The Lifeless Life

Darkness slowly fell on the streets of Angkara, while the neon lights turned on one after the other, trying to fool itself that tonight would be the same night as the nights that passed. Adam didn't think so, but he understood how people would try religiously to maintain the status quo. He felt that way too. He wished that his nights would be his regular night: drowning in his depression with BE, watching the starless sky. The world didn't allow him that. It wouldn't.

He drove slowly on the packed road, awash with natural orange-purple hues from the setting sun, and the pink-green-blue-yellow lights from the neon light. He still wore his protective suit, he felt safer that way. A dangerous gas was released into the air, and people got admitted to the hospital by the minutes. There was an assault between officers in his office, and his foster father died most cruelly. The outside was dangerous, but he didn't know about his inside. Which would devour him first? The materials from the outside, or the immaterial from the inside?

Still no words from Hagar and Y-0. He hoped they're okay.

"They're fine," Ms. Armstrong, who sat beside him said, "they're just being held."

That was really disturbing, the way she read his mind and also knew what happened to his friends, "By the goddess, are you for real?"

"Well, I'm here," she said, "so I must be real. I don't know. I'm afraid that Ms. Armstrong is only the person whose body I'm now settling in. The real Ms. Armstrong is…"

Adam held his breath.

"…sleeping," she concluded.

"Sleeping?"

"Seems like it. I can see her sleeping deep within her psyche, waiting to be awakened again once I finished with her body," she said.

Adam thought that this lady might have some psychological disorders. Perhaps schizophrenia, and all her seemingly true 'readings' were just coincidences.

"What's schizophrenia?" she asked, "sorry, can't help it. I keep on hearing your thoughts."

"Can you just pretend that you can't?"

"Why?"

"So it feels less disturbing."

She looked at him, then to the road, then to her lap, "I'm sorry. I don't know. I don't know anything about why am I here, or why I should use this poor lady's body just to communicate with you…"

"But do you know who you are, or *what* you are?"

"No."

"Huh," Adam suddenly felt very tired.

"I'm hoping… maybe…" she hesitated, "…that those who are capable to be read by me, and can communicate with me, will tell me who I am."

"What if they never found out?"

Ms. Armstrong looked to her front window, looking at nothing, She tried to come up with an answer.

"I don't know."

Adam decided not to pursue the topic. He changed the subject, "so umm… you said you were there when George shot Y-14?"

"I was there. Around. Not in a particular body… But after the real Ms. Armstrong asked him about his possible involvement with Callisto, I found myself becoming her. Suddenly I was in her seat, looking at the scene."

"I'm sorry," Adam interrupted, "' possible involvement with Callisto'?"

"Yes. Apparently, Y-14 accessed the media database to inform that piece of information, then he relayed it to other media who seem concerned with it."

"How did Y-14 knew about that?"

"He has … 'access to Callisto's database', apparently. All of the androids have…" she answered, then asked, "what is an 'android'?"

Despite his surprise that this person didn't have any clue about androids, Adam found himself lost for words in trying to explain the technicalities of an android. He finally said, "well, they're basically not human. They were created by humans. They were machines, they were limited."

Ms. Armstrong's eyes seemed to lighten when she looked at him, "humans created another being? That's… wonderful…"

"Why are you so excited about it?"

"I don't know. I feel lifted… somehow…"

Adam struggled to comprehend how the fact that humanity created a watered down version of 'life' could make someone looked thoroughly happy. 'Lifted.' As it was a holistic acknowledgment. The androids would never be true humans. They were different from people of flesh and blood. They don't have a soul. They don't share humanity's happiness, sadness, and despair. They don't have the drive for self-preservation. They don't have the horrifying thoughts of being dead. Stopping to exist.

"They have," Ms. Armstrong said, reacting to his inner thoughts, "I can sense all of those things from them. As a matter of fact, they have no difference from humans. Why do you hate them so?"

The question was like a sudden soft blow, straight out of the left field.

"I don't hate them," he answered. Too quick, without thinking.

"You're lying," she told him.

"Don't tell me what and how I'm thinking. It is more complicated than that!" Adam shouted. He then looked to the side to see her reaction.

She was looking at him intently for five seconds, then shifted her attention back to the road ahead, which was now basked in neon lights. She didn't argue. They spent the remainder of their drive to the Station in complete silence.

Adam felt the urge to apologize. But he wondered why he needed to do that.