Alien Beast

She squeezes her arms around me, sighing, breath hot. “You heard what my dad said. This is his world now. He has bent the characters’ will to do his bidding.”

I ease away from her and take another glance outside. A man in a black cloak stands in the shadows near the bar, staring up at us. Slowly, he vanishes.

“Elon isn’t a character,” he says.

Her jaw drops. Her gaze falls, but she is too late to witness his appearance. “You met him...”

I nod. “Inside that place. He showed me my file. He showed me everyone’s file.”

“And?”

I move over to the bed, sitting and waving her toward me. She follows, eyes curved like small, sad crescent moons. She knows something is wrong.

“What did he tell you, Kalxor?” she asks.

“Maybe we shouldn’t talk about this,” I say.

End of the road. There’s nowhere left to run.

As much as I know it’ll end us, I have to tell her the truth.

“What else did you see?” she asks again.

I take a deep breath. Wind whips against the windowsill, and the bright, glittering sky makes her look more beautiful than a mirage in a desert.

“He told me who you are,” I say. “What you are...”

She stammers, head wobbling. “What?”

“I didn’t want to be the one to tell you, but I can’t hold back the truth,” I say.

Her jaw looks unhinged. Her cheeks, dappled with red. Her eyes are swollen with sudden tears. “I’m…”

She can’t even say it.

We’re one and the same. Cyborgs made to love each other.

We were made to serve her father’s wishes.

But that doesn’t mean what we share is real. No, it’s just another illusion, made to turn us around and give us promise.

I feel as if I can’t go on.

“Kalxor, cut it out,” she says, relishing in a dollop of false hope.

“Your mother never existed. He never married,” I tell her. “You were his first creation. He didn’t believe you could hold empathy, so he treated you like dirt. He’s the kind of scum that helped design this place. He helped design me, too, despite Elon’s reluctance.”

Tears drape her cheeks. Her entire body shakes with sorrow, sorrow I never thought she could succumb to. But I just gave it to her.

Me.

Like her father, I let her down. It wasn’t my fault, but that doesn’t matter. I have to own this experience.

“I don’t know what to say,” she whispers, robotic and cold.

“Elon made me promise I wouldn’t let him become a part of this place. But I can’t let him out either,” I say. “He’ll make a mistake. And when he does, I’ll make him pay.”

I gaze up at her again in hopes that she’ll hold me one more time, but that doesn’t happen. Instead, she stands, eyes darting toward the door.