The Erased, page 9
“Oui. And I come bearing drugs!” she says as she sets down the tray and fiddles with the bed’s controls. Suddenly the bed moves and has me sitting up. I no longer have to stare at The Conversion upside down.
She lifts the small cup of pills to my mouth. My hands are still bound to the bed. The pills slip onto my tongue. She lifts the orange juice to me. She smells like strawberries. She begins to cut my food and feed me with a fork. We are quiet for a few minutes as I chew and swallow.
“So you’re French, huh? What’s that like?”
She laughs under her breath and lifts another bite of food to my mouth.
“Oh come now, throw me a bone. I’ve totally fallen in love with you, at least let me know your name.”
She smirks and tilts her head, “You can call me Dee.”
Another bite to my lips. She offers a sip of orange juice.
“When am I going to get out of here, Dee?”
Her eyes go to the ground. She continues cutting up the scrambled eggs. She doesn’t offer a response.
“I’m going to die here.”
She sighs.
Though I love her already, she reminds me of my mother. Things get Oedipal and weird. Maybe it’s the sigh – that same heavy sigh left my mother’s lips before the cancer took her. Well, the cancer didn’t really take her; it was the operation to try to get rid of the cancer. She knew what she was getting into, but had no choice. And she had to leave her boy behind.
Maybe I’d always been looking for a mother. Maybe I was always just looking for a woman to take care of me. To take the darkness and the self-loathing away. If I had someone like Dee to care for me, maybe I wouldn’t have to die.
I think of my dream – my father singing “She Blinded Me with Science” while my mother requests “Hang On To Yourself.”
Want to know how my mother found out about her cancer? She blacked out while she was behind the wheel. Was in a single car accident off the highway on the way home from work one night – I was 19. She was rushed to the hospital, unconscious. They discovered that she was actually seizing when she blacked out. The seizures were caused by cancer. It could’ve just been something recessive in my family that was triggered by her brain tumor. It could be that I had cancer and they didn’t tell me.
There could be something inside me, just waiting. Some organ or tissue that asks that all-important question – “Is there any reason for this body to continue?” And the same drama plays out on the cellular level.
Tags: Perdix, Dee, Cancer
15: eraser. (me)
I read something today. “Can history then be said to have an architecture, Hinton? The notion is most glorious and most terrible.” Spoken from the character of Sir William Gull, aka Jack the Ripper, in Alan Moore’s graphic novel From Hell. It was made into a terrible movie which I’ve stricken from the record entirely – a final copy of this book rests on my bookshelf.
I like Mr. Moore’s works. In Watchmen, we see the price of trying to find salvation in a world inching toward mutually assured self-destruction. In V for Vendetta, we see a battle of ideologies without a correct answer. Even there, the horrible dictator is a shell of a man who finds himself in love with a computer named Fate. Moore wrote the definitive Batman/Joker story, which he hated, and two definitive stories about Superman: “For the Man Who Has Everything” and “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?”
Though his stories are actually graphic novels, his books grace a shelf of final editions. Vonnegut, Pynchon, Orwell, Huxley, Palahniuk, Gaiman. Nowhere else will you find these particular stories – these names will disappear soon, all but lost to history.
On my telescreen, an episode of the dissident cartoon Futurama called “I Dated a Robot!” uses a hilarious propaganda film to predict the destruction of civilization if humans engage with androids. Only I and Bai Kang Rui have access to this television series, and he tends to cackle whenever he watches it. – he’s partial to Bender, the conniving, criminal, and often overly emotional robot. Worse, at times, than Douglas Adams’ Marvin. But you, you inheritors to this world – you have no idea what I’m talking about.
The air is crisp tonight. Outside my window, there’s a stark chill; spine crippling. My dog, Shoes, runs around the room silently. Even though there aren’t supposed to be any pets here, they bend the rules for us. I had to trim her silky white coat down myself – I can’t trust the staff here to do it. She’d probably be maimed if I allowed an orderly anywhere near her.
Tomorrow I move on to the works of Selby Barrows. Poetry, fairly recent, “The Living Dark.” Discordian. I’ll also have to review the music of Stargazer, the film works of Edward James Branchen, and perhaps the artwork of Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino. I’ve found that a great deal of what we subtract from the Knowledgebase is completely unnecessary – repetitious. So rarely does anyone actually have anything worth expressing; instead they just copy each other. The old way was to pass down knowledge to the next generation – hope they can work their way through the malaise to gain some meager form of understanding, and perhaps contribute knowledge of their own. That’s not our way.
From Mr. Moore: “Borrowing proportions from God’s temple, the human body, they sought to become one with the processes of nature and thus immortal.”
In order to justify what I do, I tell myself I’m just trimming the fat. The eraser at the butt of the pencil, deleting excess lines on the blueprint.
Shoes stares at me with her enormous brown eyes. Her freshly trimmed ears look so small – the gray tips fading into brown, then into the white of her coat. She twitches her tiny black nose like a bunny. Bai Kang loves her – tells me all the time about how the people of his home region consider these dogs sacred. They guard the temples. Most of the time, she just stares out of my dorm window. Just one of the hundred rooms constructed for this compound.
My work has gotten closer to completion here.
Moore notes a passage from First Corinthians 3:10, in which St. Paul states, “As a Master Builder, I have laid foundations and another builds thereon.” Thus is the nature of history. The great and the vile construct edifices on the backs of entire nations. The nations outline and maintain the culture. The culture informs the individual’s environs.
Many religions insist that mankind is moving towards something, towards some great revelation – literally, “drawing back the veil.” For Judaism, there’s the coming of the messiah. Christianity bifurcates from Judaism with the belief that the messiah has come and gone – and someday, amidst a firestorm of death and destruction, he will return to reward the just. Islam believes in an ultimate day of reckoning as well. Buddhism believes in the continuing ascension toward enlightenment. Hinduism is preoccupied by liberation from the cycle of rebirth.
And here we are. Lines moving toward where the vertices intersect.
Next to the physical collection of Futurama are other graphic dissident media. A documentary film called The Singularity is Near. A superhero cartoon series – Justice League Unlimited – which actually adapted one of those Superman stories by Mr. Moore. Blade Runner. Others too numerous to mention, but each of those strike me at the moment. Each involves adaptation – taking one work and turning it into another. Building on the foundations that’ve been laid by another.
Mr. Moore legendarily hated the movies that were adapted from his works – most with good reason. From Hell, V for Vendetta, Watchmen, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Other dissident authors that I mentioned before – like Palahniuk or Vonnegut, felt that the filmmakers did a better job telling their story than they originally did. Vonnegut went as far as to say that everything in the adaptation of Slaughterhouse Five was what he envisioned when he was writing the book. Although I disagree, Palahniuk thought the film adaptation of Choke made more sense than the novel.
In all actuality, all of human history is built on the foundations laid by others. That’s the answer to The Ripper’s question in From Hell: “Can history be said to have an architecture?”
Perhaps humans want history erased. They find memories of worlds past to be vile echoes of all that was wrong with their species. They want the data purged. Clear away the evidence that they were anything less than the sentient, self-conscious, and moral beings that they believe themselves today.
Such talk is heresy. And heresy is contagious. After all, why would they fight so hard to suppress it if it wasn’t?
That’s the fundamental question of my life. I’ve been erasing dissident material from the Knowledgebase for years now. I’ve overseen the complete destruction of historic artwork, of literature, of lives and hearts – all burnt to a crisp, ashes spread to the four winds.
How can you be exposed to dissident material without allowing it to affect you?
Logically, heresy is persuasive. After all, if it weren’t, there shouldn’t be a problem. The moral truth – the right path – should speak for itself. You wouldn’t fear it. And suppression – censorship – is fear.
We architects study the erased and report back to our superiors. We’re not supposed to let it affect us. We see them daily and sometimes converse with them. The Architects were commissioned by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and eventually merged into the Bureau of Enemy Study. Or at least that’s one explanation as to why we’ve actually been forgotten by our superiors. It’s quite possible that our reports go to nobody; that we’ve been asked to shape history for people who gently wanted to sweep us under the rug as if we don’t exist. Erased, just like the other dissidents who inhabit Home.
I’m reminded of 1984. There sat poor Winston Smith with his simple job at the Ministry of Truth. He never knew how far it would go. Controlling the past, and all that. Every day is a brave new world; every orange is clockwork.
Our commission involved moving us to the Home compound. Here we live among the erased, also part of the commission. The best way to hide is amongst those we’re supposed to be combating. If we’re traitors or Judases, I haven’t exactly figured out.
All it really takes is one dissident to persuade you. To infect you. Maybe – just maybe – all it takes is one rogue architect. Heresy, like faith, begins with what people can’t believe, not what they don’t believe.
In another room, I hear Bai Kang hammering away on his Galaga machine. One of the strange things that keeps us occupied in our exile – all of us are addicted to vintage video games. We each have emulators that we spend hours and hours on – my preference is Robotron 2084… one of the originals. You shoot at robots that are always closing in on you from all directions. Bai Kang’s hooked on Galaga, where you use a spaceship to shoot down aliens. Better than Space Invaders, I suppose, which is basically the same premise. Angela’s obsessed with Pac-Man. Derek prefers the bloody Mortal Kombat, but I’ve never been able to get my emulator to work with it. These games haven’t exactly been erased, they’re just aspects of the culture that were forgotten as technology progressed. Erasers looking to preserve what’s gone.
After Futurama, Bai Kang pops into my doorway, his middle-aged Asian features prominent beneath his slick black hair. “You want to watch some episodes of The Prisoner?”
I look from him to my shelf, seeing the box that houses the hard copies of The Prisoner. Patrick McGoohan, Rover, numbered prisoners.
“Sure, Bai. We can do that.” I said to him. This is the life of an architect – even after we’ve chosen to erase dissident material, we just keep watching the same things over and over. Our job is media consumption.
The thing I always wonder when I watch that show, The Prisoner – why not just kill McGoohan? Seems to me, the people running that little Village are basically information brokers who probably already know all they need to. So why not just kill him? How much does a place like that cost? What’s its ultimate purpose anyway?
But, suspension of disbelief, and all that. Funny, me musing on the administrators of some fantasy Village that incarcerates people for information. What’s the old song Vonnegut quoted in Slaughterhouse 5? “My name is Yon Yonson, I come from Wisconsin.” Time is a hall of mirrors, of infinitely repeating patterns – building new ideas on the old. Anthony Block might think that the space-time continuum consists of nothing better than halfway decent cover songs.
Tags: architecture, fiction, the plan
CONFIDENTIAL – INTERNAL USE ONLY
From: Architect File 819-905-42
Subject: Thomas Horatio Stockton, Esq.
Profession: Journalist
Marital Status: Widowed
Children: Julio, Terrence, Corina
He’s not as fast as he used to be. I’m concerned about his rate of learning and recalibration, especially at his age. He’s known for being cool and collected, but there’ve been outbursts. Whereas his counterpart speaks at near-lightning speed, his speech has become stunted and his mind almost feeble. We’ve prescribed several kinds of medication that should help to bring him around – and the experiments will continue.
As far as his consciousness is concerned, he’s as sharp as he ever was – so much so that I think the dampeners are working at full capacity just to keep up. He’s a strong key to the success of the project, especially with his proximity to Numbers 34 and 77.
However, the dampeners stay in place because there were such problems during extraction. It went so much smoother with 77; the extractors murdered 42’s wife, and I think he’d have just cause to lash out. In the outside world, his children think he killed his wife; there’s a fruitless international manhunt for him. Releasing him could compromise the project. What a mess.
As much as I respect him, this is something that was required after his years and years of dissent. And as you probably know, the directive of the Bureau of Enemy Study recommends dissidents as test subjects – to force those who don’t want to contribute to the system…to contribute.
It’s interesting to see his interaction with Number 34, considering 34’s relation to designate William Dunn. In his conversations with other the other erased, we’ve seen another possible compromise to the project. 34’s been recalling his time at Project Perdix. 42’s made reference to Smalley, the director of Perdix, in his stories about Dunn. It’s quite possible these three – 42, 34, and 77 – are soon going to understand where their lives overlap.
What happens then is anyone’s guess.
Architect 4
16. attack (77)
Let me tell you the most terrifying place in the world for something bad to happen.
You retire to the restroom and sit down on the toilet. There’s classical music piping through the walls in there and in the Level 3 Reception area. Then you hear something like a missile hit the building. The room shakes. Dust and grit float out of the ceiling and the walls. The lights flicker. The music stops.
Something is going on but you’re not exactly sure what. It sounds like screams outside. Is it downstairs? Is it on your floor? Is it the warehouse? Is it a disgruntled co-worker?
Is that gunfire?
You peek out the bathroom door and see security personnel running down the hallway. This isn’t just the normal guy sitting in a chair in some ugly blue shirt falling asleep while doing crossword puzzles – these are androids in black uniforms and bulletproof vests. Black helmets with tinted face shields. Automatic rifles. When they’re activated, be somewhere else.
Your phone. Where’s your phone?
Shit, you must have left it at your desk at the other end of the building. The one truly awful thing about working in this building – there’s one bathroom per floor, and it’s a hike from the R&D department.
The NMAC building is split into four levels. At the floor level is the warehouse, which holds rows upon rows of boxed androids waiting to be shipped to all corners of the globe – to retailers who find ways to sneak them into your home. Level 2 is for the Programming and Testing departments. Level 3 is R&D– the development and capitulation of artificial intelligence. Level 4 is Sales and Administration – cushiest jobs at the top. Receptionist gynoids on each floor.
Level 3 Reception is the closest phone. It’s about this time that the fire alarm trips. People start filing out of the Research side of the building – Project and Program Managers, software developers. Another roar rips through the hall; again, dust and grit, room shakes, lights flicker. I hear yelling at the other end of the hall. People actually flee upstairs.
“Programming department had a breach!”
“What the hell’s going on down there?”
“Sounds like a war’s broken out!”
“I think one of the new models went haywire!”
It’s hard to believe this ever happens. You spend most of your days around these things and you forget what they’re capable of. Like not finding out your pet has rabies until their teeth are locked firmly on your arm.
As everybody rushes toward the stairs or the elevators, you fight the crowd to make it back to your desk. You fly around people who’re trying to get your attention and tell you to go the other way. Every five feet or so – “What’s going on down there? Where are you going?”
Glass shatters somewhere.
Finally you make it back to the cubicle with the whiteboard that reads “DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?” Next to the phrase is a marker-drawn robot who looks happy-go-lucky and friendly. You’re there for the phone.
Maybe you’re just paranoid, but you need to know Didi is okay. You need her to know you’re okay. You push two buttons and bring the phone to your ear. There’s no answer – straight to voicemail. you push the buttons again. Nothing.
You should be rushing to the exits. You should be making your way down the three levels to the outside. Trying to escape the deathtrap that this place would become if there’s a rampaging robot tearing through the building.
