Melanie

Underneath the cracked glass floors of Territory 17A, there was a cockroach. It sat, gnawing at the wires contained underneath colorful strobe lights that had been disconnected years ago, due to Enkarta regulations. Joseph stopped for a moment to watch the bug’s deadly work, knowing the toxin would take effect in a matter of minutes. His father had been one of the primary developers of the poison. It was one of the better inventions of the century, created by none other than Enkarta, the science and research center that now ran the entire city. By including reactants in the poison that multiplied the amount of lysosomes in an organism’s body, it left the hungry structures with nothing to eat but the body that it belonged to.

Predictably, the cockroach began to grow a massive acidic lump on it’s back that looked similar to congealed milk, which slowly began turning crimson as the bug’s blood began leaking out. Joseph had seen enough. He already knew what the outcome would be.

As he walked along the streets, he remembered his pet rat, Tubby. He remembered his father coming into his room, and taking Tubby from his glass container, and telling his son about his brilliant new experiment.

“You know rats cost an arm and a leg now that they have to be genetically recreated. Just think how much money your Daddy would save if he could just use old Tubby!”

Joseph never answered; he knew it was no use. He had always known what his father was capable of. Indeed, the experiment succeeded, and Tubby was killed in the process.

Finally, Joseph approached the rusted metal door of the oldest complex in the city. The transparent streets of tomorrow had long since faded. They were now replaced with concrete, covered with every color of graffiti; it was only here where Joseph could relax in obscurity. However, his sense of peace soon gave way to terror. Outside his door stood an Enkarta patrol unit in full uniform, a rare sight to see. Even though technology had advanced since the first unit had been produced, there were still many glitches in even the most modern unit. There were often reports of police units showing up to patrol in nothing but bare minimum clothing, and it was far from unusual for a patroller to show up for duty missing a sock or two.

Joseph automatically knew that an inspection was in order. He sighed, praying he had covered it up well enough, because if the unit found anything even remotely unusual it would be an automatic ticket to jail, possibly even execution if the jury saw fit. Joseph quickly opened the door and tried to look as innocent as possible, even though he knew the patrolman had a lie detector system built into it’s hard drive, designed to detect excessive perspiration in a person being questioned.

“I really don’t see why this is necessary,” Joseph began, “Many years ago there were people who did this job, called the police. At least they had to have a search warrant!”

The patrol droid eyed the man. He was only making its job more difficult.

Joseph could clearly see that talking to the unit was not helping matters since no language comprehension program was built into its hard drive. The developers had been worried about a language program complicating the patrol droid’s search and destroy based job. He finally sighed, and gave in. He led the robot into his unkempt apartment. Joseph tried hard not to eye his wardrobe, and failed, stealing a glimpse at it whenever the robot’s back was turned away from him.

Finally the droid clanked over to the wardrobe, opening the first drawer so slowly it almost drove Joseph insane. At last, the droid reached the final drawer. Inside sat Joseph’s entire videograph collection. He sighed with relief, now glad he had spent the money on such useless things. Just as he was certain that the patrolman would shut the compartment, it began to pull out all the videographs, one by one. Joseph knew he had lost, but he could not run. Things far worse than jail awaited those who tried to escape their fate.

The patrol unit finally reached the twentieth videograph, which had a secret compartment. The rest went by in a blur; it yanked open the secret compartment, and the droid found the thing that Joseph had kept hidden for so many years. The picture of a woman whom Enkarta had killed nearly twenty-seven years ago. His father had served on the jury for her trial, although he worked for Enkarta, the very company prosecuting her. Enkarta - the same company that led to almost all of Joseph’s bad luck in life - never seeing his father, being condemned to this pit he lived in, and finally Melanie Starling’s death.

Melanie had been so different from anyone Joseph had ever met. Lying on the beach in the rain, when there had still been rain. She had always said it would go away someday, and that she was going to savor the last of it. She had laughed a lot, and no one ever took her very seriously. No one except Joseph, listening to all the things she said, thinking they were wise. She thought about going to college, to get an education, but her parents were not rich like Joseph’s; he remembered her consistently getting scornful looks from passerby on the streets in her torn stockings, and the eaten away cardigan she had worn since she was sixteen. She always wore her hair down, and sometimes twisted it into tiny braids in the morning, taking them out an hour later, so she looked like she had natural curls.

The patrol unit gripped Joseph’s arm, quickly tugging him to meet an Enkarta official. The unit had the photos of all who had been condemned by Enkarta built into its hard drive, and it had the sense that Joseph would soon be added to its collection, despite the popular belief that robots had no eye for the future. Their intuition was not like that of a human. Instead it calculated data from the past, or in the patrolman’s case the past offenses of those it imprisoned. Joseph already had twenty-three past offenses, all leading back to that girl. The droid recalled an image of her skipping along on the streets. A real eyesore. The droid could easily see why Enkarta had killed her; the world was definitely in no need for useless people like Melanie Starling.

Enkarta headquarters loomed before the two figures, droid and man. The streetlights glowed weakly, and an advertisement videograph was playing just outside the door. Joseph glimpsed at it briefly, but before he could watch any more, the unit pulled him inside the massive building. A secretary unit stood behind a chrome desk, welcoming both of them in a syrupy voice whilst waving its arms about dramatically. The patrol unit tugged Joseph along, up to the elevator, where it punched in a security code. The elevator arrived in a matter of seconds, and then took them to the top floor. At last Joseph was led to his final destination, Room 1154.

Inside sat an official in a stiff silver chair. There was a soft clink as a row of balls drearily transferred energy to the last ball, sending it up into the air, guaranteeing another round of the same thing. Joseph felt a sudden burst of anger at the useless device, wanting to rip it from the balding official’s desk and smash it to pieces. He probably would have done so if the patrol unit’s grip hadn’t been so tight.

“Is this Joseph Tourmaline again?” remarked the official, a hint of amusement in his voice, “I would have guessed you learned your lesson the first time. Then again, I would have guessed you had forgotten her too.”

“Guess again Frank. I’m stronger than you think.”

Frank frowned with irritation, “You do know why she was condemned, I hope. And your father! He was on the jury of all things. A respectable man! Always knew what was good for this city.”

Joseph boiled with anger, “My father was a drunk! And I’m ashamed of the decisions he made for this city! Just look at how the people live. They have no freedom because of your policies.”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk! I would have expected better from you. It looks like you’re as much use to us as that girl you seem so obsessed with. What was her name anyway?”

“Her name was Melanie Starling. Probably the only useful person in this whole city, even if her parents were poor, thanks to your company, Enkarta. At least her family spent their money on books instead of liquor.”

“Good! I will make sure to erase all records of her. Including her death. It’s unfortunate that you think so highly of her, but that will be soon taken care of,” the balding man smiled with hostility, “ I will get some medical droids to take you to the hospital, you don’t seem quite well in the head.”

Joseph bore his eyes through the man, “What are you implying?”

“There is a serum that was recently created to erase memories. Depending on the dose, you can erase almost anything and everything. That girl, for example...”

“ I refuse to go through with this. You can’t do something that drastic without a jury first!”

“Didn’t you hear?” The official laughed in triumph, “Enkarta just passed a law allowing that long process to be skipped! From now on we make all legal decisions.”

“ This is crazy! What right does Enkarta have to do this?” Joseph moaned, “ It’s not right.”

Joseph was taken away by medical droids. They dropped him harshly in an aluminum van, sound proofed so nobody could hear his terrified screams.

It was strange that he was not thinking about his own fate then, but of Melanie’s. He imagined what she must have been like when she knew she was going to die. He remembered how calm she had been in all situations, and figured that was what she must have been like even as she lived her last few days in a cold prison cell. Finally thoughts gave way to dreams of Melanie sneaking into the ambulance and freeing him so they could run away together. She was wearing a new yellow cardigan in place of her old green one, and it looked nice against her blonde-white hair. But she was dead, and she never got a new sweater. Then, Joseph woke up.

He was in the hospital now, surrounded by sterilized white. He was finally taken into a large operating room, with a robot nurse at his side telling him it was all right, just as it had been programmed to do. But he knew it was not all right in the least.

Finally a real human doctor came in wearing a ‘Proud Worker for Enkarta’ nameplate. Joseph wanted to strangle him. The needle was brought out from its hiding place inside the doctor’s coat. He was measuring out the correct dose, twenty- seven years of forgetting.

“Don’t worry, this won’t hurt one bit,” said the useless nurse. It would hurt his heart, and that’s what mattered.

The needle was injected into his arm, and Joseph felt dizzy from trying to stay awake. Right before he passed out, there was an image of Melanie in braid curls, and then everything went black.

Melanie was forgotten, and Joseph led the rest of his life just as Enkarta had wanted him to. He got married and had a child. And he became an important official in the company, like his father before him. And just as his father neglected him, he neglected his daughter, Melanie. He had always liked that name, he just couldn’t quite remember why.

The End