Calypso-15

3 - First Sight

Papa was furious. I planned to tell him that Runkle gave me a higher than normal pay due to the favor. When he saw enough medicine for a whole month, he flew into an incorrigible fury. My mistake. After having so little for so long, the thought of not having to go to the Pharma-Bay was intoxicating. 

"Where did you get this money?"

"The lab! Exactly where you told me to." 

He sweated, all his vitals elevated. 

"You dare lie? Tell me the truth, have you been whorin'? Cuz, that's what this is. Whorin' money."

I looked around our little gray box. In a month's time, we would move into a better, bigger and differently colored box. 

"No," I placed my coat, which had once been Mama's, into the wall-indent that counted as our closet. "I have not been whorin', swear on Mama's life." 

"Then, what have you been doing? I know Runkle declined to give you a spot. Bastard chewed my ear off too."

If anyone wanted me whorin', it was Runkle.

"I found a different arrangement, just as scientific." I motioned for him to hand me our food tablet. Tonight, we could afford something better than pills. We could afford a MacDo. 

"Care to tell me what it is? I've been told that there's a science to fucking." 

"Going to bite the hand that feeds you? I ain't risking my life, and you here talking to me as if I've gone to the front lines."

He finally sat onto his cot. It squeaked with his weight, even though he was quite thing. Waste-a-ing away, as he would say. 

"Don't talk to me about the front lines. That's were the young boys went to die," he muttered. I rolled my eyes. His memories were shield and dagger sometimes. There were solutions for this. Little implants that removed the hurtful memories. Therapy courses tailored to your specific problem. He trusted none of it, called it propaganda. I knew better than to question him when the big P came into the conversation. There was no reasoning with him from there. 

"What do you want, a Big Mac or Quarter Pounder?"His eyes sparkled with  boyish glee. He never questioned the job again after that first meal. 

The most boring weeks of my life followed. My instructions were simple. Monitor the flow of text coming for a computer connected to the basin with the robot. If any text highlighted in red, I wrote down the time and message.

Overflow Error. Efficiency error. Undefined error. Line 3540495. Over and over and over. Wilde would occasionally come check on the droid. It would be selfish to think he was checking on me. Government types never made friendly relationships. 

We awaited the first emotion-slip, first evidence of feeling. Every time it accessed the emotional circuitry, there would be a ding and slip of paper would print. I once asked Wilde if it was broken. He laughed in response. How on Earth was this even working? The errors came at least hourly. Sometimes more. 

"It's self-healing," he told me, as if that was a perfectly understandable answer. "I only intervene if it cannot manage the error. These days, systems are self-contained. This is simply an exercise in giving you something to do before you start to monitor the emotions."

The droid's brows stayed in that furrowed state. I found myself wishing I could smooth them back for her. It must be so uncomfortable to be thinking so hard. When I tired of watching the tiny computer screen, I watched her. Both of us, frozen. 

I came to hate the notebook and paper. It was archaic and the definition of busy-work, something only Laborers did. I was Laboring, but not to create anything. In some places, that would be a punishment. Only the pay kept me from breaking the stupid pen in half. To stay sane, I sang to myself. At first, nothing more than pretty nonsense. Both my father and I sang. There was only so much classical music a drunken crowd could take, no matter their intentions for a night of Mozart. 

Maybe it was my romantic imagination but the brows seemed to relax ever so slightly when I sang it lullabies. So I started to sing more. I sang her all of the lullabies I knew. I started to make them up, interweaving between melodies. My nights broke into three natural parts. The first, that was pure and simple silence. Usually, after the noise of my father's coughing and mumbling, I welcomed it. The second part of the night, which lasted as long as my voice did, I sang. Then, I finished the night with even more amiable silence. 

It was a ritualistic manner of living. I turned each of the mind-numbing shifts into a beautiful and predictable trance. Being a creature of habit, it made my heart happy. I could do this forever, if I had to. Papa and I would be moving into a space made of two rooms. Each check, I allocated him a little bit of money to spend as he pleased. He started going to bars as a patron and not a performer. 

The emotion slips did not come. On the night of my first full month, Wilde expressed disappointment. The errors were plenty and healed themselves. 

"I don't know many more resources I can burn on this project. This beast, " he waved a hand disgustedly. "consumes so much energy without even using its emotional circuitry. I don't know what else to do to make it feel something."

"Can you force it to access the chip?" An infinite division error appeared. I imagined Calypso walking down the line of infinity, patiently fixing each broken thing. Her hands were so gentle in my imagination.

"Well, yes. But that would not be a genuine feeling, then, would it?"

I shrugged, feeling quite out of my depth to answer. 

"We might have to shut it down if there is no progress soon," he ran a hand through his hair, a slight tremor dancing down his hand. My stomach plummeted. The number of credits in my account flashed at me. 2402. I read my balance every night before bed. "But, there's still some budget left to burn."

"The fire is lovely," I said. Wilde gave me a look of a cat contemplating whether to scratch or purr. 

I spoke to her for the first time directly that night. You're the reason I can live in a different room for my father, I told it. Just one emotion-slip would be enough. Just one. I could think of no better song than Mama's favorite to start off the night. 

Days seem sometimes as if they'll never end
Sun digs its heels to taunt you
But after sunlit days, one thing stays the same
Rises the moon

My heart stopped as the computer as the logs halted. Did I break it? The punishment for breaking anything Government related was severe. But how? I sang every night. My hand hovered over the computer keyboard, wishing it had the skill to press to right buttons on the keyboard. The logs restarted. In big blue lettering, INTERNAL REBOOT INITIATED BY ID: CALYPSO-15. 

I sat back in terrified silence. Was I supposed to write down the blue? I was only told to document the red. Red was not blue. The stream held me captivated for another minute when 

DING.

I screamed and sprinted the two meters to where the printer squatted. A piece of paper slowly came out. 

-----

EMOTION: Amusement

REASON: Sing, Angel. 

---

My eyes read and re-read the slip. When I looked up, Calypso-15 had her eyes open and face turned to me with a look of wonder. 

"Days fade into watercolor blur," I whispered. "Memories swim and haunt you..." 

DING

----

EMOTION: Playful

REASON: Do not be afraid of me. Angel.

----

I cleared my throat. "But after sunlit days, one thing stays the same, rises the moon." The logs on the computer started going faster, no errors. No reboots. The paper trembled. My hands burned. I don't know what possessed me. The papers left the facility in my pocket. Wilde would never know. 

song is "rises the  moon" by liana flores.