Parts of Me
“It will be over in a moment.” He told me, syringe in hand and cold eyes upon the fear laden vein in my arm.
“No....” I pleaded weakly, senses fading since the first shot of chems. Fading, blackness... no, don’t close your eyes. I forced my weakening body to fight back. Heart pumping softer and softer, fading again. No, I thought. No.
“Don’t worry, Miss-“ the man looked to the other, gesturing to see the papers, “Ah... Miss Everest,” he affirmed and pressed the needle into my flesh.
My vision blurred to the beating of my heart, frail, weak, soft and delicate.
I blinked awake to a spike of pain; around me blood was spread between the pieces of arms and legs. I tried to cry, yet no tears fell. I heard my voice, uneven, shaking, “No, god no... what’s happening, where am I?”
The pain in my head stinging, burning and pulsing and I knew no peace then. It was as if someone had buried the blades of a machine within my head, silencing all but the shriek of my pain.
As it broke the barriers of my sanity I looked down upon my hands to see it, they had made me into one of them. Broken and torn, pieces of vague glimpses shot through my mind. The year was unimportant, but a glimpse of a newsreel revealed that I stood witness to a time after the fall of China and India.
“Ev... Everest, remain calm,” I assured myself, shifting my eyes around and about the sterile environment. Calm down, or you’ll die. I told myself, time and time again. Realizing now that the pain was subsiding, the white and black room lit up by the flashing of a red light. “CODE 39, CODE 39, Power supply offline.” The metallic voice spiked the pain within my mind and flesh, forcing me to push onwards. My hand of lifeless metal grabbed hold of a key card, yet I felt nothing as my fingers grasped it to the sounds of inner machinery.
Dank, dark and cold was the corridor that followed in the wake of my nightmare. I must go on, but why? You’ll die if you give up. I tried to reason with myself. Distractions. It was a welcome one, keeping my mind off the migraine and flashing lights, through another door and another.
I entered what seemed to be a special chamber of some kind, nearing the pods within I felt the beating of my heart. As it pulsed to the thick air I leaned forth, squinting my eyes to watch the men and women in orange suits. Nameless and ageless, numbered, and forgotten.
There must be way, there must be a reason for this. My thoughts wandered as I walked up to the console to search the prisoner Ids. I flipped through the creative interface with a few swipes-interrupted by the sudden sound of a door opening, followed by the heavy the steps for which crept closer with silent and muffled echoes.
I held my breath as my eyes wandered to the doors, slowly, creeping backwards with subtle steps, hands curled against the pipes.
The sound grew and grew, mechanical in steps as one of the doors opened up to my room. God, please... save me, save me. I prayed silently to the crackling noise of a constant stream of static. What is the reason for this?, all crept upon my mind to fill it entirely as I fell to my knees as the machine entered.
Tall and disfigured through metal and living skin it shifted its gaze of death around the room, first scanning the pods, one by one as I sunk down against the corner, wimpering.
I recalled glimpses now of flashing cameras, hundreds, no thousands stood before me to hear my words. Words, I couldn’t remember.
“NO!” I screamed, my head felt like it burst open as I cried to tearless moments of despair.
“Everett,” the machine stated, flatly as it turned to watch me, then neared me, step by step as the clicking machinery within the once upon a time, man: sung its wicked grace.
The air grew thicker still as the moment froze, time halted to the beating of my heart. Who am I? Why am I here? I wondered, stricken by fear, frozen by despair. Why god? Why? I questioned the maker of our universe, our world. Why? I asked again, no one answered my prayers but the machine before me. By a Cold, rigid grip around my throat the inhuman held me up. I feel no pain. What hell is this? I must do something, anything. I looked around near me, as it leaned closer, breathing its cold and lifeless air against the skin of my face.
I closed my eyes, uncertain as my free hand reached for anything, feeling the clamour of barren hope as I gripped around the pipe and broke it loose, shoving it into the cogs of machine man, deep until the metal of his spine held it in place.
“Everett,” it stated, clenching around my throat I struggled to the noise of creaking metal, the pain within my mind awakened
as I shoved my elbow into its arm, freeing myself from its prison.
It grabbed my wrist, “Everett,” it stated, metallic and imposing in its own flat and emotionless state.
“Let go of me!” I screamed and pulled, falling backwards as my wrist was torn off and the machinery revealed. What... am I? What have they done... to me? I screamed within my mind as I panicked, slipping upon the blood-mixed oil as I crawled with the machine following.
As I quickly arose to my feet I ran up to the nearest door and through the slid as it opened. Quick feet carried me onwards through stairs and corridors and then I entered a room filled with people. All turned pale as they looked up me with frowns and wide eyes, disgusted, Fearful, brutal in their wicked honesty.
I felt the growing frown upon my features as my brows furrowed, “Why am I here?” I asked them, but they only stared at me. “Answer me!” I affirmed and stepped forth.
They fled from my words and visage. Don’t run, don’t leave me alone, please, I pleaded silently. “Please....” I spoke to delicate steps, eyes wandering through the room of computers and screens of various kinds. These ones seemed to the monitor other machines. Machines like me. I saw them, through the screen before me as they walked around, like empty husks, lifeless. No meaning. No purpose.
I had so many questions, yet the only reply I found was the Machineheart that kept me alive. It pulsed and thrashed to the
razors which shredded my senses, sharp it twisted and gnarled away at my sanity. Everett... the name, I remembered as I looked through the consoles to the shifting lights of red once more, hearing the shrieks of the alarm. “CODE 31, CODE 39, CODE 39, Batteries damaged, power supply offline.”
I hugged myself. No more, I can’t take it... no, you must stay... you must stay strong, struggling against my will and diminished hope I ventured forth in search for something. Perhaps a meaning to it all, someone to answer for what had been done to me.
The pulse within my flesh pounded as I ran. It didn’t take long until I reached the quarters of the workers. Section B, Showers, the title on the door said. Safe to say I entered and looked around, noticing a lonely man standing with his back against me.
What stole my attention however was the mirror to my right. My face and open muscles shifted to my movements, mixing the living with the cold dead metal.
I turned to look upon the man, “What am I?” I asked him.
The door flew open to the shouts of many, loud noises sparked through my ears as reflex took hold, muscles shifting to a quick burst of movement against the men in armour and weapons.
I felt uncertain, unknowing as I pondered to their brief screams, legs and arms bent as I forced myself through their lines, venturing deeper within the complex.
Arduous steps followed as I came upon another room, empty of all but the flashing lights in the ceiling and the banging
machinery within myself. The alarm torturing my senses further as I squinted to read a message upon the vast screen before me.
L5 Subject Everett.
I blinked to flashes of memories, failing to find all but one. My child, my daughter, no... She isn’t me, I am not her.
“Why do they call me this?” I heard my voice question, “Where is the exit?” I asked the computer and it showed me the way as I ran and ran, nearing the final door I heard shouts coming from behind.
“Miss Everett, don’t,” A man stepped forth the group of armed men, hands in his pockets as he perked a brow behind his flat glasses.
“What am I?” I asked him and rested my hand upon the door.
“Hope,” he said.
“Hope?” I questioned, confused.
“Yes, Miss Everett, Hope,” He replied, gesturing for his men to open fire.
I raised my arms to the feeling of coursing lightning, legs buckling to the pain of sound and fading mind, crackling and tearing at the last bit of living mind that remained. I looked upon them as the memories of my past flashed before my eyes to the return of my pained mind. She is not me, she isn’t, she’s someone else.
The memories were hers, not mine. Only thing we would ever have in common was that neither of us would know peace. Fading now once more as darkness took hold. I heard the sounds of the machinery that was me, contorting in pulse to my anguish. If I was Hope, why was there no peace for I.
