Rubberman's Cage

by Joseph Picard

  “Can't think like that, Lenth,” Gabe said.

  “Why not? What else would be giving him stress? They have no idea if I'm even alive!” Lenth looked to Joints again. “I can't even send a note back with him, he can't read any better than I could.” Lenth got up and paced about a little. “Put both of us in a small room, wake him up, and let me talk to him, then gas him again, and put him back.”

  “Lenth, no, we can't do that. He'd be compromised. He'd invalidate the work.”

  Lenth shot Gabe a fresh glower. “How would seeing me make it any harder for him to clean out filters?”

  “Not that work. The tests.”

  “Tests?”

  “Medication tests.”

  “One of these tests...” Lenth said, “one of them was what killed Slim, right?”

  Gabe nodded. “Correct,” he said meekly.

  “Well did he at least die right for your test?” Lenth yelled. “Are you happy with how that turned out?”

  “I don't know,” Gabe said. “I really don't. Providers don't control the testing.”

  Looking first blankly at Gabe, then sliding his gaze to the ceiling, Lenth said under his breath, “There...there's more up? There's someone else?”

  Gabe sighed and looked up as if he expected to see them. “Yeah. We keep our people fed, alive, and on the tests, and they give us the things we can't make ourselves.”

  “The Messenger...” Lenth said.

  “You've been learning more than just porn, I see.” Gabe smirked momentarily. “The Messenger just brings the things down. They don't talk about from where.”

  “Who are they?”

  “There's a theory...” Gabe said.

  “Go on...?”

  “Some say that somewhere up there is another...world. Something older than this. A long time ago, according to the theory, anyway, there were thousands of thousands of thousands of people there. Millions of people. Do you know what a million is?” Lenth nodded, then Gabe continued. “They built incredible things. They invented everything we have here, and kept bigger better things for themselves. And worse things.”

  “Worse?” Lenth muttered. “Worse than turning your Brothers into dirt so that you can eat?”

  “War.”

  “What's that?” Lenth asked.

  “I've only read about it. It's when one huge group of people really hates another huge group, and they hurt each other. Kill each other.”

  Lenth smirked a little. “That doesn't make a lot of sense.”

  “I've read things,” Gabe said with a look and a tone that wiped away Lenth's smirk. “Things that don't make much sense at all. A place without a ceiling, people ripped like cloth. People by the thousands. Torn, burnt. By tools that I don't understand.”

  Lenth scoffed lightly. “Whatever that was that you read...it must be written by someone as a joke. A dumb, mean joke.” Lenth waited for Gabe to agree, or at least entertain the idea.

  “No,” Gabe said instead. “I figured that at first too, but there's just too many things that point to a huge war in the past. It just got worse and worse. The people before, up there; they must have been some kind of...I don't know.”

  “But wait,” Lenth said. “If they're so awful, why do they send us things that we need?”

  “Maybe they don't.” Gabe shrugged. “Maybe they all finally killed each other off. Maybe it's just the Messenger, finding things and bringing them to us.”

  Lenth glanced at Joints lying there, breathing slow but steady. “So do you think that we... the Providers, the Subjects, the Managers... do you think we're what's left of those millions of people?”

  Gabe sighed and looked around. “I don't know. I have no idea. It all seems pretty farfetched. A lot of it makes an odd kind of sense after a while, but... a place with no ceiling?”

  Lenth's smirk returned. “Okay, but let's pretend that's true. What would be the point of us being in this place?”

  “I don't know about you, but I don't see any wars in here. Maybe we're protected here. And if they did all kill each other, maybe it will be our job to go back there and... and put people there. Oh, which reminds me, have you gotten your head around this human reproduction thing?”

  A little blonde girl's fist flew as hard as it could to the little face of a girl with black hair. No injury could be seen on the four-year-old, but she wailed. She wailed with a volume and pitch beyond Lenth's imagining. She wailed as if it were the greatest pain and indignity she'd suffered. And it was. At least today.

  The assailant recoiled. Two innocent bystanders looked upward as a familiar figure plodded across the ceiling grating. “Rubberman,” one of the girls mumbled. By this age, they had been taught that word by the learning machines.

  The aggression in the blonde girl's face gave way to fear, and she stepped back from the dark-haired girl. “I'm sorry!” the blonde said. “I'm sorry!” Her voice squeaked as the pleaded, and the dark haired girl stepped forward. She hugged the blonde girl and said, “It's okay. It already barely hurts. But don't do that, okay? It's not good. You'll get shocked.”

  From the other side of a wall, unseen by the girls, Gabe and Lenth observed.

  “Those young ones have a lot of hair,” Lenth said.

  “The girls don't have to shave their heads like the boys,” Gabe said, “Kind of a weird rule, but there ya have it. It makes it easier to tell they're not boys, I guess.”

  “Girls?” Lenth looked at Gabe, then back towards the girls. “Girls? Like young women? They aren't lumpy like women.”

  “That happens when they get older. Like around the same age where you start growing hair in places,” Gabe said.

  “When I...oh! Huh. So, they came out of a women who did sex? Where are they?”

  Gabe shrugged. “They did their job, and that's done. They're probably back at usual tasks. Doesn't matter. These girls have each other. They're Sisters, and their Manager takes care of the things they need. Their exercise machines also teach them stuff like basic language. You probably wouldn't remember being in a place like this.”

  “Of course I do! It hasn't been that long since I left home.”

  “I don't mean your old home. I meant your nursery. This isn't their Unit. This is where they learn the basics. Walk, talk, and follow what the Rubberman leads them to do. They'll get moved to their Unit, and if it's done right, they won't even notice.”

  “I...” Lenth tried to dig into his oldest memories. He learned a lot of words back then, and most of them, he didn't have a use for until he left his Unit. All but forgotten. The past was foggy, as the past tends to be, but he couldn't think of anything that suggested being somewhere other than his Unit when growing up.

  This place was just looked like a Unit. This method of deception seemed like should be a big thing, but overall, it somehow didn't matter at all. “Was I really that small?”

  “And before that, even smaller.” Gabe mimicked holding a baby, but it wasn't really necessary. Lenth had seen those lessons on the learning chair.

  Lenth squinted at the four girls, all roughly the same age. “I don't...wait...What about Joints? He was...no, there was another. Me, Slim, Blue, and...there was a fourth boy.”

  Leaning against the wall, Gabe shrugged. “Ideally, four grow up together and stay together, but things happen. Deaths, unexpected twins, all kinds of things can happen. It mostly works out, but there's almost always at least one Unit out there with less than four Subjects.”

  “Slim dying, Spots appearing, just the system adjusting itself, huh?”

  “More or less. Spots was having a rough time in his old Unit. Timing just happened to be roughly right for him to join your Unit. Had to fudge his memory a little bit with meds. Doing that is kind of risky, but it was the best thing for Spots in the long run.”

  Lenth turned to leave. “Well, I guess that makes Slim getting killed all worth it,” he mumbled.

  “I didn't mean it like that.” Gabe said. “Everyone's just trying to make the best of things
.”

  “The best? How many people, sorry, 'Subjects', work to support all this? None of them with any idea why? With no...”

  “The Contact says 'Ignorance is needed in the Subjects'. Something to do with the Messenger,” Gabe said, “and tests. I don't really understand, but it's about getting the things we need from the Messenger.”

  Lenth looked down and shook his head slowly. He sighed. “Contact?”

  “He can talk to the Messenger. It's always a person selected from the Providers. Kind of the leader of Providers. I guess I'm a big enough fish to have a say in who the next one is.” Gabe shrugged.

  “Fine, fine, but what is Contact?” Lenth said.

  “He controls the meds. Makes sure the right ones get to the right Subjects, looks at the results, and...and then somehow it has to do with keeping the Messenger coming, and bringing things we need.”

  “Then he killed—” Lenth stopped himself, and turned away to pace a few steps. “I have to talk with this Contact.”

  “It was an accident. I'm sure of it, Lenth.”

  “I'm not saying it wasn't. I just...” Lenth paced a little more. He'd already known that somewhere, someone put a med into the system that reacted fatally with Slim’s body. But now he had a 'name'. Contact.

  “He knows,” Gabe said with a soft tone. “I'd wager he feels pretty darn bad about it. It's not like it's a regular thing, deaths like Slim's.”

  Lenth nodded slowly. “Yeah. But how many Subjects are there? When you're looking down on that many, one is sad, but you gotta realize...to me, with three Brothers. Three people I knew existed, not counting the Rubberman, one death was...one death was big. My world was...”

  Gabe put his hand on Lenth's shoulder. “I get it. I do. Let's get out of here and grab a bite.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Fruits of Asking

  “Want to try something other than the food disks? We might be able to get a slice of unprocessed papaya.” Gabe held his finger in front of the elevator's buttons, roaming along them.

  “You can eat them? I mean, just as...as they are?”

  “I'll take that as a yes.” Gabe chose a button, and the elevator started to move.

  “Are we going to see Carin' again?” Lenth asked meekly.

  Gabe gave a wry smirk. “I was thinking we'd go to where they turn the eight crops into the standard food...but I suppose we could go see Karen.”

  “Oh. Wait a second, eight? Right! I learned about that!” Lenth said, “Could we try them all?”

  “Well, yes. But not if we went to see Karen. She only has papayas.” Gabe let Lenth stew a little, and the elevator doors opened to the floor with the processing facilities. Lenth looked out the door, down another of those nondescript Provider hallways. He stood. He looked at Gabe. He looked down the hallway. He looked at the buttons.

  “Would it be silly?” Lenth asked.

  “A little,” Gabe replied, pressing the button to go see Karen. “Going down.”

  Lenth tried to hide a smile.

  “Karen's not like the Rubberman you had,” Gabe said.

  “Yeah, I know. He's...she's a woman.”

  “Yeah, yeah, but there's two ways to become a Rubberman. You can get promoted from being a Subject, like yours was, or a Provider can take the job. Depending on this and that.”

  “I think Carin' mentioned that she was a Provider once.”

  “Yup.”

  Lenth thought for a moment. “But she seemed to kind of be afraid of Providers being mad at her.”

  “Well, there's protocol. I was kind of…ehh, uneasy about us talking so casually to a Manager, but I let it slide because she used to be a Provider. She still has responsibilities. She still has to do her job. Dispensing food, directing Subjects to the next task, minor maintenance, cleaning, and dealing with trouble.”

  “And shocking us,” Lenth added.

  “If that's what it takes, but really...how often were you zapped?” Gabe asked.

  “Enough to hate it.”

  “And enough to want to avoid it. Enough to get going, and doing the things you needed to do, to help us all continue on.”

  “And get medicated, and exercise,” Lenth said.

  Gabe gave half a shrug. “Pretty much.”

  They ended up in Karen's 'office'. She was presumably out over the grating somewhere, but they couldn't go out there and risk shattering the illusion of Karen's Subjects.

  So they waited.

  “So...Carin' knows like...what...everything you do?”

  “More or less, I guess.”

  “Hm. Neat.” Lenth looked over towards her bedroom, thinking of the books in her locker. “She can read, I guess, huh.”

  “I'd assume so.”

  “Huh. Hey, I still want to meet this Contact guy.”

  “You're not going to start any crap, are you?”

  Lenth perked up with an indignant look. “Crap? Crap like what?”

  “Crap like a fight, getting some kind of revenge.”

  Lenth held out his hand as if to push away the insulting notion. “I'm not an idiot. I understand that it wasn't on purpose. I just want to hear about how. Why. The reasoning behind it all.”

  “I already told you.”

  “But Contact can tell me more, can't he?”

  “Like what?”

  “I don't know. The name of the med that killed Slim. So I can hate that med by name. Maybe find out what it was supposed to do.”

  Gabe looked at Lenth with pity. “It won't make any difference. But I'll talk to some people maybe. Try to set something up.”

  Lenth nodded with a quiet smile. It was something, at least. They didn't talk after that, and they sat down to get comfortable. A few quiet minutes passed before the door to the grating area opened.

  Karen, in her full Rubberman outfit, halted at the door. Lenth waved with a smile, and Karen came in and closed the door.

  “Hi, Carin',” Lenth said.

  Karen wiggled out of her hood and mask, and her hair fell around her face as before, and enchanted Lenth all the more. “What... what are you guys doing here again?”

  “I thought Lenth deserved a treat.” Gabe smirked.

  “I'm going to try plain papaya!” Lenth said.

  Karen raised an eyebrow. “You should both know that they're for processing. If you wanted to break rules, you could have gone to processing, you know.”

  “We,” Gabe said, leaning his head towards Lenth, “chose to come here instead.”

  Karen blushed. “Well, I'm flattered,” she said with a polite chuckle.

  Lenth blushed more. “I...well...is being a Rubberman boring?” He wanted to ask 'lonely', but he thought better of it.

  “I read. I listen in on what my girls are yapping about. I sometimes get into the exercise area and work out a little. It's a bit on the dull side at times, sure.”

  Lenth wanted to think of a smart question. Something that would require a long answer. Something that would cause her to talk at length. He wanted to hear her voice more. “So...do you go into the Provider areas much? I don't think my Rubberman did.”

  “Not a lot, but when I have business there, I tend to take my time. I'll try to trade a book if there's any available. If I get talking to people, I'll linger for a while, unless I expect to be needed here any time soon.”

  Lenth got hung up on how she said “linger”. It sounded especially smooth. He resisted saying 'linger' out loud. Another question, another. Think fast.

  Not fast enough. Gabe spoke up. “So, what do you say? Do you have a bit of papaya hanging around for our buddy Lenth here?”

  Karen stood tall, almost at attention. “Skimming crops for personal use? That wouldn't be right!”

  “I'm not trying to trap you.” Gabe said with a leer. “If you'd been skimming any significant amount worth worrying about, you'd be a little plumper, wouldn't you? You've got to have a little here somewhere, huh?”

  Karen rolled her eyes. “Not much.” She headed to
wards her bedroom and Lenth stood up to follow. The act of standing revealed a minor problem, pushing the front of his suit out ungraciously. That damned swelling was back! He felt it right away, and Gabe saw it, stifling a laugh.

  Lenth looked up at Karen. Thankfully she had her back turned. Overcoming panic, he wrangled his 'problem' to be held more or less under control using the waistband of his clothes. There was still a bulge if you were looking for it, but it wasn't nearly as obvious.

  He looked over to Gabe, who gave him a thumbs up while biting his lips to keep a laugh at bay.

  Karen leaned around the corner from her bedroom, already out of her Rubberman suit, and asked, “Are you coming, Lenth?” Gabe couldn't stop it this time. A loud but brief laugh escaped him before he clasped his hands over his face.

  Lenth blushed even harder, and his eyes widened. He wasn't entirely sure what was suddenly so funny, but it was obviously something to do with the swollen problem.

  Karen didn't seem to get the joke either, which was a relief. “What happened?” she asked, looking at Gabe.

  “Papaya,” Lenth blurted, desperate to steer the topic away from the...the problem.

  “What? Oh, yes. Come on then, Lenth.”

  Lenth passed by Gabe, giving him a disapproving little glare. As he caught up with Karen, she was bent over in front of her closet with her posterior sticking towards him. A rear end was a rear end, but this was...was different somehow. Amazingly different! Hypnotized, Lenth's stare didn't flinch, even after Karen stood and turned to face him with a freshly cut chunk of papaya in her hand.

  “Lenth. Are you all right?”

  “Huh? Hmm? It's okay, the swelling goes down. So far, it always has.”

  Stunned, Karen took a cue from Lenth's eyes and looked down. “Ah.” She smirked. “I see. Oh, I heard some of the males are medicated so...yeah, you're new to that, I take it?”

  “Oh, you weren't talking about...the swelling?”

  Karen bit her lip. “No, no I wasn't. I'm flattered, mind you, but...yeah.”

  Unsure what to do about it, Lenth glanced back at the bed. “You didn't want to—”