silver not unlike her own.

It made her skin crawl, to think that she had anything

In common with this man, who now gazed at all of them,

Gazed at them, as they were hung there, naked and exposed,

Gazed at them, cool, cold, detached, as if all of them were

Specimens he had collected, and put up in jars.

Even as he smirked, that cold look did not leave his face,

And Saera thought she could SEE him THINKING as he looked,

See him studying all of them, like they were his tools.

Saera squirmed. All four of them did, for all of them felt

Horribly examined by those sharpened silver eyes.

“Welcome, welcome, Elementals,” said the man again.

“Welcome. This is the first time we have met face to face,

At least the first time since all the four of you were born.”

“Who are you?!” screamed Ardo then. “Just who the FUCK are you?!”

“Well,” he said, and smiled, “I am the villain of the piece.

If you are afraid now, if you feel quite out of sorts,

Then you feel that way according to my own designs.

But if you want me to NAME myself,” the bald man said,

“You may call me ‘Arius.’ ‘Arius’ is my name.

FATHER Arius, if you want my title as well.

Father Arius of the Technocracy,” he said.

“Tech… nocracy?” Marin said, and played with the strange word.

“What’s that? What’s it mean? I’ve never heard that word before.”

“It means rule by technology,” Arius explained.

“It means rule by the technologically advanced.

And that is us. WE are the Technocracy,” he said.

“We are the Technocracy, and we rule all the world.

From the shadows we have ruled the Earth for untold years,

Guided it, controlled it, ever since the Ravaging.

We have ruled it, and I think that we have ruled it well.

But I dream of more,” said Arius, with glinting eyes.

“I have dreamed of Paradise, a world bereft of pain,

A world where the Heavens and the Earth have become one.

And I have been planning for that hour to arrive,

Planning, and the plans that I have made involve you four.”

“Us?!” barked Ardo. “Why the fuck do your plans involve US?”

Arius smiled at them in a sharp and cruél way.

“You are vital components for what I have in mind.

You four are essential, that is why I built you all.”

White eyes, blue eyes, red eyes, brown eyes, widened huge in shock.

“Built?” said Marin, voice near-screeching. “BUILT?!” she screamed aloud.

“Yes, of course,” said Arius, who gazed upon them now

Calmly and serenely, silver eyes placidly fixed.

“Did you suppose that your powers all were natural?

Did you think it chance, or just a random act of God,

That the four of you were so unusual, so strange?

Did you think that you all were some destined, chosen few?

No—you are the way you are because I wished it so.”

“W-What?” stammered Terry, copper eyes immense in shock.

“You are MY creations,” Arius said with some pride.

“I constructed you. I am your Victor Frankenstein.”

“Franken… stein?” asked Saera, her own silver eyes immense.

“An old book,” said Arius, “one you have never read.

Immaterial to what I say about you now.”

“No,” said Ardo, writhing, squirming in his blackened bonds,

“No! It can’t be true, it can’t!” he said, his red eyes wide.

“I assure you, Bernardo, it very much is so.

I constructed you to fill a role in my own plans,

So I stitched you four together from genetic stock,

And I built you metaphysically—I built your souls,

With the technology of the Technocracy here.”

“N-No!” Saera said, her silver eyes bursting with tears.

“No, I have a Mama! I know she gave birth to me!”

“Your mother, dear Saera, has been lied to all her life.

So has almost everyone within Atlanta’s bounds.

This whole city was constructed with you four in mind.

It exists ENTIRELY to raise the four of you!

For it was not only your genetics and your souls,

But also your very natures I wished to construct.

Everything about this city was built so that all

Four of you would grow up with the personalities

That we WANTED you to have. We socialized you all,

And we created the types of persons that you are.”

Terry’s pale lip curled and he exposed his stark white teeth.

“So…” said Terry, breath hitching, metallic brown eyebrows

Lowering down. “So, you’re saying that the way we lived,

Our home life, our families… all of that is YOUR fault?!”

“More or less,” said Arius, who waved his long pale hand.

“All but one of you have had fake parents all this time.

Mothers, fathers, aunts and uncles, cousins, grandfathers,

All of them are fake—are false. None of it has been real.

We have managed them, controlled them, taught them what to think,

As we did for everyone who in Atlanta lives.

All your teachers, all the children you have known, and all

Of the people, of all ages, you have met throughout

Your lives have been placed around you so that you would grow

Precisely into the sort of people you’ve become.

Your personalities have been finely shaped and tuned

By every part of the city in which you have lived.

This whole city is an ENVIRONMENT,” he proclaimed,

“A terrarium in which to GROW the four of you.”