Tears of a Monster

"Please don't kill me!" screamed the pathetic human. Afterwards, a blast sounded and that was the end of that squabbling human's life. Not even a scream of pain. Why was that? Did I not prolong his miserable life long enough? I must be losing my touch. Whatever. What do I care how long they live? Although…

Juunana tapped my shoulder to wake me from my trivial thoughts.

"What's wrong?" he asked me. "You seem distracted."

"Nothing," I said defensively. "You're imagining things." I looked away to hide my true emotions. Who knows what he was thinking. He could conceal his thoughts and emotions so well. I always had to hide my face. I wondered how he could do that. I looked back to the broken and corrupted city. Any city that we had even gone near ended up like this. Pretty soon, there wouldn't be any left. That would mean no more discount shopping. What would I do then? I shrugged off the feeling and took to the sky. Juunana didn't follow, which I was grateful for. He was probably going to play 'ki games', a little juvenile game he invented in which he sensed out the survivors of our attacks and killed them with his eyes shut. I didn't like torturing humans. I hated them enough, better to kill quickly and get it over with. No sense in wasting time on them. As I flew through the sky, my thoughts dwelled on the one thing that bugged me most, the one thing that had been dominating my thought every since I was switched on. Why? Why did I hate them? Was it because I wasn't like them? What am I saying? Of course I'm not like them. I'm better than them. They're all weak and useless. Gero programmed me to hate them. The only good thing that they do besides drain areas of natural resources was create good outfits, but even that was beginning to dull and fade away. They were becoming down-right un-fun lately. I didn't notice when I began flying a little low. I scanned the ground carefully, and my cyborg eyes spotted a human half-covered by debris. The human was a female, probably around 12 years of age. I smirked and dropped to the ground. The human girl was wailing her fool head off.

"Someone!' she cried, not aware of my presence yet. "Someone please help me! Help me! I'm stuck!" I walked right up to her lifted the chunk of debris of her, tossing it aimlessly to the side. Her whining ceased as she looked up at me. "Thank you!" she cried, again, not aware of who she was dealing with. I waited to see if she would recognize me, and slowly but surely, it dawned on her that I was the woman who put her under the debris in the first place. I was a woman not to be trifled with. "Jinzouningen!!" she shrieked annoyingly. "Get away from me!" She began scurrying away on her hands and feet on her back. I almost laughed at her pathetic display of fear. I rose my hand to blast her into oblivion, but something on her face caught my eye.

"What in the hell is that?" I demanded. The girl's movements ceased. She sat there trembling, attempting to mouth out the word 'What?' "That on your face!" I yelled, answering her unasked question and pointing. The girl slowly touched her face, and wiped the unknown liquid from it.

"A...a t-tear," she whispered, still trembling. My database quickly processed that and found a definition. So it would seem most of my victims 'cried' these tears before I killed them. I was just so busy killing them to ever notice. I wondered why I had never seen a single person cry before. Why couldn't I do this? I already answered that before. I wasn't like these humans. I was better than them. Juunana and I could mask these pathetic emotions with ease. Well…at least Juunana could. I just didn't seem to have the ability to do so. What did that mean? Was I more human that Juunana was? That was impossible.

"How do you humans cry?" I asked forcefully. The girl didn't answer immediately.

"W-when…humans…g-get scared…or sad…or hurt…they st-start to cry…" Her insufferable sobbing and stuttering was aggravating me. It was clear she was in no condition to answer me positively, and I was in no mood to wait for her to calm down, so I rose my hand once again and blasted her without a second thought. Her response, though, did send my mind into questions. When humans get scared, sad, or hurt, they start to cry. I never got scared or sad, and no one has ever hurt me, physically, or mentally. Just angry, satisfied, amused, and other emotion unrelated to tears and crying. I didn't understand how I could've had those emotions, but be missing fear, sadness, and pain. Whatever, those were weakling emotions anyway. I probably could do better without them. But still, that child looked so frail, and weak. It made me sick just thinking about it. She never did answer my question completely, and now that she was dead, I probably would never get the answer. But who was I kidding? There were plenty of humans on Earth still alive. I could ask any one of them. Now that I thought about it, none of them were brave enough to even be in the same room as me, let alone talk to me in a civilized manner. Actually,…that wasn't entirely true. There was always that hybrid freak, Lavender. I don't really care what his real name is. He's nothing more than another victim to be at my hands. He was probably at his precious mansion right now, thinking he's safe there. I'll just go pay him a visit and he'll answer my question. Not wasting another second, I took off to find the hybrid.

That house, Capsule, came into view rather quickly. It was exactly the way I left it last time I had encountered it. I turned my scanners on to saiya-jin DNA. My memory banks had recorded it, since I had killed two saiya-jins before. It picked up on a life form with the same DNA, located around the back of the house. I floated effortlessly on top on the dome-shaped house and sat, watching the hybrid with my sharp eyes, as he trained, seeming to attack an unseen enemy. The little twerp was probably training to kill me and my brother off. For many minutes, my presence remained unnoticed by the young teen as he sparred alone. Finally, the moment I was waiting for, he suddenly lunged from his spot on the ground and attacked me with full force. I dodged with even thinking and went into a defensive position.

"Nice reflexes, Lavender," I commented.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded, baring his fangs. I looked at him with a serious face.

"I have some questions that only you can answer, kid," I replied calmly. My demeanor must've spooked him, because he was trembling slightly.

"W-why me?" he stuttered just a little.

"Because you're the only person who won't babble on in fear and are the bravest person on this backwater planet Earth." I glared at him. "And don't take that as a compliment." I could have sworn for a second there, he nearly smiled, but it was replaced by a frown before I could tell for sure.

"How do I know I can trust you?' he hissed. "I should just kill you right now. You saved me the trouble of finding you."

"You couldn't kill me even if you really tried," I mocked. He lunged at me again, and to prove my point, I tripped him, and pinned his left shoulder to the ground with my foot. "Stop it. I want to ask you my question." He didn't resist. "Why do humans cry?" My inquiry seemed to shock him, which wasn't the reaction I was looking for.

When he finally regained his composure, he said, "Why do you want to know?" I remained silent, thinking of a suitable answer.

"Because I can't do it," I finally responded. That sent him into further shock.

"Why would you want to cry?' he asked cautiously.

"Stop answering with a question!" I yelled. He winced.

"Gomen…" He paused, still staring at me with those strange blue eyes. "I don't fully understand. And the only way I will is if you answer my questions." I pondered this and took my foot off his shoulder.

"Fine." I walked a little bit away and sat on a nearby bench.

"Now let me ask you a question." He looked back me. "Why kill?" I bit my bottom lip, thinking. It was only fair that I answered his question since he answered mine, or was going to in a moment.

"I kill because it's in my program. I kill because I was programmed to hate Goku and anyone he protects. Gero was a little sloppy in his programming. You see, he didn't count on Goku actually protecting the whole planet, including him. That's why we killed Gero, and that's why we are killing the human race. I don't have the same emotions as you humans. All you humans experience is fear, sadness, pain, in your case, hatred for me. Those are the only emotions I don't have. It confuses me."

"First of all," he growled, in an as-a-matter-of-fact type of tone. "Humans have much more emotions, like love, hope, friendship, caring, and other positive emotions. Ones which I'm willing to bet my life that you don't have. Second, not all humans are afraid of you. Some are willing to fight you, they just can never find you. You're always jumping country to country."

"You still haven't explained why I don't have those emotions, coward."

"Because you're a freaking android!!" he yelled, frustrated. "You aren't human! You're not even alive! You only kill people to feel satisfied that someone else is in pain while you aren't! It makes you feel alive, but in truth, you died a long time ago!" I looked up, surprised by his outburst. Didn't he know who he was dealing with?! No one had the right to talk to me like that and live.

"You dare raise your voice at me, human?" I asked menacingly. He held his ground.

"You're only angry because you know I'm right. You're a freak of natural. Even if you were to die right now, you'd never go to heaven or hell. You don't even have a soul."

"What do I care? I'm simply better than all of you put together. I could blast you all in a second if I wanted."

"The point is you didn't. And besides, who cares about physical strength if you aren't emotionally tough? You're will power may be pretty high, but your inner strength could all crumble if you aren't careful." I glared at him. A part of me was regretting talking to this little brat in the first place. The only reason he was getting so cocky was because he knew I wouldn't kill. He was still entertaining. Wait…entertaining? I thought I didn't torture humans for enjoyment. That was Juunana's field. I simply killed them because I hated them. I didn't…enjoy it, did I?

"Stop it! You're confusing me!" I screamed, holding my head. My reaction surprised him, but he continued, despite my threat.

"You see?" he asked in a mocking tone. "Your emotional barrier is collapsing! You can't turn off your feelings with the flip of a switch. You can't handle the harsh reality that you…aren't…human."

"Shut up. You wretched freak!" I yelled. "You aren't human either! You're a mutation as well."

"I dealt with that when I was born. Tell me. Do you remember if you were born? No? That's because you were built in a lab!" My glare was slowly disappearing and being replaced with another expression, one I was unfamiliar with. "Humans have so many qualities that you don't. That's what makes us better than you. And that's why you'll never be able to wipe us out. That, and the fact that I'll mostly likely kill you. If not me, then someone else, but eventually, your time will run out on this planet. Most people can say they lived full lives, but what will you say? You spent a worthless lifce killing. That's it." His words were hitting me harder than I had expected. If it was Juunana in my place, I'm sure he would've been unfazed. But I was acting ridiculous. I was acting…human. I gently clutched my robotic heart.

"Why does it hurt so much?" I whispered, more to my self than anyone else. He stared at me, a mix of emotions. Mostly confusion, but a bit of…pity.

"It hurts because it's true. The only thing you've made of you android life is killing. What did you think was going to happen when everyone's dead? You never thought about what would become of you and your brother. When everyone's dead, will you become obsolete? Or did you not think that far into the future?"

He was right…

I would become useless…

No longer better…

How could I be better than something that no longer existed? No one to prove my strength to. No one to bully, or to fear me.

"If I had only planned this from the start…" I whispered.

"Planned what?" the hybrid teen asked. "Your massacre? You can't exactly plan something like that." He paused and looked away. "If you don't have emotions like pain, sadness and fear, then what other emotions are you missing? You can't better than us if you're missing so many feelings. To be better than human, you need to be human. And all humans have the emotion love. We have hearts. But even you don't have that. That's why you'll never be better than us."

That final statement sent shivers down my spine. I felt a twinge of pain in my chest and began breathing a little heavier. All of his words, everything he said, hurt even more that any blow an opponent could land on me. I was just as pathetic as these humans were, if not more. How could I call myself better than them? I was finally beginning to understand, as I sniffed a little. Then my vision blurred and something rolled down my cheek, something warm and wet, like a raindrop.

"Congratulations, monster" mocked Lavender. "You just cried you're first human tear." I looked up in shock, then touched my cheek, and brought my finger tips to view. There, lying on the tips of my forefinger, was a single tear. The tear symbolized so many things to me. Fear, pain, sadness, weakness, but most of all…human. How did I cry? I thought I wasn't human. Maybe…maybe I was at one point. Maybe I had a family, like every other human on this planet. If so, they'd be disgraced by me. And I'd never see any of them again, seeing as I'm never going to the afterlife. I could never go, even if I was human. I was simply a monster, with human tears.

*~*owari*~*