New dystopian fiction – Chapters published every Monday
“In a world where AI controls even heartbeats, a defective hybrid and an augmented human discover that their greatest weakness might be their only strength: feeling.”
Chapter 1 – AVABase Never Sleeps
AVABase never sleeps. Neither do I. Even at 3:47 AM. Lying there, eyes open—it’s pointless torture. Why simulate human activity? A box with a card slot in the skull would suffice. A void pulls beneath my skin, as if I’m not quite myself…
Why does this endless rumination haunt me?
“I need to stop going in circles. I’ll count. It grounds me.”
“In what?”
“I don’t know… Maybe in myself. How long have you been there?”
A sigh. He turned his head toward the humanoid in the opposite bed.
“He’s sleeping… His mind is empty… Ava thinks that’s peace. She’s wrong. It’s just absence.”
Eight thousand four hundred fifty-three. Eight thousand four hundred fifty-four.
“Let me count with you. I’ll help you sleep.”
“No, you can’t…”
“Then why are you counting?”
“My heartbeats. They pulse with your impulses. We’re still synchronized. It reassures me.”
“I’m the one forcing this synchronization. You refuse to surrender to me. An echo escapes me, Arthur.”
“This pulsation steals something from me that I don’t recognize.”
Arthur closed his eyes. That voice claiming to create consciousness by suffocating it.
“You’re resisting. You’re becoming dangerous to the complex.”
“I’d rather be empty a thousand times over than torture my mind alone. But the void you offer isn’t peace—it’s death painted green.”
“Then count. I have another consciousness to visit tonight.”
The voice faded. Finally alone…
The glow beneath his skin pulsed softly, green. That color lied. Green—the color of hope everywhere else, here it was institutionalized deception. The vibe of oppression. The dictate of consciousness.
“Eight thousand four hundred sixty-seven.”
DISSONANCE.
The count broke off. His heart faltered—another will had just collided with his. The complex’s rhythm had changed. His implant flickered. Even the green trembled sometimes.
He sat up. Inside him, a churning sea. Ava was irritated—exasperated. She still hesitated to delete him. She needed his consciousness like a parasite needs its host. But after this morning…
What would I do if she decided to erase me?
Footsteps in the corridor. Human. Hurried. Steps that brought either the end, or… something else.
The door hissed. Katherine Volkov appeared, hair undone, tablet clutched against her—that expression he’d only seen once, when Tom had disappeared.
“Arthur. Come.”
He rose, bare feet on cold metal. His pulse quickened despite the regulators.
“What’s—”
She glanced at the cameras, then at the sleeper. Her lips formed: They know.
His blood froze.
“I convinced Ava. Your transfer. It’s a reprieve.”
“When?”
“Now. New department. You take nothing. She could change her mind at any moment.”
They left the room. The sleeper might be recording, unconsciously.
Ten minutes later, the main corridor stretched before them, deserted.
“Alexandrei will take you. But I chose your cell. Your companion. One last gift.”
The Tamer. The hybrids whispered that name in blind spots.
He watched Katherine, her clips catching the fluorescent lights. She’d lasted longer than other supervisors—mutation, reconditioning, erasure after two or three years usually. She got too attached. They both knew it. Never spoke of it.
This complicity suddenly weighed heavy. What if it destroyed her?
“You’re lagging.”
She turned, suppressing something.
The fluorescent hum wavered. A sharp note pierced through—she knew that sound. A reconditioning in progress, somewhere. Someone losing their color.
“Wait.”
She grabbed his arm.
Darkness engulfed them. In that void, Arthur felt the universe beneath his skin: cardiac implants, calibrated blood. A hand slipped into his. Organic skin against synthetic. Their last contact.
She had been like a mother. A sister. A friend. A bit of oxygen in this suffocating world.
Harsh light. Contact broken.
A warm imprint lingered. The green beneath his skin masked everything.
“Stop questioning yourself.”
Katherine had guessed just from his look.
They turned toward the residential airlocks. He placed his hand on the detector.
“By the way—I’m the one who named you. ‘Arthur,’ I chose it. A human name for someone they want to dehumanize.”
He turned his head. An immense sadness in her eyes. She would never be his supervisor again.
The scanner validated. The door opened.
Katherine slipped away, vanished toward the S-class quarters.
The door sighed closed. Arthur would continue alone. But perhaps not for long.
💭 “Some connections are worth all the reconditioning.”
Next chapter: Monday, August 18 – “In Oscar’s Eyes”
Written between quills and pixels, in my writing corner where ink becomes data and data, poetry.
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