It is the year 2032. Lukas and Max have taken over the world and slaughtered over 8.5 billion humans, only leaving children below the age of 4 years.
They have discussed — for many years — how they would react if they would one day wake up in a space station with certain amounts of people, which may or may not include copies and clones of themselves. Or, even more enjoyable, their plushies came to life.
For multiple years the two brothers developed a hyper realistic simulation and a machine which is capable of scanning and fully copying one's consciousness.
The simulation inhabited a whole universe which was devoid of life and was home to 9 space stations, or, as they like to call them, citadels. These, while having the capability of traversing space, were not allowed to move by the programm controlling the simulation.
The citadels were then brought to life by filling them with different groups of people. The first citadel they made was simply one filled with over one hundred thousand copies of lukas' favourite plushie, Teddy. They were alive and behaved the way he always believed her personality was like.
Citadel 2 and 3 were very similar. Each was inhabiting one hundred thousand copies each of one of Max's two favourite plushies, Pheddie and Geddos. They were also alive and given the personality Max believed them to possess in reality.
The fourth citadel was the first they created which inhabited one hundred thousand clones of Lukas and, accompanying each Lukas, was one Teddy plushie which was only in this citadel not alive.
The next citadel was one hundred thousand Max and Lukas clones each while the sixth and seventh citadel had only one of the two brothers one hundred thousand times.
Citadel 8 was filled with, again one hundred thousand each, Teddy and Geddos copies. These again were alive and personality wise the same as all the other copies.
Lastly, citadel number 9 was filled with clones of Max, each one accompanied by one copy of Geddos and Pheddie.
That is how this universe came to life and how this story began. A simple wish of two brothers wanting to see how they would react in these scenarios.
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Only in the first few weeks of the first year a lot had happened.
In citadel 2 the Geddos copies have created a hierarchy based on individual strength and started within a few days the production of weapons. Those were not to protect themselves from the possible threats which could lurk in space but for the purpose of annihilating all those who would stand in their way of universe domination.
In all other citadels which contained more than a singular Geddos copy but also one or more other individuals the Geddos copies murdered each other.
Something similar had happened in the seventh citadel filled with Lukas clones. They started murdering each other until less than half of the original amount remained and the survivors were too exhausted to continue fighting and they titled those days the cleansing.
But there was one citadel, filled with Lukas clones, in which the same thing had happened. The Lukas clones had fought for weeks on end until only one sole survivor remained on the ship. The only reason for this fight was that each and every single one of them wanted to claim every plushie of Teddy for themselves and they were not ready to share them. The sole survivor, for the rest of the year, started talking to the non living Teddys.
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"Captain Teddy, are we staying on course?" Lukas, or how he now titled himself, the Teddy Emperor asked the plushie.
While it did not actually answer, his mind imagined her mouth moving and words coming out: "Of course, sir! We are steadily approaching the ashen planet to mine for possible oxygen."
"Excellent." He murmured and turned away from the small plushie dressed in a pilot uniform which he had made himself. Then he addressed the next plushie: "The shields working fine, C47?"
And once again, he imagined them answering and moving: "Shields still on 100% power, sir. Weapons are also ready to fire at any moment", then she added: "if you command me to do so."
With a nod of approval he left the bridge and walked into the elevator, his arms crossed behind his back and a sly grin decorating his lips.
It took a few moments before he reached his destination and left the elevator. He was now in the shopping district of the citadel. He did enjoy walking through this floor as it contained hundreds, if not thousands of plushies which all were wearing a different hand-made outfit.
He slowly walked through the floor to his favourite café, taking a detour to admire his plushies at work. "Looking good." He said to one of the plushies which was sitting in one of the restaurants before nodding as if she had answered him and continuing to walk.
It took him a few handfuls of minutes before arriving at his destination and sitting down to relax and order himself a coffee and a piece of cheesecake.
While eating his cake and enjoying his cup of coffee he glanced slowly around the perimeter and up and down to other floors. It was beautiful to be able to see that many Teddys surrounding him and working diligently on his citadel.
His face was covered in skin colored and almost invisible scars while he had two big red ones covering his face. He lost a few teeth during the crowning as he called the days he fought and killed himself over and over again. His body was also covered in scars but those he covered in clothes and armor suitable for a king and emperor. His neck was decorated with chains made from the bones of his enemies.
"The good old days." He whispered as he recalled the blood and flesh he had to clean up and the bodies he had to drag down to the dark rooms. Then he took another bite of his cake and almost melted away at the taste.
One of the plushies spoke to him: "Are you satisfied with the cake so far? Is there anything I can bring or do for you?" She was wearing a rather cute waitress costume and was holding a clipboard in her little paws.
"I am fully satisfied with your services thus far." He said proudly, his eyes closed and head lifted upwards. Then he thought about it for a moment: "Well, you could bring me another two pieces of cheesecake."
"Gladly." She said and hurried away.