Konsk: The Great Takeover of the Place.

30 The Eulalian ward.

"Eulalia, age thirteen, was the daughter of a noble family that lived near the city of Barcelona. Amid the persecutions under Diocletian, governor Dacian arrived in the city intent on enforcing the decrees. Sometime later, Eulalia left her home, entered the city and confronted the governor for his merciless persecution of Christians. Unable to dismiss the eloquent arguments of a young girl, Dacian soon had Eulalia stripped and flagellated, which was followed by bloodier tortures that were not to cease unless she admitted the error of her ways. Resisting to the end, she prayed that God would take her to Heaven, and died of her wounds."

From Konsk: appendices. Explanations.¹

Trueman found himself once more staring at Learner's book, floating before him. Already the experience, so different from any normal waking reality, was fading, as does a dream, even a significant one. He clung to the fragments, striving to order them, to give them labels, meaning.

There was the smudge thing and ring, flying or swimming alongside him, that had felt so familiar, like a person who then became trapped somehow. He hoped he had been able to help but could not be sure. Then there was the void space itself that was not a void, filled with that tube stuff and those big, bulging blob things. What were they? He recalled Learner’s garbled descriptions back at the Little Big Farm, that he, Trueman, had dismissed as flights of fancy and Spicer had spoken of toobs and hippos. Yes, he supposed they might suggest hippos, swimming, the huge bulks suspended in slow movement.

He shook his head; as well to call them snarks or weebles, for they had no physical reality. If he had been confused before, it all sounded even more bizarre now.

Thinking of the great whirlpool or storm or whatever it was started a cold shiver that began in the abdomen, coursed up the spine and was clenched off at the base of the skull causing him to jerk with a gasp. It made him feel nauseous. He realised that it was caused by fear. Was it that bad? Something dreadful was going on, this seemed certain.

Then there was that poor figure, bound to the boulder, trapped by that thing, that hippo, that entity? And what of the work of this body, or rather the previous occupant of this body? The evidence, here in this virtual studio, the tormented figure in the hospital bed, the so-called volley? Just one of many in that database.

A sense of cold, determined purpose took hold of the body. I will get to the root of this, Trueman thought sternly, and no one is going to get in my way. I have had enough with playing the nice guy, just along for the ride. Now its time to take control. He was a little surprised by these thoughts, as though he were watching from the back of his head.

The body abruptly stood up, stretched powerfully to the cracking of joints, located the door behind the seat and opened it. Laurence, waiting outside with a small hand-held device, yelped and leaped away as Trueman strode out.

“I’ll take that,” Trueman said immediately, indicating the hand-held. “And I want to personally check the status of all the Vollies.”

For a moment Trueman almost quailed, turned and fled back within the room. Partly because he had no idea what he was actually asking but also because he had tried to make the new body’s voice sound commanding and it had come out so hard and guttural with such an edge of ferocity that he was thoroughly taken aback. Yet he managed to maintain the eye contact and what he hoped was a tough look. He need not have worried, Laurence, looking absolutely panic stricken, thrust the hand-held towards him then backed hurriedly away.

“Of, of course,” he stammered, “Sir. Not a problem sir. This way please, sir.”

Trueman took the hand-held, resisting the impulse to examine it immediately; that could wait. The use of the term Volly had been pure bluff, a sudden impulse arising from the image of that poor woman. It appeared to have had an effect.

Laurence led off hurriedly down the corridor, still trying to twist enough to keep an eye on Trueman. The two guards fell in behind. Trueman adopted a wide legged walk, making himself as big as possible, scanning steadily to left and right. For the first time since his arrival in this reality, he felt strong, in command, an experience he found, to his surprise, to be not unpleasant.

“Hurry up!” he ordered and smirked as Laurence almost tripped over his own feet in an effort to quicken his contorted pace.

There was another lift, the descent longer this time. It opened into a reception area, a desk with a man seated behind and two more security, a man and a women, a similar soft lighting. The three instantly pulled away from Trueman and no attempt was made to hinder or even question him. I’m obviously well known, he thought and scanned the location. A corridor led off to either side, with openings at regular intervals, eight in all, Trueman counted quickly. Laurence turned to face him.

“Where would you, would you like to,” his voice shook, “To start, sir?”

Trueman was momentarily stuck. Then the voice spoke for him, gratingly.

“At the beginning, of course!”

Laurence became still paler, turned to the left, leaving all the security personnel at the reception desk. It became clear that openings from here led to short corridors with four doors to either side. The doors were blank with no fixtures and had the suggestion of airlocks about them, the corners being curved. Laurence turned left again and stumbled towards the end where he stopped, gesturing to the nearest door.

Trueman studied the blank door panel, thinking fast. Its probably a screen, he thought, or contains a screen, perhaps even a terminal. The tongue performed a roll without moving; he guessed it triggered a wireless interface in the door, illuminating a set of notes and charts. The title read Volly 7 in a plain font, possibly Arial narrow, thought Trueman.

“What about the others?” he found himself asking, continuing when Laurence just looked baffled, “Numbers 1 to 6?”

“Why, sir, they are, they failed, sir,” Laurence stammered, “They’ve been-despatched. As Mr. Manson ordered, on his authority, sir.”

Trueman nodded and examined the notes. There was a clinical outline of a 28 year old, male, height, weight, blood type. No name was given. The charts were animated, displaying temperature and blood pressure together with other information and what could have been ECG or some form of brain activity. There were also some bar charts labelled connectivity with download and upload rates.

The tongue undertook a complex movement and the screen switched to give a view into the interior of the room. The tongue flickered again and Trueman was able to pan and zoom in until the single occupant was central, sitting upright on a jointed couch, restrained by straps about his limbs and torso. Something had been done to his arms.

Trueman swung up his right hand as though to ward off the image. Instead, the door slid open with the faintest hiss. He was sweating. Fortunately the patient, victim? Had his eyes shut and hopefully was heavily sedated. Trueman stepped within the room. Various monitors beeped quietly away and there was a strong smell of antiseptic. He moved very slowly to the side of the couch, breathing as quietly as he could. When he finally stood beside the bed he allowed himself to examine the young man’s arms, as he would a specimen, trying not to consider that there were human consequences to what had been done.

A long incision had been made from each elbow downward. On the forearms, the skin had been peeled and clipped back, exposing muscles, tendons and bone. On the hands it had been removed completely and either the network of nerve endings encouraged to grow or some culture persuaded to intrude. The bundles of fibres led from the flayed hands, joining and thickening until they became a multi-coloured cable loom, bound with coloured ties, plugged into some sort of port.

The intention was obvious to Trueman and it made the jaw ache. They, whoever they were (This Manson character and presumably he, or rather, the new body's previous occupant, probably others?) were developing direct sensory input systems, human interfaces to the network, at the expense of the subjects. Volley, he thought and something clicked- short for Volunteers? He backed out of the room. Please don’t wake up, he was thinking. Or was he praying? Surely they hadn't volunteered for this?

Laurence had not entered. Trueman looked at him for a full minute. The smaller man became more and more agitated.

“Next,” intoned Trueman, eventually.

He made himself look at all of them up to Volly 19. There were some gaps, notably 14 who he had seen dead in the database. Young women and men, non older than 28 or thereabouts, all having undergone similar, radical surgery, though the locations varied. Trueman noted that attention had been given to the most sensitive physical areas, where the nervous system was most concentrated. Thus the hands or fingers, or as with his new body, the tongue; with others the face, the solar plexus, which had involved the displacement of the internal organs. The next was the spine, then the brain itself and even the genitals. The higher numbers had become even more extreme, if that were possible.

Some of these higher numbers bore the marks of other surgery, largely healed, on various parts of the body, often the back of the neck. Consulting the clinical descriptions he found that neural nets had been inserted and attempts made to grow connections to various nerve ganglia. He touched the back of the new body's neck. Yes, there was something there.

The 19^th volunteer was the last he could face. She was the youngest and had observed Trueman during the time he spent in her room, through her one remaining eye. She made no sound but her eye tracked his moving hand and the pupil dilated and contracted when he cast a shadow on it. She reminded him of Catti. He could not bring himself to look on any more after that.

He felt very detached, horribly distant as he returned to the nervous Laurence and stood in silence for a considerable time. The new heart beat strongly and he became aware that he was suppressing an adrenaline rush. It’s anger, he thought, it is rage at what has been done to the innocent, in the name of, what? Of science? he shook his head, numbly.

“Do they hurt?” he asked. “Do they feel pain?”

“If you wish, sir,” Laurence offered tentatively.

“And the consequences?” Trueman asked, sickened. “The results?”

“19 shows promise,” the other replied, “Although 15 and 16 are still the most reliable.”

Laurence held his arm away from his body, the hand open. Trueman realised he was being ushered and chose to follow; what else could he do?

They returned to the lift and ascended to the same level as before. Laurence led him further along the silent corridor to another door panel, stepping aside to allow Trueman to wave it open. Beats passwords, he thought, must be high security, restricted access. As if confirming this the two guards turned their backs, taking up position one to either side of the doorway.

Now what, Trueman thought? He took a deep breath and went in.

Thanks for reading and sorry if it was a hard one- can’t be helped, the world can be truly awful. Welcome to new subscribers, you came in at a deep end. Check out the tabs at the top of my page to follow particular sections, namely, Fiction, Konsk, of which this is one episode, The Real Coed Y Brenin dealing with matters forestry and how to manage it or not and E.S.P. Adapt the umbrella attempting to hold it all together! One more episode to come then Fire! Honestly…till then, hwyl! Chris

1. When at The Little Big Farm, Dawn once showed Trueman the painting by John William Waterhouse which depicts the martyrdom of St. Eulalia. This was during Dawn’s romantic phase, hence the attraction to the works of the Pre-Raphaelites.

Eulailia stands here for all the sins visited upon children and young people by those in the grip of the destructo-culture vortex.