The Scientist

There was a distinct click and then a soft hum, two signs that a new life had come into existence.

"It's alive!" exclaimed the scientist, roaring with maniacal laughter. He let go of the wires he had just attached and went to get a better look at his great creation.

The time machine was a solid steel cube, just over two meters across, and in all honesty, it was unsightly. There were wires and knobs sticking out all over the place, countless imperfections in the metal surface. Although he was a genius, the scientist hadn't exactly the eye for beauty. The only somewhat pleasant thing about the machine was the calming blue light flooding out from behind the door, and even that was at least a little foreboding. The mechanical whir became louder as the scientist pulled open the door.

The inside of the machine was much more inviting than the outside. The floor and ceiling were tiled with ultraviolet lights, and each wall had a reflective surface. The scientist locked gazes with his own mirrored image. Studying his deeply wrinkled face, his sunken brown eyes, his wild white hair, he grimaced. No matter how artistically challenged he was, he couldn't escape the realization that he was hideous. How old was he now? The scientist was not certain. Throughout the course of his work on this project, time had gone on in a strange way, whole months passing in only a moment. How appropriate, thought the scientist with a chuckle. Of course, the scientist had long been aware of the way time passed as one completed a project. The time machine was his best, but it had not been his first.

All of a sudden, the cellar door creaked open. The scientist watched the girl's small feet slowly make their way down the steps. When she reached the bottom, she looked up at him with her chilling blue eyes and said with a smile, "Hi."

She had been his first.

"Hello, Hortensia," he said indifferently. His female companion of thirty—or was it forty?—years approached him, wrapped her slender arms around his neck and tried to pull his face down to her level for a kiss.

"No, Hortensia." The old, frail scientist struggled against the girl's strong, mechanical grasp, but she eventually let him go.

"What's wrong?" she asked innocently. He had been reacting to her this way ever since he began to bury himself in the work of his last project, but she had not been programmed to understand the reaction. So she continued to offer her affection as she understood a companion should.

The scientist looked down at the girl he had called Hortensia, the freckles on her youthful face, her shimmering, long dark hair, her perky breasts. He sighed. It had never mattered to him that she was not beautiful. Her short, stocky build, her thick, dark eyebrows and crooked teeth—he had made her this way on purpose. If she had been a real woman, surely, by now she would be unbearably ugly. However, she was artificial, constructed of gears and copper wiring and synthetic tissues, and consequently, she still did look, and would always look, hardly eighteen years of age.

The scientist could not stand it any longer. He had ceased to desire her.

"Hortensia?" the scientist began, looking away.

"Yes, darling?"

"Would you come sit down?"

"Yes."

He led her over to an isolated chair, usually meant for scientific experiments which he conducted on himself, but Hortensia did not know this. Hortensia did not know that she herself was, in a sense, a scientific experiment. The scientist had not felt the need to tell her, did not see why Hortensia should see herself as any different from himself, except in gender. Somehow he had overlooked another vital difference, one that would become more vital with every second that passed—age.

As a blindfold was tied around her face, Hortensia smiled seductively and asked, "Is this a game?"

She had the wrong idea entirely, but the scientist answered, "I suppose so."

Carefully, he pulled back the top of Hortensia's skull until he had a good view of the inner workings of her brain. Hortensia could not feel this; she only had sensation in select areas of her body. Eventually, she would discover what the scientist had done, but by then, it would be too late for it to matter. He reached inside her head and swiftly flipped a switch. The girl's mechanical body went limp and slumped back into the chair.

The scientist walked over to the cupboard which contained miscellaneous small projects of his. He rummaged around in there for a moment and returned with two tiny cameras, which he placed on the insides of each of Hortensia's eyes. Then he flipped the switch back.

Hortensia's posture straightened, and she asked, still blindfolded, "Are you there, my darling?"

"I'm here," the scientist confirmed.

"What are we doing?" She gave no sign that any change had taken place within her understanding.

"Playing a game."

She giggled and bit her lip. "I like games."

The scientist grabbed Hortensia's hand and pulled her out of the chair. He led her to the machine he had just built and helped her inside. He took a last look at his reflection, thinking to himself as if she were human, 'How can it be that she has not grown tired of me?'

He closed the door. As much as he reassured himself that he had not supplied Hortensia with the capacity for fear, the scientist imagined he could hear her pounding on the door, screaming and crying to be let out. Hastily, he approached the control system. He typed in a series of four numbers, which displayed back to him in bright blue on the screen, and, with all his strength, pulled down a lever.

The scientist had to step back and shield his eyes from the burning, bright light. The machine's whir became louder and higher in pitch. The scientist could sense a disturbance in the bones of his inner ear. His balance was being thrown off, and he collapsed dizzily to the floor of his cellar. A few minutes must have passed before the feeling began to subside. There was a short buzz from the machine, like an alarm clock going off. He opened his eyes and crawled closer on all fours to check the screen.

"Time travel complete."

The scientist stood up slowly, still a bit off balance. Did he dare? He approached the time machine and pulled open the door.

Hortensia was gone. It was as though he had written her out of existence. The scientist lowered his head and wept.