If I'd Wanted Something Different...

September’s first chill struck more bitterly with each passing year. I preferred to blame the barometer and the labor, but the truth was that I wasn’t getting any younger. Kaite would be late at the laboratory again, I was sure, either with her students or her own work. For the last 5 hours, I’d been fantasizing about the long, peaceful, hot bath I would take. I hoped my vigor would be somewhat restored by the time Kaite got home, both for my own sake and because I was sure I looked just as bad I felt and I hated to worry her.

The knock at the door first startled, then annoyed me. I hadn’t been home 5 minutes, and already someone was disturbing the sanctity of my solitude. I knew it wasn’t anyone I wanted to see, because those who knew or cared for me at all knew better than to come knocking unannounced. Letters, com-calls and the like: O.K. But this? In my exceedingly frayed state at the time, I found the intrusion nothing short of an outrage. It was just such an odd occurrence. In contrast to an earlier time in my life and career, my home had, by this time, become quite the invitation-only affair. I’d worked to make it so for my daughter and me. My somewhat addled, tired heart was rapidly shaping and firming the conviction that it would be better if the unknown caller’s efforts were wasted, not mine. I decided anyone so inconsiderate as to come to my door unbidden deserved to be ignored. It was my door to answer or not, and I had no intention of answering it.

Yet my footsteps turned in the direction of the door. At the least, I intended to personally administer a well-deserved piece of my mind to the transgressor. He or she who would keep a man from his bath after such a day…

Who was I kidding? Perturbed as I was, I composed myself. Professionalism and the diplomacy of the true pragmatist are damnably ingrained things. Only the faintest of scowls lingered as I opened the door the see a disheveled, vaguely cherubic young woman who appeared to be in her early 20’s. Even as she stood with both feet planted on my narrow second step, she seemed constantly in motion. Her face was intermittently obscured by unruly, sandy locks that danced like Medusa’s own and her features were, while not unpleasant, round, plain and wholly unremarkable. These observations were secondary, made only after I caught the breath taken from me by first sight of her penetrating, violet-gray eyes.

‘ I have a delivery for J. Shaw. Parts.’

I was well acquainted with all my vendors’ couriers. It was known amongst my suppliers that I required such familiarity, and if a new employee or specialist was dispatched, I was always alerted in advance. This had to be either an error or a trap.

‘You must be mistaken. I’m expecting no deliveries. What company sent you?’

‘Century Laser Electronic Operations.’

‘Not one of my vendors, sorry.’ With that I moved to close the door and be done with this intrusion, but she took a step forward to match my step back…and looked at me with those eyes. Damn those odd, arresting eyes.

‘It’s a sample. I…My employers are really quite certain you’ll be delighted. Besides, it’s free. We just want to work with you…if you like the sample, of course.’

‘I don’t need any samples. I’m very happy with all of my current suppliers.’

‘But how can you be certain you aren't interested if you don't even take the time to see what we're offering?’

The persistence of this exchange had long since breached all standards of propriety, yet, somehow, I wasn’t all that angry. In fact, I found myself vaguely interested to see what was in the package. Foolish, I know. It could have been anything…but I was a smart fellow. I’d dispose of it later, maybe take proper precautions and check it out, something. What was I thinking? It didn’t matter. Whatever was within the parcel hadn’t killed the two of us as we stood discussing it for far too long across my threshold, and acceptance might expedite my escape. I just wanted this visit to come to a close, that I might be released to my bath.

‘Fine. I’ll take a look.’ As I reached for the package, I swear, she pulled it just from my grasp!

‘You’ll let us know as soon as you’ve decided?’

What audacity! I bristled and my voice turned to a low, stony monotone. ‘I’ll call if I decide we have anything further to discuss. Now, do you want me to take that thing or not?’ I made my open hands firmly available one last time, and she dropped the box neatly into them with a saccharin smile and an almost Oriental deep bow, which caused her hair to bounce wildly once again. My eyes narrowed with contempt as I withdrew my prize and myself back to the refuge of my own four blessedly impenetrable walls. The next salesperson could rot on my step until dawn, April or the next century for all I cared.

I put the package down on the table, paused for a moment, then turned back to the door. I’d be hard-pressed to say why. I looked at the unanswering wood for a moment, then reopened the door without a sound. She was halfway down the walk and turned half-gracefully/half-awkwardly back to look at me mid-stride, never missing or deferring a step. As she spun, she called, ’Let us know what you think.’ She actually winked at me as she said this. As her face turned away with the finish of her pirouette, she seemed to vanish suddenly into the darkness, as though she had never been there at all. Perhaps I’d have a glass of wine with that bath.

***<>***

My daughter’s voice roused me from my soggy slumber. ‘I’ll be right there.’ I looked at my watch on the counter as I quickly toweled off and grabbed my robe. Eleven-thirty. She WAS late…and I was deeply embarrassed to have been caught asleep in the tub at such an hour. The look of mixed amusement and pity she shot my way didn’t help.

‘Another long one for us both, I guess. I have to be back at the lab tomorrow at 7:30 and I’ve got a huge exam after that, so, hate to do it to you, but I’m going straight to bed.’

‘That’s fine. Good luck on everything.’

She nodded as she slipped off her socks and tossed them in the hamper. ‘ What’s that package on the table?’

‘Just a sample some pushy salesgirl dropped off.’

‘A sample of chocolate, maybe?’

‘What part of the brown paper wrapper and its nearly cubic shape looked like chocolate to you?’

‘No part at all, but you can’t blame a girl for being an optimist, can you? It just sounded good, but it would have been a bad idea right before bed, anyway. ’

We hugged, and within a few minutes we had both retired to our respective rooms. Forty minutes later, I accepted with great bitterness the fact that I would not be able to sleep any more that night. Maybe if I went back to the tub… Instead, I very quietly donned some comfortable clothes and returned to the front rooms. There, I sifted through the last week’s mail, electronic and otherwise, and caught up on the correspondence that merited it.

Two-forty-nine. Every tick of the clock echoed through my small home. Such nights were interminable. If only I had been more of a believer in the many helpful elixirs available, perhaps I could have quaffed something to help me escape the tortured hours. Instead, I simply tried to make the best use of the time I could. As I wandered in the darkness, searching for something that needed my insomniac attentions, I saw the box on the table again.

Two-fifty. What the hell.

The packaging certainly wasn’t the best. It would do for local deliveries, but never for anything out of the area, not without paying the deconstruct/reconstruct commercial transpod fees. What the packaging lacked in durability, though, it more than compensated for in layers. It took me several minutes to penetrate the intricate architecture of banding string, paper and nested boxes. What I found inside was a bit of a disappointment. It was a rather run-of-the-mill laser projection encoder/decoder unit. Proprietary, no doubt, for the safekeeping of critical documents and sensitive information. Maybe something in the coding was unusual. The general-admit demo might tell me more about the theory entailed, but I doubted I’d be able to access the inner logic without having been coded to the unit, and if I had no access to further tweak the logic itself, and, in doing so, see if the programming was anything with which I’d even want to fiddle. My interest was dwindling fast, but the insistent echo of the clock seemed to egg me on to at least activate the thing. I moved to the kitchen, as far from my sleeping daughter’s door as possible, so that the sound would not disturb her.

When I pressed the initiation pad, the characteristic red-through-blue violet sequence radiated quickly from the center to the edges of the concave screen, culminating in a glowing blue-white bowl as the unit tested all projection points through the full spectrum. The inevitable, welcoming 3-chord chime was done in a synthesized Baroque harpsichord voice with a subtle string harmony. Nice touch.

The thing did not launch immediately into a showy simulated-3-D oration on the myriad virtues of - what was the name – “Century Laser something…” Instead, there was an ID prompt. I figured it would have taken anything, being a demo model and all, but I wasn’t feeling particularly creative, so I just entered my usual “J V Shaw.” After a couple seconds’ pause, the holographic screen returned “User Jackson Vincent Shaw confirmed against activation data. You have 1 message.” OK, so it was going to make me work for my demo. ‘Get message,’ I told the glowing bowl with the tiny lightshow above it. Odd that they had known my middle name. That was not particularly common knowledge, not even, in fact, a matter of public record, as the addition had come almost a year after my registered birth.

The words “Century Laser Electronic Operations” appeared one at a time, then arranged themselves in single file to quickly orbit a little, glowing planet Earth that had magically materialized at the center of the view-sphere. After the words returned to their place before the Earth to face me, all but their initial letters faded away. Those grew larger and drew closer together: CLEO. All the while another vaguely medieval score teased my ears. The Earth disappeared and was replaced by an image of a young woman with elaborately upswept deep auburn tresses and sales-boosting décolletage. Even in the fashion of her dress, she’d have been the image of 1800’s elegance, had it not been for the VERY modern textiles and obvious auto-tailoring she wore...and the superfluous sunglasses! Who the hell was their marketing person? This pollutedly anachronistic, shades-bearing girl looked almost like a non-tech.

Laser Girl started her pitch. Something about the need for security these days and all the malevolent forces about who might want to steal or destroy one’s work or exploit personal secrets. Yeah, yeah, blah, blah, blah…My mind wandered. Who WAS their marketing firm?

‘…That’s why I’ve introduced myself this way, Jack,’ said the darkly bespectacled vision, snapping me back to attention, ‘and why I can’t tell you any more right now, but I truly think I have one of the keys you’ve been looking for. It’s about the new line of research you’re working on. I can’t ask you to trust me. You’ll have to make your own choice and trust yourself. But ask yourself these questions:
1) What is most important in your world?
2) Why did you accept this package?
3) Why are you still watching this?
The map that follows is set to auto-erase, along with the rest of this message, but I doubt you’ll need the map anyway. You know where the place is. Next Tuesday night, if you decide you’re interested, 9:47 pm. Dress accordingly and ask for Cleo.’

The lack of sleep must have been catching up with me. I could only answer one of the three questions she had asked, which fact troubled me more than a little. I continued watching in something of a daze as the map presented itself. She/they HAD to be joking. It had been several years, but, indeed, I knew the place. It was fairly far away. I’d been there once, and that had, of course, been in the daylight for a service call. No scientific business could possibly be located there. The map decayed to a multi-dimensional scramble of 1’s and 0’s.

“Dress accordingly,” she’d said.

***<>***

Like I didn’t have enough on my plate. What – was I becoming bored in my life, or just suicidal and senile? What the hell was I doing? These and a hundred more hostile questions I asked myself as I caught the train out of town two days later, dressed in a simple, utilitarian casual day-clothes style common to scientists and non-techs alike. I was bound for a non-tech town where I hoped I would not be recognized as I picked up some distinctly non-tech evening fashion for the next night.

The train was the risky part, as it was one of the few places where techs and non-techs inter-mingled somewhat. Most scientists had a broad work area and traveled regularly on service calls. The nons also traveled for work and leisure, but only the richest among them could afford a family transpod. The tightly packed city infrastructure combined with the lack of disposable tech labor and the expense to provide separate service for the small scientific minority to preclude the building of separate systems for the two societies. Of course, the passengers were still largely self-segregated by cars, the techs typically collecting in the front car or two, nearest the engineer, a fellow tech. I therefore hung back toward the rear cars as the train slowed at my stop.

I had walked the back roads to a station off my usual line to avoid being spotted by my regular driver. I could, of course, make plausible excuses if I was spied at this point, at least as to my dress, if not my choice of cars. While I , like most of my counterparts, most often wore a simple but modern suit to my appointments, a select few of my customers actually required attire such as I was wearing this day. Their office environments had strict codes of basic, non-disruptive casual dress.

Dress codes aside, I served so many, I was bound to cross paths with some of the non-techs in whose offices I had performed programming adjustments and hardware repairs, but I doubted they’d paid enough attention to their servant to pick him out of a line-up, anyway, completely out-of-context. The non-techs weren’t my biggest concern. Scientists in transit were the ones whose suspicions I feared. Most techs would be working at midday, most likely ensconced on-site somewhere…I hoped. I had to get out and back before evening. I’d taken the entire middle of the day off work in order to escape the questions of my comrades. I hoped the simple fact of my taking the time would not arouse too much interest.

So many concerns. This was all quite mad. What on Earth should have compelled a rational man of science to such actions?

I slipped my fare into the slot of a rear car and was allowed entry. Once on the train, I was grateful to busy myself with a “news” capsule abandoned by a previous passenger. The thing was one enormous, vacuous society page. There was speculation on non-tech politics and on the weather, the latter based entirely upon superstition. The wealth of flashy pictures and unfounded opinions finished with a humor section rife with insinuations of scientific ineptitude. Meanwhile, I got a good sense of current fashion trends and places where the generic gift-creds I’d ordered under a pseudonym would be readily accepted.

I’d judged the shopping district I opted for to be mostly geared toward middle income nons, fairly young and trendy. That was exactly what was appropriate to the venue, as I remembered it. I was a bit dubious at first, but relieved to see my age did not set me apart from the crowd. Many of the patrons were in their 40’s, 50’s and even 60’s.
Guess it’s easier to "think young” when the weight of the world doesn’t rest upon your shoulders.

The clothes were more atrocious than I’d anticipated, or maybe it was just the visual assault of the sheer volume of low-quality, synthetic goods. We made the machines. They drew the pictures from which the circuitry extrapolated the designs, the cuts of fabric and the construction. They then fed in the lurid textiles of their choice. I couldn’t say whether it was the nons’ aversion to seeing the techs for service calls or a lack of awareness when a problem was developing, but it was also very obvious to me that most of the machines that had manufactured this apparel were sorely in need of tune-ups. These facts did little to mitigate the pricing.

I settled upon the least flawed copy of a shiny blue suit with a green collar. The cut did my physique no great disservice and the sizing was close enough that I didn’t think anyone would question the lack of auto-tailoring. Under different circumstances, I would even have liked the colors. No great calamity so far, but I still wondered why the hell was I doing this.

‘Enjoy your gift from Mr. Dal Craig,’ said the attendant as I submitted my gift-cred number and the tag on the suit to the checkout machine at the exit. She extended a hand to take my purchase from me and place it in a brightly cartooned plastic bag emblazoned with the shop logo in at least a dozen colors, some of them metallic, others fluorescent. I cringed, but it would have been odd to have declined the bag. I asked for extra tissue to protect my purchase. She obliged. I’d switch the interior and exterior wrappings to a less glaring configuration on the train…which I needed to hurry to catch.

Somehow, luck was with me and I got home unseen by familiar scientific eyes.
Once again within my own space, I withdrew my purchase from its swaddling for further contemplation. There was no tag to confirm my suspicions, but I would have bet credits that no part of any plant or animal had been involved in the making of the garment. At one time “made from x% recycled materials” had been a labeling boast of industrial conscience. Now it was simply a fact, for purely economic reasons. That didn’t seem to bother the nons a bit. I wondered if I could get by with a cotton shirt underneath. Probably not.

I had no more time for silly ponderings. I hurriedly put the thing away, bag and all, changed clothes, and rushed to my late afternoon/evening calls…still absolutely mystified by my own behavior and my plans for the following evening.

***<>***

Had I not been impossibly pressed to catch up on Tuesday, I might have had the time or presence of mind yet to chicken out. As it was, the day preceding the donning of my new blue suit was basically a blur. I’d told Kaite I had a meeting. I supposed she assumed it fell within the realm of my more usual endeavors. Dressed as I was to be, I had harbored some concerns of her catching me. Much to my relief, a friend asked her to spend the night. Luck was, indeed, fully with this spectacularly ill-advised venture.

Time would be tight. I couldn’t leave until after dark, again for fear of other scientists catching too clear a glimpse of me. After 8 o’clock, I figured my chances of escaping notice would improve, as we scientists were a fairly Ben Franklin-esque lot, overall, and creatures of habit. Only a few of the younger scis might still be about at those hours, none of my contemporaries, and the youths would most likely be distracted by concerns of a more amorous nature.

I suspected the usual evening engineer would probably still be on duty, so I kept my back to the train as it approached, turning my face, finally, to the very last car. I felt conspicuous in my extreme wariness. Trying so hard to act casual must appear anything but. I’d searched for a book to read as a prop to make myself seem calmer, but all I’d found were technical manuals and collectors’ leather and paper reproductions of classic 16th through 21st century authors’ works. Either would have marked me. I took a window seat and turned my gaze to the glass, that I might surreptitiously monitor the faces and movements of the other passengers in the car. Two hundred thousand hours later, I arrived at my stop.

It was just a few blocks from the station to the door of the establishment. I remembered it well and had little fear I would fail to recognize it. There was no way they could have changed the structure enough to have disguised its distinctively unwieldy shape without having compromised the open-air lower portions that, I had been told, were one of the greatest draws to the bar’s patrons.

As it turned out, I wouldn’t even have had to rely on appearance or sense of direction to guide me. The sound emanating from the club could have directed a person from miles away. There were no large industrial districts in non-tech zones. The club was nestled amongst office buildings and other commercial establishments. The residential portion of this ‘burb was no more than 6 blocks away. I wondered how anyone in the town slept. As I came within sight of it, I became dishearteningly aware of a long line of revelers waiting to get in. The line wrapped at least halfway around the building. Some of those in line seemed impatient, but most seemed content to sway to the pulsing music while chatting with the party-goers already inside through the support bars. Happy, half-dressed, half-toasted inmates behind 3-inch-spaced bars supporting an unnaturally top-heavy structure that seemed doomed to collapse upon itself. This struck me as the perfect metaphor for non-tech society. I was fairly certain one of our own had dreamed up this ironic vision under contract.

I looked at my watch: 9:32. What kind of a meeting time was 9:47, anyway? Now, to top it all off, I’d obviously be late, unless our mysterious encounter was to take place in the cue. I still couldn’t sell my self one sufficient excuse for this course of action. I knew not what had compelled me to this ludicrous place. Curiosity? Hardly. I’m inquisitive, like any scientist, but I also consider myself a sane man. My actions the last few days cast that assessment into serious doubt. I walked quickly along the waiting line of noisy, restless bodies. The end had to be around back somewhere. If those crazy CLEO people wanted to see me, they’d wait. I couldn’t see the end of the line. I walked faster. I was loathe to admit it to myself, but I was becoming increasingly agitated, afraid that I might not make my meeting, afraid I’d never know. Know what? I’d never know! A hint of desperation started seeping into the lower reaches of my consciousness.

‘Jack?’ came a deep, male voice over my shoulder.

Oh, God I was caught! I never broke stride. If I did nothing to acknowledge the voice or my name, I hoped the speaker would write this off as his mistake. I also hoped the synthetic fabrics I wore would contain or conceal the sweat I was certain was pouring off of my entire body at this point.

Then I felt the hand on my shoulder. My mind raced, my stomach tightened and my heart sank as I stopped walking and turned slowly to see the face of my doom. What I was doing wasn’t exactly illegal, but it would, at best, ruin my career. I’d have to move Kaite and myself halfway around the globe to a place where the local nons wouldn’t have seen the news. The scientific community’s news sources were much more consolidated than the nons’ and meticulously followed by all in the disperse community. Even on the other side of the planet, my daughter and I would be completely isolated, forever denied credit and the hope of finding good research associates or any soul-mates in science. No scientist on Earth would trust our loyalty for a very long time, probably longer than I should hope to live. My life and that of my beloved daughter were ruined. And who knew what the crowd with their already loosened inhibitions might do to me then and there. What had I done?

I had expected to recognize the face I turned to see, but I did not.

‘You have an appointment, correct?’

My answer was a single, slow, soundless, unblinking nod. Just when I didn’t think any more could be done to shine the accusing searchlight on me, I found myself being escorted back up the line, past the eager patrons-to-be at the front, past the guard…directly to the service bar where a single empty stool awaited me amidst the throng. I sat and my escort disappeared. For a long moment, I continued simply to sit. Nothing further happened. Then I became aware of the bartender staring at me. I noticed a holo clock among the brightly colored bottles behind him. 9:41. Order a drink. That would be the I-belong-here thing to do. I had no idea what the names of the multi-hued concoctions might be, so I pointed vaguely to the glass in the hand of the woman nearest me. The bartender pushed a button. A matching liquid mystery appeared. He handed it to me. Then he was staring at me again. Pay! I should pay the man. I did so. He kept staring at me. I was fairly certain something (or everything) in my deportment made him suspicious, but I had no idea what to do about it. I was inside and I had a drink now. If this fellow wanted to see me head for the dancefloor, he’d just have to be disappointed. As the music and the crowd throbbed on, I stared back at him, then the clock behind him changed again: 9:46.

‘Can you direct me to CLEO?’ I finally blurted.

‘Mm-hm.’ He pointed to a far back corner and went back to his work. I was released from his stare at last. I rose from my seat and turned to go in the direction indicated, almost forgetting my drink in my discombobulation. I turned back and made a hasty swipe for it just as a group of young debauchers closed in on the open stool.

I sniffed my viridescent liquid prop as I headed quickly to the back. Synthesized alcohol and syrup. I doubted any glass in the place held anything that tasted much different. Not that we hadn’t programmed machines to distill and dispense actual aged scotches and bourbons, but those were a little too “retro” for these masses. They preferred the artificial stuff. Vile. Once this was over, I might actually slam it down on the way out the door, just to settle my nerves and reward myself for surviving my folly.

Just as it began to occur to me that there were a lot of tables back there and I had no idea which one was my destination, I saw her. Definitely the girl from the demo. Same hair, same alluringly classic cut to her otherwise ultra-modern vestments, same improbable sunglasses. She saw me and excused herself from conversation with a striking young man. She turned to a table over which the light fixture was failing. Those seated there rapidly vacated to the dancefloor without a word exchanged between themselves and the young woman. It seemed I had a private audience with Laser Girl, or vice-versa.

I set my drink down and slid into the generously padded, high-backed space. A few architectural barriers, the failing light and the overall din did seem to offer a measure of privacy. Oddly, I found, my anxiety had all but subsided. As I settled in, I turned my gaze to my companion. I hoped she could talk fast, because his young woman owed me a lot of answers.

She was, at least, pleasing to the eye in her way…elegant, even in synthetic textiles and bad light. This was a welcome contrast to that rumpled, brash, little courier waif.

Then she removed her sunglasses…to reveal a shockingly familiar pair of piercing violet-gray eyes.

'Nice to meet you, Jack. I’m Cleo.'