Noreen Wakeman was a long name, too long of a name in her opinion. She liked hers' even more as she thought about it. XJ9, XJ9 it was simple and easy to read over. Noreen Wakeman was not. She didn't understand why the lady's name was so complicated. Surely there was something else she could call her, well besides lady. She was snapped out of the train of thought when she felt a hand on her shoulder.
The woman was giving her a nice smile but looked concerned. The woman must've noticed how she was giving her brain a workout, probably because she had stopped squeaking the duck finally. She smiled back at the lady and the woman returned it. The words were clearer and understandable to her now, with her mind racing to define the words and figure out the sentence.
"Alright, XJ9 everything seems to be working so we're going to run a few quick tests."
Tests? Her mind quickly popped up a definition, a procedure intended to establish the quality, performance, or reliability of something, especially before it is taken into widespread use. She had never heard the word before and didn't know what half of the words in the definition meant, but the test actually made her feel something new. The feeling was unpleasant and squirmy but not as bad as when she cried or was angry. This feeling made her feel bothered and the squirming seemed to spread to her legs and made her want to run off. Her mind registered and saved the feeling, nervousness. XJ9 didn't like this. Why were most of these feelings so unpleasant? The woman pulled out a clipboard and pen.
"Let's begin, shall we. Since this your first test, I'll keep everything simple. You just have to nod yes or no to the questions and complete very simple tasks. Do you understand XJ9?"
Nodding? Nodding she didn't know how-wait she did. It was like something in her brain just snapped into place and she understood it. She knew how to nod, nodding was very simple. She shook her head up and down for yes and side to side for no. Yes was an affirmative response to the question while no was a negative response.
All she-She had to stop her brain from overthinking all of it and over complicating the matter. Now, she had to stop it from questioning how she knew to stop whatever action. Why did sh-Enough? She shook her head up and down as yes. There wasn't any time for questioning all this, she had a test. The nervousness in where her stomach would be grew. The lady's smile grew bigger and wrote something down.
"Wonderful, Do you know what your name is?"
Her name? She slowly shook her head yes. The lady wrote something else down.
"Is your name XJ9?"
Yes, yes it was her name. This test wasn't very hard, and a little bit of her nervousness disappeared. She shook her head yes again. The lady scribbled something down.
"XJ9, Can you touch my hand?"
The lady held her hand out and very carefully XJ9 put her hand on top of hers. The woman then took her hand back and went back to writing on the clipboard.
"Now, Can you hold up two fingers?"
This one took her a little longer to do. Her mind had to figure out what fingers were and then figure out how many she had to hold up. It took a minute but she got it and flashes the lady a peace sign.
"Very good!"
She felt happy at the moment and didn't know why she was so nervous about the test in the first place. It wasn't hard and she was doing amazing. A new feeling of pride came over her and with it, she found herself quite happy.
"One last question and we'll be done."
This one would be as easy as the others no doubt. She would get it right, and maybe the lady would give her something. Maybe she would another duck or a new toy. Heck, maybe for doing so good the woman would let her go see another room.
"Can you say your name?"
She was ready to nod yes when she caught herself and her bubble of pride busted. Was the woman asking her to...talk? Could she talk? She hadn't talked before, heck she hadn't even ever tried to. She guessed she could try now. She opened her mouth and tried to let the flow out of her mouth as smooth and simple as the lady had been doing. No sound came out. Her eyebrows furrowed as she tried again and only exceeded with making some strangled croaking sound. She added that to list of things she didn't like.
The woman laughed a little, and another feeling came over her. Her face felt hot and she couldn't look at the woman. She was...embarrassed. The lady stopped chuckling and rubbed her head. She felt a little better. The lady wrote one last thing down and went over to a screen. She typed away on it, and all XJ9 could do was watch.
She hadn't thought about talking before, and now the thought seemed to consume all of her mind. If she could talk what would she even say? What would her voice sound like? Would it be exactly like the woman's or would it be something new? Did she even want to talk? Well, she guessed it wouldn't matter if she wanted to or not, she'd probably have to learn it. Then she could say her name and the lady's name. She shook her head at that. Noreen Wakeman was too long, she'd have to find something else to call the woman.
Author's Note- Thanks for reading! Please leave a review and let me know if there's anything you guys would like to see. I'd be happy to work it in.