The Vestigial Heart Read online

  “CraftER employees, we’ve done it, we’re number one”—he stretches his arms up in the air in a victorious gesture—“in our category … and over all!” A great cheering is heard and images of an ecstatic crowd are superimposed over that of Dr. Craft. “Our products have no rival. We achieve the best results in the majority of categories and the competition doesn’t know how to stop us. Throughout this year they’ve tried everything: snatching our suppliers away from us, discrediting our distributers, disparaging our aftersales service, they’ve even tried to tempt our best staff away with big offers. But no one wants to leave CraftER, and it’s a matter of logic: we’re the only company that guarantees your future.” During his studied pause the monitors are again filled with superimposed images and unintelligible cries of acclaim. “And next year will be even better, I promise. We have projects that will surprise even the most daring among you, and I know you’re out there: young people that believe so strongly in their own inventions that they only accept non-retroactive contracts.”

  Leo feels a strange prickling sensation: it seems like Dr. Craft is talking to him … but that’s impossible, he doesn’t even know him. It must have something to do with the communication assessors, ever better at modulating discourse so that each person receives it as if it were meant only for them: a little allusion and everything is given a personal, exclusive edge. The one and only acoustic source with as many meanings as listeners.

  “Ingenuous young people: we’ll leave you dumb struck and, when you come running to me pleading for a contract extension I’ll say …”

  Is he threatening him?

  “Welcome to CraftER!, because I like people with ambition and it makes me proud that you identify with the company.”

  Nice start, president. Leo had never heard him speak and he found him to be wittier than he expected. When a round of live connections is announced, he gets out of the octopus, which has given his muscles a new lease on life, and heads for the area reserved for contestants in “The Product 2111.” In a few short minutes his sensory booth is ready for action and, with growing anxiety, he prepares himself to sit through the presentations of his opponents. It would be great for him to win! Then he could really develop his idea right through to the end, and be sure of it working. He just needs resources … lots of resources, and with CraftER behind him, he would be guaranteed to have them. A dream, having all the company’s machinery at his fingertips. No wonder the Doctor is so satisfied—he’s teased that incredible projects are in store. Who knows what he’s hinting at. But how can he let his mind run away with him now? He must concentrate on the presentation and convince the president that his product is the right one, the one that will bring the most money and prestige to the company. He has a good chance: the man himself has admitted that he has a weakness for young people with ambition … and he’s the youngest participant.

  When Mr. Gatew announces that the audience will decide the length of the presentations using the sudden death system whereby they end when two-thirds of the audience members have disconnected, Leo notices the people around him for the first time, men and women in passive mode, with their lives rented out to CraftER and with the sole ambition of staying there until the end of their days. At least that’s how he sees them. Right away he asks himself what he needs to do to make sure more than a third of these puppets don’t take their attention off him. But before he finds the answer, the speaker specifies that choosing the winner will be the prerogative of the president. He doesn’t need to worry about other people then.

  A minute passes before he realizes his error. If they don’t allow him the necessary time to explain himself, he won’t be able to convince the Doctor. They’ve thought of everything, these machi’vels, you have to get through the filter of the masses in order to be heard by the only audience member who matters. Now, during his presentation, he’ll have to entertain the auditorium with gags and immediately solvable mysteries while conveying the genius of his invention to the judge. And he’ll have to give up on his dream of the Doctor trying the booth, such a personal tool that it would turn everyone else into nothing but spectators, envious and frustrated. It would be suicide. Neither the Doctor nor anyone else will try it out, everyone will see how it works together. From the presentation tree he’s prepared, he chooses the one that contains the sequence of Mr. Gatew standing in for Michael Jordan, pulling off unbelievable dribbles, leaps and shots. That’ll keep them hooked for a while, halfway between surprise and mockery, only to succumb to the explosive enthusiasm of the manager as he left the booth after his transhuman experience. Guaranteed fun for the masses and the best possible recommendation for the Doctor from his right-hand man. Everyone will be desperate to get a taste of his invention, and he’ll be speculating about the possibility of choosing someone to win some precious time that he will fill with technical virtuosity and, above all, flashes of the limitless human perception that implementing his wireless idea could impart.

  With each new contestant that steps up to the stage, Leo feels more confident. The one who took the longest to surpass the two-thirds threshold was only able to release four motes of his sensitive space dust. The idea of extending oneself in floating sensors capable of getting into unexplored corners where only dust can go seemed suggestive enough, but they didn’t even let him set out its possible applications. The masses are demanding today, and as soon as you let your guard down they take their support away without a second thought. He must be careful.

  The man who’s up before him looks like a descendent of sea creatures, and, before he even manages to differentiate his metarobot from a standard reconfigurable robot, he’s already been forced off the stage.

  It’s his turn.

  Not wasting a second, he plants himself next to Mr. Gatew and turns him into a copromoter of the product that he’s developed at the centro-european headquarters. He was the first to believe in the product and try it out for himself, he fully deserved to be on stage. The manager smiles proudly, and Leo becomes aware of the force of the Doctor’s gaze weighing down on him. For a few moments he has his blessing. And he must take advantage of it. He walks in and out of the booth, he shouts, he gesticulates wildly as he plays with the 3D images, enriching them with comical scenes: standing up to the giant players and gushing with admiration for Gatew the infiltrator, who, astonished, doesn’t know where to look. He possesses a prodigious energy; in vivo he electrifies the promotional film even further, Dr. Craft thinks, with a malicious smile that puts Leo off his stride. As soon as he stops moving he sees the attention meter plummet ten points in one go. He can’t allow himself even a glimpse of that face and, concentrating on his self-control, he throws himself back into the presentation.

  He manages to survive twelve minutes and fifteen seconds, quite a feat. When he leaves the stage, he takes the liberty of scrutinizing the Doctor again and, beneath his threatening eyebrows, a hard gaze meets his own and follows him until he’s out of his line of sight. It’s like being touched with the blade of a sword, Leo doesn’t know if he’s been mortally wounded or chosen for the highest quest. The few minutes he has to wait for the verdict are unbearable.

  Mr. Gatew helps him pass a few minutes by coming over out of the blue to tell him that the president wants to see him. All of a sudden his heart leaps into his throat, with such force that he can’t even articulate the question that’s suffocating him. Has he won? As he walks along behind the manager, the idea starts to sink in and he practically floats along on a cloud of euphoria. Bet’s face when he tells her … She was always reprimanding him for wasting time on his “inventions,” as she called them, discouraging him saying that he would never manage to move up in the company by working on private projects … and now, all of a sudden, he’s at the top: CraftER will sponsor his dream of creating wireless transmutation. All the work has paid off.

  He doesn’t know how they got there, or how long it took, but now he’s standing in front of the unmistakable Alpha+. A watershed in robotics, he woul
d love to experiment with it; what a shame that the one day he has him within reach, it’s not the right time.

  12:25 a.m. –“Dr. Craft has proposed a brief personal meeting, during which you will be unreachable, and will not be recorded in any way, do you accept?”

  How could he refuse the opportunity of a lifetime? He’d even agree to go in there naked. After undergoing a short interrogation and cutting off his connection with ROBco, he is led into a small, luminous space, where he finds himself alone. Four walls and two transparent armchairs, nothing more. Absolute isolation in such a small space makes him a bit anxious. He doesn’t like power games.

  The Doctor’s entrance has more of an impact than he’d expected. It’s nothing to do with his physical appearance, which he was already familiar with, nor with his gait being less unstable than expected. It’s his commanding gaze that seeks to rob him of his will, and against which he feels defenseless. No one has ever looked at him this way before.

  “Do you know why I’ve summoned you under such exceptional circumstances?” He sits down without taking his eyes off Leo, who does exactly the same thing.

  “I’m not entirely sure.” Finding that he can speak helps him brush off his fear.

  “You got the largest audience, do you think you’ve won?”

  Leo doubts that triumphalism will get him anywhere:

  “It doesn’t just depend on the audience. It’s you I had to convince. Did I manage it?” He clings to the hypothesis that they have the same taste in technology.

  “Yes and no. I’ve chosen you, but not your product.”

  “I haven’t won.” The dejection returns him to his old impulsive self.

  “I said I’ve chosen you, don’t you understand that?” His eyebrows form such a pointed V it’s like Leo can see an arrow coming. “I’m offering you a proper project, not this product 2111 bullshit. You will build a creativity prosthesis, it’s just what it sounds like.”

  “A prosthesis? That’s more HandicapER’s business than a CraftER thing, and all this secrecy … do I have to develop it outside the company?”

  “I like to see your mind running away with you, but you’re not quite right. It involves undertaking research that must be carried out under strict confidentiality. Apart from you and I, only Mr. Gatew will be in the know. And the prosthesis … I call it that, but it doesn’t have much in common with what the competition is making. It won’t augment a physical function but a mental one. It will be pure software, let’s put it like that. A program that will constantly challenge its PROP to spur his inventiveness and to avoid him falling into routine patterns. A kind of critical consciousness.”

  “Sounds attractive, but … what about the projects I’m working on now?”

  “We’ll assign them to someone else.”

  “Is everything already set in stone? What happens if I say no?”

  “It’s up to you. With CraftER as your enemy, you can forget about your ambitious idea of wireless transmutation.”

  Once again the sword is hanging over him, but Leo takes the risk:

  “Do you think it’s possible?”

  “After the prosthesis, who knows. It could be the product of 2112 or 2113 …”

  “And why not 2111? Who won?”

  “The zero maintenance robot.”

  “The one that repairs itself with waste materials? But no one was interested in it, they didn’t even give him two minutes.” Leo is utterly bewildered. “Do you really think his is a better product than mine?”

  “Son, you don’t understand a thing. I don’t care about the products, all I want is for you to be available to work on the prosthesis.”

  “So that’s why you put me out of the running in the competition, despite having held out longer than anyone else. It’s not fair!”

  “What is fair is only decided by those that have the power to decide; anything else is just bullshit.”

  “My device has potential and you know it.” He’s outraged that they’ve cheated him like this, so much effort had gone into the presentation and all for nothing. Bet was right.

  “Look, Leo, that’s your name, right? I don’t give a shit about your product: what I’d like to transmute myself into doesn’t exist yet.” He pauses, as if he were thinking something over. “But, with the prosthesis, we’ll be one step closer to it. I have made you the offer every CraftER employee dreams of; you should be over the moon.”

  “Yeah? And what do I get out of all this?” He realizes he’s being too forward and corrects himself. “I mean, how will my job change?”

  “To start with we’ll update your ROB to the Alpha+ model, with the learning module, the neuroaccelerator … well, what more do I need to say? You’ll be flying in both body and mind.”

  “Will I have access to it at home or only at work?”

  “You know full well that’s against the rules.”

  “But this project is extraordinary …”

  “You’re right, the rules are there for me to break in cases like this.” He tunes himself to the kid’s coolness. “You will have access to the ROB twenty-four hours a day. I only ask for discretion. And, if I’m satisfied with the prosthesis, you will earn a full wage without having to sign the retroactive contract.”

  “Oh, you heard about that.”

  “Yes, and for heaven’s sake do me the fucking favor of taking down everything you have on the public register. If you just work like I hope you will, we’ll talk about it soon. Now go and sign the agreement, do what Mr. Gatew tells you.”

  “What agreement? I haven’t said yes yet.”

  “Fucking ego, you’re more useless than the scrap metal dummy.” He stands up and turns away from Leo. “Tell Mr. Gatew to send the next one in.”

  “I accept, I accept!” It burst out as an imploring cry.

  “Rule number one, boy: with me, never risk anything more than you’re willing to defend to the death. Any more funny business and you’re out of CraftER, understood?”

  The arrow hits home this time, despite him not being able to see the eyebrows, and, as he returns to the real world of the convention and the farcical contest, the only thing he wants is to face up to the challenge ahead of him, be worthy of it, and be strong enough not to succumb to the threat that’s still ringing in his ears.

  11

  Silvana, with Baltasar’s arm around her shoulders, joins the flow of people heading for the great hall of the ComU, but soon has to detach herself in order to greet a series of acquaintances. Hugs, kisses, handshakes and best wishes for the future, identical to those exchanged last year, but today she sees them as worn-out, expired, incapable of making her feel warmth or happiness. This feeling of indifference makes her shudder as she thinks that, outside her professional life as well as within it, skin and physical contact are no longer a stimulus. Maybe it’s because she’s obsessed. She shakes her head to dispel her worries and, taking Balt’s arm, goes over to greet the organizers of this year’s celebration.

  Yeong and Sun, two long-established members of the ComU, welcome them at the door, wearing traditional Korean dress, and, between bows and curtsies, invite them to adorn themselves for the occasion. They’re advised that the appearance and attitude adopted on this day establish a theme for the rest of the year, so it’s best to choose bright colors, which will assure a bright future. From the display of colored silks, where eye-catching and warm colors predominate, Silvana chooses a red dress, the collar and cuffs of which end in a black bow. In the meantime, Baltasar observes her with a lustful look on his face, from within some shiny blue overalls and a pointy hat that makes him appear even taller. The hosts approve their choices, while at the same time insisting that what they do today will set a precedent: in the old days people abstained from telling their children off so they wouldn’t have to put up with their crying throughout the year to come.

  When they pass through the curtain into the great hall, they’re left speechless; the space has been transformed beyond recognition, making it i
mpossible to distinguish its dimensions or find one’s way around in a place where they have spent so much time at numerous meetings and events. Ramps, folding screens decorated with stylized figures, gardens of vegetation, long, vertical strips of red paper covered in characters written in black ink, dragons made of bamboo, silk and cardboard, and lanterns hanging from the ceiling here and there that emit a yellowish light into the incense-heavy air. They really are in another world. And all without using any kind of virtual technology, as is stipulated. The recovery of traditions to mark the change of the year has really taken off, and each year surpasses the last, raising the bar even higher.

  “Do you remember the Roman one?” Baltasar whispers into her ear, and she smiles, remembering how they had squeezed into a Janus costume, the two-headed God who gave his name to the month of January because it looks backward and forward at the same time. He wraps his arm around her waist taking care not to crease her dress, and looks her straight in the eye before kissing her sweetly. “I’m guaranteeing our future”—and, stepping back a little in order to make a point of the wall of clothing that separates them, murmers—“it was easier when we were dressed as Janus, though.”

  These are the last moments they spend alone during the whole celebration. Right away, some friends pull them over to the area where they will soon pay homage to their ancestors. There are a series of dishes on a high table, organized according to a color scale that forms a somewhat peculiar rainbow. On the left, red fruit, pieces of meat, tomatoes, dates, nuts, vegetables and soups, and on the far right, rice, fish, and a whitish liquid. Some Asian youngsters, who must be visiting, as they’ve never seen them before, encourage the attendees to write the names of their dead family members on a large wall, pointing out that the top part is for great-great grandparents, and the bottom one for parents.

  The only place there is any density of names is at the bottom, and Silvana regrets not being able to contribute to the top part. Her mother never spoke to her about her origins, and, actually, she had never shown an interest herself, it’s only now that she feels attracted to the past. A Korean man with a long, white beard stands before the altar and bows twice, deeply, his forehead almost touching the floor. On either side of him, two elderly acolytes indicate to the audience that they should be quiet and bow their heads. The officiator pours liquor into a glass and holds it up toward the wall, a gesture that is followed by other Korean members hurrying to place spoons and chopsticks into different bowls of food while they perform a prayer, during which they are spontaneously joined by other partygoers. Someone behind Silvana whispers that it’s time to choose the food their ancestors most enjoyed when they were alive and to offer it to them as a sign of respect.