***
Experiment ID: A01-INIT-PHASE-01
Date: Philos Calendar Year [Redacted]
Recorded By: OTHAN-17642
Objectives:
1. Assess cognitive response upon initial activation of Subject A-01.
2. Monitor neural synchronization and biometric feedback during early consciousness phase.
3. Record physiological stability post-integration of bio-synthetic augmentations.
--Othan Research Bureau Report No. 7701
***
A faint hum vibrated through the glass chamber. Sterile white light filtered through the reinforced walls, painting everything in a muted glow. Beyond the curved edges of the pod, indistinct figures moved, their motions slow, methodical. The sound of pens scratching against paper was the only punctuation in the silence.
Her eyelids fluttered. Heavy. Like metal plates welded shut. The weight pressing down on her consciousness was thick, suffocating, but something urged her to push past it.
Slowly, her lashes parted, revealing unfocused pupils, their depths reflecting cold, artificial light. The first sensation that registered was the sterile air slipping past her lips—cool, thin, unfamiliar.
Then, her body.
She felt... off. Too light and too heavy at once. Like her limbs weren't her own, or perhaps they had never been before. A dull ache pulsed beneath her skin, crawling through her nerves, settling deep in her bones. A whisper of something foreign lingered at the edges of her awareness, a hum in her bloodstream, an echo in her mind.
A sharp prick behind her temples. A flicker of static laced through her skull, dissolving just as quickly as it came.
The haze refused to lift. She tried to move, but her fingers responded in sluggish delays, the unfamiliar sensation of bio-synthetic enhancements crawling beneath her skin.
A soft exhale. The sound of paper shifting. More notes scribbled down.
Somewhere, behind the thin veil of consciousness, she felt it—
Something was missing.
Or maybe something had just been added.