The Space Spoon novel Chapter 102

Rayna followed him through dark alleys, avoiding the city's main thoroughfares and heading for the city's outskirts. There weren't many other people around since it was late and freezing. The two veiled shadows of the night were easy to miss. Illuminated figures appeared randomly through the windows of dimly lit houses.

He stopped in front of a derelict house. The sculpted archway stood crooked above the entrance, but he went beneath it without a second thought.

Rayna stared at the white structure enveloped in moss to make sure it wouldn’t fall on her head. When the Bralxoid disappeared inside, she swallowed hard and followed him.

Doctor Iadfoc invited her into a small, dark room with a single goose-neck lamp illuminating the top of a large table filled with glass vials. He gestured toward a threadbare sofa against the wall. He grabbed a simple wooden chair and sat facing her. For once, someone wasn't looking at her with meaningless pity, for which she was grateful.

Iadfoc had a scanner and slowly hovered it in front of her, up and down.

“What now?” She shrugged. “Are you going to open up my skull and dissect my brain?”

“Straight to the point, I see. The answer is no. I won’t dissect your brain because you don’t have one. You have a silica core, a non-organic neural network, much like a motherboard. When you come into contact with organic DNA, you can create matter and replicate the DNA, like cloning it.” The tall Bralxoid smiled at her and rose from his chair.

He shook his head and walked to his work table. “Also, you like to hide your core, camouflaging it as one of your femurs. Therefore, your skull doesn’t have anything interesting inside, except for the gray matter of someone you copied DNA from.”

Rayna placed her hand over her upper leg, rubbing it thoroughly. It was bad enough she couldn’t remember her real name or how she came to be… this. But having a silica core was more than she could handle. What was she?

“What do you want to know?” he asked with a soft, patient voice.

“Everything.” Her pitch was louder than she intended, but she couldn’t hold it back.

“You are a member of a shape-shifting species called Nubilae. Your kind is unique throughout the Universe, dual carbon-silica sentient lifeforms, organic and non-organic components combined.”

Rayna followed Iadfoc and stopped next to him. Her facial muscles went slack. "I’m sorry. I just..." She closed her eye and knuckle-tapped the table next to Iadfoc's glass vials. A gentle clicking sound echoed in the room. A few tears leaked out. This was her one and only chance. She lowered her head.

"Don’t worry." The scientist gave her a friendly pat on the back. "Some data nodes are misfiring inside your neural network. I can easily mend them, and you’ll be able to control your shifting. You don’t have to look like that; you can be whoever and whatever you want. But I must warn you, it’ll hurt."

Her mind dashed from one thought to another. She was a bundle of nerves, rubbing her hands in an attempt to not chew on her fingernails. What if it didn’t work? What if all the pain would be for naught?

“This procedure might also restore your memories. You should be able to remember your past and loved ones.”

A sparkle of hope glinted inside her eye. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. You can do this, Carmen. I believe in you.”

“Carmen? That’s my real name?”

The Bralxoid scientist nodded. “When you feel the pain, don’t let go. Memories, in general, are painful. Let them flow through you.”

She laid on her back on the threadbare sofa. Rayna couldn’t believe she was going to stay there waiting for a stranger to cut her leg and repair her neural pathways inside a faux femoral bone. How crazy was that? She shook her head and covered her eye. Her very existence was beyond crazy.

Her uneven teeth gnashed once the pain started. No pain killers or devices to mute the pain. She had to feel everything to distinguish between reality and memories. But the real anguish commenced when screams pierced her thoughts. Wails and groans, full of pain, screeched inside her mind. Shadows of the past shrieking for help.

Fleeting images faded in and out, faceless beings she once loved: her family, her husband. A tall alien with a warm voice told them they would be safe, that he would save them from their homeworld and find a new planet for them. The Nubilae believed him, but his words were lies.