Earth Seven

by Steve M

  TT rooms are even becoming part of the advertising campaign being launched by the operators of Aphroditto, as they prepare to take their environment of maximum pleasure and open franchises on other planets. It requires very precise specifications for broadcasting and is limited to a single planet and satellites per VR instance. So far three other planets have expressed interest in opening a franchise.

  “I missed this place. I really missed it” said Bados looking out of the dirty train window.

  “Me too” replied Heuris looking at the capitol building where the tiny wheels of the tiny Neso government turned. Mostly they gave speeches about being free then voted themselves a nice big pay raise. Somethings never change. I bet anthropologist have a theory about it.

  Something to know about the people of Neso. They may live in a dump of a planet, a toilet of their own creation. But they don’t move away like those smarter folks on other planets that humans have trashed and turned into orbiting lavatories. Nope the people of Infelos Neso will look you straight in the eye and tell you they live in a paradise, right before putting on their breather to go outside. And they will say it with complete sincerity and more conviction than you can get from a judge. Most of them wear some sort of flag on their clothing to show their allegiance. They also are fanatics for their local sports teams.

  No, football was not invented in Earth 5. It was observed on Earth 5 then copied by the indigenous population. It was all part of the flash promotion campaign for the newest team, Brockley. They sponsored a number of games on various planets across the galaxy against teams of all stars from across the league. The location of the games were only announced shortly before the start to keep the crowds below one million. Football came to Earth 5 when Brockley announced a game featuring the return of Duane Pincher, the league scoring champion to the all-star team. That afternoon, several locals managed to get inside of the temporary stadium. How they managed to get their hoverseats to work is still unknown. But they did and your people just copied what you saw. Monkey see, monkey do. I’m talking about round ball football, not the pointy ball football with degenerative brain injuries. No the one where full grown men smack their heads into a rather large ball voluntarily.

  The train stopped at the central station. It was a short walk to their hotel room. They both put on their breathers before they left the station and went into the orange dusty environment of the capital. Heuris adjusted her breather slightly until the sweet whistle of a perfect fit found her ears.

  Her music selection played an ancient song called ‘Moonage Daydream’. The artist had long ago been lost to history. But music historians speculated that he must have been someone very special. She turned up the volume of the small speakers in her ear canal just as the final guitar part began to scream beautifully. The only other song by the artist is called ‘Panic in Detroit’ and is considered one of the most popular songs by the most recent generation of university graduates, although know one knows what the heck the song is about. Where is Detroit? There is a story that when the great man was about to die a wanderer of the stars arrived with a Remedium and a cruiser and took him away. He now lives as the musical slave of a very important and secretive man. But that is what we tell our children to get them to practice the violin. If they don’t they will wind up living in a cellar as a prisoner, but with lots of instruments most of which they won’t be able to play at first.

  When they got into their room, Heuris immediately began to unpack her bag. Bados threw his much smaller bag onto one of the beds and then turned back towards the door. He pulled off his breather to speak. Heuris had already thrown hers into the sink to clean it.

  “Remember, don’t forget me. You must come get me and make me come back with you.”

  “OK. OK. You sound like the foreman” she replied.

  “Don’t remind me of her” he said.

  The foreman hated Bados. She gave him every shitty job to do, every time. And it started from his first day on the agricultural crew. He questioned her authority to tell him what to do when she told him to do something he didn’t want to do. He naturally slouched and thought that her telling him to stand up straight had no bearing on his ability to function on the Ag team. He summarized his objection succinctly with a simple ‘NO’ response.

  This resulted in a rather loud and angry response by the foreman. But it didn’t end there. For the foreman’s response in turn lead to a response by Bados that could be considered rather creative and expressed in words that might be considered as crude and mean, even by the saltiest of galactic sailors. But logically it made absolutely no sense at all. Something as abstract as an order or command cannot in any manner be forced into a human orifice vigorously, much less enthusiastically over and over again.

  Bados and Heuris were lottery winners, if the lottery were a shitty thing and being an ag worker for 100 revs were the shitty prize for winners. With his discipline problems Bados kept getting his ag duty extended. He would probably be one of those that went the full 500 revs before they were forced to send him home. Yeah, ag duty sucked for the most part. The only good things about it were the clean air and clean water. And the free R&R trips with everything pre-paid. Just show them the ID and it’s all covered. But the ag work was hot, thirsty and regrettably, necessary to keep their beloved paradise fed.

  Mortuis Luna was the largest of the two moons that circled Infelos Neso. A long time ago, as the population of Neso crossed one hundred billion, even on a planet approaching the size of Jupiter, significant environmental problems arose. One of the problems involved graveyards. Specifically, they ran out of room for them.

  And after considerable worry, lots of deep thoughts and many, many hair brained ideas, they asked for help from the largest repository of knowledge and learning in the known universe, yep, The University of Centrum Kath.

  The university sent a team that spent several hundred revs researching the problem and evaluating the alternatives after spending the first two weeks drunk and in Aphroditto most of their time. But eventually they got down to work and the University of Centrum Kath suggested a simple solution. Bury the dead of Neso on their moon, which at the time was not called Mortuin Luna but was known as Harry Is A Wanker, due to the loss of a drunken trivia bet by one of the two most senior astronomers in charge of naming things. Fortunately the term ‘wanker’ is unknown by most people outside of Earth Five and was explained to the people of Infelos Neso as an obscure technical term used in astronomy to describe a celestial body that is best avoided and should never befriended.

  Long story short, you put enough dead bodies in the ground composting for a long time and the once barren rocky landscape becomes lush and green. Just add water and watch it bloom. And it recently achieved a sustainable atmosphere. Rain storms occur naturally now. No more oxy-breathers 24 x 7.

  Bados turned back at the doorway and blew Heuris a kiss.

  “Love you too” replied Heuris with a chuckle to her gender fluid companion. Bados’ sexuality was fluid like many people on Neso. Heuris was definitely hetero, well at least 98% certain. So far it had been all lecture with very little actual lab work to date.

  When she had finished unpacking, she brushed and flossed her teeth. Then she picked up the magazine listing all of the attractions nearby. She sat on the bed and turned on the media broadcast. She listened to a report about the discovery of a new method of adding carbonation to drinks which used atmospheric carbon dioxide rather than from a tank. Heuris didn’t pay much attention to the news. On Neso the border between news and business press releases had long since disappeared. Still she did her duty. She voted when it was mandatory but never volunteered for anything.

  Heuris looked at the museum section of the magazine. She flipped through the pages slowly as another report started, one about the Reon smog killing an obscure species of moth. She ignored it and returned to the magazine and the museum listing. Reon had the largest number of museum in the spiral. It is one of the rare positive results of the pollut
ion in the air.

  A long time ago when the Hustfik paintings were being exhibited publicly, the estate of the late Peter Hustfik refused to let his paintings come to Neso due to the effect of pollution on the canvases. In response, the richest man on Neso paid for the University of Centrum Kath to design a exhibition environment that was better than any other in existence. Because of this, Neso now is considered one of the top three destinations for significant works of art. At its current rate of growth for art exhibits, it could come to rival Centrum Kath within the next one million revs.

  Heuris was a painter. She had never sold a painting but still she painted every day. She was trying to be a believer, a believer in herself. She had spent the last 100 revs studying the brush styles of the master works by the great Only Rivera. She admired the broad way his roller slapped on the paint, letting it drip down the canvas in a brilliant display of artistic contempt for the subject.

  At first Only’s paintings were rejected by art critics and subject to ridicule. Then slowly the story of Only became known. This young man, the last of fourteen children, the eleventh of eleven boys, had been named ONLY by his parents. Many if not all of the art critics upon learning the story of Only chuckled their appreciation of the ironic name and changed their opinion of the paintings from one that considered them to be complete and utter crap to them being the next big thing and advising all of their friends to buy them immediately before the price went through the roof. And it did.

  Heuris was looking forward to seeing the new exhibit of Only’s work at the Museum of Semi-Modern but not Completely Disappointing Art (MSMCDA). She looked at the clock on the ceiling. It was too late to go out but she was too excited about seeing Only’s work to go to sleep.

  She thought about calling her parents but then decided that they would insist on her coming home and she wouldn’t get to see Only’s exhibit. She took off her comms bracelet and put it on the nightstand next to her bed. She closed her eyes. The inside of her lids were painted with Only’s ‘snowflakes in cream in a cup left outside by accident’ painting. She opened her eyes then double blinked to invoke the VR on her retinal lenses. One of the benefits of Aphroditto was that all of the latest VR technology was available and cheap on Infelos Neso. A 750 billion customers base all in one place. It was a VR marketers dream.

  She scrolled through the latest releases. It was the same old thing. She had seen all of them. Every single title listed on her VR menu under romantic comedy, she had seen them all. And it was at least five days before the refresh. She dreamed of one of the planets where new content became available when it was completed, not held back and released en mass on the same day so they could crowd each other out and establish who had the highest sales volume. Quality measures usually took much longer and its quality that really counts. It is for this reason that we can look back historically at the popular music charts and find songs of incredibly poor quality to such an extent that we cringe on behalf of the artist. Yes they were still best sellers. Romantic comedies are no different.

  Why couldn’t they produce more romantic comedies she wondered. It wasn’t like the plot had changed over time. And with each one she looked for something new. And with each one it never came. But then she settled into the comfort of knowing that the story had a happy ending because humans are optimistic as a species. However, the Media Institute at the University of Silpolonius has presented research that suggest that romantic comedies are all the same because they are easy to write, pay well and no one ever asks the writer for the money back.

  She turned to the drama collection. She just didn’t feel in the mood for an uplifting story. She was stuck on Ag duty. There was nothing coming to lift her up. It was all up to her and she knew it. And in her mind, that sucked. Adverts began to play in the bottom right quadrant of her vision.

  “Vacation on Dis 11. Every activity for every age group. Reversion therapy lets you vacation at your peak of health, no matter how old you are. Dis 11 packages start as low as”. She blinked to close out the ad.

  “You know I need you” said the handsome young man with long black hair, muscles and without a shirt. “But you don’t know how much I want you too” he said and slowly lowered his eyes down to his groin which was off camera. Then he put his hand out.

  “Yeah, right” replied Heuris.

  She had one prior experience with Aphroditto and it wasn’t positive.

  She was given a one night subscription as a present from someone anonymously at the restaurant where she worked until she sold some paintings. It was for her birthday. What happened that night was the most painful experience of her life, so far. It started with the waivers. Technically she was legally old enough to enter. However Aphroditto suggested people wait until they were 1,000 revs older before becoming a customer. It had to do with maturity or lack of. The waivers came with many questions and cautions and signing documents with very bold fonts in places. But eventually they let her in.

  His name was Stanley and after the fifth hour together Heuris went slightly crazy and told Stanley that she was in love with him.

  And you know what happened?

  He went slightly insane too and told her that he loved her too. And that was a problem. And with the problem came the loud alarms and then men and women all dressed alike showed up and took Stanley away. They parted yelling their love for one another and vowing to come back and meet again the next night.

  And Heuris came. She turned on her VR. She checked her image in the reflection on the glass as she stood outside of Aphroditto and watched the long line of people go inside. And she stood there all night, despite the strange looks from the patrons and the bouncers. And then the next night she was outside again. And then the night after that. But the following day she was very tired and slept all day and all night. Stanley never showed up and eventually she stopped going.

  Heuris became withdrawn for a long time after, living alone inside of her own head. Alone was safe. Alone didn’t hurt as much. Alone was a hole and the hole was her friend. It didn’t ask for anything. It didn’t demand her be something she isn’t. No, alone was not like her parents. Alone didn’t abandon her. No, alone was not like Stanley either.

  Now a psychologist or psychiatrist would probably tell you that Heuris clicked the Aphroditto ad as a result of her subconscious interest being manifested consciously. However, she believes it was just a stupid accident.

  But either way, a tix (second) later she was in VR standing outside Aphroditto watching the people lined up on the blood red carpet outside of the high rise tree-shaped glass building. She stopped for a moment and looked over at the place where she used to stand and wait. Then she saw her reflection in the glass. Had to hand it to Aphroditto, they made people look good.

  She was just about to turn off the lenses when she saw him out of the corner of her eye. She stopped breathing for a moment in the shock of recognition. Then she spun to face him.

  It was Stanley. Her Stanley. Her beloved one. The man she dreamed of most nights. The man who flooded her pillow with tears.

  Wait a minute! He was with someone else. Another woman. Slutty looking bitch. And he had his hand on her ass. What the hell, Stanley? What part of love at first sight is this?

  Stanley saw her and pointed at her, his long slender index finger aimed at her face.

  “I almost got banned because of you. Stay away from me” he called out angrily to her. The bouncers recognized him and motioned for him to come in quickly. He got into the building and through security without ever taking his right hand off the left butt cheek of the woman he was with. Slut!

  Heuris felt like a holiday turkey being carved, her heart cut out and stomped into the ground until it was just a red jelly stain.

  “Fuck You, Stanley” Heuris finally yelled out.

  That is when the two men appeared behind her.

  “Ma’am, if you’re not going in then we need to ask you to leave. It makes customers feel uncomfortable and that damages our business. I h
ope you understand. We really don’t have anything against you as a person. You seem like a lovely woman. But you’re yelling at our customer outside of our business. This could significantly decrease our door sale conversions. And please let me say that I don’t have any problem with you yelling at him. That’s not the issue here. I think you should be able to yell at him as much as you want. Just not right here. Its bad for business.” The man stopped and took a breath.

  “So what’s it gonna be” he asked her.

  “OK” she held up her ID.

  “A pre-paid VIP pass. Thank you for spending time with us. We hope to see you again soon” he now said with deference and respect.

  She pushed the revolving glass door and entered into the reception area of the building. But by that time Stanley was gone with his bubble-butt bitch. A very short man approached her. By very short I mean the top of his head only came up to her waist.

  “Good evening. Let me show you around. My name is Metris” he said. “May I call you Heuris, Ms Carter?”

  “Of course” she replied.

  “Have you ever been here before?” he asked.

  “No” she lied.

  “Well, we have everything no matter your interest. How would you like to help us by answering a few questions. It really will make things so much easier for us and much more fun for you.”

  “I didn’t know you have questionnaires” she said.

  “It’s a new artifact in order to get a better relevance match. And customer satisfaction has gone up because of it.”

  What happened next was a long list of very personal questions. Heuris blushed more than once at the very direct nature of the questions. Then on more than one occasion she had to have something explained to her in detail. Several times she responded with the same question: “someone really finds that exciting? You’ve got to be shitting me.”

  Did she prefer this or that? They asked that question many times over. If she didn’t know she said she liked it anyway. They stopped for a couple of tox in the middle when she became thirsty. But then they resumed and pressed on until they finished. And the diminutive man pointed to the space between them. It filled with a matrix of numbers and match percentages.