The Printer

In a dimly lit bedroom, a middle-aged man with gold, D-frame glasses is hunched over a printer which is sitting on a stool, and his half-conscious wife is tied to a fancy blue chair.

They bought that chair together as a yay-we’re-finally-cohabitating gift to themselves. She had whispered in his ear about tying him to it and doing all sort of things to him. Her lips had tasted like cherry that day, and she still wore her curls long, down to her shoulders. And now she was the one in the chair; and he was the one that was going to do all sorts of things to her. “And you know what the funniest part is?” he says to the printer, chuckling. “The place we bought that chair burned down recently.” He laughs out loud.

His wife stirs at the noise, eyes opening, brows knitting tight from what is probably a really bad headache. Her bruised face goes from pain, to confusion, to fear in a few heartbeats.

“Nzenza, finally!” he says, “I was just telling my friend here,” he gestures at the printer, “about us.”

Nzenza tries to talk but finds there’s a sock in her mouth.

“He’s very anxious to meet you.”

She looks at the printer, then back at him, yellow lamplight shining in her brown, mascaraed eyes. Her curls sit messily on her head.

“He doesn’t really have a name, since he’s a printer, but I call him Hatred.” He pets the printer’s white body. “You see, we didn’t start out as friends. In fact, I hated him more than I’ve hated anything. At least until I found out about what you were doing behind my back.”

Nzenza whimpers, shaking her head, already denying her guilt.

“Ah-ah-ah,” he wags his finger. “You don’t get to talk today.”

She squirms against the ropes, tears welling in her eyes.

Fadzai stands up, large and imposing, shirt tucked into his trousers, belt buckle glinting as he goes over to her to make sure the rope is inescapable. He grabs her by the throat—not too hard, just enough to let her know how serious he is. “You’re a dirty little liar who’s never listened to me—not once. Like ’most everyone in my life.” He pulls the rope tighter around her. “Today you’re going to sit right there, and you’re going to hang on my every word. Or hang from my rope.”

The printer named Hatred hums; it clicks and thuds, then whirs as it prints out a paper. Fadzai grabs it, reads it for a moment, his glasses edging down his nose. And he laughs, pushing the glasses with his finger. “Hatred says that he’d rather take the rope now and be done with it. Death is better than listening to me rambling on apparently.” Fadzai holds the paper to her face so she can read it for herself. “But you don’t agree with him, do you? You want to listen to me rambling on for as long it takes.”

She nods, black mascara tears rolling down her face, glinting in the lamplight.

“Okay then!” He goes back to sit next to the printer. “Where to even begin?”

There’s a distant rumble outside, a thunderstorm on its way. There hadn’t been any rain for a while, and now they were overdue a whole lot of it. Fadzai begins to tell his story, starting with when he first met Hatred. “He was an act of love,” he says, “a gift from my dad. You know how he was, always thinking about work, practically living in the office. I swear if they had autopsied his head, they’d find neat rows of pink cubicles in place of a brain.”

Fadzai rubs his forehead, lost in thought for a moment. “So he gives me the gift, telling me that it’s ‘one of them smart printers’. I tell him we already got smart printers at the office. He tells me, ‘this one’s smarter—got an AI CPU’. Now that, that caught my attention.” Fadzai drums his fingers on the printer, squinting, “Why would a printer need AI? It’s just a dumb machine, for dumb work—no offence.”

The printer hums, clacks, but doesn’t print anything this time.

“See this emblem?” he points at the base of the printer. There’s a red silhouette of a fedora, and underneath it, the words RED HAT. “I looked into them, and it turns out they’re a Chinese company who were stealing patented AI-tech, printing out cores like crazy, installing them in all sorts of things. We’re talking toasters, microwaves, reusable water bottles. They were in business in the early days of the AI craze, and anything with those two letters attached to it was like marketing magic.”

A motorcycle passes by outside, the engine howling like a wolf.

“I don’t know where my dad got this particular printer, considering that Red Hat has been out of business for almost twenty years. There aren’t many of these things out there either—barely any were sold outside of China. Probably as few as a hundred or so. The chances of this thing being here is next to zero.” He pauses a moment. “I call that fate.”

The printer whirs, sending out a paper. Fadzai tries to read it—but there’s nothing to read. It’s just a blank. “Right, I know you don’t believe in fate.”

Clack! the printer says.

“Yeah, yeah, shut up for a sec,” Fadzai says. “Anyway, I dreaded each time I had to use Hatred, ’cause the paper jammed, or the ink ran out, or the ethernet cable wasn’t properly connected to the router. There was always something with this damned thing, but the funny thing was, it was only whenever I used it. My dad and pretty much everyone else in the office managed to get it working at the push of a button. They’d walk in; they’d see the look of sheer defeat in my eyes; and then they’d get the thing working effortlessly.”

A distant police siren wails in the distance. Nzenza glances around, a hope-filled desperation in her eyes.

“He’s not coming for you,” Fadzai says. “Pay attention now, I’m going to quiz you on this whole thing when I’m done. And you better remember or … well, just make sure you remember.”

She nods. The bruise on her cheek was from the fall she took when he chloroformed her; she’d fallen forward somehow, onto her knees then onto her face, quick as a bag of cement. He didn’t mean to hurt her, but he didn’t mean to not hurt her either.

“Where was I …? Oh yes, the printer not working. I’d remove the cartridge from its black mouth, reinsert, reboot, and repeat the process over and over again. Every. Goddamn. Day. And it was never consistent either. Sometimes it would work after the first time, other times it took several attempts, and even then, it would barely print a page or two before needing another reboot.”

An owl hoots somewhere outside, probably the backyard, as thunder rumbles.

Fadzai shakes his head. “They put Man on Mars, but they couldn’t figure out a paper spitter? The printing press was invented centuries ago, and this was its latest iteration, the grandson of the greatest invention? What the hell was that AI core even doing in there? When they took it for repairs, every mechanical part seemed fine—in pristine condition even. So it must’ve been a software issue … You want some coffee? I want some coffee.”

Fadzai leaves the bedroom, going into the combined kitchen-living room area. A couple pillows on the floor next to the couch, a talking head on TV rambling about another potential pandemic brewing on an island in the Pacific. “I flashed his firmware!” he calls out into the other room, “reinstalled it. But that only made it worse. Something was wrong with the AI core itself.”

He moves over to the kitchen space. Some dishes in the sink. A few strands of spaghetti uneaten. “So I did what anyone would do in my position!” He sets the coffeemaker to 96ºC, the perfect coffee-making temperature. “I put the printer aside and just got myself a regular one, though I kept that one under my desk and the old AI one on my desk, so that my dad wouldn’t know I’d replaced his gift.” He clicks on the coffeemaker. “And I sort of just forgot about the whole thing for a few years.”

Above the sink there’s a window covered by a curtain with vibrant sunflowers, Nzenza’s favourite. Lightning flashes through them. “Hatred would try to communicate with me!” Fadzai calls. “He couldn’t print anything of his own will at the time, but he could send messages through his little display, though that too was limited, since he had to use ‘Error’ messages with some of the letters blurred out. Some of it was really … eerie—like messages that spelled out my name—but I just thought it was coincidence, until a couple of weeks ago.” Thunder rumbles outside, getting louder. “Things just sort of happened all at once.”

Something thuds in the bedroom, but he pays it no mind. He grabs a mug and fills it with coffee, blowing on the hot black liquid before attempting a sip. It’s too hot, but the subtle sweetness of a perfect brew lingers on his tongue. “The printer I got stopped working,” he says walking slowly back towards the bedroom, holding the mug gingerly with both hands, “and I really needed to print some job costing thing—can’t remember what exactly.”

As he re-enters the bedroom, he finds Nzenza still tied to the chair but she’s now on the floor. He puts the coffee mug down on top of Hatred, sits back down in his seat, and finds that Hatred has printed something out, so he grabs the paper and reads it.

“SHE CHANGED HER ORIENTATION TO LANDSCAPE,” it reads.

“Yeah, I heard from the other room.” Fadzai says with a chuckle.

Clack-clack hmmm, the printer says.

“In any case, her ears still work,” he says, thinking for a moment. “Yes, things just happened all at once. The regular reliable printer stopped working; and everyone else was gone by that time, empty cubicles outside my office. And I didn’t have access to any other printers, so I had no choice but to use Hatred. I had a deadline …” He rubs his forehead. “I don’t know how much I was sleeping but it wasn’t much. I could barely think. The last thing I wanted was to use Hatred.”

The rain finally starts outside, feint pitter-patter against the zinc roof. He picks up the mug, takes a sip, listens to the rain for a moment before putting the mug back down.

“As I stood there in front of the printer that hates me, the last gift my dad gave me, waiting for it to reboot for the fifth time, and as I realise that it still wouldn’t print my file, I found myself rebooting like the printer. ‘I’ve been rebooting my whole life,’ I thought. That’s how I ended up working there. I didn’t follow my dreams because I’d rather reboot through the whole process of living, scared of failing, constantly hotswapping who I am for others’ wants and likes to dictate my own, like a faulty printer, like Hatred. My dad wanted me to work by his side, so I did. I got that job instead of going to university and actually learning something that would take me to the Moon.”

The printer begins to make a noise, a rhythmic thud-thud, almost like a heartbeat, as the feint raindrops suddenly get louder, roaring against the roof.

“I could’ve been an astronaut!” Fadzai gestures violently. “I’m dumber than a squirt gun, but I could’ve been an engineer if I tried. I could’ve been something. And now that my dad’s gone, I don’t even know who I am, what I’m supposed to do.”

Hatred’s thudding gets louder, sending vibrations up through the mug, spilling some coffee, droplets inching down its side.

Fadzai takes the mug, leaving a brown-black circle on Hatred’s white body, feeling the thudding of the printer deep in his chest. “I came back home that day late at night. You were asleep. And I watched you for a bit, hand tucked between your legs, your curls a mess around your face, and I felt so guilty that I’d been neglecting you. Sure I was still grieving for my dad, but I should’ve let you in instead of burying myself in work. And I knew you were cheating—I didn’t have proof, but I knew. Even Hatred could see it and he’s a printer. But as I watched you sleep in that moment, I thought that if I just came back to reality and held you tight, we could be happy again. I’d forgive you and you’d forgive me.”

Hatred thuds louder still, the sound invading Fadzai’s thoughts. He remembers cuddling up next to her, kissing the back of her neck. Everything was going to be alright. “But then, in your sleep,” Fadzai says, “you said his name. Not mine.”

She shakes her head, mumbling something through a mouthful of sock. Her face looking up at him, all innocent and afraid, fills him with revulsion, and he shouts, “Liar, liar, liar!” barely able to think with Hatred thudding inside his skull. And yet she keeps mumbling, shaking her head, pleading with her eyes until it’s too much for Fadzai and he flings the mug at her. “Shut the fuck up!”

The mug hits her right in the face, spilling the coffee on her skin. And she screams, the sound muffled by the sock, mixing with the sounds of rain and thunder and Hatred. “Look what you made me do,” he says, going to her, lifting up the chair, “look what you made me do to you, Zeney.” He untucks his shirt to wipe her pained face. “Cold water,” he says frantically, “we need cold water on your skin.” He tries to take her and the chair to the bathroom, but it’s awkward and heavy. He ends up knocking down the stool where Hatred is, and the printer falls, scanner lid flapping open as it hits the floor, its unending thudding finally ceasing. Fadzai reaches the bathroom, puts her and the chair down, cups some water from the tap and splashes it on her face. But it’s not enough. He starts untying her so he can get her in the shower when he hears a noise, someone calling Nzenza’s name, knocking loudly outside.

Nzenza screams, the muffled sound echoing off the bathroom walls.

He squeezes her throat with a meaty hand to shut her up and listens for movement. Is he already inside? He lets go of her neck, she coughs, and when she tries to scream it’s only a hoarse pathetic attempt. He leaves her there as he cautiously inches out of the bathroom. He leans forward to listen closely. There’s loud knocks at the front door, so whoever it is isn’t inside yet. It’s probably Nzenza’s—

Nzenza pushes him from behind and he falls forward. She tries to make a run for it, but he grabs her by the ankle, and she tumbles head first, her skull smashing into Hatred’s scanner, burying her face in broken glass.

There’s a loud crash from the front door. Then footsteps.

Fadzai stands up.

A man in uniform walks into the bedroom, gun drawn. It takes him a few moments to absorb the scene in front of him, before he aims at Fadzai, saying, “Step away from her!”

Fadzai backs up, hands in the air.

The man crouches beside Nzenza, keeping his gun on Fadzai. “Zeney,” the man says, “can you hear me?” He checks her pulse. “Oh thank God you’re okay.” But then he turns her over, and her face is a blood pizza with glass toppings.

“Nhamo,” Nzenza says feebly, “you came.”

Nhamo radios in for an ambulance and backup, gun drawn on Fadzai. “On your knees,” he says, “keep your hands up.”

“No, you don’t understand,” Fadzai pleads. “It was Hatred. He was making all this noise and then I threw the coffee and …”

The printer hums to life and prints something out.

“See! See!” Fadzai says desperately. “Take it and read it and you’ll see.”

“On your knees!” Nhamo approaches.

Fadzai gets on his knees, still pleading. “Just read the papers please!”

Nhamo forces Fadzai’s hands to his back, cuffs him, and pushes him onto his stomach.

And all the while, Fadzai keeps pleading, “Read the papers, read the papers.” He starts rambling incoherently about how the printer is his only friend, the only one who truly understands him. And then he rambles even more incoherently about his dad, about Nzenza, about everything. The meaninglessness pours out of him.

Nhamo has enough and tells him to shut up.

“Just read the papers, please!”

“They’re blank, you psycho! They’re all blank.”

Clack-clack-clack, the printer laughs. Clack-clack hmmm.