by Greg Dragon
She had examined herself—some for hygiene, some for play—and things were working as they should. Everything was as it was supposed to be since the last time she checked but she hadn’t bled, and that more than anything else became a cause for panic as she stood like a statue in front of the open refrigerator door.
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One of the great things about this time period, this Transcendence Age that Bonnie was living in, was that across the globe, healthcare was a right and not a privilege. Bonnie decided to take advantage of this but she thought that it would be too embarrassing to ask Sal to dig up information about her OB/GYN.
She took a cab from her apartment down to a private hospital. She walked in and gave a false name to the clerk, who got her an appointment with a doctor named Saul Hearne. When the clerk tried to scan her for identification, Bonnie thought that she would discover her false identity. She stood frozen and watched the clerk intently, but nothing came up inside of the database. This sent a red flag wailing inside of her head. Had Sal erased her identity during the investigation? It would only be thorough if he did.
The clerk went through the motions of asking her questions in order to build a new medical file. Bonnie couldn’t tell when she first engaged her but after ten minutes of questions she decided that the clerk was an android.
“Are you a machine?” she asked suddenly, and the older black woman looked up from her computer with a stoic look on her face.
“I am an android, yes, Mrs. Surefire. Is that a problem?” she asked, pausing to wait for an answer.
“No, not at all. It’s just that you just seem so real,” Bonnie said while simultaneously fanning her hands as if to say, “go on.”
The woman winked and went back to punching in the information, and Bonnie looked to see if anything in her appearance should have given her away.
“Do you feel like an android?” she asked, and the woman kept typing without bothering to look up at her.
“I’m sorry but I’m unable to process that level of question,” she said before facing Bonnie once again.
An advanced-looking machine with an older, limited core, Bonnie thought. “Do you have a home? Um, does one of the doctors take you home at night when you all close up? Or, do you just sit here doing clerk stuff all the time?” she pressed.
“You ask a lot of android-related questions, Mrs. Surefire. Is this appointment a legitimate one?” the woman asked suddenly.
“What’s that supposed to mean? Of course it’s legit,” Bonnie snapped. “Seriously, did they program you to be a jerk, or did you pick that up from humans?”
“I am sorry if that offended you, Mrs. Surefire, but your line of questioning indicates that you are either a robotics enthusiast or someone that has an interest in our practice that goes beyond patient care. You have triggered my warning algorithm at core level yellow, which means that you are a vendor, pretending to need our doctor so that you can have him in a room for solicitation.”
“Not quite, Lisa,” Bonnie said sarcastically, using the name written on the woman’s lapel. “I’m here to make sure that all of my female business is working and there is nothing that I want to sell to your doctor.”
The android smiled warmly before speaking. “I am sorry for the suspicions, Mrs. Surefire. I have taken down all of the information I need. Please report to room 305, which is the fifth room on the third floor. Once inside you must remove your clothes and put on one of our robes. The doctor will be in to see you in just a few minutes.”
Bonnie gathered her handbag and scoffed at the android before crossing the empty lobby to take the elevator up three floors. She was feeling good, especially after telling the android off, and now she just needed to know about her menstruation.
“You fooled Lisa, congratulations,” said the red-headed doctor as he came through the door an hour after Bonnie had put on the robe.
She was already annoyed by the length of the wait but wasn’t surprised since it looked as if Hearne was the only doctor working that night. He was young and sharp, and as he walked up to her she felt uncomfortable with having him check her out.
“I know that you would prefer a woman, but I am a professional, Rita,” he said as she stared lasers into him. “Giving a false name and coming in off the streets doesn’t really give you many options in terms of who sees you. Get my drift? I’m not trying to be rude, I’m just saying. Now what’s going on with you, Rita Surefire?” and he rolled his eyes at the name.
“I haven’t had my period. I hope you can understand my need for privacy?” Bonnie said to him and he dropped the smirk and nodded his head assuredly.
“Have you taken a pregnancy test?” he asked and she stared at him to indicate that she wasn’t stupid.
“Okay, so, when was the last time you had sex or took a pregnancy test?” he tried again.
“Over a year ago. I’m not pregnant. This is all sorts of odd and that’s why I’m here. Do you honestly think I’d split my legs for you instead of just buying a pregnancy test?”
“I had to ask. You’d be surprised,” the doctor said calmly and then slipped his hands inside his lab coat. “Are you on any hormones, or any form of birth control? Those have a tendency—”
“No and no,” she said and then exhaled audibly out of frustration.
The doctor dropped the questions and began his routine, first checking her heart rate and then going even deeper into his analysis. After ten minutes had passed he had her lay back and then a nurse brought in something that looked like a metal tray. She lay it down on Bonnie’s stomach and the doctor began to work on its surface.
When he was satisfied he stood up and the nurse—another android—took the tray out of the room.
“Well, that would explain why you aren’t having a period,” he said with a perplexed expression on his face. Bonnie sat up and crossed her arms as she stared at him, questioningly. “You’re not human,” the doctor said without making a move. His face was like someone that had seen a UFO or something so traumatic that it had him in shock. His eyes were wide and he started fidgeting, as if he couldn’t really understand what she was.
“So, I’m some sort of alien creature. Is that what you’re telling me?” Bonnie said.
“No, no, not an alien. You’re some sort of high-functioning android, Rita. Someone made you to look like a human, in such a way that even your insides look organic. If I was a first year doctor I would have fallen for it, but I can tell fake blood and bones from the real thing. You’re some sort of masterpiece, like government-issue. How did you happen to come here? Is this some sort of test to see if you can fool a doctor with the way you look?”
Bonnie would have probably answered his questions if she were able to move as she stood staring at the floor in disbelief. How? How was she an android? She was Bonnie O’Neal, a human woman with a childhood and parents. Sure, she couldn’t exactly remember any of it but she was sure that—
She sprung from the table and snatched up her bag, not bothering to collect her clothes as she pushed past him to exit the room. Tears poured down her face as she found the stairs, and she descended them quickly to the bottom floor. As she crossed the lobby and saw the clerk, she recalled how rude she had been. It made her feel foolish beyond measure and when she got outside she felt as if she had been drowning and finally found air.
The taxi had waited like she instructed, so she jumped inside and begged him to drive. The news had been much worse than she could have imagined and the only thing she wanted—no, the only thing she needed—was to be inside her apartment to fully accept the thought that she was nothing but an android in disguise.
04 | Innocence Lost
How does one go on when all your memories are a lie and life itself is not really life? Everything she knew was simply ... programming. Memories weren't the result of life experiences and nuanced thinking; they were simply recordings stored inside a sophisticated database.
She was not a she, capable of emotions like love and hate.
She was a machine, carrying on in the way that her human creator intended her to. This revolution brought her to tears: artificial, wet and ultimately inhuman tears that came with a feeling that was supposed to emulate the human emotion of pain. It was unbearable and it made her hate whomever it was that created her.
What use was it for a machine to experience hurt? Wasn't the point to make us perfect? What sort of twisted human logic passes on flaws to an android doll? Bonnie thought.
Then she experienced an emotion that she had never felt before. It was both dark and peaceful but it gave her a clarity that made sense of her situation and what she should do. She wanted to take the path that the real Bonnie had taken before her soul was passed on to this machine form. She wanted to die, but could she die? She wondered if it were possible.
What if I was programmed to avoid suicide? What if I am incapable of harming myself?
She sat on the ground and processed it all. It was a lie; her entire existence was a lie. But the question was why? Why would they allow her—a machine—to pretend to be a woman when she obviously wasn’t? How far did it go, whose idea was it? Who built her, who placed her in place of this Bonnie O’Neal, and why did they do it?
There were too many questions to answer and she didn’t know who would be able to answer them. Was Sal in on the ruse or was he an innocent detective thinking that he was helping out a woman whose life was in danger? She thought of all their interactions and there was nothing to indicate that he was false. If he was acting then he had to be the world’s greatest actor, and who would put up an android in a plush, Florida apartment?
No, she thought. Sal was being played for a fool just like she was. He thought that he was helping and didn’t know that they were all a part of someone’s joke. For a game like this, Bonnie O’Neal really had to have pissed off someone powerful. The time, resources, and effort placed into wiping an android’s memory and replacing it with hers had to be significant. Not to mention, the murder … whomever had set up the murder had really done their homework.
What if it wasn’t Ronald, the one who shot the real Bonnie O’Neal? What if Ronald had been innocent and blamed, defending himself when set upon by Sal and his men? Her head was spinning with all of these questions and she knew that there would be no one to answer them.
“It’s going to have to be me,” she said quietly, resting her heavy head inside her palms. “It is going to have to be me to find out everything, and there won’t be anyone to help me. I owe it to the real Bonnie to find the person who did this, and I need to know if Ronald was innocent.”
She felt strengthened by this new purpose. She got up off her butt and wiped the tears with the back of her hands. “I need to find out who I really am, who created me, and why they chose to use me to be a part of this terrible crime.”
This meant that she would have to play along with the Bonnie lie for even longer. If there was an endgame to her cover-up she needed to see it through. That would be the best way to catch the puppet master, to see the show through to the finale.
Bonnie allowed herself a moment of self-pity as she considered her reality as an android. She had lived for over a year as a human being and there had been nothing to convince her otherwise. She had flirted, been flirted with, and felt every emotion under the sun. Even the sun’s rays had felt pleasurable on her skin, and the sand between her toes was so much bliss. She loved wine, though its supposed effects had never registered with her, and though she was never hungry or thirsty, she did like the taste of a good, meaty burger.
She was human, she just had to be, even though she was living in a mechanical body. She felt remorse, love and hate, and she used her memories to fuel her motivations for the future.
“Who are you really, Bonnie?” she asked, and then walked over to the bathroom and turned on the light. She stared at herself in the mirror for an extremely long time, and then reached up to touch her hair. She analyzed her locks and then her eyes, seeing if any part of her appearance was not as it seemed. Her blue eyes were hers, and her face was her own, but there had not been any pictures of the real Bonnie to verify.
She stared at the woman in the mirror and tried to see if anything was wrong. She was pretty—that was undeniable—and her skin was smooth. Her face was a flawless canvas of artificial android skin, and there was intelligence reflected in her expression.
She continued to stare, stubbornly refusing to move until something presented itself to her. She stood for an hour, a feat that would have been a challenge for any human but easy enough for an awakened machine. She stood staring, analyzing, and after a while something clicked. She recalled a similar situation where she stood at a mirror, but it wasn’t the same face that stared back at her in the past.
She had been enhanced. Similar features but this new skin was more real than the one she had worn in the past. Back then there was a wig, but this time she had implants, and her entire mainframe was a thousand times more advanced than the one she had back when she was that other person. Her old form could emulate human life, but this one was different. Now she was alive and she wondered if it was truly machinery that ran beneath her skin.
Bonnie opened the cabinet and grabbed a razor, then closed her eyes tight as she cut a gash into her forearm. What she saw were veins, and blood, thick and unending, but she knew in her heart that this was not real, just a clever copy of human physiology.
“What was your name, pretty girl?” she asked the mirror. “What did they call you back when you were you and someone loved you?”
She took out a needle and threaded wire, then patched herself up and placed a Band-Aid on the wound. Another fun game, she thought to herself. Let’s see if this new body has the ability to heal. She cleaned up the mess and leaned into the mirror. “Answer me girl, who the hell are you?” she asked again and held the position as if her reflection would answer.
When she grew tired of glaring, she walked into the living room and powered down the lights as she made for the bedroom. Then it came to her, like a blinding flash of light, as if the questions she asked had finally deciphered the puzzle.
“Tricia,” she whispered. “My name is Tricia! I was created to love a man who no longer exists.”
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Tricia had three dreams that night. Three dreams from three different people that had essentially become a part of who she was in the world. The first was from Bonnie, and it placed her inside of an office—her office—where she sat by a window looking at diagrams for a new type of circuit board. Next to her was her assistant, though her desk was much smaller and was positioned so that she could never look at Bonnie’s screen no matter how hard she tried.
Unlike the dreams that Tricia was used to having, this particular one was not lucid. She was merely an invisible specter watching it unfold and as she looked in on Bonnie, she realized how different the two of them were. Bonnie seemed to be stressed out, overworked, and cranky. The young apprentice asked her for the location of a file and she snapped at her before telling her in so many words where the general location of it was.
Two men, one tall and one heavyset, walked into the office and Bonnie’s demeanor lightened and she forced a false smile.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Graham.” She stood up, bowed ever so slightly, and gave a small wave to the taller man. Tricia picked up on the fact that the tall man had winked when she had done this, and though he only looked at her briefly, she wondered if there was something more between the two of them.
The heavyset man slipped his hands into his pockets, rocked back on his heels, and then spoke. “Hey, Bonnie, sorry to bother you, but do you mind if we take Marlene with us to this meeting with Rhiannon? I know you’re busy with the beta board, and we really only need her to answer a few questions.”
Bonnie seemed upset by his question but Marlene was beyond happy. “Sure thing, Mr. Graham, Marlene should be able to answer anything. Marlene, looks like you’ll be in a meeting in a few hours. Don’t worry about the development dossie
r. We can pick it up tomorrow and I can personally show you where to find it,” she said to the curly haired blonde.
Why is she being nice to the girl all of a sudden? Tricia wondered. She watched as the men smiled and escorted the young woman out while Bonnie sat back down and stared at the wall above her computer. Tricia expected her to do one of those sweeping motions to knock things off of her desk but she only sat there. She sat for a very long time and then tears began to fall from her eyes.
She’s being passed up for her subordinate, Tricia thought, and Bonnie shook off her momentary paralysis and went back to typing away on her keyboard. There was a dark feeling to this memory that made Tricia wonder if it was the beginning of the end for the real Bonnie. Did one of those men shoot her? Could it have been the curly-haired apprentice in a wig that stood witness to it happening?
She had been given a small percentage of Bonnie’s memories and she wondered how, since the woman was not an android. This scene was one of those not meant to be remembered, Tricia gathered, but waking up to learn who she really was had unlocked a few restraints. What she was looking at was a clue into Bonnie’s eventual fall before being replaced by an android.
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The second dream was a true nightmare. It had her running for her life from a man in all black. She was dressed in warm clothes, but she was in heels, so she kicked them off to avoid twisting an ankle and picked up her speed as she fled from the man.
The cold was numbing her toes as she cut across wet grass and as it grew more and more unbearable she tried to ignore the feeling inside of her feet. It wouldn’t work and a frustrated Tricia crossed the grassy field towards a road.
She stopped to listen to see if she was still being pursued. There was no one chasing her now, and when she looked down at her feet a jolt of shock ran through her body. The plasticine had been damaged so much from her run that it peeled back from her feet to reveal her metallic endoskeleton. Shiny silver bones wrapped inside a translucent, gel-like material stood at the end of a very realistic pair of legs.