1: Consider

The tubular machine spit out the man much like a child trying garlic lemon chicken would. The disgusting residue dripped off him and coated the ground. By the second, his muscles were forming around the steel skeleton, and his eyes gained a blue hue. His flesh was still very white, slowly settling to a Caucasian hue, but his lips kept turning red, declaring themselves like a paintball on a white picket fence.

A large piece of fabric is thrown over him, and he can hear someone approaching.

He realizes existence.

I realize consciousness.

He lifts the fabric, and I hear his gentle, flowing voice whisper to me, “Who are you?”

I try to lift myself, only to have my hand slip. My jaw meets the ground.

“Fucker-!”

“Tucker?” He crouches down to me, and tilts my head up. “Wow, your face is… wonderful. Have you heard of society?”

I cough up more gunk, feeling my tongue develop nerves. The gelatin tastes like sugar water, but it’s much more chunky. It schlops onto the cement.

He lifts me to my feet and rubs my eyes with long, rough hands. He’s like me, but of a darker, oranger tint, with brown specks. His eyes are green as envious frogs, with a blue pond settling at the bottom. Lips thin like fleshy banana peels, pale as my skin yet visibly dryer. Black mascara looked odd with his long, skinny nose. Rounded eyebrows gave the feeling of looking at an adorable yet stupid puppy. Bright orange bangs met his brows, while the rest of his hair trailed down to his thighs. He was far taller and skinnier.

“I’m Mordred Freck, and you and I are meant to repopulate the dead earth!” He posed dramatically, smiling like a car salesman.

I barf more slime silently as he continues.

“You see, in the August of 1929, humans found Atlantis! They were so happy, they broke down all the walls and just walked right in! This is how we learned what killed Atlantis: a virus that rapidly evolved to kill and use bodies as puppets to spread the sickness! Then, in 1951, Marshall Curie and all his friends started rebuilding the world! You good?”

I nod.

“Then he got shot and died.”

I shrug.

“And the virus came back due to some I.N. Kline.”

“Fuck?” I know limited responses, yet many words.

“Okay. Anyways, our creators were Marshall’s friends. Elliott Dixon made our metal skeletons. Rose made the pods. And then Joseph Higgins made the rest. That’s all. Questions?”

“Fu-”

“No more profanity! Women can’t-” He looks down at me, then crouches down to be at the level of my crotch. He stares.

“What?” I feel a little embarrassed, but I don’t know what to do.

“You’re not a woman.”

“Okay?”

“I’m not a woman.” He motions to his chest, spreading his fingers and pressing his palms to his chest.

“Does it matter?”

“Did you… listen to me? Humanity is dead. We are humanity. Two wrongs don’t make a right! In this case, two men don’t repopulate the planet.”

“New plan?” I shrug, then point to his clothes. A black turtleneck and red jeans. “I need clothes and a coffee first.”

“What the hell is coffee?”

“Beans juiced and filtered through water.”

He stares at me, a slight twitch in his right eye. He rushedly whispers, “I have HEINZ.”

I roll my eyes and pick up the fabric, wrapping it around me. He shakes his head and grabs both of my shoulders. He leans in close to my face, and mumbles.

“Why?” I feel his breath on my face. It smells of pickles.

“You’re still the only thing I have, and I told myself I’d make you my partner. I must ensure that you are doing even better than me. You need a bath first, then warm clothes, then food, then we’ll discuss plans.”

“Okay. I won’t fight that. Just show me where the- gah!” He sweeps me off my feet, heartily laughing. I let out a long, antagonizing groan as he treats me like a cat he’s found in a Philadelphia dumpster. Yes, I find the restroom, but he carried me there, ran the water, and scrubbed every inch of of my skin. He turned on the shower head to clean my hair- which I was particularly aggressive about, due to him using far too much hair conditioner.

He smothers me with the towel, then introduces me to the bedroom. He places me gently on the bed, more carefully than anything else I’ve seen him do in the half an hour I’ve known him. I clenched the blankets and fully covered myself as soon as his hands came off of my body. I watch him rustle through some drawers, until he comes up with a pile of clothes. He sets them on top of me, then sits on the bed, facing away from me.

“Pick what to wear. I won’t look.” He smiles and covers his eyes with his hands.

“Yep. It’s not like you’ve only ever seen me naked.” My voice is full of sass, I think. I’m not too sure what sass is.

He’s silent, still smiling and covering his eyes. “I won’t look.”

—————

I jumped up to sit on the barstool, my jeans catching on the old wood. My black sweater and socks warmed my bitter cold bones. Before I could settle, he slammed down a hot cup of baked beans in front of me. He extended a spoon of beans to my face.

“Mordred Freck, you do not need to feed me.” Yet, I didn’t deny the spoon’s entry.

“I want to hear you swallow.”

“I- I feel violated?” I swallow out of necessity. I didn’t want the things to just stay in my mouth. “I get it, you’ve never dealt with other- well, we’re not really people, but…” I trail off, staying silent for a few seconds. The moment his mouth opens, I begin again. “I’m no princess, nor child. I am of the same making as you. And, I get that you’re lonely or disappointed or something, but it’s… do you not know how to act?”

He tilts his head and frowns. His little puppy brows shift downward and his swampy eyes stare emptily at me. Immediately, I feel the need to defend myself.

“I mean, haha, I don’t know how to act, either. I’m lost. I just don’t like being touched and harassed.”

He continues to stare.

I stand up on my own, reaching out to his head, and running my fingers through his hair. He won’t stop touching me, so maybe reversing the roles will do something. His eyes widen with a spark as he mumbles something out. His teeth are pure white. Almost freakishly white. My fingers felt slightly greasy, but it was nothing compared to how gross his coffee-advertisement smile made me feel.

“Ask me before you do anything.” I try to force a smile, but it’s hard when someone stares at you with such… unreadable emotions.

“Could I get up to show you something?”

“Yes?”

He immediately stands up and walks, and I notice the click of his wooden heels. I follow behind, trying to stay a foot away from the hair that swung behind him. The bright orange hair swings to the front of him when he stops. An open doorway stares ominously, containing tons of dusty relics I couldn’t wish to identify.

“It said it wouldn’t open until the two pods opened. Something I forgot to mention- the speaker voice said an odd little thing: ‘If you already woke up, you’re probably the Curie android. The man never spent too long in recovery, and I heard he was two months early from the womb.’ I already told you the rest of the message.”

“So, are you the Curie android?” I extended my hand to the doorframe. Dust still floated about.

“I don’t know what it means. One of us may share blood with the man, I guess. Or, one of us is meant to look like him.”

I stumble through the door towards a square, white glow. In front of it, two chairs made of white pleather, one stained blue with jeans and ripped between one’s legs, with the other still pristine. Both were a tad dusty.

I rested at the torn-up chair and pressed the enter key like I knew what I was doing.

A voice echoed from throughout the room, mostly covering up Mordred’s rush to see the screen.

“America was once the center of perspective, then a center of reconstruction. Although, it doesn’t matter what I think. I can praise freedom, flappers, and French 75, but dwelling on death is for artists and historians.”

And the screen flashes a new image.