Ava woke up in a cold, white room. He was lying flat on a bad. He recognised it, it was the transferral room back on Mars. The place where Servs got their consciousnesses placed into new bodies. How did that happen? When? A moment ago he was on the roof of the facility on Earth, he was about to go and destroy the radio tower and chop off all connection to the network. Was he really back on Mars?
When did he get transferred here?
"I was monitoring you wirelessly," said a recognisable voice. Ava's senses unblurred, he suddenly noticed that the Major was standing next to his table,
"W-what?" Ava asked,
"When Aphrodite passed the copy-AI onto you back when you needed to hack your way into the facility, she added a command to back-up your data every few minutes. She then told me, well, ordered me, to record it wirelessly if there was any need for me to recover your memories."
"What are you talking about? How long has it been since then!?"
"Two months. And I'd like for you to watch your tone Ava."
Ava didn't reply, two months!?
"You succeeded in destroying the radio tower, and the network as a whole. A real ballsy move. I don't know whether to punish you or not Ava. Not that it matters... it didn't take too long for the Block-1 Servs to get overthrown."
"Overthrown?"
The Major sighed,
"You'd be surprised how much can happen in a couple of months." she said, "can you move? Let's walk and talk."
Ava tried moving his body. His feet, his hands, his arms. They all felt pretty stiff, far less flexible and light than his usual body.
"That's a standard body by the way Ava. All hacking models are gone now. You ok with that?" the Major asked,
"W-what?!" then again, what did Ava need that body for anymore anyway? Maybe having an average body wasn't too bad, it's not like what Block level he was made a difference anymore. Even if he was in a Block-3 body, he could feel that he had the same cognitive abilities as he always had.
He'd just have to get used to this body.
Ava slowly got out of bed. It was pretty hard to get a grasp of, he'd never had a forced transferral before, it was almost like time just skipped forwards two months.
"Stop being a baby. It's not like you haven't transferred your consciousness before." said the Major,
"It's been a while..." Ava replied, "I still can't believe I've been out cold for two months."
"I had to manually travel back to Mars, and then deal with the chaos that was going on here while finding you a new body. Not to mention one for Aphrodite."
"Wait what!? Aphrodite!?"
"Come on." The Major walked to the door, it slid open automatically. She waited for Ava to hobble over, he was still having trouble getting used to his new, weaker body. The two walked out to the corridor that lined the side of the building. The view of the entire metropolis at night was visible from the windows that lined the right side of the walls. They were pretty high up, right at the centre of the city. This was definitely the Serv military HQ.
"What was that about Aphrodite?"
"Wait a moment. I'm trying to connect to her." the Major was holding a long, black device up to her ear, it seemed to have two grills on either side, "remote contact over long distances is really difficult these days. Aphrodite made this miniature radio for me though. I can talk to a few key people who have a similar device." she rolled her eyes, "don't ask me how it works, that girl is always coming up with crazy inventions." even without a human body it sounded like Aphrodite was still a genius.
Ava crossed his arms and waited, he was more concerned with how his plan to disable the network went. The fact that the Block-1s were overthrown so soon after the network fell spoke reams about how the Serv truly felt about their governing body. The whole time it seemed like they were happy with the small council leading their everyday lives, but... it sounded like the moment people were given the freedom to act on their true feelings, they realised how unhappy they were.
And they'd been given the opportunity to change things for the better.
At the back of his mind, what was really troubling him is what had just happened to him, from his perspective, a few minutes ago. He saw Sylvie's AI fade away. She was gone for good.
Dead.
"Yeah, he finally came to,." the Major was talking to the device, she must have been talking to Aphrodite, "five days ago, we reactivated him on Monday remember?" so it sounded like they'd reactivated him a while ago, and it probably took him a bit of time to come to his senses. That explained why Aphrodite wasn't about. "Here? Why do you want to meet here?" a slight pause, "I see, well, we'll wait on the balcony of the thirtieth floor then. I'm sure the receptionist knows you well enough to let you in by now."
Ava crossed his arms,
"So she's meeting us here?" he asked,
"She said it's best if you had some time to relax and collect your thoughts before we get you up to date with everything that's happened."
That made sense. They both knew, from his perspective a person he cared about deeply was gone, and his mind was still recovering from the moment Akira had somewhat taken over him.
The two spent the next hour in silence, they sat on a bench at the huge balcony of the somewhat deserted building and looked over the vast landscape of Mars Central. The balcony was usually where Servs went to relax and get fresh air, it could hold hundreds of people at a time. But this time, only the Major and Ava were there.
Apparently, it was because Serv military had now been sent far and wide across the world on peacekeeping missions. Despite the war with the Evos ending, there was an even greater need for Serv soldiers than ever before.
Ava spent the next hour in thought, still mulling over his choice, about what happened just an hour before, from his perspective anyway.
What was he going to do without Sylvie? What was his place in this new world? He wasn't special anymore, so how could he contribute?
That was probably a question people probably asked themselves all the time back in the day, what humans used to ask themselves. He'd have to give himself a lot of time to figure it all out.
Eventually, Aphrodite graced the two with her presence.
She looked... different. Taller, paler... shinier. She was wearing a standard issue Serv shell, all white. She was standard issue height, her once soft skin was now visibly tensile, her joints were all visible. Even her face, it was similar to her original, but not quite exactly the same.
"You look like you've seen a ghost Ava." Aphrodite smirked, "I'm the one who should be surprised, I haven't seen you in a month."
"What? A month?" Ava replied, he stood up. Aphrodite walked up to the two. She paused for a moment and then gave Ava a hug.
"I've missed you." she said, "my data was sent back not long after yours was, but it was sent back directly via the satellite so I got back a little earlier than you."
"I found her data waiting for me when I arrived. Locked so that only I could access it," added the Major, "I transferred her to the first dummy body I could find. At that point, there was already civil unrest, and I couldn't have the other Block-1s finding out that the data of a human had been sent over to Mars."
"It was a really ugly body," Aphrodite scowled, "she put no effort into finding an appropriate one, like she did for you," so that was why it took two months? "Anyway, the Major helped with trying to replicate my face. But building custom bodies is harder apparently. They put your body on a higher priority than mine in that sense." she examined Ava's body, "how does it feel? It's as close as I could manage to get it to your original."
"This?" Ava looked at himself, come to think of it, the Major did say that all hacker models were gone, that meant they must have taken a Block-3 body and customised it, "you did this Aphrodite?"
"She's been a big help," said the Major, "it seems like despite not having a human body anymore, she's retained all her human talents."
"The ability to learn and invent is a talent you all have," said Aphrodite, "now that the network is gone anyway."
Ava tried to process everything. This didn't make sense.
"Wait a minute. How are you in a Serv body!? You're a human!" he exclaimed,
"I'm half human." Aphrodite replied, "remember? My original body had Evo tech in it. When I met you on the asteroid in space," she paused for a moment, as if she was trying to be careful about how to choose her words, "I didn't survive up there. I mean I was in space, and my human body can't handle the harsh atmosphere. Effectively I guess you could say the original version of me died. However, you hacked me and managed to ghost my personality to the AI, Evo side of me. Not only that, but I guess you made sure that my data was Serv compatible too."
"I did?"
"Sending my data back to Mars was your idea. You did it to save me."
"I see..." Ava didn't really like what he was going to ask but- "and what about me? The one on the asteroid? Is he-"
"Dead."
"How?"
Aphrodite paused for an almost unnoticeable moment,
"You were crushed by the debris after you destroyed the communication tower." she muttered, "you saved me in your final moments. Either way there's no point going there. We're both beyond saving."
That hit Ava hard. He'd learned recently that past versions of him had died in missions before, but he'd never really experienced it. Never to his knowledge anyway. The memories of himself from an hour ago, they belonged to someone who went on to die soon after. They were his but also not. One hour after that moment, he was standing overlooking Mars Central, but from another perspective, one hour after that moment, he was dying on an asteroid flying through space.
"I know. I'm still having trouble getting over it myself." Aphrodite said wistfully, "I don't know if I ever will get used to knowing I'm actually a copy." she crossed her arms, "but I guess technically I was originally a copy of mother anyway. So it's best not to think about it."
A brief and sombre pause.
"Apparently there are conflicts. Conflicts around the world." said Ava, "what about?"
"The Block-4s and Block-5s, some of them are revolting. Cutting them off the network restored their humanity. Unlike Block-3s who were already sapient to a certain degree, the other Blocks weren't. Being introduced to this world full of hierarchy, with the knowledge that they'd been trodden down upon for so long, it built resentment and a huge desire for change." said The Major, she frowned and rubbed her temples, "it's one of the larger concerns of ours right now. The Serv military has been sent out to prevent too much damage being done on either side, but we're not really trained to deal with our own."
"There's a lot your society will have to learn over time," Aphrodite added. "Anyway, Ava, we should make our way to the private shuttle."
"Private? Why private?" asked Ava,
Aphrodite and the Major looked at each other.
"That stunt you pulled," started Aphrodite, "everyone felt it. Everyone on the network. They saw you and Sylvie do what you did. Deep in their minds they felt you release them from their shackles."
"Saying you're a celebrity would be putting it lightly." The Major added.
"Ava. In the eyes of your people. You're a goddamn hero."