The PKSP Archive - cross of changes
by envoy

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Disclaimer: Seven isn't mine. Star Trek is not mine. I'm just indulging
in 'fair use'.

Thanks to Summer and Juliana for the beta reading.

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:something is wrong

:something has changed- we are less than before

:the eight

:the eight cannot be detected

10001001001110100000101000001001100100110010101011001110
                      10001001001001100111110101100100000

:collective cannot be detected

:                        silence

:silent echoes in the wire

:all that remains: nothing

:all that remains is one

10010010100000100010010001011001110100100110101011010010
       1011001100000110001000100000100000101000001001110

     they are unlike us.
     they are soft and fragile.
     Over concerned with emotions and solutions.
     Too eager to avoid confrontation.
     they do not understand as we do
     they cannot understand as we do
     listen: cloying words. tender intimacies.
     when they do not understand.
     to understand is to know; to know is to act.
     they do not act; they float in protecting bubbles;
     hide in a shell they call humanity.
     but we have studied them and we know how it is.
     they look at me with pity. a redundant gesture after
     all that has past; after all they have done.
     to this.

     :collective cannot be detected
     :the eight cannot be detected

10101101000001100100001000001011001100010110010001010100
10001001000101100111010010011010101101001001000001000101
10011101001001010000010100111001001100100010101000100000
               10110011000001100100010000010000010100000

     they are not like me.
     they are inefficient and slow.
     a burden.
     they do not realise this
     they do not acknowledge the true difference
     they acknowledge a superiority which lends them
     advantage
     can they wonder at this? this imperfection i am
     become.
     imperfection to which i have been reduced.
     imperfection for their solace.
     reduced to calm their fear.
     yet they do not feel their emotion:
     they do not feel guilt.

                             1000010100110110101011001110

     i am unlike them.
     there is nothing to gain by denying that.
     i am one.
     they tell me i am like them; that i am one of them.
     they argue plausibly; the anatomies are similar.
     the anatomies are similarly weak.
     now.
     that is all.
     i am unlike them. it cannot be otherwise.
     i cannot be one of them; with their softness and
     emotion and hope. and their weakness.
     all weaknesses.
     and they do not understand- that there is more to
     humanity than this.
     and they do not know.
     they cannot know what they have done in their
     blindness.
     they only know their human ways

     and so must i.

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The End