I did the big chop—shaved off my relaxed hair, years ago. I wore it in bantu knots that weeks later you’d done. I’d invited you home, and we were sitting in the lounge, the TV on, you had me sit between your thighs, as you took a Shea butter mixture and twisted my Afro into bantu knots. In a couple days I could undo them to portray curls for the weekend braai our friends were hosting. That was life for us. I miss those slow nights, the crawl of brown skin, long limbs sleep-entangled with each other. I’m stifled in this sadness, recalling the memories.
A knock. The door, steel-cold, wood-solid. She2’s frame in the peephole, looking haggard. Senegalese braids sweep past her knees. Her long dress slept-in, worked in. When I open the door, she drags herself in, drops on the couch.
“Eish,” that’s all She2 says. That word rolls out with anger, exhaustion and hopelessness. “So that MaterialSkin you gave me, I followed its history, its trail.” She2 ruffles for something in her duffel bag. “This is all that I managed to get, joh. Her . . . ”
“MaterialSkin.” Like a torn piece of garment. It’s pixelated, unreadable in our game. I bring it to my nose. “It smells like Emelia,” I whisper. “Where did you trail this?”
Your scent has left codes in places in people—their mouths. They can’t wash it off. I can smell the fury in your scent. We’re in different places, different times, probably. The MaterialSkin is the only thing that identifies us, it’s the only elixir that can allow avatars to be born into the real world—only if provided by a real-world human.
She2 sighs. “In another game. Not just any game, but some shooter game. She was in some trance, fam. Said I was the enemy. She shot me! Can you believe that? I almost got wiped out when I made contact.”
She2 readjusts her thin-framed glasses, looking rather uncomfortable. “But I’ve terrible news. She . . . um . . . she’s not real.” I give her a strange look, then she adds, “Not real like you and I.” She switches from one butt cheek to another butt cheek, not sure what to do with herself. “She’s just an avatar, ja.”
The skin you wore is not your own. Not your own as in not like mine, not where I come from: outside the box. You wouldn’t just leave me, with all the plans and dreams we had. The internet is intact to your eye structure, so why didn’t you make contact? Send an email? A DM? As I stared at you, in the dream-feed shot that hung across the wall in our lounge, my iBona feed displays last recent posts, snapshots of your skin emitting smileys, LOLs, TGIF and hashtag #Blessed in a spectrum of emotions.
I stumble, fall to my knees. She2 hurries into the kitchen, fetches me a glass of water to gulp down. She guides me to the lounge.
“You know what you have to do next,” She2 says.
“I know, but if I can’t find her, then I can’t help her,” I whisper.
“The only way she can continue to live, to be here, or try to get out into our world is if you share your skin with her,” She2 says.
“Why didn’t she just tell me? Ask me?”
“It’s a big thing to ask, and sometimes quite a selfish thing,” She2 says. “Your skin will birth her but it will mutate you, it’d be painful for you. Do you really love her that much, joh? I mean, you’re gonna have to take care of her for quite some time. Will your salary even support you both out of the box?”
“I love her. I have to save her. I can’t let her die. As long as we’re together, we’ll do alright.” Out of the box, I’d need to keep the iBona connected to my plasma TV. With my skin, she’ll be able to crawl out from it, flop onto my living room floor, real as flesh and bone. It’d be a searing pain for me, but we’ll be together. And she’d have something that no one ever gave her. Life. Opportunity. I love her, I truly do.
* She2 and Reneilwe have left the room.
* Reneilwe has entered the room.
Weeks later, I log in into our studio apartment. I switch on the dream-feed, filled with many questions. Many questions I want to ask the past you. Skins are boundaries we never wished for. On the shelf above our bed, I reach for a disk full of memorabilia that can be slipped into the skull-port to fuel once again the things I was forgetting. Who am I? Where am I? What is my purpose? All these questions are my yoga. Slowly, the memories eddy, stream into my mind. The room revolves, changes into months ago, on our bed: you undoing your braids, me reading a manhwa.
I hurl the manhwa aside. “Where are you? Please tell me where you are?
You giggle. “I’m right here, silly.”
Of course, you’d say that. The past you. Today, you’d know what that question means.
“What do you speak? Kalanga, Zulu, Xhosa?” I ask, afraid to aim for the truth. “How does it feel living in here all day? In this box. Trapped. What do you do?”
You stare through the skylight at the stars. “This is my normal just the same as that world is your normal.”
“But what do you do all day?”
You laugh, kicking up your feet. “I do avatar things. Shop when I’m told to shop. Act broke when I’m broke. Run around running errands, winning, but failing sometimes. Then I come home just like you come home.” Sometimes you’d pixelate, get zapped out of bed—explaining it away as part of your job—but I realize now it must have been when your owner had logged in, wanting to play. So you whisper, “It’s a weird job, isn’t it? It’s my job to be logged-in all the time. But”—you looked around the room—“this is my quiet place, where I get to choose what I want.” If I didn’t know the truth, I wouldn’t be able to tell how sly you were being. You were never going to tell me the truth.
I grab your hands, stare into your eyes, hoping for a miracle. “Don’t you want to get out?” I ask, regretting it almost.
“What? Like, you?” The light leans into your eyes, the irises flickering. And I see it, the truth lighting itself up in you. “What’s the point of that question? You know I don’t have a body out there. Not like you. I wasn’t born like you.”
* Reneilwe has left the room.
* Emelia has entered the room.
I rush back home as soon as I see the notification. I leave work without notice. I stumble into my bachelor pad, and the iBona, sensing me, injects itself into my body.
* Reneilwe has entered the room.
You are home, but outside the open front door where our neighbors see you, the sun golden, your brown skin flawless and clear. Hurt in your eyes. You are slowly feathering away, the tinges of dusk dissolving you. “Renee, I’m so sorry,” you whisper. My heart leaps to meet yours, hugging you, kissing you.
“They’re deleting me. Wiping me out,” you cry. “I have deformed my bones for them. How can they do this to me?” You stare at me, yours eyes still a hazel beauty. “I didn’t know how to tell you. I thought it’d be easier if I just disappeared from your life before I really disappeared. But you’ve been looking for me everywhere. I’ve been so hungry for you. I just had to see you.” And I see it’s been a hurdle for you to migrate between games to see me because the current is forcing us apart, together we keep.
I kiss your tears dry. “Shh, don’t cry, babe.”
You fall to your knees, face soul-battered, arm outstretched as if telling death to stay at bay. Lips are loose with prayers. No one moves, waiting for your death to sail the air. I do only what I should. I unfurl my MaterialSkin, wrap it out around you to shield you from the burning cold of death. You remain in my arms, in my life—together, as the last light seeps from the virtual sky, we escape the box, we escape my real-world plasma TV, onto my bachelor pad’s floor. With my MaterialSkin you are a real human girl, true to form, with real flesh and bone. Home. Welcome home, lover.
Tlotlo Tsamaase (she/her) is a Motswana writer of fiction, poetry, and architectural articles. Her work has appeared in Clarkesworld, Terraform, Apex Magazine, Strange Horizons, The Dark, and other publications. Her poem “I Will Be Your Grave” was a 2017 Rhysling Award nominee. Her short story, “Virtual Snapshots” was longlisted for the 2017 Nommo Awards. Her novella The Silence of the Wilting Skin is forthco
ming from Pink Narcissus Press in May 2020. You can find more of her works on tlotlotsamaase.com; Twitter at @tlotlotsamaase and on Patreon at patreon.com/tlotlotsamaase.
The Last of Your Kind
Vijay Varman
I wonder if the Dodo knew,
That its species was so few.
Or how the Tasmanian Tiger dealt,
With the solitude it must have felt.
What is it like to be the last of your kind?
To outlive your brothers and one’s intended design.
For decades I was used to write,
Novels, poems, and letters alike.
Some were beautiful, others were graceless,
And quite a few were a little bit racist.
The letters were the first to go,
Replaced by a system with a strange bright glow.
Digital messages so easy to send,
Were merely the beginning of my uneventful end.
As the years leisurely went by,
The dust often brought a tear to my eye.
Post-its, drawings, and the simplest notes,
No longer feasible as a final lifeboat.
Too many eras blur on by,
And humankind has conquered the skies.
Silent I sit in a museum of history,
Appearing to some as a confounding mystery.
200 years since I last was used,
So I spend most of my day choosing to snooze.
But soon the funds for me have dried,
My future no longer for others to decide.
All I can do now is wait for the end,
Humanity’s last ever ball-point pen.
A resident of London in the United Kingdom, Vijay Varman (he/him) is a scribe who enjoys writing for both the page and the screen. Though he dabbles in a variety of genres, his first love is for science-fiction. To pass the time between writing gigs, Vijay also spends his time working in the Genealogy industry and behind-the-scenes in London’s West End theatres. “The Last of Your Kind” is Vijay’s first publication. You can find out more about his worldly thoughts at vijayvarman.com or on Twitter as @CircleofCine.
Memory Malfunction
Minerva Cerridwen
With a hiss, the door slid open, revealing a human in dark grey trousers and a short-sleeved suit jacket that showed off a pair of well-defined biceps. Pinned on the jacket was a small badge with the words: ‘Deabun, she/her’.
“Mx S1812L,” she said. “Please, come in.”
The android who’d been waiting in the corridor got up from his metal chair. “Call me Sibill. I prefer not to use an honorific.”
“Then we’ve already found a commonality.” Deabun smiled and stepped aside.
The android’s black robes, interwoven with an intricate silver pattern, flapped around his ankles as he walked into Raddert & Deabun’s main office.
The room’s interior could not have looked more different from the undecorated corridor with its metal walls and soulless chairs. Cream carpet padded the office floor, deep green cushions lined the chairs and walls, and a tan, velvet tablecloth covered the oval desk. Behind it, three large wooden cabinets displayed all kinds of vases and trinkets. It wasn’t the kind of room Sibill expected on a spaceship, but then again it did fit Raddert & Deabun’s business—and certainly seemed cosy enough to spend a lot of time in while managing an intergalactic company.
A second human was seated at the desk: tall and brown-skinned, wearing eir grey hair in a small bun and a comfortable striped jumper over eir soft form. As Deabun closed the door and took a seat next to em, Sibill sat down across from them and quickly checked the other company owner’s badge.
“I’m honoured to meet you, Mx Raddert, Deabun,” he said.
“Wonderful to meet you too,” Mx Raddert replied. “We’ve read your application with great interest. You achieved an almost perfect track record at your previous firm. And I imagine the dragons of planet Firepit are not the easiest of customers.”
“I’ve never had any trouble,” Sibill said loyally, unwilling to confirm any stereotypes about his former clientele at HEH—‘we’ll Help Expand your Hoard’.
“Why did you leave HEH?” Deabun asked.
“The work was all on just one planet. I’m ready to see more of the universe,” Sibill answered.
Raddert nodded. “We’ve experienced first-hand how learning about other cultures enriches a society. Both directly through art objects and by communicating with people all over the universe in order to do business.”
“Not only to do business,” Deabun said, smiling. “I met my wife on Haunt two standard years after we started the company and we definitely didn’t just talk about the chandelier she was seeking to sell.”
“As you like to remind everyone,” Mx Raddert teased, before returning eir full attention to Sibill. “There is, of course, a small issue that complicates the matter of your recruitment.” E lifted the thin tablet in eir left hand, on which e had Sibill’s file open.
“Yes. My memory is defective.”
Deabun frowned. “Your job would be to buy and sell antiques on planets in many different galaxies. We were delighted to see an android apply, as the long journeys are more straining on a human or foochsian body, but without the ability to remember a lot of cultural details and the range of values a particular object may hold in the eyes of different people, we’re not sure how this is going to work.”
“I developed this malfunction three years ago,” Sibill pointed out, “and you’ve seen my sales at HEH. I may no longer be able to retrieve anything from my long-term storage, but the skillbases hosting my behavioural protocols and language files are still available, as well as my short-term memory, where I can save information for up to twenty hours, depending on how much new data there is to process within that time span.”
“Perhaps that was enough to remember everything you needed on Firepit, but our company sends out ships to trade with millions of cultures,” Deabun said. “You’d need to be able to negotiate with sellers to obtain the best possible price for us, yet without hurting them. And to determine a reasonable price adapted to the local market for the objects we sell. You would have to learn about all of these people and can’t afford to forget what you learned.”
“I won’t,” Sibill said. “I’m good at filing details.”
“But what good is that if you can’t recall those files?” Mx Raddert asked. “We have a proposition. Since we would be very excited to take you on, we could arrange your restoration, at no cost to yourself. Providing you with a new storage drive would offer us some security, as our insurance might not cover mistakes caused by your defect, considering we knew about it before hiring you.”
Sibill had to blink his round, black eyes a few times in shocked indignation before finding himself able to reply. “Replacing my memory drives would change my very identity. If that’s what it takes, I’m withdrawing my application. Good day.” He stood up.
“No, wait!” Deabun called.
Mx Raddert pressed a hand to eir heart. “I’m so sorry. Had I known that would be the consequence of such a procedure, I swear I would never have suggested it. My deepest apologies, Sibill.”
Sibill studied the startled expressions on the two humans’ faces for a moment before sitting down again. “Apology accepted. Look, it’s clear that employing me would be advantageous to both of us. I promise I know what I’m doing. But it would require your trust, and I understand if you can’t give me that. I know there’s much at stake and that wasting a light-years-long journey on me would be a blow to your finances. All I can tell you is that I’m driven to explore new environments and to put my extensive language skills to good use.”
Mx Raddert and Deabun looked at each other for a long moment, apparently communicating without words. Sibill knew that telepathy was not a skill humans possessed, but decades of close collaboration could induce a surprisingly similar phenomenon.
“Okay,” Deabun said finally, turning back to Sibil
l. “We want to give you a chance. Your first mission will be on Mysta. Does that sound good to you?”
Somewhere just behind Sibill’s left hip, a whirr sounded as nervous tension uncoiled. He was getting an assignment in a different galaxy right away! Delighted, he held out his right hand for the human custom of shaking. “That sounds marvellous.”
The android had personalised his office. It wasn’t as luxurious as that of Raddert and Deabun, but behind the standard oval desk was a shelf with gorgeous old books, a colourful abstract landscape painting, and a small showcase with a dozen short, rounded sticks. In the corner farthest from the door, a low table displayed the statue B sought to buy. B could barely contain their excitement at finally seeing the artwork in person, but still managed to focus on the new Raddert & Deabun representative instead.
“You are exactly on time,” the android remarked with a pleased smile.
“My species may not be known for their punctuality, but I know yours is.” B flopped one of their long ears down over an orange eye in the equivalent of a wink and pressed one of their three pairs of limbs to their heart in greeting. “Sibill.”
“B. Shall we?” Sibill gestured at the desk and started walking around it. Although the limbs supporting B’s plump body were much shorter than Sibill’s legs, they quickly fell into step. Side by side, they walked two full circles around the table as Mystan etiquette prescribed, before sitting down across from each other.
B rustled their shiny, deep brown feathers appreciatively and nodded towards the statue. “I couldn’t help but sneak a glance already. It’s in fine shape, isn’t it?”
“It was well looked after,” Sibill agreed. “The only damage is a small crack in one of those pieces of glass.”
“Not bad for its age.” B stood up again to take a closer look. The statue, carved out of grey stone, represented two characters: the first was a fat, woolly creature with several sets of wings; the other a tall, very flexible figure coiled lovingly around the first one’s chest. Both of them had oodles of eyes all over their bodies, those of the coiled figure all partly hidden behind dark, round eyeglasses.
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