Malltown Read online

  Malltown

  Lasa Limpin

  Copyright © 2015 Lasa Limpin

  All rights reserved.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Glossary

  Chapter 1

  Peggy’s breath escaped. Inhale, exhale. She breathed in a steady, hard rhythm she heard inside her mind.

  Peggy’s sneakers rhythmically hit the smooth asphalt with a satisfying, steady sensation of moving forward, advancing. She felt how her heart pounded against her chest. The wind lifted her medium length brown hair and cooled the damp skin on her neck.

  Peggy jogged down the early morning street. A yellow cab passed to her right. A metal bumblebee, bright sun glinting off its windows. To Peggy’s left, over on the sidewalk, a woman in a skirt and blazer hurried to work. The professional woman veered around a stroller and nanny, her high heels artfully steady on the uneven cobblestone.

  Peggy slipped past a Ford Motorcar, across Fifth Avenue, and in a burst, headed up two dozen white steps fronting a huge colonnaded edifice, counting as her feet hit stone: eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty one, twenty two! and headed into cool dimness. Her sneakers hit the marble floor with a satisfying, echoing slap. She glanced up at the high arches, around at vast emptiness and she turned left. In the silence her breath grew loud as she headed into a long marble corridor.

  She slowed by her favorite piece. Upper Part of a Marble Statue of a Woman, Roman imperial period, 1st-2nd century A.D., Copy of a Greek statue of ca 460-450 B.C.

  The over-life-size statue consisted of yellowish-pink marble, worn down to its original irregular stone. The statue’s torso expressed the slight imprint of drapery. The head tilted a fraction downward, mouth firmly closed, eyes forward, a long crack down the right cheek. The hair consisted of a middle-part—a plump dollop of hair on either side of the forehead, held in place by a thin, sporty band around the brow. The head and hair remained in excellent condition, merely missing a nose. The hair finished in a three-finger-thick ponytail laying against the back, tied twice, once at the nape of the neck and again above the chopped hair-end, for neatness.

  Below the waist the statue turned into unworked stone.

  The overall impression was of a tall figure, draped in robes. A muscular woman with a strong face. She had a look of steady concentration. The card read:

  This is probably a representation of Athena, for the abnormally high crown of the head may once have supported a bronze helmet. The face was broken off in antiquity and reattached.

  Panting from her jog, with the statue’s back to her, Peggy sat on a cool grey marble bench, her shoulder-blades against the hard wall, sunlight diffused through the skylight, shining down.

  Peggy wiped her brow and breathed, cooling down. She dropped her arm and tilted her head against the wall.

  “What’s troubling you?” said the statue, which had turned.

  Peggy shrugged, “Nothing, really.” The marble seat and wall felt solid. Smooth and cool against the sensor suit.

  “Then let’s have drinks,” the statue said. Marble and skylight dimmed. Bright sun hit Peggy’s eyes and she squinted. Wooden slats of a sidewalk bench pressed against Peggy’s legs; car motors, honking, breeze-shaking leaves on lonely street trees. In front of Peggy, a long open cafe under a red awning spilled into the street, iron styled into tables and chairs in a long row snaked around the corner. Peggy pushed off the bench and approached, slipping into the seat opposite that which was occupied by the statue, who now had legs and proper drapery as well as a nose, and waited for her at the glass topped table.

  Peggy, sitting at the table, looked about her: Bleecker Street, early 21st century, she guessed. September. A light breeze, sliding a sweet chill in. Peggy shivered, the sweat on her skin turning a bit icy.

  A man in a white blouse and black pants arrived with a paper pad.

  “Cafe au lait,” Athena said.

  “And you?” he asked Peggy. His dark hair shined over brown eyes and a slight smile.

  “The same,” Peggy said. Peggy watched their waiter head into the dusky cafe interior.

  “How’s the new robot?” Athena asked.

  “Good,” Peggy said.

  “Still miss the old model?”

  Peggy looked away. Across the street, behind a parked car a woman fed pigeons, leaning against the long hood.

  “Everything changes,” Athena said, “That’s a part of life. You can’t keep old tech forever.”

  “I know,” said Peggy, watching the couple.

  “Don’t take it out on the new robot.”

  “Of course not,” Peggy agreed, “I would never do that.”

  “What’s its name?”

  “The new robot? She hasn’t decided.”

  “Do you think it was wise to get a Pwamster Learner?” Athena asked.

  “It made sense at the time.”

  The dark haired waiter returned, slipping the cafe au laits off of his tray. The coffees’ steam wafted and mixed with a faint smell of cut flowers from the deli next door.

  Athena lifted her bowl and took a sip. Her mouth tightened. “Too hot, be careful,” she said and put it down. “You had your last robot for quite a while, and now, to have to teach a new robot, that takes time.”

  Peggy felt herself frown. “I thought buying a Pwamster was the right thing to do. Maybe it still is.” She hesitated. “I can’t bring a stranger into my pod. Not after so many years with Gretchen. I thought if I could make her adjust to my ways that she’d…”

  “That she’d be more like your old robot,” Athena said.

  Peggy nodded. She leaned forward, putting her arms on the cool table top, slightly damp. Peggy stared at the glass of water, beads of condensation catching the light. Athena’s voice floated to her as she stared.

  “It’s new technology. Peggy, you have to accept it. A new robot will never be like Gretchen.”

  Peggy thought of Gretchen. She’d been over ten years old, and built in a series of rectangular blocks. The tower model. Peggy could almost hear Gretchen’s shaky metallic voice rasping at her to wake up. And every morning with that extra sharp atonal note that meant business. Better than any alarm clock, Gretchen used to pinch Peggy with a claw if she slept too long.

  Athena’s hand went around her cafe au lait. She lifted it, blew the steam, and took a sip. “It’s fine now,” she said. “What was it you liked about her?”

  Peggy stared at her cafe au lait. “She was crabby,” she said. Yes, definitely. Her new robot had much more functional hands. “The new robot feels wrong.”

  “I know. But she won’t feel like that forever. Give her time.”

  Peggy nodded. She lifted her bowl of cafe au lait. Smelled the coffee steam, tasted, felt the cream and coffee slip over her tongue.

  Peggy didn’t say anything.

  “You’re not being fair to her,” said Athena finally.

  “It’s not the same. I keep wondering if there’s a way I can get an older model?”

  Athena exhaled and put down her cup. “Peggy. Listen. Give her three months, alright? Promise me? It’s hard on a robot too, if you trade her. She’ll have to adjust again, and she won’t forget you.”

  Peggy stared at the waiter, delivering two piled green salads with chicken and halved boiled eggs to two women at a table nearby. A pigeon walking under their table hustled out of the way of his black shod feet.

  A line beeped. A sharp tone. The waiter’s head turned, his eyes squinting.

  “I’ve got to get the day started,” Peggy stood. “Thanks. I’ll see you later.”

  “I’ll be here,
” Athena said, in her usual way.

  “Off,” said Peggy.

  At the beep the cafe went dark and the lights went up. Peggy stood in a slender, enclosed cylinder at the back of her homepod. The circular disk embedded in the floor lay at a slight tilt, mimicking the subtle slope of the sidewalk. The disk cycled as she ran to stimulate movement, but lately the old moving floor hardly had work to do. Peggy’s Qwammy slip-ons, the latest hand-me-down from the city, enabled her to run in place on any smooth surface, making the need for an Anyway Disc Floor obsolete. The Qwammy runners on Peggy’s feet acted like ancient treadmills, perfectly timed to keep her perfectly still while she ran hard out.

  Peggy tapped the wall and watched the cylinder door slide open. She could see her new robot standing just inside her pod. She exited the cylinder.

  “Good morning, Grippy Peggy. I hope you had a heartwarming run.” The new Pwamster Robot stood just outside the cylinder door. It had a body of three smooth globes, each globe smaller than the next, in ascending order, white as a snowperson. The robot wore a colorful paper cone on its smooth head. The hat hadn’t been there before Peggy got into the VR cylinder. The hat attached around the Pwamster Robot’s round head with a rubber string.

  "Heartwarming refers to emotion," Peggy said, correcting her. “Stimulating’s better.”

  "Yes, I see. I stand corrected. Breakfast is available."

  “I’m going out for breakfast.” Peggy pulled the VR suit over her head. It stretched, pressing up her nose, and pulled free. Peggy breathed. The air felt cool and good against her naked skin. The VR suit had an atmosphere distiller system while in use inside the VR cylinder. But outside, the inert fabric cloyed and choked Peggy almost immediately. She couldn’t understand people who wore their VR suit under their coveralls.

  “Will you be going to your usual breakfast stand and will you see Franny 2-9 Robot?” The Pwamster Robot’s large oval, starch-based, recycled, biodegradable polycarbon lenses flashed once.

  “Probably, I guess,” Peggy said, heading for the shower.

  The robot wheeled after her. “If it’s not too much trouble, will you give her my greeting?”

  “If you want,” Peggy said, not turning.

  "I would, thank you," she said and beeped alarmingly.

  Peggy frowned. She turned back.

  The robot opened her mouth: the half moon mouth shape mechanically parted and tilted the robot’s head back. An officious, pinched voice came out. “Message…Message…”

  The robot closed her head. “There is a message for you, Peggy.”

  “Who is it?” Peggy asked. Peggy noted how the robot had closed her head. The Robot had decided for herself the message could be delivered personally, verbally, without the use of the robot’s head screen or a Three-Dee hologram.

  “A Petunia-Glass.” The Pwamster I Can Learn Robot wheeled forward, three white orbs. Her eyes and mouth flashed when she spoke. “Apparently you are needed in your Grippy Factor capacity.”

  “Petunia-Glass? I know her,” Peggy said—she hit the bio lights. They flooded the room and disinfected her skin, turning her sweat into water, more or less. She padded herself dry with a towel. No time for a shower. “Senior?”

  “She is eighty-two years. Did you have a nice time with the Goddess Athena?”

  Peggy’s muscles halted for a fraction, having experienced a twinge. She headed to a handle in the wall. She pulled and a small door opened. “You’re not supposed to monitor me, Robot.”

  “I’m sorry. I did not realize.”

  Peggy drew out the beige coveralls. “It’s okay.” She unfolded the coveralls which had been stored unsealed, put a leg in. “Did you listen to our conversation?” Please no.

  The Pwamster Robot hesitated and Peggy looked over at it.

  The robot’s smooth, round eyes flashed once. “No,” the robot said.

  Peggy pulled her arms through the coveralls. Sealed up. Gathered her tech into deep pockets. She slipped her feet into her sneakers and the laces tightened themselves automatically for a snug fit. “I’ll go see about Petunia-Glass. Did she say what the problem was?” Peggy smoothed her fingers through her #3 haircut—chopped to hover just above the shoulders. Last week she’d pressed the style number on a vending machine console and spent two minutes under the precision suction vacuum cutter for a trim. Not bothering with a mirror, she headed for the door.

  “No she did not.” The Pwamster Robot wheeled after her at increased speed. “Shall I accompany you, Peggy?”

  “No, I’ll be alright,” Peggy said, not looking at the robot. The door whooshed, opening onto the clean, slightly metallic smell and the white warm glow of a rainy day in Malltown. Peggy stepped onto clean white flooring, the vast open space of sector four, the far eastern end of Malltown. Malltown’s huge arched dome rose above her. The solar glass showing a gray day, therefore Malltown’s sunlamps adjusted to create the white-light plainness that made the pedestrians pop in their beige coveralls and flattened the perspective of the huge oval dome that formed Malltown’s roof and walls, and stretched further than Peggy could see.

  Peggy slid her hand into a deep pocket and pulled out her specialized Factor Grippy Rover. In the city they’d started using contact lenses, but Peggy preferred the hard tech Malltown put into the hands of its Grippy Factors. It was what she was used to. She put the thick rectangle to her mouth: “Petunia-Glass,” she said and found the pod number. She headed in a forward, leftward direction.

  END OF CHAPTER ONE

  Chapter 2

  The micro soles on Peggy’s sneakers pressed firmly and silently against the polished concrete, the sneaker’s insoles building a charge with each step in case she needed an extra power source. A cleaner robot hummed past, its buffer brush making a faint choof choof against the white floor. Above Peggy, a glass-cleaning robot finished its morning on the dome, slowly and methodically cleaning the solar glass, its discus body spinning with a near-silent hum.

  Peggy checked her watch: 6:02 AM. Early for a call. Hands in pockets, Peggy walked for a while down the long, Left Corridor of Malltown, past the white, segmented homepods, stacked three high, in uniform lines of merging bubbles. To her right, a line of bimpercars lay sleeping. The white and clear bimpercars made two narrow rows, with a third lane for passing, and stretched as far as the eye could see. Far in the distance Peggy heard a bimpercar whirr awake, and the slight chung. She watched as, about a mile away, a tiny chair-like object shunted out of its lane to head up Malltown, using the passing lane since all the other cars were sleeping.

  Peggy frowned. She’d rather walk. On the other hand, Petunia-Glass’ homepod sat near the end of sector four, by Entrance Five. Could take over a half hour on foot. Having left her robot at home, Peggy knew her second-best option remained public transportation.

  Peggy walked over to the line of bimpercars sitting in their deep floor groove, chairs on sticks set into tracks in the floor. She picked a bimpercar at random and sat. The smooth, curved seat of vegetable-based micro-leather sunk in a comfortable fraction against her back. The bimpercar wouldn’t start—Peggy wasn’t wearing its harness so she strapped that on. The straps felt snug against her shoulders and around her thighs. “Home Pod 3497, Sector 4,” Peggy said.

  The bimpercar awoke. With an amusement park ride snappish turn, it veered out of the lane of sleeping bimpercars and into the empty passing lane, picking up speed rapidly. The chair tilted back a fraction, taking on greater speed in the freedom of the quiet morning. The air’s resistance to her mild velocity experienced on her skin and in the slight lifting of her hair, Peggy passed by homepods to her left, and central kiosks to her right. The shuttered kiosks formed a middle stretch and lay like a narrow ellipse down the center of Malltown. With a sensation of the soft pleather seat pressed firmly, and a brisk motion while seated in comfort, and add to that the slight tremors of the bimpercar’s inserted rod moving up the floor track, Peggy couldn’t help feeling like the bimpercars experienced a sensation of
being unleashed in these early morning, untrafficked hours.

  Five minutes later, the bimpercar slowed. It stopped with the slightest jolt. Peggy unlatched herself and stepped out of the bimpercar. Immediately upon its release, the bimpercar zipped into the space already created for its arrival, and settled back into its long line of sleeping fellows.

  Peggy approached Petunia-Glass’ homepod: the rounded, recycled white steel, the arched, biopolymer plastic doorway. Peggy waved at the door and a sensor scanned her.

  A moment later the door whooshed aside. A senior citizen stood in the homepod’s interior. She wore beige coveralls over a stocky form. Eyes alert over a beaky nose and tight mouth, her shoulder length hair fell in a relaxed, feathered style—a #1 Senior Cut from Clover, the hairstyle vending machine—thin and white and a bit messy, despite being well brushed. “Get in here, Peggy,” she said.

  “Hello Petunia-Glass. How are you today?” Peggy said, stepping inside. Peggy had never been inside Petunia-Glass’ homepod. She’d never spoken to Petunia-Glass that she could remember. But she’d heard her speak at meetings and seen her around town. Peggy had occasionally nodded a greeting at Petunia-Glass and Petunia-Glass had nodded back. Like so many in Malltown, they’d never been introduced, but had always been on a first name basis.

  “How am I? Terrible. Terrible,” said Petunia-Glass. “Take a seat, Peggy, please.” She lifted her arms and waved her hands. “I’m so upset I don’t know what to do!” She dropped her arms. “Drink? Have you eaten breakfast?”

  “I’m fine,” said Peggy.

  “Have you eaten breakfast!” Petunia-Glass enforced. “Look at you! You’re too thin. What has that robot been feeding you? That old thing. You really should replace her.”

  “Gretchen? She broke down 14 days ago. I’ve had to replace her.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.” Petunia-Glass’ robot hummed in. It looked like Peggy’s, save for the inverted-triangular head atop the two snowballs. “Two breakfasts,” Petunia-Glass told her. “The works.”