#element:aether

[elementxls-archived]

Transformations - v3.5

A young girl, barely 10 years old. An orphan, with no memory of a family.

A man, promising a mother and father, a home, the education she clearly was deserving of.

A plane ride, lasting hours. Other children, heading to the same place.

There is no home. Instead, a facility. An experiment.

Suppression of emotions.

Starting small, hiding feelings about minor disappointments.

Growing gradually but steadily. Not batting an eye when classmates are removed.

Time passes, unmarked. Soon, two remain. Teenagers now. They stare at each other; no food, no water, no sleep, nothing else, until there is a victor. The one who doesn’t react, who doesn’t betray weakness, will survive.

In the 25th hour, she shoots her opponent a look. The end comes within minutes, coursing through her veins. A poison which should hurt, but she's beyond feeling. “Such a pity,” say the voices around her as the world turns to darkness. “She showed such promise.”

But they were wrong. The look wasn't one of desperation, as they assumed it must be. What else was there to say?

The look said, I'm letting you win.

It said, I don't see the point anymore.

It said, I'm bored of this.

Without even knowing, they gave her what she wanted.

For a time, there was nothing, and it was a relief.

But then, a connection. Another.

Her mind found its way back together. She'd been stripped bare by those running the experiment; to rebuild herself was simple by now, no more than a puzzle to solve; she'd been through so many that she didn't question another.

But she lacked… something. She didn't know what it was. She didn't know she'd been missing it for years. She only knew that without it, she would come apart again.

Perhaps this had happened to her before. Perhaps it was always happening, a constant loop of winding and unwinding.

Until she found... not what she lacked, but a substitute. Information was quantified and sent around the world instantly; could she not do the same herself?

She broke herself down, becoming a string of code, a blip of programming. A being of pure data, existing everywhere and nowhere across cyberspace.

A being who was so detached that she didn't even realize she had left her humanity behind long ago.

[elementxls-archived]

Origins - The Spectres

While the other spirits shaped the world and acquired their emissaries, one spirit stayed behind the scenes and watched. It had no need to involve itself in this creation, for it was above it, beyond it, just as it was beyond the other spirits. It was the sum of all the others, of all things, of all knowledge.

Nor did it have a need for mortals to help carry out its will, for it had no will, it simply… was. And if it had cared enough to be prideful, it would have scoffed at the other spirits of the elements, reaching out for mortal assistance. It did not have to resort to such measures, because all who lived and died joined with it in the end. Upon death, the soul might carry on elsewhere, but all that a being had known or thought would be released, drifting up into the aether and becoming a part of this entity.

The being they once were no longer existed; all that was left were facts and information, floating freely. Sometimes, these thoughts would find each other, would join together into the semblance of what they had once been. And those still living would see, and would call them ghosts or phantoms. But they were echoes of what they once were, an empty shell, one that no longer had anything connecting it to life. With nothing to grasp onto, the pieces would soon separate again, floating once more in a void of everything.

...with very few exceptions.