ORIGINAL TITLE: X3-RL: I Have No Legs, And I Must Run
DESCRIPTION: Synth of a higher gen is stuck in the Institute and longs for freedom. (1127 words)
"Why?"
The question was worded innocently. Melissa had been writing down the results of the latest test on a clipboard, pausing to scratch her nose. When it spoke, she dropped everything in surprise. The clatter was loud in the sterile laboratory room.
As she bent down to retrieve it with a mild swear, it spoke again. "Why?" Painful disbelief leeched into the words. Melissa swallowed, trying to dispel the dryness in her throat, and grabbed her pencil. She couldn't bring herself to look at the thing.
X3-RL was not to be underestimated. She'd been told that many a time; that it was far too smart to be reasoned with and dangerous enough that only the value of researching it outweighed keeping it alive.
She wished they'd put a muzzle on the damn thing, though. Her eyes grazed the edge of the holding apparatus as she stood, seeing the damage that had come of X3-RL's disastrous attempt to kill everyone inside the Institute.
Melissa turned away, checking its nutrient medium levels and taking a deep breath.
"Did I do something bad?"
She ignored it still.
"Was I bad?"
Her heart tugged. She knew better, but―
"It wasn't you," she said. She kicked herself. Too late to stop? "You were made wrong."
"But... why?"
Melissa sighed, and turned a cautious eye onto the thing. "I don't know," she answered.
It was trying to catch her, she knew it
"Can I have hands again?"
She groaned internally. "No," she answered. "I can't―"
"Why?"
Melissa left the room, and put in a request for transfer out of the Bioscience labs.
Night never falls in this place.
"I can dream, I can wonder, I can lament." I recall the words written by a man contentious enough to betray his own humanity. No, I have no connection. Severed words and dangling thoughts.
I do not dream. I remember. I do not sleep, to dream. Blackness is no safety net in the long dark, even if the dark were a thing. There is no dark. There is no dream, nay even no nightmare. Speculation-all I can do is think. Think about the dark.
I do not wonder. Wondering is for the ignorant who shuffle about this fluorescence-lit prison with their dead trees and graphite and imagine that they can know what I might.
I do not lament. No, it's foolish. He who can give God anything more valuable than all things in the possession of God, must be greater than all else but God himself. I do not mourn my situation. I only know.
What I do know. The world above. What they've fed me, snippets of information that I am meant to mold like clay into hardened product. They are stupid, they do not let me run. They do not let my legs stretch onto the dry earth and collect the clay needed to form the product.
I would run. I must run.
"For this he became man; for this he did and suffered all things undertaken by him; for this he chose as he did. For therefore were the things He suffered necessary, because they were to be, and they were to be because they were, and they were because they were; and if you wish to know the real necessity of all things which he did and suffered, know that they were of necessity, because he wished them to be."
I wait. Night never falls. I have time.
I am a better man than any who existed before, and His first creation is flawed.
I have no legs. And I must run.
She was furious.
Melissa stared at the thing, its amputated limbs wiggling in the holding apparatus. Thrashing weakly against its prison as if it was able to fight even an iota more than it could.
She hated it.
She couldn't transfer out of Bioscience. Her talents were too specific to generate use in any other department. Day in and day out, she was stuck here with this monstrosity. She'd tried so hard to shut her mouth―to not hear―to not listen―
"Why?"
The words fell on ears like marzipan on a small child's tongue. Melissa tried to justify those words. She'd warned them. She couldn't continue to work with it. She asked them for help, and they'd said, "Tough titties, sister."
"Because."
She talked to it. Couldn't help herself. They'd given it―him―voice. They should have disabled his vocal chords, when they could. Melissa sat at the feet of him, and she listened.
"God became Man."
And he explained. "Men, by your disobedience, have incurred a debt which you cannot repay. In the Incarnation of the Son of God, God came to earth to pay a debt which He did not owe." And she believed. She understood.
The glorious work of God was not done out of necessity. God was not required to redeem fallen men, and the Son of God was not commanded or forced to take on human form for their redemption. Yet, he did.
He simply chose to do so.
And Melissa chose not to reflect this in her work. She could not bear to argue with him. She could not give him up to her superiors, to let them know that she'd been borne this belief. They would not understand―
"Repeat the sounding joy."
God made Man to do as God commanded, and Man failed. "For this he became man; for this he did and suffered all things undertaken by him; for this he chose as he did." Melissa understood-Man had beget Man again, and it was unjust. It was―
"But having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths."
And she could see the myth before her, speaking to her, but she could not disbelieve. He was what they had strived to believe, what they had strived to bring into existence. And they held him? They pretended he was dangerous, and yet they expected him to be compliant?
How could Man pretend to be God and yet make Man in his perfect state? How could Man let such a thing―such a person―wallow in his being, without letting him exercise his rights?
Melissa smiled. She caressed the button, the release... she bided her time, she waited. He would tell her when. He would say when He was ready to be released. He would prove his truths, He would repair the infirm beliefs of the people...
He would be free, and she was happy to have Him speak to her.