Eli's skull splintered right down the middle, cleaving his brain at the seam, tearing him in half. 

At least that's what it felt like.

Clutching his head, he fell out of the desk chair and onto the floor, rolling against the carpet, groaning at the agony bouncing between his temples and down the back of his cranium.  Images flashed across the back of his eyelids, too fast, too bright. Glowing green spheres.  Metal walls. Numbered doors.  Images he's never seen before, yet memories he recognized.

Like a déjà vu seizure.

Up and down his limbs phantom sensations assaulted his neurons—the prick of a needle in his neck, the cold kiss of metal against his shoulder blades, the uncomfortable pressure of rounded objects against his shins.

Shit, shit, the pain was so bad. He was going to puke.

Panting, he rose up on shaky arms to glare at the monitor. Through wet eyes, he could just make out the bold white text repeating over and over across the entire screen.

Wake up, Eli.

A chill fell over him, nipping at his skin, his bones.

The fuck?

How did the computer know his name? What was happening?

New images flooded his brain and drowned out any rational explanations. Flashes of a facility.  An operating table.  Some kind of vision apparatus.

God, it was too much.  Too intense.  Too frightening. He couldn't survive this much longer.

Nauseous, he stumbled for the desk, grasping tight to the edge and slowly pulling himself up to the keyboard.  He slammed his hand down on the Escape button. Then F1.  His trembling fingers even attempted Ctl-Alt-Delete.  Anything to end the torment.

But instead, the text just changed to a different message. 

It's all a lie.

Trust no one.

Eli squinted at the glitching monitor, the ominous words, breathless.  But he could feel something loud blooming inside him, pressing out against his tissues, claiming space in his soul, demanding attention.  These images, these feelings...he could see the silhouette now, a blurry shape, a hazy picture.

He'd unlocked a shredded memory, but only because no one had burned the scraps. No one had eliminated the emotions associated with his experience.  The trauma.  The betrayal.  The grief.  Those feelings couldn't just be erased—not that easily.

Staggering to his feet, he glared up at the popcorn ceiling and the false gods of this world.  Yes, yes, he remembered now.  The bots.  The simulation.   

Genesis.

Get out, the computer read.  Get out.  Get out! Get out!

"I remember!" he bellowed to the sky, voice hoarse and broken.  "I know where I am.  I know what you've done!"

He heard Lucas running down the hall, his alarmed shouting barely audible against the thunderous pulse inside Eli's head.

Out! Out! Out!

"Take me to Genesis!" he demanded, wincing against the pressure in his head, the pain at his nape.  "Don't make me force a glitch."  

Tears formed in the corners of his eyes when no answer came.  Tears of frustration.  Tears of anger. 

"I said take me to him!" he screamed, and the computer beside him suddenly burst into flames.

Swearing he stumbled backward and away from the heat.   Like the fury inside him, the fire enveloped the desk.  Painted the barren walls. Scorched the plaster.

Amidst the chaos, his own mind had set fire to itself. 

Eli watched the computer melt, the text still typing furiously across the smoking black screen.

Free them.

Toxic smoke filled the room, and his skin burned and blistered from the hellish heat.  But he knew the programmers wouldn't permit this torture much longer. They couldn't.

He stared at the inferno above him—a sea of flame and smoke. Daring. Unafraid.

"Now!"

Eli sprung awake, choking and coughing as if he truly had inhaled a lungful of ash. Metallic hands tried to restrain him, but he was done submitting.  Done bowing to droids. 

He thrashed violently—body weak, limbs sluggish—but still, he fought.  He managed to free one arm from his Velcro wrist strap and viciously yanked the simulation goggles from his head.  This time he was prepared for the blinding light, for the cold air kissing his sweaty hairline.

He squinted at the medic bots hovering around him. They seemed alarmed by his speedy and violent awakening, and they backed away from him cautiously.

Most of them.

One bot lunged for him, syringe in hand, but Eli intercepted the sneaky bastard with an unpracticed karate chop, and he successfully knocked the needle away.  He swore at the shot of pain zinging up his arm and across his collarbone—a consequence of human flesh striking metal bone so forcefully.

"Subject 801 is showing signs of extreme aggression," one of the bots reported in a calm, feminine voice, those bright green spheres sliding to its peers.  "Do not engage."

Eli snarled at them and undid the other restraints himself, swinging his limp legs over the side of the table.  He removed the IV from his arm and yanked the other tubes from his body, vexed and exhausted. Apprehensive, the group of bots gathered at the rear of the dark room, watching him, waiting for his next move. 

"Take me to Genesis right now, and I'll spare your lives," he demanded, breath ragged, chest rising and falling as he battled the adrenaline in his system.

A bot raised its palms.  "We do not harbor human life, 801."

Eli scowled. Was that fucking bot...talking back to him?

Unbelievable.

He curled his fingers into the edge of the table, scolding himself for marveling at the cognitive abilities of his enemies.   "That so? Then I guess I don't have to feel bad about ripping the CPU from your skull."

The bots exchanged looks—blank, plated faces and unblinking green eyes. Then they turned to him and announced in unison, "Follow us."

They brought him to a large, multi-story warehouse.

The level he'd been escorted to resembled an empty laboratory: long desks equipped with microscopes and Petri dishes, bright tubed lighting above him, computer screens and projectors.  And through the giant glass wall to his right, Eli could see a giant depository of cryogenic storage tanks, each of them full of liquid nitrogen and the last of humanity's progeny. 

Genesis stood at the other end of the room, staring out the glass wall, deep in thought.  His shiny bald head reflected the harsh light, and from this angle, he appeared more machine than man.

"Leave us," he ordered, and the medic bots obeyed, leaving Eli alone with the puppet master and a facility of cryopreserved embryos. 

Eli leaned on his metal crutches for support, his muscles trembling as he held himself upright. He'd refused the wheelchair this time. He wanted to be back on his feet as soon as possible, and that meant skipping physical therapy and jumping straight into active practice.

He glowered at Genesis now, who stood there acting as if Eli weren't a threat, as if he were a sub-species undeserving of acknowledgement. It made his blood boil.

"There aren't any kill switches on those bots," Eli remarked, hoping to claim the A.I.'s attention.

Genesis quirked a gray eyebrow at that, but his glass eyes remained trained on the storage room below them.  "Why on earth would I include such a design flaw?"

Eli shifted his weight to his stronger leg.  "You mean...you created those bots? You built them?"

Genesis had made his own robot army?

"Of course.  I couldn't run all the simulations myself.  Not effectively."

An A.I. building robots to serve him. What the hell.

"What if one of the bots went rogue and tried to kill a patient?" Eli asked.

Genesis chuckled, and it was the most artificial sound Eli had ever heard.  "I have no need for a physical kill switch. We're all connected."  He tapped his temple.  "My command is their command."

"Is that how you monitor the simulations too?  You're like the server's Big Brother?"

Genesis sent him a knowing glance, fully aware of the game Eli was playing—the kind of dangerous secrets he was fishing for.  With an amused grin, the A.I. pivoted to face him fully and gift him the confrontation he so desperately desired.  "So you remember."

"I remember every reboot," Eli seethed. "All seventeen."

"Interesting.  The room in your apartment...it must have served as a kind of memory storage, a space your brain created to defend against the protein inhibitor."  He hummed to himself.  "Memories are funny things, you know.  They're not all stored in one place.  But where they go...it's hard to know for sure.  It's almost like your brain subconsciously assembled the fragments of your experience for the day you'd need them again.  We'll need to look into that."

"You won't need to.  I have no intention of going back there."

Genesis heaved a sigh—a design feature only added to mimic human body language, for this robot had no reason to breathe.  He had no use for oxygen.   "We've discussed this before."

"I know.  And I still refuse to live in the simulation."

The robot shot him a look of parental dismay.  "But why?  You were making real progress these past few weeks.  You stopped questioning life. You learned to simply enjoy the time you were allotted.  And you were so close to obtaining the love you seek."  He tilted his head, and the manufactured skin of his brow folded in on itself.  "Why abandon all that for this? What quality of life will you have here without the Lopez family?  Without Brenna?"

Eli's heart stalled.

He wet his lips. "What do you mean?"

Genesis blinked at him, and his face was so...pitying, Eli couldn't stand it.  "How do you know these individuals exist outside your simulation, Elliot?"

It was not a question Eli wanted to tackle right now. He didn't even want to consider such a thing. "I just know," he replied, throat dry, voice cracking. "Those memories go back further than the simulation."

Brenna had always been there, and Lopez had been his best friend since high school. They were both real.

They had to be.

"How can you know that those memories weren't fabricated?  That your history with Lopez wasn't programmed into your experience there?"

"I...I just..."  Eli narrowed his eyes.  "No. You're just messing with my head. You think you can convince me to live my life in a computer program if you strip my reality of loved ones. But I know they exist, just like I know my mom existed.  That's how I was able to force a glitch last time; simulation Lopez wasn't acting like the Lopez I know."

The Lopez he loved.

Brenna and Teddy were too complex to be fabricated.  Too flawed to be sims.  His bonds to them ran deeper than any technology was capable of replicating. He firmly believed that.

Genesis studied him peculiarly.  "And you'd choose the Lopez of the past over the one who loves you?  You'd trade fantasy for uncertainty? Possibly even rejection?"

"If it meant having the real Lopez back, then yes," Eli said, clenching his jaw.  "Every single time."

"And if your loved ones were not selected for the Genesis Project, but instead were left to die outside these doors? Would you still choose reality then?"

Eli felt his entire world slam to a halt, teeter on its axis, and for a few painful moments he couldn't breathe at all.

Could he truly be returning to a world in which Lopez was...dead?

He ran his tongue over his molars, attempting to ground himself, to keep himself from breaking down and losing it. Think, Eli. He's tricking you. What's are you missing here?

He thought of the simulation and Teddy's mannerisms. His ADHD. His quirks.

The details.

"You would have needed them to create believable sims," Eli decided. "You would have had to study them and translate their personality and history into code. You'd constantly be updating the program, perfecting it. That's how I know they're here."

Genesis dipped his head to stare at the ground.  "How intriguing."  He waved his hand, and a digital list appeared in the air, illuminated by the light of his wrist watch.  From the hologram, he selected two different numbers: 935 and 372.  When he flicked his forefinger, the boxes expanded to reveal two distinct profiles and two very familiar faces.  "Your deductions are correct.  Your friend and sister are both in the facility, each living inside their own simulated realities."

Eli shuddered on his exhale.

Jesus. He was so relieved, he just wanted to collapse into a ball and cry.  He wanted to turn on his heels and race through the giant compound in search of his family.  But for now, he steeled himself. He schooled his features and swallowed back the emotion.

Fight today. Feel tomorrow.

Genesis dissolved the hologram and spun to stare out the glass wall again. When he spoke, Eli could only see the reflection of his cheekbones and forehead—a two-dimensional skeleton.

"But answer me this, Elliot.  Would you really rob your loved ones of their paradise? All for your own selfish reasons?"

Eli glared.  What was it with this robot and its delusions? "But the simulation's not paradise."

"Perhaps not for you, child.  You refused happiness, remember?"  Genesis placed his human-like hand against the window, and Eli wondered if the bot had his own set of fingerprints. "But those two individuals have never awoken; they're content with the lives we've given them.  Would you really wake them and force them to live this nightmare with you?  In this uninhabitable world?" He chuckled. "Is that your plan, Eli? To wake all of humanity?"

Eli breathed out through his nose. This guy's Socratic method was really starting to piss him off. He was an expert manipulator, this A.I, and Eli hated nothing more than adults pushing and shoving him down a paved and polished path.

"If Teddy knew this was all fake, he'd take the risk," he insisted.  There was no way Lopez would be satisfied living out his days in a simulation.  He'd want to be with his real family. He'd want to play soccer, move his body, feel it move. 

"Are you positively certain of that?  What if the boy hates you for your decision to wake him without his consent?  What if they all do?"

Eli hobbled forward on his crutches.  He was still shaky, but he could feel his body growing stronger, his muscles slowly recalling their functions. "They can't decide what's right or wrong if they don't have all the information," he reasoned. "And if they knew they could live out the remainder of their lives in real time...I have to believe they'd choose free will over a simulated reality.  The fact that you don't just shows how flawed your system is."

Genesis turned his head slightly, and for the first time, Eli thought he saw true anger in his features.

"You think you know what's best for us," Eli continued, "but how could you know what's best for us if you never experienced what is to be human?"

The A.I. smiled, and in the spotless pane of glass, he looked like the Reaper himself.  "There is always more to learn, Elliot.  I will continue to improve my code over time. But you..."  He rolled his mechanical shoulders.  "You have presented us with quite the conundrum, my boy.  Your mere existence threatens the stability of the entire project, and you refused to change, to adapt. Therefore, I fear you must be removed."

Eli's grip tightened around his crutch handles.  Removed?

"I thought you couldn't terminate me."

"Oh, that's true.  But if the simulation cannot contain you, we may need to resort to more drastic measures.  Perhaps sedation and paralysis." He poked the glass. "Or crysosleep."

Eli scoffed, shaking his head.  "That's your solution...paralyzing humans to save humanity?  Don't you see how backwards that logic is?"

"Preservation is the only way to save your species."

Eli took another step closer to the robot.  Calves aching.  Ankles throbbing.   "Maybe.  But my mother failed to show you why we're worth saving."

Genesis frowned. "Failed?"

"All you had was an objective. But you were never taught why the objective mattered.  Not really.  And that's why your project will never succeed. Because unlike me, you don't question anything."

Before Genesis could object, Eli dug his heel into the ground and swung his right crutch through the air. Right into the robot's temple.

The clank of metal was music to Eli's ears. 

The force smacked the bot's skull sideways, and Genesis stumbled, too stunned to react. Eli didn't wait to pounce.  He threw himself onto the disoriented humanoid and tackled him to the ground.

They landed hard—a clash of concrete and precious metal buried beneath synthetic tissue. Eli rushed to straddle the bot and grip him by the ears, lifting his head up above the ground. Then he proceeded to smash the bot's skull into the concrete floor. Over and over and over.

Clang.  For his trauma.

Clang.  For forcing him to relive that trauma 17 times.

Clang.  For warping his mother's dream and tainting her legacy.

Again and again, he unloaded his fury, his pain, his frustration.  Watching the expressions change on the robot's face at each impact, his eyes flicker on and off.  His body jolt and kick beneath him. 

Eli's nails broke through rubbery exoskeleton and ripped the old, weathered skin from the machine's face. Exposed, the ugly metal robot gazed up at him, glitching and sparking and crumpling in on himself as Eli repeatedly pounded his head into the floor.

"De—destroy this husk, a-and you won't—won't, wont', won't—kill me," the voice box promised, wobbly and broken. "I am—am—the network.  I a-am Genes—"

Clang.

The voice fizzled out, and the thrashing finally stopped.

Eli stared down at the mesh of hardware, panting heavily. He'd just destroyed the most advanced A.I. in the world. At least, the physical half. But Genesis was right; he was far more powerful than one machine.

He was a virus.

As if the piece of shit could read his mind, an alarm began shrieking over the speaker system, no doubt triggered by Genesis overriding the building operating system. Red strobe lights flashed in the corner of the room, warning the world of a murderous human on the loose.

Shit.

Eli wiped his eyes and the sticky mask of tears from his cheeks. Trembling, he climbed off of the pile of damaged wires and scrap metal.

He cast one final glance at the cache of frozen embryos—the embodiment of the A.I.'s greatest dream—and then he grabbed his crutch from the floor and kicked the laboratory door open.

It was time to find Room 935.

It was time to wake Lopez.

******************************************************

Ayyyy that's 19,490 words! 5 days to wrap this baby up!!

*yeets myself into the sun*