by Heide Goody
I didn’t know what to say so I just gave him a stern look and he quickly relented.
Helberg found some cloths and towels and we wiped the Empties as clean as we could, being careful to avoid whatever pressure points would bring the supervision bots. As a consequence, their orange coveralls were now mottled with red and yellow, an improvement in my view. I led them back out to the street, to find the car had gone. Dusk made it hard to see the spilled paint. The Empties went back to their usual spots and I walked back inside, disappointed that I still hadn’t found a way to help them.
***
Chapter 13
I’m aaaaa whaaaaale, sang the blue whale.
“Sure Babe!” said Rufus. He strolled through the house, across a terrace and down the steps onto the beach. There were several bonfires, with groups gathered around them, and a couple of spin-off groups who’d gone off to play volleyball. Rufus was very interested in the volleyball, but not, I realised, for the sport. Rather for the athletic, bikini-clad bodies of the women playing.
The two women with Rufus sipped on their cocktails and pulled faces. I saw the drinks sported sparkling swizzle sticks with their names on them, so I could tell which one was which, at last.
I watched as Rufus’s mind cast the girls immediately into a private fantasy. They were both wearing tiny bikinis and writhing on the floor, covered in slippery mud. As their hands slid over each others’ enormous breasts and buttocks, they giggled and beckoned to him.
Is this a memory or a dream? I asked.
Maybeeee it’s boooooth, said the blue whale.
TayTay sucked the straw on her cocktail, more than a little suggestively. “That would be cool,” she breathed.
The shout came again. “Roo fight!”
The memory shifted and contorted, gaps bloomed and resolved themselves.
The blue whale swooped and dived through the dreamscape.
“I have been privileged to learn some of the world’s most effective martial arts techniques from master practitioners,” said Rufus. “If people knew I walked among them wielding the power of life and death with a single blow, imagine how that would be?”
We were in the basement space beneath the house. There were people crowded round and there was a kangaroo. I still wasn’t sure why there was a kangaroo at Rufus’s beach party.
The animal came out of its corner with an enormous bound and hauled Rufus up by his long hair with its arms, while using the most powerful kick it could muster on his dangling body. He dropped like a stone and I saw the veil of unconsciousness fall like a blessed relief, across the intense pain.
It's beeeeetter to beeeeee aaaaa whaaaale, the whale pointed out.
In the hospital bed, Rufus groaned as he tried to shift position and talk to his fiancée, Paris. “Well, not small and helpless, surely? I took care of the—”
“Yes, we’ve made sure Miss Jacobs is up to date with the details of your fall,” said Henderson, cutting into the conversation, positioning himself between Rufus and Paris. Henderson was a parasite, a pet, a dog. At the banquet of life at which Rufus and his equals – ‘proper’ people – feasted, Henderson sniffed around for scraps of power and influence. Just because Henderson was a smart dog, he assumed he was better than the other dogs; that he could become a proper person if he worked at it, pleaded for it.
“Paris,” said Henderson, “I’m afraid I have some dull corporate matters I need to discuss with Rufus.”
“Work?” said Paris. “Now?”
“The burden of leadership, hon,” said Rufus. “Pop outside and fix your make up.”
“My make up?” Paris left.
The whale swam in.
Rufus Jaffle was now talking to Henderson and another man – Michael from legal. The details weren’t clear but it felt like Rufus was in some sort of trouble.
“You need to wipe your memory of what happened last night,” said Henderson. “You have the access to do that personally.”
“Actually, I’ve got this whale in my head that is making some of my functionality a bit glitchy.”
The whale giggled and squirted foam through its blowhole.
“Fine,” said Henderson peevishly. “Then we’ll get it done back at Jaffle Tech.”
“But please don’t go through the official company procedures,” said Michael. “I very much believe the less people know and the smaller the paper trail, the better things are.”
“Yes, our official brain-editing systems have audits that I even I can’t counter,” said Henderson.
Even I— Rufus could have laughed. A dog with ideas above its station.
“I’ll sort out something off the record,” said Henderson. “We will arrange the memory wipe as soon as you’re physically fit enough.” He paused. “There is another matter I need your signature for, and it won’t wait until then. Perhaps, Michael, you could leave us for a few minutes?”
Michael from legal rose and left the room, leaving Rufus alone with Henderson.
“Are you both getting memory wipes too?” asked Rufus, sulking.
“I will attend to all details. It’s very much in our mutual interest if you believe I have the company’s best interest at heart, wouldn’t you say? As Chief Technical Officer, problem solving is my forte.”
Rufus gave a grunt of assent.
Henderson cleared his throat. “That other matter. I need your signature for Operation Sunrise. It’s a complex project, so I can’t afford to let any time slip.”
Rufus looked at the sheaf of papers. “Do I need to read all that?”
***
I surfaced from sleep before I time to read any of the papers.
“Odd dream,” I muttered.
The major takeaway was that Rufus Jaffle had a very peculiar lifestyle, but then he was at the top of the world’s biggest tech corporation, so the pressure of his job was probably something I couldn’t begin to understand. He was definitely the man with the answers. I had to find a way to speak to him.
As I dressed I recalled the way that Rufus was fixated on the girls’ breasts and buttocks in his memory. I now recognised that these were secondary sex characteristics, and played a big part in selecting partners for intercourse. I’d spent some time jipping articles through my Jaffle Port after I’d left Helberg. It explained some of the behaviour I’d observed, where men – quite a lot of men now I came to think of it – seemed less interested in my face than my chest and buttocks. This was most definitely the case in the memory I’d just experienced, because the faces of TayTay and Mimi became less and less distinct the more time Rufus spent with them.
I wandered out of my room to find Hattie. “What do you think it is that makes us the people we are?” I asked.
She looked up from her beans. “It’s very early for a question like that. Right, let’s think. Our names and our faces are all different, and we have a special number assigned to our Jaffle Port, so the system knows who we are.”
“True,” I said, “but there are other things. Like … like I never met anyone who loved Smiley Tots as much as you.”
Hattie beamed with pride. “That’s true. Me neither.”
I thought hard. “But I suppose what I was really asking is whether other people see us the same way that we see ourselves? I don’t think they do.”
Hattie stared at me. “You’re probably right, but it doesn’t really matter what other people think about us, does it?”
“No.” I nodded and gave a small sigh of relief. “No it doesn’t.”
“Apart from when Levi thought I’d taken Brandine’s bagel,” said Hattie, wide-eyed with horror at the memory. “That was horrible.”
***
We left the apartment to go to work, the last day before a two day rest period.
“Take a look,” I said as they stepped outside, unable to suppress a grin. “Can you see what I did?”
Hattie turned to look at our door. She turned her head one way and then another. “Something’s definitely changed,” she sai
d, “but I can’t put my finger on it. Have you polished the handle?”
I shook my head.
“No, I did that last week,” said Hattie. “Something’s shinier, definitely. Go on, tell me.”
“The whole door’s shinier. I painted it, look!” I said. I dragged Hattie to look at the next door along and then back again. “See? that one’s drab and faded while ours is bright and shiny!”
Hattie nodded, and squinted critically as she glanced between the two. “I see it, I do.”
“Come on, let’s get to work.”
***
Before lunch, Paulette called a section meeting. Everyone talked in subdued whispers, wondering what was going on. “Just as long as we don’t have to watch the Film again,” said Hattie, fearful. I patted her shoulder.
Paulette took to the stage. “Jaffle Tech prides itself not only on its customer service but its relationship with the community, both global and local. We are part of a family, a corporate family and a worldwide family and—”
“Let’s cut to the chase,” said Levi, stepping in. “A felonious act has been committed and a member of staff – here! – has been implicated.”
He held up a tunic that clearly matched the uniform that we all wore. I willed myself to keep calm. It was mine, but Levi clearly didn’t know that, or he would not be addressing us as a group.
“The individual concerned has broken into a nearby residence and committed several acts of criminal damage and theft,” said Levi.
Shocked gasps could be heard around the room and heads shook in disbelief.
“This tunic was left behind, and the victim believes she herself spoke to the perpetrator earlier in the day.”
A hand went up. “A caller? Are you saying that one of us went round to a caller’s house?”
“No,” said Levi. “This was someone who met the victim on the street. Now, the victim agreed to share her memory of that encounter with us for the purposes of identifying the perpetrator. We’re going to take a look at that recording, so please all pay close attention. Every one of your colleagues will be seeing this, because Jaffle’s reputation is on the line here. I hope y’all understand just how big a deal this is. We cannot afford to compromise our position and standing in the community.”
Levi fixed them all with his serious look again and then started the film.
I gripped the arms of my chair as I recognised Claire’s garden and saw two figures approaching from the road. How was it possible that Hattie and I hadn’t already been identified?
“Can I help you?” came Claire’s voice from the screen. Two faces turned towards them. I nearly burst out laughing when I saw them. They were both as featureless as Smiley Tots. Bland idiotic smiles beamed out of two identical moon-like faces, topped with hair that looked as though it belonged on a doll. Neither Hattie nor I had plaits, and yet identical plaits swung at the sides of these two faces. They even walked strangely, dragging their limbs along the road and making odd growling sounds, like they were animals.
“Are you blind?” one of the faces asked Claire, contorting grotesquely, even going a little bit cross-eyed to underline this was a stupid person talking.
Hattie stiffened at my side. She recognised the situation. I willed her to keep quiet.
I realised that Claire’s memory was very like Rufus Jaffle’s: the recollection was distorted. Rufus Jaffle had inflated his companions’ breasts and more or less forgotten their faces. Claire had also forgotten mine and Hattie’s faces, while retaining the impression she was speaking with a pair of imbeciles. It worked in my favour: it was impossible for anybody to identify me from this evidence. I peered at Hattie’s intense expression. Well, almost impossible.
“Anybody got any ideas?” asked Levi.
Hattie’s hand started to move up. I slammed it back down onto the arm of her chair.
“Ow!” said Hattie.
Several people turned to look but another hand had gone up as a member of staff pointed out the obvious. “Those people don’t look like any of us.”
“”It is possible that the victim had been drinking that morning,” said Levi. “Alcohol, you understand.”
Paulette gestured to Levi and spoke to him tersely.
“But it’s true,” he replied. “Just the facts, ma’am.”
“Why did you do that?” Hattie said to me. “I was going to tell them and then you hurt my hand.”
“Because you were going to tell them,” I hissed. “Now, shush.”
Levi cleared his throat, his argument with Paulette concluded. “The victim may or may not have been drinking. That’s immaterial. This is the footage evidence we have. Any other questions?”
“Has this got anything to do with Brandine’s bagel being stolen?” someone called out.
“No,” said Paulette.
“We cannot rule anything out at this time,” said Levi. “Who knows how the criminal mind works.”
A reminder pinged in my calendar: the brain scan in the medical room. It was due now.
What would the scan reveal? Surely, it would uncover the changes I had been experiencing over the last day. Did I have a brain virus or had I simply been ‘awakened’ in some way? My system data showed I was operating on Jaffle Standard but I very much doubted that was true now. If they restored my brain, removed any change, rebuilt any instabilities, what would I lose? I had just started to get to grips with colours and new tastes, and a whole banquet of new emotions and physical feelings that I certainly wasn’t ready to put aside. And would they find out what I had done recently, the ‘felonious act’ I committed at Claire’s house?
Paulette wrapped up the meeting and the section staff filed out. Hattie snivelled to herself as we went.
I took her hand. “Hattie?”
She glanced at me but only for a moment. There was fear and confusion in my friend’s eyes. I steered her round a corner and into the toilets.
“I don’t need the toilet!” she wailed.
I pulled her into a cubicle.
“Do you need the toilet?” Hattie asked, gabbling. “I don’t. I don’t think so. I don’t know anymore. That was us in the video and I was going to tell them and then you hurt me. Why did you hurt me? Did you mean to hurt me? I don’t understand.”
“I’m sorry,” I said and stroked Hattie’s face.
“Are we in trouble?” she asked.
I forced a laugh. “No. Of course not.”
“That was you and me in that woman’s memory, wasn’t it?”
“It didn’t really look like us.”
“It didn’t really look like anybody,” said Hattie. “Was it your tunic they found in her house?”
I considered denying everything, but sooner or later I needed to find a new tunic, and until then it would be very easy for Hattie to check.
“Right. I’m sorry. I kept this from you, but I’ll tell you the truth,” I said. “I had no idea it would all get so crazy.”
“What’s crazy?” said Hattie.
“Yesterday, when I was in my cubicle, I stood up too quickly and ripped my tunic on the chair. It was really bad, a great big hole.” I gestured, indicating an imaginary tear across my entire torso. “So I went down to supplies to see about getting a new one. Anyway, when I got there, I saw that there was nobody on the front desk, so I walked in and there was a gang of masked intruders.”
“No!”
“Yes. They said they wanted a Jaffle tunic to do a robbery, so they’d come to take one.”
“No!”
“Yes.”
“So it was them?” said Hattie. “They must have been the ones who broke into that house?”
“Yes. They took a tunic and threatened me a with a gun to keep my mouth shut. You can see my predicament, can’t you?”
“Tell Paulette. Tell Levi. They can’t get you now.”
“They also threatened to hurt the dog,” I added, my mind freewheeling.
“There was a dog?”
“Yes, a dog. Long floppy
ears, smiley face.”
“Dogs aren’t normally smiley,” said Hattie with a frown. “You should tell anyway, and the dog can take its chances.”
I should have realised that Hattie didn’t care much for dogs, especially after the poop incident. “Aaaand, they also said they’d come round to our house and hurt the Smiley Tots.”
Hattie’s reaction took some time to play out. First her hands went to her face, clamping her cheeks as she inhaled noisily, then they found the top of her head, which she pressed as if might come off, and finally pressed to her bosom. She made tragic gulping sounds and staggered around in circles which, in the cubicle, meant bouncing repeatedly off the walls.
“We mustn’t let anyone find out,” she whispered.
I nodded. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep my mouth shut. It will be fine, you’ll see.”
***
I returned Hattie to her desk and calmed her a bit by saying she should look at some of the latest Smiley Tots on sale. Then I put a call through to the medical centre.
“Hi, I have a scan scheduled for today.”
“Yes, Alice. Everything is ready for you. Come down now if you would.”
“That’s the thing,” I said. “We’ve hit a bit of an emergency up here. Unusually high demand in our sector. I’m going to need to postpone our appointment.”
“You’re calling very late to cancel.”
“I know.”
“And your supervisor should be able to authorise your absence. It’s not a lengthy procedure.”
“Yes, but as I say there’s a lot of work on. I don’t want to bother my supervisor. She’s under a lot of pressure as it is.”
“I don’t think you appreciate how much this facility costs the organisation.”
“No,” I said ambiguously.
The woman sighed. “I’ll book you in for the same time tomorrow but—”
“I have two rest days after today.”
“Then on your return. I’ve booked it in. Please ensure you’re here on time.”
“Thank you,” I said and breathed a sigh of relief.
