Рич Ларсон - Tomorrow Factory - Collected Fiction

“Fully automated,” I say, as the waiter rolls up to start dispensing bread baskets, arms all clicking and whirring. “Not bad, right?”

Oxford’s pa nods his head, looking weirdly amused.

“They have AI cafés in Dakar,” Oxford informs me, scrolling through the tabletop menu. “Since last year.”

He’s already put in an order for scallops, so I guess it’s too late to head for the Space Needle. Instead I ping the kitchens for oysters and a few bottles of whatever wine has the highest alcohol content, which turns out to be something called General Washington. I pull up a wiki about vintages to give Oxford’s pa some background, seeing how I can barely tell the difference between a white and a red.

“To the Diallos,” I say, once me and him have our glasses filled and Oxford is nursing a Coke.

“Cheers,” Oxford beams.

We make some chatter about the length of the flight, about the stereotype that it always rains in Seattle but how really it’s mostly just cloudy. My mouth is more or less on autopilot because I’m watching for Oxford to peer over at the immersion pods. When I catch him at it the third time, I give him a nod.

“Have a go, man,” I say. “Company tab. We’ll grab you when the food is here.” Oxford grins and lopes off without any further convincing, leaving me with Diallo senior. I lean over and top off his wine glass. “You started off playing in the African leagues, isn’t that right, Mr. Diallo?”

He takes a drink and makes an approving glance at the bottle. “Yes,” he says. “Then Greece.”

“You must have been a terror back then,” I say. “To drag Trikala all the way to the A1 finals.”

Oxford’s pa shrugs, but looks nearly pleased.

“I watched a few highlight reels,” I say modestly. “Part of the job, isn’t it, checking out the pedigree.” I swish my wine back and forth and take a big gulp. “Oxford gets it from somewhere.”

“From more than me or his mother,” Diallo senior says. “From who knows where. Maybe God.”

But he’s glad enough to talk about the stint in Greece for a while, about how he was nearly picked up by Cordoba in the Liga ACB before the bronchiectasis reared its head and suddenly he couldn’t run how he used to. I ping the kitchens to hold the food.

When the bottle is gone and Oxford’s pa is finally slumping a bit in his chair, eyes a bit shiny, I spring the question. “Why doesn’t your boy want a mesh?” I say.

Oxford’s pa flicks his gaze over to the immersion pod where his son is jacked in. “His grandfather had a mesh,” he says. “My wife’s father. He was a soldier.”

I kind of startle at that. I mean, I know, in theory, that the nerve mesh technology was military before it went commercial—so was Velcro—but I never thought about it getting use over in fucking West Africa.

“They used them to track troop movements,” Oxford’s pa continues. “And to monitor the health of the soldiers. To monitor their anxiety.”

“Ours do that, too,” I say. “Mental health of our players is a top priority.”

“They did more than that.” Diallo senior empties his glass with a last gulp, then sets it down and looks over at the second bottle. “They wired them for remote override of the central nervous system. You have heard of puppeteering, yes?”

I shake my head.

Oxford’s pa opens the new wine bottle with his big spidery hands, looking pensive. “It means a soldier cannot break ranks or desert,” he says. “A soldier cannot turn down an order to execute six prisoners taking up too much space in the convoy. Someone else, someone far away, will pull their finger to pull the trigger.” He sloshes wine into his glass and tops mine off, gesturing with his other hand. “A soldier cannot be interrogated, because someone far away will lock their jaws shut, or, if the interrogation is very painful, unplug their brainstem.”

He mimes yanking a cord with two fingers, and I feel suddenly sick, and not from the wine.

“That’s fucking awful,” I say. “Christ.”

“Not our invention,” Diallo senior says.

“But that’s nothing like what we do with ours,” I say. “We don’t control anything. Not a thing. If you could help your son to understand that—”

“Not a thing,” Diallo senior echoes. He snorts. “You think knowing a million people are going to be watching out of your eyes does not control what you do?”

“If you’re talking about off-court fanfeeds, those are entirely optional,” I say, but I’m not sure that’s what he’s talking about. “The fans love them, of course,” I add. “But it’s not contractual.”

“Oxford does not want you inside his body,” Diallo senior says. “He does not want you behind his eyes. He does not want the mesh.”

Then his retinal blinks blue, and it’s a good thing, because I don’t have a good response. He excuses himself to the washroom with his kit, weaving just slightly on his way, which leaves me sitting with a full wine glass and the mental image of some mutilated soldier having his brain shut down by committee.

But that’s nothing like our mesh.

Inab Oxford out of the immersion pod while his pa’s still in the washroom. He climbs out looking all groggy, craning his head to see where the scallops are at.

“What’d you think?” I say. “You like the nervecast?”

Oxford nods, almost reverently. “I crossed up Ash Limner,” he says.

“That could be you in there, you know,” I say, tapping the pod. “People would be paying to be you in there.”

Oxford gives the pod a look with just a bit of longing in it.

“Everyone has a mesh,” I say. “Ash Limner is meshed. Dray Cardeno is meshed. Why not Oxford Diallo, huh?”

Oxford chews his lip. “I promised,” he says.

“To your grandfather?” I ask.

He looks surprised. “Yes.”

“But this mesh is different, Oxford,” I say. “We don’t call the shots. You call the shots. We’re just along for the ride.”

Oxford frowns. “He said the mesh is a net you never get untangled from.”

“You said you liked the nervecast,” I say. “That’s kind of hypocritical of you, don’t you think? You enjoying someone else’s nervecast when you won’t get a mesh for yourself?”

“No,” Oxford says simply. “They chose.”

“They chose, yeah, of course,” I say. “It’s always a choice. But they made the right choice. Man, you have a gift. Your dad said it himself. You have a gift from God.” I put my hand on the pod again. “You owe it to the world to make the most of that gift. I’m never going to know what it’s like to slam how you do. I could barely dirty-dunk back in high school. Ninety-nine point ninety-nine percent of people are never going to know what it’s like. Unless you let us.”

I can sense him wavering. He’s looking down at the pod, looking at his reflection in the shiny black mirror of it. I feel guilty in my gut, but I push right through, because this is important, getting this deal, and he’ll thank me later.

“You owe it to us,” I say. “Your dad’s in the washroom. You know what he’s doing in there?”

Oxford looks up, startled. Nods.

“Hacking up blood,” I say. “He’s never going to run again. Not how he used to. You don’t think he’d like a chance to feel that again? To hit the break? To get out for that big dunk in transition, pound up the hardwood, slice right to the rack, drop the bomb like wham .” I clap my hands together and Oxford flinches a bit. “You owe it, man,” I say. “You owe it to your dad. He got you here, didn’t he? He got you all this way.”

And that’s when Diallo senior comes out of the washroom, and I couldn’t have done it any better if I choreographed it myself, because he staggers a bit against the wall and looks suddenly old, suddenly tired. Oxford looks at him, looks scared as hell. Maybe realizing, for the first time, that his pa won’t be around forever.