The Kubic Kat

by Liam L. Carton

Mr Smith had a first name, but nobody ever used it. And as nobody ever used it, few people knew what it was. Mr Smith did not really care. But he knew that it was Anthony. He knew that he had been named after one of the countries two founding parents. Everyone knew of Margret and Tony. Everyone knew of their secret love affair and of how they had had to hide that love from the forces of darkness. How they had worked together, to build a stronger, more functional country from the hatred of the Muslims and the anger of the Communists.

  He had read the history books, so he knew these things.

  But, for some strange reason, he felt ashamed. He felt ashamed of his name; because he knew it was a lie. All of it was a lie. He knew this, not because he had worked it out for himself, and not because he had read about it. He knew because he was no longer a robot.

  But still, the name existed: Anthony Smith.

  Yesterday, and the day before that, he had been a robot. He had been a robot for a very long time. He could not recall a time when he might not have been a robot, but now he knew. Now he was sure – the robot was gone.

  Now, sitting here with Sally, beneath the shady spreading chestnut tree everything was different.

  Six days ago, he had woken up to the blare of his digiSleep monitor. As usual it told him the sad truth that it was a quarter to eight, and he was, once again, late. Somehow it never managed to wake him up on time.

  After the Jobs for Knobs bill had been passed in honour of Stovepipe Knobs, it had been mandated that those who arose late, even if they arrived for work on time, would still be penalised.

  His current penalty was to start work twenty five minutes early each day. Such penalties, intended to act as sacrificial duty to the ego of corporations (now, thankfully sanctified as legal entities), were, of course, not remunerated. And as he almost always woke up late, no matter what time he asked the digiSleep to wake him, his daily offering had climbed from five minutes to twenty five. At this rate he did not think he would ever get back to zero. He had been foolish enough to try to get the sacrifice reduced, by blaming the digiSleep, but the only result was to have a blasphemy fine billed to his account. It was bad enough that he had had the cheek to complain about a Crapple product, but in his case, the digiSleep was the ten year commemoration model celebrating the official Vatican deification of Saint Knobs. He should have noticed the image of the “gang of four” on the top. (Stovepipe Knobs, Mucky Succubus, Lanky Puke, and Sugary Bum)

  He looked up at the ceiling to see the frail shifting lights of the bio-luminescent digiSleep display. Not only did it show that he was late to wake, it also showed that he was now overdue for his monthly “marital” duty.

  His wife lay, leaden and snoring, on the bed next to him. She still had fifteen minutes of sleep left, so the digiSleep had not tried to rouse her. And so he had the choice of rousing her, then arguing over waking her early, and then he probably still would not get the monthly duties completed - or leaving her to sleep.

  Looking over at her rotund shape, and mean pinched face, he decided to leave her be. The thought of even talking to her made him want to vomit, and mostly she seemed to have a similar aversion to him. Never-the-less, they would need to get it over and done with soon, or their morality index, already lower than his co-workers, would slip again. Then he could face demotion, and he could not afford to let that happen.

  Perhaps, he mussed, that evening he could eat into his little allowance of alcohol, and that might deaden the revulsion a little.

  The easyAid bath mirror in the bathroom told him that he should brush longer, take less time to shower, use colder water, and not waste so much soap.

  Once downstairs, the coffee pot reminded him that he was late, and the toaster refused to serve him as, it told him that that would just encourage his procrastination and laziness.

  He did not like being told off by the toaster.

  He felt that the comments made by the easyAid bath mirror were just about okay; after all it was an expert on such matters! But to be condemned by a toaster as being lazy and feckless, it was just too much! He would have to try to find a new home for it. It probably would not even mind, as it seemed to hate all the family anyway.

  As he got into his electroZev, hungry and humiliated, it hummed to life and with cheery voiced petulance told him: "Tick-tock! Late again. …Please be aware, that in celebration of Margret Thugyas great contribution to environmentalism, the Department of Minimalism have deemed this to be a “drive slow” day. Your maximum speed allowance has therefore been dropped from twenty kilometres per hour to fourteen. Would you like to walk instead?"

  That was it! Now he would be very late! He would certainly loose another five minutes of sleep, and would probably be docked an hours pay.

  He climbed out of the car and threw his airPack bag at the electroZev. "Fuck you!" He shouted.

  The airPack said: "Ouch! What did I do?"

  The electroZev said: "I heard that."

  He almost kicked the car, but then, at the last minute, turned and hit the wall instead.

  "For abusive treatment of your IP licenced devices, and threating behaviour, you have been judged as displaying phase-one anti-social behaviour. Your violation of the IP laws and morality statutes has been reported to the Department of Adjustments. They will contact you shortly to discuss your appraisal and treatment programme." said centComp. "Your AnthropicLog has been supplied as supporting evidence of your transgressions."

  Even here, in the driveway, the sensitive ear and long arm of centComp reached.

  Cold ice formed upon his back. It had never got this bad! An appraisal? For IP law violation? Even when the estate of Tony Blur had sued him for royalty payments, for unsanctioned use of the name “Anthony”, he had not been appraised, and had simply had a lien placed upon all of his future earnings. The Judge had been sympathetic. But there was little he could do, and the estate had insisted that he not be allowed to request a name change. After all, their future earnings depended upon his continued use of that name.

  In the end he had had to admit, that there were less fortunate souls. One kid in his class had been named Thugbook, after the product range of a famous corporation. The court had issued enslavement papers directly in that case. The last he had heard was that the poor bugger was digging yellow cake in Australia for his sins.

  With shaking hands and chill sweat on his brow he had headed to work on foot. His head down against the rising tide of smog and grit, he had been unaware of the girl until he saw her feet enter the top of his vision. He looked up, into the face of an angel. Girls did not look that good. At least they did not look that good anymore. The morality statutes had made such looks a convictable offence many years ago. Too stunned to speak he stopped walking and stared into her face. Then, when she caught his eye, she had winked!

  He almost lost his composure at that point. With breath heaving and heart racing he stood agog. As she sashayed past him, swinging her hips to some inner rhythm she had blown him a kiss! As she walked passed him, he caught just a hint of her perfume, fruity and warm, before a gust of wind threw dust into his eyes. He bent over, his eyes haemorrhaging tears, as he tried to see through the hurt. But by the time his eyes had cleared enough for him to be able to make out anything she had gone.

  Her departure left a rather large hole in his day.