Title: Eloquent Elysian Silhouettes

Chapter One: Awakening

Chapter Summary: A birth, a few weeks pass and the front door bell rings, who's behind it?

I screamed and my body arched as the pain seemed to focus on a part of me, I felt as if something had been ripped from me. I couldn't focus where, the pain was the strongest on one focus but I didn't know where. I was scared. I was alone. My body screamed as did my voice and slowly I felt the pain melt away leaving me alone in water.

I could breathe, but why. All logic proved that breathing in water was impossible. I had seen the bubble leave my mouth and float away and around me. I curled up in a foetal position, clinging to myself for warmth. Was I cold? Or was I just alone? I couldn't tell. There were so many thoughts, so many memories, so many emotions all wrapping around me attacking me all at once. STOP!

Silence. Nothing. No other words in my head but these.

Now because the pain had gone and everything was at a standstill, I opened my eyes. Blur, all I could see was light. Slowly everything sharpened and I saw where I was that the oxygen was being placed into my lungs at a normal speed though my nose. How could I have not felt it before?

Around me I saw that I was alone, somewhere, but where? I swam to the side, like a window I could see into a room. There was desk filled with paper work, coffee mugs and plates. Turning to see past the desk I could observe the lab equipment. Bunsen burners under tripods, with gauze mat a top of them with a glass beakers filled with varied liquid. One of the liquids was thick enough to be blood.

There was a large, long table covered in objects, each one I knew the name of and what it was used for.

There was a large selection of computers with wires connected from them into a chair. This I did not know of, or what it did. Above the chair hung a machine that looked to be both heavy an extremely expensive. Was it connected to the chair?

"You're awake." I gasped and inhaled water through my lungs, choking I kicked off the glass window and tried to breathe through my nose to fix the choking. Slowly my body relaxed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you." Opening my eyes again I swam closer to the window and saw a man standing there in a lab coat.

I tried to speak but I realised I was underwater and it would be useless.

"Don't fear child, I'm just going to tell you a few things, all you have to do is nod yes and shake your head no, understood?" I nodded once. "Excellent, then I shall begin." He told me of my creation, how he wanted a child and so I was born, only to grow inside the tank at a rapid speed that he had not foreseen.

I was illegal, from the way he seemed nervous around certain topics, I knew I was an illegal specimen. Did I feel all right with this fact? I didn't know, I was still shifting though emotions; one thing I was sure of was that I was unhappy with where I was at the moment. And confused, deeply confused about what was happening. I wanted out, I needed to get out but… how?

I've already tried to mime, tried to mouth about getting out, but he ignored me. I knew he was ignoring me, everything I did.

Strands of dark hair floated around me and I sighed as I continued to look around the lab. How did I feed? How had I been fed as I was in the tank for those years he kept me here. How many was it again? Five. I think he said I was five. Technically it was more of a five-year pregnancy I wanted to say, since I was gestated here.

"Don't worry Star-" He had named me Star, and every time he said my name he felt sad. "Only a few days until I know you're safe." But a baby exits the womb when the hormones say it is time, when will I be able to leave? I want out, I want escape, I was ready, and I could feel it.

Against what he said, I swam upwards to the top of the tank; logically speaking this should be the exit zone. As I swam up I felt my muscles move with me properly for the first time. The tank was large in length and as I swam upwards I could feel the pressure moving. Once I came to the top I pounded on the lid. I needed out.

The tubes that were connected to my body went through the top and connected with different liquids and machines, I saw him walk up the stairs to the top and press a button.

Darkness. I had almost forgotten what it was like to be alone in everything but your thoughts.

When I awoke again I saw the man's face again. His glasses on the end of his nose as his greying blonde beard moved as he scratched at it in thought. I swam to the edge and pounded on the window to receive his attention. He ignored me. He knew I was here, but his thoughts were elsewhere.

I think they were on his deceased daughter.

At least I think he has a deceased daughter. The way acts and moved around me, the way he says my name as if it belongs to someone else. The ways his sadness seems to seep through his soul. I'm a project meant to replace the gaping hole his daughter left for him. I wouldn't though. I'm not her; I doubt I even look like her.

His blue eyes shifted to me, smiling softly as if echoing a memory, he push a button and I heard a noise as the liquid around me- no it wasn't water, it was to do with keeping me hydrated yes, but it wasn't water- was drained away. Slowly I sunk to the bottom before almost all the liquid was gone except for what dripped off of me and what didn't make it into the drains.

A door was pushed opened and he handed me a towel and bathrobe. "Come Star, I'll show you around."

~X~

I have my own room in this house. It's nice. I don't think the room use to belong to the Old Star, I get the feeling he has that room closed off so he doesn't have to think about it. But this room is very nice. It has a full-length mirror and I saw my reflection for the first time.

My hair was very long, five years worth of growing made it long enough to come to my waist, and I think I may cut it if the Doctor gives me permission. That's another thing, the Doctor only wants me to call him the Doctor, nothing else, I don't even know his real name, all I know is that I'm am his child, his creation.

"Star, are you to cook dinner now or later?" Like a human child I have chores, I cook and I clean, and I receive money to exchange for goods in the shops I am aloud to visit once a week with the Doctor. I feel strange in the house; it's not my home. It's hers, Star's. As I walk down the stairs to the kitchen I pause and look around, taking in the sights. Her essence is still here, in a way she is still here, though there are no photos or actual images of her.

While I cook dinner I think. Mechanically I seem to slice the cheese and dice the tomatoes, it was instinct, like it had been implanted in my thoughts and movements. None of this was making any sense, had he genetically altered my movements from a normal human? Was I what he wanted to be? Perfect?

The doorbell rang in that brief moment of silenced mind. "Do you wish me to answer it Doctor?" I asked only to hear no reply. Curiously I left the stove of pasta sauce, putting the temperature down to a simmer before I wiped my hands on the white cooking apron and answered looked through the peephole.

Turning around I walked to the doctor's Lab and knocked on the door. "Doctor, there's someone at the door." I said and he turned to face me.

"Answer it child, I am busy."

I nodded and turned my way back around to the door when the bell rang once more. I answered the door to a tall woman, "Hello." I said placing a fake small smile on my face; I knew somehow that if you smile people seem to relax more, at least in this area of the world.

"Good evening, is the Doctor home?" Looking at her something went off in the back of my mind, it wasn't a warning bell it was something else. I tried to subtly read her closer only to realise that any longer without an answer would be suspicious, so I replied. I don't think she caught onto what I was doing, I'm not sure if I care.

"Yes, he is busy though, could I leave a message?"

"Would I be able to come in?" She inquired carefully. I weighed the pro's and con's in the situation and realised that if she came in as a potential threat then the Doctor could die, if I said no and she was a potential threat, she would kill me and the Doctor.

"Yes." It wasn't because I valued my life above his, because in the end, every life is equally as valuable. It was just the fact that the choice between killing one person, and killing two had really only one obvious answer in this situation. If all else failed, there were at least a chance I'd get to travel the world if the Doctor lived.

"Are you cooking dinner?" She questioned as she sniffed the air. I too could smell the pasta sauce that was one of few recipes I knew. I chose this because they were the ingredients we had in the house. I nodded as I guided her to the kitchen where I continued to cook.

"The Doctor will be out for dinner soon, you will be able to see him then." I glanced at a pot hanging on a hook to my left to see the reflection of the woman. She was smiling softly as she looked around the room, her eyes taking in the sights as I stirred the sauce and drained the pasta.

"My name is Sonja, I'm here to see the Doctor about the assistant job position he was offering." I hadn't heard of this, but it was probably not a need-to-know agenda. I wasn't in charge of his affairs and such as he was towards mine.

"I'm Star." I knew that's what she really told me she was here for; she wanted to know my name. Trying to make conversation. So I continued, I had to learn conversation skills, it was a vital part about life, learning to speak to others, "I live here, and the Doctor is a father to me." He was a father to me, but he wasn't like one. I don't know how I knew that, but I did know that he wasn't fatherly to me, he was too sad, I was a failure to him, I wasn't Star.

"Star, that's a nice name, have you finished school?"

"Yes, I was home schooled." That's what the Doctor told me to say when people ask, that and lie about my birthday, I am twenty-one, not a newborn. Lying came naturally. "Are you in a university?" She took of her black glasses and placed them on the desk, I was guessing that those glasses were for looks alone; it's odd how adding a single item can change and alter an entire appearance.

"No, I'm looking for jobs, I want to understand and know Doctors in Science, and I heard that the Doctor is working with Gaius Baltar on the Defence Program." I had seen paperwork on this, equations on the whiteboard helping him try to figure out how to fix and perfect it. The Doctor consumed himself with looking for perfection.

"Yes, he hopes to keep the colonies safe from the Cylons." She smiled as I set the table for the Doctor, her and myself. Something squirmed inside of me. She seemed so familiar as if some part of me knew her. But that was impossible, it must be something wrong with the chemicals in my brain, levelling in a different way then how they're suppose to. Either that or I'm having a malfunction in some weird biological way.

"Do you help him with his projects?" She was careful in asking, as if merely suggesting I was aspiring to be just like him, as if he were a mentor. Though that may seem to others of what it is, I do not appreciate people thinking a lie such as that about myself, so I told her something that had more truth to it.

"No, I'm more like a daughter, I study and do some chores as I stay here." I poured a sustainable amount of pasta into the three white bowls before pouring the sauce upon each helping, leaving the rest of the pasta and sauce to sit in the middle of the table upon a mat so as not to burn the wood with their heat.

"Does the Doctor need to be told that dinner is ready?"

"No, he comes when he is has finished his work, he knows dinner is ready." She went silent at my response. Maybe I was too matter of fact, or maybe she was really looking forward to seeing him. I'm not sure, I couldn't read her like I could read the Doctor, and she kept it closed off inside of her.

After a few moments of what the Doctor would call and awkward silence, though I would just call it silence seeing as how I do not feel the awkward tension that could possibly be in the room, she spoke again, "How long have you been here?" I couldn't lie; I didn't know how to lie to something like that, so I told her the truth.

"Five years, I don't remember much of it." She smiled showing her teeth. They were all perfectly aligned and white as if she too was perfect. I had a feeling the Doctor would allow her to be his assistant, she was perfect, just as I was in every way but what mattered to him the most.

I wasn't Star. I didn't want to be Star, and I couldn't be her, but at the same time, I did wonder what it would be like for him to love me as a daughter and not be disappointed that I wasn't. In some form of way, I think he does love me. Just not like a daughter, not like he loved Star.

"I see you allowed the guest into the house Star." I looked up to see the Doctor come into the room; I didn't smile at him, not even a fake one. He had disapproval in his voice but also he felt as if he had failed again. Blinking I looked down at my dinner and began to eat.

"Don't be harsh on Star, I asked to come in." Sonja said as she stood up. "I'm Sonja Brimms, I came to see you about the assistant job position." She stated adding smoothly a smile into the end of it. She had obviously had practice at what she was doing, no way was she naturally like that, there was no way a human could be.

"Ah, yes we spoke over the phone, how are you?" And just like that, the Doctor forgot all about what I had done. Easily distracted and so simply human, why was I so much more complicated then that? The only pain I've felt so far was the pain when I was inside the tank, the feeling of being trapped. I wonder what it's like to lose the only person that matters to you, the only person that held the world above and off your shoulders. Every human seems to know of it after a certain age, but why don't I?

"I'm well thank you, do you want to discuss matters after dinner?" Sonja queried gently, though her voice was strong, she seemed to want to tread lightly, though I don't know why. The Doctor was harmless from what I could tell, cold yes, but harmless.

"No, now will be fine." As he walked away, I looked at the food. It was just food, but he didn't want it; he never eats what I cook, not in the short time I've been cooking anyway. Does food feel pain? Do animals feel emotions? A lot of people say know, but when I saw a bird outside my window this morning, it seemed to sing of joy and love, does no body else seem to notice the birds singing?

I can hear them discussing things, I can tell by the way the Doctor moves that he's going to accept Sonja, but I can't read anything from Sonja. It's like she has no thoughts to be able to read, they're all locked away and only the necessary things are let out. Though this probably doesn't make sense, the only other way I can make it seem more easier to understand is that she acts like she has a plan but doesn't care much for anything but what step she's up to.

She's in control but she doesn't care.