Brobots

by Trevor Barton

  ‘Well… I like to meet the people. It’s good for that. I also like to be around my Bro’s. It might wear off, but… we’re kind-a hooked on each other. We never like to be too far from each other and nights at the club make up for the years spent working together but not really …I don’t know… talking or enjoying ourselves.’

  ‘But you could still do that and do other things? Last week you were only there a couple nights.’

  ‘I miss… No.’

  Jared reached out and rubbed Byron’s bicep. ‘What do you miss buddy?’

  ‘I liked being able to work Jared’s yard. I know it wasn’t huge, but it was big for a city house. I planted a few things out and never really got to see them grow all that much. I also miss the radio…’

  ‘You’re green-fingered!’ Alma exclaimed. Byron sat up off his elbows and looked at his hands with concern. The others chuckled.

  ‘Means you like nature.’

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘He’d make a good groundsman or park keeper Jared. I’d say forester, or ranger, but there ain’t no forest round here.’

  ‘How about it, Byron? You like the sound of that?’

  ‘I don’t know what a groundsman does.’

  ‘You look after all the nature. So… like… if you were the park keeper this end of town you’d probably get a few parks to keep up. Maybe some driving of grass clippers or coppicing trees or …I don’t know… cleaning up benches? You’d get to be outside all daytime.’

  ‘Probably all weather, too. Can you do that? Or do you have to stay dry?’

  Byron chuckled. ‘No need to stay dry. You should have seen the mud fight we had last year on the farm!’ The boys laughed together.

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe.’ Byron looked out across the park. The space was so wide. For the first time ever he was sat with a friend and a lover out in the open with no need for a uniform or disguise. (They’d taken the risk. High summer made for happier people minding their own.) His heart ached with the beauty of it. Little details like the different colors of flowers in neat beds. Different kinds of tree. Nicely painted fences. Tidy little paths with their macadam butting up against the lawn. The smells of fresh air. The sensation of a light summer breeze on his skin. The textures of bark.

  ‘What about Ned?’ Alma asked.

  ‘What about him?’ Jared fired back.

  ‘What’s he do?’

  ‘Not very much as it turns out.’

  ‘Well… You can’t do much when you’re only up every other day!’

  ‘It isn’t that.’ Byron said, turning back.

  ‘Any particular reason he turned out a bum, Byron?’ Jared wanted to know.

  ‘If I know the answer I don’t know how to put it. I think he still wants to be just what he was before. More like a flicker than a spark.’

  ‘He can’t turn it into a sexy dance like Tasley does?’ Alma winked at Jared.

  ‘Perhaps. But he’d have to get off his fat ass to do that.’

  ‘Looks like you found the one to be your hat stand.’ Alma said to Jared.

  ‘It may come to that. I’m a little fed up with him right now. Thought it’d be Chuck I’d struggle with, but he’s doing fine. Dating Jason now; y’know, my friend from Adaptic Tech?’

  ‘Oh! Are they in love?’

  ‘Not sure. Probably horny lust at present. It has long-term potential, though. Jase needs someone who’s not a bastard. Chuck needs someone to go all gooey-eyed over. It kind-a works in its own slightly twisted way.’

  ‘If I have any more gin in this sunshine I’m going to pass out! You want some, Jared?’ Alma passed a hip flask to Jared. Jared took it to play with; also to make sure that she didn’t have more.

  ‘Yana gave me a talking to that last day I saw her back at the farm.’

  ‘She did? What about?’

  ‘The same stuff you said. About not fixing things and enjoying myself more.’

  ‘Well she’s right. You think you will?’

  Jared looked at Byron and moved over so that he could rest onto his side. ‘Ever since universal basic income came in I could drop work. I’ve got the house proceeds. We can live on the UBI at Christopher’s. The rent is next to nothing; it’s only really set for one and the Bro’s don’t exactly require much else than a spark.’

  ‘Electricity’s so expensive these days though, ain’t it? Ever since the nuclear reactors all got shut off.’

  ‘Yeah…What’s with that, I wonder?’

  ‘Less of it to go around. Prices go up. We should’ve put in more solar farms and turbines long ago. That was my generation’s bad. Sorry about that. It’ll come down again. Sunshine dun cost a dime.’

  ‘I guess I don’t have to work any more. Not really. I could contribute in other ways. But I don’t know what ways those would be.’

  ‘There’s always the radio.’ Byron looked at Jared, helpful like.

  ‘The radio?’ Alma wanted to make sure she hadn’t misheard.

  ‘Oh… Remember the old radio I had as a boy? The one I bought with pocket money.’

  ‘Sure I do. It was a hundred years old and you couldn’t understand why you couldn’t get to hear pop music from the 1960’s on it.’

  ‘It broke long ago but it was still at the house when I moved back in. Not long after Byron woke up I gave it to him to see if he could get it working. We’ve been talking a bit since then… sort of a pipe dream… about how one day we could find old radios and fix them up with wifi players inside. Kind of like a steampunk thing.’

  ‘Oh god.’

  ‘What is it?’ Byron asked.

  ‘Those steampunks get on my nerves. They hang on street corners in their silly Victorian costumes smoking their weed from those vapes. It stings my eyes when I go down Walnut some days.’

  ‘Can’t you take another street?’ Jared chuckled his words.

  ‘I would. But the gin palace is there, and that’s the only one in Scrinton.’

  ‘You could.’ Byron looked at Jared who was still chuckling. Jared just looked at him with a sparkle in his eyes. Maybe.

  I love you, Jared. With all of my soul. You’re gentle and you do the right thing at all times. Where would any of us be if it hadn’t been for you? We don’t have to stay now. We’re free. But we all want to, because you’re in our family.

  ‘What is that smell?’ Jared looked around wriggling his nose. ‘Did you just fart, Byron?’

  ‘What? No! That’s a human trait I have to put up with.’

  Artemis looked sheepish sat behind the boys and under the tree with the other two dogs. Alma caught the look and winked at her, but said nothing.

  --

  ‘What a glorious afternoon.’ Jared took his shades from their resting place on the top of his head and discarded them on the small kitchen worktop. Byron swung around his side to face him and kissed him on the lips.

  ‘Alma’s the best.’

  ‘Isn’t she?’

  ‘Liked the park too.’

  ‘Good. So nice to be out and not have to think about it very much.’

  ‘May be a sign of things to come.’

  ‘Here’s hoping.’

  Jared kissed Byron back. ‘Do you wanna celebrate somehow?’

  Byron smiled his “I’m on to you” smile. ‘What did you have in mind?’

  ‘Kinky stuff.’

  ‘Yeah? What like?’

  ‘Oh, you. In your old work clothes. Is that bad?’

  ‘Okay. I see where you’re going. Do I have to act?’

  ‘Mmmm. There’s an idea.’

  ‘I’m your unit, and you have to boss me around? Make sure I grease your pole right?’

  ‘Uhuh.’

  ‘Will I be in trouble if I drop my load, Mr Manager?’

  ‘Oh yeah.’ Jared started hot kissing.

  ‘How much?’

  ‘Only this much.’ Jared felt around and pinched Byron’s ass.

  Ned was online today. He wandered slowly into the lounge and round to the kitche
n. Catching the love-birds at their game he shook his head in disbelief (jealousy) and walked back out to his room.

  Jared led Byron to their room. As they worked through their therapeutic fantasy drama the hot love and desire poked fun at what they’d been through. No more Dartonia. No more construction. No more mental slavery. No more threats of jail. No more fixing people. No more waking up from emotional coma. They could be themselves and that, deep down, was hotter than any kind of sex today.

  As Jared fucked Byron slow and good, club music echoed through the walls from next door. Tasley was in rehearsal for tonight. Chuck had chosen him and Mike a hot number a few days ago. Something new. It was a mash-up of sister-fit tease type tracks from the late 20th Century. 2050’s tracks were lined up for later. ‘Tool Me Up’ (for the men), ‘Martian Male’ (for the ladies).

  Jared looked out the small window from the bed, checking out the tiny yard between the flat and the club and smoked his vape. Byron looked down on a pillow and played with the feathers beneath the fabric.

  ‘We should go to the farm. Shall we go next week?’

  ‘You think there’s room?’

  ‘I don’t know. But I do know I’m a guest of honor – so that bedroom is ours.’

  ‘You don’t wanna find some barn stacked with hay?’

  Jared curled his lip and twinkled his eyes at him. ‘Now you are talking my language.’

  Harris

  ‘Oh god. Not over there. No!’ Instructing new Sentients in the finer points of land management was proving to be a challenge. The cliché would be herding cats. It wasn’t a cliché. It was exactly like that. One thing was the battery swapping. It was a different team every day. Each Bro had a battery every other day with two extras. That meant the rotation went like cogs.

  Another thing was the Bro’s themselves. The newly-arriveds were just as interested in picking up bits of machinery and exploring them or laughing at each other as they were in serious work. Perhaps he was taking the ‘foreman’ role too seriously.

  Despite the challenges, they’d managed to get the tractor and a ploughing attachment working last year. They were both big old things from the days of intense mega farming. There wouldn’t be time to sow crops this year, but they could at least start to get the fields in a manageable state. Of course, some things had grown far too big in the fields for a plough. Small trees and shrubs had to be cleared in a manual way. It kept the team busy; when it didn’t turn into a dirt fight or various games of innocent war.

  Jared raced down the route in a self-drive. He was teaching Byron 1960’s pop, rock and roll. Byron’s song voice was passable. He could hit the notes but not much else. The roof was down and they hollered the song together.

  Arriving at the farmhouse, they were both curious to find nine ‘sleeping’ Sentients inside, but nobody else. On a lovely day like this they must all be working the fields. They started walking.

  It made sense to them both to take the walk they’d taken the first time they were both on the farm. Things were much prettier now than they had been then. Hedgerows and trees were in leaf; a cacophony of birdsong in the air.

  ‘Y’know…If you still want to fix up radios I could find you one.’ Jared scuffed the dirt.

  ‘That’d be nice.’ Byron sauntered his big weight with his hands in his trackpant pockets. ‘You wanna do the next one with me?’

  ‘Sure! You can do the hardware. I can do the software.’

  ‘Oh. So not a repair this time. Kind of like a mod?’

  ‘Maybe. We could put Edison lights inside and a wifi browser to filter free radio. Then sell it on the Internet when we’re done.’

  ‘That’s… I mean I like it. I’d like working on it with you. Brains and braun did make a good team.’

  ‘They did, didn’t they?’ Jared smiled and stroked Byron’s arm.

  ‘But I also like Alma’s idea.’

  ‘The one about the park management?’

  ‘Yeah. Is it too early? To be doing a public job like that?’

  ‘Well… The job market is tough in any kind of work, y’know? The so-called “second industrial revolution” did that. Can you believe we used to employ people just to drive trucks?’

  ‘I’ve seen movies where there were people employed as supermarket checkout attendants. Hard for me to imagine a time when there weren’t any robots at all.’

  ‘Yeah. Me too, actually. But it wasn’t just robots. All kinds of things have changed. Hundreds of men used to dig in coalmines, too. And that’s a thing of the past. Some say climate change. Others just say collecting sunshine is cheaper.’

  Jared scuffed some more dirt as he walked and then took Byron’s hand out from one of his pockets to hold it. ‘But… If there was a job like it in Scrinton you’d have the right to apply. The question really is, would it be safe enough. I mean… in the daytime spring through autumn people are usually in parks to enjoy themselves. If they even looked at you and worked out you were a Sentient they’d probably just think it was the right sort of job for you somehow. A good follow to construction work. Hiding in plain sight again, to be honest. But you’d have just as much work to do in the winter months and…I guess cold weather can make people selfish and mean. Darker days. Kids playing around getting drunk. Parks are not always safe. In fact, they attract the trouble sometimes. Depending on the park.

  ‘It’s weird, actually. Some parks can somehow rise above the trouble. Others just sink down. We’d… have to choose carefully. And I’d worry about you.’

  Byron reflected on the day he’d punched into Chuck. They weren’t all that far from the spot, and he’d hardly been there again since then. ‘I’m not proud to say it, but…You should’a been there the day I laid into Chuck. I can throw a punch if someone gets me angry for good reason.’

  ‘I know. But you get a whole gang set on you with knives or guns? A punch won’t do much good. If they lay into you and evidence what you are they’ll just as likely keep at it until the only way to get you back is a download to a new body. Brobotics sound like they’re doing alright, but even then…’

  ‘I haven’t actually seen anyone be that mean. Except on TV.’

  ‘It can happen for real, Byron. Trust me.’

  ‘Should I drop the idea?’

  ‘No. Didn’t say that. Just… Let’s see, can we?’

  ‘Yeah. I get it. I do.’ Byron sort of shook his head like a grizzly bear. He understood, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. Freedom on paper, it turned out, was not really freedom yet. It wasn’t about “working” or “being useful” any more. It wasn’t even about that for the people who survived on UBI alone. It was fulfillment in using his hands, being in the elements, and the love he had learned he had for plants and wild things. Taking that point he scanned the fields. Looking across to a neighboring one he caught sight of twelve large men atop a trailer tugged by tractor. Some were whirling ball caps in the air while others fell about as the tractor etched some wild turns.

  ‘Can you see?’ Byron pointed.

  ‘Ha! Cropping up some happy! I can see! Love it.’

  --

  Getting to know the newbies proved rather confusing. Easy was conversing with the ‘old boys’ which, Jared realized, he still hadn’t done much of to this day. Harder was familiarizing with several of the new men on one day, and a different several the next.

  That said, things were much more relaxed here than when Jared had visited the last time. The old boys knew their routine and role. Do their best to help new arrivals through their wake up a few hours. Get them working in teams on the fields or machinery a few more (also a way for them to work through their wake up). Take quality time learning from media. Watch movies or play games for fun. Allow each Bro a bit of private time as best as possible. There was a pattern and the pattern had been approved by Susan; even talked about as a kind of boot camp for Sentients wanting citizenship. It was still concealed in terms of location. But official routes to it for those with the spark were opening up.


  This also meant for a quicker turn-around. The old boys effectively had a permanent right to stay for now; and if they wanted the farm to be operational long term that would have to remain so. Gone were the days (and budget) that this mega farm could operate in any mega way. For one thing they were starting on close to zero budget.

  Newbies had four months of boot camp. Then (the idea was) they would have to start looking for places to go. Rather like anything fur being automatically his, Jared wanted to take all of them home. He felt sad learning of this new arrangement dictated by Susan. But she had nothing else she could do. The farm was only so big; and if he reflected on it that urge was only really a passing whim. The idea of 24/7 Brobotic boot camp actually made him feel sick. All that naivety; all the joshing, all the freak encounters in dilapidated barns with guys who didn’t know they were bro-fit until they met their first gay human. Twenty bro’s at a time. Fifteen new. That would be one gay Bro every six months at least. Not all of them would be Chuck-like, but it was enough for Jared to think ‘no thank you’.

  ‘So how long you here?’ Harris was propping up the kitchen counter enjoying Jared’s company.

  ‘We’ll stay a few days. I’m off work until Tuesday.’

  ‘Great! Are you treating it like a holiday?’

  ‘A bit. Why?’

  ‘Well… we could sure do with your help.’

  ‘I didn’t see anything to take to market.’

  ‘Ha! No. Not this year, but… With the touchy feely stuff.’

  ‘Oh. Right.’

  ‘Do you mind? I could use a break.’

  ‘Sure. How you’ve not gone insane yet I won’t know. Happy to help.’

  --

  ‘What do people do with themselves if they’re not working?’ asked one.

  ‘How do you mean?’ Jared replied.

  ‘Well, if they get a guaranteed basic income now and they don’t all work during the day then what do they do?’

  ‘The idea is that UBI is cheaper in the long run than giving people benefits – like for when they’re ill and can’t work or they have bad luck and lose a job or they end up homeless so they need shelters, case workers, health checks and so on. So the state doesn’t need anything in return, but the hope is that people won’t just sit around doing nothing all day and instead they’ll find meaning somewhere. Maybe charity work or doing up a street or running a museum or whatever.’