Work Text:
I checked and re-checked the schematics, feeling the icy claws of my master in the back of my brain. When he was sure I was serious and not simply intending to kill myself, he let my brain go, and let me put the droids in motion.
I knew what I was doing. I was rather insulted by my master's suspicions. Were I planning suicide, I would be far more devious than this crude effort.
I activated the droids that I had so carefully designed, and then seated myself in the center of the chamber. Slender needles pricked my skin, injecting drugs that would keep me numb, but aware. My vision blurred around the edges, but I kept my eyes open. I wanted to see every detail.
Electroprobes touched my skin in a dozen places, controlling my breathing, pulse and other gross bodily mechanisms. A moment of adjustment and the droids took over the task of regulation entirely, leading smoothly into the next step.
I watched in the mirror as restraints closed around my head and neck, keeping me perfectly immobile. Mentally I quivered with anticipation--but how refreshing to be free of involuntary physical response. My breath was steady and my heart kept a metronome beat--but not for long.
The laser saws severed my head cleanly through the base of the neck, cauterizing the blood vessels as they cut to minimize damage. The major veins and arteries were stopped up. I lost the sense of my body entirely as the saw cut through my spinal cord; and then the motors lifted my head as I watched with satisfied delight. The arms quickly brought my head forward twenty-seven centimeters, and set me neatly upon the neck of my new body. The soft jelly-like connecting material bonded with the wound of my neck as hundreds of tiny electronic connectors sought their home. It dissolved the stoppers on the major blood channels, allowing my own blood to mingle with the artificial bloodstream. My face turned quite white as the red was diluted with the clear fluid.
Circuits snapped into place. The drugs were filtered from my system. I felt tiny tweaks of pain as artificial nerves came alive and I began to breathe again.
I tried moving--and my new arm leaped off the rest. So much power compared to my failing flesh! I signalled movement carefully, as if I were at the controls of a new ship. My fingers curled in response. Then my ankles bent, and I pressed one foot to the floor, then the other. I watched in the mirrored wall as I stood shakily. I took a step and fell to one knee. Picked myself up off the floor haltingly. I stood quivering slightly, my arms and legs twitching with the strange signals traveling down the remnants of my spinal cord.
I lifted one foot carefully, setting it down in front of me and shifting my weight onto it slowly. I felt like I was walking on air. This body was so much stronger, so much more powerful. I practiced small movements, reaching out to touch the mirror slowly.
The armor was my armor as always. But I was even taller now, more physically threatening. And the armor was not a separate thing, but essentially my skin. I retained sensation in my hands, the only place I needed it; all else was reduced to bare pressure and heat data. No pain signals, I didn't need them. No real sensation. Unnecessary.
I was almost entirely electronic now, except for my cursed head. I hadn't been able to design a replacement for the functions of my head--not yet. But that was next. First the mouth, throat and vocal cords, or possibly the ears; I would have to research more deeply to see what I could accomplish first. And then the spinal column, once I understood the nerve interface of the brain. And eyes...full-spectrum vision, without the distortions of the mask or the limitations of aging flesh.
I could remake myself entirely, rework my body to match the chilled and mechanized mind inside.
//Not so hasty, my apprentice. I have some work for you.//
The Emperor's presence was like an oily black cable woven through the steel meshwork of my mind. I had not the means to rid myself of him, not after so many years.
I barely wanted to, any more...at least in my conscious thought.
//Yes, my master.//
I replaced the modified mask over my hated flesh and covered my scarred head with the helmet. One day, this would be my face. I longed for that day. I lived for it.
I keyed in the code that would take away my old body to be vaporized, and left my workroom to attend my duty to my master.
end.