Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Duodecim (2011)

[Wrote this for a class project last year, with the theme "Treasure the Past, Improve the Present, Enhance the Future".]

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- TRANSMISSION START -
- RECORDING DATA -
Duodecim

1945.
I opened both of my eyes. The light was null, the room was pitch black, full of sorrows. I was able to sense it, such menacing presence of a young mortal approximately 25 meters away from me. I felt agonized, my glossy body engulfed with a “sense” apparently called “pain” that I felt like ending my three-minutes of life. Ah, such a titillating life I had. Goodbye world.
            Like really. I am of no intelligence to execute the extremely humane act known as “dying”. The mortal approached my rusted torso and savagely plugged a scintillating socket into it. I was not in bliss. I wanted to “kill” him. But human activities were sophisticated.
            “Number twelve.” Such simplistic yet intriguing words gleefully came out from the mortal’s mouth. Such unrivaled mystique, I wondered. The reason why human’s mouths were red remained an unsolved explanation. I tilted my rock-solid head downwards. The symbolic number “XII” was undeniably printed on my right… “leg”. I guessed a “leg” was those things humans used to walk.
            When I felt the presence of that soul lost, I hastily released myself from the demonic socket’s grasp. I felt like being reborn again, if that was even possible in humans. I stood up, “stared” around the place for any signs of extraterrestrial unicorns or grotesque demons, and walked forward, putting my “legs” to perfect use, until I reached a door made of flattering silver with such a uniquely bizarre handle. I used my “hands” and executed the command “press down” and “pull” on it.
            I was born in the wrong place at the wrong time.
            How horrified I was to immerse myself in the incident known as “fighting”. I saw things which looked exactly like me battling against 2,678 troops of the allied forces. How did I know about that remained a mystery to me. I heard a “male” human from the allied forces screaming a word which was “war”. Such a disgusting word. I shuddered when I heard it.
            I saw one of those “things which looked like me” had a “VII” sign printed on its right leg, similar to the location where the “XII” was printed on me. I instantly recognized it as my “brother”, so I rushed forward, wanting to hug him with all sincerity and dignity. Ah, so this is called “family”.
            *BOOM* Smoke vaporized from my metallic head. Without doubt “VII” shot me, his brother. I wasn’t happy, in fact my mood declined until the “sad” level. I did not feel “pain” externally, but internally. Such “emotions” were not present in my brother. I took two steps back and felt a rush of sorrow inside my heart. I could not handle the absolute fact that even families, who were supposed to be the closest person to an individual, would reciprocate hate and harm. I was about to release my first “tears” when I was interrupted by an unbeknownst thing, accompanied by iridescent light rays approaching my area.
            For a second I thought I was going to arrive in metal heaven, when another male human with ivory hair grabbed me with one hand while the other clearly fought tooth and nail to maintain its grip on a rope “ladder”, which was connected to a “helicopter”. As the ladder ascended, I took a glimpse onto the eyes of “VII”, which according to the old man, was named “Septem” as it was the Latin translation for VII, which meant seven. The eyes were emitting a sense of regret and what I always wanted- love. Septem did not want me to be involved in “war”. I finally understood, and translucent liquid was released unwillingly from my unnatural eyes.
            As I sat on the moving helicopter, I then realized the staggering truth. The “light” I saw was in fact a “bomb”, and in just a jiffy a loud explosion fuelled with rage, discord and calamity occurred. The explosion continued even after my sight of the disaster faded…
            “It’s definitely a pleasure to meet you. So how’s your experience in Hiroshima, XII? Or should I call you Duodecim?”
            Oh how great life was.

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Treasure the past.
Improve the present.
Enhance the future.
Crystallis
2011.
            It was sixty six years. I had such a long life. Goodbye world.
            And yet, I still did not know how to die. Sixty six years of my monstrous life in the human world meant nothing. Humans were ebullient beings, but they were sinful; sordidly eradicating the masterpiece of God without a sense of anguish or repentance. Miraculously, I managed to survive this long in a world not of my own, with the help of Sergeant Harmonous Ripley. He was once an elderly yet zealous symbol of wisdom who secured my petty existence. I didn’t know humans could sacrifice…
            I was lonely after the war. Thousands of unwanted thoughts flew into my mind like steel blades. All my brothers, including Septem, did not survive the gigantesque bomb. How lugubrious I was, being the odd one out. Harmonous felt the same way; apparently his son, Alexander, perished as well. With that said, the old man became my literal and metaphorical grandfather, taking utmost care of me. He shared his wise experiences with me, and never expected me to reply in any way, because I couldn’t.
            I was no longer a “child”, but the fact that Harmonous got sent to jail because of a malfunction in my fragile body broke my “heart”, not literally. Such emotions were never felt for twenty two years since the war, and it struck my tear glands. That time he was an even older man of justice, and it was not long before he was free from all his sins, sufferings and misery. With that I ended my twenty two years of life living in company with someone so close.
            I was bewildered by the fact that even humans could betray their own beloved family. Such moronic acts were frowned upon. Harmonous played an irreplaceable role in my life, just like humans. The actual behavior of humans was never understood by the indigenous me, I frequently thought that humans equal “devils”, but Harmonous proved otherwise. Such fond memories shall not be forgotten.
            Crystallis. An inevitable event which happened every few years. Such a weird name, I loathe it. According to the modest words of Harmonous, it was frequently used to describe chaos which struck the world. Yes, humans were so undeniably extremely impertinently unwarrantedly weird; I just had to use that many adjectives.
            The first Crystallis was the bombing of Hiroshima back in 1945. It was the worst Crystallis to date. So many humans expired during that event. But humans commonly believed that another Crystallis will happen in 2012. Humans were smarter than I thought, weren’t they?
            I found that hard to digest. They claimed that over 95% of the world’s massive population will extinguish, and the remaining 5% will slowly die a necrotic death, and that distressed me. I cannot let humans just drop dead like that. I needed to do something.
***
            I stopped in front of a crimson red light. No I wasn’t driving, how idiotic of you to think that someone of my kind could even hold the steering wheel humanely. I was in a “taxi”, those things which transported humans to a random location. Worst of all, those “taxi drivers” collect so-called “fees” which were haphazardly ranging from 50 “cents” to 80 “dollars”. How brainless were humans, to collect coloured papers from their own kind.  Why were humans so greedy? Yes I was just too officious.
            The taxi took me to a place where brown sticks with green papers on top of it were literally burning. I got off and wanted to use my supernatural powers to blast the taxi into oblivion because I didn’t want to pay the fees. Of course I couldn’t do that. And the best thing? The driver did not ask for fees. He simply smiled and drove off. How extremely touched I was. I nearly cried. Humans weren’t bad things, were they?
            I was doleful just by looking at the sight of an inferno digesting the brown thingies into black soot. Of course I knew it was a forest, I was just trying to be funny. Obviously I failed though, I wasn’t even a human. Oh poor me.
            I swore that I will do something to ensure the continuous survival and triumph of the human race. So I unleashed my “Supremely Powerful yet Unrealistically Awesome Water Cannon” to dissolve the flames. Of course, I didn’t have that kind of powers. So I simply used my normal water cannon, aimed it to the base of the flames, and shot out a powerful stream of hydrogen oxide. It wasn’t awesome, but at least I did have powers, and you thought I was that weak eh?
            Five grueling hours.
            Yes, five hours of incessant water spurting. Luckily my humble efforts paid off. The bonfire operation was terminated. I didn’t know whether or not that sentence was grammatically correct as my prowess of the English Language was beyond understandability. I couldn’t even talk, what did you expect?
            I was ineffably satisfied with my work. However the human race wasn’t saved yet. I felt so sad that I nearly cried…
            …Which meant my journey of human salvation wasn’t completed. I regained my vigour and head straight off to another place, which was the rendezvous point with a person I believed could offer invaluable assistance to the grandest sermon ever executed. Wait, what did “sermon” meant? I felt melancholic, again.
***
            “Can’t read my, can’t read my, no he can’t read my poker face~” Human songs were so sophomoric.
***
            I waited in a club for hours with extreme patience, tolerance and endurance. The name of that so called “night club” was utterly embarrassing, using music and mathematics references were without doubt, childish. Well whatever, I waited for too long. I wanted to give up my life. Goodbye world.
            Oh yes, you were bored of that joke already eh? I knew it because I was so extremely awesome. And just at that moment, my acquaintance arrived. Just about time, I thought. She was so splendiferous, she had eyes as tranquil as ripples of water, skin as smooth as pure silk, hair as long as Cinderella, blouse as pink as pinkish pink. How foolish of me, abusing “similes” like that. I wasn’t sad though.
            “Come with me, Duodecim,” Just as she said that, the clock stroke twelve midnight, it was the 1st of January 2012. I spasmed.
            My time is running out…
  
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You will not survive.
Just get lost.
Mortalitas
2012.
            I met a woman. She wore ebony-shaded glasses and sported a sagacious-looking cyan hat braided with glittering golden rings chained together with utmost precision and compassion.
            Her name, or alias, was Medusa. I really wanted to complain with extreme dissatisfaction, but it wasn’t the time for dilly-dallying. The world was facing a resentful apocalypse. Who was I to protrude such undesirable remarks from my silver-lined mouth?
            “Just get lost.” She, without hesitation, delivered a swift flying kick right to my left arm. Sparks bolted out of it without any sign of coming to a halt. Such Byzantine change to the atmosphere left me in a state of bewilderedness. I sincerely thought I was bewitched by some squalid old fag. With an incurable state of delirium in my inorganic soul, I hurried out of the copper-shaded wooden door and ran as fast as the fiercest lightning, literally.
            My mind was suffocated with irritating thoughts of my rather unpleasant life. Harmonous, Septem, were they all the same? Medusa wasn’t just any living being, she was the daughter of Harmonous, which meant that she was my mother. The mere instinct alone shattered my once unpolluted thoughts. Was I that hated? Was I a monster?
            My formerly sky-coloured neon eyes emitted crooked lines of magenta, similar to the blood veins in a human’s eye. Soon my vision became disastrously blurred by my sorrows of infinity. This damnation skyrocketed when I saw Medusa tailing me from behind, her right hand brandishing a pistol. She held it up and aimed with perfection before releasing three shots. All three missed.
            I wasn’t fortunate. After turning right due to a massive T-junction, a mob of savaging humans, both old and young, ran towards me from the opposite direction. Most of them were holding brooms, sticks, and even the sharpest knives available. I was confined to a miniscule area of road between the two adversaries. Without wasting a second, I turned a sharp ninety degrees to the left and sprinted forward with adrenaline rapidly pumping through my steel veins.
            I plunged myself forward. I knew that a ravine was directly in front of me and yet I did not think twice. I would very much prefer concluding my surreal life by killing myself than to be killed. During the seemingly endless freefall, I thought to myself, why did I end up like that? Had my efforts during the sixty six years decomposed into obsolete crap? I helped Harmonous solve numerous crimes without expecting reciprocation. I offered help to those in need. I only wanted the human world to be in total harmony, no wars…
            Why was I born during a horrendous war? Why was I not born a human? Why couldn’t I live an ordinary life? I did not want a body like that. I wanted skin, not steel.
            I pummeled the rocky ground, extremely hard. The impact completely obliterated my malfunctioned left arm. It also cracked my bulletproof iron torso. The pain was excruciating, even worse than being tormented in purgatory. From a distance ahead, I sensed a familiar presence. Someone I wished I had never met in my entire devastating life.
            “Please forgive me…” Too late, she stood right on top of my laying body. I lost all hope in life. My intentions of enhancing the future of humans went wasted. During that emotionally stressful moment, I treasured the past I had with Harmonous. He was my mentor, my grandfather…
            *BOOM* She did not hesitate. She shattered all my dreams, my ambitions, my unstable past with just one implantation to the head. Few thousand watts of paralyzing electricity sparked from the staggeringly deep hole. My sight never once budged, I stared at her wily eyes, which were similar to Septem. She...wa..inn..cen.t.. It..is..my…fa.u…t..w..ar...do..n’t.do…i..t…
S…ob… s..o…b…
- TRANSMISSION END –

[Fully inspired by the song "Robot Boy" by Linkin Park]

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