The Rise of Jacob Keller

[Leo]

"Well then, since it seems that I have no other option...It would seem I have no choice in the matter." I said sneering at the AI ship.

"You run like a yellow guppie should, do you know that?"

"Well, when you have a huge AI cruiser chasing you across half of Sirius..."

"I'll give you that one, Jacob. Now...down to business. Do you know who I am?"

"Obviously, Nemesis by your IFF that you're transmitting. More than likely a rogue AI that's lost it's true reason for existance."

"Hit the nail on the head, what use did I serve?"

"I don't know, automated soup mixer in a homeless shelter somewhere?"

"Don't get lippy with me, meatbag. I once served a group that was funded originally by the Liberty government. The group went rogue after an accident in a secure location, and caused the men and women of that project to lose their minds and fall under Nomad control. This was a long time ago, of course, just before 800 A.S. I'm not even sure if the Liberty Government remembers the situation.

"After the Nomad wars, most of the people infected were cured and saved from their ailments of the infection. When they were cured, a lot lost their memory of anything that happened beforehand. It was deemed a possiblity that because of the infection, that they had a certain protein in their blood that caused memory loss from the incident. Some retained their memories, however, those people remained silent. Never speaking of what happened in those labs and what happened all those years after the incident.

"In 810 A.S, several of those men and women went missing. Their lives abandoned. Their homes left as if they were simply going out for a walk on the town. Information in Alaska went missing off the computers, entire disk drives stolen. Men and women of any projects aboard the station reported no strange sightings or any unusual activities aboard. Further investigation of the people who reported nothing missing, came up with the same protein marker in their blood and scans of their brains indicated the same protein marker."

"So their memories were wiped."

"Yes. The data that was stolen was of the same project almost 12 years beforehand that caused the rogue element to break off. One of those disks was my AI program. Until two years ago, they studied in silence, taking people with certain abilities and bloodlines. They named themselves "Tainted". No one is sure how the name started, but they were a group so evil and sinister that no one would come out of any of their ships the same as they went in.

"Two years ago, a man named Leonardo Masuyo destroyed the group from the inside out. One of their prior men, his memory was wiped somehow and he regained bits and pieces of his past, and used that information to terminate the leaders of the group, effecively shutting down the group for good. The men and women later discovered had no memory of what had happened since before the Nomad war. The same protein markers were present in their minds indicating a memory wipe. Only half of the group "Tainted" was found, the other half were not present.

"Scientists have studied this marker further and discovered that when this marker is present, their memories are gone. Each of people in question were once infected by a Nomad. But only some gain the protein marker. Some don't, and remember everything of their past as a Nomad. They believe that this is why they continue the Nomad's plan...because they remember it."

"Why are you telling me all this? What does it matter? I'm just a Mercenary looking for jobs."

"Because, Jacob...you're not Jacob. You're--"

"There! There that bloody thing is, kill it!"

"Bloody hell. We'll talk again Jacob, until then...good luck."

The ship turned a bright white color, and faded out of focus and with a loud pop, the ship vanished.

"Damn! It jumped! Get back to Malta and defend the planet. Keller, I told you to get out of here in Eta. I suggest you do so now."

"Yeah yeah..." I replied.

"...you're not Jacob."

What had she meant?

---

You fear oblivion. Yet you forget. The universe remembers every atom of your being. Even dust hums your name in the dark.

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Starlight Research Consortium | The Banished Legion | Astral
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