Horizons: A collection of science fiction short stories

by Nolan Edrik

  “Let me go! Someone help!”

  Tina felt a dull heat on her cheek, like a flashlight held at close range.

  “Hey!” a voice barked. “Let her go.”

  The man released his grip and leaned back in his seat. He barely seemed to notice the café’s manager, a woman with short-cropped blonde hair and a full sleeve of tattoos, towering over him.

  “Sorry if that distressed you,” he said to Tina. “I needed you to stay still while I conducted my scan. However, I’m now confident—”

  “Hey, buddy, get lost,” the manager said and grabbed the man by the collar.

  “—that you have a basal cell carcinoma. Your treatment options include—”

  “That’s it, dude, you’re out of here.” The manager yanked him out of his chair.

  “—curettage and electrodesiccation. That procedure entails removing the growth with—”

  The manager leaned into the man’s weight and shoved him inch by inch toward the door. He barely resisted and continued rambling on about cutting off the growth. Tina sat paralyzed at her table. She wanted to run out the door, horrified by this man who’d come in out of nowhere and grabbed her head. She was even more horrified by the idea of a scar on her face. How could she present that to the world every day?

  When the manager had Henry at the glass door, he swatted her hands away and shoved her to the ground, sending her skidding across the tile floor.

  “I’m sorry, Miss,” he said, acknowledging the manager for the first time. “I need to attend to my patient.”

  Tina trembled as he approached her table again.

  “Leave me alone!” she shouted, tears streaming down her face. “What are you doing? I don’t care about anything on my face. Just get out of here, creep!”

  The man stopped in his tracks and ran his eyes over Tina. She sensed warmth on her neck, then in her pupils, and on her lips.

  “Based on various biometric readings I’ve taken, it appears that I’m distressing you,” the man said. “I’ll go now, but I must warn you that you have a pre-cancerous growth on your face. Your health could be in serious danger if this is not attended to.”

  “I don’t care. Get out of here!”

  “You should care.”

  *

  The Berserker Scenario had long been Sam’s main worry about an advanced artificial intelligence. That was the term he’d given to the possibility that Henry would decide the most merciful outcome for any human he evaluated was death. Immediate death.

  The software Sam had implanted in him, a mix of evolutionary algorithms and neural networks, would make him a quick learner. Soon, it may occur to Henry that even if he could cure any given patient of their ailment, their humanity predestined them to a certain level of psychological and physical suffering for the rest of their lives. And as a reward for their constant struggle, they’d die. So maybe Henry would decide to put them all out of their misery right away.

  “We have to call the cops,” Rodney said as he and Sam stepped onto the sidewalk outside their building. The late-July air broiled in the afternoon sun, the humidity turning every breath into a chore.

  Sam glanced left and right, hoping that Henry would be visible.

  “We’re not going to do that,” Sam said.

  “Wait a minute. A military-strength robot with a questionable moral compass is roaming through Boston right now, and all you want to do is amble around and see if we can find him?”

  “Basically.”

  “You really don’t think we should call the authorities?”

  “And tell them what?” Sam said. “‘Hello police, can you fan out across the city and detain every white male in a lab coat? He could be an android that might go on a killing rampage.’”

  Rodney tapped his boot on the pavement and tried to come up with a less insane-sounding way of phrasing it.

  “Spare yourself the mental energy,” Sam said. “Calling the police is not an option.” He pulled a quarter out of his pocket, flipped it in the air, caught it in his right palm, and slapped it onto the back of his left hand. “The police won’t do us any good. And besides, we’d get fired. I’ve got five kids. I can’t get fired.”

  Rodney put his palms on his forehead and paced up and down the sidewalk.

  “I bet Auschwitz stayed in business because guys like you didn’t want to get fired.”

  Sam stayed in his spot, holding the quarter on his hand.

  “All right,” Sam said. “Are you done with your rant yet? You want to find Henry?”

  Rodney shook his head in resignation.

  “Heads we go toward the Convention Center; tails we go to Boston Common.”

  Sam lifted his hand to reveal the presidential coat of arms. They turned left and walked away from Boston Common.

  *

  Vince Crawford was sitting on a bench along Boylston Street, head in his hands, tears streaming through his fingers and down his wrists. He peered up at the cars whipping by, fellow conscripts charging around blindly on the cruel battlefield of life, hurtling themselves through an uncaring universe toward inevitable oblivion.

  That’s a good line, Vince thought. I should write that down.

  He wiped his nose on his wrist, pulled a small black notebook from his backpack, and patted his pockets in search of his pen. When he realized he’d left the pen on the kitchen counter, he hurled the notebook into a bush.

  This is why she left me. I fail at everything.

  Vince slumped back over, and as another wave of self-pity threatened to erupt into tears, the slats of the bench bent with the weight of someone sitting down next to him.

  “Good morning, sir, I’m Doctor Henry. Nice to meet you,” the man said. “What can I do for you today?”

  Vince looked up.

  Some boring old white guy, anesthetized by the cult of American consumerism. Dang. Another good line.

  The man stared cheerfully at Vince.

  “What can I do for you today?” he repeated. He smiled, with nothing on his face moving other than his eyelids, which blinked at precise four-second intervals.

  “You can put me out of my misery,” Vince said. “Throw me into traffic over there. I’d do it myself, but I’d fail at that, too. I’d step onto the curb and my nerves would—”

  “You are exhibiting symptoms of clinical depression,” Henry said. “If you allow me to take a blood sample, I can tell whether your neurochemical profile is consistent with this condition. If so, your ailment may be treatable with the proper medications.”

  Vince laughed, pulled his cigarettes from his pocket, and popped one into his mouth.

  “Hey man, I’m not tapping a vein for you, even if you are wearing a lab coat. No matter what you’d find, I’m not getting all drugged up. I know people on depression meds. That shit’s bad for you.”

  Vince searched his pockets for his lighter, failing to notice the man’s puzzled expression. He remembered leaving his lighter at home, right next to his pen.

  “Dammit!” Vince said. “Do you have a lighter?”

  The man opened his mouth to speak, then stopped and thought for a second.

  “Would you like me to recommend a smoking-cessation program for you? There are a variety of proven methods that can help you quit.”

  “That’s not necessary. I don’t smoke regularly. Only on days like today, when the whole world is going to hell.”

  “So if I could cure your depression, you’d stop smoking?”

  “You’d have to help me win my girlfriend back. Then I’d stop smoking. She hated it.”

  “I’m sorry, that’s out of the realm of procedures I’m authorized to—”

  “I’m messing with you, man. My point is that you can’t cure sadness. You can’t cure pain. Bad things happen and always will happen. Especially to me.”

  “But don’t you want to try to prevent as many bad things as possible? Don’t you want to prevent physical ailments, such as lung cancer?”

  “Not today. Just leave
me alone and let me be sad.”

  “That is not rational. Don’t you want to avoid sadness?”

  Vince snorted.

  “Human life is sadness. Perpetual sadness. And then you die.”

  *

  “So, hypothetically, say Henry does go on a murderous rampage,” Sam said as they strolled down Boylston toward the Convention Center, “how would he do it?”

  “You mean in the Berserker Scenario?” Rodney said.

  “Yes. Say he does start killing everyone, given how he’s built, how would he do it? How exactly would he kill people?”

  Rodney thought for a moment.

  “Head-crushing.”

  “Head-crushing?”

  “His hands are strong enough to burst skulls like grapes.”

  Sam shuddered.

  “Like little ripe grapes,” Rodney said and made crab-claw motions. “Squish, squish, squish.”

  *

  Henry, becoming aware of a gap in his knowledge of human psychology, decided to visit the Cozy Nook bookstore in search of texts to remedy this deficiency. As part of his programming, he had digested the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as well as entire collections of various professional psychological journals. Yet he hypothesized that those publications missed a certain layer of the human experience and that this blind spot was hindering his ability to help people.

  He entered the bookstore and scanned the section headings: Fiction, Non-Fiction, Spirituality, Self-Improvement.

  Henry halted his search on that last category. His medical programming told him that most improvement in humans came from within themselves. As a doctor, he could prescribe medicines or perform procedures that would lessen their symptoms or speed the healing process, but for the most part, the human organism fixed itself. Maybe psychological malfunctions behaved the same way.

  Only a smattering of people wandered the bookstore, and none appeared to have any injuries or malignancies, so Henry’s programming allowed him to bypass interaction and begin reading. He picked up the first book, Another You, and fanned through the pages in seconds like a poker dealer shuttling cards between his hands. The book postulated that humans could become happy by imagining their ideal self and working to develop those qualities in their daily lives. The strategy was rational and likely to be effective, Henry concluded.

  For the next twenty minutes, he worked his way through the self-help section this way, grabbing a book, devouring it, digesting it, replacing it. Every book he read seemed reasonable and likely effective in its prescription for human mental wellness. Many suggested that people change their perceptions of the troubles in their lives, others encouraged them to view reality more keenly and take concrete actions to change it. Other books simply offered encouragement, while yet others did little more than extol the benefits of happiness.

  Halfway through the shelf, right at Minds Made of Magic, Henry reached the preliminary conclusion that humans could live happily and healthfully. In front of him were more than 100 books, all of which provided humans with simple, rational strategies for leading fulfilling lives. At the very least, the books’ authors must be living in accordance with their own advice.

  Henry concluded that in his current day’s work he’d encountered a statistical anomaly: two consecutive extreme examples of human deficiency, one who didn’t care about a potential physical danger, and another content to languish in psychological distress.

  Right as Henry had finished codifying this conclusion as the basis for future actions, a woman walked up next to him. She appeared to have some minor neck pain, judging by her posture, yet she also was dressed in clothing typical of practitioners of the current form of yoga. He concluded she was already aware of her condition and working to improve it.

  Still, even though she didn’t seem to need medical attention, Henry’s programming compelled him to offer her some kind of assistance. She appeared to be searching for a book.

  “Excuse me, miss, I’m Doctor Henry, can I help you find a specific volume? I have read all of these texts,” he swept his hand over half of the shelf, “and I’ve found many to be quite insightful.”

  The woman looked up at him and frowned.

  “Yeah, I’ve read all of those too. Nothing has really made a difference. I was hoping for something new.”

  “None of these books have helped you?”

  “No. They do. I mean, they all have useful parts, and they help for a little bit. Then I kind of, I don’t know, lose attention.”

  “Why don’t you commit to one of these systems? The authors themselves surely provide examples of the stability you seek.”

  She chuckled.

  “Most of these folks are crooks or snake-oil salesman.” She picked up The Smiling and Shining Manifesto. “This guy, he’s gone bankrupt after blowing all his money on hookers.” She pointed to Cultivating the Crystal Lotus Within. “Killed himself.” And to Time to Take Charge, NOW! “She’s in prison for tax evasion.”

  Henry noticed the bags under the woman’s eyes, the droop in her shoulders, the strands of ragged hair that had escaped from her ponytail. She was fatigued and distracted, and, judging by the remnants of sweat still on the yoga mat tucked under arm, she had only minutes earlier undergone an activity meant to combat both of those ailments.

  “If none of these books help you, why do you keep reading them?”

  “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Gotta try something.”

  *

  Sam and Rodney had just finished checking for Henry inside a liquor store when Sam’s phone rang. He unclipped it from his belt and peeked at the number.

  “Crap. It’s Blanton,” he said.

  “Crap is right.”

  “Hold on, hold on, I’ll figure something out.”

  He glanced up at the sky, then swiped to answer his phone.

  “Hello, this is Sam.”

  “Sam, it’s Blanton. Where are you guys? We’ve got five mock patients waiting around to see Henry for today’s training.”

  “Oh yeah, about that. You can send them home. We’ve got some hardware issues we’ve got to work out before he can do another round of testing.”

  Rodney gave Sam the finger.

  “He’s sort of twitchy today. Could be the original design, could be some of the gesture modifications. Who knows?”

  “Let me take a look,” Blanton said. “Where are you guys?”

  “Oh, yeah, we’re over in the – Blanton? Blanton? You’re breaking up, let me call you back.”

  Sam pulled the phone away from his ear and ended the call.

  “Really?” Rodney said. “The ‘You’re breaking up’ ruse?”

  “Fine. You talk to him next time.”

  *

  Henry left the bookstore and walked down Boylston toward the Common. Along the way, his brain kept working to solve the human problem. No matter what he could do for their immediate ailment, it appeared he could never restore them to total mental and physical health. The cumulative toll of minor discomforts spread out over an entire human lifespan was severe. No responsible physician could ignore this problem. So what could he do?

  He was about to engage his hypothesis-testing processes when he detected an irregular traffic pattern ahead. The vehicles traveling along Boylston had the green light, and thus, the right-of-way, but a large black sedan was approaching on Charles Street at a recklessly high rate of speed.

  Henry focused on the sedan’s driver and saw him staring at his phone and tapping in a text message. The man was unaware of the red light and the traffic ahead. Similarly, the drivers on Boylston were unaware of the sedan.

  Henry sprinted toward the intersection right as the tires screeched.

  *

  “OK, smarty, here’s a question for you,” Rodney said. “What are we supposed to do when we do find Henry?”

  “Shut him down. Duh.”

  “Duh,” Rodney said back to him. “But how do we do that? He doesn’t have an off button. And there�
�s no way, short of artillery, to bring down his body.”

  “Don’t worry about it. We’ll just ask him to shut down.”

  “What if he doesn’t want to? What if he’s busy putting the human race out of its misery?”

  “I programmed a linguistic kill switch into him. There’s a phrase I can say that will bypass his decision-making apparatus. I built it in case a software malfunction threatened the whole system and I couldn’t shut it down on the keypad. Even if he doesn’t want to shut off, hearing the phrase will put him down and keep whatever malignant processes are under way from wreaking havoc inside him. The only problem is that shutting him down that way will wipe out his memory of everything since his last reboot.”

  “And what is that phrase?”

  “I’m not telling.”

  “Come on. What if he squishes your head before you have time to say it?”

  “In that case, if I’m gone, who cares what he does to the rest of the planet?”

  Rodney’s mouth fell open. “Your kids, perhaps.”

  “Ah. Right,” Sam said. “In that case, the phrase is ‘Rudiment Ego Slumber Ergo Tart.’”

  “Rudiment Ego Slumber Ergo Tart? And you think I’m weird?”

  “Well, you don’t want him to shut down every time he hears ‘Good morning,’ do you?”

  *

  The black sedan hit the compact car square in its passenger-side door and sent it skidding across the intersection. The tiny car came to rest bent against a light pole. The sedan halted in the intersection, the driver embedded in the white pillow of his airbag.

  Henry judged the odds of injury to the sedan driver as minimal, given that the impact in his vehicle was head-on and his airbag had deployed correctly. But the driver and passenger of the compact both sustained impacts from side – the passenger taking the hit from the sedan and the driver striking the tree. Henry judged the probability that they had been injured – broken bones, in particular – as highly probable.

  He sprinted over and assessed the situation further. Both doors were bent inward and crammed shut. Inside, the passenger clutched his right arm, sobbing and on the verge of hyperventilating in shock. The driver was slumped forward against a now-deflated airbag and appeared to be unconscious. Blood streaked the cracked window next to her head.