A/N: I’ve been gone awhile… sorry. I know I frikkin said at the very start that this was only going to be 2-3 chapters so I would be able to fully commit. But wow am I terrible at approximation. So I need to now move my plot along to the end haha. It will… probably be good in 2 more chapters? I hope??? I have a lot of stuff lined up, and classes have started and bombarded me so I’d like to really offer a full story for this, at least wrap it up properly. Hope to see you all til the end of this crazy ride.
Also, I am extremely sorry for the LONG delay. I was dealing with a few fics in another fandom and this was half-written, and my life has been… it’s been incredibly tough lately. Still is. I hope I can make up for it!
Haven’t written in a while so this will be incredibly rusty and a far-cry from the original quality I started out with. (basically, it might suck) Probly. Sorry?
For now,
Enjoy?
~Shintori Khazumi
A Real Girl Chapter 4: Malfunction and the Production
Just what should she make of this situation right now?
Hikawa Sayo was known to be someone quick on the uptake, truly ahead of her class and at the top of their school rankings in academic performance. Surely, seeing such a sight before her- so clear and blatant- would immediately click in meaning for her, for anyone.
But it didn’t. Not for Sayo.
What most people didn’t know was that Hikawa Sayo had lately been struggling with processing any sort of situation involving feelings as they weren’t really lining up with what she had initially been taught about them.
Smiling was not simply happy people, crying was not solely reserved for sadness and pain. Sayo was trying to wrap her head around this concept for a while now. It seemed complicated, and it truly messed with her data banks, but she had decided she wanted to try understanding it. Understanding feelings. Why? She… well, if it meant that she could better please the people she cherished, then why wouldn’t she put in the time and effort to ensure their happiness?
Their joy was hers too.
But somehow, she didn’t seem to want to understand this scene displaying the peak of emotions in front of her. Specifically, the emotion called love. Somehow, she could not fathom why she couldn’t find it in herself to feel jovial when the two people before her- two people of whom bore the deepest roots in her heart- were smiling and basking in the warmth of their mutual feelings.
Sayo didn’t get that.
Why?
In her current blank state of mind, lacking in comprehension, she felt her autopilot instincts kick in, forcing her to take a step back, leaving a print on the still-present snow.
She watched as lips parted from each other, bodies moving inches away, only to share a gaze filled with a warmth Sayo once believed also belonged to her.
Belonged?
Since when had such a thing ever-? To Sayo?
No, no.
How could she have forgotten?
How could she have let herself get carried away all because of her companions’ kindness?
How could she have believed-for even the smallest of moments- that she, Hikawa Sayo, was normal?
…A Real Girl?
She took another step back, semi-conscious of how her shoes sunk into the slowly melting snow.
She wasn’t supposed to see this.
She wasn’t supposed to be here.
She wasn’t supposed to… feel… feel anything, being here, seeing this.
“I love you… Yukina.”
Sayo instinctively jolted at the sound of that familiar, beloved voice, taking another step back.
“I love you too, Lisa.”
As the pair continued to embrace one another, Sayo also continued her painstakingly drawn-out journey back,- quite literally backwards, taking a single step at a time with long intervals between each motion.
Her ‘mind’ could not process all this, could not seem to update her data banks that had been filled to the brim with her own assumptions on Lisa and Yukina and how they… how they possibly could have ‘felt’ about her.
Maybe that was where she had gone wrong.
To go ahead and save such thoughts in her carefully maintained system that should have been solely reserved for only facts, Sayo- someone who knew she knew nothing about feelings- presumed other people’s emotions. And look where it got her?
It got her traveling a road of confusion. She thought she had read the signs- followed the signals they had been sending her. Or so she had believed.
But maybe Sayo was wrong.
She knew nothing, and not even the standardized manuals and textbooks could help her out with this one.
Not when all they spoke about was the relationships between a man and a woman, and the norms in society when it came to relationships. She, however, wasn’t so uneducated as to have no idea at all about relations regarding people with the same… er, parts… and their possibility of dating one another. She was at least exposed to these concepts to some degree- credit due to none other than her ever-helpful sister, Hina.
It may not meet the usual expectations of society, but Sayo was never one to judge. She didn’t understand much about things like love and attraction, and sexual desire anyway, so it wasn’t as though she could say anything in the first place.
Also, she had known for a while- or had come to the awareness- that she harbored something with far more weight than feelings of friendship forbothYukina and Lisa.
Still. Why did they act the way they did with Sayo? Were they disloyal towards one another? But Sayo couldn’t imagine such a thing between them.
So did that mean that… they wanted to include Sayo in their relationship? But… weren’t relationships… only between two people who had given their hearts to one another?
Or… were they… playing with her, messing with her… stringing her along, knowing she wasn’t… normal.
No, no. No. They would never. Sayo knew this deep down. They were her friends, her comrades. She knew them. She knew them well.
She… thought she did… at the very least-
“How do we tell Sayo?”
“How do you think she would take it, in the first place?”
Quiet murmurs from the figures she’d been shamefully observing reeled her back into the present situation, heartbeat thrumming in her ears, making it almost too difficult to hear anymore.
So they were talking about her. So they were going to inform her of something- of what? She had no clue. Maybe it was of their relationship and how they were dating? Of how they wanted Sayo to give them space as a couple and to not hang around them as much?
Of… of how they… could… maybe, just possibly… abandon the unwanted mess that was Sayo just like everyone else had? Just like her parents had?
Something was triggered in her system, a switch that might have quite literally flipped. Sayo wanted to run, she wanted to turn away from this scene. She dared not see anymore, hear anymore… feelany more than she was meant to, programmed to, madeto.
She couldn’t listen in anymore, something within her raising prompts that she could no longer do this. She had to leave. And she did so quietly- or well, tried to.
“Well, but Sayo-”
Just as she spun on her heel, her other foot landed write on a protruding twig, causing an echoing snap throughout the relatively empty park, previously silent in the sunset save for the rustles of the occasional passing breeze and the whispers of her two previously unknowing companions now staring wide-eyed at her, frozen and alarmed at her presence intruding in on their private conversation.
“Sayo? SAYO?!” Lisa was the first to snap out of it, immediately jumping to her feet and calling out for Sayo who had begun to build momentum in her escape, going from a staggering walk backward to a jog, to just dashing for the hills or wherever her feet would end up taking her. “Sayo! Wait-”
Sayo didn’t.
//
She stumbled in her steps, not knowing how long she had been sprinting for. Thoughts of being cast aside, abandoned, left- they all were her fuel that kept her running on and on, desperately wanting to silence the turbulence in her mind, thinking that if she continued on, she’d grow too tired to even think.
Alas, Sayo wasn’t like normal girls were. She believed she still had a tank barely full in her system, allowing her to keep running, seemingly never tiring.
Reaching her neighborhood, she chanced a glance backwards, hoping that Yukina and Lisa hadn’t taken off after her. She wouldn’t know how to face them anymore. Not after all that.
Despite her unfatigued movements and usually sharp and calculative system, Sayo had failed to think through her actions, having looked away from in front of her for only a moment- that moment being enough time for an inconspicuous rock to appear on the road, undetected by Sayo’s sight sensors.
And so she tripped, and she fell, the speed at which she had been moving made her fall all the more harsh as the momentum caused her to skid a few feet forward on the cemented road.
Feeling the burning sensation of what she had remembered was pain from skinning her hands and knees, she got up, checking on her outer layer. She prayed no one saw and tried to help her as she wasn’t sure if she’d exposed anything of her truth if she had an opening in her skin that she had yet to see.
Finding no deep cuts or wounds, Sayo pushed herself up, staggering the last few meters to her house, unable to run as her system compensated for the current issues in order to keep her functioning basically.
Heaving a sigh as she slumped her weight against the door, she gave the bell a ring, immediately detecting the sounds of excited footsteps- Hina’s, no doubt- coming to greet her.
“Onee-chan? Is that you? Welcome home, one-” The door swung open and she almost fell through had it not been for her sister catching her. “ONEE-CHAN?!”
“Hina.”
The younger twin’s silent worry was palpable, so many questions in her head being held back- Sayo could tell.
“Hina, I-“
“Hina? Who’s at the door? Did your sister finally come home from practice?”
Sayo froze at the voice, form stiff in anxiety, unaware that they had planned to come to visit today, not wanting to be seen like this-not by them;not while she felt the way she did; not when she had absolutely no clue as to what she felt, why she felt, and what feeling even was in the first place.
No, not like this-
“Oh, it is Sayo. How are yo- Sayo?” Her father paused in his gait, a confused frown at his lips. Seeing him look that way somehow frustrated Sayo. As if he couldn’t understand why she was in her current state, as though he didn’t understand her and what he’d subjected her to, installing these confounding concepts the normal people labelled as feelings.
The more she tried to learn about them to decipher their true meaning, the less she understood. The less she understood, the more she’d thought about it; and the more she thought about it, all the more did her frustration grow.
“Sayo, are you okay? What happened to you?” He stepped forward, a hand reaching out.
Sayo’s peripheral vision caught her mother pop out into the hall, wondering about the commotion and the presence of her family gathered by the entryway. Somehow, that fed her steadily growing irritation more. All the confusion and negative feelings that had been long stewing within her were slowly bubbling to a surface that was just about ready to burst- everything that had ever tormented her in the recesses of her mind now coming in to play to build the monster about to rear its hideous head on her family.
“Who did this to you?” Her father quietly asked again, approaching nearer to Sayo, hand still outstretched to touch her.
Who did what, exactly? What was he even asking? Who allowed her to fall on the streets? Who made her run from a scene, clutching her heart in an indiscernible emotion she could only think of as agony? Who allowed her to feel in the first place? Who… Who programmed all these thoughts, these emotions… these- these ideas in her system? Who made her? Who started all this pain she didn’t know what to do with and could never seem to understand?
Wasn’t it them?! What was she to answer even?
“Sayo, are you oka-“
Sayo swiftly slapped the large hand away, too close for comfort as she hid behind Hina, a growled question dropping from her lips,
“What am I?”
Not even ‘Who am I’- did she even have the right to ask that? When she clearly had no clue-no. When she clearly wasn’t even human?
Her father’s eyes widened, lips floundering for an answer that Sayo gave him no time to procure as she bombarded him with more.
“Why did you even make me?”
“Sayo, wait-“
“For what reason do you torture me with my own existence?”
“Sayo, dear-“ Her mother tried, and failed to diffuse the situation.
“Why must I go through this? Why am I alive? Is this really what you humans call living-“
“Please, Hina is still here! She doesn’t-“
“I know.” Hina’s breath hitched as she confessed, “I know everything”.
Those words were what silenced all the older Hikawas, eyes the size of saucers before narrowing as they glanced at one another, brows furrowing, ready to pin blame on one another, surely, for this slip-up.
“Sayo.” He returned her hostility from earlier, snarling out her name. “SAYO. I thought I’d told you never to-!“
Sayo only glared in return, squaring her shoulders, not keen on being accused of this fault. “Father, I believed this knowledge was never supposed to come to Hina’s attention, thus it could not be my-“
“I SAW THEM, OKAY?! THE PAPERS. THE DOCUMENTS.” Hina’s bright greens were blurred with unshed tears as she clutched onto Sayo in her arms for dear life, praying that this unneeded face-off would end- “I know.”
-Praying that they’d come clean and talk about this properly. As the familythat they were supposed to be.
Sayo watched their father’s tense posture slack, sighing as his hands went up to cover his face, rubbing it in frustration. Her mother had sunk to her knees at some point, staring blankly at the trio in front of her, overwhelmed by all that had unfolded in so few seconds.
“We need to talk.”
//
“Your mother, she- she was pregnant with Hina.”
In the living room, sat on one of the dining table’s wooden chairs, Sayo felt the stab of that very first statement deep in her heart already as she gazed upon her father sat on the couch, face buried in his hands, unwilling to even look her in the eye to tell her the truth.
Her mother- or well, at this point, maybe she should call her Hina’s mother as she should address the couple in front as Hina’s parents- was rubbing circles on his back in hopes to calm Mr. Hikawa down to no effect.
“So… she… I…”
Sayo knew that she was not made through normal means, that there was no possible way that she was conceived through conventional means. Regardless, she hid hopes in her heart that this was not the exact truth and that maybe- just maybe- she had been planned because she was wanted.
“We were told early on that… that there was a possibility that… miscarriages because of a certain factor of your mom’s health… we thought-“
They had planned, yes. They had planned, but not because they wanted her, Sayo; it was because they wanted Hina. Of course. Of course, it had always been that way and always would be. What had she expected to hear?
“Just tell it to me straight.” Sayo spoke evenly, senses numbed, emotions dulled as though they’d been shut off by her system like a background application that could no longer be supported because it had become too much to run.
“Okaa-san… Otou-san…” Hina encouraged them, squeezing Sayo’s hand to keep her calm, to keep her there,hopefully.
“… We had spent all our lives working in the lab; we realized we were getting on in years and… and… we really… we really wanted a child. Desperately.”
Sayo’s eyes met the man’s, almost feeling sympathy for him. Almost.
“Our lives felt dull despite the love we had for each other and our work. We thought that if we had someone to care for, a child of our own, it would brighten up our lives-“
It was as though he was looking for Sayo’s pity in her eyes that had turned as cold as the steel that was used to build her body.
“We… we took some of the cells and DNA from Hina’s developing form and…”
Sayo didn’t even want to think of all the ethical crimes they had committed to get to this point. All she wanted was to hear the full truth from them. Though she knew she was not real, she never quite knew why and for what purpose had she been allowed to live a life that she was slowly realizing was not hers.
“We thought we… a… b-back-up-“
“A replacement?”
The couple’s eyes widened, Mr. Hikawa clearly insulted. “No! Hina would never be replace-“
And that confirmed enough for Sayo. Had Hina not made it and been born, then she would have likely been raised none-the-wiser, probably believing that she was the real ‘Hikawa Hina’.
All she had been hearing thus far had only driven home the facts that she’d always feared would come into light: that she was unplanned, unwanted, and unloved- facts now established in the deepest records of her mind. Regardless of the hurt they seemed to be causing her, according to her informative programming, she still needed to learn more. More to know and answer the question of just what she was exactly.
“I-if you… If you…. ‘took cells’ from me…” Hina butted in, wanting to move the conversation along from the uncomfortable halt it had taken. “-Why didn’t you just… I-I… I dunno, mom and dad, but… couldn’t you just have cultivated… the cells…” She tried, brain, no matter how genius, unable to come up with words in that moment. Her sister’s pain and anger was almost tangible to her, and all she could do was hold on to her hand in desperate prayer.
“We… we made a mistake along the way…” Her father admitted. “But we didn’t want to give up and so-“ He choked on his words, turning away from Sayo’s gaze, unable to continue.
Mrs. Hikawa finished the complicated puzzle, voice quivering in her tears- “we supplemented what we had with mechanical parts… but…” She bowed to Sayo, tears staining their carpet. “It wasn’t enough to give you genuine life and so… even your brain… that’s why you ended up… you’re…”
Sayo stood up suddenly, releasing her sister’s hand, all her companion’s eyes now on her.
“I know I’m not real.” She spoke coldly, scarily calm and collected.
“Onee-chan, that’s not-“
“And since you have Hina now anyway, I suppose there wasn’t and isn’t really a need to keep a machine such as myself with no apparent use around. If my purpose was to be Hina, but she’s here, you are wasting resources, Hikawafamily.”
She could no longer stop her words. She was aware of how hurtful they could be to humans, but Sayo was a malfunctioning computer simply combusting as they do, she justified. She no longer cared.
And neither would they after they heeded her next command.
“Shut me down.”
It was swift, the slap Hina delivered to her cheek. It was like a product key that suddenly restarted all her functions of pain as her hand shot up to cover the stinging area, her other hand grasped at her heart through her shirt, shock surging through her system as it scrambled to process everything that had suddenly started up again.
“You have no right to say that!” Hina yelled at her through her tears. “You can’t just- You can’t just decide you’re not wanted, that you’re useless- that you’re a waste all on your own!” She sobbed, falling against Sayo’s chest, hitting her lightly with her fists. “Not when I can’t stand being without you.”
Sayo felt a tear slip. Then another. And another.
“Don’t… don’t just ask… to go away like that… not like that.”
She felt hands take both of her own, saw thei- Hina’s- the… Hikawa parents kneeling in front of her.
“We’re so sorry, Sayo. Sayo, we’re sorry. Sayo… sorry…. Sorry, Sayo. Sayo, we’re so sorry.”
Hikawa Sayo, once again, found herself dumbfounded and lost. All she knew in that moment was pain. Pain that made her sad. Pain and sadness that was the reason for her tears.
“We’re sorry… we’re so, so, so sorry…”
She was at a loss, facing her adversaries-feelings- once more.
