A Company Called Fate

Unease quickened in his centre, as he stared at the figure draped across the lap of the man facing him. She was content, smiling. Her chest rose and fell with laughter, cheeks reddening. 

But there was something. Maybe in the soft flow of uniform hair, long and black and solid. Looking as if you could pluck it away in one motion. Maybe it was the stillness of her arms and hands and legs, almost ceramic. 

Uncanny valley, they’d called it. Back in the day of wax museums and science fiction. 

Distracting you, is she? 

The man grinned, all teeth and eyes. 

How long have you been with us? 30 years? That’s the longest of anyone, Adam.

Don’t you think it's time you were rewarded? 

***

It was a gift from the Corporation. He couldn’t refuse. 

That had been his reasoning all through the long, plodding and winding journey up the spiral staircase. Also, all the way through the sleepless night before, and the months that led up to the blushed and stammering ‘yes’ that he choked out - sat in his superior's office, half a decade prior. 

Indeed, it was really rather commonplace now. Of the workers on his floor, Isaac, Jacob, Noah - he was the last standing alone. The last one living in silence, unmade sheets and echoing heartbeats. It wasn’t so bad, he’d told himself. But God, was he tired, was he bored.

The reason, for all this discomfort, was just as he was of a different era, they assured him. Raised in a different town, had known the world, albeit briefly, by a different name. He was still the type of man that carried the ghostly figure of his past on his shoulder - and it was that making this difficult - not him. Never him. He was easy-going, he was light. He was a modern guy, a skilled guy, the best of them all.

 This is a reward, they had said. 

 This is a reward, he had reminded.

He chose not to question the pool of tar growing in some caping cavity that suggested that maybe, it wasn’t. Not entirely. 

He’d put in the work, that was not up for question. Ever since that first day, ever since the first marvel at sliding doors and whooshing lifts and glass panelling, he’d thought of little else. And he’d risen, in stature, status and floor, becoming part of the inner circle when others had tripped, become distracted, fell. But he? He had something to be proud of. This was just his earnings. No difference to the penance of currency dropping into his account each month, an empty figure that he couldn’t deny was not worth much with his life stagnant in indecision like this. Yes, he agreed. It was time, it was rightfully his. His just to take. He had earned this.

***

The seat seemed plush, soft under worn leather. As he threw himself down, one leg slinging over the other, he discovered that it was stiff and cold, and like most things, plastic. He shivered in relief for his long polyester blend trousers and the salvation they provided from the sticky grip of PVC against his too-warm leg. He was handed a clipboard and filled out the form mindlessly, ticking consent boxes, leaving his identification without a second thought. He narrowed down his music taste to a top five, his love of films into three, now, they were a reward he had celebrated. This was just like that, he told himself, just like that. 

And to his surprise, as he found his feet scraping against cold stone and retreated from the secluded clinic, a building foreboding yet carefully hidden in a place where people could claim deniability as to what was on their doorstep - he had to admit it was a better system than before. 

Not that he’d experienced it, of course. He was a young man when things started to shift. But he remembered the loud voices of his parents, the uncertainty that hung thick after each door slam and screamed profanity. He remembered the stomach flip across the room, and the heavy sickness of shame that followed. The not knowing. He hated not knowing. 

So this situation, though clean and sterile and unnatural, was softer, somehow. You could spend your life diligently working, knowing that you will still be fulfilled, so to say. Though they had never so much said as such, he knew that was why they implemented the scheme. Kept people focused, head down, lives devoted while still fulfilling that need. The reality that, despite it all, people will always want someone, something, to work for. 

It had still come as a shock when it was first announced. The air had been hostile, with a surety that it would inevitably be a bad move, and that people would rebel. ‘Fight To Feel’ had been the contrary slogan at the time. He'd had a pin of that, stuck to the handle of his satchel. Yet, it was remarkable how quickly people gave up, gave in, and were happy to let someone else do all the work for them, how much they wanted it to be taken it out of their hands entirely. How tired everyone was. Now, you don’t hear of anyone even attempting a different route. This one was just so easy, so peaceful. The organisation was called ‘FATE’, and often, it did feel that way. 

It was a feeling he was reminded of when the soft purple sheen of the envelope flitted through his door the next day. 

CONGRATULATIONS…

YOU’VE EARNED…

NEXT STEPS… 

Familiar words to drop onto a doormat, but this wasn’t a scam, for him to wistfully imagine ‘what if’ against, then toss in the bin. No, this was fate. 

***

Pick up was at 18:05. It was currently 14:41. The coil of his stomach had been getting tighter, the heels of his feet shaking faster. His hands were sweaty and his mouth was dry. The computer beeped a lonely cursor back into his flitting eyes, look, it said, remember me? 

Is this what it had been like before? This nervous trepidation, distracted mind, wandering hand. Had it been like this for them, all the time? Another reason why this was good, another sign that he was doing the right thing. If it saves us pain, he thought. He was doing what he should. He was. 

As the clock crawled its way to 17:50, he knew it had been the worst day of work he had ever put in, in all of his 35 years in this same skyscraper, he had never been so vacant, so drifting. Another time, and he’d fear punishment, retribution - but no. It was too late, he’d earned this.

He didn’t need to leave until 17:55. It was only 8 minutes across the complex. Down the lift, under the tunnel and around a bend. He could do it in 6, if he hurried. Time efficiency was a pride for him, but today, he left earlier than he needed to. Pacing around the lobby, glancing through the door with the small, mesh covered window and chipping, purple, paint. 

Adam? 

He stood, back as tight as steel framing. 

Come with me, hun. Your turn now. You’ve earned this. 

He had, hadn’t he? 

In the room, she was seated. Probably around 5’3”, brown hair falling just below the chin, bangs scraping her eyes, which were almost spherical, unmoving, and as blue as the sky he remembered. His throat constricted as he thought of shamefully erased 3am internet searches. He hadn’t told them about that, had he? 

Her lips were parted, the soft white glimmer of perfectly natural teeth peeking through behind flushed pink. Her hands, smooth and unadorned lay with twisted fingers on her lap, which was covered by a perfectly creased aubergine tennis skirt. His eyes roved over her, looking for a flaw, a blemish, some humanity. She made no acknowledgement of his presence. 

We calculated your career performance, and what an illustrious career it has been, in combination with the information you provided us with, and we found Eve, here, to be your perfect companion. 

Companion. They’d always been careful to use companion. Never soulmate. He supposed, how could a business in the 22nd century ever have been taken seriously with the promise of a soulmate? No. Fate didn’t float over our heads, waiting to be harnessed. Fate was forged with self-determination and ingenuity. But it was clear what they were tapping into. Clear what parts of the brain they wished to alight. What fantasies they grabbed you with. 

It had started to click when he noticed how the women that began to loop the arms of the men he knew, were always so young, so slight. With their gazing, big eyes, tilted-in heads and stomachs that swelled like clockwork. He wasn’t sure how long everyone had believed the idea that this was a matchmaking service. Not sure when he stopped. Maybe, against his better judgement, it wasn’t until she, Eve, was sat here. All beauty, all vacancy. 

He’d worked with AI, knew the sheen of their skin, the whirring in their heads. She wasn’t quite like that, yet she lacked something, something fundamental - a light in her chest, a hardness in her face. 

May I? He questioned. 

He was met with a nod, not from the girl - of course. 

As the soles of his shoes squeaked across the linoleum floor and across to the bed, akin to a hospital gurney, he leant. Tipping her head up, he felt the soft give and crease of human skin. Their eyes connected. He saw openness. A field, the distance topped with the dark green blanket of trees, mist dancing above. He saw a paper plane flying through an expanse of air that was infinite. His heart hitched up his chest, as he watched sunlight dapple on a familiar lake. He saw endlessly, endlessly. He saw it all. But it wasn’t her. He couldn’t see her. 

He saw himself. 

He wanted to jump back, gasp for air. Find a bin he could empty his stomach into. He wanted to run. Not just out of the clinic, the hidden building, he wanted to run out of the complex. He wanted to run until the stick straight skyline was nothing but a memory. To trees and lakes and the dappled sunlight he knew was gone. He was about to. He was about to. He was about to move his feet when- 

He felt her hand rise, fingers enclosing his. 

I…I… he choked, saliva a distant memory. 

I know. 

Her voice was familiar. His, but in a way that wasn't. A mimicry. 

But you’re… you’re…

Sir, you can’t turn this down. She was made for you. You’ve earned it. 

And he had. Hadn’t he. 

And she had. Hadn’t she. 

If it saves us pain… 

Because it would, right? It would save him so much. And she, well. This is what she was made for. Better than dragging some poor woman in that would have all sorts of accommodations. This was just easier.

When she looked at him like that, when her voice lilted like that, when she felt like that - did it matter if he heard the faint whirring in the night? If her skin dulled with pallor in the morning? She would know no different, but he did. He knew. That was the difference, wasn’t it. 

As if she could read his mind, the attendant handed over a clipboard, just like before. He didn’t even blink. Didn’t even take his eyes away for a second as the pen skimmed the paper. He pushed it back. 

You’re free to go. 

He wasn’t sure who she directed that at. But it didn’t matter. They were one now, weren’t they. He held her wrist, her fingers falling limply in the air. No longer did he worry about the mess of his floors, the smell of his shirt. No longer could he comprehend regret, he had signed now. He had earned it. 

So Adam didn’t notice, of course he didn’t. Or perhaps he didn’t care to. 

He didn’t notice the flinch in the face. The glistening of sky-blue eyes. The sudden thump of a very present heart. 

Because he’d earned this. Fate had told him so.