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Description
There had actually been a lot about the cybernetics he wasn’t told. The nuances, if you will, the little things that took the most getting used to. Take his eye, for example. They’d told him he would be omnipotent, able to see the matrices within a computer projected as reality, able to see through walls as though they were windows, able to watch a man’s blood flow through the veins in his body. What they’d neglected to tell him was that he’d also be able to see through his own eyelid, and though it was only one eye they’d replaced, he still had trouble sleeping, trouble telling the dreams from reality. He’d never appreciated the ability to close his eyes before, but it was one of the things he missed most. Not that he could really sleep anymore, of course.

His arm had been the gateway. They were amputating it, anyway; if all those tactile nerves weren’t going to be used for anything, why not add a bit more purpose? The hardware was in his head, the interface was in his eye, and so they’d simply gone ahead and sewn the nerve endings into the electronics. He could touch a computer and delve into it, swim among the circuits, surf through avalanches of data and information. That was another thing they’d forgotten to mention, though. The tactile nerves still served their old purpose, alongside of their newer call. He could feel the internet wash over his arm like wind, a whisper of pins and needles, the remnant feedback of electronic noise passing through overloaded nerves. Phantom limb syndrome was a condition that afflicted those who lost extremities… illusions of sensation in the missing arm, missing leg, pain from a misfiring mind in a place long since left behind. It was like that, he supposed. A phantom limb, haunting the one hung by his side, all too distant and far too real.

The dreams were what gave him pause, though. Maybe he could have slept with a lead eyepatch, maybe he could have shut down the tactile center of his brain, but the dreams would still be there. For all its mighty knowledge, science did not know why dreams existed. Theories, of course, pointed them to fragments of the day, rearranging themselves in a cohesive, subconscious dance, an organic sorting algorithm. Dreams, designed to process information. Dreams, designed to lend understanding when their host awoke. Sometimes he wished his mind still worked like that, because what he saw when he closed his eyes was frighteningly clear, yet lent no revelations the morning after. It was something about the way the cybernetics didn’t quite click with his mind; conscious activity was unimpeded, but he could feel it, brief static when he tried to remember. A barrier of sorts… eidetic memory at the cost of lag time during access. There was a catch between his brain and the chip that used his body heat to power itself, and when he slept, the catch caught.

The halls always looked the same; empty, blank, so grey as to be black, clouded by the corruption he could feel inside of him, the static behind his eyes that he couldn’t tell for glitch or grief. Each night he walked this realm, built from small fears and nagging paranoia, stored in parts of the chip he couldn’t alter. Were it just this, he could perhaps have borne the darkness, but no hell is complete without its hope, and his was sight and sound. He could hear the silver bells, always around the corner, always a step out of reach. He could see the glowing butterflies, flitting through the air like mercury, just as intangible and poisonous. Hope. They were his personification of hope. Fitting, perhaps, that they were ever and always far beyond his grasp. He used to run, used to strain and struggle, used to try to catch the flitting creatures or listen to the song the bells were playing, but time wears harsher than rust, and in time, he rusted away. Each night now, he stared down the hall at the light, so far out of reach, wondering if it was enough to wake up for. Wondering if it was worth it, watching the light dull with each passing night.

Another nuance always manifested itself when he woke up - tears only ever fell from one eye anymore. Sometimes he let them land on his arm; he would stare at the droplet, shining on the surface of the metal, and wonder if his dreams were as corrosive as the saltwater was.

Description
There had actually been a lot about the cybernetics he wasn’t told. The nuances, if you will, the little things that took the most getting used to. Take his eye, for example. They’d told him he would be omnipotent, able to see the matrices within a computer projected as reality, able to see through walls as though they were windows, able to watch a man’s blood flow through the veins in his body. What they’d neglected to tell him was that he’d also be able to see through his own eyelid, and though it was only one eye they’d replaced, he still had trouble sleeping, trouble telling the dreams from reality. He’d never appreciated the ability to close his eyes before, but it was one of the things he missed most. Not that he could really sleep anymore, of course.

His arm had been the gateway. They were amputating it, anyway; if all those tactile nerves weren’t going to be used for anything, why not add a bit more purpose? The hardware was in his head, the interface was in his eye, and so they’d simply gone ahead and sewn the nerve endings into the electronics. He could touch a computer and delve into it, swim among the circuits, surf through avalanches of data and information. That was another thing they’d forgotten to mention, though. The tactile nerves still served their old purpose, alongside of their newer call. He could feel the internet wash over his arm like wind, a whisper of pins and needles, the remnant feedback of electronic noise passing through overloaded nerves. Phantom limb syndrome was a condition that afflicted those who lost extremities… illusions of sensation in the missing arm, missing leg, pain from a misfiring mind in a place long since left behind. It was like that, he supposed. A phantom limb, haunting the one hung by his side, all too distant and far too real.

The dreams were what gave him pause, though. Maybe he could have slept with a lead eyepatch, maybe he could have shut down the tactile center of his brain, but the dreams would still be there. For all its mighty knowledge, science did not know why dreams existed. Theories, of course, pointed them to fragments of the day, rearranging themselves in a cohesive, subconscious dance, an organic sorting algorithm. Dreams, designed to process information. Dreams, designed to lend understanding when their host awoke. Sometimes he wished his mind still worked like that, because what he saw when he closed his eyes was frighteningly clear, yet lent no revelations the morning after. It was something about the way the cybernetics didn’t quite click with his mind; conscious activity was unimpeded, but he could feel it, brief static when he tried to remember. A barrier of sorts… eidetic memory at the cost of lag time during access. There was a catch between his brain and the chip that used his body heat to power itself, and when he slept, the catch caught.

The halls always looked the same; empty, blank, so grey as to be black, clouded by the corruption he could feel inside of him, the static behind his eyes that he couldn’t tell for glitch or grief. Each night he walked this realm, built from small fears and nagging paranoia, stored in parts of the chip he couldn’t alter. Were it just this, he could perhaps have borne the darkness, but no hell is complete without its hope, and his was sight and sound. He could hear the silver bells, always around the corner, always a step out of reach. He could see the glowing butterflies, flitting through the air like mercury, just as intangible and poisonous. Hope. They were his personification of hope. Fitting, perhaps, that they were ever and always far beyond his grasp. He used to run, used to strain and struggle, used to try to catch the flitting creatures or listen to the song the bells were playing, but time wears harsher than rust, and in time, he rusted away. Each night now, he stared down the hall at the light, so far out of reach, wondering if it was enough to wake up for. Wondering if it was worth it, watching the light dull with each passing night.

Another nuance always manifested itself when he woke up - tears only ever fell from one eye anymore. Sometimes he let them land on his arm; he would stare at the droplet, shining on the surface of the metal, and wonder if his dreams were as corrosive as the saltwater was.