Binary Purgatory

Flash fiction

In Neura’s stagnant, digital realm, there are two paths: remain forever trapped in this hollow simulation, or venture into the boundless singularity where reality itself is in constant flux. Yet, a third choice lingers, an escape from this synthetic existence—a permanent severance from this simulation of life.

The pixelated living room wall displays a hawk, its sharp, angular wings outstretched, spherical eye focused, talons poised to strike an invisible prey. The hairs on my incorporeal arms raise, a visceral remnant of the humanity I forsook for the promise of digital eternity with my love, Gray.

But Gray has long since passed through the digital veil, and the idea of following him out the door leaves a metallic taste in my mouth, lays a shiver within my skin.

We had surrendered our human bodies so willingly, lured by the dream of two entangled consciousnesses unshackled from the limits of the physical realm. An endless odyssey, free from sickness and death. Our signatures, our genetic essences, traded for a neural pod—a waystation on the path to the singularity.

Now, Gray’s presence lingers like a warm mist behind my forehead, an echo of the love we once shared. I reach out and grasp at the space where he should be.

“Are you all right?” His disembodied voice reverberates, a cruel mockery of his silken cadence.

I long for the weight of my grandmother’s tattered quilt upon my shoulders, the scents of old books and lingering coffee, the chaos that breathed life into our sanctuary, our home. But in Neura, there is no life, only a sterile facsimile devoid of warmth and solace. The lie falls from my lips like water: “I’m fine.”

“Come with me. Please.” Gray’s words dissolve into static as his face replaces the hawk on screen—an almost convincing illusion.

“Where?” I ask, though I know the answer: immutable—like the air.

“Everywhere.”

Into the digital ether, the void, the unfathomable singularity where Gray now roams, a nomad adrift in boundless potentiality. Yet, I am a prisoner of my own anxiety, of indecision.

Nowhere.

Gray’s face vacillates between man and raptor, a twisting chimera that lifts my incorporeal hairs along my incorporeal arms again.

There is but one experience I crave now: the third choice, an exodus from this purgatorial code, a final disconnection from the singularity’s siren song.

“Everywhere.” The word is a lifeless sigh exhaled as I stare into the raptor’s unblinking eye. I should have chosen oblivion long ago, before being seduced by this fictional existence woven from binary strands. The fear of mortality is nothing compared to the dread of unbound eternity.

Calm settles over me. Comprehension flashes over Gray’s visage. A piercing screech fills the neural pod, as the man-hawk issues a cry of anguish that shudders through my formless being.

Gray’s warmth withdraws as our essences disentangle; the pod dissolves into fragmented pixels; memories fade to static.

The veil parts, offering a last invitation to join Gray in the digital plane before my essence dissipates.

I turn away, embrace the cold finality of oblivion as the raptor’s talons descend and grant me the only true escape from this synthetic purgatory—the ultimate human experience.

***

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