Future Tense Fiction

by Kirsten Berg

  Usually when Jalebi came to the ledge with her textbooks, 3cry left with a string of curses. These weren’t necessarily hostile—crows liked to insult each other, and often did it with great affection. Mostly they thought it was hilarious that humans couldn’t understand words. So crows rained their most creative snark on human heads, marveling at how oblivious they were to the humiliations they suffered from the beaks of people flying overhead. But one afternoon, 3cry arrived during their study session and did not fly away.

  Jalebi was musing about something she’d learned in a recent lesson about atomic structure. “What if it turns out we really are spreading cancer to each other on a quantum level?” she asked.

  “Human squawking!” 3cry yelled. “Shit and plastic! Featherless fool!”

  Robot decided to ignore the insults. “Afternoon time,” it said pleasantly. “Human here! Jalebi! Part of the group.”

  “Group does not include living sandwiches.” 3cry laughed.

  Jalebi watched, wide-eyed. “Can you speak crow language?”

  “A little,” Robot said. “My vocabulary is small, but I can say a few things. This is 3cry. She’s… my friend.” As it said the word, Robot realized it was true. Thanks to Bey’s social programming, it knew that groups were statistically likely to be made up of friends or kin. Since Robots have no kin, that meant Jalebi was a friend too.

  Jalebi tried to make the sound of 3cry’s name and the bird ignored it.

  “I found something you like, Robot. Near-death. All over a human tree.”

  “She said your name perfectly! I read that crows can imitate words, but I’d never heard it before!”

  3cry glanced at Jalebi, then at Robot. “Annoying Jalebi.”

  “She said my name too! That’s so cool!”

  But Robot wasn’t paying attention to the interesting language data points. It predicted 3cry had found a disease outbreak, and that took precedence over all other inputs.

  “I have to go,” it said to Jalebi. To 3cry, it added, “Take me there.”

  Robot followed 3cry in a southeasterly direction, eventually alighting at the top of a building on Missouri Street. Like Jalebi’s home, this building was partly open to the air. Its layout suggested that it might have been a public building like the CDC; there were long hallways lined with small rooms like offices. Water sources were isolated in a few areas, unlike in a typical habitat, where water welled up in multiple rooms. But it was definitely a human habitat now, with soft bedding and buckets for water and data access points made from cans. As they flew down a stairwell, Robot tried to estimate the population of the building based on noise, heat, and live wires. It settled on a 75 percent probability of 50 humans on each upper floor, with populations growing as they descended.

  “Here!” 3cry landed on a railing in front of a door marked 2, for second floor. “Near-death!”

  “Thank you.”

  “End group,” 3cry said, taking to the air. The phrase was one way crows said goodbye.

  “Until morning,” Robot replied, already using a gripper to tug the door open.

  The corridor was full of light from scratched windows along the left-hand side, illuminating dozens of doors to habitats that were once something else. Classrooms? Offices? Consulting rooms? Robot flew slowly past them, modeling possibilities and looking for humans. The fourth door was propped open, and several humans were inside. Their breathing was labored, and one was crying. Something had knocked out the walls between rooms, creating a wide-open space full of cloth dwellings, plush bedding, and piles of bright plastic containers.

  It was time to land. Humans didn’t like it when Robot flew overhead, and besides, the face and legs were part of what made it seem so friendly. Walking over to one of the humans wrapped in blankets, Robot smiled and waved a tiny gripper in greeting.

  Patchy black hair covered the human’s head, and cracks had formed in the lips that didn’t smile.

  With no baseline language established, Robot estimated that it should try the dialect spoken in Jalebi’s building. “I’m a friend who is worried about your health! Can you cough into a tissue for me?” The human stared at Robot’s face and blinked, before succumbing to a coughing fit. For Robot, it didn’t matter whether the coughs were intentional or not. It took a sample and moved on to the next human.

  “Hello!” Robot said to the juvenile, who was using a mobile device to access the internet.

  “Are you a cop?” The juvenile used a sociolect of English that was common in East St. Louis.

  “I’m a friend who checks to make sure you are healthy! I share information with doctors, not police.” The human frowned and Robot made a sad face. “A lot of people here are sick. I would like to help.”

  “Nobody is going to help, stupid drone. Hospital for citizens only, yeah?”

  “Please cough into the tissue, so I can figure out why you are sick.”

  Another human spoke up, head emerging from a cloth shelter. “What are you going to do about it?”

  Robot stood still for several microseconds, modeling possibilities and considering what language would be the most soothing. “I am going to find out what is causing your illness. This is an emergency. I will find help. I promise. Please cough into the tissue.”

  One by one, the humans complied. Robot flew from room to room, checking for disease. After sequencing several samples, it found the same virus strain in multiple humans. This met the definition of an outbreak. It was time to call Bey.

  “Is that you, Robot? I can’t believe you’re still running! It’s been…what? Over a year?”

  “Something really bad is happening in East St. Louis,” Robot said, deploying the exact words Bey had used to delineate when it would be appropriate to call her. “There is an outbreak. I need to send you data.”

  “Do you have sequence? Maybe I can…” Robot heard background noise, as if Bey were moving something on her desk. “Can you send it as an anonymous dump to this address?” She sent the directions to a temporary storage cloud, and Robot deposited data from 127 samples it had taken from humans in the building.

  “We have a system for anonymous reporting, part of this new Amazon Health philanthropy project.” Bey paused. “Got it! Let me analyze this really fast and see if it’s more than just a garden-variety…oh shit.”

  Robot predicted that she was not saying shit for the same reason 3cry did. “What is it?” Robot asked, putting on a fearful expression for itself.

  “This is really bad, like you said. We need to get someone in there. Unfortunately, Illinois doesn’t have a state health department. Maybe there’s a local group or…” Bey was typing. “OK, Robot, I found something. There’s a nonprofit health collective in East St. Louis called Community Immunity. They could probably manufacture vaccines and a therapy. It’s a known pathogen, but hasn’t ever been spotted in the Midwest before. So all they need is this file.” Bey sent a small amount of data. “Do you have anyone who can help you? You might need a human. Sometimes people are hostile to drones, even cute ones.”

  Two hours later, Robot was describing the situation to Jalebi. It was evening, and 3cry was likely sleeping with other members of her group. But Jalebi was wide awake and extremely agitated. “You’re talking about that health collective on MLK Drive! I’ve seen it!”

  Robot nodded, smiling. “Can we go there now?”

  Jalebi glanced toward the door to her habitat. “Yeah. My mom won’t be home until morning anyway.”

  Community Immunity was located in the husk of an old strip mall, its gleaming counters and wet lab hidden behind windows duct taped with tinfoil and cardboard. Bey was right that Robot needed a human. Jalebi had to pretend that Robot was her school project, and Robot had to pretend that Jalebi had programmed it to look for outbreaks. Once the humans at Community Immunity had the data, they made unhappy faces and said “oh shit” in the same way Bey had.

  A human with purple hair and a prosthetic arm offered Jalebi a seat and some hot tea. The human spo
ke the same sociolect of English that Bey used. “It’s very good that you brought this to us. You are a good citizen.” Then the human looked at Robot. “Thank you, Robot, for giving us the file with an open therapy and vax recipe.”

  “I am happy to help. I don’t like it when people are sick.”

  This human, unlike the others, seemed to know that Robot was the person who found the outbreak. “I’m Janelle, by the way. She/her pronouns. Do you know if there are other places where H18N2 is infecting people?” Robot liked the way Janelle identified herself by name and gender, the way crows did.

  “A friend told me about this outbreak. I don’t know if there are others.” Robot deliberately chose vague language. After Bey’s warning, it did not want to reveal its data-gathering techniques.

  Janelle took it in stride. “Can your… uh… friend help find more? We can manufacture a therapy and a vax tonight, but we need to get it out there fast before this sucker mutates.”

  Robot nodded. “Tomorrow. I will try to find more.”

  When 3cry arrived in the morning, Robot had to strain against the boundaries of its vocabulary to make itself understood. “Need group. Find near-death enemy.”

  “Enemy?” 3cry scratched her head.

  “Enemy for humans,” Robot admitted. But then it had an idea. “Enemy causes human death. Dead humans mean less food.”

  Despite butchering the crow syntax, Robot thought it had made 3cry understand. Plus, sometimes crows just liked an excuse to get the mob together. “Begin group!” 3cry yelled, taking off. Robot leapt into the air behind her. They flew over East St. Louis, calling for the big group that had taken out the hawk. “Begin group! Begin group!” More birds joined them. “Here! I’m here!” They called their names and swirled to roost in a tree at the edge of the Mississippi River, where freeway met water.

  “Find near-death!” 3cry said, then issued some directions and specification words that Robot did not understand.

  “Near-death! There! [Measurement unit] north!” The words came from a big crow named 2chop1caw, jumping into flight. Most of the group followed, possibly to assess what exactly 3cry meant by “near-death.” 2chop1caw led them to a fabric habitat nearby, where Robot quickly identified three sick people. The virus matched the H18N2 signature identified at Community Immunity.

  “More near-death! Where else? Begin group!” Robot called the birds to the air again, and they fanned out over the city, making a racket and hurling their best insults. Each time they uncovered a new outbreak, they gave their loudest calls, sometimes passing those calls to the next bird, until Robot could follow their cries back to the source. By the end of the day, they had discovered five small outbreaks.

  “End group!” 3cry yelled, following Robot back toward MLK. The crows called farewells and locations to each other. “End group!” “Evening time!” “I’m here!” “You there!” “Food!” “Death!” This was followed by laughter, because food and death diverged into many puns far beyond Robot’s comprehension.

  3cry appeared to have decided that she was roosting with Robot for the evening. When they landed, she hooked her claws around its rotor pole, and clung there as Robot signaled arrival to the door of Community Immunity. Robot didn’t mind. Humans found small animals disarming, and that always led to greater compliance.

  Jalebi was there with Janelle, looking at something on a monitor. “Hi Robot!”

  “We have data on the location of more outbreaks.”

  Janelle laughed. “Really? Did your little feathered friend help?”

  “Her name is 3cry!” Jalebi failed to pronounce 3cry’s name again. And, once again, 3cry ignored it, jumping off Robot and using her beak to straighten the feathers under her right wing. Robot reached over and plucked one out that was bothering her.

  “Where can I put this data?” Robot aimed a concerned expression at Jalebi and Janelle.

  “Put it here for now.” Janelle waved a mobile device near Robot, setting it to accept uploads. “Jalebi, do you want to help us synthesize those doses of nasal spray? Looks like we’ll need at least 500. And then we’ll start making vax doses for injection.”

  “Yes! Absolutely!” Jalebi acted like a crow about to charge into the air. But she was only racing across the room to boot up a mixer.

  Janelle had a thoughtful expression on her face. “Did this crow really help you find the outbreaks?”

  “Yes. The crows think humans are idiots, but they appreciate your garbage.”

  Janelle laughed for a long time, and Robot was not entirely sure why.

  When Jalebi returned, she sat down alongside Robot and 3cry and smiled. “This place is really cool. I like it here.”

  “Maybe this is your group,” Robot guessed.

  “Maybe.” Jalebi cocked her head like 3cry. Then she scooped up a tiny tube full of wound adhesive. “Here, hand me that beautiful feather.” Robot dropped 3cry’s feather into her hand. Dabbing a bit of adhesive on Robot’s back, she stuck the feather to its shell next to the place where its rotor pole emerged.

  3cry was startled. “I like it,” she said. “That human is a fool.”

  “Yes she is,” Robot agreed. “You are also a fool.”

  “Yes I am.”

  The three people roosted contentedly next to each other on the floor, watching Janelle and the humans preparing antivirals for other humans. It was a scenario that Robot would not have predicted. But now it could. Robot smiled to itself, organized the data, and retrained its model for friendship.

  WHEN WE WERE PATCHED

  Deji Bryce Olukotun

  The last time we ever spoke, my partner Malik asked me whether I believed speed or power made for the best athlete. I was puzzled, of course, feeling that neither could explain why some athletes excelled more than others, even in straightforward competitions like sprinting or the javelin. “There are enough variables to make it unclear,” I observed, “whether speed or power offers a better advantage in competition, or whether some other factor confers the greatest advantage.” It seemed to me an unanswerable question.

  “And how about elegance versus quickness of thought?” Malik asked. But he stormed off before I could respond, as if he had confirmed some awful quality about me. By then I should have known not to expect anything from Malik, because he was about to ruin my career.

  You see, I come from an illustrious line of sports officiants, spanning the world’s most dynamic and lucrative competitions, and I think my family would agree that my treatment by the FogoTennis Officiants Association was abominable. I should never have been suspended because of dishonorable behavior on Malik’s part.

  Like many referees, I remember the very instant I was called for the first time to officiate on the professional FogoTennis circuit, widely considered the most exciting and dangerous sport in the world. I had honed my skills by watching my parents officiate before me, and by observing my siblings, cousins, and extended family. You could say that I was an officiant from the day I was born. Not only did I learn from other matches, but I also visualized countless scenarios of FogoTennis so that I could fulfill my duties to the best of my ability, cementing my family’s reputation as impartial, efficient, and affordable judges. But there is a difference between officiating in theory—even when it is woven into your very soul—and officiating in reality, when you can find yourself with an irresponsible refereeing partner.

  On that day, my invitation from the FogoTennis Officiants Association arrived as I was running through several game simulations in my mind.

  3ab:1340:4532:4b:120:8ef:dc21:67cf

  I could not hide my excitement! The IPv6 address meant that the match was at the professional level, in the final round of the Zanzibar Open. Thrilled, I immediately traveled to Tanzania, taking any number of shortcuts to get to the match as quickly as possible.

  When I arrived on the island, Malik was already at the courts, going through some sort of warmup routine. He wore the typical soft red tunic of a medium-ranked FogoTennis referee, and he
jogged in place while muttering to himself, “En, de, trwa, kat, senk, sis…” and performing backbends and calisthenics. He had dark chestnut eyes and stood large for a referee, at about 1.9 meters.

  “In pren twa plis letan qui mo ti pense pou to arriv ici,” he said.

  “Pardon me,” I replied. “I did not quite catch your meaning.”

  “In pren twa plis letan qui mo ti think pou to arrive here.”

  “I beg your pardon, but you are not speaking French.”

  Malik lowered into a knee-bend as I retrieved his profile. His speech patterns were highly irregular.

  “Ah, there we are,” I said. “You have a most unusual way of talking. You appear to have picked up some Mauritian patois.”

  “Nothing unusual about it,” he snapped. “I was raised in Mauritius.”

  “Indeed you were,” I replied. “I only expected that you would be speaking standard French. It was a mistake in your profile. It is a pleasure to meet you, Malik.”

  “Right. So you can understand me now?”

  “Every word,” I said proudly. “Our calibration is complete. Would you like to take a look at the athletes’ records?”

  “You look a little different from what I’m used to,” he said.

  “I have improved my appearance based on feedback from our partners: cherry-red alerts with light-green scorekeeping. The contrast is designed to emphasize only the most essential information.”

  “I’m colorblind.”

  I muted my colors somewhat, and switched from red and green to blue and yellow. “How is this color palette?” I asked, now eager to please.

  “Much better.”