The Crash

I heard the cars collide before I saw it.

A scream. A sickening, gut-wrenching, grating sound, low and guttural. The groaning of metal as it contorted and twisted into a shape that looked nothing like the front of a car. Glass shattering and tiny fragments scattering, tinkling as they landed.

Then: bright lights. Blurred shapes and ringing in my ears. I checked myself –dazed, running my hands across my arms, my torso. Nothing more than superficial injuries, nicked skin from the glass fragments sitting on the dashboard. Smoke, coming from somewhere I couldn’t see, burned my nostrils. My fingers fumbled over the seatbelt, which clicked and slithered away in an instant. My legs shook. My breath came out in ragged pants.

The other car had butted into the passenger seat of my car. The front had completely crumpled, the windshield shattered, radiating the hot smell of metal. I slipped out of the driver’s side door. The ground felt hard, and I stumbled. Tire tracks had darkened the road.

‘Hello?’ I croaked, making my way around the front of the car towards the other driver. ‘Are you okay?’

I couldn’t see much, only a tangled knot of brown hair, smeared with blood. Slumped against the airbag that had exploded into her face.

‘Are you alright?’ I repeated. The woman stirred, groaning, as if only awakening from a deep, restful sleep. I caught a glimpse of her face: young, pretty, with hazel eyes and full lips that were now painted with blood that streamed down the side of her head.

‘Got to go,’ the woman mumbled incoherently. ‘Got to go.’ Without looking at me, she unclipped her seatbelt. With effort, she slid into the passenger seat and opened the door. ‘Got to go.’

‘Wait, please, stop,’ I called after her. She stepped out of the car, and for the first time, I saw it: her arm, twisted at such an angle it looked like she had two left hands. I grimaced.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ the woman muttered. ‘Got to go.’ She still wasn’t looking at me. Her head was low and seemed to barely be supported by her neck. I stumbled towards her, grabbed her shoulder.

‘Hey, stop,’ I said. ‘Are you okay? Look at your arm. I’m calling an ambulance.’

The woman’s eyes widened. For the first time, she looked straight at me. Terrified.

‘No,’ she said. ‘No. You can’t. You can’t.’

‘Your arm’s broken. You need an ambulance.’ I dug around in my pocket for my phone. More broken glass tickled my fingertips. The screen must have smashed in the collision.

The woman grabbed my arm. Her icy fingers wound around my wrist, with bruising force, her eyes wide. ‘No.’

I shook free of her grip. The woman trembled, frail and pained. ‘Why not?’ I asked. ‘Tell me why or I’m calling them.’

‘Money,’ she muttered. ‘The money. I don’t have the money.’

‘Do you have insurance?’

The woman nodded absently.

‘Then that won’t be a problem. I’m calling them.’ I brought my phone out, dialled triple zero, pressing the cracked screen gently to my ear.

The woman lunged. Her bent arm hung limply from one side, like it wasn’t hers. But her other yanked the phone from my hand. It clattered to the ground. The screen blinked into black.

‘Hey!’

‘No ambulance,’ the woman said, staggering backwards.

‘Why not?’ I yelled. My head throbbed. ‘They’ll just put in some new bones, or something. It’ll be fine.’

‘No, it won’t.’ The woman mumbled, swaying unsteadily. ‘You don’t –you don’t understand. They’ll take me.’

‘What do you mean? They’d take you? Why?’

‘I can’t –I can’t tell anyone. I can’t tell you.’ The woman’s face was white as a sheet beneath the hardening, crimson blood. Her eyes seemed unfocused and hazy. Her good hand was clutching her shoulder, her knuckles white and shaking.

‘Why would they take you?’ I repeated. My anger melted, giving rise to concern, worry. ‘I won’t tell anyone, I promise. If you’re in trouble, I can help you.’

The woman’s eyes darted around from beneath drooping lids. We were alone –the road was far from the hustle and bustle of the city, not in the country, but where light pollution was minimal and the inky black sky was dotted with twinkling stars. The road was empty. Houses were few and far apart.

‘You can’t tell anyone,’ the woman said huskily. She seemed to have aged a decade in a few minutes. The dim streetlight illuminated the skin beneath her eyes, waxy and puffy, light creeping into the wrinkles that criss-crossed her face like a roadmap. ‘Can you keep a secret?’

‘My lips are sealed,’ I promised earnestly.

‘I’m human.’

A pause. Then, I laughed. The sound echoed. My smile faded.

‘What?’

‘I’m human,’ the woman repeated quietly.

‘No, you’re lying,’ I said incredulously, stepping back, as if she was a wild animal. ‘There are no more humans left. There haven’t been for fifty years. You can’t be human.’

The woman said nothing. But the look in her eyes –one of utter exhaustion, pain and despair –told me she was telling the truth.

‘You’re lying,’ I said again. My stomach knotted.

‘I’m not,’ the woman replied.

‘I’m telling the police.’

‘No!’ The woman shrieked. ‘You can’t tell anyone. They’ll kill me. Please, you promised. You have to help me.’

‘Humans caused the collapse of the climate,’ I spat. ‘Humans caused world wars and killed each other and left nothing but destruction in their wake. The world is better without them.’ I reached for my phone. My blood boiled. How could she put me in a situation like this? How could she live knowing what her ancestors did?

But somehow, I found myself wondering. How could she live every day in a society that would kill her if they ever knew her biggest secret?

‘Stop! How can you do this?’ The woman’s eyes were cloudy, now, hazy with tears. Tiny pink circles coloured her cheeks with anger. ‘How can you do this to me?’

‘How can I not?’ I retaliated. ‘The world is better off without you.’

‘You really believe that? You believe everything they tell you?’ She scoffed. ‘You can’t say robots are smarter than us when you blindly absorb everything you’re told. You never question it?’ She continued at my silence. ‘How can you turn your back on the species that created you? That gave you life and feelings and consciousness?’

I froze. My mouth went dry.

‘Robots were –were created by… Humans?’ I stammered.

The woman nodded. ‘You’ve nearly made us extinct. We created you, and you, you turned on us. You took everything. No mercy.’

No, this wasn’t right. Humans were the villain. Ever since my childhood, picture-story books with vibrant, dazzling colours, T.V shows with characters who spoke in way too high-pitched voices. The monster in the background. Ugly, mean. Humans.

‘No. No, that’s not –’

The realisation was enormous. Crushing, devastating.

‘You can make this right. You just have to –have to help me. Please. Keep my secret.’ The woman pleaded, her voice hitching in her throat. Her hair was slick with blood that had begun to clot. Real, human blood. Red and metallic and warm. Her arm –the mangled one –had begun to change colour, her fingers a mottled purple.

My head throbbed. But the decision was clear.

‘What do you want me to do?’