Asimov's SF, June 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  I shrugged. “I already had two.”

  Penny paused. “Why the hell would you have two Inhibichips?”

  “I started chain-smoking again when the jerk ran off. I sprang for an InstaQuit to save Henry's little baby lungs.”

  “And the other?”

  I felt suddenly embarrassed, and slipped my masked helmet on. “Anti-swearing.”

  “You paid for a chip to stop yourself...”

  “It was a two for one deal.”

  * * * *

  We lined up for Mel's inspection, Penny and I filing from our bank of lockers, Roy and Vikram from the men's. Like us, their metal faces were mirror-smooth, empty-eyed, with slits for mouths. Behind, their helmets drew to a cone-like point, where ours curled up in a flange that looked suspiciously like a 1950's flip-cut. Both pairs were indistinguishable unless you scrutinized our shoes—Pen, for example, needed a half-inch less sole to reach the standardized female height than I did. We mustered before Mel, who polished a smudge off one of the men's faceplates, assured himself that our knee-pads were symmetrically donned, and barked, “Stand up straighter, Elsa.”

  “I'm Penny, sir.”

  Mel narrowed his eyes and resumed his scrutiny. “Voice check.”

  “I'm Penny,” I said, voice modulated to a flat soprano buzz.

  “No, I'm Penny,” she said, in identical tones.

  “Would you like fries with that?” said one roboguy.

  “Good morning,” said the other. Identical baritones.

  Mel tested the lights on our breastplates—red, orange, blue, with accompanying sounds—and sound-checked our earpieces.

  “Let's go, people,” he said at last, as if he had been waiting on us. “Robots are never late to work.”

  I shot him a look over my shoulder as I marched to my place behind Roy, or Vikram, at the double door. The clock above gave us four minutes.

  I didn't know how the others prepared mentally for the day. I imagined Roy, an actor, was thinking about gears, lubricated hydraulics, logic circuits. Penny was probably still thinking about the winter fashion lines, or contemplating the horror of a life without swearing. Vikram I barely knew. As for me, I closed my eyes and let all the emotion drain down into my toes and puddle on the floor around my platforms. No hurry, energy, desire for grace. No attempt to inspire envy or lust. Movement had motive, efficiency, no beauty. I emptied myself and waited for a stimulus, waited to react. The bell rang, and we clanked into the public space of Burgerdroid, the Restaurant of the Future TM.

  No actual lies were told. What does “Restaurant of the Future” mean, anyway? What does it promise? Burgerdroid's ads just showed what you'd see at any Burgerdroid at lunch or dinner time. They never claimed the metallic beings behind the counter were robots, but everyone believed they were.

  The actual cooking was heavily automated, to avoid displays of human error. The customers could watch the uniform burgers created to their specifications, the calibrated condiment squirters ooze precise amounts of goo onto the buns in nice round slicks. We moved the components from place to place, pressed buttons, waited for beeps, assembled the food and drinks, took their money.

  The company could have eliminated us entirely. Add a few more belts and a push-button interface, and you'd have had the perfect marriage of a fifties “automat” and a short-order cook—and the same burger for five dollars rather than fifteen. But the good folks at Burgerdroid HQ knew that the food wasn't the appeal. Automation isn't as interesting as automatons. A real humanoid robot cost more than a Lamborghini, and was even less practical. People came to Burgerdroid like tourists, because they would never own a robot themselves.

  My first customers that day were a couple with a four-year-old. The little girl had to be dragged across the glossy floor, so dubious was she about the shining metal faces.

  “Good morning, and welcome to Burgerdroid!” I said. “Will you be ordering separately or together?”

  “Together,” the woman said as the man hoisted the girl up and whispered reassurances.

  “She's just like Ruby Robot on Sesame Street!” I heard him say. “You're not afraid of Ruby!”

  The parents ordered two Wasabi Burger combos and a Future Meal, and watched Roy and Vikram assemble their order from the various machines. They pointed and whispered as if they were at a museum, or the zoo. The crowning glory was, of course, the tiny robot toy that dropped from a tube into the shining Future Meal box.

  “Here is your receipt,” I said. “Thank you for visiting the Restaurant of the Future!” For most people, this was the payoff—the metal fingers pressing the receipt into their hand. Cold round fingertips, hard for pressing buttons, brushing their palms. For the parents, we do something else. I bent towards the little girl. “Small customer! Would you like a Burgerdroid sticker?”

  She lost her shyness at the suggestion and nodded. I showed her the Mylar sticker before sticking it gently to her shirt. The parents beamed and the child bent to examine it further—my face, implacably friendly, above the BD logo.

  We rotated jobs every hour, so one of us could take a break—supposedly the heat of the kitchen got to our delicate circuitry or something, which was not entirely untrue. No matter how much air conditioning there was, we got overheated in those costumes. The yellow light on the breastplate told us to swap jobs. The red was a panic button we could activate ourselves, if we dropped something or felt sick. The procedure was to start the “malfunction” light with a control in one glove, and perform a convincing mechanical problem for the customers before beating a retreat to the back room. Mel's official job was “robot mechanic.”

  The lunch rush arrived, and I fell into a groove, shifting between bits of pre-scripted welcome patter in a pseudorandom stream. I rang up some giggling teens, and the white-collar workers from the office park that come every day.

  The regulars come for a variety of reasons. Because it's convenient, or trendy, or because they don't care how much their expense account pays for a burger.

  “Greetings and salutations, hungry human!” I said to a man fingering his tie. I was long past wondering who decided robots are intrinsically camp.

  “Umm, hi.” The young man blushed. “Uh, can I get a Barbeque Chicken Burger with tofu-tots?”

  “Certainly, sir. Would you like a beverage with your meal?”

  “Water? Just water, if that's okay.”

  “Certainly, sir. I will now complete your transaction.” He held his card up to the prox-reader and shuffled his feet as the charge went through. “Here is your receipt. The Restaurant of the Future wishes you a healthy and happy day!”

  “You too,” he said, then looked confused and sheepish. He took a step back and ran into the burly businessman behind him. I loved the new customers.

  The businessman stepped forward, his eyes still on a computer display in his hand.

  “Good afternoon, and welcome to—”

  “Double cheeseburger with secret sauce, extra large fries, large coffee, one pudding pie.”

  “Which flav—”

  “Strawberry.”

  “Certainly, sir. I will now complete your transaction.” The man stalked to the condiment bar, still without looking at me. “Here is your receipt. Thank you for visiting the Restaurant of the Future!” I finished. The job had taught me that some people will pay twenty-five dollars for fast food every day if it allows them to avoid human contact.

  Penny opened the door to clean the fingerprints off, letting Simone inside. I prayed rotation would sound before she reached the front of the line. Simone was a roboregular.

  The roboregulars came to observe us. They lived for discoveries like the fact that we only asked them whether they're paying together if they were standing side by side—if they came in together but stood one behind the other, we automatically made up separate tabs. For some reason this was fascinating to them. The problem is, of course, that we could never make a mistake. My head hurt at the sight of Simone's thin, eager face.

&
nbsp; “Here is your receipt. Thank you for visiting the Restaurant of the Future!” The yellow light flashed as the women in front of Simone turned to go, and I pivoted with great relief and marched into the back room for my break. Let Vikram deal with Simone.

  In the back, I pulled off my helmet and scratched my eyebrow at last. Mel was motionless, analyzing all the screens for a break in pattern, a call to action. The troll seemed to think his job was as important as a Secret Service agent's. Sure, there was danger. The whole robot farce was fabulously expensive. They hired dancers and actors when they could, bribed us with health insurance to minimize turnover. The costumes, voice modulators, and breastplates were expensive, as were the Inhibichips, the automatic kitchens. The need for a cover business for employee entrance added overhead, and the air conditioning costs were sky-high. However, the company was doing well. They could charge exorbitant amounts for the food. No one complained about the lack of drive-through because everyone wanted to interact with a robot. A Burgerdroid in every major town in North America and Japan, good profits ... there were advantages to the business model.

  None of us could even hint to a union organizer that we worked in a Burgerdroid without breaking our ironclad Non-Disclosures. The occasional protest by jobs-for-humans groups—which we always laughed over in the locker rooms—gave free publicity, as did the inevitable newspaper fluff-piece in each town where a BD opened. It couldn't last forever—if nothing else, someday robots would be affordable and the thrill would fade—but no one, neither Mel playing Mission Control nor me, blowing cold air on my face from a nozzle near the lockers, wanted to be the one to end the run.

  That afternoon, I was on grill duty. In theory, this involved dispensing patties, aligning cheese slices and bacon on the finished patties, and transferring them to the other machine, but in fact it was, like most jobs at Burgerdroid, half staring into the distance, not moving until you heard a beep. You got good at staring, working there.

  At about three, some yobbos came into the empty restaurant. The smaller one was a disheveled Puck with ginger hair and a Harley Davidson jacket. The larger stood by as Ginger howled, “Lookit meeee! I'm a roooooobot!” and executed some wild dance maneuvers. This sort of thing happened once in a while when no other patrons were present. It was some mixture of the daring of the unobserved and the sort of mentality that enjoys taunting the guards at Buckingham Palace. “I'm a rooooooobot!”

  “No, sir, you are a human,” said Roy, who was on register. “As such, may I interest you in a delicious Burgerdroid Special Bacon Burger?”

  “I'd rather rot,” the young man said, and looked around. He sashayed over to the condiment bar and started stuffing relish packets into his jacket. “I bet Roborelish is the best!”

  “Sir,” said Roy, “If I understand your stated intention correctly, you do not plan to partake of our delicious Burgerdroid food. The condiment bar is for the pleasure and convenience of those who do partake.”

  “Whoooo! Come stop me, robot boy!” Ginger threw mustard packets on the floor and started to jump on them.

  Roy thumbed a control on his register and we converged on the counter, obedient to the signal in our ears. We stood in a perfect line as if for Mel's morning inspection. “Sir, I must ask you to leave. The police have been called should you require further incentive or assistance.” “The police have been called” signaled Mel to phone them.

  Ginger stopped smearing ketchup on the windows and looked shocked. “Big robot like you needs the pigs?”

  “Sir, I must ask you to leave,” Roy repeated.

  “Fine. Damn place is no fun anyway.” He nodded to Bashful, who preceded him out. He pointed at me as he left, and winked. “Nice Roborack.” He jogged off, consulting his watch.

  It wasn't that unusual, and Mel canceled the police before they arrived. I was just glad it was Vikram's turn to be on break and cleaning—I wouldn't have to mop up.

  It was Vikram's turn to close, too, with Penny. In the back, I shucked off my carapace and stroked my sweaty hair, the malleable flesh of my face. I could hear Roy showering across the divider, singing softly. We all had our rituals. I climbed into the women's shower, running it cold for a moment like a baptism. Hair dried and disguise reassumed, I emerged into Mel's abandoned domain—he went home when the restaurant closed—and was surprised to see Roy standing by the bank of darkened screens. He had turned one on and was watching the foreshortened metallic forms of Penny and Vikram, sweeping and emptying trash.

  Roy was about my age, I was sure, but in his office costume, white button-up shirt not quite buttoned up, he looked younger. Prep-school boy sans blazer, an earnest college Young Repub. He turned guiltily and clicked the monitor off, and his face assumed its proper age, its laugh lines and bohemian, world-weary brows.

  “I wonder sometimes what we look like. Mel doesn't exactly invite over-the-shoulder viewing during breaks.”

  I laughed. “Any actor wants to see how he looks on TV.”

  “I'm guessing, just like Vikram,” he smiled. “I'll actually get another chance to see, soon. I've got a commercial.”

  “What kind?”

  “Pizza.”

  “Ordering or delivering?”

  “A wandering pizza boy, I.”

  “Really?”

  “Hey, you don't think I have the chops?”

  I blushed, “No, they just usually cast goofy guys for that.”

  “I can do goofy,” he said, and cut a caper as he opened the door to the office.

  “Nice job with Tweedle-Dee today. ‘No sir, you are a human'? I almost laughed out loud.”

  “Sorry about that,” he grinned. “What would you have done? There's no script for that.”

  We passed into the still office. “This place creeps me out,” I said. “Fake family pictures and knickknacks. It's like it's embalmed.”

  “Do you think every office is like this one? Same knickknacks?”

  I shrugged. “The names vary. H.E. Underwriters or something is the one over in Fairfield.”

  “At least we have the majesty of the sea,” Roy said as we passed out into the chilly night. He rubbed the words “Marine Insurance” as if for luck, and we walked to our respective economical cars.

  * * * *

  Henry was in a mood when I reached daycare. “What is it now?”

  “The teacher thinks I lie.”

  “Why's that?” Henry tried to respond by shoving a colorful sheet of paper in my face as I negotiated a dangerous merge. “Ack! Wait, Henry, wait!”

  At a red light, I looked at the drawing on his lap, and felt all my internal organs jump together and cling like a pile of just-dried socks. Lovingly rendered in every metallic shade in the daycare's crayon collection was a robot. Next to it was the brown-haired figure I knew was meant to be me. If I hadn't had that Inhibichip, Henry might have expanded his vocabulary. I turned into the nearest parking lot and stopped.

  Turning to Henry and picking up the paper, I said (in the sickly franticalm voice I despise when I hear other parents use it), “What's the picture of, Henry?”

  He looked at me a bit oddly. “The teacher said to draw what our parents did for a job.”

  “What did you draw, sweetie?” I said in the same oversweet tone.

  “Well, you never said what your job is, but I guess it's with robots. So I said you wash robots. They have to get dirty, right? And they can't take baths or they'd rust.”

  I started to laugh. Now that I knew, it was clear that the tiny brown-haired “Mom” was brandishing a pink sponge at the robot. It was still too close. I'd be knocked down a pay grade if BDHQ found out.

  “What do you do, Mom?” Henry asked. He doesn't like being laughed at.

  “Sorry, Henry. Sorry. I—I am in insurance.”

  I spent the rest of the drive explaining insurance, and the walk into the house lying about what I had to do with it.

  “What are we having for dinner, Mom?” he yelled down the stairs. Perhaps 9:30 is too late for
a child to eat dinner, but that's the way life was in our condo.

  “We are having mini-pizzas. Please be more considerate of the neighbors,” I said in a normal tone.

  “Whaaaaaat?”

  I gave up on communication and stood at the stove, topped the neat rows of English muffins with tomato slices and cheese, slid the tray into the oven. The oven ticked and whirred, and I stood, feeling drained. I tried to name the color of the numbers on the range's clock—green, but almost teal. The color of scrubs on old hospital shows.

  “Mom? Mom...” Henry frowned at me.

  “Umm, what, honey?”

  “You're just standing there.”

  “Sorry, I must have gotten distracted. What's up?”

  “What's for dinner? I asked ages ago.”

  “And ages ago I said mini-pizz—darn,” I hadn't set a timer. The pizzas were a little brown and dry, but I put them on the plates and we dug in. He didn't complain, and by the time the last pizzas were reduced to crumbs, he was yawning. I carried him piggyback up the stairs and swept all the toys except his teddy bear off his bed. “Good night,” I said, but he was already dozing.

  I tiptoed down the stairs. The oven clock ticked from 10:19 to 10:20, the segmented shapes changing from one task to another without flow or pause. I caught myself storing the observation, so I could remember, the next day, to try to move like a digital clock.

  A noise that was half-laugh, half-sob escaped before I covered my mouth. I stared at our little family room for a moment, then pushed the furniture aside—discovering a few more toys—and put on some music, very low. Raising my arms, I began to dance. My toes tried to trace half-circles on the carpet, but caught in the nap, or jerked too fast through the motion. I watched my arms reflected in a framed print. My elbows seemed so sharp, and I couldn't soften the curve—I couldn't even give my hands fluidity or grace. I moved with economy. Efficiently.

  I could feel the thread of music, the lift of my heart, but my body wouldn't move with it. I felt like the dancer on a music box I'd had as a child, frozen in porcelain, lurching in a clockwork spin.

  * * * *