What constituted one to be alive? Was it the heart beating along, pulsing blood along? Or Was it all those signals in the mind, having a never-ending chase-up? Was there any difference between the two? The heart had thoughts, and the brain had blood. no distinction to speak of, when one thought about it by a that much.

However, it did take all those thoughts, all those responders to sensation, to figure out that there was any blood running in the first place. Without the brain, one would not be able to realise there was any heart. However, without the heart, the brain could still figure itself out for some time.

Back a few decades, that idea might not have been sustainable. In those darker days, humans were constricted to whatever the heart fancied. It decided when the blood ran around. That had changed drastically now, where there was nothing to stop people from jamming artificial organs up in their bodies. Who needed an organic heart, when one could just have a nuclear-powered pump in its place? The age of hearts was gone, and the time of the mind had begun.

In conclusion, the mind had triumphed yet again, deciding itself to be victorious. It would have been a sad thing if it had made itself the loser. What would have been the outcome of the mind’s loss? Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. Nobody would ever know, those brain of theirs always deciding themselves superior.

Though… was that the truth? Was that mind all that great? Yes, it might have been capable of balancing many of those thoughts. Yet there were much too great at doing that for too long. Where was that balance when it was needed? It was perfect in times of peace, but it all ran downward when it came to those few moments of trouble. When it came to the critical moments, there were no opportunities for critical thinking, that part of the brain shutting right down. What great parts of the brain were in that scenario? Perfection shown off until it was put to the test. Right shit, that was. Nothing to be proud of, contrary to what many would say.

And there wasn't much better in the other departments. Design failure upon design failure. As a fun fact of the day, the brain had a default on it always hiccuping. There was a specific part of the brain developed to inhibit that permanent default. If those connections were ever damaged, whoever hit would be cursed with the symptoms of a full meal eaten. For their entire life, of course. It would never stop, all because of the fact that evolution found hiccups to be the most important thing in the world.

Nothing good came from that stupid evolution. Failures made up the ninety-nine percent. Some would say that humans were not part of the lucky one percent. That was perhaps true, even. Not much good to be found in those bodies. Bones were brittle, DNA prone to get cancer before anybody hit eighty. Couldn't have made themselves a little more durable, of course. One small hit to the side of the head was enough to cripple anybody perfectly. Something the size of a toothpick was wholly capable of causing irreparable nerve damage, the only factor stopping it being the reality of chance.

And going one step back to the heart, the only thing stopping that particular organ from being a right pain in the ass was the position that the body was in. Lying down on the fact, likely having been thrown on the floor minutes ago, was a perfect example of how the body could be riddled with pain, all of it starting from the place that all the blood came from.

Nothing came out of the body. There were no wounds to see. Yet Troy could still feel every time the heart pulsed. He could feel it reminding him of the fact that was still living, made to endure the mass of needles inside of him. That was how it felt like, at least, some part of himself feeling the need to torture the other sides. Nothing good came from it, but who could tell it that?

Not Troy, of course. He could do most of nothing. His body was unwilling to be much use. His earlier visit to the medical wing felt like nothing compared to what he had now. Tiredness everywhere? Damn it, did that sound good. The absence of whatever existed now. His skin felt ready to tear itself apart, bursting into a thousand pieces. How had he ever felt anything negative about that lack of sensation? That had been heaven, nothing to complain about. A void was better than this, no arguments needed to be had.

What he would not have given to have it. Instead, he was forced to move painfully. His face was smudged against the cold floor, making the man several kinds of uncomfortable. Slowly turning his whole body to move, pain being sent through in increased magnitudes, was a hard thing to do to himself, but it needed to be done. He needed to know just where he was.

Getting the back of his head hit to the floor allowed much to be seen. The coldness on the warm skin was close to feeling scolding, yet it was thrown off as just being over-sensitivity. Troy just ignored it, as there were more important things to see. And the first detail noticed would have been the colouring.

It was darker than normal, nothing as lit up as before. The corners of the room showed off shadows. An unprotected lamp was above him, just high enough for a human to never possibly reach. Not that he would make any attempts to actually grab it, of course, as there was no chance he would get up from his position any time soon. It was just the first thoughts that had been made.

The next would have been the colouring of the place. There were no white walls, and most certainly no floor or ceiling to match. There was a dark grey, bordering on pure black. Without the lamp to shown off the sheen, Troy would have believed himself to be blind. No matter. It wasn't like there would be too much of a difference.

While it was akin to pricking himself with small needles, he turned the eyeballs around the place. Almost a minute was spent in an attempt to find a door, an exit, or anything that would let him get out of the hellish place. He could not move, yes, but that was perhaps not permanent. It was not a bad thing to plan forward, and he was desperate for a ray of hope.

No ray was to be found, however, and certainly no exit of any kind. It might just have been hidden in the darkness of those corners, the light not reaching the edges that well. Or, as a more disturbing alternative, it might also have been hidden in the walls. This place was well-known for its use of secret doors. It would not be too much of a surprise to find that their jail cells had one of those as well. No chance of Troy trying to break down the door, if he didn't know where it was, to begin with.

…

Oh, yeah. He was in a cell, detained until further notice. He had woken up in here, never realising just when he arrived. He was in pain, he was cold, he had trouble with the basic task of looking around, and he had been betrayed to the utmost degree. There was not much that could be done right now, nothing physical that his body could reasonably get done. No way for him to escape right now, even. He couldn't break down any of the walls, no matter how much he tried.

He was supposed to have escaped right now. Or, maybe he wasn't, instead of lying in wait somewhere hidden, until the time to strike came along. Troy would not have known. He had agreed to follow Dr Hale’s words perfectly, without question and without hesitating. No asking for details and none of that wasted time used to think about the reasoning. Results would come from just following her orders. That had been the premise from the start.

Again and again, that way of thinking had been shown off. Dr Hale had sliced into his shoulder with a knife, berated him for everything he had ever done in his life, and had in the end just betrayed him without looking regretful about everything.

She had looked regretful while doing it of course, though that might just have been done under an image of fakery. A double-layer made to think that the woman felt bad for her actions, yet still doing it as a means to an end.

It was all meant to be done for the end result. Troy was supposed to endure the pain, so that they would make it into the world, with Adam in their hands. He was supposed to go through all the pressure, all the time spent constantly being watched as if nothing was wrong, to begin with. He had been forced to force himself through mental breakdowns without showing the slightest sound of it. He had had trouble getting a second of restful sleep, only allowed to be comfortable the second where he had a moment of peace.

Troy had lived through the pits of hell, and he was supposed to have gotten a reward at the end. It wasn't supposed to have been anything big. Just… anything would have been fine. Something he could point at, and see that he had been the cause of it. Even if they had failed, even if they had only gotten some of the way out, Troy would have accepted that he somewhat succeeded, if only temporarily.

That would have never happened, however. It had all been rigged from the start. Was that storage device even real? Was anything they had done capable of making a difference? There was not a high chance of it. Why would it? It had all been one stupid experiment.

What had it been about? What was the point of it all? Dr Hale had said that Adam had refused, and Dr Fidelis had apparently appreciated the response. Was that what they wanted to know? Just had to make sure that the Stockholm syndrome had set in correctly?

Was the story he had been told true, even? Was the AI one with multiple incarnations? Was he actually a tortured soul? Was that just another lie, that had been made to play on his heart-strings? If that was true, it had certainly worked.

Troy had been utterly fooled. He had done so many things. He had lied to one of the only people that he had trusted, willingly going along with it all the way. There had been thoughts about making a difference, yet it was beginning to be obvious that none of his actions had any meaning to them.

Those few movements that had been made were stopped before they gained any momentum. What good would they have done? Nothing would work. Information made to deceive would not help him break the loop. He was wit mind, yes, but his body was betraying him. His brain was ready to go, yet his heart was not pumping hard enough for him to do anything. This was not a life to live.

He would probably die soon, honestly. He had done what he was supposed to. Dr Fidelis had said it was over. Though, that might have been a lie as well. He honestly didn't know. He knew nothing. He could only guess.

And he guessed that, at some point, somebody would come into this room, and shoot him in the head. It was only a matter of time. Maybe it was a second. Maybe a minute. Maybe it was a whole day. He only knew that the time would come. And he would do nothing but patiently wait.

Because that was everything he could do.