( Awakening )

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Confusion greeted him when he had opened his eyes.

He immediately took note of his surroundings upon waking up. He was unsure of his whereabouts, but the room he was in appeared to be abandoned. The paint on the walls were peeling off, along with some strange moss growing out of cracks that had somehow gotten there; papers were scattered all about the floor; some ruined, some not; filing cabinets, desks, and chairs looked as if they had been tossed over, and he also noticed that the lights were flickering on and off every now and then, sometimes leaving him in the darkness.

Why he was here, and how he had gotten here were the first two questions that entered his mind. He couldn’t remember any events that took place that could have led him to being here.

All he could remember was that his name was Choi Minho, and that he was twenty-three years old. Nothing else could come to mind. Family, friends, and facts about himself; no history or relations could be thought of. It was like he had forgotten every bit of information except his name and age.

He glanced down and saw that he was almost inches from touching the floor. This made him realize that he was lying on the cold surface of a metal table. Minho didn’t think much of it at first until he looked up, seeing that there was a large light hanging above. Was he in a hospital? He didn’t feel hurt.

Minho slowly sat up from where he lay. A twinge of pain ran down his spine as he did so, as if he hadn’t moved in years. The brunette blinked and attempted to move his right arm, but it too hardly moved. What was wrong with him? Had he been asleep all this time, and now his joints were too stiff to properly move?

Then again, how could someone sleep for so long? That couldn’t be possible unless he had been in a coma. Minho shook his head in annoyance, ignoring the fact that he could move his neck with no trouble, and suddenly swung his left arm as if he were punching someone. The noise that was emitted from this action caught him off guard. His arm sounded like a bike that hadn’t been used in forever, as if rust had coated it during its rest.

But none of his body parts looked out of the ordinary. Maybe it was…something inside him. How could that be possible, though? His bones couldn’t possibly be acting like this. If they were, then they surely would have broken by now.

Minho sighed at this. He carefully swung his left leg over the edge of the table, managing to set his foot on the ground before doing the same with his opposite. He placed both hands on the table (after he had made sure both arms were moveable), then pushed himself off the surface and stood upright. His legs still felt somewhat stiff, but were better than before.

Now that he was standing, Minho looked around a bit more. He saw that were various machines around the room, but none were up and running, since the room was in complete silence.

Minho steadily walked over to one of the walls, staring at it for a moment before gently knocking on the surface. To his surprise, his knuckles came in contact with metal, which echoed throughout the room for a few seconds before disappearing.

“…Odd,” He muttered under his breath. This place was abandoned, there were no windows, and the walls were made of metal. Minho didn’t know how this was able to get any weirder, but he didn’t really want to stick around much longer to find out.

He turned around and walked away from the wall, deciding to approach one of the overturned desks. He noticed that there was a pile of files lying to the left of the desk. All of them had different kinds of writing on them, and it piqued Minho’s curiosity. He bent down, picked up one of the files, and stared at what was written on the cover.

“…Study of Robotics,” His eyebrows furrowed after he had read the title aloud. Robotics…was he perhaps in a lab that worked with this type of stuff? Minho lowered the file a bit and looked around. Now that he thought about it, the room was fit for just the occasion. It was fairly large, and the various machines that were around the room seemed compatible with such tasks.

Minho turned his attention back to the file and flipped it open, seeing that there were a large stack of papers stapled together on the inside. He didn’t know if he could read all of this right now, but he would keep it in mind. Closing the file, he set it down on the overturned desk and looked back at the files on the ground.

He got on his knees and stared at the rest of them. There was one labeled Physics, but that didn’t really interest him. Another was Study of Physiology, which he guessed was the study of how organisms acted. Minho scratched the side of his head as he looked through the pile. So far, he had kept the Study of Robotics and Study of Physiology.

After a few minutes, Minho was about to stand up and maybe find an exit before one of the files caught his eye. It was simply titled Subject 008.

Subject…? He thought.

Was this a place for running tests on real beings? This brought a sinking feeling to his stomach. Had he been tested on? He certainly hoped not. Even if he couldn’t remember anything, he still didn’t want anything bad to have happened to him.

Hesitantly, he flipped the file open and saw that there were more papers stapled together; however, there only appeared to be three or four in this file. Minho blinked upon seeing what was on the first page.

Subject 008 has yet to be tested. He has been having a few difficulty issues with starting up, but we are sure that we are able to have him up and running as soon as possible. My colleagues and I are hoping that we are able to have him functioning just like a human being. Emotions, movement, speech; every characteristic a human has to make them lifelike.

Dr. Lee Jinki

Dr. Lee Jinki? That name didn’t sound one bit familiar to him. But who was this Subject 008, and what did this doctor mean by ‘have him functioning just like a human being’?

Questions ran through Minho’s mind, but they would remain unanswered unless he found someone in this place, or if he were to somehow recover his memory.

His eyes went down the rest of the page, skimming over the words that Dr. Lee Jinki had written. They appeared to be like diary entries, but they spoke of this Subject 008’s progress. One entry spoke of the subject apparently malfunctioning one day and not starting up at all. Another spoke of him being unresponsive to anyone who spoke with him; however, he would answer with body motions. The doctor wrote that he assumed his ‘voice box’ wasn’t working properly, or had somehow been damaged.

Minho didn’t know what to think. The more he read, more questions popped into his mind, and he was more confused than ever before. After he had finished reading the first page, he flipped to the next.

A bit more progress, but Dr. Lee Jinki had written this page as if he was beginning to lose hope for this ‘Subject 008’.

Everything is wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong! My colleagues have somehow managed to wipe out half of his data! He has forgotten most of the training that we have taught him to act like a human being! He’s emotionless, inhuman; he’s just like…a robot! This is not what I wanted.

Dr. Lee Jinki

Minho frowned. Wipe out half of his data? Forgotten most of his training? Suddenly, it clicked! Dr. Lee Jinki and his colleagues had created a robot, and had been training him to act as if he were a real human! A dozen questions left Minho’s mind upon figuring it out. But he still had one question that he would like to be somehow answered.

Why would they be making a robot with human characteristics in the first place?

Then again, the robot was a test subject, after all. Perhaps they were experimenting with it, since it was probably something they had never tried before. Shrugging his shoulders a bit, he turned to the next page and read the next entry.

I have managed to retrieve some of his data on my own, but I am afraid that I am unable to continue working on him. A few of my colleagues have left, leaving me and my trusted assistant, Park Sun-Young, and a couple of others left. Four seems like a large number, but we are not able to keep up with the work and research that we have done for so long.

It saddens us that we have to end this so soon, but we are sure that perhaps our robot will remain safe here. We would send him elsewhere; however, we do not trust many. Who knows? He could possibly end up in the wrong hands, after all!

And…if anyone were to stumble upon this, I would appreciate it if you leave this place a secret. I do not want anyone ‘bad’ finding this place, since I would like for my creations to remain secret. Especially Choi Minho, the only creation who I had devoted all of my time into.

Dr. Lee Jinki

Minho’s eyes widened at the last sentence. Creation…? This did not sit well with him, but he couldn’t help but think that it could be possibly be true. He had awoken in this lab, his joints a while ago felt rusty, like they had hadn’t moved in years; and the journal entry mentioned that half of his ‘data’ had been erased. Maybe that was why he couldn’t remember anything, except for his name and age.

He closed his eyes and angrily threw the papers on the ground.

Minho wanted answers. He knew that it was unlikely he would be able to receive them, but he would get them one way or another.