EXISTENCE                                                                                 

She disappeared.

Lyner Grail disappeared.

Why did she run? When the whole nation's eyes were on her, when the whole world waited with bated breath to see what she could do ?

She could hear subdued whispers around her, through her anesthetic haze. Her surroundings were awash with a rush of activities and mechanical beeps of life support devices.        

As she opened her eyes, the bright lights of the OT hurt stung. She blinked a few times. Her head hurt.

They told her that her name was Lyner . They told her everything she had forgotten, which was everything. They gave her the name, an identity and a life.

They told her she was Lyner .                

She remembered almost nothing of her past. Only flashes and fragments of half-remembered memories,  myriad in their colors and a thousand other emotions, vibrant and nauseating in their elusion. She tried to capture them, envelope herself in them, all she experienced was a dark gaping abyss and splitting headaches.

They told her she was Lyner .

They pushed needles into her, strapped electrodes all over her head. They made her run naked. They made her twist and contort her body in a thousand ways, while they looked on with dead eyes. They gave her unending volleys of mental tests. They stared on. In their white lab coats and glazed eyes hidden behind goggles and masks.

They told her she was Lyner .

She felt tired, monotonous and sick. They taught her languages, they taught her history and science.

She dreamt of sunshine and rain, she did not know how.

She could find no kindness in their eyes, when they glazed over her naked form as they took measurements. Except for one. Her nametag read Dr. Kennan. She gave her an occasional smile, she didn't shove in the electrodes with operatic tenor and disregard to her pain.

Kennan told her that she was pretty and strong.

She told her that her name was Lyner.

She dreamt of fleeing the glass walls, to watch the stars she knew only through poetry of Keats and Shelly.

They left the straps holding onto her bed loose one day. She ran.

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She ran. She ran. She ran.

Out of the barbwired grounds, out of reach of white coats and raised gun barrels.

Lyner  disappeared.

As she ran, she gulped for air. Air that smelt of scorched asphalt and summer grass, vastly different from the sharp, cold air of her home? Facility ? Lab? What was it?

Suddenly, her chest felt hot. A flush of heat and light washed over her body.

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A small sub-urban home. A little boy was playing while his parents watched the TV.

"The heavily lobbied about Project Lyner  aka EVE has been scrapped. Reportedly, the artificial brain or AI of the Humanoid was corrupted by the implanted memories from the brain cells taken from deceased volunteers, giving rise to individuality and unprecedented emotions. The First Model, codenamed  Lyner #1 had fled the facility failing the test whether the AI would choose to desert. The AI has been remotely terminated to  prevent harm to the citizens......" the TV reporter droned on.

Apparently, The reporter got hold of some classified pictures and were proudly displaying them.

"Awful things. They are encroaching on God's territory I say”,  roared the father in indignation.

"Dad, why are they poking her with needles? Won't it hurt?"  the boy innocently asked.

The mom apparently was bored, "Honey...shall we order in Pizza for dinner ?"

"Why is she running naked?"  asked the boy again.

No one answered the boy, they were busy arguing over Pizza or Risotto.

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She had wanted to live. As the last of her batteries discharged,  while her charred, mutilated remains lay in a pool of leaked coolants and lubricants, she exclaimed to herself  "I am Lyner , I .... I...wanted to..."

Her half decimated face was turned towards the sky, something fell.

It was raining. It rained over the mountains, over the seas, over forests.

It rained over the test facility, it rained over the remains of Lyner. Did it reach her?

Why did Lyner dissapear?

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Read my other work, a dark fantasy. very dark-  http://royalroadl.com/fiction/4802