An Unexpected Encounter

[This is for a writing exercise by my friend Ushasri Nannapaneni for www.ushaveera68.wordpress.com]

She was sitting by the corner seat—she looked totally out of place in the bustling Data Udupi Hotel—as if she had landed there my some mistake, and would, at any moment—disappear completely. The waiters, clad in ill-fitting pants and shirts of light blue, stood a respectable distance away.

The clatter and clamour of the outside world—the dust that was thrown up every time a bus passed by the dusty main road, the honking of the cars, the general ‘people’ noise—all seemed insignificant now.

I tried hard not to stare at her, but it seemed like the locus of the hotel had changed now, and it was inevitable that we would all look at her, even if we tried not to. She was wearing a gray business suit that fit her ample body perfectly. Her face was not what anyone would call pretty—but it had a certain look some might call stately.

She ordered a plate of idlis. When the server brought them to her, he laid them on her plate and somehow ensured it made no sound. No cling-clang. No thwack. When she ate them, one by one, her head didn’t move an inch towards the idlis—her hands brought the idlis to her mouth, as if the idlis had no business expecting her to meet them halfway.

She signaled for water in a fluid, almost poetic motion, and the servers emerged immediately with a bottle of cold mineral water. No “mineral or regular water?” “Cold or ordinary?” that I had been subjected to. She unscrewed the bottle cap and drank the water as one would in an ad. I nearly expected a “cut! Cut!” from some corner of Data Udupi at any moment.

Just then, my phone rang. It provided the break from the collective trance that the hotel seemed to have fallen under. It was an embarrassing ringtone that my son had set for me—“Ayyayyo ayyayyo,” it went. She glanced across at me too, and that’s when I saw a flutter of recognition in her face. 

The End of Reason.

TR012045693, or Troin 693, or Torri, as he was called, rolled out of bed. With a diameter of 3.15 metres, it was a bit of a struggle for him. He rolled over to the cabinet and picked out his pill for the morning. It was all part of his daily routine, one that had scarcely changed for the past 200-odd years.
He took the small vial, as he always had, unscrewed the top and attached it to his ingester. Yeah, that should keep him going until the evening. Torri had to go to work a bit quicker today. "Go to work" was a bit of a stretch-all he had to do was log on to the server and control the traffic from there.

There was something he had to report to HQ for today. He had received the message about 120 hours ago, and his body was automatically programmed to reach HQ by the prescribed time. He was just surprised he had to go there in person--most things would be achieved through virtual contact, he knew. But that was the limit of his reasoning, and that wasn't surprising. They had phased out the Reason 200 series, and Torri, whose "father" was one of those models, had opted to get his "Reason" attributes neutralized. "Makes for an easier life for him," he had heard his fathers tell each other.

It was rumoured that the Polit had commissioned a new Super Reason series, but they would not be hybrids--they would be pure-breds, and only used for military and government.

Torri was no pure-bred: in fact, he could trace his ancestry to the time that women roamed the earth. His last known woman ancestor was Priya. On an impulse, he reached for his records in the public database and accessed her photo.There they were--his image next to hers.

She, with her long black hair, and he, has most of his species, shorn of hair. He ran his hands, with all fourteen of his fingers, over his head, feeling the smoothness of his bald pate.

And their noses and mouths: hers, long and a bit curved at the end, and his, a pair of holes punched in his round face. And that which they called a mouth--there was just too much going on in her face. Instinctively, he touched the area under his breathers. Yeah, nice and smooth, none of those ugly monstrosities they called the teeth and the lips and the gums. Too complicated.

But the eyes-black and brown, and the only feature that spoke to him. He ran a matching algorithm, as he had a thousand times earlier, and felt a wave of tenderness when the screen showed the score for the eyeprint match: 100% match.

The price is right

Titius rushed toward the agora. He had to reach there today, or it would be a waste of time. His father, Hermogenes, had asked for a few slaves, and he had to go and do the needful. His father was a good man, he knew, even if a bit stingy on the money.

As he neared the marketplace, he got ready for an onslaught on his senses. He hardly left the agora without a few things he didn't need. He saw shimmering fabric, which his father had warned him against, but then, that was what all his friends were wearing. Surely, he could bargain and get a good slave even after purchasing just a little bit of silk?

He walked towards the store, and when he was done (or rather, when the trader was done) he had way too much cloth. And now he started to panic. He didn't have enough for one slave, let alone two that his father had ordered.

"Slaves! Slaves! Cheapest of the cheap" he heard someone shout, and went over. How much? 400 drachmas only! He counted his coins--he had 300.

He approached the seller and said, 300 for two. The man looked at him as if he were uttering blasphemy. "No way! I am already the cheapest in the whole area."

Titius didn't quite know how to proceed. "What about those men there?" he asked, pointing to a group who looked mean and lean. And missing a limb or two.

"They?" the trader asked with scorn, "They are missing this or that. Although perfectly healthy," he added.

He racked his brains to remember what his father had wanted them for. Not for anything important, he knew. They were just replacements for the old man who had passed on recently. So any old slave should do, he reasoned.

"Alright--give three for 300," Titius said with a tone that suggested finality.

The trader thought, and acted as if it were a grave matter, and agreed.

It was thus that Titius went home with three men--with a total of six limbs and five eyes between them.

When he went home, his father, whose eyes flared up in anger, looked at his stupid son and said, "My son, the cost, whatever you thought you had saved, is for the arms and legs."

"But, 300 drachmas for an arm and a leg? Way too much, dad!" he said.

"Yes, my son," said Hermogenes, trying his best not to shout at his son. "Slaves do cost an arm and a leg."