Chapter 1
He became aware of himself but complete darkness otherwise. He tried to open his eyes, and they opened. His opened eyes revealed a small aluminum desk with a holo-player set on it; surrounding it was a darkness so thick it looked like it could be a tangible obstacle. He looked down to see himself, a tan colored naked human body, hands and, legs. He sat himself in the chair at the desk. He looked back up to the holo-player and opened the first holo-video. A blue, semitransparent scene came to life. A humanoid creature with wrinkly skin and short, dark hair was looking at him in some sort of laboratory, or something like it.
"Wel….Ch..rLIE. WELco…arlie," Repeated the creature in the broken hologram. 'Welcome Charlie' he realized was what it was saying. 'Charlie. I'm Charlie. Yes I am Charlie.' Charlie said in his mind. He subconsciously pressed the button to continue on from the first recording.
The next scene started to play. "Say hello to C…..ny." The broken voice of the creature could be heard, but instead of the first creature the face of a human girl, around the age of 10, could be seen. She had a round face with a pointed chin and very dark hair. "Courtney, this is Charlie." The creature said
"Hello!" Courtney said smiling and with a cute, semi-high pitched voice. Then the video turned off. A second later it turned back on to reveal another screen. On it was a list of names listed in pairs, following alphabetical order. Most of the names were unusual, but a few stood out, the first of these being Charlie and Courtney, then a second pair, Jirako and Jijna. And finally Viktor and Via. Next to each name was what looked like a title. Charlie only managed to catch two of these titles. His and Via's: 'The Man', and 'The Winner. After the holo-player finished it's quick scroll through the names, the holo-player powered down and the single light above Charlie went out.
Charlie woke with a start. He had just woken from a dream is all he realized. He looked around to see he was lying on a molding mattress, on a pile of garbage, in an ally. He wondered what he was doing there and tried to think back before he fell asleep, or even a few days ago, but he couldn't remember a thing. Nothing except his name, the five other names that had stood out to him on that list, and the wrinkly creature from the first holo-video. As Charlie tried to remember anything else, he felt something move at his side, and he looked down to see the girl from the second video, Courtney was he name, still around the same age, lying asleep, snuggled up next to him. Charlie just stared at her wondering what they were doing their in the alley as she slowly woke up.
"Good morning." She said with a smile after noticing Charlie
"Good morning." Charlie replied as Courtney gave a large yawn. "Hey, do you remember how we got here?"
"Well, we… No. I don't remember how we got here." She whispered, a little fear creeping into her voice.
"What all do you remember?" Charlie asked, his concern rising to very high levels very quickly, though he did let it show through his voice or face.
Courtney sat and thought for a few moments. "I remember your name, and that you're like my older brother, though you're not actually my brother."
"Well, that's something I can't remember." Charlie said
"I remember a name, Sier." Courtney said, staring off into empty space.
"I remember several other names, but, again, not that one." Charlie said, looking around the corner of a dumpster toward the entrance of the alley.
"What names do you remember?" Courtney asked looking back at Charlie
"I remember ours," He said, "but also four others. Two boys, Jirako and Viktor, and two girls, Via and Jijna."
"Okay. Do you remember anything else?" Courtney asked in a quiet voice.
"Nothing else." Charlie replied
"Me neither." She said. After a few seconds she threw off the thin sheets they were using as covers. Charlie looked down to see that he was wearing a pair of dark green cargo pants held up by a utility belt, and a black long sleeve shirt with shoulder guards covered with a light brown cloak. He had black boots on, and on his wrist he had a digital watch with a cheap looking communicator attached to it. He looked over at Courtney. She had her short, black hair back in a pony tail and was wearing loose pants and a shirt that went well past her hips wrapped around with a utility belt. She also had a cloak; however, her cloak only went down to her waist. She also had a watch with communicator.
"Well." Courtney said hopping up from the mattress. "Let's look around. Maybe something will jog our memories."
"Got nothing else to do." Charlie said, accepting Courtney's outstretched hand to help him up, which she did with incredible ease. She seemed to be incredibly strong Charlie realized. They exited the alley to see a heavily populated, industrial area with lots of both air and land traffic. They walked over to a safety rail and looked over it to see several more levels of walkways below them, also busy.
"I think this is Coruscant." Courtney said confused, and a tad bit exited.
"What are we doing on Coruscant?" Charlie said to himself
"Maybe we live here." Courtney answered for him.
"What if we don't?" Charlie asked
"Yeah. What about our parents," Courtney added. "if we had any." She finished quietly.
"Well! We live here now." Charlie said with determination; a determination to make it in this world or any, but also a determination to strive even as a… 10 year old? 11? 'How old am I?' Charlie looked over at Courtney, who was about the same height as him, to see her smile fading as his had just moments ago. "Courtney, do you have any idea how old I am?"
"Huh?" She said confused
"I can't remember how old I am. Can you remember?" Charlie said. Courtney closed her eyes.
"You are 13 years old right now," She said after a few seconds, then opened her eyes again. "but not for long if my memory is true."
"Well it's the only memory we've currently got, so we'll stick to it like it was the sun coming up each day." Charlie said smiling
"Fair enough. Now do you know how old I am? Because I do not." Courtney said keeping her smile the whole time
"Lemme think." Charlie said, really thinking; thinking as hard as he could. Taking in all of her physical characteristics he could, plus any fragment of sub-conscience memory of her that he could, one number kept coming up on top.
"11." He said confidently. "And I believe newly so."
"Really? Can you remember my birthday?" She asked
"I can almost." Charlie said. "I have a hunch on what it is but I'm not 100% sure."
"Well, I'm sure I know your birthday." Courtney said smugly.
"And that day is?" Charlie asked curious, expecting Courtney to tell him.
"Not telling. It'll be a surprise." She said, "Because we could never successfully do it when you were expecting it." She gave him a friendly punch while smiling.
Charlie smiled back. Then realized… "You remembered that you couldn't surprise me on my birthday!" He said smiling wider
"Yeah! At least that's something." She said happily.
"Come on." Charlie said heading back to the alley they came from. "Let's assess our supplies, or lack there-of, before we go anywhere."
"Agreed." Courtney said following Charlie into the alley. They go back into the alley where their mattress was and lifted it up to see if anything of use or value was underneath it. There wasn't. They then snooped around the pile of trash next to the mattress and found a single Galactic Credit. Courtney put it in one of the pouches in her belt. Charlie then checked the dumpster as Courtney checked a broken freezer.
"Nothing." Courtney said coming over to the dumpster that Charlie had recently started diving into to reach the depths of it.
"Well." Charlie said popping his head out. "I've had a little luck. I've found a key ornament, not in the best of conditions, but it still looks ok. Here's also a trophy for who-knows-what, made of some sort of metal, could make us some money if we sold it, and look over there, next to my shirt and cloak." he said pointing to His left, Courtney's right. "That is a jammed pellet blaster and here are two pellets that go with it. There's probably more in here, but I don't want to search any more. Move out the way, please. I'm coming out." He said, hopping out of the dumpster. He was covered in filth of all kinds. There was filth in his short cut light-brown hair, on his face, on his well-toned bare chest, and stained into his green pants. He was a mess.
"You're filthy." Courtney said plainly.
"Ha. I'm aware." Charlie replied chuckling. "I had something else, something just for you." He said searching through his pockets and pouches. "Where did I put it? Huh? What's this?" He said pulling out a handful of 10-Galactic Credits.
"Oh my." Courtney whispered.
"Count these." Charlie said handing them to her to search the rest of his pockets. After he finished searching his pockets, he had her search her's. Over all they found 613 Credits from both of them and two small beam-lights. They each got one light and Charlie took 300 Credits and Courtney got the rest.
"Well," Charlie said after they had distributed the money. "I think now we can get going."
"Then let's go." Courtney said following Charlie out the alley and down the walkway to whatever lies ahead of them.
Hello again! This is the first chapter of Man or Machine, hope you guys like it! Once again, criticism is appreciated, and flame just makes my review counter go up.
I forgot to do this in the prologue so I'll do it now before I get in trouble. I don't own anything about Star Wars except my OCs. Everything else belongs to Disney. Good old Disney, buying everything up, but I won't go into that. :D
Please follow this story for updates, leave a review if you want, and join me again for the next chapter. Bye!
-TheGreatNate