CLINTON ST. QUARTERLY having to purchase the Wimp. Something about the big Muscle robot made her want to deactivate him and then stick sharp objects into his vital machinery. Bluto scared Thelma just a bit. She always made sure she could reach his off switch. She even bought the expensive remote control bulb to keep in her teeth while he was operational. Still there were times when she had to admit to herself that he was actually about as dangerous as a sofa. It was his Tough-Talk tape that kept the fantasy alive. His rough voice muttering, “ C’mere slut, roll over, bitch,” and the like could, usually trigger some excitement even when she was tense and tired from work. She rubbed luxuriously against the smooth folds of Bluto’s deflated form where it hung against the wall. She didn’t look at the deflated body on the fourth hook. She didn’t glance toward the corner where the small console sat on the floor with its cord plugged into the power outlet. The console was roughly the shape and size of a human head sitting directly, necklessly, on shoulders. A single green light glowed behind the steel mesh in the top of the console. She knew the Brain was watching her, wanting her to flip his activation switch. She deliberately slid her broad rump up and down against the smooth Near-Flesh of the Bluto MALE. The corner of her eye registered a faint waver in the intensity of the green light. She looked directly at the Brain. The green light began to blink on and off rapidly. Thelma turned her back on the Brain and sauntered out of the closet. She crossed to the full-length mirror on the bedroom door and stood looking at herself, seeing the green reflection of the Brain’s light from the open closet. She stretched her heavy body, stroking her breasts and flanks. The green light continued to blink. “ I think just for once I won’t take any of these along on the trip .” The green light went out for the space of two heartbeats. Thelma nearly smiled at herself in the mirror. The green flashing resumed at a greater speed. ‘‘Yes,” Thelma announced coyly to her mirror, “ it’s time I tried something new. I haven’t shopped for new styles in ages. There have probably been all sorts of developments since I last looked at a catalogue. I ’ll just rent a couple of late models from the hotel and have a little novelty for my birthday.” The green light in the closet seemed to become very bright for an instant and then it stopped. Went out. It appeared again steady, dim, no longer flashing. When Thelma had finished encasing her bulges in the severe business clothes that buttressed her image as a hard-nosed Bureau manager, she strode into the closet and flipped a NEARFLESH switch on the base of the Brain console. The mesh face glowed with contrasting colored light, moving in rhythmic sheets across the screen. A male voice said, “ Be sure to take some antiseptic lubricant along.” The tone was gently sarcastic. Thelma chuckled. “ Don’t worry about me. I’ll take an antibiotic and I won’t sit down on the toilets.” “ You know you would rather have me along.” The console’s voice was clear, unemotional. A thin band of red pulsed across the mesh screen. “ Oh, a little variety is good for me. I tend to get into ruts.” Thelma’s coquettish manner felt odd to her in her business suit, grating. She was accustomed to being naked when she talked to the Brain. “ I t’s too bad,” she murmured spitefully, “ that I have to leave you plugged in. It’s such a waste of power while I’m aw ay .. . . ” She watched the waves of color slow to a cautious blip on the screen. “ Well, I ’ll be back in three d a y s . . . . ” She reached for the switch. “ Happy birthday,” said the console as its colors faded into the dim green. BOSS VOLE strode off the elevator as soon as it opened and was halfway down the line of work modules before the young man at the reception desk could alert the staff by pressing the intercom buz- zer. The Vole always made a last skulking round of the office before these business trips. She claimed it was to pick up last-minute papers, but everyone knew she was there to inject a parting dose of her poisonous presence, enought venom to goad them until her return. Lenna Jordan had been the Vole’s assistant too long to be caught by her raiding tactics. She felt the wave of tension slide through the office in the silenced voices, the suddenly steady hum of machines, and the piercing “ Yes, Ma’am!” as the Vole pounced on an idling clerk. With a quickly hidden grin, Jordan pushed the bowl of candy closer to the edge of the desk where the Vole usually leaned while harassing her, and went back to her reports. She heard a quick tread and felt the sweat filming her upper lip. Boss Vole hated her. Jordan was next in line for promotion. Her future was obvious, a whole district within five years. Boss Vole would stay on here in the same job she had held for the past decade. The Vole had been ambitious but humorless. Her rigid dedication to routine had paralyzed her career. She grew meaner every year, and more bitter. Jordan could see her now, thumping a desk with her big soft knuckles and hissing into the face of the gulping programmer she had caught in some petty error. When the Vole finally reached Jordan’s desk she seemed mildly distracted. Jordan watched the big woman’s rumpled features creasing and flexing around the chunks of candy as they discussed the work schedule. Boss Vole was anxious to leave, abbreviating her usual jeers and threats in her hurry. When the Vole grabbed a final fistful of candy and stumped out past the bent necks of the silently working staff, Jordan noticed that she carried only one small suitcase. Where was her square night case? Jordan had never seen the Vole leave for a trip without her robot carrier. A quirk of cynicism caught the corner of her mouth. “ Has the Vole gone and found herself a human lover?” That notion kept Jordan entertained for the next three days. By the time Thelma Vole closed the door on the Hotel Bellman and checked out the conveniences, she had assured herself that in most respects this trip would be like all the others, lonely and embarrassing. The other office managers at the convention had been skipping rope and climbing trees when she came to her first convention as an office manager. Thelma flopped onto the bed, kicked off her heavy shoes and reached for the communiphone. She asked for a bottle of Irish whiskey and a bucket of ice. Hesitantly, after pausing so long that the room-service computer asked whether she was still on the line, she also asked for a Stimulus Catalogue. She poured a drink immediately but she didn’t pick up the glossy catalogue. The liquor numbed her jittery irritation and allowed her to lie still, staring at the ceiling. The Brain was right. She was afraid. She was lonely for him. All her life she had been lonely for him. When she first landed her G-6 rating she realized that she might as well devote herself to the Bureau since nothing else seemed a likely receptacle for her ponderous attentions. It was then that she jettisoned the one human she had ever had any affection for. He was a shy and exaggeratedly courteous little man, a G-4, who had professed to see her youthful bulk as cuddly, her lack of humor as admirable seriousness. She had been hesitant. Displays of affection for Thelma had always meant that someone was out to use her. He was persistent, however, and she allowed herself to entertain certain fantasies. But one day, as she stood with her clean new G-6 rating card in her hand, and listened to him invite her to dinner as he had done so many times before, Thelma looked at her admirer and recognized him for what he was: a manipulator and an opportunist. She slammed the door convincingly in his injured face and resolved never to be fooled again by such treacle shenanigans. She had begun saving for Lips. And Lips had been good for her. The long silence after she left the office each day had been broken at last, if only by the mechanical and repetitive messages of the simple robot’s speech tape. She had bought Bluto on the bravado of her promotion to G-7 and office manager. Bluto had thrilled her. His deliberately crude and powerful bluntness had created an new identity in her, the secret dependency of the bedroom. But she was still lonely. There were the rages, fits of destructiveness once she had turned the robot off. She had never dared to do him any damage when his power was on. There had been the strange trips to the repairman, awkward lies in explanation of the damage. Not that the repairman asked for explanations. He shrugged and watched her chins wobble as she spoke. He took in her thick legs and the sweating rolls over her girdle, and repaired Bluto I until repairs would no longer suffice. On the humiliating day when the repairman informed her cooly that Bluto was “ Totaled,” she had stared into her bathroom mirror in shamed puzzlement. It had taken three years to pay for Bluto II and the Wimp. And still she was a G-7. Still she sat in the same office sniping and nagging at a staff that changed around her, moving up and on, past her, hating her. They never spoke to her willingly. There was, occasionally, some boot-licker new to the office, who tried to shine up to her with chatter in the cafeteria, but she could smell it coming and took special delight in smashing the hopes of any who tried it. She visited no one. No one ever came to her door. Then she overheard a conversation on the bus about the new Companion consoles. They could be programmed to play games, chat intelligently on any subject, and through a clever technological breakthrough, they could simulate affection in whatever form their owner found it most easily acceptable. Thelma’s heart kindled at the possibilities. She found the preliminary testing and analysis infuriating but endured it doggedly. “ Think of this as old-fashioned Computer Dating,” the technicians said. They coaxed her through brain scans, and hours of interviews that covered her drab childhood, her motives for chronic over-eating, her taste in art, games, textures, tones of voice, and a thousand seemingly unconnected details. They boggled only briefly at programming an expensive console to play Chinese Checkers. It took three months of preparation. Thelma talked more to the interviewers, technicians and data banks than she had ever talked in her life. She decided several times not to go through with it. She was worn raw and a little frightened by the process. For several days after the Brain was delivered she did not turn it on, but left it storing power from the outlet, its green light depicting an internal consciousness that could not be expressed unless she flicked the switch. Then one day, just home from work, still in her bastion of official clothing, she rolled the console out of the closet and sat down in front of it. The screen flashed to red when she touched the switch. “ I’ve been waiting for you,” said the Brain. The voice was as low as Bluto’s but the diction was better. They talked. Thelma forgot to eat. The Brain was constantly receiving as well as sending, totally voice operated. When she got up for a drink she called from the kitchen to ask if it wanted something and the console laughed with her when she realized what she had done. They talked all night. The Brain knew her entire life and asked questions. It possessed judgment, data, and memory, but no experience. Its only interest was Thelma. When she left for work the next morning she said goodbye before she switched the console back to green. Every night after work she would hurry into the bedroom, switch on the Brain and say hello. She had gone to the theatre occasionally, sitting alone, cynically in the balcony. She went no more. Her weekends had driven her out for walks through the streets. Now she shopped as quickly as possible in order to return to the Brain. She kept him turned on all the time when she was home. She made notes at work to remind her of things to ask the Brain. They had been together for several months when the Brain reminded her that his life was completely determined and defined by her. She felt humbled. She never used the other males now. She had forgotten them, was embarrassed to see them hanging in the same closet where the console rested during the day. HE COULD not remember when she conceived a longing for the Brain to have a body. Perhaps the Brain , himself had actually voiced i the idea first. She did re- ' member, tenderly, a mo- .. ment in which the low ? voice had first said that he loved her. “ I am not lucky. They constructed me with a capacity to love but not to demonstrate love. What is 6
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