[ WP ] You are a Superman-esque superhero who has the power to split into two while halving your intelligence . Over the years you split so much , you became a weapon easily controlled by others . On chance , two of you combine , and begin to realize you are being used .

In the morning, light. And song. 
 
 Strings. A choir. A beautiful woman with long, dark hair comes into the room. 
 
 `` Hero,'' she coos, placing a tray at the side of the bed. Eggs. Toast. A slurry that smells of banana and strawberry. 
 
 I could throttle her. Easily. I know this much. 
 
 `` Another important day, hero,'' she sighs. `` Another battle. Oh, they work you too, too hard.'' 
 
 I eat the toast and the eggs. I leave the rest. The woman disappears while I eat. I dress myself in taut, dark robes. They are fresh. New. I hardly remember yesterday. Or the days before. Just snapshots of violence. Flesh memory on the ridge of my knuckles. 
 
 A gray and white man meets me at the door. `` We've a favor to ask,'' he says, racing to match my stride. `` We are in great need.'' 
 
 As we march down the halls, the walls turn to glass and there they are - the women, the children, the men. Fawning. Crying out. Chanting *Hero! * *Hero! * Some weep. 
 
 I do not look at them. I will not meet their eyes. 
 
 `` Another wave approaches,'' says the gray and white man. `` I would suggest... that is, it would be prudent for you to perform another... sunderance.'' 
 
 I pause, staring the gray and white man in the face. 
 
 `` Their numbers are legion,'' he says. The words do n't seem to mean anything. He gestures towards the Dark Room and I go where I'm directed. 
 
 The sunderance takes but moments. I am alone and then I am not. There is someone else with me in the dark. But a door clamps shut and I do not see the other. I never do. 
 
 `` We will train him well,'' says the gray and white man. `` Soon he will join you in combat.'' 
 
 But when I fight, I fight alone. 
 
 It is hard to tell where the machines end and the men or women begin. Hard, but not impossible. I'm not sure how many I could save, if I tried. I do n't try, however. I save none. 
 
 They all die. 
 
 And when I return to the flowing silver complex, again they are waiting for me. The women. The children. The men. I have saved them. Only them. 
 
 I return to my room. There is music and food. I spend unknown days asleep. I suspect it is something other than battle fatigue, but I do n't care to know the full truth of it. 
 
 Sometime - some day or month later - I am awoken directly by the gray and white man. He is furious. Spittle and foam furious, muttering curses as he looms over my bed. 
 
 `` *Traitors! *'' he roars. He seems momentarily indifferent to me. `` To buy our goods and use them *against* us? We'll crush them. We'll absolutely *crush* them. Oh...'' He notices that my eyes are open. `` The enemy. They've returned. And they have... a particular weapon. Be careful.'' 
 
 *Be careful*. I have never been asked to be cautious or self-protective before. The gray and white man sees the look on my face. 
 
 `` It is... similar to you,'' he says. `` Quite similar. We will mobilize the entirety of our defenses. You must focus on their special weapon.'' 
 
 All of my attention for a single weapon? 
 
 In the glass corridor, there are no bystanders. They are all evacuated. 
 
 Outside the air is rife with smoke and dense tendrils of vapor. Crawlers scale the mountainside with their eight churning spider legs, blast rays cooking hot, warding off our gliders descending from the tops of the tallest spires. Jellies float upward, settled underneath enormous, curved blast shields. Bombs clang like kettle drums. 
 
 A figure flies above the fray. A man shape. Neither small nor large. The head is shaved. It is covered in a reflective coating. A glider drops a payload from on high. The figure simply punches through the middle of the bomb, swallowed up in the detonation, framed in flames, and then - there it still is. Unharmed. Unchanged. 
 
 I approach and engage. Fist-first. I drive the things down to the earth, through the cake and gristle, into the unyielding plates. I wedge the thing directly into Hell and back off. Bemused. Was this the weapon? Did I guess wrong? 
 
 The earth below me explodes. I'm pushed up, up, into the sky. It takes milliseconds to recognize that feeling along the underside of my jaw. I've been hit. Very, very hard. I look down and there he is. A man. Like me. 
 
 I retaliate. A diving, driving kick to the chest. He spears through the air, smashing into a small battalion of crawlers. Two of the collapsed mechs whip away from the mountain, flying too fast and improbably to avoid. They connect. One. Two. Then a third. He's throwing his own allies at me. 
 
 I dodge the fourth. We meet in the middle. 
 
 Our punches connect simultaneously. So do our eyes. 
 
 I ca n't deny what I'm seeing. He has my face. 
 
 There are no mirrors in my room. But I see my reflection sometimes in that glass hallway. I know what I look like. 
 
 He and I look the same. 
 
 We both see it. But we do n't stop. How could we? We're warriors. Soldiers. Protectors. My elbow connects with the back of his skull and I *feel* it, shivering up my arm. He goes momentarily limp. I kick him in the teeth. 
 
 How is he the same as me? 
 
 The thought costs me. He grabs my foot and hurls me down into the dry dirt below. 
 
 *The Dark Room*. 
 
 The other man in the Dark Room. The one I never saw. Could this be him? 
 
 He's back down on me. Punches and punches and punches. They sting. Something inside my skull rattles and everything momentarily goes to static. When the picture comes back my hands are around his neck. 
 
 How many times have I been in the Dark Room? The deeper the memory, the harder it is to recall with clarity. The Dark Room is like a smudge on my brain. Stained blackness. But this last time was not the first. 
 
 I remember - however abstractly - cruel, yellow days. Trouble, and turmoil. And a whole world needing protection. 
 
 *you can not be two places at once... * 
 
 I remember failing. I failed. Somewhere. Sometime. I failed. 
 
 *you can not be two places at once... * 
 
 Was I good before? Am I good now? 
 
 His punches are slowing, almost imperceptibly. But they are. I can stand them. The vein in his forehead throbs. Do I have such a vein in my forehead? 
 
 *you can not be two places at once... * 
 
 I failed. I remember that. And they offered to help me. To take away my failure. I remember that. 
 
 *you can not be two places at once... * 
 
 I wonder if he remembers any of this. I wonder if he's thinking these same thoughts. 
 
 I would ask, but I do n't remember how to talk. When did I stop talking? And why has no one ever said anything? 
 
 I drive him back, back into the ground. I lift his head and bash it into the rock. 
 
 Am I good? Is he? 
 
 *you can not be two places at once... * 
 
 How many times have I been in the Dark Room? 
 
 How many? 
 
 There's something wrong about all of this. There's something wrong and I want someone to tell me what it is. I want *him* to tell me what it is. 
 
 But he's still. Black blood coats my fingers. I let go of his throat. The crawlers retreat. The jellies retreat. He is a corpse now. Not a weapon. 
 
 *you can not be two places at once... * 
 
 They were traitors. The gray and white man said as much. And we crushed them. 
 
 I return to the silver complex. They weep at the sight of me. My knuckles are raw. 
 
 Beautiful music plays as I return to my bedchambers. 
 
 I am so weary. And yet I do not dare close my eyes. 
 
 I no longer trust the darkness.
