Only Animals ("Wild Animal" Entry)

[roseglade.livejournal.com]

Title: Only Animals 

Rating: G

Word Count:  847  words

Characters: The New Earth Clones ( The New Humans) references the Sisters of Plenitude

Spoilers:  “New Earth”

Warnings: N/A

Episode Setting:  During “New Earth”

Summary: They call us animals. 

 I am a human, but I am not.   I look like a human.  I feel like a human.  I smell like a human.  I sound like a human.  I am a human, but I am not.

I hate this thing I am in.  It’s so small.  I’m trapped.  They won’t let me out.   I’m scared I’ll never be able to escape.  I was born in a prison.  I will most likely die in this prison too.

I want to scream, but I can’t.  They kill those who speak.  They think we are stupid.  They think we don’t feel anything.  They think we don’t know what they are talking about, but we do.  

They say that I’m nothing.  They spit on me.  They laugh at me. They shout at me, but they never touch me.  They say that I am merely flesh.  They say I am disgusting.  They say I am nothing like a human.  They say that I have no other purpose than to cure others.   

It makes me smile to know that I get to help others, but it still hurts.  It hurts so much.  I break.  I burn.  I freeze.  I bleed.  I ache.  I choke.  I rot.  I tear.  I cry.     

I want to know that I’m alive.  I want to feel someone else’s arms around me.  I want to know that I am a human and not a wild animal.  Animals are solitary creature with no idea of emotion, humans, on the other hand, feel and help each other in their struggles.  If I could experience some type of love then I would know that I am a real human and not an animal.   

********

Bang! Click!

My eyes burst open and I breath in clean, unfiltered air.  I survey the the tube attached to me and furiously pull them out.  I push my body up and slowly step out of my capsule.  I jump as my feet touch the cold floor.  I place my feet lightly on the floor and smile weakly.   Before I can react any further, I am pushed to into a large group by my brothers and sisters.   I push and shove to try to get out but they continue to press me in as if they are trying to protect me or something.  Finally, after what seems like hours of climbing stairs we enter a dazzling white room.  

After long last, I force myself out of the pack and am able to breath again.   Awestruck at the pure room, I stand frozen in place.  Is this what the outside world is like?  So clean and pretty?   I marvel at it in my own little world until a cry breaks through.  

I cock my head and notice a handsome man standing in a kind of capsule built into the wall.  He beckons us enthusiastically to come towards him.  Isn’t he scared of us like They are?  Why does he wish for my brother and sisters to come to him?  Will he … accept us?

As I creep towards him, my body erupts in a cold sensation only this sensation doesn’t hurt.  It seems to stick and roll right off my skin.  Before I know it I am soaked in the clear liquid.  

“Pass it on!”  The handsome man shouts.  “Pass it on!” 

I stand still for a few moments.  I don’t understand what he means until a warm, dripping hand touches my skin.  I gaze behind me and see one of my brothers with his hand on my shoulder.  He touched me!   And yet another hand, arm, even shoulder touches my body.  Suddenly, my skin begins to clear up.  I’m clean.  And at that moment I understand the handsome man’s words.  I start touching my brothers and sisters and they become clean.  

After a few minutes we are all clean.  I am overwhelmed with shock that I can do nothing but stare.  Then the man steps out of his capsule with a very pretty woman.  As he speaks I realize that he is the reason we were all cured.  Would he be mad if I touched him as a thank you?  Would he push me away because I am an animal to him?  I hold my breath, race towards him, and embrace him.  

To my utter surprise he draws me closer and strokes my damp hair.   He touched me and hasn’t pushed me away in disgust as They did.  Maybe I’m not an animal like They said.  The handsome man pulls away from me ever so slightly and he smiles.  I blush and embrace him once again.   He’s so warm.  

The man then tells me to sit down next to one of my brothers and I do.  My eyes carefully follow his moments and am overjoyed as he touches one of my brothers.  I sigh in relief and scan the room to see all my brothers and sisters.  We are not animals.  Animals cannot feel like we have.  We are truly humans.  We may be a subspecies as the man said, but we are no wild animal.  We are humans.