From the outside

The humming of my uHomey 13e fades as it follows its vacuuming path out of the living room. Soon, the flat white disk that houses my robot’s brain will detach from the vacuuming base, hover up to the oven-like uHomey KitchenHub and rest in its dock, where it will begin to prepare one of its ninety preloaded meals. I sit and smell the chicken-flavored uHomey InstaMeal cook as I watch the news project holographic replays of local riots on the other side of the city.

I sink further into my beaten leather recliner, cupping a mug of uHomey EverWarm tea. The packet said it was supposed to be mint-flavored, but I can’t taste a thing. Three-dementional images of the riot flash before me in flickering, vibrant color. Protestors smash the glass of a skyscraper’s lobby, its interior aflame and smoldering. Riot police act like berserkers, wailing at whoever they can reach. A fear I’ve known for years jolts through me. I change the channel and the holographic display shifts to footage of masked robbers raiding an apartment complex and holding residents at gunpoint. Change the channel. The next stream shows the war in the northeast. Change the channel. The next shows what’s left in California, its warring factions creating evershifting lines in Los Angeles. Change the damned channel. Flooding in the Southern states, holograms of splashing blue overwhelm what was once downtown Orlando’s Universal Drive.

It’s been seven years since I’ve left my two-bedroom home. When all the world went to hell, reports like this made my resolve to stay put stronger than iron. At first, my friends and family mocked me, then they begged me to come out, then they followed my lead. But now, a yearning is creaking, growing, gnawing at me like never before. I want to stay safe. Of course I do. I always want that. Yet, I ache. I want the air of the world on my brittle skin again.

An advertisement for the uHomey system plays on television. It depicts similar atrocities that I just watched on television.

“The world has become corroded. Thankfully, your friends at uHomey has made it so you never have to leave the safety of your home again with self-resupplying culinary, cleaning, and medicinal supplies–all synthetically printed through our patented DigiReal data materialization software, ” a perky voice says.

Files. Data. Binary bits. That’s all that makes up my sustenance anymore. I look around my house, and none of it matters. Not dusty books I no longer read. Not the clothes I never change out of or wash. Not the photographs of trees I never ponder. It’s all superfluous to the data that runs the show.

I grown as I stand up and limp over to the window, gripping my metallic cane. Pain swells in my feet and my legs. Hell, my whole body cramps in pain. It must be something in the air. The uHomey ventilation system must not be working as properly as it should be. I make it to the window, and whisper with my hoarse voice to the only other I talk to anymore, “uHomey, unfog living room window 1.”

The window’s opaque glass clears up in a second, revealing a barren street. I look up to the sky, saturated in charcoal clouds. My mind goes back to the feeling of cold, cleansing rain on my once-young skin. I remember liking the rain. I remember not worrying about it being poisoned, or contaminated, or a bioweapon in disguise. I remember a lot.

Before those clouds, I see a faint flashing green light. My first instinct is to tell uHomey to put me into lockdown mode. It has to be one of the many conflicts finding its way here to the Twin Cities. But then, something grips my mind.

I believe I was seven, no, six, when I first saw one of the delivery drones. It dropped off a small cardboard box at my front doorstep, my sister and I squealing with excitement to open it. It was the only thing in the world that mattered. We opened it and sure enough, it contained two small bags of taffy from my grandpa. The drone then sang a fun little chime as it flew away.

Before I even know what’s happening, the drone lands right at my front door and I panic. Clearly, this has to be some kind of explosive. Maybe it’s from one of the radical groups, or it’s the government, whichever one is currently in charge, telling me that my block is the next to undergo military adoption.

The drone is loud as its blades continue to spin while it lowers a small cardboard box onto my front doorstep. It then rang that same chime I heard as a kid as it flew away.

Now the parcel sits and waits for me, sitting on the welcome mat that hasn’t been looked used since my friends stopped trying to get me to come outside. It’s an unknown, an anomaly. Something from out there. Other.

The mere thought of the small cube box makes my heart pound. The thing is simple. Old-school, traditional cardboard. Another thing that takes me back to my childhood.

I should tell my uHomey to call External Services and dispose of the box. After all, it’s not invited, I certainly didn’t order anything. Plus, it could be from anyone. No one from my old life is left to send me any gifts. But this box, it’s here, right now. It’s new. Whatever it is, I find myself getting excited at the thought of opening it. My mind is starting to scoff at the thoughts that it’s something deadly. Clearly, it’s paranoia. It’s a gift. I should be excited. In fact, it excites me so much that I wobble over to the front door, where only a few layers of metal barrier is between me and a piece of the world calling me.

“uHomey,” I say. “Unlock the front door.”

“Please confirm request,” a female voice says from the speakers in the ceiling.

“Unlock the front door. Please,” I say, voice trembling.

I hear the whirring of the locks undoing. My hand shakes as I grip the handle. Finally, I pull, pushing back a panicking voice somewhere deep in my subconscious. The outside comes back.

The autumn coolness washes over me and I gasp. Memories of jumping into leaves and trick-or-treating and Thanksgiving come over me. Tears crest in my eyes. My left hand grips my cane while my right grabs the box.

“Let’s see,” I say out loud.

I turn it over, and I then see in large, black letters.

“Sorry.”

I then feel a presence behind me, and three armed men in pig masks stand behind me. One is pointing a rifle at me with a lackluster stance.

“No!” I shout.

They rush inside and slam the door behind them. I hear the locks whir, shutting me out.

Smashing and crashing echo from inside. I feel the hardness of the concrete under my bare feet. The panic in my raw throat. The wonderful feeling of the cold autumn air turns bitter and horrible. I become exposed.

The box in my hand is as empty as it’s promise of something new.