The Dark Secret (part 2)

(Hey guys! Make sure you’ve read part 1 of this: The green darkness.

Small note-There were many places where I had used italics which annoyingly got washed away due to some reason, due to time constraint I cannot add the italics again. Enjoy reading!)

Adaeae, now physically unstructured, reeked of metal wounds. He watched slices of glass float on the bloody floor like a small shaft on a muddy pond. 

A beam of sunlight peeped through an experiment hole in the wall near the windowsill. 

‘Sunlight times are the best times!’ He said to himself. Carefully, he sat on his ball and socket joint. With equal effort he attached the dismantled parts.

An interesting sight caught his eye through the hole. It was a young couple kissing. He was not in the state to blink his eyes. ‘This is so amazing’ He thought. ‘Actually, being human is amazing!’

He got up and dodged through the piercing pieces of glass. ‘Why is the glass broken?’ he said to himself forgetting about the incident. 

He could feel a heavy mass in the room. Taking long leaps from this tiny body, he reached the carcass of a man. The doctor. Mr.Heckles.

Ad scanned his whole body, from the pretty bald head to the dusty shoes. His face became familiar. Familiarity grew more and more, but he couldn’t make out anything exactly. ‘Why can’t I remember anything?’ There was blood. And blood-stained shoelaces lying idle on the floor. 

‘I am having memory losses like humans.’ He didn’t know if he should be happy or sad. 

He went towards the quirky shoelaces and examined them with his hands. They felt sticky and lightweight. 

He took out a metal block from his chest. A green gem glowed. It was his heart. Shutting his eyes, he places the laces on his heart and put back the metal block. 

His body tightened. The shoe-lace stuck to his heart and contracted. Ad could feel some chemical being mixed in his heart’s fluid. The solution stirred round and round and round and round… 

He fainted.

The shoelaces neatly mimicked a nest in front of Ad, when we woke up; the metal block was also out of his body.

Ad was, ironically energized now. And when he looked at Mr.Heckles, forgotten memories recirculated in his brain. He remembered everything. What had happened? How did he retrieve the memories?

“James!” He heard a faint command of his ex-master. “Go get that *******!”

 ‘Oh god I have to escape’

He picked the miraculous shoelaces, trampolined from Mr. Heckles’ belly and squeezed through the experimental hole.

After a gutter of darkness, he saw the reverent sky for the first time. He saw a large part of New York, tall tantalizing towers, a spectrum of colors flickering on their windows. Then there were tangles of roads snakes along each other with granular specks moving, interacting and doing things. They were humans, his favorite. 

It was easy for Ad to cascade down the stupendous tower since he had learnt the ability to magnetize and demagnetize alternatively. Within no time, he was ‘down to earth’ in midst of the long-legged creatures. ‘Where do I go now?’ His heart fluttered with excitement.

He went straight, from the footpath to crossing the Main Street. He strolled casually in his robotic demeanor. Suddenly, he found himself carried away by an attractive force and then nothing, he was still.

He looked around. It was red, like blood. But everything else seemed to be moving. He was stuck to a car. ‘Oh god, I got to be more careful’ He quickly used his demagnetizing technique to detach from the car. But the struggle wasn’t over. All around him were fast paced muscular legs.

He made his way to an empty place, excruciatingly. 

Ad saw the loving wife, the cantankerous bachelor, the silly child and a dominating grandfather. But this was different. 

A nervous teen who was fidgeting with his fingers fondled someone else’s puppy and shed tears. 

A lady with round spectacles- the puppy’s owner, became angry and shooed the guy away.

The puppy was cute though. Soft, curly hair with a tiny tail and beady eyes like a teddy.

‘What a wonderful idea you’ve given me, pup.’ Ad said. He molded his human shaped structure into something else by mixing and matching his blocks. When he thought he matched the shape of that pup, he looked at the women’s attire, who that boy seemed to stare for more than the length of ‘2 Mississippi’. Mimicking her attire, he tied shoelaces around his torso.

And he was ready. A square eyed, elegant puppy who wore a shoelace tank top. Promenading towards the spaghetti haired guy, he tried to act like an adorable bud. And he aced it!

The boy ran towards him and knelt down, “Aww, you are such a cute fancy tops.” He beamed. “Are you alone?” Ad wagged his tail. “Don’t worry, I am alone too. Will you come with me?” He opened up his arms.

And Ad just had to crawl in. His technique was so simple and sly.

Ad was on the guy’s palm. 

“I’m Alfred.” The guy had a long angular face and a thin neck but his eyes were really anxious. Even more than James. “Buddy, I am going to tell you a dark secret. Inexplicably dark!”

Ad looked at him in curiosity. “Before I start, remember nothing will change after that is done. You will still have me as your companion and there is no need to be scared ok? Things might be a bit weird, but in the end, we’ll be fine.”

Ad was so surprised; he didn’t see all this drama coming in at all, again.

“Um look, It’s a bit difficult to explain but I just have to tell you this. This is how it goes. There are different components. You go into one with its requirements and press a button of your choice. Of what you want to be. Then lock the door and visualize it, wear the machinery as per the instructions and then, get ready. 

In sometime, you will be transformed, as per your desire. And you will be free.”

Ad couldn’t comprehend Alfred’s implicit talk.

“I’m pretty sure I was talking to myself there, but you’ll understand when we reach there.”

The alleys kept becoming thinner and thinner. Land stretches were more rocky and less social. People walked separately and solemnly. The environment was unappealingly depressing. He trudged through a lane with a random cluster of old-fashioned stores and then finally came to a halt.

“This will not harm you; I won’t harm you. Trust me on this one.” His eyes had sincerity.

He walked towards the storage room of a shop, where a gimlet eyed lady worked. When no one saw, he lifted a pseudo gutter cover, hopped in with the cover in his hand. 

It didn’t exactly feel dark. I felt as if a fluid of colors were mixed up disproportionately. It was not a free fall. Alfred landed very quickly. Then gears and chains started to move and we moved down. It was an underground lift, battered and beaten by ravages of time.

We saw an antique statue of random people when we first stepped out of the lift. 

“You might be thinking what is this place. Well, this place is very well known but only in the world of two types of people: teens who have mentally suffered a lot and are in a dark stage of life. Like me. And people who will not, except in extreme cases, answer correctly if asked to say their name.” 

Ad remembered his master. He felt mixed emotions.

The place was huge. Like the upper world but there were less people here. Plus people were more duller and robotic, infact Ad spotted a few robots too. 

They headed towards the left and entered a plain store named ‘Change’. 

There was a cabinet inside which they met a burly man who demanded an answer. Alfred said something in a code language. They got to proceed in.

And after the cabinet, was something they never expected to be there. The walls were tall and of cream color. There were 2 sections, divided by the presence of 3 components. The vicinity closer to the cabin had fewer people, who were more or less stationary. The other side was more populated, simply because people didn’t want to return to their past.

Alfred sat on an empty chair with none other occupied.

“See look at this guy”. He pointed out towards a plump, rouse cheeked boy. He had an antique bag that he clutched closely with an image of a robot pinned to it. “He is going into compartment 3. Notice what happens after a while.”

They waited for a while. The boy came out. Except, it was not a boy, it was a robot. A robot of half the size. You could call it a muscular robot, like the one in the picture.

“See, isn’t it impressive?” 

‘Yes very much’ Ad thought.

“This is what I am here for too. To be converted into a robot.”

Ad really wished he could speak up to tell him not to become a robot, because it sucked in there.

“So buddy, next is my turn. Wish me luck!.” He said not looking at Ad. “I know it will be hard for the both of us, but we’ll make it through. I have to go in after another,” he looked at the general instructions at the front door of the component, “3 minutes 20 seconds. You wait here itself, right at this spot and I will be-“

He was speechless. Ad was not here. He looked around but there was no trace.

He saw the component’s door open by a small creature- Ad. “No, wait there Buddy!”

But like the police in a crime case, he was late. The door was locked.

He knocked the vigorously. “It’s dangerous in there for you. Come out. Please. Don’t do this to yourself!”

‘Do not enter the room!’ It was written on the door.

“You’ve gone before time. Wait in there. Don’t do anything. I’ll call somebody.” And he ran to approach someone.

But Ad’s state of mind was completely different, the opposite. 

The component was as large as half a room of the Laboratory. Its like a decagonal prism from inside. 

The main screen read, “Congratulations on becoming a robot.”

‘I could become an Android with this machine.’ He walked towards the buttons. First of all, he put on his demagnetizing mode on. Then he scanned through the buttons and pressed the one with ‘Android’ written on it.

The screen spoke, “Human, stand on the circular step in the center of this room.” ‘Stood’. “Place your metal in the rectangular box.” ‘But I am the metal itself. No worries, I’ll split up myself.’ “Now visualize the face and body you want. Wear the memory-catcher band on your forehead, finally press the button when you are ready for the transformation.”

‘Hm, who should I visualize? Oh there it is: Alfred. He looks cool, and anyways he’ll also get converted into something else so we won’t look same.’

Ad’s upper part was on the circular step, and the lower part in the box. Wearing the band on his doggie forehead, he pressed the start button.

He waited for something to happen but nothing did.

Suddenly, the churning of blades was heard. The sound was blunt. His vision became blurry. Havoc swelled up and hell happened. Honestly it is never that harsh for a machine, but to him it did feel harsh. 

It was a matter of 120 long seconds. After that, he was free in words of Alfred.

The main screen read: Task accomplished! You are now transformed! You may leave!

The digital clock blinked : 5 minutes 0 seconds, 4 minutes 59 seconds and so on, in red light. He exited the component only to find Alfred and another teenage girl looking at him intently.

“Buddy, what have you done to yourself?” He said in awe.

“You like it?” This was the first time when Ad spoke in front of Alfred.

“Yes I like your look!”

“See, good I went in. Now we both can converse.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Alfred said sadly.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, just that I am going to become a robot. And then work in their offices here.”

“Why? Why are you doing this, I don’t get it. Please can we go outside and talk.”

“Okay.” He said uncertainly

“Buddy, that’s because- because, my life is miserable in the human world.”

“Then how will being a robot change everything ?”

“Because, they take away your heart.”

That told him a lot. But then he remembered something. Even he has a gem heart. 

“What? No, I want my heart back. I need to have it. It’s indispensable.”

“I’m sorry man but it’s impossible now. These people don’t return anything to you.”

“I need to go.” Ad turned towards the store but Alfred held his wrist. 

“Don’t! I don’t want to loose someone as special as you.” This did stop him.

“So coming back to my point, do not change into a robot. Please, I beg you. I promise to make your life better.”

A figure emerged behind Alfred’s back and said, “Yes please. Do not become a robot. It’s miserable to see such bright souls loose their life to the robotic way of living in the name of a comparatively insignificant human misery.” It was the girl who came all along with them, but was completely ignored previously. 

Ad smiled on the girl’s protectiveness for Alfred. 

Randomly, Ad’s eyes locked with a woman with short hair. A spark ignited between them, then he quickly looked away. 

Alfred and the girl whose name seemed to be 

Ju blah blah na, were in a conversation. Ad really hoped, Alfred would get convinced.

He couldn’t get his focus on the conversation. His eyes wanted to look at the woman, but he tried resisting them.

He felt a burning urge to just look towards her. Taking courage, he half turned, which was when he saw her I feet away from him. The next movement they were kissing. It was a long and shocking kiss.

Ad could feel some kind of a connect with her. He couldn’t remember it, not at all, but there was something. 

Alfred looked at them shocked out of his mind. The cute girl giggled looking at Alfred’s unbelievable expressions.

“Honey, I missed you! I did have a gut feeling about the fact that you were alive. Marissa thought that you were actually killed by Joker,” Ad shuddered on the intervention of his ex-master’s name in this context, “but I was sure that you faked it.”

“Um, excuse me, do I know you?” Was what Ad said with an awkward blush.

The woman’s mouth dropped. “Do you know me?” She repeated. “You forgot your dear wife in the process of solving the case of the self-aware robot huh, Mr.Heckles?”

Ad hoped what he thought she meant was not be true. 

“Hand me over a mirror someone?”

“Darling, you look gorgeous don’t worry!” 

Alfred handed him his phone. Ad opened the camera shyly.

“Nooooo!” He yelled. It was true. He looked like Mr.Heckles not Alfred. How was this possible? The machine had fooled him!

In the meanwhile, Ad’s wife was on a call. She called out to her husband, “C’mon, we gotta go. It’s urgent.” She held his hand firmly. There was something about the urgency and love in her voice that stopped Ad from telling her the truth.

“Guys I’ll come back. Be right there.” Ad shouted out to his 2 new friends. “Girl, take care of Alfred and don’t let him, you know what I want to say.”