Artificially Intelligent

Chapter 8

              I wake up to the oh so familiar sound of unfamiliar voices. Instead of opening my eyes and surveying the scene, I choose to keep my eyes shut and breathing slow until I lose the effect of whatever sedative they used on me.

           The voices seem to be in an argument over something. I hear one say, "...so you just brought a stranger here with no warning? How stupid are you?"

           "I know, I-I'm sorry...I acted on impulse and that was not right of me, but look at them," the voice replies, "and tell me that-"

           "ENOUGH!" a third voice shouted, "Stop bickering like children and pay attention. For the love of, they're probably awake now and..."

           I don't hear the last part because I'm too busy panicking at the third stranger's comment. Do they know that I'm awake? Why author, why? Why 'd you put me through this?

          "No they're not!" I hear the second voice add in, "Look...obviously asleep."

          "They are faking," a new, robotic voice chimes in.

          "Prove it, tin can,"

          "Excuse me, I know you're scared, but, please, open your eyes."

          What should I do? Half of them know that I'm awake, but I can't show that I've been listening for as long as I have. I feel a cold, metal stick poke me in the ribs, and before I know it, I grab hold of a metal arm and feel the satisfaction of melting through solid metal fade away as the sedative completely wears off.

            I release my grip and open my eyes, revealing an android made out of what seems to be tungsten painted to look like bronze. Finally something that science can explain, a simple android. "I'd apologize, but I ran out of sympathy yesterday," I say as I smooth down the half melted metal. I didn't hold it long enough to sever it off of the android's body, but I was able to give it's arm the appearance of butter that had been half melted and crushed.

             "I accept the apathetic sarcasm as a means of apologizing," the android replies, unknowingly being mocked, "my name is 89426HEML. Most people call me Hemmle, and he calls me 'tin can'." Hemmle gestures to the person who was mocking him, and the mocker stops.

              As I start to survey the scene as I had been refusing to do earlier, I get a better look at the guy who was mocking Hemmle. He's a strawberry blonde guy who looks about as stupid as you can get. He wears sunglasses indoors, what looks to be a football jersey, and has these light grey eyes that almost look white. He looks strikingly human with the exception of one feature that I notice when he pulls down his glasses, the whites of his eyes aren't white; they are pure, blood red. It's somewhat unnerving. Next to him is a girl who looks exactly the same, just female and not wearing sunglasses.

              On the opposite side of the room, there is a tall woman, strangely tall. Her eyes are a near black shade of dark blue with a teal color cutting into the iris from the normal, white whites of her eyes and a fiery scarlet exploding from her pupil. Her hair is very dark brown and long. It's also buzzed on the left side of her head.

               I look around the rest of the room. No one else is here, but you saw how that worked out with Stanly.