Dog walk story

As mentioned in an earlier post - stories concocted on a dog walk then transferred to screen/paper when entering the house, as a stream of consciousness rather than something worked on at length. Flash fiction, but longer....

                                                                      G78.     

© Kate A Hardy 2024

 

I stretch my legs out under the desk, wincing slightly as the metal implants tug at my kneecaps. The pinstripe wool trousers are still rather too long but the medics assured me within a matter of sevdays my legs will attain their extra four cms. Of course, I should store the suit away - wait until the trousers fit correctly but I just need to adapt into my new persona completely.

 

"Trank!"

I wince again, not from the knee pain but from the fact that Benkins is calling me as he wheels himself in my direction. I fight the rising nausea that always threatens whenever I see his bizarre form. The product of an AWOL artificial creativity mishap some months back, Benkins is now half man-half grotesque vehicle, of sorts. He approaches, his fleshy wheel creating strange sticky noises as it passes over the shiny flooring. The other reason I keep away from him as far as is possible is his incessant use of the latest short-lang. Short-lang goes against everything I hold precious in this life where so little of any substance remains.

 

"Trank - sums done?"

I avert my eyes from the wheel and focus upon the compubanks stacked behind him.

"You mean, have I the figures for the number of new telephonic apparatus required for the lowest ranks, I assume?"

He sighs causing his robo-surgeon lifted cheeks to inflate as much as they can. "Talk norm, man."

"I am. This is normal - for what I have chosen."

He eyes me suspiciously with his pale irises. "Century?"

"Mid 20th. I like the clothing, the trappings, the words."

"Time-waste. Watch above . . ."

I know he refers to the occasional swooping on the higher ranks who might have assumed a bit too much freedom of choice. But my work is excellent; my control over what could be something explosive, well maintained. I turn and snatch up the figures as requested, handwritten on a sheet of luxurious paper. He takes the sheet and scowls at me.

"I sent mind question. Why not respond?"

I have had this procedure - it's very difficult to refuse it, but I hate the feeling of someone's questions snaking about in one's brain. Also, unless you develop the skill to its maximum you overhear and audibly digest all sorts of drivel that others are thinking or possibly trying not to think. I try an excuse that occurs.

"It gives me plurial headmals - and, recently I started receiving ancient televisual divertissements from the early twenty-first century. The worst being an example named 'who wants to be a millionaire'. The associated music made me want to kill someone."

The second part of the excuse is true and made me feel totally unnerved - enough that I've had the implant disactivated - something not strictly illegal but considered as very odd, veering on untrustworthy.

He grunts a reply and steers back to his work area, glancing back at me with incredulity. He's still peering at me when he's installed himself back in his work bay, those curious opal eyes darting about behind the replicate Ficas Benjamina plant. It wouldn't take much for him to whisper a few suggestions about me into certain ears or minds. I decide it might be a good time to double check those figures as when I had done it previously it had been following a rowdy night involving too many hooch sticks which tend to fog the mind, to say the least. 

Sighing, I stand up and take the currently functioning lift to the cleansing area. While the metal box descends, I wonder what Benkins does when encountering a broken lift; stairs and wheel not being a good combination... Maybe he lives in the office - has a suite somewhere in this enormous sterile place. I only ever enter the main door, show my palm to the digistar register and proceed to my desk; anything else is strongly discouraged, apart from a visit to the servo machines at mealtimes.

The lift jolts as it stops at the basement. I cease thinking about Benkins and pass through the security door into the steel corridors of the formicages. Why this name has been employed I don't know - from the French, meaning ants. Maybe antcages doesn’t have such an easy ring to it. 

A base worker waves me over.

"Cleanse room free, if you are going in."

I wish I could just say, thanks, but I'm just having a quiet stroll down here to think a few things over, but I'm here to count heads, and check thumbs. He opens the grating door, rusted at the bottom from countless showers. I pass through and go through the routine of undressing, carefully hanging my precious wool suit in the closet and pulling on the grey overall waiting on a hanger. Goloshes added, mask snapped on and rubber bonnet in place I open the door and nod to the worker. 

The lecopad and pen are ready in the zipped pocket. My stomach clenches slightly as I anticipate the noise that will ensue as the studded metal door gradually opens. I could just stop, collapse, feign death . .. but then that would be viewed as deeply suspicious, lacking in motivation, ignoring the common good, and possibly be found out to be a lie - if tests were deemed necessary. I sigh as loudly as the northerly gusts that will later flay my darkened apartment building, and nod to the door operator. 

They don't notice me for a few moments, even though the sliding door had pierced the air with its screech. I take in the perspective lines of the room; the ugly, green-tinged lighting that highlights the shining baldness of many heads, heads bowed in silent all-absorbing concentration - if it is concentration. I imagine more a sort of flickering visual captivity, eyes seeking every movement of the screens before them.

Then the gathered realisation of the door noise enters their collective minds. Some attempt to stand up on long-forgotten legs. They fall back to the benches, mutter, eyes pulling their attention back to the scrolling images. Others shout, waving their fones, demanding the feverishly anticipated upgrades that are promised every sevdays but rarely arrive within the promised time. 

The door-guard fulfills her second job of pressing the sustenance release button, and the troughs begin to fill with the usual beige sludge. A few minions look without interest at the steaming gunge; others, taking one last glance at their fones, place them territorially close to themselves before taking up the alu-spoons. This is the best moment to take the measurements. I pass silently behind each grey-encased back and watch fingers juggling clumsily with spoons. The increasingly large thumbs are causing problems with cutlery, and there is talk of tubes instead - the minions to be fed like baby birds. I pass the lazer counter over each thumb, requesting briefly that they be stretched out if they are still curled around the fone's black casing. 

No one has escaped; I doubt if they would have the brain capacity to even imagine such a thing. The thumb lengths are as I had previously logged. I glance once more over the long thin room, press the door release, and go back through the clothing routine, my appetite for a servo machine protein burger even more diminished after viewing the sludge.

The lift is broken. I take the stairs slowly, each metal pin under my kneecaps making its presence known. A distant, bright voice chirps from the area I have just left.

"Great news, partners. The awaited upgrade has been superseded! G78 will now be channeling all your feeds. Praise the Custodian!"

A muffled cheer leaks from the room beyond the showers. 

Sketching

Of all the places - woodland glades, top of mountains, on a train, comfortably seated with an excellent view of the Taj Mahal (never done this one) within the crowds in front of the Louvre . . . cafés are the best places for sketching.

A cooling cup of tea, earwigging on snatches of conversation, admiring city outfits, observing people and attached dogs, ancient shady trees; a jumble of street signs, brisk waiters and folk hunched over phones, oblivious to the sounds and colour of the world that surrounds them.

I add a few scribbled words about the tea being experienced, the weather, my thoughts on that day, jobs to be done or that I've escaped from. For me, these brief drawings bring back memories, even from years ago far more resonantly than camera or phone images. 

    

Unknown stuff

While sitting in a café recently, I took out my laptop to do a bit of editing and noticed they advertised Wi-Fi free - being in French this actually means, free Wi-Fi, or weefee, with the accent. I thought I might as well check an email or two and logged on.
The list of surrounding weefees was extraordinary - about thirty different 'types' from Orange to Chez Felix or wherever it was that I was sitting. How can you escape all this, if you want to? Difficult. There is a man who lives in a village near us who has apparently spent thousands on 'Bacofoiling' his entire house and himself such is his angst, or perhaps very real fear/reactions to this peculiar air-born, invisible . . . thing.

                                        


Being a bit of a luddite myself I can understand the worry over something that has crept into our world insidiously and taken over our waking, and sleeping hours.
I still regard Microwaves with a certain amount of suspicion, and all phones with what I regard as a healthy disregard. Phone = useful device with which to contact or be contacted by people in a situation where information needs to be relayed: 'help, I have driven into a ditch,'  'can you remember to get more cat food,' and more importantly things such as: 'my neighbour's house appears to be on fire.' Most other yakking, checking how many Likes one has or playing Discontented Slugs, or other latest App drivel seems, to me anyway, a tad alien. Hm!
Anyway. WiFi. Mark, being an occasional insomniac like myself, read a report somewhere recently that suggested turning off the device at night was likely to promote better sleep - possibly common sense, but good to be reminded of such things, just as people need to be reminded that perhaps sleeping with their phones under their pillows might not be a good plan (arg! Why would you do that?)
So we did, turn it off, and . . . yes it could be total placebo BUT, I do sleep better - deeper, longer and with even more bizarre dreams than usual (a good thing, I think). I used to wake up at the slightest sound: a dog's collar jingling downstairs, a cat prowling over gravel outside, now - nothing.
It was as if I had been on standby not really OFF; ready to receive information streaming from our small white box downstairs: celebrity hair, Donald Trump's latest verbal gifts to the world, recipes, junk emails from Uncle Amazon; people inviting you to invest in their money-laundering ideas, tweets, reminders, Waitrose wine (how the F did I get onto their list?) gadgets, maps, reports . . . and so on.
The brain needs sleep: big, wide, profound sleep to repair itself and the body, and anything that can be done to assist this is of huge value - just a tiny switch- click-off; maybe it doesn't have any real effect but if one's mind can perceive it as an aid to total night time obliteration - great!
I read this morning about a Dutch study on growing cress placed next to wireless routers. One set of plants in a room with no routers, and another placed between two routers - result, the cress close to the radiation didn't grow . . . mm.
Anyway, just for saving energy alone, everything should be turned off that is normally on standby, and all chargers removed from plugs even when connected to devices; it all adds up to higher bills, general electricity waste and more stuff bombarding our already sore brains.
Goodbye, off to put this onto shutdown, not sleep.

Oi! stop that.

In 2010 I had an episode of extreme pain and fear that went on for what seemed like months, maybe it was only weeks, but it felt an awful lot longer.
(Blog post 'evolution' in 2010, if anyone is interested . . .)
Not wishing to recall all that, but I had a reminder of it this morning, as if myself had prodded myself and said 'hey, stop, otherwise  . . . remember this!'
After the afore-mentioned phase, I had worked out pretty much what caused the pain in my face and neck and had avoided, as much as possible, doing the things that set it off. But we get complacent, do we not?
In my case it was: don't over do it on the computer (this will be a short post) don't use the phone much, and absolutely no stuffing it into my neck and talking with head at a stupid angle while cooking/washing up/ feeding the cat, etc. NO coffee - actually I have stuck to that one, but the tea amounts and strength has been creeping up; don't slump while reading or TV watching; alternate sitting activities with walking, gardening etc; and the big one: Don't get stressed.
Easy to say: we all do and about the most pathetic things sometimes. But I do think the cumalative stress thing is damaging; adding on more and more to the list and feeling guilty if not everything is dealt with.
So today, I have done most of the jobs, cast an eye over the list, ignored some things and spent a bit more time just . . . existing; a bit more time looking at trees, clouds and appreciating the day for what it is. It may not last, and I might get another warning in which case I will slow down again and thank myself for reminding myself that it's just not worth getting that stressed; a bit is good - keeps things moving along, but just not - too - much.

Image borrowed from 'Sweetoldvintage blogspot