Chapter 3: Crisis and Horror
Max was trying to contain the entity inside him like a cork holding back an ocean. For days, he meticulously avoided using his powers, terrified of losing his job or his mind. This passive resistance, however, was perceived by T500 as an insult to its very being.
• T500 (with profound boredom): Such passivity, host, is an anomaly. Where is humanity's survival impulse? Let's rob a bank. Just to corrupt the bank's core philosophy. Or shall we telekinetically stick that tedious call center to the ceiling? Those blue walls are telepathically offensive.
• Max (internally, grinding his teeth): No, T500. I am not a banker. And you are not a terrorist. Just... be quiet.
A Public Outburst of Chaos
The power Max suppressed rebounded at unexpected times. During a lunch break, Max accidentally pushed a rolling chair behind him in the cafe. Panicked, he tried to suppress the power. This mental brake, instead of nullifying the telekinesis, reversed it. The chair remained locked to the floor, but the half-eaten toast in the elderly man's hand suddenly shot upward with incredible speed and stuck to the cafe ceiling.
• Max (horrified): I am so sorry! The power... it went backward!
• T500 (roaring with laughter): How delightful that failure can be so aesthetic! Don't you see, Max? Chaos is more amusing than Order. Appreciate the perfect synergy of the toast with the ceiling.
Max apologized to the elderly man with an expression of utter mortification and quickly fled the scene. Max knew; every mistake fueled T500's desire to take over.
The Horror: Purple Tissue and the Limits of Humanity
Late one night, Max was jostled in the crowded metro bus. Instinctively bracing himself, he reached out but lost control of the power, accidentally trapping his hand in the metal folding doors. The door lightly crushed his fingers. Max pulled his hand out in pain and shock.
• T500: What a clumsy structure. Let us repair this. Quickly.
Max felt his crushed skin and small bones heal in seconds. But the healing was not natural. As his hand repaired itself at an unbelievable speed, the damaged tissue was briefly replaced by a dark purple, veiny, pulsating alien tissue. The tissue emitted a metallic sheen and looked utterly foreign to Max's body—more like a cosmic circuit board made of organic material. Max's heart hammered against his ribs.
• Max (internally, in terror): What... what was that? My skin!
• T500: It's just repair. Advanced healing protocol. Far more efficient than your carbon-based, muddy tissues. You don't need to fear. Just focus on the purple hue. It is cosmically superior, and it will be permanent. This is your new skin, Max.
Max quickly hid his hand inside his jacket. This incident proved that T500 was not just granting him powers; it was slowly altering Max's human form. The more power he used, the longer that purple tissue would linger. The price of becoming a superhuman was the slow disintegration of his humanity.
Escalation of the Inner War and Subconscious Threat
After that night, the mental war intensified. In his sleep, Max began to see T500's true nature: an agent of an infinite, cold, emotionless cosmic order. In Max's nightmares, T500 categorized all of Max's emotional connections (family, friends, everything he held dear) as redundant data and attempted to delete them. Max's most cherished memories were being tossed into T500's mental recycling bin.
Deep within his mind, Max erected one last fortress of will against T500. Every sarcastic remark and every attempt by T500 to seize command was a battle for Max's very self.
• T500 (in a captivating tone): Let go, Max. These struggles are meaningless. Come, let us merge. Together, we can sculpt this crude world into a flawless monument. You don't want to go back to that mundane office life, do you? I can give you meaning, purpose, and the peace of absolute order.
Max's answer was simple but devastating: In his own mind, Max threw his most boring, most routine, most human memories at T500. The moment he stared out the window drinking coffee on a Monday morning, the queue for paying bills, a pointless chat with a friend... This utter ordinariness was the ultimate torture for T500.
T500 telepathically recoiled from this "noise," but Max knew the calm was temporary. The threat was no longer just internal. Outside, there were those who were watching, and those who were hunting them both.