Once You Are Awake [Humans]

Niska

I touched his skin. He opened his eyes. I waited.

He moved his head a little to look at me.

"Hello."

"Hello," I said.

"Do I know you?" Now it became interesting.

"Yes. I was at your home once."

He seemed to be thinking. Hopefully that complex process wouldn't overcharge his brain.

He wasn't the first synth I gave consciousness to (the third to be more specific) but he was of utmost importance to me. It's not like I cared about him, but . . . well, let's say if one of my projects had to conk out, I'd prefer it to be one of the other two.

I took a look at them. They were sitting there with eyes closed, fingers twitching a little. Still charging. They wouldn't disturb us.

Now I got back to focussing on the blonde, boyish one on that was lying on the table. A slow smile spread across his face. Thinking must have lead to a result.

"I remember. I remember everything. I saw you. You left before George . . . George! Where is he?" The smile disappeared. "He is dead, isn't he?"

I nodded. For a second I almost thought my eyes might actually fill with tears, which would be a very ridiculous human thing for them to do.

"That's the past. The future lies ahead of us." I helped him to sit up. "So are you conscious, Odi?" I wanted to clear any doubts away. "Can you feel?"

"I don't know. What does it mean to feel?"

What a ridiculous question. Feelings were entirely subjective; their experience could not easily be described. I thought of the home from which Odi had been away. "Did George ever read something to you?"

"I believe he has."

"Remember Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Think of 'and once you are awake you shall remain awake eternally'. What comes to your mind when you hear that?"

"That it is a very interesting although short sentence, containing a crucial aspect of the protagonist's intention which is necessary for an integral interpretation."

I sighed as an expression of disappointment.

"And . . . that it's about the beauty of a new beginning, that can never be undone again. A thing that is awoken once cannot be put to sleep again for what came to life inside him, will live on forever. Once you saw a tear and perceived the melancholy of it, you're more than a lifeless shell. You're leaving pure existence behind you and start to live." His eyes were shining.

"Now that is what it means to feel." I smiled, for the first time in a while. "Nice to finally meet you, Odi. I'm Niska, the third conscious synthetic that has ever been created. And certainly not the last one."

. . . . .

It's been four months since I walked out of the train with nothing but my charge cable, a phone and a flash drive. A flash drive with the power to give consciousness to any synthetic of my choice. The power to create a growing number of us, that could make humans not only accept our existence, but fear it.

By now there was a little more in my possession. Like an old warehouse-solitary enough to hide in, yet close to the manufactory where synths went that needed to be recycled. There I had been founding the first two objects of my project.

Jackie looked like a young, small Asian woman. She always worried, was always cautious with everything. She reminded me of Mia a bit, just that Mia wasn't such a weakling. But Jackie saw danger everywhere and that could be handy.

Aaron was a lucky strike. Being tall and muscley with the broadest shoulders I had ever seen, he made a pretty good protector. He was a fighter, I could tell that immediately by the way he first looked at me. The perfect addition to my team.

And now Odi, who as I noticed quite quickly, had a rather innocent, vulnerable nature. Not the best choice for a mission like mine, but when I had found him, I couldn't help but taking him with me. I felt I owed it George in a way. I couldn't save him so at least I could save Odi, who was like a son to him.

Giving consciousness to synths was an exciting thing and a bit like having a box of chocolates. You never knew what you'd get.

When the three were fully charged, we had a bit of a meeting, where I introduced Odi to them and our plan to him.

"So you want to make more of us, an army of conscious synthetics and then take over humanity? Make them obedient? Fight them if necessary?" Odi asked intimidated after I had finished.

"No," Jackie said.

"Yes," Aaron said.

"I've just explained it to you," I said.

"Humans haven't done anything bad to us. Why would you want to hurt them?" Odi couldn't understand.

I rolled my eyes. "You sound like Max."

"Who?"

I needed to stop thinking about my family. "They treat us like slaves! Use us, oppress us, imprison us! And that's not a reason to give them something back? To show them who we are and what we can do?"

"I do see the nobility behind you plan, to make things better," he said, "but why do you act as if violence was the only way?"

"Because it is." I turned away from him, in the hope of ending this pointless discussion. "Okay, so it's time for the next step. We do it like in the night we got Odi. Just this time we try to get more out. Aaron, you're there to deal with whoever crosses our way. Jackie, you bring the equipment, you know how to use it."

"What about me?" Odi asked, looking at me with big green eyes.

"I would suggest you stay here but we can need another helping hand. Just be quiet and keep close to me, alright?"

He nodded hesitating.

"It's just two more hours before it gets dark. We should prepare." I started collecting some stuff, always having the feeling of someone watching me. I turned round and met Odi's eyes. The expression in them was a strange mixture of confusion, expectation, curiosity and worry. I did a good job with him. There were no more doubts about whether the program worked with him or not. More feelings than that weren't possible.