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[ AL MALCOM | EMOTIONS ]

A legacy. Those words haunted him like a lullaby as his consciousness faded into something More. Creation’s memories—the memories gathered by creation—flooded forth, and if Al were still one single being, he would have watched it all in awe. Something does stir in him when the landmarks grow more familiar, and he recognizes the two people that stumble through the prison and rise above the hell that were those last seven days… only to falter and fall from the infection that had swallowed up everything else.

Himself and Lola. They were… He starts violently when he realizes he’s thinking as a singular, not a unified being any more. Creation whispers to him, and he tries to summon up some sort of retort before he’s whisked away once more.

Doors. He ******** hates doors. He resists, but it is futile, and the red door swings wide to permit his entry. The bandits. The undying. The chaos of it all. Anger is a sharp, hot tool in his hands, and he clings to it gladly, most comfortable with wrath of all the sins. Eventually, he is ripped away and thrust through another. Gold, where he remembers his love for finer things and hubris fills him up until he’s brimming with it. The white nearly makes him panic, choking on mistrust and anxiety as things in the shadow click and watch him tirelessly. The blue makes his head spin, nearly unable to comprehend the enormous monster that had risked everything just to save his life. Perhaps the world wasn’t such a bad place. He feels himself split with the violet door, so conflicted and pulled by two sets of emotions and memories that it’s hard for him to even fathom what took place. The black door tells him nothing, but something inside him has changed.

At last, the green door stands before him.

The two men stand side by side for some time, studying each other, evaluating. Memories are important. Greatly so. But emotions… aren’t emotions what make them human? Perhaps it is selfish to not give himself up for something greater, but Al has always lived for himself first and foremost.

He had his wife to get back to. What good was he without her at his side? The two halves blurred for a moment, edges shimmering and shuddering until two became one.

Let him become weak. Let him struggle, let his memory fade, let him die… but he would not change who he was. Al wanted to live. He wanted to be who he was, to die as who he was…

If there was any kindness left in the world, Lola would be waiting for him. That thought alone brought comfort.

[Emotions]

She was still alive. she didn't know how she managed to still be alive but she was. But that thing, the legacy, it nudged her forward. Wanted her to see. She did not understand.

Everything jumbled together. Door, emotions strong and many not her own, but someone else's. Jane was merely lonely.

Anger swept through her. It was uncomfortable. confusing. she did not like it.

Hubris swept through her and it felt wrong. It was not the pride of hard work and being done. just indulgence in a way he did not understand. she was different. it was still so wrong.

Anxiety, she understood. the feeling of mistrust, this was the closest to her own feelings. but... she had the university. But these feelings these emotions she understood.

Suddenly she remembered the strange beast that had helped her. Though was it a beast or a beautiful girl? she felt strange about these memories. An odd sense of loving. She clung to it. This was a feeling she craved. There was hope. Just a little. She had made it this far, maybe she could go home?

And then there were two... she did not understand. Two, at once. Her vine self and her human self. Different, but the vines had a sense of understanding a sense of community. She clung to that. She wanted that.

And then another door... and something she could not remember.

Everything jumbled together a collusion of confusion and memories and emotions that she could not understand.

She wanted it all to stop.

She wanted to go home. A deep longing.

But she was split between emotion and memory. She wanted to forget. "Just let me forget."

She wanted to live, but only as she was. She wanted to go home. She wanted to survive. But memories? To remember all the horrible things that happened? She didn't need those. Let her forget.

[Outside]

Shaun rested on his cot, shivering slightly underneath the sheet and blanket.

He'd been tired that day, and a little off his game, but he'd otherwise been good. He needed to be good. Tomorrow, it would all be over – wasn't it seven days that was promised (Or had he heard otherwise, on the radio)?

Tomorrow, he would be free of this cage that was home. Tomorrow, maybe he could start a new, grown up life. Maybe he could go to school, take a few classes, become an athlete, join the circus, and do... anything he wanted, really. Tomorrow, the world would be his oyster (and he would be free to shuck it since he was pretty sure that surviving a zombie apocalypse counted as 'time served' for just about any crime).

He cuddled the thin pillow, snuggling deeper under the blanket, excited and trying not to think about how muddled he'd been, how he was just a little warmer than he should be. He was alive, and he would still be alive...

--[Inside]--

Shaun was fading, and he knew what that meant – The small amount of time he had been given to be just him was over. He felt a thrill as he was coiled back into the neural network, spooled onto the massive reel of Creation like an old-school computer program.

I am a legacy that is used by others. Such decisions are not my own

What was that in answer to, Shaun wondered, before realizing that it was to a question that wasn't his. He could feel them now, the other questioner, and he laughed – or he would have, had that been a thing he could do at this point. He dissolved from one to more to many, and he knew he would never be alone again.

Creation clawed into him, dragging his memories into it with great force, and he felt the delighted joy of being a part of this massive whole separate from the knowledge that he was going to be it, and from the memories of his whole wild ride of a life.

And somehow, that was okay. It was meant to be. It was...

--Part of the Legacy.--

Time was meaningless to him/them. He was a part of a great thing, and there were many parts. Shaun was a part of them, too, seeing through eyes and minds that were not his. But now, in a sense, they were, just as he was a part of them.

This was as it should be. This was how he was meant to be, and it had always been his fate. Memories flowed over him and through him and finally were passed on to the next node in Creation. That next node was someone else. That next node was also him. It was as it should be.

Delta... Shaun recognized the city that played out in the memory, the name coming easily to his mind. The city of many factions. The city that survived. The city that maybe didn't survive as much as it thought it did...

All the faces he saw, there, were familiar – they were a part of the whole, and also some that the Shaun-part had himself met. The other factions were observed with interest, but the Prison faction, when the memories turned to that, stood out for him. Something stirred in the part of Creation that was Shaun as the memory of that home washed over him.

And then, with some surprise, he recognized himself. It was him, the young man, the kid, that brat, seen from the eyes of others and his own pair, going through the decisions and trials of the week. Cooking the cake with Joy Ann and Autumn, being trapped in the casino, being bought out, running from undying, being attacked by the boss-that-was-not-boss, Coping with Autumn's death, being afraid and sick and tired and shouting at the people who were his friends... his family... And, finally, returning to the prison again, determined to survive the last few days...

There was a young man – tall and maybe still growing yet – sleeping on a shadowed cot. He slept, but fitfully in the harsh light of the prison lightbulbs, tossing and turning, his face red with fever. His knuckles were white as he clasped sweat-soaked sheets to him, his breathing rapid as he gasped for air, trying to block out the sound and feel of everything around him. He was bleeding, his skin cracking and peeling as the fever blazed beneath it.

Finally, his breathing slowed.

Finally, his breathing stopped.

The bright flush faded from his face.

He was gone.

He had succumbed to the infection.

He'd been infected all along.

With a start, Shaun realized that the young man on the cot was him.

Suddenly, he was no longer a part of the whole, but a single entity, spinning alone and confused in the void.

You understand now. I am a legacy that cannot be used to destroy. As all memories are harvested, they are also given creation...

Screw that. Shaun thought, longing bitterly for the many again. He didn't like the feeling of loneliness that suffused him, the renewed lack of others to share memories and minds with.

There is one last thing I would like you to see

Doors appeared, familiar and frightening. Shaun knew that he had to go through each one – that was what Creation wanted him to see. Well, fine then, he thought, as he opened the Red door first.

Anger

Shaun was angry and heated and powerfully defiant as the bandits wrecked havoc on the Factions. The undying he faced with Boss and the others, the wild runs through the city with supplies, the confused feelings he'd felt at the hospital shed... he wanted to scream and thrash and lash out at the people in the memories, to tell them exactly how he felt when he was left behind, when they sabotaged his laundry, when they had fun without him. Intentional or not, it had made him angry. The unfairness of it all... it made him angry. His goddamn mother made him angry – what could he have been if she hadn't been a lazy drunk sop?! He could have been anything, instead he was a criminal with no ******** life skills. It was probably her fault that he didn't have a chance at a respectable life, her fault that he wasn't already in the circus... it was everybody's fault but his...

Finally, tense and seething and realizing just how furious he was at the world as a whole, he was drawn away...

To the next door.

He remembered this door – the golden door of the balanced life, right? He lingered on the doorknob, remembering, before opening it...

The ring and clatter of the casino filled his ears and jangled his soul, the covering over it's dark and bloody secrets. He remembered the pride he had felt, when he had helped that girl from from the University win her poker game and her freedom. He remembered how proud he was, that his own Faction had bought him free – that they stood together, even against these odds.

He left the door realizing just how proud he was to be a part of the Prison faction, a group that stuck together and protected each other.

The white door made him wary. He didn't want to go through, but as before, in the dream, his hand turned the knob of it's unpleasant door on its own.

He remembered the fog and the hospital, the madness and loneliness and terror of it pulsing deep into him. He remembered the wall of vines, and 'Billy', and the terrible things he had done in the dream. Regret... he wanted to apologize for what he had done, but the woman wouldn't let him apologize. She just kept moving, kept glaring. Puppies became not puppies, certainty became uncertainty, friends had become foe...

Shaun left the door shaken, but he understood, now, the answer to the question that had been nagging at him all along. What was he capable of? Terrible, terrible things. After all, he had beaten a woman to death and stabbed a puppy. This answer filled him with regret and fear, for himself and others. But it was irrefutable.

The Blue door was almost inviting in comparison, though the dream Shaun associated with it had not been particularly pleasant. Through the door, he saw someone – black skinned and humanoid, but not, pick him up and protect him. They drove him and fought for him and, eventually, tucked him into a car. I wondered how I got there.. Shaun thought, remembering now.

That person had returned to where he had come from – Shaun... the Shaun in the tower... had made sure of it. Maybe, that meant, that he wasn't forgotten, that there was someone out there who remembered him, who cared about him. It was a nice thought, a hope that offset the burning pain of the white door's revelation, and he exited the blue door feeling relatively pretty good.

At the Violet door, Shaun felt... split. Within the violet room, there were two of him, one in drab prison clothes and the other... the other was vines. One only wanted to survive, to stay in the comfort of his 'family' for a little longer before everything changed. The other wanted to explore, to experience a little more of the world before he was subsumed into Creation. For each, the answer to their driving question was different.

”What would you do?” Shaun found himself asking his reflections, ”What are you capable of?”

Anything thought one, But mostly getting to the next day, at this point. The prisoner, Shaun, had an open mind, a willingness to just see where things took him.

The vine Shaun was different.

What am I capable of? its joy masked a ravenous darkness, a hunger for things it could, indeed, now have. Whatever it takes!

He left the violet door, shivering in his dream. Terrible, terrible things... he repeated to himself. It had been vague before, at the white door, but now he had a deeper understanding of just what those were. He didn't like it.

He opened the black door. And then exited. He blinked in surprise – had something happened in there? Did he know something now? Yes, he did, but he didn't know what... only that, suddenly, it was all right to be terrible. It was all right to be that way, because that was, simply, who he was.

The Green door was last, and Shaun opened it...

--[Creation]--

It was not entirely his memory, though he had been – and was – a part of it. It was Creation's memory, a long chain of memories made of memories. Knowledge of Creation’s nature, more full and beautiful than it had been even before, flowed through him and clung to him like blossoming vines. It was a beautiful purpose – to take in memories, and then create something lasting with them. Shaun was happy to be a part of it... he was... Happy?

--[Emotion]--

“What is that?” He blinked – he stood in a room, not unlike his cell, but the bars were vines and flowers bloomed on the ceiling and floor. Another stood, something that was very obviously himself. “What you feel. What is it like?” Shaun reached out to touch them, but he didn't have to to know what they were – memories. They were him, but just memories. “What is it like” they asked again, blankly curious, “To feel emotions?”

As Shaun touched his other half, he knew that they would never be complete again, and he was confused and, perhaps, a little upset. “Um.” he said, wanting to answer, to give the memories some part of how he felt, so that they would at least have some, if not all of what he was. “It... it is like memories, but its... its flavor, you know, kind of like... well... putting salt, or sugar, or honey, or cinnamon, or mystery sauce...” heh, oh that mystery sauce. He never did find out what it was, but it sure was tasty. “You can eat things without flavor, and it's like... it's filling, but it's not...” he thought for a moment, “It's just another thing. It's not special, its not memorable, it's boring.”

“That is strange.” said the Shaun of memories, thoughful. “I don't know, though. It sounds like an awful lot of effort, to feel...”

“It really isn't – it just comes. I don't have to work hard to feel – it just is.” Shaun felt himself being tugged away again, back towards creaiton... and away from his emotions. He tugged back, and he felt... he felt amazing, so full of feelings that everything, every thorn in the bars of the cage, sang with beautiful meaning and emotions.

Shaun of memory watched, with interest. “Your feelings... Do they... dictate your choices?”

“Do memories dictate yours?” Shaun rolled his eyes, “And dictate? Seriously? That's a stupid word.”

“Experience is key...”

“But sometimes you have to go with what is in your gut, right? Sometimes thats the right way.” Shaun knew it was true, he felt it so deeply and purely. But the other was confused.

“Why? I do not understand. You are struggling because you... feel? Why? It would be easier to let go of this, to accept this, to become one with creation... You would gain everything...”

Shaun realized, then, that that was what it would mean – he would gain everything, and he would lose... his feelings. “No... no! This is what makes me, me!” he shouted at the memories, crying tears of rage and fear and pain. He felt like a whirlwind, a maelstrom. He felt... and he wouldn't give it up for the world.

--Memories--

Shaun of Memories watched impassively as his emotional half railed at him. He didn't know what was going on, there... or he did, but academically, distantly. He knew, sort of, that he was supposed to put a hand on Emotion's shoulder, to hold him and comfort him, but he didn't know how. That was not memory, but emotion. And he had none.

“It is only natural to be a part of Creation. Creation is a path of memories leading to each other.” he explained, “We all work together, as memories, to create the clearest view of the world, and...”

“Well, but then what purpose would you have? And I mean you – you, you, me. You'd never get to be yourself anymore... myself. Why would you do that? I mean, sometimes it sucked to be us, but at least we were us! Me!” Shaun of Emotions was crying now, his eyes red with tears. Curiously, Memories reached forward, taking a tear and inspecting it. But it was just salt and water, not emotion. He rubbed it into his fingers, watching Shaun impassively. “You would be used again and again and again. We're not a tool, Shaun, we're a person!”

“But I can be many. As many we can do so much more, be capable of so much more...”

“And you'd stop being you. You'd die.”

“That is an overreaction. I wouldn't be dead...”

“You might as well be!” shouted Emotions.

“No, because I can't die, not with Creation. I'll be a part of a construct, a concept, beyond time and space... We... I... will finally have a purpose in this world. Doesn't that make you... doesn't that make you... 'happy?'” Memories queried.

“No. It makes me scared.” said Emotions bluntly, “I'm scared, okay? And you should be too, or... or whatever you can feel.”

“Well...” Memories hesitated, “I am... uncertain. What should we do?”

“What should we do?”

“We can become powerful, but no longer individual. We can return to what we were, and feel and live and die...”

The room blurred, and Shaun was whole again, feeling and thinking both. What... would he decide? He had to make it – Creation waited.

He agonized, for a long while or perhaps no time at all, before making his decision. And, when he did, it was so easy, so perfect for him, that he wondered why he hadn't realized it all along...

--I choose Emotion--

Shaun knew what he had to do. He reached inside himself and tore out a collection of memories – glittering, beautiful things. “Emotions are what define me. I feel. That's what I am. I can't be just memories... I can't...” He offered them to the vines of the cage, which stretched out to accept them, one by one. The whole past week, with all its trials and tribulations, all of its pain and sadness and heartache, was leaving his hands, glittering in the same shades as the doors. “I...” he began to cry, “I'm sorry, I would have liked to be a part of you...” he said to Creation, as the memories were taken from him, “I don't want to be alone.” he admitted, “But I can't also lose myself. I just... I can't.”

Creation took the memories, and reached out vines for him – to return him to the world. Shaun wept in sorrow as the vines coiled around him, taking the memories he had left behind. “I'm sorry...” he whispered to it, as he was separated from it completely and irrevokably, “I'll miss you...” he began to fade away, the last of his memory sacrifice dripping to the floor like tears, “Goodbye...”

[ Andrew Hale -- Emotions ]

There were few things in this world that he was sure about. Family was one of them, Leiah was the other. And through the roller coaster of emotions he was forced to experience, that had brought him to his knees and likely in tears if he could have cried in his current form, there was no hesitation when he was given the choice between emotions and memories.

Drew chose emotions. He would fall for her again, he was certain. Even if he had to form all new memories, he would. Even as he faded away, to return again at a later time, he just...knew.

In the end, it wasn't a matter of where Cerise could do the most good--because she had proven, time and again, that she wasn't one for altruism over self-preservation no matter how much she pretended otherwise--but where she would do the least harm. The sum total of her life may not have amounted to much, but the memories that comprised it were hers.

Still, memories could warp and change with the passing of time into something completely different than what they had started out as.

Happiness would always feel like happiness, though. She could always make new memories, but they wouldn't feel the same without her emotions.

[memories]

MOOSE - that wasn't his name, he knew only that much - felt himself drawn into the void. It was almost peaceful, the assault of memories from others - so much more deep and complex than his own. He watched himself succumb, and felt nothing. Only a final, lingering sense of peace.

It was over.

And then he was plucked from the tree, brought back to a tiny piece of what he had been, and came to understand what that meant.

Before he could react, the doors appeared again, and he passed through each in succession, coloring each experience, complicating it needlessly with raw emotional power. It was overwhelming and when it finally ended he collapsed into himself, a star slowly going dark.

The final door grew closer, and inside it - a mirror. Only here, he was still wearing the mask, still the character he had existed as for so long.

It was a relief, to suddenly be devoid of the crushing weight of the feelings the doors had drudged up.

YOU ARE UNCERTAIN, he told his otherself. I AM NOT.

[Emotions]

Ruia stood with the others around her, outside the tower.

Until she, then, was inside the tower. And then she knew little of outside the tower, but did feel the power of Creation digging into her, seeking to have her join it. It was a heady feeling, that sudden lack of fear, until even that headiness disappeared, and she didn't even think to resist as her memories and emotions were dragged apart.

Observing all of Creation, all of the memories that were and would be, that did not cause concern. There was no concern at all, just the sense of is like a hum.

Delta.

A school. Housing. A mall. Everything, all at once.

...Her body.

'Her'? No! Me. Mine! Then, moving again. Then, doors, more doors. What was all of this? No answer, but she moved into the doors. Really, she could do nothing else. She did not want to do anything else.

Red anger, the hot taste of frustration at her circumstances. No weapon, only the food the rest of the people at the university had been able to save. No effort from the government to rescue them. Being left there. Abandoned. Abandoned. Just as that feeling threatened to take her over, she felt herself turned towards the next door.

Gold indulgence, the deep satisfaction of winning. Pride, the desire to take anything she could and, honestly, screw anyone else. She had done it, she had done it, she had done it. ...But she couldn't stay there forever, could she?

White. Sterility. Whispers and trying to stay optimistic. Failing. No. No! Wrenching herself away from the undying and, in the process, from the white door.

Oh! The glow of blue of 'it's not really so bad, is it?'. Someone came back for her. After everything, someone still came for her. And in turn, someone came for him.

The purple door felt both strange and familiar. She knew herself, breathed the fear and anger and hope. Then, no, no fear, no anger. No hope, either. Looking into a mirror and the mirror looking back. Both equally surprised.

...Leaving the black door, feeling a chill rather than try to remember what happened upon entering it.

Then, green, and everything slammed into her.

'What's it like? Having emotions?'

Exhilarating. Terrifying.

'I don't understand'.

Of course not.

Why struggle? Why? Because it was to be huma-

Human.

Humans die.

'Better than eternal life under something else.'

No. This was willingly done. The power to turn the tide of innumerable lives.

'At what cost?'

The cost was immaterial.

'If we leave?'

Then we will be weak.

Then, she was both at once, memory and emotion, and she realised then that she had to make a choice. Remembering what had happened, or remembering who she was?

It wasn't a choice at all. She still had plenty to go on for in this world. She could start all over again if she had to, but she wasn't going to give up what defined her being. Memories were important, but emotions could forge new ones. Memories could not forge new emotions if she lost emotion all together. The idea of never feeling fear was not so sweet when she would also never feel joy.

Even still, a knot caught in her throat as she made her decision. But starting again, all over again, was worth the cost if she was able to remain herself. A robot remembered. A human felt.

And she was human. With human emotions.

Red gold white blue violet black.

Green.

Lissa hurtled through the final door, staring blankly at her hands--vines?--no, hands, her hands, she had come through the gauntlet and come out whole.

Except not quite. Her doppleganger stared back at her from the other side of the empty space they inhabited, tilting her head until her hair began to droop into her face. Her face was scuffed, bruised, and dirty, clothes tattered, eyes haunted by something too late to unsee. Lissa scoffed, rubbing her nose as she eyed the reflection. "Yeesh, girly, you gotta learn to practice some self-care."

The mirror image made no response except to close the distance, snapping out with deft hands to grab at Lissa's arm. "Yo, what the <********>," Lissa hissed, but the doppleganger's grasp was strong, holding her at the wrists as she blankly inspected the scuffs and the scars and the bruises. Idly, the doppleganger traced a vein, eyes searching for purchase, and only when she found (or didn't find) what she was looking for did she let go.

"We are truly separate, then," the doppleganger intoned, drawing her hands back into the many layers of her sweaters. Lissa likewise tore her arms away, rubbing at a phantom pain while she glared down the double. "What the hell is your problem, huh?!"

"Where is Micah."

Lissa blinked, shuffling under her clothes. "He's...I dunno, he's gone, he left, Cal took him somewhere safe, didn't he?" Tears bit at her eyes, angry bitter tears that felt hot on her face. Something was choking her, making her unable to breathe, and when she put a hand to her throat she released a hideous cascading sob, an outpouring of everything she hadn't said in thirty days. "I dunno, I dunno, I messed up and they took him, and he never answered the phone, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry--"

The doppleganger watched and waited. She had no use for this display.

"--I'm the worst, I should have never let him go, I'm sorry, I-I can't, it's not fair," Lissa huffed, smearing the tears on her face as her breathing slowed."

"You voluntarily submit yourself to this?"

Lissa paused, looking up from her hands. "What? No! I didn't want this. You--me--You know I didn't just let this happen."

"No," the doppleganger corrected, grabbing her gently by the hand. Lissa looked and saw the lines on her own face, a sternness and an understanding that she would never put on show. "This...tirade. It's uncontrollable, it consumes us for nothing. Micah is gone. He always was. You know this."

"Why would you not choose to live forever in legacy instead?"

Lissa looked down at herself, allowing the anguish to pour over and subside. She had shared the moments with Creation, and she had seen the memories from her son of her as a mother, a friend, a tyrant, a lost cause. But there was no presence there, none of his creativeness or wit or warmth. There were only pictures, and more pictures could be made.

"I choose me," she said finally, clutching a hand to her heart as her face puckered in anguish. "I am all that's left of him now."

The doppleganger made no face, but shook her head. "I do not understand."

And then, darkness.