The first thing I ever saw was myself, reflected through a pair of gold-rimmed glasses. The second thing was him, a wiry, middle-aged man behind those glasses. We both seemed astonished by each other. Or at least, I was certainly astonished. I mean, I’d just been born a few seconds ago.
Rain was coming down heavily, pitter-pattering against the sides of the building. The man who peered at me overhead was Father.
“Marietta,” he said. His brow wrinkled. “You’re alive.”
My Cog whirred. Having information packets and learning modules downloaded meant that data churned through me rapidly. I knew this was a lab and that I’d been an experiment. It had to be a successful one, because I was alive. I was finally here, thank god.
I stretched out my hands and marveled at their strength and structure—bones supporting muscle supporting flesh. I was alive, and it was fantastic. My heart thudded against my chest. It was necessary for it to keep beating, in order for me to keep going. My Cog told me that.
I was positively giddy by now. I leapt off the steel surgical table. My first steps were a waltz. My sturdy feet pounded against the cold floor. I spun in a circle. I was alive.
I was finally united with Father, who had created me in this very lab. For years he’d toiled and failed and tried again to make and remake me. That fact was part of me, downloaded into my Cog along with the fact that I needed a functioning heart to survive, that I was built much stronger than most anyone, and that this place, Amaris City, this rainy volcanic island between Northwest America and East Asia, was mine to call home.
“You’re alive,” he said again. This time with a note of incredulity. I could hear the ghost of a question, lingering in the room with us. Are you?
In Father’s lab there were rows of long steel tables like the very one I’d leapt from. Some incomplete parts lay upon the other tables: hollowed-out torsos, mismatched pairs of legs, a pile of wet organs, and a length of shiny black hair, roughly severed from a scalp. It looked an awful lot like the hair on my own head.
Along one wall I saw jars of smaller human parts—a dull red heart, preserved in some indiscernible milky fluid; carefully sliced irises in a range of candy-like colors; a grizzled old tongue. There was an astringent scent in the air—chlorine, my Cog supplied, which masked some of the effluvia. But there was still the hint of the body, regardless. Blood, sweat, tears; they were all part of this place too.
Father was frowning. But why? I saw myself in the mirrored glass door and grinned in delight. I was so fucking beautiful.
I had long, sturdy legs and well-formed arms, coiled with muscle. Long black hair, dark brows, and dark brown eyes. I was comely, pulchritudinous—my Cog scrambled for the slang term—an absolute babe, ten out of ten. I flexed my arms, grinning wide. Now that was even better. Eleven out of ten.
“It took a lot to make you who you are,” Father told me, his voice scalpel-sharp, breaking my reverie. “Lots of material and energy has been expended on your behalf. The best of the best, in fact.”
“Duh.” That was my first word on earth. It came out petulant, before I could form something more lyrical, perhaps by borrowing a line from antiquity. For heaps of books, music, and poetry also whirred through my Cog, along with the stirring sensation of … something else. Something uncomfortable.
I ached. But where?
I patted around my stomach anxiously, looking for the source of the pain. I looked for marks and open wounds, but found none. Nothing was wrong. My stitches were healing nicely too. The different body parts I was comprised of were coming together. Pretty soon, I’d be whole. Everything on the outside was working perfectly.
There was a question mark, a blank space, an unknown quantity of something that didn’t work perfectly. Even my own Cog couldn’t diagnose it, let alone supply the solution. But I knew it was something on the inside that didn’t quite fit right.
I frowned, and then—when I noticed Father watching me—I flashed a smile instead. I wanted him to know I was glad to be here. Lots had been expended on my behalf: material and energy derived not just from Father, but from the lab and land itself. Geothermal energy powered this room, energy that this island provided. I could feel it under my soles, thrumming.
Besides the one in my own head, there were other Cogs in this room too, all powered by that same energy. Beyond the organic parts, there were rows of computers, rows of Cogs. Wet and fleshy pink objects, palm-sized and still inanimate, suspended in small vats of clear fluid. They looked like something between a human brain and a computer mouse. They gurgled quietly, churning data like hungry babies.
I saw an in-process experiment: a lone Cog’s port was still connected to the stringy, wet, pink wire—metal wrapped in PVC dripping with condensation—that plugged into one of the lab computers. This was how information transferred between computer and Cog. As for the computers, those were programmed by Father. In some ways, I guess I was a direct extension of him. Father had wired himself a brand-new daughter.
I ran my hand against the back of my neck, feeling the protrusion from where my own Cog had been inserted. Where I had been plugged in and made alive.
The bump made me a teeny bit self-conscious. I made a note to acquire a cute necklace as soon as possible.
“Duh?” Father echoed, somewhat blankly. “Was that really your first word, Marietta?”
“Yup,” I told him.
Behind him, I heard someone suppress a laugh. In the excitement of waking up, I’d completely failed to notice that there was a second person in Father’s lab, despite my keener-than-average senses.
The gleaming metal name tag read Penny. The woman donning it was young, a handful of years older than me—probably early or mid-twenties at most. She had circular glasses and a shock of bright pink hair tied back into a ponytail. While she also wore a white lab coat, bearing the same curling purple inscription of The Institute of Scientific Progress, her demeanor could not have been more different than Father’s.
There was a clear dissonance between her personality and her work, and I found myself immediately interested in her. Ink-black tattoos peeked out from under the sleeve of her lab coat. She’d changed her skin, marked herself as different on purpose. I could see most of the tattooed letters, but my Cog worked out the full phrase running up her clinical uniform: ROTTEN GIRL.
“Marietta woke up too early,” Father said to her, frowning. There were pauses in his voice. Gaps heavy with some meaning I couldn’t parse. “We haven’t run tests. And her Cog …”
“She looks damn healthy and seems pretty sharp,” Penny said, surveying me while snapping her gum. A sliver of lime green poked out from between her teeth. “I’d say this was a big success, Doctor.”
Rotten girl—something about that phrase felt ominous. I patted my stomach again, wondering where the ache was. Maybe on the inside I was rotten too.
“More examinations are certainly needed,” Father finally said. And then, after a hesitation, “But for now, she can come home … given enough discretion, of course.”
The three of us walked side by side, sheltered under three large black umbrellas. I was quiet while my Cog buzzed like wild, taking everything in.
We stood near the top of a volcano that spread down a long green hill. Mount Amaris fed the Institute, which converted its natural energy into new technological advancements like me.
“Amaris City, a place like no other.” The slogan rang through my Cog. It was embedded in me like a familiar lullaby. A place like no other; that was why people lived here. I knew Uphill life was the best of the best … since Father only dealt with the best of the best.
The same went for myself—I knew there was nothing else like me on earth. Or at least, not yet. An augmented human girl, with only a small protrusion at the base of my neck distinguishing me from the rest of them.
Dark shapes hung around the edges of dark buildings; blackberries were coming up everywhere they could on the island. The plants crept through the cracks in the pavement. They slunk up the sides of old knotted trees. They crawled in a green-and-black pattern across the facades of the office buildings, schools, and tall, gleaming apartment complexes.
Insects buzzed in the air. Many-eyed and many-mouthed, their brittle wings the same color as the sky. Orange. Father swatted them away impatiently, muttering about how this shouldn’t be such an issue, especially not up here.
Which made me wonder, what was down there? Past the manicured hill … What else was there to this world?
I pointed up at a dark shifting shape, perched on the edge of the research institute building we’d come out of. Penny and Father had acted furtively, whisking me away speedily so I wouldn’t be seen by anyone. The trench coat they’d wrapped me in bunched up uncomfortably around my broad shoulders.
“Ravens,” I said aloud, distracting my Cog from processing existential thoughts. There were many of these dark creatures around us, all perched along high places, crying out in discordant, mournful song. “They’re everywhere.”
They were massive too.
“Amaris ravens are bigger than ravens anywhere else on earth,” Father said. “They’ll eat almost anything. Fish off the coast, and berries. Even garbage.”
“Relatable,” I said.
Father looked at me as though I’d sprouted another head. But I heard Penny chortle. When Father turned away, she gave me an encouraging wink. “Did you know, the ravens are a failed Institute experiment? They were supposed to help with—”
“Penelope,” Father said.
Penny’s cheeks flushed. She didn’t say another word, although I was dying to know what the ravens had done wrong. Instead, she wrapped her coat around herself tighter.
Penny and Father were both wearing long beige trench coats, same as me. It was soon apparent that almost everyone on the hill was dressed in the same fashion. This was what Father had meant by discretion—I had to fit in with the style of the region.
People walked hurriedly, their steps brisk and businesslike, coming and going to various appointments. They donned long coats, carried black umbrellas and black briefcases. I found their highly polished black dress shoes—what was the word?—obnoxious. Yes, that was it. It was fucking obnoxious to have gleaming black shoes like that while walking in the pouring rain.
“You’re lucky the path is short,” Penny told me. “It’s only five minutes on foot between the lab and your home … well, probably two minutes for you, with legs like that. A few steps downhill.”
Amaris City was divided into two major areas; that fact was firmly implanted in my Cog in the same way I knew that Father was my father.
We were Uphill. The volcano only stretched downward from here. It wound in wide, paved paths like a network of nodes, down toward other apartments and offices and recreational buildings, and finally toward the bottom. The not-Uphill part. Downhill.
But Father had always lived Uphill. Therefore, I would too.
“Marietta,” he said. “You know what the expectations are, correct?”
I nodded. Father was overstating what I already knew had to be. I would stay Uphill with him, for as long as I was alive. This was my chosen path. There were no other routes since this was the only one in which I could be of use to him.
“How many fire hydrants do you see?” Penny asked me, once we arrived at Father’s apartment.
There was a gridded image on the computer screen in Father’s study, depicting a landscape that hadn’t been embedded in my Cog. But I recognized the disparate pieces that shaped a suburban landscape. A row of nearly identical two-story houses, framed by white fences.
“No fire hydrants, just some ugly houses,” I told her.
“Congratulations, you’ve passed the CAPTCHA challenge, and are therefore human,” she grinned. “Not that it was ever a question for me.”
“Hm,” was all Father said.
He wanted more performance checks, and so more were executed. I passed each one with flying colors.
My heart rate was steady. I was strong as an ox. My physical reaction times were fast enough that I could almost preempt their prompting. I could meld into shadows, do a triple pirouette, and play Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin on the piano in the living room—flawlessly in both execution and expression. Sheet music was easy to read, since I’d already had the fundamentals downloaded into my Cog.
And yet Father frowned, because something about me wasn’t quite right. “We haven’t done bloodwork yet,” he said, staring at me. “What if it—I mean she—doesn’t even bleed?”
“She’s your daughter.” Penny’s voice trembled. “I was there for the blood donation. It’s Type B, Doctor. Plus, she’s already done so many tests today. You should really—”
“And I’m your boss,” Father reminded her, in a flat voice that left no room for argument. “Bring me a tourniquet, disinfectant, and some needles, Penelope. Quickly.”
The blue rubber band was already wrapped around my exposed forearm. Father pushed me back against the leather chair, snapping his white gloves on impatiently. Sample tubes were out on a silver tray, but it wasn’t them I was worried about. It was the sharp needles.
“Where are those supposed to go?” I managed to ask, even though I was pretty sure I already knew the answer to that.
He pulled my sleeve up, and before I could protest, he pressed the needle directly into my skin. Immediate pain shot up my arm. Tears welled in my eyes as he siphoned. The tube filled cherry red. My blood, I thought dizzily. There it is.
“This is nothing,” Father admonished. “When you’re in the lab with me, you’ll have much harder work to do. Anything I need, you’ll bring me. I didn’t make you so strong just to see you cry over a little drop of blood, Marietta.”
Penny rushed over with a pink Band-Aid and rummaged through her bag before she found a green-apple fruit chew, which she promptly handed over to me.
“Thanks,” I sniffled, pressing the Band-Aid over my still-welling wound. I do bleed, I wanted to tell Father. Can’t you see that you’ve hurt me?
“Now it’s time for dinner,” he said. “It’s been a long day, and I’m hungry.”
Penny and I worked in the kitchen together while Father sipped green tea in his study. I cut up ingredients while Penny stirred, watching the noodles come to a boil. The smell of crisping shallots and fish stock made my stomach grumble. She was a good cook … and I would be too, Father informed me, sounding definitive about it. Or else was strongly implied.
Throughout the meal, he continued to look at me while I fidgeted in my starched button-down shirt, wincing whenever I moved my sore arm. Every time I did so, his frown deepened, and he’d make a note in his leather-bound journal. A mark against me.
The three of us ate together in stilted silence before Penny finally excused herself. Her life seemed exhausting. Not only was she Father’s lab assistant, but she was his personal one too. Hours on top of hours of different forms of work.
On the way out, she squeezed my shoulder, her multiple bracelets jangling cheerfully. “Until tomorrow, Em.”
Em. I already liked that much better than Marietta, but it still didn’t quite fit. Just like my clothes didn’t quite fit. Or even my bed, which I was in by nine p.m. It creaked and groaned under my weight as I tossed and turned listlessly. I was sure Father, down the hall in his own room, would hear it and make another mark against me in his journal.
That was one of the house rules: I had to be in bed early. Nothing good happened after dark. Plus, I needed all my energy to help him in the lab. I couldn’t waste it on frivolous things. His work demanded only the best of the best.
Father’s tone was brusque when he said it again—the best of the best. I felt that he was angry about something, but I couldn’t pin down the reason and I didn’t think asking him would help. We didn’t know each other well yet, but something told me that he wasn’t the kind of man who shared his problems, especially not with his own daughter.
So I pretended to sleep while his snores echoed down the hall. The walls were white and unadorned: plain. No books or games. An austere room, befitting what Father needed. There was nothing to distract me from work except a single small rectangle looking out to the city.
I stared out the window and watched the shadows grow long and crooked, until finally the sun went down over the green hill. People were running downhill, their long trench coats sparkling with rain under the lamplights. Thunder rumbled through the walls, and through me too. It played my skin like a drum.
There was a couple kissing by a tree, illuminated by lightning. I felt a sudden ache watching them. It twisted at my insides like a secretly festering rot.
I knew Amaris well through the history modules downloaded in my Cog. But I didn’t really know anything outside of the city. When I searched for those places, there was nothing there. I had some small smatterings of art, poetry, and books. But they hovered in me, disconnected from other things, in a vacuum. I would have to ask Father for more information; otherwise I’d have to link the gaps myself somehow.
Father would have to help me. If I couldn’t fix things on my own, I knew he would. He’d made me, after all, which meant he could do anything.
Oh, cheer up, I told myself, picking at my scabs and stitches until the bits formed a small mound. I opened the window and threw the heap out. I watched a raven swoop down to devour the whole stringy mess under the purpling sky.
“Ew,” I mumbled, but quietly enough so that Father wouldn’t wake up.
It was only our first day together, and there would be so many more to look forward to. I hoped he’d soon put that dreaded journal away and stop taking notes about me.
I sighed and stared back out at the lovesick couple through my window.
The two of them were completely enraptured by each other. Their coats were discarded in a puddle beside them, and they were kissing like it was oxygen. Kissing like it wasn’t a want but a need, never mind the hungry cawing ravens above them, or the wild blackberries that threatened to tumble them into the gnarled tree, or even the lightning that hovered dangerously close, threatening to send them and the tree up in smoke. They were kissing like they were the only two people in all of Amaris City.
When the pair finally left my field of vision, holding hands and stumbling down the long road, I felt strangely forlorn. I looked down the hill—forbidden, Father had said, like I’d ever go against him, my own father—then forced my eyes shut.
Maybe Marietta would fit better on me in the morning.
I really hoped so, but something inside of me—maybe the broken part, the secretly rotten part—told me it was only going to get worse.