Persona Factory

This sight was too horrible to take.

I wanted to help the suffering infant, but the sound of obscure footsteps stopped me. The footsteps came from the dark tunnel, and they turned louder and closer. My heart cried for me to help the infant, but I could not stand there any longer. I quickly checked around for a hideout, and noticed a door to my left, hidden between two tall shelf stands. I took a last snatched glance at the infant and ran to the door, barely choking my tears. The door automatically closed behind me.

I was now standing in a circular room, which seemed more like a test area – all the walls around had thick, narrow glasses on them, as well as a warning sign. I strained my eyes to read the signs:

"Presence in this room with gas masks only."

I tried to open the heavy door of the room, but it's locked tightly.

Loud wheezing sounds suddenly broke the silence and red lights flashed all over. I raised my head and noticed vents surrounding the ceiling.

Gas clouds appeared from the vents, streaming into the round room, each vent streamed gas in different color.

A few more seconds and the probably toxic gasses will fill my lungs, and who knows what they could cause. Luckily, a closet full of gas masks stood to my right. I quickly grabbed and wore the first mask my hand could reach. I was panicking and hyperventilating in my mask. The gasses slowly made their way into the center of the room and spread around. At this point, I could not see any glass window neither a wall. I was standing in the middle of the colorful gas cloud, completely outplaced. The gasses began to interact with each other. They mingled with the each other, mixing their colors into new ones, repeatedly. I was confused yet oddly charmed from the sights surrounding me.

Then the locked door opened as strengthening light sneaked inside the room. The sudden sounds made my heart skip a beat. Boots were pacing inside, but I could see nothing. I crouched and waited. The pace of boots turned closer until they surrounded me.

This was the time to act – I got up and ran as fast as I could toward the light coming from outside the room, like a dispatched sprinter.

I was running as quickly as I could, the colorful gasses swirling and blurring in my eyes. I was a dangerously close to hitting someone. Though eye contact never made, I am sure he felt my presence as I passed him by.

I made it out of the gassy room, untouched. I turned my head and saw the door closing behind me. I also noticed a sign on the door, which indicated where I had been. The "Essences" room.

The last room was nothing like the others – this room was great, enlightened and sanitized. Dozens of incubators stood in rows all across the room.

The incubators' contents could be seen clearly, though their glasses were dirty and dull. Small silhouettes with limbs and head – infants, or as known in this sickening place, "shells".

The infants whined softly as nurses wandered amongst the incubators.

The nurses didn't give any attention or a glance toward me, as if I never entered the room. They observed every incubator they passed by, looking with heartbreaking indifference on the infants lying within. One nurse stopped her wandering.

"This one is ready!" she called to a second nurse nearby.

The other nurse quickly approached to the other and observed the infant within the incubator. She scanned him from many angles, and after a few moments of testing, she looked at her associate, and approved her diagnosis:

"Yes, he is. Get the respirator."

The nurse, who gave the primal diagnosis, searched her pocket. She pulled out a small breathing mask and a tiny sealed test tube made of glass.

The tube contained a colorful gas, which was swirling inside. The nurse attached the tube to the bottom of the mask and handed it to her associate. The latter reached her hand into the incubator and picked the miserable infant, while holding the device in her other hand. She carefully put the mask with the tube on the infant's face. The nurse clicked with her thumb on a tiny button on the mask.

The tube got unplugged with loud "Pack" sound, and the gas swirling inside the tube began to flow outside. The nurses literally drugged the infant, who was inhaling the colorful gas slowly. The more gas he inhaled, the more the infant's face changed – his eyes began to lose their pitch black color while small eyeballs made their way outside his skull. His gray dead-looking skin turned pinker and more swelling. He inhaled the gas eagerly, like a narcotic man would do. The gas was his oxygen, his deepest desire, his key to survival.

At last, when the glass tube was sucked clean, the nurse holding the infant removed the mask from his face. The poor and miserable infant he used to be was gone. His new form made him significant to his fellow infants in the incubators around. The manufactured personality that he had taken into his body made him fully alive, individual and unique. The infant was finally ready to begin his life, now that the missing part of his existence had been added artificially.

I do not remember how long I'd been there, I do not even remember if I left that place. But there is one thing that will never leave my mind, not as long as I am alive. The horrified cry from the baby's mouth has been echoing in my ears to this day.