Brainwaves

It wasn’t about greatness, not even about commitment. Everything Eric strove to be in this world, he did it for one reason and one reason only. To be the first, the best, and sometimes, even the only.

No one got in the way; no one interrupted his trek to the top. His friends, his family, they all told him he was working far too hard, exhausting every ounce of his being, the breathing that he could have saved for living a healthy life, wasted on what all else thought was unattainable.

What made the situation even worse; he never told anyone what it was he was going for. The goal of this madman was a question mark to the outside world. Sometimes, his insides were the ones in need of rescue. What he did that night passed the borders of obsession. He went into his brain, and removed all the parts that held the memories of friendship and family, and so the next day, they weren’t even a memory. They never existed, neither did the concept. All that was left was his mission, and the basic functions of the human body.

Soon, he even tried to take those out, rejuvenating himself through an experimental process, Subconscious Override. He inserted tubes, wires, and all the necessary outlets into his flesh, his veins, all connected to the computer, which he allowed to manipulate the process of sleep and eating through a carefully calculated computer program. It wasn’t just a simulation. His body was put through the cycles of eating and sleeping, however, his brain was kept awake; his consciousness was alive, while his body lay dormant. With that, he controlled mechanical appendages, but usually left them to the most basic of tasks, stirring, clipping, chopping, but only large portions of material, not the minute ones.

And one day, he was gone. His machines had been left behind, but the thing that was Eric no longer resided in the room that had consumed his life. All that remained were files. Those files held patterns, but no one could understand the patterns until a neurologist was given them to analyze and confirmed certain suspicions. Those files were brainwaves, Eric’s brainwaves, which could be downloaded or uploaded into any computer program available. The problem was that the skin he had left behind bound with the machines. Now, they were flesh covered mechanics capable of breathing and bleeding; a twisted symbiote that had no identity other than domination and growth.

The speakers unleashed a horrible shriek when Eric's famil set the flesh on fire. They didn't know that it was capable of feeling, even though it had long forgotten what pain was, or rather, it never knew.

(Took about six minutes to write. Too much caffeine.)