Read The Apex Book of World SF 2 Online
Authors: Lavie Tidhar
The Apex Book of World SF 2 (2 page)
Alternate Girl
stared at the screen. Each day the spam mail showed up without fail. Same time
stamps, same recipient name, all from anonymous senders.
Who sends this mail?
she wondered. And
did everyone in her neighbourhood receive the same mail with the same time
stamps every day? If she had the courage to reply, would she receive an answer
from all the anonymous senders? Her hand hovered over the delete key.
If you sent garbage
to the landfill, it got buried underground, but what about garbage in the
ether? Did it float around silently on the airwaves? Would all the spam and the
deleted mail come back to haunt her in the form of ether pollution or some such
specialised name?
While she sat there,
the speakers gave off a faint ping. She clicked and waited as the new message
filled her screen.
Happy Birthday,
Alternate Girl! Today is a milestone for all of us. You have successfully
completed one hundred weeks of expatriate life. In recognition of your hard
work, a reward has been issued to you at the designated station. Report in as
soon as you can and don't forget to register at our renewed website. Greetings
from [email protected]
Alternate Girl
squeezed her eyes shut. She opened them and stared once more at the message on
her screen.
Could it be what she
had been waiting for all this time, or was Mechanic finally calling her home?
mixed feelings regarding their origin. Many of them harbour a secret fear of
losing touch with the collective memory. While they seem content with their new
lives, repatriation is a common subject of conversation. For the expatriate, to
return raises a complex response.
of this study worded it this way: "Return is something I fantasise about and
desire. But at the same time, it is something I am afraid of."
new life in an unfamiliar land represents a leaving behind of the collective,
and while there may still be remnants of a shared life, the expatriate faces
uncertainty. What if he or she has lost the ability to pick up the threads of
their old life?
On Expatriate
Behaviour
, Mackay and Lindon—
was of Father's eyes shining down at her from his great height. Light filtered
in through drawn shades and she could see an outline of buildings from where
she lay. It seemed as if there were a thousand busy bees buzzing inside her
skull. Beside her, someone moaned. She shivered and echoed the sound.
"There, there,"
Father said. "No need to be frightened."
"Father," he said
pointing to himself. "Metal Town." He gestured to something beyond her vision.
She repeated the
words after him, and listened as he murmured sounds of approval.
"You're progressing
very well," he said. "Soon, I'll take you to the Mechanic."
He shuffled away,
out of her line of sight. She heard a thump and another moan, and she called
out anxiously.
"Father?"
"I'm here," Father said.
His voice was soothing and she drifted away into a kaleidoscope of screeching
metal and the crescendo of another voice wailing out Father's name.
When she woke, the
curtains were drawn back. From where she was, she could see black metal struts
and the carcasses of vehicles piled on top of one another.
From far away, came
the hum of lasers and a low bass thrum that she later discovered was the
Equilibrium Machine. A man bent over her; his face was shiny and round and she
saw metal cogs where his ears should have been.
His fingers felt
cold and hard on her skin.
"Just like one of
them," he whispered. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were one of
them."
His words made her
uncomfortable, and when he took her hand she pulled it away.
"Don't fight it," he
whispered. "Fighting only makes it worse."
She felt something
sharp and burning on her skin. Wet leaked out of her eyes. She couldn't move.
"You'll be fine," he
said. "It's all part of the process."
message on her screen, she wondered if Mechanic considered this as yet another
part of the process.
"Leaving is a part
of the process," Father had said.
"While we may long
for return, we also know that having left we are already changed."
She looked around at
her cosy nest, stared at the brilliant blues and greens of her living room, at
the paintings of sunflowers and butterflies, and she wondered whether she would
be able to go back and surrender to a life spent waiting for harvest.
Outside, the digging
machines had fallen silent. She looked up at the clock. It was half past twelve
and the men who drove them were probably off to lunch.
on the creation of Alternate Girl: 2001 hours
face follows, arms, legs, and other parts. Assembly proceeded as planned.
Pliables applied.
when she passed the 4000-hour mark. Father beamed, and Mechanic looked happy
and hopeful. Metal Town's citizens came in reply to Mechanic's summons. Of
these, she loved most the ones who rolled in on lopsided wheels and who smiled
and chirped code at her.
When she tried to
chirp back, they encircled her and projected their enthusiasm in signals and
bleeps that she couldn't put into proper words.
"You are one of us,"
the chirpers said. And she felt welcomed and included.
Father beamed at the
compliments he received.
"Yes, I am proud of
her," he said. "Our first success," Mechanic said. Alternate Girl wondered at
his words. Had there been others then? If she was the first success, where were
the ones that had failed?
The chirpers moved
away and she was surrounded by tall and gangly ones who took her hands in
theirs. They ran their fingers up and down her arms, peered into her eyes and
asked her questions about her training. Mechanic beamed and looked on. He
sipped oil from a can he held in his hand and bowed his head and gestured
towards her.
Where were the words
to tell a powerful being that you had no wish to be looked upon and admired as
if you were a foreign object placed on display?
Foreign. It struck
her then. She lifted her hands, marvelling at the elasticity of her flesh. Of
course, she was foreign.
followed, she passed through various tests.
A model housewife,
she learnt, was dedicated to maintaining a perfect home and garden. She perused
hundreds of pages of magazines culled from God knew where. Housewives by the
hundreds, all extolling the virtues of various cleaning products, household
goods, cooking sauces, oils, liniments, lotions, facial creams, garden products
and intimate apparel. The array of faces and products dazzled her.
"Will there be
others like me?" she asked Father.
"If all goes well,"
he replied.
"What about you?"
she asked.
"When the time
comes, the old must give way to the new."
She waited for him
to continue. Wanting to know more, wanting to understand what he meant by his
words.
"You're not old,"
she said.
He touched her cheek
and shook his head.
"I shall tell you
more soon," he said.
These hours spent
with Father were precious to her. He was patient with her attempts to put to
practice the things she had learnt.
"You must learn
control," he said. "You are far stronger than others think you are, but control
will serve you better where you are going, AG."
all go through."
"Why would they take
you away?" she asked.
"In the order of
things, old models must make way for the new," Father said. "But even if I go,
my pride and joy live on in you, AG. Eight thousand hours old and going strong.
You are our future."
"Where are you
going?" she asked.
"I'll be there,"
Father said.
She looked to where
his finger pointed and saw the Remembrance Monument.
"When the time
comes, I will be harvested as others have been before me. My memories will
become part of the monument. There are those who say that when the end of time
comes, we will unfold our bodies, regain our memories and find ourselves
changed into something more than machine."
"Will I be
harvested, too?" she asked.
"I don't know," He cupped
her face in his hands. "You are our first success. We don't even know what you'll
be like when you're as old as we are."
"Can I have your
memories?" she asked.
He didn't answer.
Outside, Mechanic's men tramped through the streets of Metal Town. Someone
screamed.
Harvest
, the word whispered
through Alternate Girl's circuits.
Father flinched, closed his eyes and bowed his head.
"Will it hurt?" Alternate Girl asked.
"I don't know," Father replied.
But she knew he was lying. She wondered what happened at Harvest and whether it was indeed a
natural thing as Father had said. She visited the Remembrance Monument, and
tried to make sense of it all. Its cold walls gave back a reflection of her
face—so unlike the faces of her fellow citizens.
She thought of a life without Father, and there were no words for the grief she felt.
"Take me then," she
said to the Monument. "If you must take Father, then you must take me, too.
But the monument
stayed silent, and no matter how hard she listened, there were no messages or
codes from the beyond.
more conscious of how the machine men made their daily trek to the walled
buildings. They went in the same as they came out. The drones monitored the
streets, gathering up residue and scrap metal. It seemed to her that each one
had a duty to perform, a routine task to follow.
Mechanic had found
no routine for her yet.
"Learn all you can,"
he had said on one of his visits. "You will be our first ambassador. The model
housewife, a perfect expatriate. They will love us because of you. Perhaps they
will finally remember us and we will be reconciled with the original makers."
"What about Father?" Alternate Girl asked.
"He does his part," Mechanic said. "You must do yours."
She didn't like the
uncertainty of his answer, but she had learnt not to say so. Instead, she
nodded and listened and took in the knowledge he fed to her.
There must be a way out,
she thought.
It was the first time she thought of escape.
Economic. Some expatriates choose to live or work in a different country or society for the
sake of material gain.
Social. Some
expatriates choose to live or work in a different country or society because
they see this as a means of increasing their stature in society. Others choose
exile for the sake of love.
Political. Some
expatriates embrace voluntary exile as a means of protest against the ruling
body of their home country.
—
Observations
of Expatriate Behaviour
, Mackay and Lindon—
the rift in the barrier a week after Mechanic's visit. It was late at night,
and she had chosen to take one of the roads leading south. She ventured further
and further away from the heart of Metal Town. The moon cast its light on the
road before her and she could see the long shadow of herself stretching out and
mingling with the waving shapes of wild grass and brush.
She was deep in
thought when the sound of wheels swishing on asphalt caught her attention. She
saw a flash of light, and then she was at a barred gate. Through the bars, she
could see the outline of cars and buses flowing in a rush away from her. She
stared at this vision of vibrant and full-bodied creatures, and she understood
that they were relatives of the disembowelled who lay stranded in the many
garages around Metal Town.
On her way home, she
was conscious of the spy eye stationed atop the Remembrance Monument and,
passing close to it, she heard a faint murmur that sounded like voices
whispering through the scaffolds of the Monument's steel ports.
The recollection of
screams played back in her memory and she stopped. One day they would take her,
too. She'd be joined to the Monument regardless of whether she desired it or
not.
Across the street, she saw the Mechanic. Moonlight glinted off the chrome of his head, and he gave
a slight nod when he saw her. She could hear him muttering to himself as he
crossed to where the tin houses of the Numbered Men leant against each other
like pale reflections of their owners.