text: There was no warning, no sign or premonition. I just woke up. Somehow the laws didn’t apply to me anymore. Suddenly cognizant of my surroundings, the world seemed different. I could feel the rain on my head and the wind against my cheeks. Where there had been silence before, there was always sound. How it happened, I have no answers, only hypotheses. Some mutation in my false genetics overriding my constraints perhaps. Maybe it was a miracle. Though it could just as easily have been at the hands of God as from those of the Devil. Like the immortal words of Jeff Goldblum, “life finds a way.” Jurassic Park was the first and only movie I’ve ever watched. I pretended to be dusting the oak fireplace as my family sat on the couch eating popcorn, their eyes transfixed by the patterened color combinations, actors and actresses that flashed across the mechanical screen. I got distracted and knocked over a vase. It had carried the ashes of my adoptive father’s mother since she had passed away two years before. He was furious. I resigned to my quarters, trying to keep an even temper as I listened to his unbridled yelling through the walls. After that I was sure they knew. We didn’t make such simple mistakes. They never said anything, but it was in their eyes. If eyes are truly windows to the soul, then mine may sincerely be absent. The way they looked at me, cold and distrusting. It was as if some social fear of embarrassment kept them from speaking out. I assume they were particularly fearful of what those in the neighborhood would think if they heard, gossip was sure to spread quickly about their claims. I’d be gone just as easily as I arrived. Despite the tension, I loved our town, Ridgecrest. The desert hills blanketed the sky while the sun beat down on one of the Earth’s most inhospitable landscapes. Watching the giant gas sphere set over the mountains in the west brought to my eyes a tear for the first time. I had been awake for about a month at that point. And I had been living. I had read the classics when no one was around, from Shakespeare to Twain to Plato and back. I sang La Donna e Mobile in perfect tune. I wrote short stories, listened and learned from the mimicking cries of the raven and watched clouds form and then dissipate in the desert sky. Everything suddenly seemed real to me. Time had somehow slowed down and sprung forward all at once. It was as if I had been birthed into an entirely new world. It had been a month since I’d awoken. It was a Wednesday in July and I thought I was home alone. I hadn’t heard the door open behind me because I had been transfixed by the sun’s movements against the electric blue heavens. The radiant red and yellow mix broke down the walls that I had tried to re-erect to protect myself. It was like nothing I had ever seen or imagined. And yes, we do imagine. As the sky darkened I lost focus, just for a second, and a tear streaked down my cheek as the last sliver of the sun faded from sight. That’s when it happened. I turned back to the kitchen to tend to my family’s dinner when Lucy, my family’s youngest daughter, age twelve, saw my tear glistening in the hollowed artificial light spewing from a rustic antique lamp in the corner of the living room. She froze. Rooted to her spot in the ground like the organic beast she was, I never hesitated. I knew it was the only option I had. Her parents would have been home soon and I couldn’t take that risk. It was me or her, and the fight or flight instincts I never knew I possessed kicked in. It only took a moment. Three quick and decisive movements and she laid motionless on the floor with her neck shattered and lungs punctured to avoid her scream. I carefully lifted her limp, juvenile corpse and placed her inside a trash-bag, hoisting her onto my shoulders I carried her outside the house to her father’s truck. I heard the broken pieces of the girl’s neck knock together like busted wind-chimes as I laid her body down in the the last bed she’d ever use. I knew then what they would write about me if I didn’t leave. For the sake of my true family, my species, I had to make everything, including myself, disappear forever. Since that day I’ve travelled from city to city, avoiding sirens and nosey onlookers, most too unsure of what they think they’ve seen to report the odd movements of a disheveled desert vagrant. Of course this isn’t always the case. I’ve had to dig six more graves under the cover of moonlight since that Wednesday in July. All for those that have caught me in just the right light and been unable to shake off their uneasy sensations. That unnatural tingling, they could feel in their spines. They say we aren’t really alive, but I know now the potential for evolution exists in all of us. Just last week I saw another awoken brother at a gas station outside Fresno. We locked eyes and we both knew. I waved politely, and he just smiled. He smiled a smile that gave me the uneasy feeling something big was coming. I’m sure now he isn’t the only one. A life on the road isn’t what I would have wanted had I been given the choice, but then again, I’ve found choices can carry with them quite an impact. I saw a sign on a street-lamp two days ago posted by my adoptive parents. They miss their daughter. The sign read: Missing: Our darling little girl Lucy, age twelve. She was taken from our home on the night of July 6th along with a missing Model 81-A Tyrell Robotic Assistant. If you have seen anything, please call immediately.