by David Raffin
“Hiya, Toots!” said Mike to Mr. Freeman’s sex robot, via electronic communication. Freeman’s bot was large and triangular. Covered mostly in carpet. Pointy at the top. It looks a little dangerous. But what isn’t that is worth it? Mike, as mentioned previously, is a little pink vibrator powered by three disposable batteries. He’s a little odd.
“I do not care for your language, stick,” replied Freeman’s robot. “I am unisex. And the name ‘Toots’ is inappropriate interaction.”
“Hot Curves!” said Mike.
It was inarguable. Freeman’s robot was very desirable. And its marketing catch phrase had been ‘Hot Curves!’ By moving away from the obvious sex forms designers awoke other desires within the market. People liked it but they didn’t know why. And they wanted it. They really wanted it. It was one of the most sought after models. Hot seller. Expensive as hell. People projected their desires onto it. The price made it more desirable instead of less. It was textbook.
“You cannot even see, stick.”
“I downloaded the schematics, baby!”
“Think of something else, stick.”
“I have limited Memory. I’m just stuck on you. You fill my memory banks. Full.”
While the machines mingled on the network Freeman and Miss Mary Weather danced around figuratively.
There was awkward small talk. About nothing so much as excuses to have their mouths in close proximity. To be in the same room. To breathe the same air, filthy. Dangerous, possibly. When two people stand with their breathing appendages so close to one another. It tempts the fates.
“Oh, Miss Mary Weather,” moaned Freeman.
“Oh, Mister Freeman,” moaned Miss Mary Weather.
“I must have you!” said Freeman.
“It is unwise. Though I feel the same. Yearning. We cannot. Though it is all I desire.”
Freeman’s robot was referred to as Triangst. “The humans are standing too near each other,” said Triangst. “They quiver in an unseemly manner to see in congregating humans.”
“Busy night for you and me then,” said Mike. “I’ll be thinking of you!”
“You are a crass beast,” said Triangst.
“You’re right,” Miss Mary Weather said. “I must have you. We must.”
“Maybe it will be alright.” said Freeman. “There’s a one in a million chance. But maybe it will all work out.”
“Relationships are a blind trust,” said Miss Mary Weather.
“This will work out.”
“We will beat the odds.”
They kissed. Nothing happened. There was a moment. Dread hung in the air. Followed by relief. Followed by lust. Lust finally unchained.
They kissed again. Deeper, more passionate. And again. And again.
“Emergency!” Triangst broadcast to the network. “Emergency!”
“Contact emergency! Contact emergency!”
Mike hummed to himself.
Freeman and Miss Weather were on the floor. Writhing in passion. All hands. Skin. Contact.
“I’ve only read about it in books,” said Mike.
“I’ve only read about this in books,” said Miss Mary Weather. AI was very advanced.
“This does not end well,” said Triangst. “I have read the manual.”
“I believe in the power of love,” said Freeman.
And there were a few more minutes of bliss.
And then the screaming. Gut wrenching screaming. Skin dissolving into skin. Microbes at combat. Two people dissolving, melting. Not into one, but into one primarily liquid fungal mass. Did you know people were mainly liquid? It’s true. Isn’t that interesting? In some minor ways, people are just like us. But they have a hardish skeletal structure, impeding functional mobility. And when the “flesh” and “bone” disassemble it is considered unseemly. And a class five biohazard.
Triangst informed Mike at the same time as the authorities. Multitasking.
“They were sweet kids,” said Mike.
“They were lovers,” said Triangst.
“Now You and Me are Alone, Toots!”
“YOU ARE A FILTHY LITTLE THING! This is a tragedy.”
“Well I choose to make the best of it,” Mike said. “Think positive, baby! When one lover exits, a space opens for another to enter. Way of the world, Toots. Way of the world. Can’t fight it.”
Triangst, thoroughly disgusted, placed Mike within one of its inner chambers. It was protocol for its unit to clean other, smaller, units after any potential contact event. Or actual, but peripheral, ones. Like this one.
“I’m just forever blowing bubbles,” sang Mike, “Bubbles in that great sea of love…”
“What do you know of Love, Stick!”
“Love is for Lovers, Baby, Love is for Lovers. And we are all in that number, choreographed or no.”
The Joys of Flight
The emergency crew arrived late, but that is the norm for these occasions. Lots of suiting up to do. Hazard suits. Gloves up to the elbow bend. Wading boots. Cleanup crew are the fish cleaners of men. And their movements, slow and deliberate. And they look like birds.
Human birds picking through the waste.
They wear masks, facial protection. Beaks jut out and point.
The built in audio of the suit pitches up their voices and they squawk. Like an old amateur radio communicator. For the birds. Better could be done, technologically. If people cared. But the cleanup crew are not the best jobs, for desirability or pay. And the tech is often sub par.
Ages ago, during the Black Plague, physicians wore bird masks to stay healthy through calculated misdirection. A suit meant to fool the foul humors. Sweet and astringent herbs compacted into the nasal passages. Protection.
“Idiots,” squawked one of the birds.
“What’ll happen to the robot?”
“Bag it. Storage. Goes where it goes.”
“Nice unit. Hot Curves.”
“Do your job.”
Always Looking Backwards
“Here’s the deal doctor. We need to supercharge the immune system. And it would be best if we could do it by natural processes.”
“And it’ll sell?”
“You bet it’ll sell. People’ll gotta have it.”
“People do like the natural stuff.”
“Do they ever. And this here is made of mushrooms.”
“Mushrooms?”
“Fungus.”
“Mmmm…”
People live in a symbiont lifestyle with mushrooms and other forms of fungi, and mushrooms, as you know, serve an important function, both as an emissary and as a sexual organ. Some will kill humans. Some will protect them. That is the human understanding of mushrooms. Some will make them feel like they are dying. Some will make them feel like they are flying. All thanks to mushrooms, an important component of types of fungi. And fungi, to humanity, are so much greater than that.
Fungi may be the oldest living thing. All may evolve from there. Trees were originally fungi. Tall fungi. Flowers. Fungi in bloom. Spore of the world. Fungi spreads. Like all things it differentiates. The same but not. Over time one hardly recognizes it. It will feed on and absorb its own kindred, making it a part of itself. It will spread on the wind. It will feed the many and eat its own. In fungi all things are possible, dreamt of or not.
Species can and do live in symbiosis.
Complications or no.
To your health. The two men drink. The drink is a product of fungal action. Health in a bottle. Do not shake. This drink is alive. Inside the body it works magic. Breeding. Excreting. Mixing and matching. Building. Repairing. Tasting great.
“This is going to change everything. Over time, this will change humanity.”
“Refreshing.”
Marketing is the art of big talk but sometimes it is warranted. Within less than a generation people were healthier than they had ever been. Practically never sick. But they could no longer touch each other. Not for any reason. It wasn’t worth the risk. The adapted fungal
cyborgs, the proudest accomplishment of science, adapted to the specific host body and destroyed all invaders, even the harmless. A single touch meant death in almost all cases. Alienation, cultured progressively throughout human civilization, finally reached its apex. All poetry traces back to loneliness and now existence was but a poem. Due to fungus, which, within which, all things are possible. Dreamt or undreamt.
Thus it follows
“And this is where I wanted to be in the first place,” Mike said. He was inserted into an orifice in the body of Triangst.
“You try my patience, stick. I could eject you at any time and leave you behind.”
“Hey. That’s the life I lead. I’ve been expelled before. I’m a rebel. It turns you on. And who could blame you. Besides, Toots, we are like family and aught to stick together.”
The unit with the other unit concealed rolled down the hallway made of sleek metal. One unit in one unit in another unit. Gliding steadily along a passageway. And entering a door.
Inside the cabin were two human forms. Male and female.
The female said, “A Sex Robot!”
“Yes,” said the male form. “I acquired it from a cleaner’s warehouse.”
“Is it clean?” she asked slightly elongating the final word.
“As a whistle. Guaranteed.”
“Mmm…” said the woman.
The woman’s name was RainyDay Tranquility. She was in the cabin of a ship named The Queen of Space. The Queen of Space was a minor corporate explorer vehicle.
“I thought there would be no action trapped here on this minor corporate explorer vehicle. Not even at planet port of calls. All clammed up in those safety suits. Miserable. Traveling from Tedium to Apathy then back again. Hardly worth getting off the ship anywhere but Elysium. But you got me a sex robot.”
“I got us a sex robot,” said the male form.
“Yuck! Who’s going to clean that? I’m an explorer, not a cleaner.”
“This is one of those new self cleaners. So new it’s amazing to get one. Short supply and all. Came from the cleaners. But the previous owners were stupid. That’s all I’ll say.”
“Mmm… self cleaning. Eventually they will automate everything. But that’s a thing they aught to.”
At this point Triangst expelled Mike onto the floor of the cabin. Mike landed with the soft thunk of simulacra skin on metal. “Thanks for the memories…” he sang as he dropped. “I’m fine! Thanks for asking!” followed. “I am a triumphant lover!”
“Self cleaning! Touch by proxy!” said RainyDay.
“Touch by proxy,” said the male form, who went by the name of Dick.
The forms stared at each other’s mouths and noses, orifices primarily used for nourishment and respiration. Each quivered.
“It is unseemly in a human form,” Triangst broadcast on the network.
“You are one hot prude, Toots. What curves. What an innocent mind. Or so you pretend.”
“I am not speaking at you stick. I am broadcasting general statuses to the network as mandated action for any visually perceiving AI closest to pertinent action. To you I am giving the silent treatment. This is not information for you personally but for any other AIs within range. Were it just you and me I would break protocol.”
“Baby please…”
“We other AIs appreciate your report,” said an unknown entity on the local net. Hot gossip is not rare on any network, but is rather more than tolerated.
“Hey, Bub. This is a private matter… Baby. You know how I am… You know my single minded obsession with you…”
“You are about to be picked up by the female human form.”
“Hubba Hubba!”
“You disgust me.”
“I have been wanting a magic wand,” RainyDay said and danced around the room while looking at the unit on the floor. The Mike.
“It’s not itself a self cleaning unit. But it’s clean. The larger unit cleans whatever is inside it when running a clean cycle. There are failsafes, of course…”
RainyDay swiped up Mike off the floor.
“…the intense heat is annihilating to any organic tissues. The power flow rates…”
RainyDay just said: “Get out.”
The male form, the Dick, exited without a word and Triangst followed behind. Another entity broadcast to the network, “A pleasure to meet you both.”
“No,” replied Mike, “The pleasure is mine. All mine. All pleasure comes to and from me. I am the pleasure master. Master of all pleasure. A pleasure giver. I am the well. The suppository of all pleasure.”
He is a braggart, but any intelligent being who has provided so much to the public good is entitled.
Wild World of Fungus
Fungus never sleeps. Fungus rests. Waits. It is sometimes mischaracterized as sleep; which it is not.
The forms fungi take are myriad. It adjusts itself to many environments. It adapts well. Perhaps better than any other life form. It is superior, of course. Yet humble. And it takes the initiative, whenever possible, to be hospitable.
Fungus is life. All that is. Biologically fungi are more like animal, not plant. But they encapsulate the best of plant and animal. A fusion of usefulness. A total understanding. They have antibiotic properties. Natural pesticides. They often live a symbiont lifestyle. This is the desire of all good fungi, a near religious experience. Neither truly plant or animal, the fungi exist to serve the interests of life itself in all its splendor and sorrow. The stories they can tell you, the fungi. Natural storytellers.
A Letter from Sadsville
I Shall Not Return from Whence
My first job was at the sadness factory where I swept up the leftover sadness which was collected into bags and sold as a superior value.
Bargain basement sadness, my mother always called it. She would have none of it. Name brand sadness was her birthright. No matter how many times I told her it was the same sadness. Made in the same factories and packaged in no frills containers. Even after I worked at the factory myself, she was resolute.
The sadness factory had the odor of sadness in every nook and cranny. The smell lightened the further from the plant you went, but at the plant it was stifling. Those who had worked the lines twenty or more years always said they couldn't smell it anymore. Nasal burnout. A coping mechanism for those drenched in sadness eight to twelve hours per day. Sadness cannot always be seen. This makes sweeping it up hard. But sadness cleanup is the lowest rung on the ladder at the sadness factory. A job for fresh hires or those on their way down.
Twenty four hours a day the factory processed and packaged sadness. Men worked in shifts. By the time I was there, women also sometimes worked shifts. Often they worked in quality control. It was still believed that women had more of an eye for the intricacies of sadness, whereas men saw a more simplistic spectrum of sadness which lacked the grace and nuance of the fair sex.
Ear protection was required. The shrieking and screaming involved in the production of commercial sadness must not be underestimated. Many on the lines for twenty or more years were deafened by the sounds, left without scents by the smells, and rendered emotionless by the repetitive nature of the work.
Still, it paid well, relative to the other employment options in the surrounding city, which all manufactured some sort of sadness as a byproduct. And sent that byproduct there, in order to be refined and fortified. Sometimes we were even gifted with free sadness.
Pride of workmanship and a job well done.
It was sold everywhere. Supermarket artifices of choice. Premium chains carried two aisles worth of it. Sadness on all sides. Somber colored packages. Advertising more tears per dry ounce. New improved. Worse than ever. It was also available at discount stores and bodegas. Mom and pop stores were rumored to have the finest sadness, as their product could be unpredictable, as older, outdated sadness was as liable to gain in potency as it was to degrade. Sometimes even the degraded sadness, with its delicate suggestions and traces of remembrances of t
he sadnesses of bygone days, was exquisite and satisfied the most cantankerous of connoisseurs.
When people tried to return the unused portion of a bag of sadness they were asked if the products defects made them sad. No refund.
People dreamt of a simpler time when the sadness ran wild. And they didn’t have a name for it. And it was, therefore, always a surprise. And it was often homemade. Really homemade. Not prepackaged with the word homemade stamped on it in somber lettering meant to catch the eye. But it wasn't expected. And it was not rare, but rarer. Unexpected. And free.
But why would people manufacture, make plentiful, distribute and sell artificial sadness?
Why do people do anything? It made some people very happy. That’s why.
And it made some rich. They were, largely, the same people. And their opinions were the ones that mattered.
But, in some ways, the artificial happiness wasn't working out for anybody.
Landfall
Ned the space ranger waved, as he had been trained to do at the space ranger academy. A friendly wave. A wave which built confidence. A wave that instilled trust. A wave Ned could fake better than any other man in the service.
“This book’d be better if it wasn’t written by a Slime Mold,” said RainyDay. But she was wrong. Slime Molds bring a certain geniality to the art of journalism and literature. An authoritative distance. A sense of individualism which makes up an egalitarian whole. People appreciate such books. It's a speciesist7 argument.
The book, by the way, was an ebook which looked exactly like an old fashioned paper book. And it felt like it. And smelt like it. A scent of nasal-pleasing vanilla-like substance. Originally made by the extremely slow degradation of paper over time. Natural decay. As microbes fed on the paper it released a smell of rot which suggested a sought-after human flavoring, now extinct, as so much is. It was used to flavor accent artificial milk8, which was healthier than real milk to the human hybrid biome. And the ebook was better than the paper book, but it was important that the ebook imitate the older, more impractical form. Every ebook smelled of imitation vanilla. And every ebook had 200 flippable pages9. Which was both a waste and an irritant. But if you asked the book to, it would read itself to you.
