Cyber Noir Redux: (Book Six) (The Feedback Loop 6)

by Harmon Cooper

  Looking out the passenger side window gives me a perspective on the world I’ve never had before. It is akin to wearing my Reaper mask: measurements, stats, notes of volume, life chip readouts … the list of things I experience from a Humandroid’s eyes goes on and on.

  I wish I could turn it off and just see things as they really are.

  “Pretty good, huh?”

  “Reviews? Yeah, sure, good.”

  Chuntao lands in a freshly painted parking spot. A drone patrols the lot, making sure that those parked are indeed shopping at the thrift store. As I exit the vehicle, I hear her vehicle fire off another fart noise.

  “Your car is pissing me off,” I tell Sophia and a voice that doesn’t accurately portray my current mood. Damn Evan’s voice! There must be a way to give me something gruffer. It doesn’t have to be Croc the doorman’s brusque tone, but anything is better than Evan’s metrosexual singsong intonation.

  She hooks her arm into mine. “Come on, Humandroid friend of mine, cheer up!”

  “Since when did you start drinking the Kool-Aid?” I ask her.

  “What do you mean?”

  A group of hipsters exit the store and strut right past us.

  I’m almost disappointed that the Humandroid viewing pane doesn’t instantly register the group as possible hostiles. With their stylishly used and abused cowboy boots, too-cool acid-dyed shorts, ironic shirts a la Rocket, and newsie caps, it should be easy for the droid’s AI to identify them as potential threats.

  “Well, I found one flaw in the system,” I tell Sophia as we enter. “It doesn’t register hipsters.”

  My last word agitates a hipsterette hanging up a punkified up dirndl. Clad in an oversized black sweater over a white collared shirt buttoned all the way to the top, Wednesday Addams gives me the stankiest of stank eyes. I try my Aiden lupine grin on her and her frown of disapproval sinks even lower.

  Can’t win them all.

  I take a big whiff of the stale air inside St. Cajetan’s, imagining the smell of attics and mothballs. Unfortunately, my olfactory senses only alert me to potentially hazardous materials. No explosives, toxic chemicals or biohazards in the air, no smell.

  “Nice Fetts,” says a passing sales clerk. On her head is a bonnet decorated with pins and spiked studs. She whispers something softly to Sophia and Sophia giggles.

  “What’d she say?” I ask.

  “Nothing, let’s just get what we came here for.”

  “In that case, zoot suits.”

  I don’t wait for her to roll her eyes. I head straight to the men’s section and start at the most oversized suit I can find. I pull out a suit large enough to double as a circus tent and am instantly reminded that we’re in Baltimore. Even with intrusive FDA Monitors and a very active Calorie Consumers Anonymous, there are a ton of fatties here. I move towards the middle rack and find a nice little pinstriped number.

  Sophia chokes back a laugh. “You’re joking, right? PLEASE tell me you are joking.”

  “Stylin’ and profilin’, that’s something my dad used to say.”

  Sophia’s voice lowers. “You’re a Humandroid now, which means you’ll need to think about breathable synthetics. Sure, you sweat a little to cool your system, but your epidermis layer may not like a warm suit like this.” She rubs the material between her fingers. “Is this wool?”

  A flashing icon on my iNet screen tells me that the suit is 28.2% wool, 71.8% polyester, which is a great combination for swamp ass when you add just a modicum of humidity. “So you’re telling me I can’t wear a zoot suit?”

  “You can wear suits, if that’s what you’d like, but you’ll need to have a specially made suit for Humandroids. I thought we came here for some basics, you know, a t-shirt and some jeans.”

  “All right, already, I’ll put it back.”

  I stick it back on the rack, perfectly, I might add. Advanced precision is one thing I’ve already started to notice about my Humandroid body. Which gets me thinking about an article I read a week back about the impossibility of Humandroids competing in sports games. The gist of the article was that there’d be nothing to watch. Each side would perform at the optimum level and the only thing that would decide a winner would be time and who got to go first. Plus, the droids tested had to be programmed to be competitive, unlike us humans, who start competing as sperm racing for the egg. From what I can recall, I was a particularly competitive sperm. Pretty sure I used my tail to strangle the bastard in second place and still had time to cross that finish line. That, or, I just got incredibly lucky.

  Probably the latter.

  “How about this?” Sophia shows me a blue collared shirt with some embroidery on the front pocket. “It’s a little preppy, but it’ll fit you well.”

  A quick glance at my other offerings, or should I say, lack thereof, and I decide Sophia is right. “Fine. Anything is better than Evan’s knit shirt.”

  “And some jeans. Let’s see you look like a size 30, maybe 28.”

  A prompt appears on my viewing pane. “I’m size 28X34. Just call me Daddy Long Legs.”

  She pulls a pair. “How about these, Daddy Long Legs?”

  “Are those purposefully distressed?”

  “That they are.” She picks at a patched over hole on the pocket of the jeans. “Is this not your style? You should at least try them on.”

  “Fine, fine.” I take the stylishly vandalized denims from her and turn to the dressing room.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “I’m not ready to go home yet,” Sophia announces. Frances has told me several times to give Sophia a chance, that she ‘grows on you’. Yeah, well so do tumors. We’re back inside her itty bitty Barbie car and I’ve changed into my newish button up shirt. The distressed jeans, as well as a pair of shorts and a black t-shirt are in a bag on top of all the other crap in the behind the seat space.

  “I know!” She places her hands on the steering wheel and smiles at the windshield. “Chuntao, take us to the McStarbucks near my apartment.”

  “The droid too?” her AI asks in Mandarin.

  I shake my fist at the dashboard.

  “You two really got off on the wrong foot,” Sophia says as the vehicle lifts into its appropriate airlane. “Maybe you should start over. Sometimes, sharing something about yourself helps you relate to others. Once common ground is discovered, the mutual understanding that follows can form a lifelong friendship.”

  What a load of PC psychobabble!

  She nods at her steering wheel. “Okay, Chuntao, you can go first: tell Quantum about yourself.”

  The AI answers with her digitally synthesized bi-labial fricative.

  Way to go, Chuntao!

  “Play nice,” she tells the dashboard.

  Chuntao lets another one rip.

  “Too many muffle Trumplings from Hu Jintao’s Pu-Pu Dumpling Express, huh?”

  “What?” Sophia asks.

  “Sorry, inside joke.”

  “With whom?”

  “Doesn’t matter.” I glance over to her to see that her heart rate has again increased. Sophia offers me her toothiest grin, which I hope she never does again, and goes about adjusting her Asian fro.

  “How’d you get an afro anyway?” I ask just to ask something.

  “My mom’s hair is like this, granny too,” she says, “it’s just puffy. It’s a pain in my ass to deal with.”

  “You could always put it into corn rows and keep things gangsta, or at the very least, early 21st century gangsta.”

  “Ha! I’ll get right on that. Video on.” A live feed of her face appears on the inside of the vehicle’s windshield. She slathers on some red-red lipstick that is very definitely the wrong shade for her skin tone, and then goes to the heavy Cleopatra-style retro 1960s blue eyeliner.

  That, in combination with the heavy pancake makeup and her big bulbous bouffant hairdo reminds me of someone – and it takes a moment for me to make the connection.

  She looks distressingly like Nicky the Wig.r />
  She turns and smiles at me fondly. “You know, I think this is the most time you and I have ever spent together.”

  “We were stuck in an RV for a couple of days, if I’m not mistaken. If that doesn’t count as quality time, I don’t know what does.”

  “Oh that’s right, Doc’s RV. Yikes! Talk about claustrophobic. Doc’s a weird guy.”

  Nope, not gonna get started on a conversation about Doc. Besides, I’d bet good money that he’s watching us right now with a bucket of super cheesy garlic popcorn and a sixteen ounce Lonestar, or whatever beer is currently cheapest at the HEB Extended Plus in Gun Barrel City, Texas. So I switch up the topic. “Say, I was wondering about tonight.”

  “Tonight?” Her eyes dart over to me and quickly return to the image of her face plastered onto the inside windshield. And I thought one Sophia was too many …

  “Yeah, I mean, am I supposed to just sit there while I recharge and not do anything?”

  “What, you can’t be still for six hours?”

  “I’m a pretty active guy, I’ll have you know. Just before I got stuck, I did a few very intense cardio workout in the Frances’ stairwell. I’m talking Crossfit over here.” I point my thumbs at my chest.

  She laughs at this and the live feed of her laughing flashes on the inside windshield. I’m experiencing Sophia overload, and I’m surprised a bell hasn’t gone off in my head warning me of a potential environmental hazard. “Don’t worry,” she assures me, “I have a bit of a treat for you.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “Trust me, it’s not as bad as it sounds. And double trust me – this experiment is far from over.”

  “Shit, Sophia, quit being cryptic and tell me what the hell is going on!”

  “And ruin the surprise?” She laughs again and there goes her image laughing on the inside windshield. “Relax, it won’t hurt a bit.”

  ~*~

  “Great spot!” Sophia tells Chuntao as the vehicle lowers into a tight parking space in front of a city bench. “You are so talented!” I reach to unbuckle my seatbelt only to discover that it’s now stuck. Great. I press the button again. Nope, nada, zilch. I start beating my finger on it like it’s the circle button on an old Playstation 5 control.

  Sophia is already out of the vehicle and turns back to me. “Are you coming or not?”

  “No, I’d rather stay in the cramped jalopy for the rest of my droid life.” I give the glove compartment a hard flick and an alarm sounds inside the aeros cabin. “Chuntao, let me go!” I do it again and the seatbelt tightens.

  “Chuntao, release him!” Sophia scolds the vehicle in Mandarin for a moment. “And Quantum, don’t hit anything! What did Doc tell you about that?”

  Doc: What she said. Do not assault anything unless otherwise instructed. Do not make me deadswitch you!

  Chuntao lets up and I’m able to unbuckle the belt. Worst AI ever. I have the notion to give the vehicle a little Sweet Chin Music but professionalism, Doc’s second warning, and good manners ingrained in me by Mrs. Hughes keeps my leg down.

  Sophia walks over to me and hooks her arm in mine. “I’m sooooo hungry.”

  I try to pull my arm away but she holds tight.

  “What?” she asks, “We’re friends now, remember?”

  “Sure,” I tell her, “sure we are.”

  McStarbucks are the same everywhere you go. There’s the cafe portion, generally on the top floor if it’s a two story building, or on the left side of the building if it’s only a single story, and then there’s the hamburger section. This one is a one story affair. If I were in my RW body, I’d make a beeline to the burger section and order McRib McNuggets and an Ethical Big Vita Mac, which tastes the same as the Big Macs of my youth but are made from vitamin-infused McMeat grown in Petri dishes in Bangladesh and other places where the labor is still cheaper than just having droids do it. Of course, Sophia ain’t me, so she heads to the cafe and instructs me to take a seat in the burger area and wait for her.

  “You’re not the boss of me,” I grouse as I move towards an empty table.

  I sit and take in the bland industrial familiarness that is every McStarbucks: a collection of pleather sofas placed in a semi-circle to inspire conversation and a sense of community are set beneath an upside down Lego-looking light fixture; a long, impractically thin table in the center of the room surrounded by tall metal bistro stools with built-in wireless charging hubs; holoscreen hang on every wall showing coffee beans being poured into burlap sacks or sizzling burgers being flipped on outdoor grills; display stands hawking overpriced bags of coffee adorned with signs that promise to donate the necessary parts to make a French press to some poor coffee farmer in South America with every purchase; a pastry case laden with shockingly overpriced low-cal fair-trade morsels that conform to all current and proposed legal, moral, ethical, and religious dietary restrictions; and the curvy mermaid in front of the golden arches McStarbucks logo displayed with the same ubiquitous enthusiasm the Nazis gave the swastika.

  As usual, the place is a visual stimuli a la Times Square that both frightens me and leaves me in awe of the true power of conspicuous consumption.

  I watch as Sophia waits her turn in line. She’s heroin-waif model thin and would have made a great basketball player if she hadn’t gone into science. Me? I got the body of a Humandroid. ‘Nuff said.

  My cybernetic eyes jump from her to the derriere of woman who has just finished her afternoon jog and who now waits in line behind Sophia, ready to regain those calories and then some in a single beverage. I notice that I’m able to play around with some of the viewing options just by thinking them. First I go night optics, not bad, then I switch to electrical signals, which gives a faint halo around anything radiating electromagnetic waves. I hone in on her tushie, protected from the outside world by a painted on layer of black sweat-wicking fabric. Well, at least it isn’t electric. The bad news is that while I can read her vitals, Humandroids apparently don't have x-ray vision capabilities, which really pisses me off and should doubly piss every sci-fi writer that has ever written about the future. You’d think droids would at least be able to see what’s beneath someone’s gladrags. I mean, reading her vitals allows me to see her skeleton and the outline of exterior body parts, sure, but it ain’t the same as checking her out in the trad sense.

  My view is suddenly obstructed by the Dream Team’s very own Dr. Daisuke Serizawa.

  “Let me guess,” I say as Sophia approaches, “a suger-free nonfat almond milk French vanilla dry cappuccino heated to 140 degrees with half a Stevia and a quarter packet of brown sugar mixed into the espresso?”

  Her eyes light up. “You know my drink order? That’s awesome!”

  “I … I was just kidding,” I tell her as she sits.

  “Me too.” She smirks at me. “That’s not my order and never has been. I can’t stand cappuccinos. Too much foam. Also, Stevia? Ick, real ick. Dang, I forgot my biscotti.” Sophia returns thirty seconds later with a green biscotti about the length and thickness of a pencil. “I’m cheating today,” she says, “after all, it is a really really big day for me. For science too. I know, I know, top secret, but still, a big deal.”

  “Great job by the way,” I tell her. “I mean it, while this isn’t an ideal situation for me, it is definitely a way to get me out of The Loop, which I appreciate.”

  “You mean it?” She gives me a toothy grin. Why have I never noticed how white her teeth are? Probably because I do my best avoid eye contact with her and she hardly ever smiles at me.

  “Against nature,” I hear a guy with a mustache mumble under his breath. I look right to see a pouty-faced Orson Welles lookin’ dirty boy mad-dogging Sophia and Mrs. Hughes’ Metal Baby.

  “Did you hear that?” I ask.

  “Hear what?” She bites her biscotti and gives me a confused look as she chews.

  It is then that I realize the capabilities of a Humandroid’s hearing. By focusing on the barista speaking behind the
bar, I can hear him telling the hourly dame next to him about his wild night out at a pollute bar. Focusing on a short grandma speaking to someone over iNet gives me the skinny on her latest visit with her nutritionist. Since I took this body, I’ve been noticing noises I wouldn’t normally pick up on, but I’ve been so focused on the body and the big-ass Sophia overdose that I never realized its listening capabilities. I’m like a freaking bat over here! I return my attention again to the jug-faced jabroni now staring us down.

  “He knows I’m a droid.”

  Sophia laughs. “Everyone knows!”

  “How?”

  “Are you being serious right now? We are human, or the rest of us are, and we can tell the difference between a human and a Humandroid, although you are pulling it off quite well.” She shrugs. “From a distance it is hard to tell but up close, Humandroids just aren’t that perfected … yet. I’d hate to see what they are like in thirty years!” She takes another delicate nibble of her biscotti. “And really, Quantum, I don’t need to be an ophthalmologist to tell you the power of a human eye in recognizing subtle differences in objects.”

  “I prefer iridology myself.”

  “What?” She takes a sip from her coffee leaving a lipstick stain on the lip of her cup. “Oh, another Quantum joke. It’s weird to hear those coming out of your current body.”

  The guy grumbles again, louder this time.

  “Welp, that settles it.”

  “Settles what?”

  I look to the bottom feeder and sub-vocalize. “Hey, you, yeah you, you walrus-lookin’ fat ass!” His face morphs from surprise to anger. “If you got a problem, bub, we can definitely do something about that.”

  “Quantum!” Sophia kicks my shin.

  “What the hell did you just say to me?” He stands and my viewing pane indicates his vitals, his increased heart rate, and his status as a potential aggressor, which unlocks a new layer of scan for weapons. Sweet! Nothing but some aeros keys in his pocket; looks like I’m good to go.

  “Quantum, stop!” Sophia grabs my arm.