Three Days in April

by Edward Ashton

  “Servos are locked up. Haven’t been able to move it since last night.”

  “Huh. Planning on doing something about that?”

  He half shrugs.

  “Yeah, I’ll get it looked at. Can’t do it until Monday morning.”

  “So why don’t you take it off?”

  He looks at me blankly.

  “Take what off?”

  I wave a hand at him.

  “The exoskeleton, Doug. Why don’t you take it off until you can get it fixed?”

  The scowl comes back. Definitely terrifying.

  “I dunno, Anders. Why don’t you take off your endoskeleton every time somebody startles you, and you bang your head on the ceiling and break your own leg?”

  Well. That was unnecessary.

  “Oh, don’t look at me like that,” he says. “It’s exactly the same thing. This isn’t a suit I’m wearing. It’s just as much a part of me as my organics.”

  I lean forward.

  “Except that you actually could take it off, right? You can’t do that with your balls, for example.”

  “In fact,” he says, “right now it would be easier to take off my balls than this rig. The left arm is frozen. I may not have mentioned that.”

  The waitress comes by with our food. She smiles at me, and asks if I need anything else. I shake my head. She gives Doug a sideways glance, glowers, and walks away. I pick up a slice of bacon. It’s perfectly crispy brown, and still hot. I take a bite and chew slowly, letting the salt clear the taste of rat anus that’s still lingering in my mouth. Doug is trying to cut his waffles into precise squares one-­handed. It’s not going well.

  “You know,” he says. “That bacon is nothing but fat and sodium.”

  I shrug.

  “And you know that waitress wiped her perfectly proportioned ass with your waffles, right? Explain again why you don’t feel the need to tip?”

  Doug sighs. We’ve been through this before.

  “Tipping allows the management to continue to employ low-­cost human labor, where an automaton would clearly be more efficient. If nobody tips, the servers will eventually demand better pay, which will prompt management to replace them.”

  “But it’s not everybody who’s not tipping, Doug. It’s just you—­which means that the servers are not replaced by hyperefficient mechanical men, but I do have to sit here catching backsplash from the stink-­eye they’re constantly throwing you, and watching you eat waffles that spent the best time of their lives down the back of someone’s shorts.”

  He stabs a forkful of waffle and shovels it into his mouth.

  “Tastes okay to me.”

  We settle into eating. The waitress stops by to refill my tea. She really is a piece of work, and I find myself wondering if I could talk her into meeting up with me later. Hard to figure out how to start that conversation without coming off like a possibly dangerous weirdo, though, so I table the idea for the moment. I finish my last bite of eggs and give the pancakes a poke, but my stomach lets out a warning rumble. Doug finishes his waffle, drains his water glass, and leans back in his chair.

  “So,” he says. “I suppose you’re wondering why I asked you here today.”

  I actually was not wondering that at all. I look at him expectantly.

  “The answer,” he says finally, “is that I have a proposition for you.”

  I raise one eyebrow.

  “Not the naked, sweaty kind of proposition,” he continues. “The business kind.”

  I lean back and fold my arms across my chest.

  “I have some documents,” he says. “I need you to review them for me. They’re . . . outside my expertise.”

  “You mean not related to donkey porn?”

  “No,” he says. “Not related to donkey porn, or monkey porn, or monkey-­on-­donkey porn. Technical documents. I think they’re close to your area of expertise, but I’m not sure. If they’re not, just delete them, and I’ll find somebody else.”

  “You’re not sure because you don’t know what’s in the documents? Or because you swap to kitten cage-­fighting videos every time I try to talk to you about my work?”

  “Can’t it be both?”

  I sigh.

  “I’m sure it is, Doug. Fine. What file sizes are we talking about?”

  He shrugs.

  “A ­couple of terabytes, I’m guessing mixed media. Shouldn’t take more than a day or two to go through it, but unless you’re a lot better informed than you’ve led me to believe, you’ll probably need to do a fair amount of background digging as well.”

  I pull out my phone, and make a show of checking my calendar. Truth is, I have absolutely nothing going on.

  “Great,” I say. “I’ve got finals coming up, but I can probably get to it after that. What’s the rate?”

  “The what?”

  “The consulting rate. What are you going to pay me for this?”

  He looks genuinely startled.

  “Pay? Come on, Anders. I thought we were friends.”

  I roll my eyes and wait for the laugh, but it’s not coming.

  “I understand that you’re the cheapest cyborg on Earth,” I say finally, “but did you or did you not just say that this was a business proposition?”

  “Yeah,” he says. “But I didn’t mean the paying kind of business.”

  I close my eyes, and massage my temples again. The headache had been receding, but it’s coming back now with a vengeance.

  “Just to clarify,” I say. “Is someone paying you to decipher these files?”

  He manages to look offended.

  “That’s kind of personal, isn’t it?”

  “But you expect me to spend several days doing the actual work for you, for free.”

  He looks up at the ceiling and sighs.

  “Well sure, it sounds bad if you put it that way.”

  “So let me put it this way instead: I bill out at six hundred an hour.”

  He shrugs.

  “Fair enough. When can you get back to me with some answers?”

  Considering that Doug didn’t blink at my pulled-­from-­my-­ass consulting rate, I’m feeling like I can spring for a cab to get back home. The car drops me off a little after two. I climb the six steps up to the stoop, and dig in my pockets for my keys. In addition to living next to a drug lab, I live in the only house left in Baltimore that doesn’t have electronic entry. I’m about to let myself in when the door jerks open, and Gary pulls me into a full-­body hug.

  “Where were you last night?” he wails, and crushes his face against my chest. “I waited and waited, but you never came home.”

  I push my way inside, pull the door closed behind me and pat him on the head.

  “Sorry, honey.” I say. “I meant to call, but I was busy having sex with a prostitute. I hope you don’t mind.”

  He laughs and lets me go.

  “I figured as much. You smell like a Dumpster. Also, rent transfers tomorrow. Can you cover, or do I need to add it to your tab?”

  “No,” I say. “I’m good. I’ll push it tonight.”

  I start upstairs. I want a shower and a nap before I start thinking about not taking a look at Doug’s files.

  “Hey,” Gary says. “Somebody named Dimitri stopped by looking for you this morning. Do we know a Dimitri?”

  I keep climbing.

  “So many Dimitris,” I say. “Russian hit man Dimitri? Ballet dancer Dimitri? Dancing bear Dimitri? What did he look like?”

  I turn the corner at the landing. Gary’s still talking, but I’m no longer listening. I peel off my shirt and drop it in the hallway, step into the bathroom and turn on the shower. As I turn to close the door, I’m surprised to see Gary standing at the top of the stairs.

  “Seriously,” he says. “This guy was definitel
y not a dancer and probably not a bear, and he seemed kind of torqued when I told him you weren’t here.”

  I kick off my shoes and drop my pants.

  “I don’t know anybody named Dimitri. What did he look like?”

  “Six feet, kinda stocky. Black hair. Brushy little beard. Pretty serious accent. Ukrainian maybe?”

  This is not ringing any bells.

  “Look,” I say. “I’ve got nothing. I’ll think about it, and if I come up with anything I’ll ping you. Good enough?”

  I close the door without waiting for an answer.

  I spend ten minutes washing, then another fifteen letting the hot water steam the rest of the alcohol out of my system. I shut off the water, and by the time I’m finished toweling off, I feel like I could curl up and sleep on the bathroom floor. I collect my clothes and chuck them into the wicker hamper. As I do, my phone drops out of my pants and bounces off the tile. It pings when it sees that it has my attention. I’ve got a voice-­only. I pick up the phone and acknowledge. It’s from Terry.

  “Hey,” she says. “I heard you might have had a visitor this morning. Sorry.”

  “I did,” I reply. “Can you elaborate?”

  “Sorry, no. I’m a limited-­interactive. Terry has authorized you for direct access, however. Would you like me to attempt connection?”

  Just as well, I guess. I hate talking to fully interactive avatars. I get that they’re just simulations, that they don’t really have thoughts and hopes and dreams and whatnot, but the good ones have been able to pass the Turing test for a while now, and deleting them has always felt weirdly murder-­ish to me. No such problem with the LIs, though. They’re just annoying.

  “No,” I say. “Don’t ping Terry now. I’ll get back to her later. Delete.”

  Whatever this Dimitri thing is, I don’t feel much like dealing with it at the moment. I open the door. Steam pours out into the hallway. My room is to the left, Gary’s is to the right. He’s sitting on his bed staring into space, either stroked out or watching something on his ocular. One eye focuses on me.

  “Hey,” he says. “Towel, maybe?”

  I turn into my room and shut the door behind me, drop the phone on my nightstand and fall into bed.

  I have a recurring dream where I’m downtown, wandering around the mess just north of the harbor in the middle of the night. I have a car, which I do not in real life, but I can’t remember where I parked it, and the streets keep changing names and directions until I don’t recognize anything. I usually wind up getting chased around by somebody. This time, it’s a bear in a tutu who keeps yelling at me to stay away from his girlfriend. He corners me in a blind alley. I’m standing on top of a Dumpster, scrabbling at the brick wall of the building behind it, waiting for his bear teeth to sink into my ass, when I snap awake. The late afternoon sun is slanting through the window, and I’m soaked with sweat.

  I’ll later learn that while I was napping, the good citizens of Hagerstown, Maryland, more or less simultaneously crapped their pants and died.

  2. TERRY

  I’m just back from a run, dripping sweat and still panting, when my phone pings. I’ve got a full-­interactive from Dimitri.

  “Hey,” it says. “Pick up. I saw you come in.”

  Shit. I keep meaning to deny incomings access to the house.

  “Fine,” I say. “Connect.”

  I walk into the kitchen, turn on the sink and splash cold water on my face. The avatar manifests as a talking bear. I don’t have an ocular, so it shows up in the wallscreen instead of standing in front of me. Still, annoying.

  “So,” it says, in a cartoonish parody of Dimitri’s accent. “Dimitri found your new boyfriend. He lives in a crack house. You should stay away from him.”

  “Really? That’s what you’re here for? Del—­”

  “Wait! Wait! I have other things to say!”

  I can feel my face twisting into a scowl. The bear raises one eyebrow hopefully.

  “Fine,” I say finally. “Two minutes, and then I’m in the shower and you’re in the recycle bin. What?”

  “Your new boyfriend has contact with unsavory characters,” it says. “Very bad ­people, with bad motives. Dimitri is concerned for you. He would not want you to get caught up when new boyfriend comes to bad end.”

  I roll my eyes as I turn off the water in the sink.

  “Could you please drop the accent?” I say. “It’s not cute. And could you also lose the bear suit?”

  The bear smiles, which on a bear face is more creepy than reassuring.

  “Is this better?”

  The accent is gone, but now I’m looking at a fat guy in a leather thong. When did Dimitri’s avatars turn into smart-­asses?

  “Look,” I say. “I’ve been pretty clear that Dimitri and I are not a thing, haven’t I? We are not lovers, sex pals, soul mates, or significant others. We have been friends, but honestly I’m starting to question that now. Who I choose to bring home with me and what I choose to do with them is none of his business. Understood?”

  The avatar raises its hands in surrender.

  “Really, Terry, this is not a jealousy thing. Your new friend is probably not a bad guy, but there’s a good chance that he’s going to be in some trouble soon. Dimitri would very much prefer that you stay out of it.”

  It seems sincere. But of course, that’s the beauty of a full-­interactive avatar. It honestly believes whatever information Dimitri fed it. That’s why full-­interactives are a favorite tool for ­people who are completely full of shit.

  “I’ll tell you what,” I say finally. “I’ll take it under advisement. Does that work for you?”

  It shrugs.

  “I suppose it will have to do. Please contact Dimitri directly at your earliest convenience.”

  “Yeah, I’ll get right on that. Delete.”

  It gives me an ironic salute, and then disappears.

  I’m not sure exactly what, if anything, Dimitri might have done to Anders, but whatever it was, I feel at least partly responsible. I don’t know where Anders lives, but I did skim his number while he was passed out in my bedroom. I give him a ping, then drop him a quick voice-­only by way of apology when he doesn’t connect. I don’t know if I’ll see him again, but if I do, I don’t want the first topic of conversation to be the nutjob I led to his doorstop.

  Not that Dimitri’s a nutjob, really. This jealousy thing, if that’s what it is, is totally out of character. I’ve known Dimitri for three years now, and despite the fact that we met at a support group for ­people who’d recently lost loved ones, he’s never really gotten into my personal life before. Also, the bear was pretty insistent that Dimitri’s interest in Anders is professional.

  Hard to see how Dimitri could have a professional interest in Anders, though. I don’t know exactly what Dimitri does, but I know he works for NatSec in some capacity. I asked him about it once, early on, when we were still trying to feel out what our relationship was going to be. I tried hinting around for a while, then asked him flat-­out what he did for a living. He just smiled and shook his head.

  “What?” I said. “If you told me you’d have to kill me?”

  “No,” he said. Dimitri’s not exactly a laugh riot under the best of circumstances, but this was as serious as I’ve ever seen him. “I would not have to kill you, Terry. There is an excellent chance, however, that if I told you how I spend my workdays, someone would have to kill me.”

  Thinking about that conversation leads me to wonder for the first time if maybe Dimitri might have some actual justification for an interest in Anders. Anders didn’t seem much like a terrorist last night—­but then, I’ve never spent much personal time with a terrorist before, so what do I know? I try to picture his big, goofy, drunk-­on-­four-­beers ass putting bombs together in his basement, or cooking up a super virus in a secret lab somewhere, b
ut the image just makes me giggle. Dimitri developing a sudden, uncontrollable, possessive love for me seems a lot more plausible.

  I strip out of my running gear and step into the bathroom. This room is the only thing I truly hate about my apartment. It’s got an open shower stall on one side, facing a floor-­to-­ceiling wallscreen on the other. I do not like looking at myself naked, and I really don’t like other ­people looking at me naked. I like to think I’m in pretty good shape, but between the big shoulders and the tiny breasts, and the brow ridge, I’m not ever gonna be a lingerie model. I actually asked the landlord to put in a closed stall when I first moved in. I do interior design for a living. Rich old ladies pay me obscene amounts of money to give them this kind of advice, and I offered it to him for free. He was pretty clear that he thinks this bathroom is a selling point for most tenants, though, and he was not interested in changing it.

  I turn on the water, let it go from cold to lukewarm, and step under the spray. I did a pretty thorough scrub-­down this morning, so this is really just a sweat rinse. I’m starting on my hair when the screen pings. I wipe my eyes clear and squint through the spray. It’s my sister.

  “Connect,” I sigh. “Audio only.”

  The wallscreen stays blank, but I can hear the grin in her voice.

  “Hi, Terry. No view?”

  I close my eyes again, tilt my head back and let the water plaster my hair to the back of my neck.

  “I’m in the shower, Elise. What do you need?”

  “Just wanted to talk pretty dresses and appetizers,” she says. “Nothing important. Want me to try back later?”

  Ugh. I let my head fall forward until my chin almost touches my chest.

  “If you don’t mind?”

  “No problem. Maybe an hour?”

  “Sounds good, Elise. Disconnect.”

  There’s something to look forward to. Elise is getting married in a month. I’m supposed to be the maid of honor. Her best friend, Grace, is a Pretty, and Elise might as well be—­tall, thin, and blonde, with gravity-­defying boobs and a face that looks like it’s been digitally enhanced. The thought of standing up in front of everyone we know in between those two is enough to make me want to crawl into a deep, deep hole and pull the dirt in on top of me.