Робин Слоун - Sourdough

“I’m quitting General Dexterity.” It was the first time I’d said it out loud. I felt as renegade as Beo with his restaurant. “There’s so much more to do. So many skills! Knives, food processors, frying pans … the arm could reach right into the oil. There’s a marketplace for ArmOS extensions, and I’m going to sell kitchen skills.”

Mr. Marrow was silent. Then I heard a modulated sound that might have been a laugh. I looked at Belasco and mouthed, Is he laughing?

Mr. Marrow composed himself. “I don’t understand half of what you said, which makes me think you might be onto something. Keep your savings. I’ll buy the robot in exchange for twenty percent of … whatever this is going to be.” The modulated voice was silent a moment. “Are you sure this is what you want?”

I was sure.

“Belasco, cut the check. Lois—make it work.”

The phone went silent. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized how much I cared about the opinion of an anonymous benefactor who sometimes inhabited the body of a painted fish. But I did.

At General Dexterity, Peter did not seem very surprised.

“We’ll miss you on Control,” he said, “and I know the guys at the Slurry table will miss you, too. Have you tried the latest formulation? Revision G mark … five, I guess? The glycemic index is unreal.”

I ducked into the cafeteria to reassure Chef Kate that I would keep her supplied with sourdough even though I was leaving the company. In the kitchen, I found her robot arm wheeled out of the corner, reactivated, cracking eggs merrily alongside her sous chefs.

“I heard we have you to thank for this,” Kate said drily. Her expression was complicated.

“I can’t tell if you’re happy about it or not,” I said.

She sighed. “Neither can I.”

As I was shepherded around the office, enduring various last-day-of-work rituals, I was accosted first by Arjun and then by Garrett.

“There’s something you need to know,” Arjun hissed as I was walking out of the HR debrief.

“There’s something you need to know,” Garrett whispered as I was preparing for the Proprioception handoff.

“Garrett’s in love with you.”

“Arjun’s in love with you.”

I told them both I didn’t have time for this bullshit, and if anybody wanted to ask a lady out, he could do it via text message like a normal person.

Across Townsend Street, I walked the length of the Task Acquisition Center, headed for the desk of Deborah Palmer-Grill, where I would make my arrangements to purchase the refurbished arm. I peered across the rows and tried to spot the bearded chef, but of course, he was gone. I’d made him obsolete. Confidence.

DPG rose to meet me. “You did it.” She reached for my hand, giving it not a mere shake but a hearty rattle. She was grinning. “I think I’m going to get a raise because of you. Andrei was obsessed with the eggs!”

I bent across her desk to reach her keyboard and tap my payment information into a digital form.

“Are you sure you don’t want to stay?” DPG said. The purchase order floated on her monitor. “You could join me over on this side of Townsend Street. We would make a good team!”

I looked back at the arms and their trainers. There were fewer than before. It wasn’t just the bearded chef who was gone. General Dexterity was making progress.

I shook my head. “I think I want to get a little labor in while there’s still a chance.”

I walked out of the robot factory into bright sunlight with my belongings in a small box. My tablet and stylus; my picture of my parents; Kubrick the cactus. It was the middle of the day and I’d deployed no office chaff. Odd parts of me, my chin and my heels and the soft backs of my arms, felt tingling and buoyant. I was light.

THE NOVICE’S GRACE

ANOTHER WEDNESDAY CAME, and with it the final market preview. Soon, our secret kingdom would open to the world. Every customer whom I’d ever seen was here this morning, snapping photos to post on the expedient image-based social network. This was their last chance to prove to the world they had been one of the elect.

I had forwarded Chaiman’s album along to Naz, and this morning he played it through the concourse. Stretched out by echoes, the songs of the Mazg were sweetly sad. Valedictory. They were perfect.

There was at least one new customer on this, the last of the Wednesdays. I recognized her. Charlotte Clingstone.

“So, here you are,” she said.

A trio of acolytes clustered behind her, eyes roving the concourse warily. I recognized them, too, from the kitchen at Café Candide. They all noticed the Vitruvian at once. It was mixing placidly. They stared.

“That’s quite a contraption,” Clingstone said. “Is it really necessary?”

“It’s helpful,” I said.

She lifted a loaf from the ping-pong table, faced the smiling crust squarely through her glasses. “It looks different than I remember it.”

I offered her a taste. Her contingent, too.

The acolytes chewed dutifully. Clingstone sniffed the bread, raised her eyebrows, and took a nibble. “It’s very competent,” she said. “Do you bake anything else? Croissants? Pizza dough?”

I did not.

“You do remind me of Jim with his mystery starter. He had the novice’s grace, perpetually. It was maddening.” She nibbled her sourdough sample and continued, sounding very casual. “I have a proposal for you. Leave the robot behind. Come join us at Café Candide.” It took her acolytes a moment to process what they’d just heard. When they did, their eyes went wide, and they looked at me with bewilderment and horror.

Clingstone continued. “Bring the starter back to the café. You’ll apprentice under Mona Rahut. You met her. There’s no better teacher.”

I felt the disorientation of a generous offer that in no way lines up with anything you want to do: like a promotion to senior alligator wrestler, or an all-expenses-paid trip to Gary, Indiana.

“That’s very kind of you,” I said, “but I have a business here. They’re about to open the market. It’s going to get a lot bigger.”

My reply pinged off Clingstone’s calm countenance without leaving a mark. She chewed the last of her sample and swallowed. “Many young people wait years to be offered an apprenticeship at Café Candide.” The smoldering hatred in the acolytes’ gazes indicated they had recently been those people.

“I just don’t see myself working in a restaurant,” I said.

Clingstone’s gaze was even. “It’s really quite a bit more than a restaurant.”

“No,” I said. “Thank you.” Firmly. “I’ve learned a lot on my own.”

She hmm ed, and it was almost musical. She looked from me to the Vitruvian to the starter in its crock, and back to me again. “I wonder if that’s true? Some days, that bread of Jim’s … it seemed almost to bake itself.”

I was going to protest, but Clingstone turned and shepherded her acolytes back onto the yellow-tape road. “Thank you for the taste,” she said. “Though I do think you should try pizza dough. A killer sourdough crust. Can your robot do that?”

More customers passed by. I was reaching into the Faustofen when I heard a voice I recognized: “Lois! Proprioception!”

It was Andrei, linked arm in arm with an older man.

“What are you doing here?”

“I was invited,” he said. He started to laugh. “I didn’t expect to see a Vitruvian! This is the one you bought.”

“She’s one of your employees?” the older man asked. He was very handsome, with an old sea captain look to him.

“Was. Gregor, this is Lois Clary. Originally from Michigan. She worked with us on the Control team for … fourteen months?”