Dyed blue hair. Pale skin. Brown eyes. Makeup. Tattoos.
First look descriptions. Short chapter of a long story. Sometimes meaningless. Sometimes everything.
Her first looks of you are filled with nonexistence. Emotionless. Empty but not quite. There's something there. Something life-like but not life. Dark.
Part of a machine.
This is what she thinks of you.
A flaw.
This is what you think of her.
Hotel rooms are lonely. This one was no exception. There were people across the hall with the TV up too loud, but she was still alone. Different from everyone, but not quite wrong.
Scratched the itch on her wrist. Stared at the wall. This was wrong.
Stood up. Walked around the room once. Twice. Three times. On the fourth, she got angry.
No pain in her wrist. Still scratching, she looked down at the smooth expanse of skin. Well, kind of skin. Looked like skin. Felt like skin. No complaints from other people who had touched her. But to her, it didn't hold the same life that others' did.
She was always different. Always stood out. She hated it.
Ran a hand through her hair. Wanted to run.
The urge to flee was almost unbearable. Waiting was sending sharp stabs of pain to her gut, but it was strange because she shouldn't have one. The doctors discovered that. Discovered that it wasn't just her outward appearance that was different. Her insides were wrong. They didn't know why. She didn't know why.
A knock on the door.
Turned her head. Stared. Slowly walked to the peephole in the door and looked through it. No one.
Stabbing fear coursed through her. She turned away. Continued to pace.
Nervous energy danced around the room; she could taste it. Smell it. All from her. If anyone was outside, she was sure they could tell too. More stabs of fear.
Took a breath. Ignored her emotions. They couldn't matter now, not in this situation.
She walked over to the bottle of champagne that had greeted her on the way into the room the first time she walked in. Picked it up. Opened it. Took a sip. Tasteless.
Disgusted.
She took it over to the sink and tipped it. Watched the liquid pour down the drain. Smiled. The act didn't give her pleasure; instead it made her feel power. She stared at the label as she poured it out. Her smile grew. This thing cost upwards of one hundred dollars.
When the thing was empty, she smashed it against the sink. An easy feat for her, but not for others.
Glass glinted on the ground and the sink. A shard had lodged itself in the mirror. She eyed it, smile growing. Her face looked deranged, even to her. Ran a hand through her hair, brushing it out of her face.
Good.
Walked over the glass, uncut.
Opened the door.
Walked out. Time to leave.
There were shouts from down the hall. She looked over her shoulder, no longer grinning the demon grin. The people from earlier that day were there. She looked forward again. Walked quicker.
She felt dizzy, the same dizziness that comes from smoking. She needed to keep walking. Walking but not running.
Turned a corner. Ran down the stairs. More shouts. Running footsteps. She forced herself to sprint faster, faster than a human down several floors. The footsteps running after her faded, but she kept sprinting.
Run on gasoline.
If she had a heart, it would be beating too fast.
The man at the desk in the lobby stiffened. She didn't stop.
Out the door. Down the street. As far as she could.
Train stop.
She slowed down, debating. Stopped. Waited. Heard the sound from an oncoming train slowing down. It stopped. Opened its doors. She walked inside.
People were staring. Whispering. She had been in the newspaper that day. Not on the front page, but she'd had a long article written about her.
She stayed standing as the train moved. People were moving away from her, out of their seats and farther up in the car. When a few rows emptied out, she sat down in the back. People turned around in their seats to look at her. She ignored them and instead entertained herself by looking out the window at the street nearby. This city was laid out strangely. She was used to it.
She remained in her seat until the last person on the train walked out. She was going to the last stop; the farthest away. Couldn't be seen by the people earlier. Had to avoid them. Tension cracked across the sky, and she looked up. Lightning. It had timed itself perfectly to the beat of her inner clock.
Someone was staring at her face. She stared back, made her gaze emotionless. She wanted to be nothing. Low on self esteem. Running on gasoline.
Whispers in my head.
You can't wake up, this is not a dream. You're part of a machine, you are not a human being.
Walked away. Tried to ignore my mind. Wasn't working.
Rain. Hurricane. Thunderstorm. Wanted something.
Water hit her skin. She looked up at the sky again. Something was there. Something loud and dropping water from the clouds. No smile this time. Just turned her head down and kept moving.
Someone saw her. Grabbed her. A car pulled up. Door opened. Shoving.
She didn't know how, but she blacked out.
Woke up strapped to an operating table. This is not a dream.
"I think there's a flaw in her code."
Flaw. Code.
You are not a human being.
"Kill it."
Fear.
Struggle.
Push.
Pull.
"No".
Her small voice filled the room. Her hands were cold.
She may not be human compared to their standards, but she was alive. They created her.
My body may be a machine, but my mind isn't.
Who are they to tell someone that they are not a human? Especially someone designed to be a human? To act and move and talk and feel and think like a human? They couldn't just take that away because she disobeyed them once.
But they were.
"I'm sorry."
Nothing.
