"My memories are… locked?"It took an entire minute for him to register the revelation. Even then, he could only look at the dim rays of sunlight that were piercing through the blanket and blink in a daze.
He finally formed this thought after going over what the voice had said multiple times. It was hard to believe, but then, a different thought came to him.
"Isn"t it better to find out that they"re locked… instead of having to deal with the uncertainty that they might be lost, forever?"
The silver lining made him feel better. The silence around him also helped immensely in letting him calm down. Deciding that it was the right thing to do, he emptied his mind, seeking to go forward with clarity instead of confusion.
Lying on the bed that dug into his back in five different places, he closed his eyes and took in a few deep breaths. When he opened them again, he was ready to begin.
First, he thought about everything that he knew about himself at the moment. He knew that his name was Daneel, even though he had heard himself be called differently. He clung to the belief that this was his real name as he had been able to recall it as soon as he woke up, and no matter what anyone said, that was how he would call himself.
It wasn"t hard to recall the first thing he had heard after waking up. The voice had said that he was in a place called the "Mainland", and it had also given its name.
"World domination system. System, system, system… why does that word sound so familiar?"
It almost felt as if he had said it so many times that it felt natural on his tongue. He pondered on it for a few seconds, but seeing that he had hit a brick wall, again, he went back to that first message.
He recalled the overall goal it had mentioned, next, and slowly… he began to realize something.
His memories were certainly locked, but his feelings were not. Different ideas and even words were making him feel different things, and from these feelings, he saw that he might be able to find clues about who he really was.
The idea made him feel happy, and the experience of rediscovering this emotion felt… good. It also made his mind speed up perceptibly, so he reflected that incessant worry was like a rock that was bearing him down.
He wanted to test the idea immediately, so he repeated the goal over and over again to himself.
"Dominate and conquer the world. Dominate and conquer the world…"
The more he ruminated over the phrase, the more it felt… right.
"It"s working!"
As happiness filled his mind, he felt his lips stretch, while the corners rose. It took a moment to realize that he was smiling for the first time since waking up, and he enjoyed the sensation, letting all other thoughts drift, forgotten, for a few seconds.
Suddenly, the sounds of someone walking by the hut made the feeling disappear. Remembering what the old man had said, he relaxed his eyes and pretended to be asleep, and a few seconds later, the steps receded and silence returned.
He hadn"t heard what they were talking about, but they had reminded him of the conversation he had overheard.
"I"m going to be hanged? But why?! What did I do?"
This seemed to be the most pressing issue, at the moment. Like the voice had said, he needed to survive if he wanted to find answers, and as soon as he became aware of this, he also noticed something else.
"Answers. Yes… at any cost, I must find them, and for that, I must live."
This thought made him feel something stronger than everything he had experienced so far. Immediately, he identified it to be the determination to do something he had set his mind on, and at once, he discerned something that felt important.
"This tenacity… is precious. It feels like a strength that I"ve retained even though I"ve lost my memory… so I must use it well."
As the thought pa.s.sed his mind, his smile returned, and in the next second, he knew what he had to do.
"But how should I do it?"
The question stumped him for a few seconds, but the answer arrived when he went back to the moment before he had received this latest message.
Hesitantly, he spoke in his mind.
"Uh… World domination system? I want you to unlock the memories."
This also reminded him of how the voice had told him that he had taken over the body of someone else, but he filed this away as something else that he would deal with later, after the most pressing question about his fate was answered.
Even though he had been hoping that it would happen, he flinched when the voice returned.
[Command received. Releasing lock.]
Instantly, it felt as if a door had opened inside him, and within lay a flood of images and sounds that swept over everything on his mind. Each and every one was crystal clear. For a few seconds, he let himself be swept away by the flood, but after recalling that he didn"t know how much time he had, he pulled himself out with effort and wondered what he should do.
"Skim. Yes… I should skim! I"ll go through it all quickly, and draw a general picture…"
Setting himself to the task, he lost himself in it. It let him forget everything else at the moment, and this felt like a blessing.
An unknown amount of time later, he once again pulled himself out of the deluge that was just now settling down into some corner of his mind. He still felt unaccustomed to knowing that they all represented what he, or at least, what his body had lived through until now, but he was slowly getting used to this fact.
After spending a few more moments to concatenate what he had seen, he scrunched up his eyes and began to summarise his past.
"My name, or at least, the name of this body is… Daniel Jerrock. I am one of the six sons of the master of this village. I grew up with—oh, c.r.a.p, that"s really a ton of it—with a lot of pampering. I was given everything I asked for. My father owns a lot of slaves, and after watching my brothers, I started terrorizing every slave and villager I could find. I took pleasure from it…and for almost all of my life so far, I"ve been quite happy. I liked training, painting, and… learning about torture. Really? Come on! Ah, I"ll just finish, first… anyway, I was going to be sent to a special school when I turned sixteen, but just yesterday, my father somehow found out that I was not born to him. My mother died long ago, but details of an affair she had were revealed… and I was kicked out of the household. Using the opportunity to get their revenge, the people almost beat me to death… and that"s the last thing I remember."
Even after stopping the summary, Daneel couldn"t get over the memories of all the pain he had inflicted. He remembered dragging away the daughters of slaves to do what he wanted, setting impossible, painful tasks to those who displeased him in even the smallest way, practicing his strength on villagers who were tied into sacks…
It took quite a long time to stop himself from going through them with disgust, and when he finally did, a single thought remained. He knew that he should get back to trying to figure out the reason behind him being hanged, but the thought remained, so he just let it out.
"d.a.m.n… I"m really an a.s.shole."
He only whispered the words, hoping that doing so would let him remove them from his mind, but a second later… he received a response from somewhere near him.
"That"s right…and it"s time to pay for your sins."
His heart leaped to his throat, and as the sound of a dagger being unsheathed reached his ears...he wondered whether he had opened his mouth and summoned death, itself, instead of letting it take its merry time.