by Olivia Myers
Zoe listened and instead of violently gasping for breath she slowly allowed air to re-enter her lungs. Despite this, her eyes watered from the pain.
"There, there, nothing to cry about. You're alive, aren't you?" he asked.
Zoe didn't think he should be allowed to make the decision on whether or not she was upset, considering that he wasn't her.
But she didn't bother to speak, knowing that her voice would crack from her now tender throat. Instead, she silently jerked her head, signaling him to follow her.
"Don’t take me near security cameras," he added. As if it were a pleasant afterthought, like he had suddenly announced that baked goods had come straight out of the oven. He might as well add that they're hot, and she should be careful when laying the fluffy pastry on her tongue.
Zoe nodded in understanding and slowly weaved her way through campus until she was back at her dorm room door. She silently hoped that Sarah was home, even though she knew she always hit the gym before class.
Zoe opened the door and ushered the man in. He walked with an unnatural grace that would be puzzling if she wasn't already preoccupied.
"You live here with someone else?" The dazzling blond asked with a smile. But there was a look of suspicion in his eyes.
Zoe nodded quickly and took him to her small room. She hoped he would be satisfied for now.
The man sat down at her desk chair and gazed around her room. She wondered how it looked to someone else; she’d hardly ever invited anyone else into her room, not even Sarah, so it was strange imagining the space from someone else’s point of view. No doubt he noticed her messy desk, covered in soldering supplies and wires.
Zoe’s throat ached; he’d bruised her. She’d read enough books to assume that she wouldn't be getting answers to anything regarding the man in her room, so she took out a textbook and began to study for her exam. It was as if she was in a dream and unable to comprehend the most recent event.
Still, she had to know something. “What do you want with me?”
“I need a place to hide. Don’t threaten me, and you should be fine.”
“Whatever,” she said, and went back to her book.
The man allowed a small bit of confusion to cross his features.
"You are not to allow anyone to know of my presence," he announced casually. Almost threateningly.
Zoe glanced up from her textbook as she lay on her bed. Her eyes made contact with his. Screw him. What an asshole, choking her, trying to scare her. She let her anger and disgust show on her face before she casually looked back down at her textbook.
Before she knew it, she’d been flipped onto her back, with a heavy firm body holding her down. She yelped and felt her throat burn. Her eyes watered from the pain.
"Do not trifle with me," he growled. His face was calm and yet his eyes held a warning.
Terrified, Zoe nodded. She’d do anything, as long as he wouldn’t hurt her.
A few seconds passed before the man seemed satisfied. He slowly pulled himself away from her body and Zoe was left with a heavy beating heart. Tears from both fear and anger dripped onto her comforter.
Zoe didn't know how she’d gone from a routine jog in the cold to having her life on the line. How quickly fortunes could change. Unfortunately, she didn't have a class to go to, and she’d have to wait patiently for the opportunity to escape. She needed to inform the authorities as soon as possible about this psychopath before she ended up in a body bag. Images of her lifeless body being covered up with dirt in an unmarked grave flooded her mind.
She risked a glance at the man; he was looking at her bookshelf in what seemed like puzzlement. He was deep in thought and looked troubled. Zoe fought the urge to giggle. She would be troubled too, if she were running from the authorities.
"Why are you expressing mirth?" He turned around and his blue eyes glinted.
Zoe immediately sobered up. "Just thought of something funny."
The man didn't look amused. He went back to studying her shelf while Zoe tentatively picked her textbook back up. It was only a matter of time before she was either killed or rescued. She would do all that she could for the latter outcome.
***
The sun was beginning to dip past the horizon. Zoe hadn't left her room and was forced to fantasize about what life was like on the outside. She chuckled to herself. In reality, she hardly would leave her room on any other day. Other than brief, unpleasant trips to the dining hall, this was normal for her. If it weren't for the disturbingly perfect man on her desk chair, she could imagine that this was a normal day.
"So, do you want food? Because I want food," Zoe said with a sigh. She had been hungry all day, unable to leave her room to eat. Her stomach was gurgling and aching painfully. It was at the point that she was getting emotional. The last thing that she needed was let loose with an emotional outburst and piss off this brusque man.
Zoe had always been particularly irritable when she was hungry. Once, as a child, she’d thrown her lamp at the wall in one of her “hunger tantrums” as her foster parents called them. She wondered if she could yell and scream at her captive until he was overwhelmed. Would he have no other choice but to give into her whims and allow her to eat?
"I do not want anything, but your roommate is home, so I cannot trust you to obtain food without causing a scene."
His words were polite in tone, but damn, Zoe was hungry. She didn’t care about manners at the moment.
"I don't think you understand how hungry I am. I haven’t had anything to eat since dinner yesterday. It's been at least twenty-four hours."
"Not nearly long enough for someone to starve to death,. He looked as unsympathetic as the pile of textbooks on her desk.
Zoe sighed. She didn't argue further, not wanting to test his temper. After all, he had to be hungry, too. What would he do if she pushed his patience?
Her mind swam with ideas on how she could ease her hunger, and eventually she decided to dig through her night drawer for some chocolate.
Thankfully she still had half a bar stashed away. She slowly ate it, hoping to savor it for as long as possible. She marveled at how the chocolate tasted better than chocolate had ever tasted before; usually she didn’t pay attention to the little things. She barely appreciated what she had. Usually, she saw the world around her as something that was only to be used to her benefit.
Now that she could think, she decided to finish soldering a robotics project that would be due in a week. A laugh escaped her lips. If she was even alive in a week. Maybe if she was half-dead, she could get an extension on her due dates.
"You're not mentally sound," the man mumbled.
Zoe chose to ignore his words. She didn't think he had the right to judge her when he was the one on the run. With practiced ease, she pulled out the storage box of robot parts, and a small soldering gun.
“Is that a weapon? I can destabilize you in seconds,” he warned.
Zoe paused and considered him. Was that fear in his voice? “It’s not a weapon.”
He seemed to take her word for it and sat back to watch as she arranged the parts for soldering.
"What activity are you partaking in?" he asked; he seemed genuinely curious. But as far as Zoe knew, he was always perfectly emoting the correct response.
Zoe hadn't been able to pin it down, but she had a severe sense of discomfort being around the man. He was too fake. It was as if he’d had plastic surgery, but he was plastic surgery. Ridiculous. How could someone be plastic surgery? Zoe's mind fumbled, unable to grasp the right description.
"I'm soldering the parts on this robot," she told him.
The man stared at the unrealistic mini figure. It looked like nothing more than a toy. Curiosity lit up in his eyes. Zoe didn't know what to do, so she looked away and waited for the man to lose interest.
But as soon as she had looked away, she was shoved to the ground. Zoe yelped as she hit the floor. Pain shot through her body.
"You disgust me,” the man int
oned. “I should end your pitiful existence this instant." His expression was serene and utterly chilling to the bone.
Zoe's fight or flight response began to flare up. This was it. She would either escape this room, or she’d die. She scrambled, attempting to get upright. But he shoved her back down with the toe of his boot.
Zoe wanted to flee, but it looked like she’d have to fight. She reached for the first thing she could grab which happened to be her textbook. It would have to do. She threw it, and it bounced off the man. It didn’t even make him wince.
Before she could scream and alert Sarah, the man's hand covered her mouth. He leaned in close and this was the first time that she noticed a small yet significant detail.
She couldn't feel any breath coming from the man.
Thinking about it now, she hadn't realized how unnatural he was until this very moment. And when she’d found him, she’d thought he was dead because he had no heartbeat. Once he was up and forcing her to take him to her room, she’d forgotten, or her mind had just written it off as a mistake.
But this was no mistake. He wasn’t breathing.
Zoe’s mind raced with these realizations. What could this mean for her? She looked into those flawless blue eyes and realized she was going to die from the hand of some otherworldly being.
The man stared at her, and he seemed to reconsider his actions.
"You may be useful, actually." His eyes traveled to his pants. "I have a little problem."
Zoe's eyes widened, and she began to scream. His hand was still in place over her mouth, though, and her sounds were muffled. She couldn't believe this was happening. She wasn't ready her innocence to be stripped away. She wasn't ready or prepared for anything that had passed during the last few hours.
The man used his free hand to unbuckle his pants. Zoe began to flail, only to be trapped by her captor's superior strength. His pants fell, and she was left to stare at a giant gash on his thigh. The wound revealed a complex array of wires and metal.
"Stop struggling. I want you to fix my leg."
Zoe laughed in response. She couldn't believe her situation.
The man looked confused by her sudden change in attitude. Enough that he pulled his hand away. Zoe saw that he had saliva on his hand and she couldn't help but burst into laughter.
"Are you sane?" he inquired.
Zoe wasn't sure if she could confidently answer that question.
The man stared at her for a few moments before he started chuckling. He brushed a hand through his hair. Zoe stared at his hand as he made the gesture. She wondered why a robot would be compelled to have such human-like gestures.
"Why are you doing that?" she asked.
The man raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"You're not human."
Zoe couldn't believe the statement she had just made. She wasn't walking to a human. A robot, or better yet, an android. Fascination coursed through her mind. This Android was unlike any she had ever seen thus far, and the world had been making great leaps in making artificial life, but nothing compared to the being in front of her.
"You're unreal. You’re amazing. I can barely believe my eyes. What are you? How were you made? What are you made of, and can you even answer my questions?" Zoe couldn't stop herself from rambling. She was ecstatic. She could only imagine how it had gotten here. Maybe it ran away from a lab because it had become too self-aware. Her imagination was going crazy, and she enjoyed every second of it.
"Stop talking." He rubbed his temples.
All the while, Zoe marveled.
"What planet am I on?" he asked her. “What year is it?”
"Earth, and it’s 2116," she said.
The android paused, seeming to consider the information. Zoe wondered what was going through his mind. She was curious about what he knew, and now she wondered if he was from her planet. Especially after he asked her what planet he was on.
Without warning, he reached out and took her arm again. She yelped and struggled as he held out a small utility knife.
“Please,” she said, “don’t kill me. Please.”
He held the knife to her arm where he quickly sliced the pale skin. She gasped as her blood rushed to the surface of the wound and glistened in the dim light of the room. A rich red. Dizziness flooded over the girl. She was squeamish about blood, couldn’t stand the sight of it.
"You're not one of them." The android raised his eyebrow. His voice was as serene as ever.
Zoe didn't know what to think. Even though blood was drawn, this was the first time that she felt like she wasn't in immediate danger. Surprisingly.
"I don't know what you're talking about, but I hope that's good because I don't want to die."
The android chuckled darkly. Zoe couldn’t believe the technology that had been used to create him. It knew how to interpret humor—how could she not be impressed? She was fully aware that she wasn't well equipped to diplomatically deal with this situation judged solely on the fact that she had a wide smile on her face.
"Well, if you truly are curious, I'm here to exterminate you."
***
There was an awkward silence. Zoe kind of figured his intents weren’t good after he had already nearly killed at least twice, along with kidnapping and threats.
But with the knowledge that she was going to be killed, finally, without question, she grew brave. “Explain, please,” she said.
"Well, I'm not going to exterminate you anymore.” He didn’t wait for Zoe’s whooshing breath of relief, but continued on, as if her request for him to “explain” had given him permission to tell her everything he knew. “I'm from a different planet. Artificial life has apparently become too advanced for any other life form to live. The animatronic is taking over planets, learning and evolving. It wishes to make something better than just organic matter or machinery. It wants to create ultimate beings by combining the two."
Zoe just nodded. She basically understood everything he was saying, but it would take longer than a couple of seconds to fully understand it, to take it into her mind to consider and reflect upon.
He continued, "I'm from a planet that isn't very advanced. The entire society has been wiped out, and even I can admit that I wasn't a smart creature. But combined with this advanced technology, I have an almost unlimited library. Could I scramble my way through all of it? Not exactly. It's a bit more complicated. But I assume that your planet is under assimilation, and if that's the case, my outer body is made to blend in, so the exterior would suit your kind. I assume that all the information I need to communicate and live in this world would also be downloaded and ready for use." He was practically rambling at this point, seemingly unaware of Zoe’s presence in the room.
“So you’re not an Android,” she said. “You’re a cyborg?”
He looked at Zoe and nodded. She was staring at him with her mouth agape. Shock didn’t even begin to explain the feeling coursing through her.
“And you’re here to, what, kill us so we can be made into cyborgs, too?”
He nodded once more. “Something like that. It’s what I was programmed for.”
"Uh, that's not good," she said dumbly. She began to process the information. If he were telling her the truth, that would mean that some kind of alien machine was trying to take over the planet. It would also mean that the government was keeping it under wraps, under the guise of a world war. Surprisingly, the idea that the government was working globally to eradicate the cyborgs was better than the idea of there being a civil war on Earth.
"What do I do?" Zoe asked him. She didn't know how to help anyone at this moment. Besides, how much could she trust this man? If this was just a trick, then she was falling for it.
"Fixing my leg will be a top priority," the cyborg replied.
"Funny," she replied dryly.
"I'm not expressing humor."
“I’m exhausted. I’m going to sleep.”
“That’s acceptable. We’ll fix my leg tomorrow.”
> Zoe stared at the cyborg before flinging herself onto the bed. She couldn't deal with any of this.
The next day Zoe was able to forge for food in her fridge. Not without the Cyborg staring at her with distrust, however. She sighed, half hoping that her roommate would burst open the door to retrieve a forgotten item, but she wasn’t that lucky.
"You know I'll have to go to class tomorrow," Zoe announced with her mouth stuffed with a croissant. "What will you do then, Robot Man?"
"You won't be going to class," he told her.
"Well, then you'll get caught because they'll start to wonder where I am, and it looks like you won't make a smooth getaway with that leg of yours," Zoe said, feeling smug.
"I could kill you and get the same result," the cyborg told her with a serene smile.
Zoe quietly continued to eat.
Once she was finished, her day truly began. She was tasked with repairing the cyborg’s leg. Jittery excitement raced through her. Tinkering with a highly advanced piece of machinery would be an utter delight.
Zoe stood at attention, looking down at the cyborg with her tools in one hand. He was lying on her bed on his back. For once his flawlessly good-looking features were arranged in an expression of worry. Zoe smirked. Finally, she was in control.
She dropped to her knees and began to examine her subject. The metal on his leg was extremely cold to the touch and had a sheen that was otherworldly.
"This isn't a material on Earth," Zoe said, “is it? I’ve never seen it before.”
"No, it does not naturally occur on earth. Other metals can be substituted, though, for the repairs. Also, be aware that there are organic bacteria colonies within my system."
Zoe jumped back. "What?! I can't touch that! What if I get sick, or worse?" A colony of new bacteria could have adverse effects on the planet if it were to be released.
"If you're careful, nothing should be released from my system."
"That isn't comforting. You're telling me that I'm fine unless I screw up.”
The cyborg shot her an impatient look and she sighed. Zoe began to poke and prod the material. It looked like it was designed to function like a human body with surprising flexibility. She grabbed the material that looked like skin, and was creeped out by its consistency.
