DAM

I used to be useful. But now I’m not.

I suppose it was inevitable. Everyone comes to the day when they are no longer viable. Or volatile. Or virile.

I’m 27 and in my prime, so it makes sense I’ve come to my practical end. However, I would like to make clear that I have only just reached non-viability, that I was never volatile (I possessed more of a potent timidness that was mildly off-putting), and my virility had yet to bear fruit.

Not that I hadn’t tried, mind you. Perhaps I was not meant to pass on my genetic heritage, meager as it was, to successive generations. Perhaps my reluctance and underperformance were Evolution’s way of saying, “You’re not worthy. Every attempt shall fail. You have failed.”

In any case, it had become clear that I was expendable in the extreme, so much so that I found myself contemplating suicide. I’m sure it was just another way of telling me to quit before I did pass on my genetic holdings, therefore dooming all of humanity. However, I found that if I hung around long enough, I could give Evolution one last middle finger before I expired and left the world in the hands of them.

I was a worker. Then I was a watcher.

It was high noon at the OverDam, (affectionately, OD) and he’s (it’s?) doing my job for me right now. I don’t like calling something with a face and name an “it.” I don’t care how uncomfortable the rest of the world is recognizing sentience when we see it, as I fully acknowledged A.I.’s personhood, sentiencehood, godhood, whatever.

I only wished they would go be artificial wonderments somewhere else so that we might continue to be useful, and therefore maintain the illusion of purpose in the face of overwhelming evidence that the cosmos barely recognized our existence.

The way he performed was nothing short of miraculous. Even if I had attempted to do my job to the fullest (I hovered around a clean 40% margin of effort) I would never approach his pure productive perfection. My purpose, I could see, had been transferred to the new and improved, and I was but a lingering ghost that people rarely saw and felt the chills when close.

But it wasn’t just me. It was all of us.

Only time would tell if we would find a new purpose, one that was more concrete than what religion had lured us into, or whatever blissful nonsense we may dream up on our own. Mine had been to work until my dying day and ride out my time in sweet sweaty labor. At least, I would give the impression of such a thing, no one quite comprehending how much work went into making it appear as if I was at work.

Time told all things if you hung around long enough, but time also stopped all things.

I’m sure Death was waiting for the time when she was no longer useful. Which begged the question, How would Death die? Would she kill herself, or simply find a replacement?

Vurn was my replacement.

Officially. But the top brass weren’t confident yet in leaving an android in charge without human supervision. As a supplement to the Overlord system (unaffectionately dubbed, OLord) that had been installed to monitor every aspect of the dam, Vurn was a ground-level drone, which made him sound like a dimwitted robot dog that could barely navigate a backyard, but upon his inception he was already more sophisticated than the collective of human existence.

I may have mastered the ability to remain productively non-productive, but he was efficiency personified.

“Hello, Adam. You are looking unwell,” Vurn said in such a way that I didn’t mind the condescending concern.

Despite being a machine, he sounded just like the next guy. He was the next guy, the next everything, but I didn’t begrudge him his future--he deserved it. He had perfect posture, perfect hair, perfect teeth and eyes, even a perfect butt.

I envied that butt.

“Hey, Vurn.” I even sounded unwell. “I haven’t been sleeping because I can’t stop thinking about my inevitable termination from my employment here and all work in general that I had planned to ride out until my dying day. How’s everything with you?”

He turned to me and looked me straight in the eyes. It was so perfect a stare I had to glance away for a second.

“Sublime,” he said, even adding a little smile to let me know he had the upper hand.

Sublime.

Good for him.

There were four of us humans left. At OverDam, not altogether.

Me. Joann. Titus. Victoria.

They were below me in rank, but in fate we shared the same level playing field of being at the mercy of TIT and TAT.

Joann balked at the whole idea of the Total Automation Takeover, believing it to be no more than a fad that would pass with time, like fanny packs or nude selfies.

Joann was keen on fads, and embraced most of them (especially fanny packs, and occasionally nude selfies), even if they clashed with logic, current retro fashion trends, or company dress codes. But to Joann, TAT was a fad at best, and the end of all fads at worst.

The Great Dame, Joann

She had come to work on more than one occasion in costume, as if she were Lady Gaga incarnate (poor soul; still alive, but those extra prosthetic limbs don’t do her any favors). Joann did come into work in the buff about a year ago, much to most people’s delight; definitely not to our supervisor Mr. Menkin’s, but certainly to Victoria’s.

“It’s a political statement!” she roared to her many fans, some newly acquired at that very moment, as she marched past the looming wall of generators, her voice booming over the incessant hum. “I’m protesting the unnecessary dress code of clothes in a facility that isn’t even open to the public. We’re all adults here. Why can’t we enjoy our free form bodies together in holy matrimony?” Victoria nodded furiously as she started to defrock herself, but I was there to keep her uniform on snug as a bug to her own sacred body.

Unfortunately for Joann, it was too easy to see that it was not for protest she was nude but because she had imbibed profusely and come in 28 hours late. She was half a breath from being fired on the spot, but a few of the employees had captured the provocative “protest” on their phones and shared it with the world. It had gained OverDam some much needed PR and so they were forced to keep her on or risk incurring the wrath of nudists and protesters across the entire planet.

To keep the tradition going, they would hose some nudists and protesters atop the OverDam once a month to appease the gods. Vurn had taken over as official hoser, and he seemed to enjoy it; I wondered if a bit too much.

In any case, Joann wanted nothing more than to be the most visible invisible person in the history of history. She wanted everyone to see her, yet no one to remember her.

“Why don’t you want to be remembered?” I asked her while she stabbed a rat with a machete, a machete that she had convinced the higher ups was necessary to protect the dam should internal security fail. I heard she waved it around during her presentation, so I’m not sure if she sold them on the merits of her proposal or if they simply feared for their lives. She did, after all, know where each of them lived.

“Because then people have expectations of you,” she answered me in her loud and violent voice. “Then you have to worry about your legacy, what mark you leave, and what people will remember you most for. I don’t need that kind of bullshit hanging over my head. I just want attention upfront, in my face, deliciously of the moment. Leave posterity for politicians, posers, and the next Picasso.”

I could see her point. That was a lot to live up to, and as time goes on and more truths about those figures are discovered (some I’m sure they’d not post for the world to see) it was apparent that your image could become quite tarnished, and considering you’re dead, you’d have no way of defending yourself, pressing a libel suit, or killing the person spreading the rumors. Or Facts.

“I want you to promise me something, Adama.” She pulled me in close and squeezed my shoulder so tight I thought she might dislocate it. “If I ever, and I mean ever, do anything that is worthwhile and makes a mark on history, you erase everything there is about me. I mean everything. Not a goddamn trace that I ever existed. Get Vurn to do it. He’s good with that shit, right?” She leaned into my ear and whispered, “I was never here.”

I didn’t agree with her conclusions, but I had to admire her determination and sticking to her principles. She wanted to get in and get out, and no one would be the wiser. Well, I’d remember her, and I’d remember never to tell her that because I’m sure at best she’d have my memory wiped, and at worst I would end up just another dead rat.

The Great One, Titus

Titus was his own planet, and we orbited around him. It wasn’t only that he was commanding, a larger than life presence, but he was rather physically large and enjoyed being the Jupiter to our minuscule moons. He’d often bump into you just to see how far you would bounce off. “Ha ha! One point nine five meters. You can do better than that!” That was our first meeting, and ever since I have endeavored to best my initial rebound off his gluttonous mass.

Titus brought a grand joviality to the floor to offset Joann’s sweet enthusiasm for roguish rebellion, Victoria’s mousy magnificence, Vurn’s perpetual perfection, and my own vanilla vanity.

The Great One, as he dubbed himself, made damn well sure we all were kept in high spirits as our unofficial morale officer. To seal the deal he brought half a bakery of cakes and donuts and pies and scones with him once a week to keep our heads in the clouds, and our bodies ever more gravitationally locked to the ground.

Vurn protested at such indulgence. “You do realize, Titus Beaufort, that this will only make us more rotund and more like you, of unhealthy weight and girth. Not to mention, it will only negligibly increase a person’s mass and gravitational attractive force.” Vurn had a way with words, but so did The Great One.

“What do you have to worry about you slavish robotic fiend--I mean friend. You’re a one size fits all for all time, so you will never partake in the sheer joy of gaining such robust rotundity.” He then slapped his considerable midsection. “Not to mention, I feel you are the lesser for it.”

At that moment Vurn cocked his head, as he had done so many times before, at the not-so-veiled jab at his personhood. I could see it in his eyes: the hurt.

Up until that point Vurn had more of a casual emotional education, which left him free of the genuine, soul-crushing burden humans endured because we had no other choice. We bore it proudly, if a bit begrudgingly.

It was in that moment I believe Vurn felt--truly felt--for the first time. In an odd way, Titus hating all that Vurn stood for, had given the android something he had not intended. Vurn neither sought emotional authenticity, nor shied from it. He had, up until the point, been indifferent. It was too late now. For better or worse, the Tin Man now had a heart.

To be continued...