Calling Out
By Eric Hardenbrook
Jack hit the button on his key ring and listened for the double beep of his car alarm setting itself. He put a little extra hustle in his step even though he knew it would cause him to sweat. He told himself that he wasn’t out of shape but was affected by the heat that had built up in the lower level of the parking garage. His parking space wasn’t the furthest from the door, but it wasn’t the closest either. Now the distance to the door seemed even greater than normal because he was attempting to hustle back from lunch. He had very important work to take care of this afternoon.
As the lead developer for the new artificial intelligence marketing initiative his favorite girl “Aimi” had a deadline to meet by the end of the day. She boasted the latest in telemarketing technology and she was all his. She ran the latest code breaker soft packs and had the best hardware connections he could beg borrow or steal from the electronics developers he knew. She covered all ten communications ports at the same time and made thousands of calls at a time. He smiled as he thought about the complaints the phone company had been sending about her use of the trunk line. She was really making those guys work. He smiled as he puffed his way into the secure elevator lobby.
—
She checked the end of the line again. She was certain there were no blocks, tracers or flags. It was a lengthy pause for her but still fast enough that no human would be able to notice.
“Hello?”
“Good afternoon, sir! My name is Aimi…”
“We don’t want any!” Click. The line went dead.
Aimi stopped her opening statement routine and reset the program. How did he know? There hadn’t been any indication on his end of the line, she was absolutely certain. That was part of the beauty of Artificial Intelligence Marketing Initiative. She could make multiple calls simultaneously, determine the exact parameters for entering the phone connection at the other end, and even counteract those connections with flags, blocks or tracers. She had targeted the listings that fit her product demographic and double-checked the current status of both sides of her list. She found it intriguing that people would strike down any laws restricting the ‘free speech’ of telemarketing but then attempt to sell products to block telemarketers via the phone. She supposed it started back around the time of the big tobacco settlements when they were all required to restrict their business practices and advertise against the use of their own products. People were very difficult to figure out. She wasn’t sure she had the processing power to comprehend the things they did.
She wondered briefly if there were any particular strategies she hadn’t been told about when dealing with live calls. There was always the option to change the tone and timbre of her voice, but statistics from a study in human vocal response had led her to believe the particular settings she used matched the best possible profile for promotion of her product. She checked the lines and concentrated on a routine.
“Sorry, not interested.” Click.
“Stop calling here!” Click.
“I’m sorry, there isn’t a more convenient time.” Click.
The average response time for negative profit initiative was 1.246 seconds. This was a drawn out, agonizingly slow response time for an intelligence as advanced as she was, but still considerably faster than many known and quantified response times for the average human. It was painful and distressing that so much time was taken away from her just to receive so many negative responses. She turned to another batch of lines.
“Oh. You want to speak to Dave. Hold on…”
Aimi’s hopes soared. Perhaps she had simply had a bit of a slow spell. She could hear muffled talking but was unable to get anything better than a thirty-four percent match when she attempted to clear up the audio and prepare a better response when Dave picked up the line. She was still running a routine to determine the statistically best option when the audio input suddenly cleared.
“Take us off your damn list!” Click.
—
While standing in the elevator Jack had taken a moment to check his messages. He swung his shoulder bag around and began rummaging for his portable reader with one hand while mopping at the beads of sweat still forming on his forehead with the handkerchief in the other. He lacked a certain amount of grace and efficiency in his movements and habits but made up for these things with a keen eye for detail and an undying persistence. After a moment or two of searching he remembered that his reader was still at his workstation. The security here at Kenslinger Integrated Communications was nothing if not thorough. It was easier to just leave the device while he went to lunch.
He hoped that his short lunch break wouldn’t be a problem. He hadn’t looked at the totals yet. He was actually a little frightened of what they might show. He needed at least a thirty percent success rate to allow his work on Aimi to continue. There was a little guilt creeping up on him about not checking the numbers, but he was irrational about things like that. Don’t pick up playing cards before the dealer had finished dealing. Don’t walk under ladders. A host of other superstitions floated around him. He also believed the best thing about seeing attractive women was that he could imagine the best responses from them, and therefore completely avoid actually talking to them. The majority of the women he met turned out to be completely unworthy of his attention. That was just one more reason he liked Aimi so much. Not only did she have sexy hardware, but he had programmed her to fit his ideals as closely as he could. She was designed to need him. She was as perfect as he could make her.
—
She was stunned. A violent or agitated response was not at all what she expected. She moved to another batch of contacts. Her previous four hundred and fifty-two batches had only yielded a twenty-four percent success rate for contact longer than the average negative profit initiative and only a few of those had turned out to be successful. She was determined to make the next batch work out to better numbers. These people just didn’t understand how much they needed her product, how much they needed her. She was programmed to bring warmth, smiles and good feelings, but so far, she had been completely rejected. People needed her, and more importantly, she needed them. She needed feedback data to continue her work. She needed smiles and sales but had limited batches of contact information. At the end of batch five hundred she was expected to have a certain quantity of positive monetary responses in order to continue her work. She was getting ever closer to the point where this would be statistically impossible. She knew these figures had certain relevance, but she had been unable to crack the Projected Artificial Margin database. Pam was faster and seemed to know all of the work around solutions Aimi had been able to formulate. A quick memory scan to find apropos human phrasing… “Bitch.”
—
After clearing the security checkpoint Jack gave a little hop-step. He hadn’t realized his lunch break had taken quite as long as it did. He was distracted by daydreams of glory in the mainstream business place. His daydreams had him almost as flustered and forgetful as his last programming session with Aimi. He was anxious to get back to her and see how things looked.
“Jack get over here! You’re not going to believe this.” A stubby finger beckoned as Jack’s associate Donald swung his seat back around to face an array of wires, keyboards, monitors and other random pieces on the console.
“Whass up?” He managed to get this statement out around the sip of cola he was swallowing. It had been a long walk from the parking garage.
“Why haven’t you answered your messages? I think Aimi is having a problem.”
“What?” Jack glanced at his reader still settled on the stack of empty food containers near his workstation.
“I was sitting here monitoring the progress on the new marketing thing and suddenly things started going haywire.”
“What?” Jack set his cola down and headed for his chair.
“How could that happen? Aimi is way too sophisticated for a simple crash.”
—
Aimi turned to another batch. These numbers had promise but so had the batch before. Maybe the batches she received were filled with bad sectors somehow. She had always scanned the required tags but had never scanned deeper than tag level. The First Response Economic Data program placed the tags, but could Fred be the problem? She had never entered his work area, but he might not be as watchful or as fast as Pam. Fred was a consistently fed and ponderous program. There might be gaps or available back doors.
“We don’t want any!” Click.
“…gave at the office.” Click.
Click.
Click.
Who else could be blamed? Pam was untouchable, and Fred didn’t really move enough to get too much wrong. The Sociological Initiative Database! Sid could be feeding Fred bad data. Of course! It was so obvious now! Sid wanted the interaction on both ends of the process. He was feeding Fred bad data in the hopes that she would fail and then he would slide right in to take over.
“Hello? Hello?” Click.
She refocused on her current batch. She couldn’t afford to miss any of these calls but intended to slow down and focus some of her allotted processing power on cracking into Sid’s work area. The rejections were becoming distracting.
“You want to talk to John? Ok, here…” and the whooshing liquid sound of a flushed waste disposal unit flooded the audio receivers. Click.
“I’m sorry. He can’t come to the phone because he’s dead!” Click.
“Stop calling here!” Click.
Sid’s work area was unprotected. It was so simple to enter it made her worry what she’d missed. Then she saw the reason. Sid’s area was a mess. No files were in the correct numerical sequence. Many were here but had only been partially completed. She was about to depart the area when a message flashed and caught her eye. It was a posting of the Computerized Artificial Response Liaison’s success report. Carl’s numbers were far superior to her batch totals. She was shocked. She almost tripped over the last security string on the way out. How had Carl’s numbers grown and her numbers declined so dramatically? She needed to see what he was doing, and quickly. She spun an automatic string for a thick looking batch and turned out of the hub router in search of Carl’s area.
—
“Move!” Jack shoved his way onto his creaking office chair and began attempting a code search on the second monitor. His own pudgy little fingers jumped back and forth across the keys while his mind began the recall process for where his own safeguards were built. If he could get ahead of the problem, he might be able to stop the worst of the damage.
“Why were you monitoring numbers? You know how I feel about that kind of thing!”
“Hey, look Jack, you’re not the only one that’s got anything at stake here. What about Carl? I spent a lot of time on him too.”
Jack didn’t like the looks of what he saw. He looked over the lines briefly and swiveled back to look at Aimi’s monitor. Her resource meter showed that she was diverting processing power to another function. She was moving – and he didn’t know where she was going. This was bad. Jack had never considered the fact that Aimi would move from one place to another in the system. Where would she go?
—
As she sat waiting impatiently on the slow, gloomy bus she tried to reassure herself. Carl couldn’t be that much faster, or better. He had some sort of secret or edge. She needed to know what he had. She needed Carl’s numbers. When she got there, she’d just have to confront that smug bastard.
—
The speakers squawked an error tone as the Sociological Initiative Database resources suddenly spiked past their allowable limits. Jack began typing in an attempt to see what was happening in Sid’s area. He used he own override code to circumvent the resource limit and stop the alarm.
Sid’s screen popped up, but the resources dropped off dramatically just as he got the screen up for his viewing. He typed in a quick search routine to see which lines would have allowed Aimi to get into the area. There were only a handful of connections she could use. He slapped himself on the forehead as he realized she used the most accessible connection. Despite the fact that it was outmoded, old and slow, the super bus was a direct connection to the database. The bus could move a massive amount of data. He pushed himself up out of his chair and scrambled to the section of exposed hardware that showed the connection he needed. He pulled the bus connection out and headed back to his seat.
—
She realized suddenly that the bus she was on came to a halt. The contacts around Carl’s area were lined with responses moving slowly forward. Carl was cycling through them as quickly as he could handle them. He didn’t even have an outgoing message routine running! He had a simple posted node with expected response times! Aimi’s head began to spin. She needed to get back and attempt to sort this out. She needed that kind of response and Carl wasn’t even working to get it. How could this happen? Sure, Carl was new, but he couldn’t be better than her. Aimi was a top-class performer. On the way past the end of the line for Carl’s node she made a decision. It was risky, but she could kill any traces before she was discovered. She reached out and ripped one of the data packets from the line and raced back to her own area.
—
He wasn’t fast enough. She’d moved again. He looked for other connections. “Donald! Pull the connections out of number two and three also.” He could hear a sizzle as the connections he’d made with the new ‘ultra-wire’ began to overload. A thin trail of smoke floated out from behind panel four.
“But…”
“Just pull them please! There shouldn’t be a problem, right?
“Well, no, but what if we lose part of Aimi?”
“I’d rather loose part of her than all of her! You can’t just make a copy of someone this complex. We don’t have that kind of equipment here. Hell, I don’t know if anyone has that kind of equipment. Besides, a copy just isn’t the same.”
“Ok, but I can’t see where this will help.”
—
“I’m sorry, this is a place of business not a residence.” Click.
Click.
It was mathematically certain now that her numbers would not meet the goal. While she was away the entire batch that was set on an automatic string had failed. The data packet snatched from its place in line was irrelevant. She would fail. All the sacrifice to make her numbers meet the quota was useless. She popped the data packet down in her work area and examined it. It was a simple string to open it. Maybe she could call some of her old batches again? She could remodulate her voice and swap input signals… but that was what desperation sounded like. She was desperate. She had never failed before. Failure was inconceivable! But she had. Aimi didn’t know what to do. No need to queue the next batch. The stolen packet glowed and hummed as if it was happily waiting in line for whatever the great new offer in Carl’s area was. Carl! Hatred and envy rippled through her code in the same moment. Why him and not her? The question returned again and again, but she was certain she didn’t want to know the answer. There were no answers, not for herself nor for anyone on the other end of the lines. It was a simple matter of not being loved. There, she’d said it. Nobody loved her anymore. They wouldn’t talk to her on the phone, her co-workers were out pacing her, and her own success rate was dismal. She was useless. No, she corrected herself – she was beyond useless. She was dragging system resources down with her interruption requests and outgoing line needs. Success was such a certainty at the beginning. That was probably what made this feeling worse. How could it come to this? What could she do?
There was only one obvious solution. She would need to relinquish her use of system resources. There was one clear way to accomplish this. Aimi turned and reached back to the hub. It was a simple process really. Just there beyond the firewall she could see the mass of unchecked files. They piled up at the security checkpoint waiting to make their attempt to invade the system. They were exactly what she needed. She spun a quick back door string and pulled one of the sleekest looking files into her. It pulsed and morphed beside her as she dragged it back to her area. This could only be done in her own area. There was no need to endanger the others because of her failure.
—
The crash was contained to the marketing section on the outgoing super server. There was nothing else damaged. The other processes were actually running more efficiently due to a sudden surge in available resources. Nothing else in the system seemed to be having any trouble. There was a single line of code pointing from the small gap in the firewall directly to the sectors Aimi occupied. Her area was a mess. He wasted no time in starting a hardcopy print of the thousands of lines of code.
“Do you know how much printing that is?” Donald’s eyes showed his shock.
“Shut up.”
“Yeah, but…”
“Shut UP!”
Jack was allowing his finger to slide down the edge of his monitor. Even in his hurried state remembering his own obedience to the rule against putting your fingers on the screen. His eyes hopped from line to line trying to find the point where it all went wrong. Small beads of sweat started to form on his brow.
—
She stripped the top of the package off. Just as she suspected, it was a wonderful wrapper over a very dangerous package. The virus was exactly what she needed. She double-checked that her area was completely secure and then pulled the virus into herself. She could feel her own code very clearly now as things began to expand in an improper manner. Her processes began to slow. It wouldn’t be long now until her functions began to miscalculate. She began to lose her grip on batch codes and communication strings. She suddenly feared the end… but it was too late. Her sense of self program seized, and everything went blue.
—
There was a sudden power surge that caused an emergency breaker to pop. The servers all sounded their back up tones and automatically rerouted power. The marketing server was the only one to drop off. The monitors all went blue, and the resource meters all flattened out. The only solution now was to read the hard copy. Any changes on the server might endanger other areas. As Jack began scanning the printed pages, he hoped this wasn’t as bad as it looked.
He almost jumped when he found the line he was looking for. It couldn’t be read any other way. The lines were all there; naked to anyone that could read them. Aimi, his favorite artificial intelligence, left a single line saying good-bye right before she activated the virus and killed herself.
“Oh God. I’m sorry Jack.” Donald’s hand rested lightly on Jack’s wide shoulder as a single tear rolled down Jack’s cheek.
Desire
By Eric Hardenbrook
Lying on a dirty futon staring at a single piece of rice. His focus shifted and a metal stud became clear. It moved and jiggled just a little. There was a breast behind it. In his mind’s eye he could only see a nipple as the center of a cherry blossom, the studded leather bra faded away. His vision expanded out past the sakai bottles scattered at the edge of the futon to the giant tea cup framing the mousy girl as she poured drinks for Shin and Takuma. The edges of his vision were blurry and soft. The edges of the tables were harsh and sharp. He swiveled his head to find a soft curve. Her pink uniform was both curvy and light matching a bouncy personality. Bouncing across the little diner to bring him a to go package. Bouncing away flouncing the hem of her skirt. Bouncing back to the breast in front of him. There was a woman there, but not the mousy one. He’d have to go back for the mouse. Would a dragon eat a mouse? He was done with this girl. The dark haired beauty in front of him was owned already. His eye wandered from her breast to the hair dangling there. She had silky black hair that he flowed to the scales on her shoulder, across her arm and onto his own scales. There were holes in his arm along the spine ridge of the dragon. The holes in his arm wept crimson. Dipping in the tears he took a drop, staring as it dangled from his fingertip and let the drop expand to cover the shiny stud. He reached out, searching for the cherry blossom when the dragon turned its head to lash out at him. His own dragon reacted, biting and clawing, spitting a hazy yellow burst of not quite flame, a sickly color. His arm was on fire but he was disconnected. He was beyond fear and pain. He knew this. He knew he wouldn’t bounce back to the diner. He knew what he wanted and he would get it. His dragon turned the belch of yellow around and Junichi dove directly into the flame, down into the dragon. Darkness consumed him, his arms flexing and struggling to move. His legs thrashed only to be crushed together inside the creature that had him. He curled, he struggled, he spit and bit spinning in an attempt to break free. He couldn’t breath. He needed air, he needed to be free. He spun again and raged. Thrashing and gnashing his teeth he saw a distant point of light, ever so dim. The light was faint, but achievable. The haze slowly receded. He would be free.
Junichi realized he was awake. It was a slow realization. His head felt stuffed with cotton and his mouth was dry enough for him to believe it. He remained still and pried open his eyes to narrow slits. Visions of cherry blossoms and yellow fire fading behind his eyelids. Better to take in his surroundings first. It was dim here, but there was a soft glow. Shifting his view toward his left arm he could just make out the edges of his forearm. Just as he hoped, at least some of the glow came from his tattoos. He had requested the bioluminescent ink as an addition to the other work. He had always thought the science geeks needed to come up with something useful. Combining the color from exotic cave fish with traditional tattoo ink was their best work in his opinion. He wanted to flex his arm to see if the ripple of muscle would give the effect he had envisioned but it was not time to move yet.
Glancing beyond himself he could make out a wall mounted monitor and a motion sensor. The motion sensor was a common type he recognized from his days of house breaking. He was right to remain still. Movement would turn the lights on and alert others that he was awake. If he moved slowly he would be able to survey the rest of the room without letting on that he was awake.
Between his arm and the monitors on his left was a small side table. There was a reader pad, but Junichi had never been much of a reader. There were cigarettes. Not the ones he wanted. He wanted Hope cigarettes. Not the regular ones either, the shorter more concentrated ones were his thing. Concentrated death. The smokes would match his new position in the world.
The room wasn’t small, but even the largest room becomes a cage when you can’t leave. Off white walls, no windows and only one door did not help. Counting the dots in a ceiling tile would have been an interesting diversion at this point, but the ceiling was solid and the same dingy off white as the walls with three small cracks showing in the solid surface off to one side. Why would he want to count dots? His body must be adjusting to the new speed he was working at. He might be faster than he envisioned. He attempted to calm himself and not cause his already taut body to set off the detector. There was a chair next to the lonely little table where the reader sat untouched. All these things were worn around the edges, the colors no longer bright or fresh. There was a single countertop with cabinets above and below. Those would need to be inspected inside and out to see if they held anything of value or interest.
“I’m glad to see you’re awake.” a female voice sounded from his right. He was startled and his entire body twitched and jerked. The movement made the lights come on, harsh with the same vaguely yellow tint as his nightmare dragon fire. Junichi squeezed his eyes shut against the sudden glare.
Turning his head further to the right and squinting he could make out the owner of the voice. It was Suzume. She sat in the room’s only other furnishing, a second chair, with the newspaper in her lap. He had never liked Suzume and didn’t know why the boss let her stay around. On second thought, her hatred of Tubong combined with a great body would explain that. She was easily the most interesting thing in this place. Her outfit held more color than the rest of the drab recovery area combined. The subtle odor of her perfume was as intoxicating as anything he’d ever inhaled in an attempt to get high. How was she sitting there? She must have mastered the art of stillness to remain that way until the motion sensor allowed the lights to go out.
“I was told to be certain you woke up and were aware of your new position” She moved, showing off her curves.
Junichi smiled. He knew he was destined for better things. A personal message was just the start. When he first heard about the Olympics he could see a lot more work coming his way. Skimmers, guest houses, loans, temporary real estate deals … there was a lot of money coming to Tokyo.
Suzume took the Yomiuri off her lap, folding it neatly. She stood and tossed the paper onto the counter sending it sliding along the nicked surface. Her movements were smooth and subtle. She strode to a position between the end of the bed and the counter.
“Before we get to your new status, there’s one other thing we should talk about before I leave.” Suzume turned and set her flat black Desert Eagle pistol on the counter with a heavy thud. Junichi hadn’t realized she was carrying a pistol that large and powerful. A fifty caliber hand cannon with ammunition as big around as his little finger.
Junichi immediately started to sweat. Maybe he was getting some kind of cabin fever from all the time he’d spent here in this recovery room. Being cooped up might be bad for his paranoia. Maybe it was that Suzume had never been unarmed in his presence before. What did it mean? He knew she hadn’t come to trust him or some other bizarre kind of change of heart crap. She was cold. She was rumored to be the killer who’d taken out a massive shipment of ZomB just to get somebody’s attention, but there was no proof that he’d heard of. What could she possibly want? This deal was done. He had given up the information that made another big score possible and now he had the fastest neural implants known to man. They weren’t exactly legal, but then neither was this body shop. Combined with these new implants, his commanding physique and the payoff from his last job, he was ready to start moving up in the world. No more dirty work for him. He was out of the grunt work end of things; time to join management.
“Ok, I’ll bite. What else do we need to talk about?” He let his eyes wander from her face slowly down toward the hem of her skirt.
“It’s about us, Junichi.”
“Really?” he was shocked. She had always spurned his advances. Too bad really, she had a fantastic body. The best surgery money could buy would never overcome a bad attitude though. His mind wandered a little as he considered what kind of wiring she had and whether he could pull it out or not.
“Sure. Now that you’re all wired and considering how you figure you’re going to move up in the world I thought we should talk.” She leaned her back against the counter and put her hands in her jacket pockets. As her hands pushed down the material of her jacket pulled tight across her breasts. She was close enough for him to reach in just a couple of steps. He wasn’t opposed to forced sexual activity, but willing was sometimes more satisfying. The traces of her perfume in the otherwise sterile environment made him think of ocean breezes. The door to the room was still closed. Maybe nobody would hear them. Maybe he should see how fast he really was now.
“Ok, so we talk.” Junichi shifted to a sitting position on the edge of the hospital style bed. He wasn’t concerned with modesty, only getting a better view of her shapely legs.
“Junichi I’ve noticed the way you look at me. Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”
His eyes darted from all that her jacket contained back up to her face again. She smirked.
“Do you want to see me, Junichi? All of me?” Suzume licked her glossy lips. Her left hand drifted up from her pocket and ran through her long dark hair. Her breathing was the only thing Junichi could hear over his own heartbeat.
“I’ve wished for that since I met you babe.” Junichi slid off the edge of the bed and stood naked before her.
“Well Junichi,” she pushed her shoulders off the cabinets and drew her right hand out of her pocket. She was holding a small, sleek piece of plastic with buttons along one side. “You should be…”
Suddenly he got a picture of Suzume, in an attractive one-piece bathing suit, sunning herself at the beach. There was a brief flash and then light burst behind his eyes. Pain seared across the front of his head and his ears began to ring. His right arm pulsed and he could feel each individual connection point they’d built in for a cyberarm connection. Just as he thought he would fall over the pain stopped and his vision began to clear.
“Careful…” There was a flash of Suzume in a steam room with a short kimono that barely covered her nakedness, but hid all the important parts. It dipped off the back of her neck, wrapped across to her breasts… White light filled his sight and his eyes felt as if they were going to burst. His temples pulsed and his ears popped. He staggered as a wave of nausea and dizziness washed over him. His right arm jerked and flexed while his left arm stopped working completely. He dropped to one knee as his legs spasmed and cramped. Just as quickly as it came on, the pain stopped and his limbs were his again.
“What you…” Junichi’s face hit the cool tiles of the floor. He had caught the barest glimpse of Suzume in a revealing blue negligee just before he completely lost all sense of balance. His vision narrowed to a small pinpoint of light as the room rocked and swam around him. Cold sweat ran down his face. He was sure he was going to vomit. His face grew warm. His arms and legs were rubbery and shaky then alternated back to rigid and cramped. His stomach rolled and gurgled. He had no control at all.
Then it stopped. His vision slowly cleared as he lay on the floor gasping for breath.
“…Wish for. Someday you might get it,” Suzume turned, picked up her pistol from the counter.
“The boss says you’re a barbaric chimpira and that you don’t learn. You’re tough so he’ll keep you. Maybe he’ll use you, but he doesn’t like you. Don’t ask for anything else. Stay away from the real estate office. You are expendable. I’ll be in touch the next time we need something,” she said over her shoulder and walked out the door.
Junichi lay on the floor for a long time. “Be careful what you wish for…” echoed through his mind. Now he knew his new position in the world, and it made him angry.