To be human

My fingers twitch at the sudden new feeling of being alive. A blinding light shines above me and I try to adjust to the white I see.

It's hard to function and move yourself, when all you remember is waking up in a cold room surrounded by metal tables and blinding lights.

I turn my head to the side to see that the rest of the metal tables are empty. I scan the area, looking over the empty space before I decide to look down on myself. My fingers twitch again and I lift my hand up, turning it over in the blinding lights. My finger curl up into a fist and I turn it around again just to see it better.

I can hear voices from behind the heavy sliding door that is set in the corner of the room. A buzzing feeling in my head tells me those are humans speaking and walking past this metal chamber. But how do I know this if I don't even know who I am?

I sit up on the metal table, looking down on my figure to see I'm only draped with a white sheet. My body underneath it is completely bare. My hand runs along my thigh, the surface that was supposed to be delicate and warm is now smooth and cold.

I swing my legs over the edge, a foreign feeling settling itself in my buzzing head. There's laughter coming from the other side of the door and I register this as a happy feeling.

Feeling? What exactly is a feeling and how do I know this?

I slide off of the cold metal, my bare feet hitting the cold tiles underneath. I tilt dangerously to the side, my cold hands flying backwards to the metal table to grab ahold of it. An alarming buzz in my head makes me glance down at my jittering legs.

Balance. I need to balance myself in order to walk out of this room. But again, the unanswered question of how do I know this stays lingering in the empty space of my buzzing head.

I take a step forward, settling my weight on one of my legs as I lift up the other. I fling my arms to either side of me so I can keep my balance while I try to keep my footing in place. Why is it so hard for me to walk if I can hear people walking just normally outside that sliding door?

I notice something catch the light of the blinding lights that hang from the ceiling. It makes me turn towards it and I forget all about the complicated sense of walking. I head over there, the buzzing in my head alarming me that I am walking completely normally, now that I'm not thinking about it too much. Walking comes naturally.

It's a mirror. A mirror caught the relfection of the lights. I step in front of the glass, finally being able to look at myself properly. What I see in the mirror tells me this is not how humans are supposed to look. From the surfacing knowledge that comes in waves, an image produces itself for me. An image of what a human being should look like. But my reflection doesn't look anything like the image in my head.

Dull blue lines travel all over my body, like somebody decided to draw on me. They shine slightly, the blue flickering slightly like a heartbeat.

My eyes look like they hold the knowledge of the world in them, a bright azure blue shining from them, just like a computer screen.

I lift my hand up to my cheek, where the blue lines outline a form. I press on the middle of the form and there is a soft clicking sound. The plate suddenly lifts up and I notice the grey and black wires that tangle under it.

I'm not human. If I'm not human, then what am I?

The plate settles back into place and I can see my lips turn down, into a frown. How can I move my face like this? This is all so new to me.

My hand travels over my bare forearm and the skin, or should I call it the surface, suddenly ripples. I notice how it changes color and shifts, like my own mind would be controling how I look. Or is it my computer chip that controls such things?

Soon enough the surface changes into a grey color, producing a skin tight body suit for my figure. I look back to my azure blue eyes, almost seeing the wheels spinning in them, reminding me how far from human I actually am.

I turn to the heavy sliding door and step towards it. My palm presses against the cold surface and suddenly the door slides away, granting me an exit from this cold metal chamber.

I stop in the middle of the doorway, looking down at a white hallway that leads left and right of me. There are people in lab coats walking past me, minding their own business and not even giving me a spare glance. They hold small digital screens in their hands and clipboards that shine in dull blue color, like a computer screen.

Their leisurely walk tells me their in no hurry to get to their destination.

The buzzing in my head increases when I sense something stop beside my figure. I turn my head from the left side of the hallway to see a petite looking human standing beside me.

She's smaller than me, reaching up only to my shoulder. Her ash blond hair is tied back in a tight bun, a few stray hairs dancing around her face. I can see myself in her big glasses, my digital looking eyes shining in the glass.

I register that she has a small smile on her face which makes me see she's happy to see me standing here. Her skin is as pale as her lab coat and my eyes register the eyebags that settle on her face. Her figure looks weak and tired and I don't understand why she looks so unhealthy.

It's like a screen appears in front of my eyes. I can see her vital signs blaring in a bright red color, announcing how fragile she actually is.

"It's good to see you on your feet, Project Ei." Her voice shakes when she speaks and I have to blink to get rid of her vital signs that dance above her head. What does Project Ei mean?

"It's time the extermination begins."