Lavie Tidhar: The Apex Book of World SF 2

She looked to where his finger pointed and saw the Remembrance Monument.

“When the time comes, I will be harvested as others have been before me. My memories will become part of the monument. There are those who say that when the end of time comes, we will unfold our bodies, regain our memories and find ourselves changed into something more than machine.”

“Will I be harvested, too?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” He cupped her face in his hands. “You are our first success. We don’t even know what you’ll be like when you’re as old as we are.”

“Can I have your memories?” she asked.

He didn’t answer. Outside, Mechanic’s men tramped through the streets of Metal Town. Someone screamed.

Harvest , the word whispered through Alternate Girl’s circuits.

Father flinched, closed his eyes and bowed his head.

“Will it hurt?” Alternate Girl asked.

“I don’t know,” Father replied.

But she knew he was lying. She wondered what happened at Harvest and whether it was indeed a natural thing as Father had said. She visited the Remembrance Monument, and tried to make sense of it all. Its cold walls gave back a reflection of her face—so unlike the faces of her fellow citizens.

She thought of a life without Father, and there were no words for the grief she felt.

“Take me then,” she said to the Monument. “If you must take Father, then you must take me, too.

But the monument stayed silent, and no matter how hard she listened, there were no messages or codes from the beyond.

After that, she grew more conscious of how the machine men made their daily trek to the walled buildings. They went in the same as they came out. The drones monitored the streets, gathering up residue and scrap metal. It seemed to her that each one had a duty to perform, a routine task to follow.

Mechanic had found no routine for her yet.

“Learn all you can,” he had said on one of his visits. “You will be our first ambassador. The model housewife, a perfect expatriate. They will love us because of you. Perhaps they will finally remember us and we will be reconciled with the original makers.”

“What about Father?” Alternate Girl asked.

“He does his part,” Mechanic said. “You must do yours.”

She didn’t like the uncertainty of his answer, but she had learnt not to say so. Instead, she nodded and listened and took in the knowledge he fed to her.

There must be a way out, she thought.

It was the first time she thought of escape.

The Expatriate Choice as subject of this study reveals the following common causes for expatriation:

Economic. Some expatriates choose to live or work in a different country or society for the sake of material gain.

Social. Some expatriates choose to live or work in a different country or society because they see this as a means of increasing their stature in society. Others choose exile for the sake of love.

Political. Some expatriates embrace voluntary exile as a means of protest against the ruling body of their home country.

Alternate Girl found the rift in the barrier a week after Mechanic’s visit. It was late at night, and she had chosen to take one of the roads leading south. She ventured further and further away from the heart of Metal Town. The moon cast its light on the road before her and she could see the long shadow of herself stretching out and mingling with the waving shapes of wild grass and brush.

She was deep in thought when the sound of wheels swishing on asphalt caught her attention. She saw a flash of light, and then she was at a barred gate. Through the bars, she could see the outline of cars and buses flowing in a rush away from her. She stared at this vision of vibrant and full-bodied creatures, and she understood that they were relatives of the disembowelled who lay stranded in the many garages around Metal Town.

On her way home, she was conscious of the spy eye stationed atop the Remembrance Monument and, passing close to it, she heard a faint murmur that sounded like voices whispering through the scaffolds of the Monument’s steel ports.

The recollection of screams played back in her memory and she stopped. One day they would take her, too. She’d be joined to the Monument regardless of whether she desired it or not.

Across the street, she saw the Mechanic. Moonlight glinted off the chrome of his head, and he gave a slight nod when he saw her. She could hear him muttering to himself as he crossed to where the tin houses of the Numbered Men leant against each other like pale reflections of their owners.

Alternate Girl wished she had the courage to run up to Mechanic.

“Please,” she would say. “Please spare Father.”

But she already knew his answer.

“Our duty is to the original creators of the monument,” he’d told her once. “It is our task to harvest the bodies and to store the memories of the gone-before. It is all for the greater good, Alternate Girl. We all have our duties to perform. Your father understands his place in all of these.”

Memory, its storage and the passing on of it, is essential to the inhabitants of Metal Town. What function does the Remembrance Monument have, if not to store the memories of the gone-before? At the heart of Harvest is the preservation of the spirit that is Metal Town.

Father was silent. He dragged his feet when he walked and complained about his joints. She tried to cheer him up, but all the while her mind circled around the question of escape.

“They’ll be coming for me soon,” Father said. His speech slurred and he sat down and leant his head against the back of the chair.

“Mechanic wants to create a partner for you,” he whispered. “He wants someone created in your image. An alternate man designed to fit the perfect housewife.”

“Father,” she knelt down beside him. “If I told you we could get out and not have to come back, what would you say?”

He laughed.

“Don’t you think anyone has tried that before? Why do you think the monument keeps growing, AG? Our masters created us to stay in Metal Town, but there were always those who tried to escape. Everyone comes back to Metal Town, even those who leave with the Mechanic’s blessing.”

“But there’s a road out of here,” Alternate Girl insisted. “If we leave, at least we’ll have a choice.”

“They’ll always catch you,” he whispered. “Metal Town allows no exemptions, AG. Right now, you are one of a kind, but what’s been made before can be made again.”

He closed his eyes and leant back in his chair. She could hear the slow whirr of his heart, and she felt more frightened than she had ever been.

“Why did you make me this way?” she asked. “You could have made me a drone, if this is all the life I’m meant to have.”

“Do you think a drone’s life is of less value than yours?” Father asked. “Memory and hope is all that lies between you and the life of a Numbered Man. We come home when our time is at end. To be joined to the original dream of our creators is a privilege, not a curse.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry, Father. I didn’t mean for it to sound that way. But please, please, won’t you at least try? Without you, I might just as well be a Numbered Man.”

“Escape is never without price,” Father said.

But she only heard the capitulation in his voice.

Copy of Memo as lifted from Mechanic’s desk:

Received: 23.11, Remembrance Monday

Re: circular number: 792-A-1B3Rae

Release Request: Alternate Girl

Status: Under consideration

They left Metal Town early in the morning. In the quiet dark, the thrum of the Equilibrium Machine was magnified a hundred times. Avoiding the street lamps, they kept to the shadows as best they could.