Memories that sell

“15 euros, eh? You’ve got enough material for a 40-minute ride?”

“Totally! I just got back from a trip to Murcia, you’re going to LOVE the drawings I made of the beach. Plus, I have a peach mocktail recipe I can share with you, and the lyrics from a local hit. Not to mention the airlines reviews, drama from the hotel I stayed at, restaurant-”

“Okay, okay, hahah! You earned this one, come on in!”

Eva made herself comfortable in the Toyota Aygo, carefully placing her cardboard sign between the car seat and the door. “Insta Museum”, it read: a place of immense historical value, highlighting stories from an era that had long ago ended.

John greeted the young girl with a beaming smile; you could barely tell he had eyes squinted between his eyebrows and those hairy cheeks. His red flannel shirt sat comfortably around his plump torso. A cloud of red curly hair bloomed over his head. Despite his youthful voice and the comic figurines hanging from the mirror, there was something very fatherly about the way he handled his words and his car.

Eva mirrored his relaxed pose and did a mental tally of the stories she would recite. She felt her heart race ever so slightly upon realizing she had forgotten her notes, hoping her client wouldn’t notice the uncertainty in her voice. Maybe she should keep on pretending that she always talked with a tremble? Yet, as she went on and on with her travel tales, she knew there was no reason to hide her rookie’s mistakes from John; that man was essentially a hugging bear that could drive. He wanted the hitchhiker to feel comfortable and learn from her mistakes as an entertainer, guiding her with questions.

As she would find out later on, John was an E.T. researcher. That was short for “Even Though they call me a researcher, I practically have no research to do”. Still, it was one of the most sought-after careers one could have, despite the lack of information on the extraterrestrial.

He, too, was heading to Insta Museum for the ceremonies. For that day marked the 200^th anniversary since the first Alien War. That’s what the military had named it to salvage their pride, anyway. In reality, it was just an Alien Hit-and-Run that set our civilization almost half a millennium behind.

***

The night sky evokes a universal loneliness, inviting our minds to reach out to the Cosmos. Every person to have ever lived has pondered on extraterrestrial life; from medieval children being shoved off towers to cover the typical family incest to today’s scrawny scholars who would rather chew on pencils than their lunch. The possible scenarios for humanity’s first contact with aliens surpassed the number of times a writer second-guesses their abilities.

What could have been the most touching moment for two civilizations at once, was instead an immense inconvenience. It took the Alien Tribe less than a week to hit the rewind button on the human race, undoing centuries of progress. Normally, you would expect unusual sightings to have occurred months, perhaps years before an invasion. Not even extraterrestrial beings should be exempt from the rule of “knowing your enemy”, and there were oh-so-many people willing to teach them, even to side with them in case of war. Plus, that could have been a blessing for telemarketing tycoons and their waning business.

Instead, they came at once like a huge vacuum from the skies, bringing our worst nightmares to reality; they foraged the whole planet for every data storage device you can think of: CDs, USBs, hard drives, even RFID tags. Such was their hunger for memory and information, they rendered our radio useless by means of a technology that redirects all broadcasts to them. There were no victims whatsoever, except for a poor man who held onto his bus card too tightly, causing him to lose a couple of fingers, his card and his balance bracelet.

The tribe took what it wanted and left in peace. It was later discovered, much to the disappointment of sci-fi fans, that the aliens fed our memory devices to their pets (real scrumptious snacks, according to the rumors). They looked a lot like cats, except they were bipedal, had no whiskers, were covered in slime and were significantly larger. As for their pets, one could describe them as adorable fluff balls the size of a 2-person elevator.

Some theories speculated on the taste of different data: did the taste of a memory stick change depending on the music it stored? Were Facebook’s servers more nutritional than Google or DropBox? Were our radio signals their automatic pet feeders?

There were several places you could hold those discussions, but the Internet was not one of them. The Internet, in fact, was no more. There was no technology to support it. And that hurt more than losing one or two fingers.

***

In a world where the Internet, stored music and radio shows had long ago ceased to exist, there was no shortage of opportunities and problems that needed solutions. A specific need had surfaced in the market: on-the-road entertainment. The need for podcasts and audiobooks, as every primary need, remained unchanged through the centuries.

Thus, there was now a very high demand for hitchhikers. One could say they were the natural evolution of “travel bloggers”. They got free rides and money in exchange for their tales from the road. They brought information from the rest of the world in a society that was so art-deprived, info-hungry that even hotel reviews and advertisements would light up their imagination.

Not to mention how promising the career of a hitchhiker was: the most prominent ones worked in agencies, securing their delicious monthly incomes. They would start by entertaining small coach buses and tourists, slowly making their way up to limousines, cruise ships and the “high society”. It was said that more than a third of today’s celebrities were married, or somehow related to professional hitchhikers. Their lives were juicy, and living them to the fullest was a matter of self-preservation.

***

It was an entertaining ride. Eva’s chirping voice (“You sound like a canary; I could listen to you all day!”) would eventually open a new door to freedom. John pulled over in the parking lot and asked Eva to wait for him; he wanted to introduce her to someone. She had no idea what to expect, but networking was great for business… and at a place like this! She stood aside and wore her backpack backwards, hugging it –no, squeezing it closer to her body to feel a sense of support and protection.

The museum towered above her like a gigantic sphere. A terrible choice for a building shape in terms of practicality, but was it a sight for sore eyes: white and silver, shimmering, with 5 different gardens spread around it; one for each country that financed it. Bonzais and sakura trees faded into a rough, yet welcoming patch of pine trees and all sorts of foliage Eva couldn’t recognize, but admired nonetheless. The scorching heat from the parking lot was lifted from their skins like a veil the moment they stepped foot in the Japanese garden, leaving the city behind.

The celebrations had already commenced, but no one seemed to mind their tardiness. Eva followed John blindly as they moved past the audience, straight towards the backstage. She tried to hold back from looking around her like a star-struck child, in an attempt to look professional and not out-of-place. She let herself go, however, seeing how preoccupied everyone was.

“Steel, we finally meet again!”

John’s voice had changed: it was cold and professional, in total contrast to his open arms that welcomed a bulky blond man into a brotherly hug. Eva stepped aside nervously, giving the men some space to catch up.

Steel (a shortened version of some foreign name, she figured) was dressed for the occasion, but his messy hair and constant beard-twisting made him look like a teen in a suit. He didn’t lack perseverance, patience nor tackiness, judging from the dragon tattoo that climbed from his hand to the back of his neck. He talked with a slight lisp that Eva would find attractive, had they met under different circumstances.

They finally turned around to look at her. Steel introduced himself as the new Content Developer of Hitch Agency, the most prominent hitchhikers’ agency in the country. He had inherited the role last month, and was very excited and anxious to make a name for himself. In other words, he was on the lookout for talent on all seniority levels.

Eva, in an unexpected show of confidence, stopped Steel in the middle of his sentence. “All right, what do I have to do?” she asked all professionally, as if she had just charged John 150 euros instead of 15. Steel raised one eyebrow in approval. “Not one to waste time, huh? Makes sense. Why spend your time here when you could be travelling?” he said as if chatting with an equal. “I mean”, Eva smiled back at him, “if there is a client who wants my services, why keep them waiting?”

“Your client weighs 200,000 gross tons and is departing from North Port tonight. 10 sharp. And she pays beautifully, considering she is accommodating 4,000 clients of hers as well. You’ll be visiting Australia, New Zealand and Southern Asia, so I would suggest packing, ah… what do you call those dresses that… never mind. Just bring your notes and anything we might find interesting. All right, then.”

Steel patted her on the shoulder and went on with his tasks, starting from inspecting the open bar. The mixologists were already experimenting with her peach mocktail recipe, and she felt her shoulders rise in pride; she had made an impact.

Then her brain finally processed what had just happened: a deal. She closed her first big deal. Her first HUGE deal. A deal weighing 200,000 gross tons. Thanks to her drawings, her peaches and a story about a Spanish throuple breaking up in the room next to hers, she would be seeing a new part of the world, gaining much more experience and memories she could monetize. She would perhaps be in the top minority of hitchhikers to have earned a sea trip. The status upgrade was a huge boost on its own.

She had to leave. Now.

“Need a ride home?” asked John, zapping her back to reality.

“I… I can’t really concentrate on work now.”

“No worries. You deserve a free ride. Let’s get you home safe.”

***

If she didn’t know better, she would have sworn someone had misplaced a hotel in the sea. The White Viking was a very unfortunate name choice for a cruise ship so welcoming and luxurious. John dropped her off at the port but he couldn’t stay to see her off; as his Aygo drove further away, it freed up space for apprehension in her mind.

The fear washed away in waves as she joined other rookie hitchhikers: there was Andrea, a short girl with caramel skin and the most adorable pointy canines she had seen. Jaiden was born to hitchhiking parents, but they didn’t like to talk about it. Finally, the twins Al & Ann showed up, bringing free drinks for all.

They boarded the White Viking as a group, promising to stick together and share tips and tricks of the business: beginners had to support one another. Eva and Andrea checked in their rooms and left to get ready for the welcome party. Eva knew she had to make herself interesting and ace the first impressions, if she had any hopes of returning a little richer and a whole lot more experienced as a story-teller. Perhaps she should open with anecdotes from her first road trip in Russia, back when she was a freshman.

***

The clocks insisted it was 3 a.m., but Andrea’s charming singing voice and people’s high spirits had stopped time in its tracks. The night had only just begun.

Eva had managed to draw the attention of a few interesting patrons, but her energy had drained away. Her thoughts were more focused on her suite’s queen-sized bed than her journeys. She knew she ‘d better excuse herself, but the idea of missing all the action stiffened her chest with jealousy. Perhaps a little break was a good compromise for the time being.

Wandering in the ship’s corridors, the silence from the bottom floors lured her in: as she left the music behind, she noticed the first signs of a headache blossoming near her temples. With more than 4,000 people on here, she was sure she’d find a doctor’s office soon.

She couldn’t help but notice the exquisite woodwork on the walls’ edges. Minimal and vintage, perhaps inspired by artistic movements of the 2020s? She approached the walls to feel the carvings and get a better estimate of their value, but she felt the inside of her palms stick to the wall; was that slime?

The liquid was clear like water and felt like cheap nail polish, the kind you’d apply right before a date, only to have it ruin your outfit because it never dries properly. If she squinted her eyes, she could notice a trail of slime glistening along the walls. Curiosity tickled her mind like a trainee massage therapist, making her headache disappear.

***

She walked and she walked and she tripped and she got back up and she walked. The walls were naked of any paintings or clocks, but she calculated it was past 3:30. The slime trail was fading, causing her to almost miss her destination.: a cheap, plastic door. Compared to the rest of the ship, this part was painful to look at; without any furniture to adorn it, the off-white walls, the stains on the floor and the buzzing lamps were suffocating.

But most importantly, this hospitalish part of the ship offered no place to hide. It was a single plastic door in a corridor that went on for several meters. Eva assumed that whatever was behind it must be huge.

She pressed on the door knob with surgical precision. Surely, whatever was behind it wouldn’t notice a tiny crack, she thought, ready to sprint the opposite direction.

The door moved silently, allowing the conversations from the conference room to flow into the corridor and right in Eva’s ears.

“How can you call this a shortage? There’s 11 billion of them!”

“Yes, but they are not ready for sowing. And if we begin our operations, we will taint the product. We will disrupt the ecosystem, the food chain, everything!”

“The demand is strong. A lean supply is not a problem. But we have to be careful. The devices were easy to store, but these are no hard drives: this is organic matter. Preserving 1 million of gigabytes will escalate the cost, even if it is just one brain we are discussing.”

“I do not understand “lean supply”. I consumed my last memory stick yesterday. I starve. The brains in this room alone could feed hundreds of our kind.”

There was a short pause.

“Well, I do hope you start from the ones we brought you!”

A roar of laughter erupted, giving Eva a chance to push the door a bit more and get a better look in the room. Sure enough, the hospital vibes she was getting now made sense: two throbbing human brains were laid on a dining table. Around them, bald men in suits were humoring a figure with pointy, triangular ears, yellow eyes and claws.

“Anyhow, let us begin tasting the samples. These organs right here are particularly rare, and provide excellent insight in the correlation of memories, taste, nutritional value and sowing methods. These… are the brains of twins. Almost identical in all aspects. Except, we drugged the female one, while the male was awake during the extraction process. We wanted to see whether fear and pain affect the quality…”

***

It felt like someone was trying to screw the brain off her skull. This was no normal headache; it felt prophetic.

Her stomach had risen up to her throat, but she knew vomiting on the spot was not an option; she wouldn’t risk leaving a trail with her DNA all over it. Instead, she sprinted to the upper deck and properly ejected her vomit in the ocean. The first step of ensuring her safety was successful. She rewarded herself by allowing her body to go numb for a few hours, mindlessly staring into the ocean until the crack of dawn.

Her brain was the candy and she was the wrapping. She was trapped, miles away from the land, among traitors, aliens and soon-to-be corpses. It was easy to see which category she fell under.

As the sky turned from a hopeful blue into a dusty pink, she could discern the figure of a sailboat. Perhaps, that would be her only chance of escaping. If only she could hitchhike a ride with them.