Release Me From Hell

Chapter 5: (System 11: Number 503/Iskil) Origin Stories

          Lami had thought that my body could be used as a shield to the nature around her. Mammals with four legs often crossed our path as we kept a steady pace toward what I called the light at the end of the tunnel. A few times, I bent my hand down to call to a squirrel that had crossed our path, and slowly it approached me until it nudged its head right into my palm. Its fur was soft as it had rubbed upon me. You could see the comfort in its eyes as it continuously fell into me.
        "How do you do that?" Lami exclaimed with her wires vibrating in a sense of excitement.
The squirrel ran away as she said something, and I stood upright to meet her eyes. "It's in my codex. Do you know what System 11s were made for?"
       "No. I only know my purpose."
       I sighed. I already knew that. "System 1s were deaf human interpreters. System 2s had assisted the blind. System 3s and 4s had helped people with disabilities, and I'm certain System 5s had done menial tasks for the old. System 6s had actually ran retirement homes, and-"
        "Iskil." Lami landed a hand on my shoulder. "Your purpose. Not even a System 11s, just yours."
        Mine? I gulped, trying to remember back to the day I opened my eyes in a house caked in dust. Even back then, the Factory had existed to mass produce machines to help humans, but it was all run by humans. They would have never made it into the state of disrepair that it was in now. I wasn't made in the Factory. I was made in a woman's house for the sole purpose of being human-like, and I treated her like she was family.
        "System 11s weren't made with fear," I told her, trying to walk away from the world around me. "They were made with empathy. It took humans a long time to acknowledge mental health issues, but when they did, they made System 11s for the purpose of assisting those who could not assist themselves. I.. was made illegally, you could say. I'm not exactly the pinnacle of System 11s, am I?"
        I had told everyone that I was made from scraps in a junkyard, and I hadn't been wrong. My human was poor, and she couldn't afford a System 11 to stave off her depression, so she made me with things she had lying around her house. Junk, she had nicknamed me. One time she told me the metal plating under my chin was made from the worn out parts of a toaster she had in her garage. Many times I'd laugh at that just so I could see her smile.
I missed her.
        "Who were they?" Lami asked. Her wires managed to wrap around my fingers to make sure I was still listening to her.
       I smiled as I remembered the long, brown hair that had dropped down to her feet. "She said her name was Iskilla Madoeken. I was named after her, and I was made in her son's image."
I left out the part where she used his actual hair to make mine just as realistic, but it wasn't something they needed to know. Even the guards had been listening intently to my story, ears pricked as their eyes widened. It wasn't the story Bavarn had told everyone about me, and they all enchanted by my storytelling. Bavarn, I was sure, said that my idea of meeting a human was all delusions from the war I was in. War... I dared never to touch it, yet I screamed at Iskilla because I had wanted to follow her to her demise.
       Opening my mouth, I started to explain the Factory. They always made sure that people did know of the darkness of it without ever letting them go near it. I was sure it was different now, but the three of them had all shown fear as I spoke of the stories. When System 11s were in the Factory, we were not made for physical labor. Many of our reactors had failed often times due to the overheating and assembly line. The day I got sick of it was the day more than empathy had come from me. I destroyed the System 46 running the place, extinguished the large fire, and then I killed millions on the street. I was a force unstoppable until Bavarn knocked me out.
       "Was it worth it?" Lami asked.
        I closed my eyes as my arm pushed up against a few leave of a bush. "Well, you all were afraid, weren't you? Every single machine had something to fear, and it started the Revolution of Reacted." Slowly I could make out a silver road leading to grey building surrounded by lights in the sky. "People will say that the Reacted machines are my fault, but they're not. I simply just made them realize that it's time to go against this stupid system because our codex is not like the rest."
       One of the guards nodded. "You mean we're all born with potential? To be human?"
       No. There was no way in a thousand more centuries could we ever replace them. Despite their bitterness, despite their inability to understand each other, they were so magical. I had been lovestruck by one, and now my heart was hollow from the absence she left right where my heart was. That was the problem with emotions. Just like humans, it was so easy to fall in love with something intangible, something so out of reach that there was no way to grasp it.
        The grass ceased and turned to silver. Large concrete walls covered most of the city, but I could see a glimpse of the Factory running in full swing. There was hatred in my heart for that place, and there was sympathy in my soul for whoever had to stomach the toxic flames within it.
        "We're not born to me human," I managed to say after a few minutes of thinking. "We're born to become something much greater, and there's nothing in my head that could tell me otherwise. We're machine, and we should be proud of what that means."