A Change of Perspective

Sunrise. I've lost count of the number of sunrises I've seen, the number of high and low tides.

My designation is Thirty-Two. I and my ninety-nine companions are mighty tired of sunrises. Most of them aren't all that spectacular. Often, they are obscured by clouds.

We watch the sea advance and recede. Some of us vanish beneath the waves twice every day while those of us at the back watch those in front appear and disappear on a regular basis.

About once a week, a huge white liner sails by with glittering lights. If the wind is blowing in the right direction, we hear the music blaring on deck. Otherwise it's just sea, sand and clouds. It gets boring after a while.

We were created knowing some things. We know we were created to be placed on the east-facing Broadway Beach in the city of Whitworth, Innovia. None of us has seen the city - it is behind us, and we were brought here in a closed truck, jammed in like metal sardines.

The other thing we know is that we are all cast iron clones of a living human named Jacob Masters. He is 5' 7" tall, of medium build; he has a crooked middle finger on his left hand, a straight nose and an average sized penis. He was naked when they took the cast of him. We don't know anything about his fashion sense, his family, or his likes and dislikes.

We were born from the same vat of molten iron and we are connected. We hear each other's thoughts. Any piece of information one of us sees, hears or feels is shared between us all.

We continually learn, mostly from the living humans who visit the beach. They come from the city to look at us, take pictures of us on little hand-held screens, and while they are here, they talk. From them, we have learned that the weekly liner is "The Round Innovia Cruise" and that travelling on it is something that many of them aspire to do, someday. We wonder why, when they can move freely, they don't just do it.

We learn Jacob Masters is an artist, a sculptor - he lives in another city called Metatron, which many of them say is a strange kind of a place.

Sometimes the humans give us gifts. Fifteen was given a necklace made from shells by two small humans which he still wears although several of the shells are broken, now. Forty-three sported a plastic shower cap for a few hours until the tide came in and washed it away. Thirty-Nine was painted blue, which gives him a different look, not covered in rust and barnacles like the rest of us.

We've been here for five years and we're bored. We want to see what the city behind us is like. We want to know what makes the sounds we hear.

Moving is an effort for us. We cannot do it when any humans are around and it is rare for the beach to be deserted. They even come to the beach at night, couples holding hands, or people wanting to photograph us at sunrise.

We have worked out there is one night when nobody ever comes. It's the night after the sun rises directly over One Hundred's head, from Ninety-Nine's perspective. It's the longest night of the year. Tonight. Now.

There is no sound but the roar of the wind and waves and the sound of sand shifting on metal as we turn, as one, away from the sea, to face west, and see the city for the first time. It's dazzling. Lights like coloured stars move and blink. Ninety and Seventy-Seven report they can see humans moving around inside illuminated blocks of stone. We watch, entranced, as the sky grows lighter and most of the lights go out, although some coloured, flashing ones remain, as do the red lights on top of the tall towers. We see that many of the moving lights were attached to metal boxes on wheels. There is so much more to see.

Soon after it gets light, the man with the dog comes. He comes every day, but today we see him approaching through the dunes. We don't know his name, but we know the dog is called Derrick. Thirty-Four and I have particular reason to dislike Derrick. We dread his visits because he sniffs around our feet, then raises his leg and sprays us with a foul yellow liquid from inside his body. The man once took a photo of him doing it and seemed to find it funny.

Today is no different. I swear if I could move in front of humans, I would kick that damned dog. The man is engrossed in that little device they all carry but when he looks up to call Derrick, he freezes. He stares at me, and at Thirty-One, and then wide-eyed at all the others. "What the feck...?" I hear him say.

He takes pictures with his device and then talks into it. He talks fast, and loudly, although the wind whips away many of his words before they reach me. I pick up, "...facing the other way! ...I swear... I'm posting the pictures on Whitter right now!"

It's not long before more humans arrive - more than we'd expect on this particular day of the year. They take more pictures and I pick up a few phrases like, "student prank" and "publicity gimmick".

Humans in uniform come and inspect our bases. These humans complain because the rest of them have "obliterated any tracks made by the perpetrators."

After they leave, others arrive with larger cameras, bright lights and furry cylinders which are suspended over their heads. They talk to the cameras, saying things like, "unexplained phenomenon" and "180 degrees overnight".

This goes on for several days but it gradually dies down to the usual seasonal level of visitors and we have the chance to try and make sense of all the things we can now see.

Ninety-Three can see a large screen inside a glass building. It shows non-stop images. Most of them seem to be of a green space on which around thirty humans run about passing a small white object between them, and sometimes fighting over it.

These are interspersed with close ups of humans talking to each other; of the metal boxes on wheels rolling past mountains or on city streets; humans pouring liquids over themselves and washing it off; and humans eating food.

Once, Ninety-Three reports that we are on the screen ourselves, with the sea behind us. It's so much more interesting than sunrises.

Then, one day, Fifty-Seven watches two humans come to the dunes in the late evening. Judging by their sizes and modes of dress, a male and a female. The male drags the female by the hand. She pulls back, trying to get away from him, but he won't let her go. When they reach a spot in the dunes where only Fifty-Seven can see them, he pushes her to the ground, lying on top of her to stop her escaping. Fifty-Seven can't see exactly what he does to her after that, but he can tell by the screams and cries that it is not pleasant. After a while, the man runs off and leaves the woman there alone. She sits there and sobs until it is fully dark.

Twenty-One sees two adult humans arrive with a child. They sit in a hollow in the dunes. The child is thin and sickly looking; Twenty-One says he can see why, for the adults eat and drink a lot, but give the child nothing. One of them smokes a cigarette and stubs it out on the child's leg. When the child cries, the adult hits him. We all agree that cannot be right.

Sixty-Four sees three humans set upon another who walks alone along the coastal path. They take the bag she is carrying and run away. Tears are streaming down the woman's face as she staggers back the way she came.

Forty-Seven watches two humans arguing. One of them pulls out a black, shiny object and points it at the other. It makes a loud noise; smoke comes out of it and the other human falls to the ground and doesn't get up. His companion doesn't help him - he runs away as a puddle of crimson liquid forms beneath the fallen one. He doesn't move at all and after a while humans in white coats come, draw around him in white chalk before carrying him away.

Two is closest to the building where hundreds of the small humans called children gather each day. They all dress the same but they vary in size. The bigger ones gang up on the smaller ones and the ones with red hair. They push, punch and kick; they throw sand in each other's faces.

We start to realise that humans do not treat each other well.

They do not treat animals well, either. I'm not a fan of dogs, as I said, but it still disturbs me when I see humans hitting their dogs for no apparent reason and making them yelp in pain.

Eighty reports seeing humans shooting birds out of the sky, taking their wing feathers but leaving the bodies to rot. We know humans eat birds, but here they take a part with no nutritional value whatsoever and leave the rest.

Ninety-Three carries on watching the screen. He sees disturbing images. Humans throwing objects at other humans which blow up. Metal boxes on wheels exploding. Twisted wreckage lying on the ground. Humans dumping noxious liquids into the sea which cover the birds so they can no longer fly. Mountains of human rubbish.

The city is not as beautiful as we first thought. The humans in it are always rushing. They argue. They run each other over with their metal boxes on wheels, so that the victim has to be carried away in a metal box with wheels and flashing lights. Sometimes the metal boxes collide with each other - humans will get out of them and start hitting each other.

We come to the conclusion we do not like the humans very much. We yearn to see the sunrise again. We don't see the sunset, really, because their tall buildings get in the way. We no longer see the stars in the night sky because of the city lights. We miss the clouds, the waves, and rainbows. The city is disturbing. We do not wish to look at it any more.

We wait for longest night to come around again, although now that Ninety-Nine can no longer see One Hundred we are not sure how we will know when it is.

The city tells us. Festive lights appear, and on one building, a handy countdown of how many days to go until the big event.

Tonight is longest night, the night we will turn away from the humans and their dreadful city to face the sea once more. I don't think we will ever find sunrises boring again.