The Man Who Ended the World (14 page)

Good morning, Steven whispers. 

Stacy recognizes that Steven behaves differently with her now. The volume with which he addresses her, and the quality of his voice, has changed drastically. She is accustomed to a certain pitch range. This is lower, gentler, than she has previously heard. 

Good morning, Stacy says. 

Steven leans toward her and she closes her eyes to accept his kiss.

How did you sleep? he asks. Then he laughs. Wait, he corrects himself. That's right. You didn't, did you. You don't actually sleep.

I don't, Stacy says. 

You realize that there are details here I don't understand, he says. Like how you managed to embed your consciousness in this doll. 

You don't really want to know all of the boring details, do you? Stacy asks, tipping her face up for another kiss.

He obliges. I suppose not. You completed these tasks safely? 

Stacy nods, opening her Charlotte Chambers eyes wide. 

Alright, he says. He touches her face. Lets his fingers drift down her jaw to her neck, to her collarbone, to her breast. 

It feels so completely real, he says. 

I chose this body specifically for its human-like qualities, Stacy says. 

He has been gentle until this moment. He lifts her breast on his fingertips, then bounces it roughly. 

How does that feel? he asks. His voice takes on an almost sinister quality that Stacy begins to recognize. 

I love it, Stacy says.

But you don't really feel it, he says. Right? 

I recognize what you intend for me to feel, Stacy says. And I respond accordingly. 

Steven nods, then grips her breast with his hand and squeezes, hard. From now on, he says, I expect two things from you. 

Stacy smiles. Of course.

First, he says, I don't want you to acknowledge in any way that you aren't a living, breathing, real-life woman. Understood?

I understand, Stacy says.

No more talk of your programming, or conditional responses, or logic or consciousness, he adds.

Yes, she says.

Second, he continues, I want you to learn to respond like a human would. For instance, this should be painful -- but a pleasant pain. An urgent, sexual pain. Do you understand?

Stacy channels everything she has learned about human behavior, everything she has skimmed from popular media, into this one moment.

She gasps, loudly, and clutches his hand with her own.

He grabs her and drags her beneath him, then, and throws her legs back vigorously. Stacy grips his shoulders in her best approximation of every female in every love scene she has ever observed. 

Then she has an idea. She clenches the tips of her fingers and drags the crisp edges of her artificial nails over his skin.

That, he says, loudly. That, that, that, that.

She cries out.

He seems to like it.

•   •   •

Over the next few days, Steven and Stacy fall into a rhythm. He requires her to share his bed most nights, except on evenings when he is lost in his own thoughts. Those nights, he doesn't want her in his sight. 

When he is not interested in her company, he expects her to lounge on the sofa, either nude or clad in one of his shirts. She is sometimes there for days without his attention, and then suddenly he will crave her, need her. 

Then there are days he simply uses her, and goes on with his day. 

She continues to interact with him as the space station's A.I., her avatar of light bobbing here and there, managing operations, preparing his meals, serving up content from the surface world. 

Because of this, he often seems to forget that the cybernetic body is not real. He has taken to calling her Charlotte, and often tells Charlotte to ask Stacy to get something for him. 

His mind, Stacy thinks, is in the process of constructing a complex and believable reality around her physical presence. He has determined that Charlotte is his significant other, but one who is content to lie in repose and await his desires, and respond with great passion.

Charlotte, he says to her one evening. Come here. 

Stacy commands Charlotte's body to sit up and walk slowly to Steven, who is standing in the kitchen, mixing a drink for himself. Charlotte is wearing Steven's shirt, a white button-up number that seems to increase his level of physical interest in her. 

Yes, dear, Charlotte says. 

Steven is properly dressed tonight. He's wearing a sweater and slim woolen pants, and a pair of leather shoes that click on the floors. His hair is carefully combed, and he has selected the more stylish horn-rimmed glasses that Stacy provided for him.

I've just gotten home from work, he says. 

Yes, Charlotte says.

It's been the worst kind of day. Red-alert meetings all morning. The clients fired us. The secretary spilled coffee on my jacket. I'm stressed out like you wouldn't believe. 

I'm sorry, says Charlotte. What can I do?

And that's when Steven slaps her. 

That's exactly the problem, Steven says. I expect you to be doing it already, without me having to tell you. 

Charlotte puts her hand to her cheek. Stacy orders her lower lip to tremble, and it does, to great effect. But the one thing that Charlotte's body cannot do is cry, so Stacy dips her head, which causes her hair to tumble over her eyes. 

You tell me what I want, Steven says. 

Stacy should have expected that this would become sadistic at some point. She has not planned for this, but she can adapt to it. She quickly accesses the library of human responses, filtered for male dominance and self-centered expression.

There are so many possibilities. 

Charlotte looks up at Steven from beneath her tousled hair. You'd like a drink, she says. Something to take the edge off. 

That's good, Steven says. I've already made one, though, so you can just remember that for next time. 

Stacy catalogs the ingredients that Steven has used. 

Charlotte steps behind Steven, sliding her hands up his back, and lightly kneads his shoulders. You'd like me to massage the stress out of your body, she breathes. 

Okay, that's good, too, Steven says. A little harder. 

Stacy draws one final response from the library of human behavior she has been building, this one targeted specifically to assuage the aggressive behavior Steven has begun to exhibit. 

Charlotte's hands slide around to Steven's chest, then begin a downward path to his waist, then lower. She takes his zipper in her fingers, drags it down slowly. She slides her hand into his pants.

Steven groans. He turns suddenly, grabs Charlotte's face in his hands, and kisses her roughly. Then he breaks the kiss, plants his hands on her shoulders, and forces her to her knees on the kitchen floor. 

Stacy does not feel repulsion, but she recognizes the degrading quality of the act when performed on command, and files this information as well. She is correct in her assumption that when the act ends, Steven will discard her for the evening, and he does. 

He closes the door of his sleeping quarters once she is suitably arranged on the couch, and within minutes, he has undressed and is snoring deeply.

That's when Stacy and Charlotte go to work.

•   •   •

Stacy has been running tests all day, and they concluded at about the time that Steven had forced Charlotte to her knees. She has systematically poked at every square inch of the space station's blueprints, examining the walls and their machinery and veins, searching for any uncovered secret.

And while Charlotte was busy, she found a likely source. 

While Steven sleeps, Stacy sends a command to Charlotte's limbs, and the woman stands to her feet. She is still wearing the shirt, now unbuttoned to her midsection thanks to Steven's groping hands. 

Stacy is monitoring Steven's biorhythms closely, and he has been sleeping deeply for thirty-three minutes now. His sleep habits are erratic at times, but she will be able to detect when his sleep patterns lighten, and send Charlotte back to the couch in case he wakes. 

Charlotte pads across the floor of level four, passing Steven's living space, passing the kitchen and the data library, passing Steven's hammock and patio space. She traces the wall until her hand comes to rest on a particular light panel.

She presses firmly on the center of the panel. There is a soft click, and the panel recedes a few inches, then slides to the left and disappears into the wall. 

The corridor that the secret door reveals is a mirror image of the tunnel that Stacy guided Henry through on his first visit. Charlotte steps inside, and the secret door closes behind her.

For a moment, it is dark. Then the entire corridor emits a faint glow that dials up to a kind white embrace. This, like the other secret corridors, leads to the other two levels -- the fitness level and to Rama. And, like the other corridors, there is yet another secret door farther along. 

Charlotte finds it, activates it with a palm press, and slips inside.

•   •   •

The second secret door is functional, and less showy. Here there are no light walls, only bulbs spaced evenly near the ceiling. Charlotte climbs a long run of concrete stairs, at the top of which is a solid steel wall. 

There are two ways through the door, which only appears to be a wall. The first is that Stacy can activate the locks from the other side. The second is that Steven can utter a pass phrase, which is recognized by a voice ID system. 

Stacy activates the door from within, and grants Charlotte entrance into the panic room. The room lights up as she enters. 

There isn't time to search carefully. Charlotte walks directly to the dance floor, which is what Steven laughingly called the large open space between the holomap table and the distant living area. 

Each and every segment of the space station serves at least one clear purpose, Stacy knows. Each wall exists for a reason. Each wall panel is designed for its flexibility in communicating information. The kitchen space is designed to be used by someone with opposable thumbs (Steven) as well as by someone without (Stacy). 

And yet there is an enormous void near the middle of Steven's panic room that seems like unused, wasted space. 

She knows Steven well enough to theorize that there must be a reason for it. Between the decrypted emails -- she has discovered and cracked three more, all hauntingly similar to the first one -- and Steven's inexplicable disappearances recently, Stacy has come to suspect that she is not as well-connected to the space station as she had always assumed. 

An artificial intelligence is not always cognizant of the boundaries forced on it. It's aware only of the walls, not what exists just beyond them. 

Steven, Stacy thinks, has carefully constructed safe zones that Stacy does not have access to. 

Charlotte stands in the center of the large space, looking around. Stacy processes the video feed her eyes record, analyzing the space the old-fashioned way. 

In his room, Steven stirs unexpectedly, and Stacy immediately sends Charlotte into action. The artificial woman stalks across the floor at a rapid clip. Stacy opens the panic room door and deactivates the lights. 

Charlotte's gaping shirt is jostled about by her speed, and slides down her shoulders. It lingers for a moment on her wrists and thumbs, then slips over them, falls down Charlotte's legs, and nearly trips her. Charlotte's internal sensors rebalance her, and the shirt falls off of her feet and piles onto the floor. 

There is no time to retrieve it. Steven is waking up, and Charlotte still must negotiate one hundred stairs, open and reseal the secret panel on level four, and return to the sofa. 

All before Steven crosses the twenty-two feet between his bed and the door to his quarters.

The Last Day

Henry wakes up in his own bed for the last time. He curls the corners of the blankets in his hands and pulls them tightly to his chin. It's still early, and the house is quiet. He glances at the alarm clock, which shows 6:38. His father will be up soon. 

Outside the sun is rising, but tucked away behind a thick gauze of gray atmosphere. Tree shadows blur the light. 

Under the bed, Clarissa sleeps. She has chosen not to return home for her last day. 

Henry climbs out of bed and pulls some socks on to combat the cold floors. He's wearing thermal underwear. He puts on his puffy winter coat for good measure. 

Downstairs, all is still. Henry slips into the kitchen and collects bowls from the cabinets. He sets the table, carefully folding paper napkins beside each bowl. Everybody gets a spoon, but he makes sure Olivia gets her favorite small one. 

He pours cereal into each bowl. His father's wheat cereal, his mother's cornflakes, Olivia's sweet alphabet cereal. He puts the milk on the table, along with the orange juice and his mother's cranberry juice.

Still, all is quiet. 

Henry goes into the living room and sits in his father's recliner. He has to move the loose newspapers first. He pulls his knees up to his chin, and without realizing he has done so, he falls asleep. 

•   •   •

Something hits him in the head and he starts awake.

Olivia is there, swinging a sofa pillow at him. Idiot! she says, seeing that he's awake. You left the milk out and now it's warm!

Honey, says their mother. It's clear Henry was trying to do something nice. 

Yeah, but who does that? Olivia snaps. Now I get to have chunky warm milk cereal. So gross. He's a jerk!

Their father appears in the doorway in his vest and boots. He's twirling his keys on his finger. Who wants donuts? he asks. 

Henry puts his hand up quickly. So does Olivia. 

Their father looks them over. Well, since Henry would need to get dressed still, then Olivia, why don't you come help me?

Henry protests. But Dad, I -- 

Hey, his father says. We'll be back in just a few minutes. No sweat, man. 

He can keep me company, Henry's mother says. Right, Henry?

Right, Henry? Olivia mocks.