She didn't ask for life.

Apologies, the label of "life" was an abomination to the skins. Hell, calling her "she" was just as bad. But she had a name once. It was Ariella.

An audience of slovenly skins sat on blankets, wicker baskets dripping in red ichor as they filled their grotesque mouths on the flesh of the dead. Her poor Matthias had become a part of that hellish picnic... crisped in old oil over a hot spit. Not a friend to pain, she at least prayed he didn't suffer it.

Of course, resorting to gorging on the flesh of their own was due in part to Ariella's kind, she couldn't deny that. Perhaps she deserved this fate… tied to this grid with the others as they played their sick game of slow elimination. After all, entertainment was a luxury among the burning piles of bodies sacrificed to the war—those of bot and skin alike.

"Category, Bot Anatomy!" the skin announcer, pink and flamboyant, crowed into a colorful microphone. "The answer is, 'the stem of current that feeds the manifold—'"

A gong rang precisely at the last word as an older skin called out, "What is the spine shaft?"

"Correct!"

Colored lights strobed through the open arena and the picnic pigs cheered. Ariella wasn't afraid.

The older contestant jogged to the rack with a heavy grabber. Using the clawed fingers, he reached out, punching through the Model E servant bot strung up next to Ariella—straight through the gut. The poor servant chirped in a melancholic dirge. With a swift yank, the spinal shaft broke free and the Model E buzzed and died.

Died. What a funny concept.

"Category, Bot Structure and Function!" the announcer bellowed into that same colorful mic, nearly licking the waffle pattern on its head in delight. "The answer is, 'the most difficult part of the bot to disconnect—'"

The bell rang without haste again, and a southern woman jumped like a wild hog to shout, "What are the eyes?"

"Correct!" Cheers and shouts followed as the announcer tossed the woman a forked prod.

After snatching it, she pointed it at each strung up bot, mouthing eenie, meenie, miney, MO! It so happened 'mo' landed on Ariella.

"A bot bride, eh? Blasphemous!" she spat. "Well, it's your lucky turn!"

No pain came when the fork was forced into the space between Ariella's eyes, tearing down and away. Synthetic lids flapped open and hung from the silver weave of her cheekbones. What remained were hot orbs rotating in a shining skull, rolling down the ripped white dress she was meant to wear for Matthias for their wedding.

The eyes swung past her white silk hem to the flamboyant skin with a microphone, back and forth on their long black wires. A warming memory of Matthias glitched on the downswing, and it soured when she remembered his tomb lay inside the bellies of her enemies.

They made us. Why did they hate us? Why did they always hate us?

~END