‘His mother told him someday you will be a man,
And you will be the leader of a big old band.
Many people coming from miles around,
To hear you play your music when the sun go down.
Maybe someday your name will be in lights,
Saying Johnny B. Goode tonight…’
They let the song play out before turning off the golden record. It had been found aboard the spacecraft, Voyager, which had floated helplessly into the magnetic webbing. They did not know the language of course, but the music had a nice bounce to it! A species the producers would no doubt like to meet. They began a message:
"Found another one.”
Chapter One
I came to slowly, my mind fighting through a slowly clearing fog. I could do nothing but ever so slightly shake my head. That woman must have dispensed some kind of powerful sedative. I was no longer at the station, and I could hear the gentle hum of a fan. This was it. I hope they, whoever they were, made it quick. I always had an odd kind of ease about death. Maybe because of my early exposures. That was what that school appointed therapist had told me at least.
Pain, now that was another story. There’s a cruelty to pain. I understand it from the whole evolutionary perspective. We monkeys needed triggers to inform us that something we were doing was not in our best interest. Don’t put your paw in the fire. Don’t eat your tail, you need that. But now that we are these big brained intellectuals, we get the point. Most of us can be pretty miserable even without pain. Life is tough enough already. Stop beating a dead horse. Some say no pain no gain. Ask the gazelle who is about to get munched on by a lion what they have to say about that. What’s there to gain from that arrangement? Pain for pain sake is just torture with better marketing.
A voice interrupted the panic spiraling. I couldn’t tell where it was coming from, but I did recognize it - it was of that woman. The one who had bamboozled me into this.
“It is going to take you some time to acclimate and regain your faculties. Try and relax”.
“Please! You can’t take my organs! I’m not a donor. Check my ID. I have a family. A kid I support. They need me!”
“Pffft, come on Tommy. You don’t a kid. Sasha can’t conceive”
“How…do you know my name? And how do you know Sasha?”
Sasha and I had been introduced at my friend Andy’s bachelor party… at a strip club. I had finished the most boneless hot wings in one sitting. Sasha is what you might generously call a marital aid. No, I didn’t name her, it was on her tag. She’s a sex doll. We get along well.
She ignored the question and repeated herself. “Try and relax little buddy. Proxy Project testing is now live.”
I lost consciousness again.
————-
Earlier that day
Bee Bee Bap, Bee Bee Bap..
Ah. Another day.
I flipped over, feebly flailing at the snooze button for the the fourth time of the morning. I stared up at the ceiling, working through the math in my head. If I cut the shower down to three minutes and get coffee at Lake Station instead of doing my usual home brew, I could be at the office two minutes before work. One more snooze should be OK.
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Three more snoozes and a frantic hour later and I was on the train, pulling in to Lake Station. I was stretching for my 800 meter qualifying sprint to the office, but the doors didn’t open. The train began to move and pick up speed again.
“What in the…”
The monotonous and lifeless voice of the conductor came through over the loudspeaker.
“Attention passengers, this train now identifies as an Orange Line and will not stop at Lake. Those who were transferring to the Blue line should ride to Randolph, transfer to the Purple Line, ride to Hay Merry, transfer to the green line to Kent, transfer back to the Purple Line at Davis, and then get on to the blue line at Main.”
Come on now, please not again.
Jen was going to be pissed. Jen was pissed when I was on time. Jen was pissed on Monday because it wasn’t Friday and on Friday because it wasn’t Sunday. Her perpetual pissiness was one of the qualities that likely made her an indispensable middle manager.
‘Well,’ I thought as I walked up to my office building, now almost an hour late, ‘let’s get this over with.’
Jen had two primary flavors of bitchy. There was aggressive and in your face, and there was the backhanded, condescending route. She garnished with a general aura of superiority and ‘I’m judging you’ energy. She really was the worst.
I walked out of the elevator and pushed open the swing glass door into Lake Shore Strategic Marketing Initiatives. Jen was waiting next to Leah at the reception desk.
"Good afternoon Thomas".
“It's 9:52 Jen. And like I’ve told you before, I go by Tommy. Only my mother called me Thomas, and only when she was angry with me."
"That’s three times in the last two weeks, Tom. I gave Dan a ring, and he is not happy. He said to get Ria to put you on the schedule for tomorrow. He will try to make it in to join."
Dan was COO, and Ria was the head of Human Resources. Dan hardly ever came in to the office and it was clear to all of us he cared very little about the happenings at the company. Maybe that’s what made him a good boss. I doubt he was upset with me. If anything, his ire was probably pointed at Jen for making him come in at all. Now Ria, she was a cool chick. I had asked her out for drinks once. She reported me to herself at HR, but reviewed the case and promptly dismissed it. No punishment.
"It’s still Tommy. And I have stayed late each of those days to make up for it. But fine.”
"Get to work, you have client pitches to finish".
“Bitch,” I muttered under my breath.
I didn’t leave the office until 6pm that evening to compensate for my egregious mistake of relying on temperamental public transit. It was a slog of a day, and I had this meeting to look forward to in the morning. I knew I wouldn’t have the energy to cook, I didn’t have that energy on a good day. So I stopped at the cafe at Lake Station for a bite to eat. I ordered a sandwich with a decaf and took a seat.
Thats when I saw her.
The woman walk into the cafe, a confident gait in her step. Her dress was remarkable. If I were to imagine what a gypsy would wear in a few thousand years, that was the style she sported. She wore a swirling iridescent robe covered with interesting and intricate geometric patterns - pyramids, spirals, tangential circles - which covered her head loosely. A pair of steampunk goggles covered her eyes. The garment had sleeves and connected around her chest and hips, the rest of it trailed behind her like a caped superhero. She wore leather thigh high boots which had the same colors and patterns. She was slim but toned, with wide hips. Her skin was a deep olive color and her hair a dark brownish red. Despite the odd attire and unique colors, she was far and away the most beautiful woman I had ever seen.
She carried a sleek tablet in her hand. Larger than a smartphone and smaller than an iPad. She noticed me gawking from my seat and looked me right in the eyes, as if she was reading in to my soul. She moved the goggles to the top of her crown revealing a pair of otherworldly silvery blue eyes, and smiled. I looked away sheepishly. After a few long seconds, she spoke.
“Hi, do you have a moment?”
“Me? Yeah sure uh, what’s up?” I fought out the words out through my suddenly dry mouth and pit in my throat.
“I was hoping to introduce you to the project my organization is working on. We are about to launch our Beta and we are looking to sign on a few more testers”. Her voice was… hypnotic. If sounds had taste, hers would be honey. She had a unique accent too, like none I had ever heard before.
“Yes, please”. I would give this woman my kidney and two thirds of my liver if she asked for it. Anything to keep this encounter from ending.
She smiled. "That’s great, I really do appreciate it."
She began speaking. I tried listening but I all my mind could muster were thoughts about how much I would like to see this woman naked. If Sasha knew I was having these thoughts.. I’d be in the doghouse.
She went on and on, not taking a pause or a breath. It sounded rehearsed, like she had done it plenty of times before. I caught bits and pieces.
- Paradigm shifting new technological breakthrough
- Profit driven consortium operating across the cosmic expanse
- Volunteers for cross-functional third iteration
- Factorial growth
- Developing and manipulating dimensional frameworks
Finally, she wrapped. "Just read and complete this form here," she said.
Then, the tablet was in my hand. A document was already opened.
PROXY PROJECT TERMS AND CONDITIONS
I scrolled to the bottom, not digesting a single word, mind swimming with how I could parlay this favor into a date.
Click here to certify that you have read the terms and conditions.
Muscle memory took over here. My finger tapped the box before my brain even registered it. Years of conditioning from Apple, Facebook, TikTok, and the like.
The instant my finger made contact with the button on the screen, the world froze. I stared at the women as my field of vision became fuzzy. Whatever facade she had been putting on was gone. She looked…sad.