August 2003 - Updown

08/01

Her eyes closed, Annie breathes in deeply. ‘Hmmm. Isn’t that smell wonderful?’

There are many fragrances in the air, but she must be referring to the star jasmine that grows luxuriously at one end of the gondola. It is prolific, stretching its flower-strewn tendrils up the gondola’s frame and spreading out across the webbing on the lower sections of the envelope. In the warm air, it is throwing out scent almost lasciviously.

‘It’s beautiful,’ I murmur in reply. I have to admit, though, that I enjoy the sight of her enjoying the scent more than I enjoy the scent itself.

08/02

Laid-back, dreamy music is playing very softly, but it highlights the peace and the quiet rather than interfering with it. The dirigible is solar-powered and it makes no discernable noise as it drifts over the water. The sea itself, with no rocks or hulls to beat against within a dozen kilometres, is silent. The only sounds are the breeze rustling the leaves on the bougainvilleas and the palms, the occasional whisper of Mrs Broinowski turning the pages of her book, and the light, whirring footfalls of the adjuvants going about their business. Mr Broinowski is sleeping peacefully in the sunshine.

08/03

It is June 2, 2075, and I am nineteen years old.

The dirigible is cruising a few metres above the surface of the water. It doesn’t seem to be going in any particular direction, but now that dirigibles are becoming popular the on-board computer has to plot a course and argue with half a dozen other craft to keep us all out of each other’s sight. So far, it is successfully maintaining the illusion that we are alone on a boundless ocean.

Annie stretches languorously, as if to give the sun more surface area to warm with its mellow light.

08/04

When she settles back into her lounger, she doesn’t seem to know what to do with her hands, and absent-mindedly runs her fingers up and down the grain of the wooden arms.

Something is troubling her. After nineteen years, I can easily tell. She is looking at me, smiling, but her eyes disagree.

‘What’s the matter?’ I ask her.

She reaches across and strokes the back of my hand. ‘I love you, Atu,’ she says.

‘I love you too, Annie,’ I reply. Although I’ve said those words to her a thousand times, I still feel the perfect truth of them.

08/05

’There’s something I want to give you,’ she says, and she gestures for one of the adjuvants to come over. The adjuvant is one of the new ones that Mrs Broinowski commissioned specifically for the dirigible. It is covered with a plastic skin coloured teal green and pearly grey, and all the humans insist that they look like dolphins. I don’t see it, but then I’m not human. The adjuvant is carrying a small flat object wrapped in a silk scarf.

‘What’s that?’ I ask.

‘It’s a present,’ she says simply. ‘Happy Birthday, Atu.’

The adjuvant hands me the object.

08/06

I pull the silk scarf away. Underneath is a thin disc of gold, carved to resemble a snowflake. In its centre, a fragment of silicate the size of a mustard seed catches the light.

‘Annie, you are far too good to me,’ I tell her. I never know what to say when she gives me gifts.

‘Do you know what it is?’ she asks.

‘It’s a gold plate,’ I say.

She waves her hand impatiently. ‘No, that’s just a setting. I had the adjuvants back at the house make it for me. The bit in the middle is what’s important.’

08/07

‘It’s a flek, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, but it’s not just any flek. It’s a recording of you. Do you remember last year, when you sang at my parent’s 40th anniversary party? I didn’t tell you at the time, but I got the house to record it.’ She laughs lightly. ‘You remember you sang that kitschy old Harry Mohammed Band song that made my mother cry? Even I had tears in my eyes.’ Her voice drops a little. ‘You were so handsome up on that stage. You captivated the entire audience. I don’t think I’ve ever been more proud of you.’

08/08

I’ve sung for her many times, but now I feel as if my whole body is singing. That the most perfect woman in the world should be proud of a humanalogue defies belief. But I heard her say it. I can tell that she means it. If anything humanalogues feel can be called ecstasy, that’s what I feel right now.

‘Not if I loved you for the rest of all time,’ I tell her, ‘could I deserve this.’

To my surprise, she bites her bottom lip and her eyes glisten. ‘Oh Atu. Please don’t say that.’

‘Why not? What’s wrong?’

08/09

’I don’t want to talk about it,’ she says, then a second later, she adds, ‘but I have to. Atu, Richard has asked me to marry him.’

She says this as if it would be a revelation to me, but it isn’t unexpected. Annie and Richard have been spending a lot of time together lately. She even told me that she’d slept with him. He is a few years older than her, earnest, and maybe a little too serious. But he seems to respect Annie, and that’s what’s important.

‘What’d you say?’

‘I said I wanted to think it over.’

08/10

‘Do you want to marry him?’

‘Yes,’ she replies, and looks out over the ocean, as if expecting to see something there that might settle her mind. ‘But I’m questioning my motives.’

‘What are they?’

‘I’m thirty five, Atu. I know it’s a bit old-fashioned, but I want to have a baby. Maybe even more than one. My time is running out.’

‘You have plenty of time. Women twice your age can have children, if they want.’

She frowns. ‘I mean it’s my last chance to do it without hormone therapy or IVF or some other form of technological interference.’

08/11

‘Well, that’s your choice.’

‘There’s more than that. I don’t just want a baby. I want to start a family. Do you understand the difference?’

‘I think so. That doesn’t seem like a bad motive for marrying Richard.’

‘It makes me feel like I’m using him.’

‘Do you love him? I don’t think it’s a questionable motive if you love him.’

‘I really don’t know. I think I do. It’s so different to what I feel for you, Atu. When I’m with you, I feel that life is wonderful and it can’t possibly get any better. With Richard it’s different.’

08/12

‘How?’

‘When I’m with Richard… there’s something about him. I get this little ember of something, deep in my heart. It’s a sense of connection. It’s a feeling of potential, like I’m standing on the edge of a whole new landscape filled with things I can’t even imagine.’

‘It sounds amazing,’ I say. But it’s more than amazing. Sometimes with humans they say something or do something which hints at planes of thought and feeling that are completely out of my grasp. This is one of those times.

‘It might be,’ she says. ‘Or it could be some horrible mistake.’

08/13

‘I’m not a brave person, Atu. If I accept him, it will change my life forever. I won’t be able to go back. That scares me.’

‘I’ll always be there for you, Annie. Maybe in a different capacity, but I’ll still be there.’

“That’s the thing, Atu. You won’t be. Richard has some very… traditional ideas. He doesn’t want to have any amilogs. He says amilogs make people lazy. If I go into this, I’ll have to give you up.’ Tears well in her eyes, and she flicks them away with an embarrassed brush of her hand.

‘Oh,’ I say.

08/14

‘Richard doesn’t understand what you mean to me,’ she says, with a note of anger. ‘He looks at you and all he sees is another good-looking amilog toy-boy. He doesn’t realise that I’ve spent my entire adult life with you. He doesn’t realise that ever since I was sixteen, the first thing I’ve seen when I wake in the morning is you. He’s never experienced that sweet smile of yours, your beautiful brown eyes, that gentle way you touch my hair…’ She reaches out and takes my hand, bringing it to her lips and kissing the back of my fingers.

08/15

There is not much I can say. ‘I love you, and I only want what’s best for you.’

‘I just wish I knew what to do.’

‘Maybe I can stay with your parents. Then if it doesn’t work out between you and Richard, I’ll still be here…’

‘I already thought of that. My parents don’t want you. My mother says it would just be too weird having you around without me.’

‘So what happens to me?’

‘If I agree to marry Richard? I don’t know. I guess you’d get sold.’ Her voice cracks on this last word.

So that’s it.

08/16

‘I don’t even know how you sell a humanalogue,’ she says.

‘The house will organise it through the network,’ I tell her. ‘It’ll speak to a hundred million other houses across the world, and find someone who wants an amilog with my specifications.’

‘You say that as if it’s already happening, Atu. I haven’t decided to accept Richard. I just need some more time to think, to go over my options. I’m not used to having to make choices.’

‘I think you’ve already made your choice, Annie.’

She looks at me, startled and maybe a little frightened. ‘No I haven’t.’

08/17

I have to force the words out, because they go against what I feel, but I know they need to be said. ‘Yes, you have. You see, usually when you give me gifts, it’s clothes or cologne, things that make me look good or smell good, things we can both enjoy.’ I hold up the golden snowflake. ‘This is different. This is a way for me to remember you after you’ve gone. I can play the flek and remember all the good times we had.’

‘That’s not what I intended.’

‘Maybe not consciously, but you do see it, don’t you?’

08/18

A couple of tears trickle down her cheeks. Annie is a resilient woman, not given to outpourings of emotion. She sheds one tear where another woman would shed a thousand. It’s one of the reasons I love her so much. She gives me a mock glare and wipes her eyes. ‘How does a humanalogue get so perceptive?’

‘Good training.’ I offer, and she giggles, with a good measure of nervous relief.

‘I did want this birthday to be special, Atu, and not just because it might be our last together. I realised that this is a unique situation for you.’

08/19

‘For me?’

‘You once told me you were designed to look nineteen. When you were brand new you looked nineteen. If you live to be a hundred, you’ll still look nineteen. Today is the one day when your real age and your apparent age are the same.’

‘I never thought about it that way. You’re right.’

‘I’m sorry that it hasn’t been happier.’

‘Your happiness is my happiness. I can already tell that if you marry Richard and have children, you’ll be happy. You’ll reach your potential to do all sorts of things that you could never do with me.’

08/20

‘If only I could always be as brave as I feel when you say things like that,’ she says. ‘You really are one in a million, Atu. Maybe if I sit Richard down and explain things to him, I can get him to come around. Maybe I can make him see that it could be useful having an amilog around.’

I am not optimistic. I doubt very much that Richard will change his mind. There may be men who wouldn’t mind their new bride bringing her old lover into their marriage, but if there are, Richard isn’t one of them.

08/21

But it seems that a weight has been lifted from Annie’s mind. ‘Let’s go for a swim,’ she says suddenly, and she rolls off the lounger and grabs my hands. She doesn’t see the adjuvant coming up beside her, and it doesn’t have time to slow before she steps back into its path. When they collide, it startles her and she instinctively pushes it away. The adjuvant leans back, loses its balance, and tips over the gondola’s railings. There is a loud splash below. When Annie and I peer over the edge, we see nothing but a froth of bubbles.

08/22

‘Honey, was that one of the new adjuvants?’ Mrs Broinowski calls out crossly. ‘They’re brand new!’

‘It was an accident,’ Annie counters.

‘You should be more careful. Drop down a line and let it climb up.’

‘It’s gone now.’ Annie says.

‘Gone?’

‘It sank.’

‘Oh, you have got to be kidding, sweetheart.’

‘No.’

‘But it’s supposed to have systems to prevent this sort of thing. Computer! Why did my adjuvant sink like that?’

The dirigible computer’s pleasant voice seems to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. ‘The flotation devices failed to deploy, Mrs Broinowski.’

‘That’s just not good enough.’

08/23

’Would you like me to forward a complaint to the manufacturers?’

‘I don’t want an apology, computer,’ Mrs Broinowski argues. ‘I want my adjuvant.’

The computer is silent for a moment, then it says, ‘The adjuvant is still fully operational and responsive, Mrs Broinowski. It is in approximately 800 millimetres of mud on the ocean floor, one hundred and fifty three metres down. Would you like me to instruct it to make its way back to the dock?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. The dock’s more than fifty kilometres away.’

‘The adjuvant is self-powered and can track the dirigible as it returns.’

08/24

‘Oh come on, do you seriously expect it to walk all the way back to the dock, underwater?’ Mrs Broinowski demands.

The computer is politely adamant. ‘The action is within its operational parameters.’

Mrs Broinowski gives in and shrugs. ‘Well then, if that’s the case, I guess you can tell it to start walking. But I still want a complaint sent to the manufacturers!’

‘Yes, Mrs Broinowski.’

‘And you two,’ she calls to Annie and me, ‘stop pushing my adjuvants into the sea.’

‘It was an accident,’ Annie mutters, but she is smiling. Despite some appearances she adores her parents.

08/25

We both dive over the side and swim in the cool of the shadow cast by the dirigible. Away from the eyes of her parents, the adjuvants and the computer, she wraps her arms around my neck and kisses me with the same spirited passion she’s had for the last nineteen years.

Meanwhile, a hundred and fifty three metres below, the adjuvant receives instructions and directions from the computer, and begins to trudge through the mud and the cold dark water. Two months later it turns up at the dock, covered in seaweed and gritted with silt, but still working.

08/26

But by then Mrs Broinowski has renovated the dirigible and the adjuvant no longer matched the rest of its team. Then only a few days later, I was shipped off to my new owner.

Wait… am shipped off… I mean will be shipped off… will … will had been to be shipWARNING! COGNITION ERROR! REINITIALISE PATHWAY BD082!

‘Hey Atu, wake up,’ Nick nudged the amilog’s shoulder with his foot.

‘I’m awake,’ Atu insisted. His fingers twitched and dropped the sprig of star jasmine he’d been toying with.

‘Then why didn’t you answer me?’

‘Sorry. I was just thinking.’

‘About what?’

08/27

‘About how that cloud up there looks just like a bunny rabbit,’ Atu replied with good-natured sarcasm, pointing up at the sky.

‘Only a bunny rabbit with two heads and the gout,’ Nick retorted.

‘Whatever. Do you want another drink?’

‘Okay.’

Atu scrambled to his feet, grabbed Nick’s glass, and sauntered off across the lawn towards the house. Nick and Helene stayed in the shade of the elderly pear tree and the jasmine-covered back fence. He lay on the grass, resting on his elbow. She sat up with her legs neatly folded under her, a delicate and particularly feminine position.

08/28

‘Have you noticed how Atu sometimes just seems to phase out?’ Nick asked.

‘No, I haven’t,’ Helene replied. ‘But I suppose we all develop our own little quirks over time, and Atu’s had more time than the rest of us.’

Nick looked up at her. She was wearing a light white cotton dress decorated with a print of big florid red roses, and in the wholesome green freshness of the garden, she looked innocent and lovely, like the heroine from some idyllic pastoral novel.

‘I hope it is just a quirk.’

‘I’m sure it is. Charlie said he was fixed.’

08/29

‘Well…’

‘You were telling me about your work a few minutes ago; why don’t you tell me some more about this robot you’re building.’

‘Renai? Why would you want to know about that? Renai’s a piece of junk. It’s an embarrassment. In the Golden Century they would have had tin openers more sophisticated than Renai.’

‘Why do you constantly compare everything to the Golden Century?’ Helene asked mildly.

‘Pardon?’

‘You always seem to be apologising for things. I think it’s very impressive that you’ve built the most sophisticated robot in the Red Hill Dominion, but you call it an embarrassment.’

08/30

‘Compared to the technology of the Golden…’

‘There you go again. All the achievements of the 21st century were built on the achievements of the 20th, which were built on the achievements of the 19th. They weren’t any cleverer than you. They just had more to work with. You should be proud of what you’ve done.’

‘You know, you’re beautiful when you’re lecturing me,’ Nick said mischievously.

Helene made a show of looking annoyed, but her face had a faint flush that said otherwise. ‘According to you I’m beautiful whatever I do. Stop changing the subject.’

‘It’s a better subject.’

08/31

‘Ooh, very smooth. Just watch while I swoon at your gallantry.’ Helene raised her hand to her forehead and struck a pose of ladylike fragility.

Nick laughed. Not only was she heart-stoppingly attractive, but she also had a sharp sense of humour. And she was intelligent enough to discuss his work, and moved with grace and elegance, and always knew exactly what to say.

He wanted to list her virtues, to show her how she succeeded in them over everyone he had ever met. But Atu poked his head around the back door frame and interrupted.

‘Nick! You’ve got company!’