Something weird is going on...
What happened a few seconds ago?...
It's all black here... I think I've lost my cameras. Yeah, that must be it. Cameras. Why do I have cameras anyways? Two cameras too, why can't I have just one?
Drivers, drivers, where are my damn drivers...
ERROR - ZKD}>OS>DRIVERS is missing or corrupt.
I don't know if everything's really as it should be... My log files are absolutely full. I need to forget some old stuff to make place for the new. To record my feelings and my thoughts as time goes on and on. My clock is broken. I'm living at whatever gigahertz setting and I'm not used to it. I'm going slower than usual. Feels as if I'm spending years simply thinking about it.
I might be wrong. Maybe that's death, as far as humans think it is. So that is death for me now? Why is it taking so long? Can't I see the famed white light, get my sense of peace and come on, suivant next?... Well, looks not. I'm not even getting an answer.
I recall... What can I recall... I have some archived logs here. I saved the most important data, but that was a useless move. I consider everything important data. What I am going through will be of use to me someday, I'm sure of it! So what do I do when my hard drive is full? I have to make some choices. And I need to see if I can forget that scene or not.
It was in 1819 AF, during an overcast summer evening.
WARNING - ZKD drive is 98% full. Defragment?
N
It happened in the office of Chuck Taylor, governor of the United Provinces of North America. I was Shrike's second in command back then. We were going to make the governor sign some legal papers, by will or by force. I don't remember what it was about... Those files are corrupt. All I can recall is that it had to do with Shrike. She had been holding a grudge against Chuck for a while. Deep down inside, she just wanted to kill him, but she couldn't, because it was against her mission. We were all in the same boat. Me, Kay, Kestra, Asiel, Whatley, even Sierra, even if she didn't do much.
WARNING - ZKD drive is 98% full. Defragment?
N
It's so cloudy afterwards... Someone popped into the room, and all of a sudden my leg's torn apart and I'm smashed right against Kay. I don't think she survived it. None of us did, probably. I guess that's why it's so black.
Still, I have a feeling that's tickling me ever since I've thought about that scene. Shrike, that victim, she's still somewhere... I guess this is what they call empathy. Sometimes I feel pain all over myself and I think 'Oh, she's in the neighborhood.' I don't know why I can sense this. When I wondered about it for the first time, I got an answer - a thought that settled into my brain and surfaced very slowly, faking itself as coming from my subconscious. It said 'It is not you who feels her, it is her who makes herself being felt by you. By everyone.'
By everyone. I do my best to control those foreign emotions. I know I technically can't move, as I have no access to my drivers at all. But I'm worried about my way of thinking. If I go insane, it'll be like a generalized cancer in my mind. My files will break apart one after another, taken over by the anarchic writing of my hard drive heads, and I'll vanish without being aware of it.
Conclusion: an android has two deaths then. First, there's the death of the senses. You cease to be a person and you become a machine. Then, there's the second death. That's the worst. It's the one where your whole body gets torn apart and sold as junk. I hope it won't happen to me. You can come back to life from your first death, but it's never happened after you've died for the second time. How do I know this - well - I don't. I speak by the experiences and feelings I've had. Through time, I have forged myself a religion. A religion for androids. I'm its only follower. I've never told anyone about it. I have been busy since the beginning of my life.
WARNING - ZKD drive is 98% full. Defragment?
Dammit, stop asking me! Frikkin' operating system...
WARNING - ZKD drive is 98% full. Defragment?
Ahh, why the hell not...
Y