Emerald Tear

Master stays in bed motionless except for the almost unnoticeable rise and fall of His breaths that fill His chest. A small 20’’ by 20’’ room, walls painted pale white ( as instructed), a twin sized hospital like bed, a blank tv screen, a monstrous refrigerator, a full kitchen (for myself to use for all His needs), a half eaten chocolate gelatin pudding, and the consistent beeping of the heart monitor. He is the only one I know, only one I met, yet He is dying. Why am I here?

I try to understand life as much as I can but do not know what “life” means. I do not know how to live, I wasn’t instructed how to do that. My purpose has been to serve and protect until the monitor no longer beeps. What do I do when it stops? Does my time end? Is my clock ticking? Am I intertwined into His dying moments? I do not know what it means to feel but a screw feels loose. The possible outcomes are, what I assume, haunting and terrifying for others that are in my position. I do not know what I would do without Him.

It has been 2 hours 37 minutes and 48 seconds since He has spoken to me last. I was told, “Zetra retrieve the morphine and start the IV again,” to which I immediately acted to His wishes. He has been in bad shape for the past year (that’s as long as I can remember, when I was brought here) and he hasn’t gotten any better or any worse. The condition he has is known as cirrhosis of the liver. I understand that there is little I can do, but I cannot betray my Master, I was made to serve for these times. Without Him I would be nothing more than a toaster and some screws. Some time goes by and His body lays motionless, cold, pale, his breaths become more shallow and irregular. I cannot help with anything else as I wasn’t made to fix, I was made to help ease His pain. He lets out a strange gasp for air and looks at me and then stops. The monitor broadcasts a noise I have never heard before ——silence– complete silence.

I stay in the room with Master for many hours, time goes by quickly as I compute all scenarios possible. I do not believe he is actually gone; I check his body over and over again for any sign of life. I mentally cannot understand a possible reality without Him alive. I till over many sleepless nights of what has gone wrong. Was my care inadequate? Did I do something wrong? What do I do now?

It’s been about a week since the death of Master and nothing has changed. I remain in the seat I was in when He died. I get excited whenever His body lets out any residual noises, hoping that it was all fake and He was never dead. I dislike that this is the end, no other way for me to ever see Him, to really see Him. My insides boil over and my temperature rises whenever I think of Him. This could not have been His time; why bring me here if it was all for nothing. I try to shake Him back to life repeatedly but ultimately fail over, and over agin; just how I failed to save him the first time. I do not like this resentment that I have over Him, He made me this way and with no instructions on how to live alone.

I don’t know how to do anything without His commands. I stare at His body, beautiful, serene, at peace in the beginning but as the days grew longer so does His decay. Within the first few days His skin is starting to flake, it has a certain sheene to it that was not there before, the body is stiff and hasn’t moved at all (even when I touch His sacred body). On days three to seven He seems to have gotten larger (almost double in size), there are occasional noises of gas rippling through Him, and many flies, maggots and other sorts of insects are beginning to wander towards Him. I try to keep the pest away to give Him the best treatment I can, it’s what I was made to do. I don’t know how to do anything else. Getting rid of these bugs makes the time go faster and some of the intensity inside go away.

It has been another seven days, day fourteen since Master has left me alone, since I have waited for my next purpose. I move only to try and make His passing more pleasant and enjoyable for His soul. He was a devout man and believed in a higher power of God saving Him in another life. These days have gone slowly, I have started to lose track of time; only counting the days because of the sunrise from the window that allows a glimpse of the reds, oranges, and yellows that illuminate the skyline. I have lost all hope for myself and have no reason to keep on living but I believe that Master has another plan for me; I just need to find it. I made a commitment to be with Him until He was completely gone and cannot leave until he has left this God forsaken room for good. I need to see that He has left me in order to leave Him. Afterall I considered Him my Father; I see Him in the same light that Jesus saw God.

Master must have left a plan for me somewhere within this building; I have never explored any other room than this one. I have only seen these pearl white walls, and Master in a bed for all I can remember. Once He has reached a state where nothing can harm Him anymore than I will explore what He may have left for me. There has to be something in here somewhere that will tell me what to do and what I am. I have faith in Him that I will not be left empty handed. His passing was a way to open up a whole new world for me.

On day fourteen His body began to deflate, to lose the increased size. I was unaware that this would happen. His body began to regain normal size by day twenty, but His teeth ( all shiny white and perfectly placed within his mouth) along with his nails on both hands and feet ( which I kept trimmed) began to fall out slowly, one by one, dominoes in a line taking each other out. Around this same time liquids began to flow out of Him from every hole imaginable, His mouth, nostrils, ears and eye sockets were especially filled with strange colored liquid reminiscent of reddish green brown wet clay. The liquid gently marched out of His body and onto the now

yellow brown bed, which is no longer the white it was made to be. The image of Master has started to escape me, His once cheerful gleam now just a pile of flesh, bones and liquid that is unidentifiable, unsalvageable. I know that I can no longer provide any sort of support for His body, but I cannot leave just yet.

I am cold, my body wanting to curl into a ball on the bed next to Him. I want to feel his warm embrace again, but I know that is no longer possible. I stay awake at night staring outside the window, the bright stars scattered all over the black sky, a sliver of moon in the shape of a letter “c” glimmering against the darkness. I’m overwhelmed by the darkness, pulling my body closer to the edge (I have no control of my legs), I lean over and everything seems so serene and at peace. I want to have this, I cannot live with this guilt and cold anymore. I sit on the ledge waiting to fall a few inches forward into the darkness until I am totally consumed. I call out into the darkness for His help as He was the only light in my life, hoping that He can save me once more. Then I see a man on the moon sitting on the corner of the moon (like that guy before the movies that Master would watch) staring at me intensely. I crawl off of the window careful not to fall over and curl into a ball on the ground weeping and calling for Master to hold me again, to which there is no answer.

Master’s bed is now just a pile of bones, filth and an imprint of the body that used to lay there. It has been almost a month since His last breath was taken, when it was His time to leave. I wrapped what was left of His body with the dirtied sheets and took them out of the room with me for the first time.

I exit the room and there is only one other door straight across about 20 feet in front of me. I walk up and enter the room, turn on the light on the inside wall and look inside. The walls are painted white, a shaky light hangs from the ceiling, wires running all over the walls and

edges of the floor and empty bottles scattered over desks. On the walls are blueprints for a machine called Zetra, the name He called me. I read through the design to what seems to be able to transfer the consciousness of a person into someone or something else. It seems that Master has created something that can move a person into another person or into a machine. I look around for any more clues as to what was happening here, why I was here. There is an old dusty recording device on the floor underneath a desk on the floor laying atop a piece of paper. The paper reads:

To my Zetra,
This must all be very strange for you and I wish that I could have told you more but there was no way I

could bring myself to do so in person. I have left this recorder here hoping that you would come across it one day soon and finally know the truth as to what you are.

Your beloved always, Xavier

Immediately I play the tape and can hear his raspy, deep old voice again for what seems the first time in ages. He starts to talk of what I am.

Zetra as you may or may not know you are not completely human, but you are also not completely machine. You most likely do not remember this but you were once a woman by the name of Artez, my wife and true love of my life. While in childbirth God took you and our baby boy Sebastian away from this disgusting world and into a new one. I tried so many times to join you and make our family complete once again but failed.

His voice scatters around the words as he seems to evade the tears streaming down his

face. He continues on with the story:

I couldn’t let myself join you and Sebastian just yet because I had a plan. A plan that would bring you both back to me. I know that it sounds crazy bringing the dead back to the land of the living but I needed you, without you I was nothing. The only reason I have lived as long as I have is because of the thought that one day we could be reunited once again.

The tape stops and another one immediately follows up after the last.​ ​His crying seems to have stopped and his voice grows stronger and more serious as he delves deeper into our life:

I am recording this tape on the day before you will be back to me, I have figured it all out Artez. We can be back together again. I have waited for this day for 20 long, tiresome years. All I want is to hold and hear your voice one more time. I will see you tomorrow my love and everything will be alright.

The tape stops and another one immediately follows up after the last.

I was wrong- so terribly wrong, I should have never done this. The extraction did not work as I had planned and there were some flaws with the procedure. Right now you are down the hall lying in a bed, barely alive but you are alive. I will keep fighting to keep you with me. I could not let myself fail after coming this far and getting so close. I will bring you back no matter the cost.

A new tape starts to play, this one with more joy filled in his voice,

Artez my dear today you have shown signs of brain activity. When I was asking you simple questions you would respond with eye movements of yes being 2 blinks and no being 1 blinks. You know who I am, who you are and everything about yourself, your favorite color red, our old pet dog Teddy, where we first met in London at the pub, and even about our little Sebastian. This progress gives me great pleasure and hope that I am doing something right and just need to wait for you to come back soon.

The tape ends with a soft whimper and a new tape begins with a much more upset

Master, his voice raised and some sobs breaking through;

Artez I have failed once again in my miserable life, I cannot do anything right anymore. Why have I even bothered to try any of this? I knew none of this would work, it was all just a silly old pipe dream. An old bacterium has infected most of your brain, forcing me to remove almost everything except for the most simplistic features that are necessary to keep you alive. I have tried to replicate machine parts to fill in for everything that has been missing. The only parts of you that are original by now are your eyes, those beautiful copper eyes with hints of green on the edges of your iris, and the leftovers of your brain. I have tried to program as much of your history into a micro sd card but have decided to leave it out and allow you to make that choice if you ever can. I have left the micro sd card next to this recorder in a small black box, the same one your engagement ring was in. If you want to put it in, there is a port on the left side of your head underneath your ear, as soon as the chip is in you should remember almost everything. I leave this choice up to you for whenever you find this tape. Until that day comes I am going to need you to take care of me, my body has run out of miles and is treading on slowly on a bumpy road in need of your help to make me better. I implanted a chip into you that will make you take care of me to the best of your abilities. My love I hope to see you in all of your glory soon, I beg that whatever you do don’t make the mistakes I have made.

I find the box that he was talking about wrapped with a red ribbon and inside is the card. I run my fingers over the card trying to feel and imagine all the memories that are lost and in here. The memories of him and I, our life together, a life I lost too early and didn’t get to spend entirely with him. I cannot bring myself to remember again, I am terrified of the feelings that will come and the things I will want to do. I look for a reflexive surface and find a small mirror

on the ground and I see what I am. A machine with human proportions and resemblance but with only the eyes of my former self, those green eyes he loved so dearly.

I lay with Xavier on the ground and grab excess wires from the walls. A spark sets the sheet on fire as we lay together on this terrible planet for the first and last time. The flame spreads to the walls turning them black with ash, the door flies off the hinges, and the fire lingers into the dark hallway illuminating the room where I spent all of my second life and Xavier the end of his. The next time I see him will hopefully be with our family, our little Sebastain, my baby boy that never got to grow old with us, once again. Maybe in this next life we can be a real family, not one built out of pain and sorrow. A tear falls out of my emerald eye for the last time as the room bursts into flames. Through the pain and sadness I blare out my love for Xavier, the man I would give everything for,” I love you Xavier to the end of time and life itself”.