"Open your eyes...".
What was that? O-open my eyes? I search my mind for the right answer, the correct action. Then, open my eyes. I blink a couple of times before seeing a rather different thing than the regular black. I see a lab, made of silvery metal, a floor..which also seems to be metal, and a young woman, standing infront of me, in a long white lab coat. She is holding a piece of wood, with a paper attached to it.
"Is everything working properly...?"
She spoke again. Everything? I touch my fingers together, and wiggle my toes. I look back to the woman and nod slowly. When she speaks, she opens her mouth, and uses something in her throat to make sound...I should try it....
"Gyuhhh...?"
I search my memory again, looking for a set of words I can use, or maybe something to help me speak. I can hardly get anything out of my throat. Finally I manage to say, "Where am I?".
The woman is even more surprised than I am, "Oh, You speak.". She jots down a couple of things on her paper plus wood invention, then smiles as she looks up from her writing and stares directly at me. "Then, your name will be Rei. I am your creator, Rui.". She stretches her arm out, and holds a hand infront of me, "Take my hand."
I nod slightly, and stare at her hand. It is very pale, and looks very unhealthy. In any case, I reach for her hand, and grasp it tightly. I notice she is pulling me off the table of which I am sitting on. As she does this, I place my two feet onto the metallic floor, and lift myself up off the table, putting all of my weight onto these two feet. Does it take this much work just to stand?
Rui now is trying to help me walk forward. I already know this stuff, but I guess I can't blame her for trying to be safe. I step ten paces forward then walk backwards back to where I was. I turn to look at my creator's expression, searching for any sign of satisfaction. Ah, just as I suspected, she is indeed pleased with me.
"Alright then, Rei. Come with me, and we'll do a bit more tests.".
I follow obediently, struggling to keep a fast pace. She had brought me into another room, quite smaller than the one before, and had me sit down in a small black chair. The walls of this room were very bright white, and hurt the eyes when looked at. First she had put me through a hearing test. Just simple little rings. She says I've perfected the test, a bit of surprise lacing her tone. Next, was the seeing test. Another simple thing. And another perfectly done test.
"It seems you are perfect in both hearing and seeing!"Rui exclaimed excitedly, pulling her hand infront of me again. She has a very wide grin, and a slight sparkle in her eyes.
I stare at her hand blankly. What's with the sudden change? Does she want me to grab it again?
Rui's smile dropped, and her hand moved back down, "...Rei?". What did I do to make her so crestfallen? She glanced behind herself, looking towards her computer, then placed a hand over her mouth. "Oh no,-"the rest of the words were muffled. I strained to pick them up, I managed to hear, "I can't believe I'd forgotten..".
….Forgotten? There's nothing missing, I'm perfectly fine the way I am. She even said it herself. 'Perfect in both hearing and seeing.'. Although, she hadn't said I'm perfect in everything. Before I could say or ask anything, she had already gone over to her computer, clicking away at her keyboard keys. I lurk over, trying not to make a sound. I scoot over to her side, staring up at the screen. It's bright green in color, and rather huge. Thousands of numbers, mainly zeros and ones, are scrolling down the screen, at quite a fast pace. "What are you doing?". I figured it would be nice to learn something that I don't already know.
Rui turned to face me for a mere second, then went back to staring at her computer screen, "You don't have something very important.".
"Very important?".
"A heart, Rei. A heart."
A heart? I search my database for the word, but nothing comes up. Strange, I'm sure I've heard of it before. Oh well, it doesn't seem like I need it anyways. I turn away, and sit near the back of the room. I continue to watch her endless clicking...
Over the next few days, Rui had tried her best to teach me the ways of life. Although she was too stupid to realize the brain she had installed within me had already contained the knowledge of life. Once something is born, it grows, and as it grows it may someday hit an endpoint, and disappear. Rui says that I will not be able to reach an end, because I'm not a 'human'. Apparently she was.
I noticed her bending down close to the ground, digging into the sodden earth with a small shovel. I calculated how deep she had gotten it. Two and a half feet. She placed a small tree inside of the hole, and pushed the dug-up dirt back into the hole around the tree. "Rei..do you see this tree? It is one of the very many vessels of life. Someday, this little tree will grow....it will grow far more bigger than it is already. As it ages, the bigger it gets,"She explained to me. It took me a couple of minutes to register this newly found knowledge.
"Rei...why don't you smile?"
I stare blankly at her. Smile? I studied her expression, she obviously was testing me. She already knew the answer. "I don't know..."I answer flatly.
She does not like my answer. I watch as my creator turns around, and hurries back to her lab. I guess I have upset her with my answer. I follow her into the room with the computer. She is already typing away. Just what exactly is that computer for anyways? Moving closer to her, I look over her shoulder. However, I notice something different from her regular stare. Her eyes are wet, and dripping water, or some type of liquid. I lift my hand to wipe one of the drips away, "Rui, what is this stuff?".
"Tears, Rei,"She said, sniffling a little. She used the side of her sleeve to wipe the rest of the liquid off her face.
I search the word tears, however I can think of nothing. "What are they doing on your face?".
Rui sighed, "When someone is very sad, they cry. A thing called tears falls from their eyes. It's..kind of ha,-"
I instantly cut her off, "Then how come I can't cry?".
"Please don't be difficult, that's the last thing I need right now."
"Then at least tell me why you are...uh, crying.."
She gives me her regular 'Why do you pester me' look. "Well, I'm sad because I've failed...I've failed as a scientist, I've failed as a human, ...and I've failed to keep my family,"She answered. More of the tears came, then she leaned over her desk, shivering. "What about me? A family,"I search my mind for the right information, "Is a group of people living together. I live with you, don't I?..Why can't we be a family?".
She turns around, her eyes wide. Please don't tell me I said something wrong again. Instead of yelling, she wraps her arms around me in a warm embrace. She is crying heavily now. "You're right, Rei. I'll be sure to make our time spent together the best..".
Rui is now back at her computer. She has allowed me to read her set of books, hoping that I may grow more knowledge. I flip quickly through the pages, scanning each and every word, registering them into my mind. The story was about a boy, and his pet. The pet grew of age...and ending up dying. The boy had cried all day and night, but came the the conclusion that the pet must be happy, now that he can dream forever. I scan the word death over and over, but cannot come up with anything. "Rui..what is death?". She must obviously know.
She explained to me while she still continued to type, "Remember I told you that everything reaches an end? Well when they finally do reach that end, it's called 'Death'. You however, will never meet death. Because I've made it so that you cannot ever die.".
I nod slightly. I save this newfound knowledge and continue back to reading. He ended up getting a new pet, and moved on. He had forgotten about the one he loved half his life, and moved onto something else. I toss the book down on the floor, and reach for the next one. I find no interest in these poorly made stacks of paper. I guess Rui just wants to keep me busy so I do not pester her.
A couple of hours pass, and I start to hear a light rumbling sound, coming from the black-haired scientist. She is leaning over her desk, her eyes closed, with a slick trail of slobber slipping out of the side of her mouth. Ah, that's right. Humans have to shut down every so often to restore energy. I am not sure what to do, so I continue to stand by her side, looking at the computer. It is flickering bright blue, to bright red. I slowly lean over, and pull my hand towards the screen. Before I could touch it, something grabbed my arm, pulling it back.
Rui gripped my arm tightly, keeping it away from the screen. "Rei...."she began. That was not a good tone. She sat up, wiping saliva off of the side of her mouth with her other hand. "Rei,.."She repeated herself.
"Promise me, you will never open this program".
Program? She has been working on a simple program ever since I was created? What a waste of time, I think absentmindedly. "I said PROMISE me!"I heard Rui's yell, which seemed to snap me out of thought.
I nod because I cannot find the right words to say. Whatever this program is...it must be strong, if not even I can open it.
"Rui..I went to the store like you had asked,"I say, walking into the scientist's computer room. I set the bags that I had In my hand, and looked around the room. Rui was not there. Shrugging my shoulders, I go into the kitchen to put away what I had brought home. She wasn't in here, either. She was rather small and wrinkled, last time I looked at her. And very unhealthy too. Maybe when people face death they vanish? I wish she would've made it more clear to me. Nevermind, it doesn't matter. She'll turn up somewhere.
It has been two-hundred years now, ever since she disappeared. I counted. That equals to 73,049 days of boredom. I stare blankly out of the doorway to our..I mean my home. The tree that me and Rui had planted is very tall, just like she said it would be. I'm surprised it didn't wrinkle and shrivel up like she had been before she vanished. The house was decaying aswell. The door fell off it's hinges, the walls were starting to crumble and fall apart, and the roof was nearly blown off from a bad storm.
Suddenly I hear a beeping sound coming from behind me. I quickly spin around, only to see Rui's computer flashing bright blue to bright red again.
"Promise me, you will never open this program."
Her words still spun around in my head. She's gone now, so it doesn't matter if she will yell at me or not. I slowly inch towards the monitor. The colors were hurting my eyes the more I got closer. Finally I stopped, and leaned over, reaching my hand towards the screen. I touch the smooth computer monitor....
Suddenly the colors started to flash from Red, to blue, to green, to orange, to yellow, and so on. I feel an intense thing going on in my chest,...and then, I finally realized...everything.
"Ko...ko....ro..."
The words came out of my mouth like a broken record. I was missing emotion this whole time. The liquid that Rui called "Tears" started to pour from my eyes. I dropped to the floor on my knees, gripping my chest. A rough beat was pounding against my rib cage, almost as if it wanted to get out. I search my mind, finding a new set of knowledge. I'm crying, because I am sad. But why? I strain my mind trying to remember, what causes me to be so sad.
...Rui! She....she's gone. After she spent her whole life working on me and making this heart. "M-maybe she isn't dead..just yet,"I say to myself hopefully. I charge outside for the tree, because it seems to be the only place she could've gone. Last time I saw her she was standing out in the door way, looking out at the great pink tree. ..Why did she have to send me out. Another feeling struck my heart, a feeling that seems to be called regret.
I finally reach the tree, looking around the thick roots. She isn't there. I hit my head against the tree, nearly screaming in both pain and sadness. Over the sound of my whimpering I hear a crunching sound. Of leaves and sticks. I turn around, to see a young black-haired girl, with a gentle smile and a warm pair of yellow eyes.
A wide grin spread across my face, as I ran towards her. I wrapped my arms around her, burring my face into her shirt. "Rui...I'm sorry...I thought I'd never see you again, I opened the program like you tol,-"she put her hands over my mouth, so I could not speak.
"The program worked fine..."she muttered, looking at me with surprise. I wonder what would've happened if the program hadn't worked, would I be gone? Wait...humans cannot live forever,..then how is Rui still alive? It doesn't matter, I'm just glad she is here.
"It filled me..with..so many feelings. I'm so happy,"I say, still smiling. I have my arms still wrapped around her aswell. However I notice a slight unhappiness in Rui's expression. "W-What's wrong...?".
Rui gestured me to follow her as she started to walk around the tree. She pointed towards the ground. I nearly choked down a scream. A bone which belonged to the arm poked out among the grass and weed that sat below the tree. I pulled the bone out, revealing a whole skeleton. "R-Rui....W-W-What is this...?"I ask her, stuttering heavily on each word.
"I'm dead...those are my remains,"Rui said, her voice low and depressing, "I don't have much time on earth..". What!? R-Rui is dead...just as I expected. Those heavy drops of liquid poured from my eyes again. However, I should man up...a boy should not cry, especially infront of a girl. I used my sleeve to wipe the tears off my eyes, then gave her a serious look. "There's nothing that I can do to help you live again?".
"No,"She answered quickly.
I stammered, "B-b-but you gave life to me!".
"It's not the same."
"Then at least...stay with me for a couple more hours...that's all I need,"I say. I am determined to get her to stay! There must be some way. I finally receive Rui's nod of approval and reach for her hand.
A couple hours had passed, of playing and rolling around in the leaves that fell from the giant tree behind us. We lay on the ground, arms around eachother, smiling happily. Nothing could break such a wonderful moment. That beating in my chest, that Kokoro... it is bursting with so much feeling, I cannot contain it.
I could not handle my new Kokoro,...and sadly, I shut down. It wasn't until another five hundred years later, that I was found lying under a tall, old tree, with my arms wide open, as if I were embracing something. The two who found me, whose names were Len and Rin, decided it was best to leave me be.
...I love you.
Note: This was a first try at first-person style. I may finish this with a second chapter, in Rui's point of view, though I am still not sure how yet.
Kagene Rei and Rui are fanmade vocaloids based off of Len and Rin
This story is a mix of different PV's and translations. I only claim the writing. Thank you. :'3
And no critique, I have a rather weak heart.
And I'm sorry, towards the end, I started to get writer's block.