Tales

Synthia looked down at the sad face that stared blankly at her. She had long ago decided that the entire body should look as natural and normal as possible, but despite the long line of rejected prototypes, the face-with its flattened features and gun-metal polymers that poorly imitated flesh and blood-never seemed good enough.

"Alright, then," Wylin said, "Preliminary checks are go. This is it."

Synthia swallowed, nervous for the first time in almost a decade. It was a unique type of nervousness, not the kind she would have gotten from stagefright or worry and not the kind she got when she made her first tentative kiss. Rather, it was something indescribable. This bulky face was more than just another invention, more than just an experiment. It was her child.

She had known for a long time that she was incapable of bearing children, that nature would not allow it, but that had never stopped her from trying. And now, in the hunk of complex chemical wirings that was lying inert on the table in front of her, she had the chance to beat nature, to do the impossible. She wanted so much for it to work, because if it failed, her child would not have life.

"This is it," repeated Wylin, "Are we gonna start him up?"

Wu coughed, "I do want to see what Al has to say."

Synthia rubbed her fingers on the cold surface of the robot and whispered, "Yeah, let's give it a go."

What followed was the moment of truth. Wylin punched his fingers on the console and turned to look at the machinery on the table. Synthia swallowed hard as its eyes slowly opened.

They told Glen that it was going to be painless. They told him that, in reality, he wasn't taking any severe risks in letting them do the thing they had to do. Regardless of their assurances, though, he went under with a lot of doubt, fairly certain that there was a good chance that he wasn't ever going to wake up again. Scanning his brain was one thing, but this time they were going to open him up to study his neurons in full surgical detail. As the anesthetics went in, he pondered how much he loved Synthia. Hell, he was willing to do this because of her. This was her pet project, and Glen, being the stupid man that he was, volunteered to be her guinea pig for nothing more rewarding than a gleeful laugh and a gracious smile.

He awoke, greeted by surprise and confusion. Uncertain what was happening, his first thought was that the anesthetic hadn't worked and that he was awake during the operation. He was overwhelmed with disorientation and panic; his whole body felt heavy and strange, his closed eyes had an oscillating red glare attacking them, and the only thing he could hear were the intensely loud alert klaxons.

He quickly opened his eyes and looked for Synthia, but she was not in the room. Finally realizing in one brief second of enlightenment that he was not still being operated on-that he was, in actuality, waking up after the fact-he could have sworn that he had just gone under. There he was, though, awake and alone, lying down in a darkened room that was only occasionally highlighted by the pulsing red alarm lights.

He carefully put his hand to his head. His skin was cold, and he was bald, even though they had promised him that they'd only have to shave parts of his hair. They were right about the fact that there would be no scars, however, because he couldn't feel them at all.

But why was it so dark?

Through the fog of his confusion, the alarms finally caught his attention as more than just a passing consideration. A sense of dread filled him and he tried to sit up to get a better look at his surroundings. He was sore, though, and found it incredibly difficult to move. He laid back again, closed his eyes, and tried to find a reserve of energy. It had probably been a couple of days since he had moved, so it shouldn't have been much of a surprise to him that his bones and muscles were weak.

He was amazed, however, when he noticed that he had yet to take a breath. He inhaled sharply and nearly gagged on the giant gulp of acrid air. It was dry and tasted like dirty laundry, but it was still sustaining, so he held it in, milking the oxygen. After another few deep breaths, he was able to relax his diaphragm and take it in through his nose, but was immediately punished by a pungent and acidic smell he couldn't identify.

Forcing himself to breath, though, he found his strength and managed to sit up, but what he saw made him wish that he had stayed on his back. He closed his eyes again and his brain kept telling him that it couldn't have been real. His mind had to have still been drugged; that was the only rational explanation. He gulped down another deep breath of mildewy socks and opened his eyes again.

But the bodies were still there, exactly as before, spread out on the floor in horribly unnatural positions, blood soaking the hard ground and drying on the walls. The blood was black, and the bodies were of people he knew. Glen wanted to vomit, unable to cope with the reality of the scene. He didn't puke, though; he simply stared for several very long, morbid moments.

The klaxons worked their brutish way back into his perception and he looked around in the vague darkness in search of a console that linked to the main computer. There didn't appear to be one in the room. He swallowed, because he knew that it meant that he would have to get up and find one elsewhere.

He wished for a few brief moments that he hadn't woken up, that he didn't have to face this problem. He wished that he was dreaming, or that he was imagining things, or that maybe somebody had slipped some acid into his IV. He knew, though, that none of these fancies were true. The horror in front of him was real and no amount of wishing would make it go away.

But the klaxons did eventually cease, leaving a silence so profound that it made his head hurt and his ears ring. He wouldn't have thought that the noise could comfort him, but its absence-leaving him alone with dead people-was unsettling in a less intense but more insidious way. His desire to leave the room increased exponentially with every second that he remained still.

Tentatively-his legs rigid, his joints stiff, and his mind pounding-he climbed off the table. His feet hit the cold floor, his left heel stepping on something dry and rough. He winced; it was caked blood that belonged to Quig Wu, one of his best friends.

"Jesus," he said.

His voice was surprisingly stale and unnatural. He couldn't imagine it being his own voice, but the thought that it was somebody else's was quickly discarded as absurd. He'd been under for too long and that was the reason his voice was so rough. He hadn't spoken in several days, and his brain had been operated on. He took a deep breath and decided to move on, to get out of the horror of the room before it became too much to take.

The hallway. He had to get to the hallway. Unfortunately, to get there, he had to step over Wu's body and the dried lake of blood. Glen was barefoot, too, which didn't help, but he was able to push himself through the mental gymnastics that were required to divorce himself from the moment. As quickly as he could manage, he walked to the hallway.

But it was the wrong hallway. It was the hallway out of the science lab, not the med-bay. He stood for several seconds trying to reason with the disorientation. Maybe it was the after-effects of his waking up from an operation or maybe it was the dark red glow of the alarm that was causing him to see the wrong hallway. He turned around and looked back, but only managed to confirm that he had come from the science lab and not the med-bay.

Why had he been in the science lab?

Then he saw them for the first time, out of the corner of his eye. Something had definitely moved, and moved quickly. He turned to look at it, but it was already gone. There was another back where he had originally been looking, uncurling itself somehow, but it was too much in the periphery for Glen to figure out what it was. He looked back, but it was gone just as fast as it had appeared.

He heard them whispering in his ears, all around him, but he couldn't make them out. For the first time in his entire life, Glen Hanegraaf felt complete and utter fright, but somewhere in the back of his terrorized thoughts, he was relieved to be in possession of an empty bladder.

He didn't know what to do or what to think and all his mind could tell him was that none of it was real, that he hadn't seen any dead bodies and that no strange phantoms had suddenly appeared. He swore he felt his heart pounding against his temples, and he ran. He ran down hallways, through the mess hall, around corners with no distinct direction, just looking for somebody else alive on the ship. He stumbled on something, heard a shout, and fell to the ground, his hands stinging and aching with the impact.

"Albert!" Synthia shouted.

Glen looked behind him and saw Synthia lying on the ground, looking right at him. It was she that he had stumbled over. Her face was covered in soot, as if she had been staring closely at a fire, and tears had streaked down her face, revealing long strands of ghostly white skin beneath. Additionally, her curly black hair was filthy and matted, and one side was red with blood.

"Synthia," Glen said, "You're alive!"

Synthia was quiet for a long moment. Glen could smell the mild perfume that reminded him of every wonderous thing in his life, and it calmed him.

"What's happening?" Glen asked, panic subsiding, "What's going on?"

"I-" she said, "I can't believe you're conscious! I can't believe you worked!"

"Worked?" repeated Glen, "What do you mean? What's going on?"

Synthia stared at him for a few seconds and then lifted herself up.

"Albert," she said.

"Albert?" Glen repeated.

There was another pause. Glen looked into her eyes and was frightened again. There was something wrong, something he didn't dare put his finger on. He got up and reached out to her, but suddenly came to the horrifying realization that his hand was not a normal hand, that the metal and the badly colored polymers he thought were skin, muscle, and bone were not. He stared for a long time, unable to move and unable to think. He knew he had to be going insane.

"You think you're Glen, don't you?" asked Synthia.

"No," Glen snapped, "I know I'm Glen. I'm Glen Hanegraaf!"

Synthia held his outstretched hand, her warmth reminding him of how inhuman his own body felt.

"You're Albert," she said, "You're my robot."

Glen grabbed his cold, bald head and turned away from Synthia. It wasn't happening. It wasn't real. He was Glen Hanegraaf and this was a horrific nightmare.

"You only think you're Glen because of the brain I gave you. It mimicks his in almost every way, so it is only natural that you would be confused about your identity," she explained coldly, "You have his memories, his thought patterns..."

"NO!" Glen asserted defiantly, "That can't be true!"

He knew it made sense. Somewhere deep inside, he knew that everything she was telling him was true. He simply couldn't accept it; he couldn't believe that he wasn't who he knew he was. It was impossible. It was a nightmare; nothing else.

"Shhh..." she said calmly, rubbing her other hand across his bulky face, "Let me show you."

She walked passed him after a moment, still holding his hand. Glen turned and followed her obediently, but his mind was swimming. He was Glen Hanegraaf and nothing she could show him would change that. The alarm echoed in his head and the red lights attacked his senses. He stared at his inhuman hand and tried to reason with it, and the longer he stared, the more real it began to look. Maybe this was a mistake of some kind. Maybe Synthia was mistaken somehow and the drugs still in Glen's system were causing him to be susceptible to suggestion. Maybe-

And then Albert saw the dead body of Glen Hanegraaf.

It was in the med-bay, on the bed that he had gone under in, the IV still attached to his arm. His chest had been clawed open and there was blood everywhere. Despite this, he had a calm look on his face, a blissful ignorance of his macabre death. His eyes were still closed and he had a strange smile across his lips. It looked like he was sleeping peacefully.

Albert wrenched his hand away from Synthia and grabbed at his eyes, screaming like a tragic Greek hero. This was as real as it got, he thought to himself. He was not Glen Hanegraaf, because Glen Hanegraaf was dead.

The robot flung himself out the door, away from the body and as far away from the med-bay as he could get. He ran down the hallway, screaming in his synthetic voice and ripping at his fake skin. It was too strong for him to tear, but he wanted it gone. He wanted to see that beneath the plastic there was human skin, that, deep down inside, he was still Glen Hanegraaf and that all of this had been some horrific magic trick.

He stopped suddenly when he heard the whispers again. He looked around, wondering where the phantoms were, and the only thing that went through his head was that it was strange that he couldn't cry. The phantoms weren't visible, but he could definitely hear them. He couldn't understand what they were saying, but they were whispering in an agitated and menacing voice. They sounded almost human this time. But, before he could make them out further, they were drowned out by the sound of Synthia, shouting at Albert as she ran after him.

He turned to see her only a few yards down the long hallway, but he wanted nothing to do with her. For no rational reason whatsoever, he hated her. He turned back and continued running, faster than he could have run if he had been Glen. He took random turns, smashing his fists into the walls and into the tables in the mess hall. He broke most of them and left a trail of enormous dents in the ship's corridors.

He kept screaming, unable to think or understand anything anymore. Nothing made any sense-it was all utter confusion-and everything was worth hating. He especially despised Synthia, for being the woman that Glen had loved and for being the God that gave life to this pathetic robot.

When he stopped, he was back where he had started, in the science lab. He was looking at the floor where Wu had been and noticed that the body of his-of Glen's friend was gone. In fact, all of the bodies that had been in the science lab had mysteriously vanished.

"You are not Glen Hanegraaf, you stupid robot!" one of the phantoms whispered.

Albert swung around and smashed his inhuman fist through the open door. He was alone; there were no phantoms in the room with him. He closed his eyes, pulled his hand out of the door, and fell to the floor. If he had had tears, he would have been crying them.

His life as Glen Hanegraaf was over. He had died and was being cursed with some other life, the life of a robot he had helped create. It didn't make any sense, but Albert was certain that it was the way of it. There was no justice. There was no love. He couldn't even cry.

When he finally opened his eyes, he saw one of the creatures in front of him.

It was as alien as he could have imagined, with strange reddish skin and no discernable head or face. It had long limbs that hung to its side and a strange black fur scattered randomly on its fat, breathing body. When it moved, it squirmed in a strange, tight movement that looked exactly the same as it felt to have one's skin crawl. It almost swirled, and then it was gone.

For over ten minutes, Albert sat there, staring through the empty space where the thing had been, puzzling its nature.

"It wasn't real, you know," one of the phantoms whispered.

Albert looked around slowly, but knew that he wouldn't see anything.

"None of this is real," the phantom said.

The robot closed his eyes and stood up. He took a deep breath and, when he opened his eyes again, he saw Synthia standing in front of him. She had the same look on her face that she had had when Glen first kissed her. She was melancholy and afraid.

"I love you, Glen," she said to him.

"I'm not Glen," Albert admitted, "I'm Albert, a robot."

She smiled, "I know."

She walked closer to him and wrapped her arms around his artificial body. She sniffled and Albert knew that she was crying. Several moments passed and then she looked up at him and kissed his metal face. It was an unnatural feeling and one that stung Albert's nonexistent heart. He couldn't reciprocate that kiss, and he couldn't enjoy the beauty of it. He was only a robot.

Wu suddenly appeared in the room. Albert hadn't noticed him enter, but he was there and alive, without a trace of blood on him. With a strange, sad look on his face, he laid his hand on Synthia's shoulder.

"He doesn't work," Wu whispered.

Synthia petted Albert's face and said, "I know."

And then it was over.

Synthia looked at the robot's bulky face. There was no response.

"You turned it on, right?" she asked Wylin.

Wylin looked down at his console.

"Yeah," he said, "Al's up and running. All body functions are going smoothly."

Synthia, agitated, said, "Do we have any brain waves?"

"Nada," Wylin said.

"Damn," she said, resisting the urge to melodramatically smack the science lab's table with her fist, "Let's run a full diagnostic."

"We can't," Wylin told her, "We'd have to shut him off and go in."

Suddenly, Argentin turned from his console at the other side of the room. He ran up to the table around which everybody was standing and held out a printout.

"I think I isolated the problem," he said, "These brain configurations aren't coinciding with his programming. You've created some kind of paradox here and these readouts are showing me that his higher brain functioning is running like a computer stuck in a feedback loop."

Synthia stared at the data. It didn't make any sense to her.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"I'm not sure," Argentin said, "But, if you ask my opinion, I think Albert thinks he's Glen Hanegraaf and it's short circuited his programming."

"Give me a break," said Wylin, "It's got to be a simple configuration problem. Let's shut it down and find the route."

"No, wait," said Synthia.

She didn't know what she wanted to say, but she knew that she didn't want to shut Albert off yet. He was alive; he was breathing. She thought that if she waited, he would magically wake up like Lazarus from the dead. She knew, though, that it wasn't going to happen, that her child had been stillborn. She leaned forward, looked in his artificial eyes, and kissed his artificial lips. She started to cry.

Wu put his hand on her shoulder, trying to comfort his friend and colleague.

"He doesn't work," Wu whispered.

Synthia petted Albert's face and said, "I know."

And then they shut him down.