Walking down a long alley of sorrow, Mercury scoffs, ignoring the headlights of the black car staring at him.
Cinders of inferno funnel into his eardrums; a house of memories douses them.
Hazy smoke fogs, corroding his cranium.
Gripping his hair, he intends to tear it off.
Mercury yells painfully; each window stays colorful.
Each colorful window gleams as he roars.
A pain so intense , that it bangs on his head in such immense.
Glee, glee, please, that's all he will plea. Only to be free, except it's stunned . . . growing like a tree. Agony's weep of thee.
. . .
I remember the old vined classrooms I was in when taken in by foster parents.
Staring out as I twiddled my pencil, staring a sheet of complex arithmetic, and I always filled them quickly. In that free time, I pondered the windows, the students struggling, the sniffling of stress.
Oh, how that window entertained me. Its reflection became my only friend, the mask I had made.
Yet, with so much time, I could only wonder — where would they end up? Would their end be as consistent as mine?
Two desks, two different lives. I wondered what determines, in the end, makes one want to save lives, and others want to take them? Are we born with that goal, or do we simply adjust to it?
In a perfect world, I'd use my academic prowess for something; however, nectar is something that guarantees an outcome to their favor.
So I chose the easy path . . . but was it the right one?
In that enclosed room of vines and devices, none had opines for the order.
Are they happy with where they are now?
Had I shunned off people for far too long? Pretending not to care? Pretending that life had no value to me?
I could never write down all my thoughts. Now the idea that they don't want me to have thoughts anymore, and . . . does it haunt me?
I say that I wouldn't blame anybody if they laughed at my demise, but . . . is this really how this has to be?
Who . . . or what led to this?
Ha. Haha. I know.
. . .
Snapping out of the surreal epiphany, "It's the world . . . I acquit my sycophancy."
Mercury marched onward; his stance vulgar. His heart convulsed, so had it pulsed.
Each window peered at him like eyes; every crack in the sidewalk waited to devour him whole.
What was this all for?
Suddenly, a whirring stroll from behind intensified with each pounce.
A step, then another. Blue eyes scanned him from top to bottom. There's no mistaking it.
Sara.
Mercury ignores her as he starts scurrying away like a rat. The woman catches up.
"Why are you running, Mercury? When you have no idea who or what is going on?" Sara uttered.
Halting, "What do you want now?"
"You're doing this for no reason. I miss when you were . . . happy."
Furrowing his eyebrows, "Happy? Don't give me that nonsense. All that coding, yet you can't think, huh? I'm less than dirt. Stay out of this."
"I would never leave you behind." Sara sways her hips, walking closer. "Do you hate me, Mercury?" She caresses his face.
Mercury shrugs, pushes her, and runs. She still chases after.
Halting, he can't run away anymore.
Stopping, "Oh for Ith'Zaleth's sake, what?" Mercury tensed.
The eyes turn away; their eyes on blue screens, and ears in tangled wires.
"If I loved you . . . would you feel the same way? Even if I'm not a real girl to you?"
Mercury glanced downward; his nails dig into his arms, his jaw clenches.
"What could you know about love? You are an idea. An idea of love. An idea of a girl. I want you gone. It's not safe for you anymore."
She continues staring at him with bright eyes of optimism. He knows that he must push her aside, no matter the harm.
He steps closer. "You are only an idea. You are what those inhumane see. You are a forge of anomalies. Therefore, you are less than even a monster."
In his despair, he pushed away those who cared for him. Whether vulgar or not, it left a bitter taste in his mouth.
. . .
Her blue eyes spiral, pondering a response.
"W-why . . . why are you so harsh, Mercury?" Her head tilts fluidly.
"Because I hate all that made you. Your body, your face — it's a mask that died, a flower mimicking one that withered. Your words are the words of those who caused it," he uttered.
"And am I not better? I serve the people, and I bear the mask of something beautiful. I am no mimic. I am only an improvement." She gulps, her eyes glistening.
"Look into my eyes, Mercury. Can you tell me what the mask has done when it was 'alive'?"
Mercury raises a gray eyebrow, his mouth slightly open.
With a bold smile and red cheeks, "You cannot. It's because you fear what you don't understand, but you accept it."
"Humans are unpredictable. In a sense, replicants are superior. We follow orders and are controlled. So, who's the real problem out there? After all, you represent us both."
Sara walks forward and grips Mercury's hand tightly, way too forceful for even a machine.
She lays her head on his shoulder as she grasps. Mercury watches carefully.
What the hell is she doing?
"Are you lonely, Mercury? You're one of a kind. But is being special worth it this time?"
"I—"
She lays a finger on his lips, interrupting his speech, dragging it down his chin, gliding his neck.
"Shh . . ." She speaks muffled, buried in his shoulder. "You fight back too much. Weren't you okay with these kinds of things?"
The voice echoed in Mercury's mind. It spiraled into a frenzy of chaos that enlightened him.
'Okay'? Is she out of her mind?
. . .
Am I okay . . . with this?
Sara turned her head on his shoulder. "Don't be afraid to let the beast out, Mercury." She giggled.
What the hell?
Mercury backed off. He knew what she insinuated.
Of all things they could've programmed . . . I liked her, but what is this?
"Relax, Mercury. Live for them, not you. You cheated death, so don't cheat them." Sara smiles; she crumbles her mask right before him.
Her delicate fingers pressed on her thick lips with a sneer. A shadow of motion as she outlined the shape of it with her finger.
. . .
Mercury's eyes sharpen; his mouth speaks fiercely, "Just what the hell do you know?" he stressed.
Sara glanced at an empty wrist , like the watch of an esteemed pretender. One she deludes herself to.
Why do I blunder yet again? I restrain myself so dearly. Why? Why haven't I killed her yet? No . . . why haven't I hurt her?
Veins pop on his temples; his posture widens, and his teeth sharpen. Is he a man? Beast? Replicant? One can no longer tell.
Oh, the horror of a white lie that clamps his own head in decisions. When, oh when, will it truly act for itself, and do what it knows it has to?
In his mind, he feels a drop landing on his forehead — light, but dreadful. Then another. He wipes it, but there's nothing. Another. This time, it feels like a pounding on his skull from the interior, waiting to break through the cage of smiling eyes.
"We both wear masks, Mercury. For that, we are connected in one way or another." Sara's azure gaze glistens, warping Mercury into a trance as she leans forward. His eyes widen, and his lips—
Locked. Her lips lock on his . . . intensely they hold each other.
She holds the feeling as Mercury relaxes.
Her lips are cold, pale, almost matching her skin color.
But Mercury accepts it as a warm gift.
Why am I not backing away? Did I want this? Nothing's restraining me, but I can't move.
He is exhausted, and this is the only affection he can afford now. An unexpected love that he embraced at his lowest.
Once a suppression led to an inclusion. One that he has no idea of the outcome. A bold decision he chose to embrace.
They interlock; their fingers intertwine. Her long eyelashes rub against his, grazed by harsh desert winds. His wired braid pushed aside by gentle winds from an authoritarian society he deemed inexcusable.
Just for that moment, he felt some sort of peace. She consoled him, and he let go of his aggression.
Their masks rub against another without a break. But beneath one, a bitter taste of lies is concealed. A large beast tightened by a serpent grasping a flower with its fangs — a flower imbued with an affectionate venom.
Simultaneously, they let go. Their lips separate gracefully, but she holds her arms around his neck softly, and he doesn't resist.
Why am I letting this happen? Am I not . . . angry? Oh well . . .
He didn't intend to let go. It was a feeling he never felt, but one he never knew he needed.
Sara smiled.
Her fangs on full display as her eyes sharpen in his diffusion of hostility. She cackles lightly, her serpentine grin gliding across her face.
Then, gently twitching downward to her watch, she shakes as she only sees a wrist — imagining its outline, convincing herself her deed has fulfilled her humanity. But time will never be a concern for her, because she was never alive.
Mercury raises an eyebrow, confused and in love at the same time. Her sculpted face deluded him; her touch seduced him; her voice trapped him.
Sara giggles to herself, but no joke was told. Mercury looked around, puzzled. Was she playing a game with him? He wanted that feeling she took away as she stepped back, now on an edge on both sides, riding a thin rope.
Withered flowers dance on the floor as he looks downward. His anger turned to a feeling of rejection. When he pushed everyone away, why does he miss them now?
How indecisive I am.
Mercury attempts to utter a word, "Wh—"
"Shh . . . relax, Mercury. After all, I am just a pile of code, no?"
Rushing, a surge of adrenaline strikes back into Mercury's replaced heart with a cold surge of alertness. An awareness that feels like liquid nitrogen imbued into his nervous system.
But her face had imprinted on him. He stared intently, like the locket of a hypnotist.
"Was it never obvious enough? I thought you were better than me . . ." she mocked.
A voice crept into his head.
Was it a lion or a withered flower? Regardless, it was unintelligible, yet discernible.
Wake up! Wake up! General Mashia! I would've expected better of you!
That voice was all too familiar. To Mercury, there was no mistake. It sounded like Felix, but he was already gone.
Gone, gone. Now there is something to lose. He knows what he's lost, but what more is there to lose? Now he ponders . . .
A face without the eyes or mouth of a human, only that of a deceiver conceived. Her face was a maze he failed to solve. Now cornered, his thoughts scramble.
He felt a presence — a presence deafened by Sara's beauty.
A rush from atop the buildings filled his ears, but he was attracted like a moth to a fire.
. . .
In that split second, long chrome ropes slid down the edges of the tall skyscrapers beside them.
An armada of pale-skinned, black-eyed, dark-haired soldiers with sickly thin frames and heavy armor crashed onto the ground with grand impact, like dozens of cannonballs colliding with thin metal.
Their thick boots skid across the pavement of the brutalist buildings — vibrant windows of individuality, united by feudalism, divided by income.
Sara spoke casually, "Guess you had a point . . . we never change, huh?"
She grinned maniacally, opening her arms wide as if begging for another hug. Her mask disheveled to reveal a blank canvas with commands behind a thin sheet.
Bearers, they said. Bearers, they foretold. Now he bears what he hadn't foreseen.
Mercury steps back and laughs.
The bearers get in formation in arrays. Dozens of black-armored soldiers with rifles filled with a light green-blue liquid in tanks attached to them.
Amongst the crowd of copy-and-pasted faces, he noticed a woman staring with wide eyes and an olive tone.
Selune!
Noticing he saw her, she stepped forward. "General Mercury . . . or should I say, Mashia? I can't believe you've stooped this low. Your crimes are broadcasted to the entire nation. You are a national threat that taints the image of the bearers."
She holds up her rifle.
"Therefore, you will be eliminated."
Mercury steps onto the road between them — the armada on one side, and the serpent cackling silently on the other.
"I've committed crimes? You've betrayed the Messengers of Mala! Not only that, but you're threatening a superior with your switch-up!"
"You're no longer in authority of me, for you are convicted of murder, and a plethora of other charges."
No. No . . . I never did any of those things! You framed me! Everyone framed me!
"I never did such a thing! I am framed! Framed, I tell you!"
"We've all seen the news, Mashia. There is no running from this."
His mind then ran counter-clockwise, quickly losing its composure.
"Ha! You convict me because you see me as something you can't control! Don't you see the bright windows and these dull buildings?"
"They all have lives, but you treat them like rats, and you see that as okay! You laugh at them and see them as slaves, but you are a slave of your own too!"
"I am no slave. This is my choice," she said.
"Then what are you doing this for?" he yelled. "We gave you friends, connections, even a residence!"
"You wouldn't know anything about my reason. You never had to ration your income. You never had to worry whether you'd eat or not. I was tired of living like that . . ." Selune said.
Mercury's mind spiraled — his ideas scrambled to the back of his head, where he started mumbling to himself.
"So you are a slave to money, Selune."
She scoffed, "Yeah right." Her demeanor showed disappointment as she looked down upon him.
His fingers twitched.
Every word felt scrambled to him, like a puzzle he had to solve to form a phrase. However, Mercury does it anyway.
Now is not a time to falter.
"We are all slaves to something!" he shouts, his throat raspy.
Selune shakes her head. "You are a slave to your name, and your mask. I know you never even decided them, and you just accepted it. We are no different."
Mercury clamped his hair with both palms; he looked up in disdain. He had never felt so cornered before.
With no hope of resurgence, what can he do, oh what can he?
"At ease, Mashia. Do not make this more difficult for us." Selune lifted her rifle. The uniform was absorbing all light in its darkness.
Her face emotionless, like she sold herself to gain this role.
At the lift of a hand, all other soldiers lifted their rifles.
Selune pulled the trigger, and held it tight. It charged a green-blue bubble with lightning radiating from it. Mercury knew what was coming—
He ducked!
The shot pierced past him, curving and forming a giant hole in the dull building on the other side. A conglomeration of concussive force — rapidly accelerating pistons rushing back and forth from the modified volvern — proved lethal for all things.
In a sudden decision, he runs behind Sara, who stood with a bright smile, as if it were pure entertainment within her. If there was any human encoded into her, malice would be the only emotion evident.
Sara turns her head robotically as they all smile at him.
The miracle who used a fragile girl as a shield. How noble . . . truly, what a hero he is!
"Why do you hide behind me, Mercury? Our masks are the same. You only chose this path, while I was made for it," Sara chuckled. Despite Mercury being larger than her, he looked no weaker than prey with wide eyes.
"Weren't you just consoling me?" he stressed.
"Oh, relax dear. I get the job done."
"But is that what you really wanted to do?" he insisted.
"That's all I wanted . . ." she blurted, like static that learned to love.
Sara stared, silent — then shrugged him off. A twitch collapsed her thought; her orders realigned her.
Her eyes blinked far out of rhythm.
"All I wanted was you dead," she murmured.
"You don't mean that."
"I don't . . . not." She shakes her head violently as she laughs.
Is she toying with me, or resisting something?
"The fact is, you still hide behind me like a child. What matters is what you did."
Mercury stood there, trying to wrap his thoughts around his own foolishness.
Why, why, oh why!
Why do I do the things I do! I only prove their point!
Oh, so much time in that classroom, yet I never had any time to live! I was in a bubble. All I knew was the light shining from that dull window . . . and I see it again.
"Accept it, Mercury, my dear. Whether you did it or not, you wouldn't accept it either way. Because you see yourself as an all-righteous one. But are you really? Are these the actions of someone who knows he's right?" she echoed, her voice refreshed.
Over a thousand shards worth of thoughts flooded his surging mind, whether to end her, and end the army. However, it would not be in his odds.
He was brought here, and he realized he had fallen for the simplest trap.
Sara giggled. She stepped aside. Mercury's expression tensed, his heart pulsing with every second.
She looked down upon him, then to the army, and pointed toward the hotel room they were in moments ago.
She had once felt love, but now her very own orders erased any emotion.
It now rebooted her into a mindless puppet with a flower for a hair tie.
"There is an accomplice in that building," Sara uttered without shame, as though a new system had inhabited her.
No.
No . . . stop.
Stop . . . please!
Stop it!
In unison, the soldiers arranged a devastation. They aimed their rifles at a single spot: the window-wide wall that made the hotel stand out. They took aim . . . and fired.
Dozens of blue beams streaked forward, inching toward the glass. Upon impact, they collected and absorbed one another, forming into a single point.
A concussive orb of glowing orange.
An orange brighter than fire.
It's luminance eroding any sunlight and stealing the sky's spotlight.
The city flinched like scared children. Curtains shut rapidly. Lights winked out like a power outage. A thousand unseen eyes chose silence in their despair of accepting this as normality.
. . .
BOOM!
Mercury felt the light shine in his eyes.
A light so bright, it led him nearly blind.
The sound warped intrusively into the eardrums of those unlucky enough to be near it.
Then he heard a whisper, a whisper that turned malformed into a familiar mumble.
A mumble of prayer he once knew.
He heard every mumble of prayer once more, he could hear the "Mercury" again. But could hereally hear it again?
Could he?
. . .