´óÏó´«Ã½

Kimmi walked along the street, eyes filled with tears, carefully averting her face from the rest of the people. The bluish steel cobbled road ran in a straight line, never ending, its clean cut corners shining like knives. Some would say it was a safety hazard, something as sharp as that; someone could get cut. But they would be called old fashioned. After all, what harm was a cut if there was no blood to spill? That's what they think. No blood, no nerves, no harm done. People hadn't had blood for centuries. Except me, Kimmi thought savagely, I have blood to spill, tears to shed, I'm human. But I'm just Kimmi Baxter, the quiet girl with the forbidden history, why should anyone care about me? She tried hard not to blink, but the tears clouding her vision were swelling. She knew what would happen if someone saw her cry. That was why her mother left her, all those years ago'

It was her first birthday, and she was having a party in the back garden under the never ending sun that was programmed for summer. The music was being pumped from the silver speaker that was built into the grass, and her mother had voice locked it so it would only play selected songs, and after a while, toddler Kimmi got bored and tried to change it. She balanced her way across the steel netting that covered the pond, her mother's friends' children watching her, mouths agape. Once she had got to the speaker, she set about in finding her preferred choice of music. She pressed the brightly coloured buttons, babbling long strings of fluid baby-talk to the silver mesh. The computer, misreading her babble as a command by her mother, (both of them having similar voice patterns, being related) turned the music up to full volume, blasting noise of drums and banging instruments straight at the startled toddler. The young Kimmi screamed and fell back into the sharp steel netting covering the pond, hit her head and cried. All went quiet. Kimmi, unaware that all were looking at her perform a human action that hadn't been seen for centuries, cried for her mother to come and get her. Page Baxter didn't move. She was glued to the spot, unable to move, repulsed and horrified, staring at her child who was walking shakily towards her, hands outstretched, calling for a cuddle. If she had a heart, it would have torn in two if it had seen what the scene looked like. If she were human, her child's calls for her would have pulled at her heart strings so, she would have ran to her daughter and cradled her in her arms. But Page Baxter wasn't human. None of the people at the party were except Kimmi. So she took one last look at her daughter who was now even more upset, wondering why her mother wouldn't comfort her, and turned and fled. No one knew where she went that night ' that time was the last that Kimmi ever saw of her mother. But years later, she had not managed to grow up, not managed to get rid of the last feeling she had then, she was still a little girl inside, hurt, confused, wondering why the person she loved most in the world hadn't picked her up and loved her, had abandoned her, had turned her back on her weeping daughter.

Kimmi blinked. Tears rolled down her cheeks and splashed onto her feet, washing away all hope she had onto the floor and down to the drains below. The people stopped and stared with a deathly hush. The whole street seemed to hold its breath. Kimmi looked up into the yes of a mother with two twins in a hover ' chair and was met with the same horrified look that her mother had given her all those years ago. She blinked and the spell was broken. Pandemonium broke out ' there were shouts of help, people yelled at her, asking her who she was. Kimmi turned, but was blocked, a wall of people were closing in on her, yelling and shouting, waving hands. It was too much. Sobbing and screaming, Kimmi ran at the crowd, who dispersed with screams, jumping out of the way of the repulsive tears. Kimmi ran blindly, not looking over her shoulder or to where she was going. All she knew was that she needed to get out of this place, this inhuman, knife filled, steel monstrosity of a city. She didn't know where she was going but she knew where ever it was, it had to be better than here. How could anyone live in a place that's ethos was that if anything was real, it was wrong? How could anyone live with people who despised emotions and feelings? Even if these people could bleed and weep and love, they wouldn't. Even if these people had hearts it wouldn't make them human. None of the people here were worth knowing. They were just too'''inhuman'.