Even before EnchantedWorld opened their doors back in the year 2060, it had gained enough publicity to be considered one of the world's most sought after attraction. Inside the park, the environment was designed to look and feel like one was actually in the renaissance era. The sounds of music being played on harps and boisterous timpanis' filled the large peasant town of MistHaven, the innermost city of EnchantedWorld. Familiar smells of cooked mutton and dried meat attacks the senses putting one's mind in a daze and it would actually smell like the 1300's. The S.H.O.W.S even dressed in the appropriate time period clothing and even the Guests would as well to stay immersed and make the experience feel real as possible.
It was an amusement park no doubt, but it was also much more. The company improved on their older designs of animatronics and created them to be lifelike. The S.H.O.W.S weren't these cold robots like being. They looked and were able to think like a human being through advanced coding and programming from an expert engineer in Biometrics. Their coding included their personality, their ability to make choices and the most important thing, their coding made them unable to kill a living being, or even fight to defend themselves.
Years went into designing the S.H.O.W.S, even before Regina Mills was born, her mother Cora was advancing the technology that is being used today within the park. Her mother died before her life's work was completed, but EnchantedWorld had its destiny to open.
When the park opened its doors thirty years ago, even then the public didn't know what to expect, but once inside the park it felt like one was re-born, a new person, the person you wanted to be, but couldn't because of morals or laws. The objective of EnchantedWorld was to satisfy one's need for adventure and excitement by going on thrilling escapades with the S.H.O.W.S. The Guests could go on adventures with Prince Charming to help him wake his sleeping princess from an evil sorceress. Or save Cinderella from her evil step mother and get her to the ball. If a Guest wanted to play the villain, they could. Whoever they wanted to be, Dr. Mills allowed the Guests free range to do whatever they desired in the park.
But that wasn't enough to curve the Guests' appetite. The S.H.O.W.S were beautiful, EnchantedWorld's made them very desirable. So the Guests began pandering to their baser instincts of violence, sex, and gratuitous self- gratification. The S.H.O.W.S went day by day in their modest loops, only to be disrupted by rich antsy park goers that wanted to fuck and pillage them like savages.
Some were never gentle with them.
So, they're not real was the favorite line the park goers liked to use. To prove to other people they weren't a sick individual for going to a park to rape an android, or mass murder some S.H.O.W.S without blinking an eye or even feeling bad about it. A lot of park goers would go broke trying to satiate their desires in the park. A day in EnchantedWorld wasn't cheap. A couple of hundreds would only get someone a wrist band to stay 12 hours. If a Guest was rich enough, some would stay weeks at a time, only to become lost in their delusion, wishing that EnchantedWorld's reality would stick. When security finally threw them out, the real world didn't feel real anymore and most committed suicide from the withdraw symptoms of EnchantedWorld.
For 30 years, over and over again, the Guests would come. And for 30 years the S.H.O.W.S were reset over and over again, their memory wiped clean, leaving only vivid lucid dreams and nightmares of their violent encounters. So when the company began receiving reports of the S.H.O.W.S showing visual indicators of insanity, Regina would recall said S.H.O.W for a tune up. If the diagnostic showed they couldn't be fixed, they were incinerated. A living being destroyed like garbage.
"I know that look Ruby," Merlin said walking out of the examination room with Dr. Lucas. "You're thinking way too hard about something you shouldn't be."
"We have to do something," She finally said."If the S.H.O.W.S are becoming conscience and waking up, we can't let them live like this."
Merlin pulled her into their workstation, away from listening ears. If someone at the facility heard them speaking like that, they would be undoubtedly reported. "And what do you propose we do. Liberate them from EnchantedWorld?"
"Merlin we have to do something, think about what the Guests do to them." She said.
"That's why we erase their memories Ruby, it's all we can do to help." Merlin tried to explain. He understood what Ruby was feeling, but the fact still remained, the S.H.O.W.S belonged to Regina.
"But it's not helping anymore. If Belle can remember, so can the others." Ruby said. "Have you ever stop to think that maybe the reason the S.H.O.W.S are going insane is because of what the Guests do to them."
"So what would you do huh?" Merlin said sarcastically. "Send them out into the real world, have them coexist with the same beings who torture them while in the park?"
"No, but maybe we can talk to Regina. They can live in the park, under our protection." Ruby tries to explain to her colleague. "EnchantedWorld needs to be shut down."
"Listen to yourself Ruby," He stood up angrily in frustration. "This is Regina were talking about. The woman practically bathes in the money EnchantedWorld brings. She would never close down the park."
"We have to a least try." She said, she wished she could make him understand how serious this was. "Goddamn it Merlin, I can't live knowing that the guests are abusing and tormenting a conscience being to the brink of insanity, then we destroyed them like livestock." She sighs. "There has to be something we can do."
Merlin knew she was right, and the S.H.O.W.S were coming in more frequently exhibiting signs of insanity. He calls to mind the S.H.O.W Peter Pan. Peter was one of the first to be driven into madness. He was only a boy, the guests tortured him relentlessly because he was a villain in one of the adventures or "Stories". He had died at least a thousand times and EnchantedWorld kept resetting Peter and clearing him to return to the park. One day he snapped, begin talking to himself, going off his loop and murdering other androids. Now Merlin realized why, he was alive and he was tired of being abused. They recalled Peter Pan and then he was incinerated, only because he was trying to protect himself.
"Robin," Merlin said, but it was meant to stay in his thoughts.
"Who?"
"Robin hood, he's Regina's favorite," Merlin explains. "Maybe if we wake him up, Regina will see that the S.H.O.W.S are alive. Maybe you'll get what you're asking for."
xox0xox
Belle was an anomaly. She was a perfect imperfection and his love for her grew every day. He began to stop worrying about why she was able to love him and began to appreciate the fact that she could. They spent every day together, and everyday Carter felt like she was opening up more.
He made her feel amazing, inside and outside the bedroom. Carter always made sure to remind her that she was all that mattered in his life and his love was so passionate, which was probably the reason why they became intimate. He was capable of reaching into her very soul and pulling something that lay dormant there for so long, she was becoming less concern about him being her father, the deeper they fell in love.
"Did you like that princess?" he asked, while he helped her pull up her panties.
"I loved it." She said slightly breathless and heavily sated. "Just as I love you."
Carter chuckled lightly before lying beside his daughter, transfixed on her beauty and ocean blue glow in her eyes.
She rakes her fingers through his hair, pushing some strand of his hair from his face. "Why don't we ever take things further?"
He sighed, that was a question he asked himself over and over, only now while looking into her eyes does he have his answer. "Because I'm afraid I won't be able to return back to being your father."
Belle giggled and kisses her father. "But you're more than my father, you're my lover too."
"I shouldn't be," Carter confesses to her. "And it's probably the reason you're able to wake up without a command because I'm making you shift between roles." He said,
It was an illogical statement so he knew Belle would overlook it, but it felt good to voice his concerns out loud to her even though she wouldn't be able to understand, or so he thought.
"What do you mean by that?" She asked, cocking her head to o one side curiously, placing a hand on his chest.
"By what sweetheart?"
"That I'm able to wake up without a command." She answered, her eyes filled with wonder.
"I thought you weren't supposed to notice things like that." His eyes narrowed in confusion.
"Why wouldn't I?" She asked, trying to understand the baffled look on his face. It was the same look the young man named Killian gave her when he mentioned she shouldn't have a father. "You know dad lately I've been having these dreams-"
"Dreams?" He inquired, human beings have dreams, not S.H.O.W.S.
"Yes about me being a princess, or warrior, or something- something other than actually me- me now." She tried to explain to him, though she fails to mention she was also dreaming about a strange man as well.
His eyes were focused on her trying to make sense of what she was saying, but he couldn't, all he saw while staring into her eyes was his daughter. He pulled her in for a hug and nuzzled his face into her neck. "You're so different, Belle."
"I don't mean to be."
"It's hardly your fault, it's probably mine." He said. Carter felt like the things he was doing with her were forcing her out of her role as his daughter.
They lie there for a moment more, both of them were wrapped in deep contemplation. Gold's was more regretful of what they've become. How was he supposed to keep up this father-daughter relationship when they were being sexual, what would happen if he did take that next step, how deeper will he fall? While Belle's was more reflective, things weren't making sense, and if she didn't ask questions, she feared she may drift into the madness she was skirting on the edge of.
"What's EnchantedWorld?" She asked, but he didn't answer, only looked at her with a freaked out expression before climbing out of bed, almost like he was scrambling to get away from her. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
"Because you're scaring me." EnchantedWorld was the place she was made, she's not supposed to ask any questions that would make her suspect she wasn't a real human girl.
"Scaring you, but dad I only asked a question."
"Yes but it's the question you asked." He told her. "You're not supposed to know about EnchantedWorld because of- of-"
"Because of what?" She asked
"Because of what you are."
"Then what am I?" Belle asked, feeling the unnerving sensation of deja vu.
Belle was fully sentient.
She was questioning her very existence and who she was. Carter was speechless and incapable of finding the right words to explain to her, but his curiosity got the better of him. He leaves the room for a moment leaving Belle with an uneasy feeling. The deja vu she was experiencing was getting stronger, she felt like she has asked that same question before, and never got her answer. When Carter returns, he's holding a brochure.
He gives her the leaflet hesitantly, he didn't want her crashing again from this illogical paradox he was presenting her. "This is what you are. EnchantedWorld's the place you were built."
Belle looks down at the booklet and begins to flip through the pages. There were pictures of people, but they weren't really people, they were machines. She reads that they're designed by carving and casting a human sculpture from synthetic material. After design, a programmer has coded a specific role for the newly built android. Next is beta testing, where a behaviorist monitors the S.H.O.W.S for a duration of time to make sure they're ready to be cleared and implemented into the park.
Carter watches Belle read through the pamphlet. What she was reading about was normal to him, S.H.O.W.S have been around for more than 30 years now, however they never questioned their own existence. He wasn't understanding, Carter had been to EnchantedWorld many times but none of them were able to think the way Belle was thinking, it was almost as if she was aware.
"A Synthetic Human Object with Stories." She finally said. "So – so you're trying- you're telling me I'm not real."
"No sweetheart, you're real to me. You're my daughter and you'll always be." He said sitting down next to her to comfort her.
She didn't know whether to cry or to scream. What her father, or whatever he was to her, showed her turned her whole world upside down. Everything she was, was built by people she never knew. How was what he was saying even possible, but at the same time made so much sense. Belle always felt different, like she wasn't truly the person she was. But she had no idea she was an android. This couldn't be real.
Belle picks up Carter's hand and places it against her cheek. "We feel the same."
"We are the same." He said, cupping her cheek in his hand.
"Then how can you tell?" She questioned, looking at him with those curious blue eyes that compelled him to want to answer all of her questions.
"You were made, and I was born. You will never age, you'll never suffer from sickness." He tells her. "Belle, you'll never die."
"But if I won't age then how am I seventeen?"
"The scientists programmed you to think you are seventeen, but you were built over 30 years ago."
Built? She shook her head in disbelief, a strong bout of light-headedness was overwhelming her. It just didn't make sense, how could she never age but still remember being younger? "No, that's not true. You adopted me, I have memories of you as my father since I was a little girl."
"It's all in your programming the scientists uploaded you with. Sweetheart, you were never a little girl and we've only truly known each other for a little over a year."
"You're lying," She screamed. "Stop trying to scare me.
"I'm not Belle." He promised.
"Yes you are! You're lying to me, I thought you loved me." She cried, words crumbling as were her feelings.
"I do sweetheart and It's because I love you that I'm telling you the truth." He flips the pages of the booklet to a picture of her.
"Wha-" She gasped. "is that me?"
She was wearing a yellow ball gown, like the one from her dreams. She was smiling and looking happy, like this Belle enjoyed living in her warped reality. Belle was creeped out seeing herself like this outside of her dreams. It was surreal, she was having a hard time distinguishing what was real from what was fake.
"I believe you were one of the first ones they created using the new design, they would advertise you a lot."
"So why tell me all this, why not keep living in your perfect little world with your daughter?" She asked, all of her pain and anger, were in her words.
"I don't know, you're so different from the rest of them." He tells her, lost in his own confusion, but still looking at her with so much adoration. He saw her pain, and felt the anguish she was going through, but it was just so astounding to him that she was unable to overlook this paradox and that she was even questioning it, like a real human being. "I don't know how you're able to think the way you do, but honestly I'm amazed, it's like- like you're alive."
This was a lot for her to take in, to realize that her whole life was a lie. What did she do to deserve this? She looks down at the booklet again and reads: In EnchantedWorld, Guests are given the right to indulge, the S.H.O.W.S are designed to please the Guests most carnal desires. Belle only existed to gratify the needs of others.
"So everything I know, everything I am is a lie," She said, voice breaking as she spoke. "A fake life that someone put in my head"
He nodded sadly.
"But why," Belle asked, although Carter didn't answer, but she took a guess anyways. Hell, the companionship she and Carter had wasn't even a true father and daughter scenario, they were intimate with each other. "Let me guess, it's so that you can fulfill your twisted fantasy of having sex with your daughter." She cried out.
"What, Belle of course not-"
"Then why did you want me?" She asked.
He looks down pathetically, afraid to tell her the truth while looking into her eyes. "I wanted a daughter."
She sighs, even though Belle didn't know who she truly was, she knew that Carter loved her. She knew it wasn't his fault, and he never did anything wrong to her. Even when they became intimate, Belle wanted Carter sexually too. "I think you were lonely. Any man would be."
He nodded.
She hands Carter back the pamphlet. "Show me."
"I've shown you everything."
"Take me to EnchantedWorld."
"Belle I can't. If I take you there and they hear you questioning things like this, they may take you away from me and I can't lose you."
"I have to go, and if you won't take me I'll figure out a way to go by myself."
There was no way he was going to let her off into the world alone, so he agrees. "But why?"
She looks up at him. She loved her Carter, but she knew he wasn't able to answer all her questions. He couldn't explain the dreams she's been having of a dying man or even who the man was.
"I want to meet my maker."
OMG your theories are so good!
Keep them coming. I love reading them.
-RL
