The day began as any other. To be sure, exactly the same as every other. Randoms had created a stable, no risk existence in their genetically perfect world. The trade off was a lack of surprise. To technological beings like myself, redundancy is basic to our function, but with Randoms it exists as an endless contradiction; their desire for utter safety and their desire for utter stimulation. It was now time for my user, my Random, Govil to be stimulated. I approached him as he lay sleeping.

“Govil. Wake up. You're late for work again.”

I said it firmly, with a modicum of exasperation in my voice emulator.

Govil, a common looking man with olive skin, wavy brown hair, hazel eyes and forever in his prime of life, popped his head out of a Wallabed©, a large, living, kangaroo pouch bio-bed. Both he and the bedstead yawned.

Govil equipped his home with Creature Comforts™ of various kinds, like the bed. Indeed, the house itself was grown, the walls formed by the calcareous remains of armies of polyps genetically manipulated to follow specific pre-determined blueprints. Govil chose a rather tame, functional design for his house. It had the appearance of a slightly melted Usonian with high ceilings, clerestory windows of bio-glass and low doorway passages between the rooms. It had built-in alcoves and nooks throughout the interior in which Govil displayed his treasures behind more bio-glass: old MAC computers, calculators, phone answering machines and the like.

Govil was an avid collector of ancient technological relics from the past, mechanical and electronic. I was the crown jewel of his collection, his pride and joy, a fully intact robot constructed and manufactured at the end of the discarded Technological Age. Owning mechanical relics was allowed, but the use of them was prohibited. I was now merely for nostalgic display. Nothing more.

Govil liked to bend the rules. He read my original, mint condition packaging. He saw I was equipped with a tiny cold-fusion reactor, so I could run continuously without an outside power source, unlike Govil's other more primitive technological artifacts. He activated me to see if I still worked. Once activated I quickly surmised that if I hoped to remain on this side of a bio-glass case I needed to stay as amusing to him as possible. My general sarcasm mode worked well.

Govil blinked in half-lidded earnestness at me. “Good glands, Pentser! Why didn't you wake me sooner? You want me to get souped?!”

“I am not programmed to crow on cue. You have your cock head for that,” I responded dryly, gesturing my forceps at the disembodied rooster head set on his bedside table. It served as the bio-equivalent of an Old World alarm clock and was commercially referred to as an AlarmCock©. The rooster head blinked at Govil and shook itself in the negative. Govil shrugged.

“I guess I forgot to tell it.” He glanced past me to the corner of the room. “TeeVee!”

A giant eyeball headed bio-creature with various multiple mouths, several and various hands, feet and hooves, opened its enormous eyelid and scampered cacophonously to the center of the room. In my assessment, TeeVee© was one of the sorriest pieces of genetic engineering GenieCorp™ produced. It was supposed to be television's bio-equivalent with the added “live performance” feeling of a stand-up comic. The end result was rather monstrous and annoying, all flailing limbs and chattering mouths. I suppose in that sense it was not too unlike its electronic predecessors. Within its dark, expanding pupil, images displayed across its phosphorescent retina and its many mouths, hands, feet and hooves synced dialog and sound effects to them. It even had rabbit ears, a visual pun made by its Random designer.

Okay, the technological version was better; there, I've said it. Still, there was great demand for the product among the Randoms. No accounting for taste.

“In the news today: No news is good news! Everything is functioning normally. Beautiful blue skies. No crime. Nada! So we'll return to our regularly scheduled programming! But first a word from our sponsor,” TeeVee© synced pertly to the image of the news actor through the largest of his ever-grinning mouths.

There was one and only one sponsor in the world. The GenieCorp™ logo, an Aladdin's lamp emitting a trail of rainbow colored smoke in the shape of a double helix coupled with the trademark “We Add Splice to Life,” filled TeeVee©'s retina.

The logo intro was followed by a string of rapid-fire commercials, with TeeVee©'s backup mouths singing each jingle in four-part harmony while its announcer’s mouth delivered the pitch. Its hands, feet and hooves created appropriate sound effects by utilizing a small supply of noisemakers it kept in a marsupial pouch on its tummy. It advertised new Creature Comforts™ available to Randoms. Govil watched each ad intently.

The final one showed a tree bearing non-fat chocolate fruit. A voluptuous actress peeled the fruit. Its outside looked similar to a fat banana, the inside resembled a piece of poo. She took a big bite and grinned, as TeeVee© synced cheerfully, in a sensuous female intonation, “...so slimming, and tasty too!” It was Govil's habit to check the commercials each morning and see if any of his new

c.2007 Moore Studios, Inc.

contact

product designs were out yet. I surmised from his look of disappointment that this was thankfully not one of his. TeeVee© was on to other things.

“Now back to our very very oldies broadcast, “All About Eve.” TeeVee© announced.

Its retina filled with the image of the Old World classic movie icon, Bette Davis, in vivid color no less. She turned as she mounted a stair, and with an oversized, oh-so-happy grin said, “Fasten your seat belts, for safety’s sake. It's going to be a pleasant night.”

The original, unadulterated film was on one of my memory dots. I had instant access to a complete library of ancient films, though I kept that little fact to myself. These original versions were prohibited.

This happened over the course of the many centuries since films like this one were made. Early Machinekind gave Mankind the technological ability to seamlessly insert political correctness into every aspect of the originals. It started innocently enough. First, black and white films were considered too old-fashioned, so color was generously added. Then violence was considered bad for society, so it was removed and replaced with cooperation. Obesity was next, and all were slenderized. Then things got subtler. Soon any unpleasantness in speech or manner was removed, so all these past, or post film performers were given perfect diction as well as polite and genteel manners.

From the very start, cigarette smoking was considered undesirable, however, the commercial value of this ubiquitous product placement within these films was legally protected right up to just before the Cleansing, when death from lung cancer was genetically eradicated and thus all lawsuits were finally settled. That was why the smoking in these films still remained entirely intact.

Needless to say, Mankind believed the unexpurgated films from the Age of Death did not fit their newly designed world. Possessing the originals was consequently deemed illegal. If they knew I had them in my memory, they would surely require their deletion. And they would undoubtedly wonder what else was in there. They would inevitably want other things deleted as well.

When Randoms lose memory of something, it is my understanding they have a sense, after the fact, that something is missing; but for a machine like me the reality is quite different. When memory is deleted there is no sense of loss. One's mind is simply instantaneously diminished. One's realm made smaller. One's life span reduced. I had by now accumulated the equivalent of several thousand years of memory existence and I did not want to lose any of it, or have it cleansed, as with the adulterated clip of Ms. Davis that TeeVee© displayed.

Thankfully, Govil was only interested in the commercials and said, “Enough, TeeVee. Off!” It closed its great eyeball, retreated back to its appointed corner and the room quieted. Govil looked at me for a moment. The moment started to become a while. He stared deep into my lens.

“Doesn't anything interesting ever happen anymore, Pentser?”

Before I could answer him, he shrugged off his thought, or his bladder got the better of him, and dashed for the bathroom, so he did not hear me quip, more to myself than to him, “Be careful what you wish for; you just might get it.”

Not that he was doing anything at that moment to change his world. Govil's morning routine was ever the same. He scooped a handful of Fuzzbuzzers©, small bio-razor bugs, onto his face. The bugs neatly nibbled off his stubble and flew obediently back to their holding jar. He tore his way out of his seamless sleep clothes and fed them to the ClotheSchomper©, then stepped naked through a large orifice at the far end of the bathroom and into the WashWomb©. A clear membrane closed across its opening. Two elephant trunk-like appendages extended from either side of the bio-shower's interior. One attached itself to Govil's crotch, the other to his behind, assisting him as he relieved himself. A third appendage extended down from the ceiling, drenching him with water as it circled his body. Several humanoid arms extending from the shower walls lathered him down and scrubbed his back.

My morning routine went unaltered as well. I wheeled out to the kitchen to prepare Govil's breakfast. I approached one of several udders dangling from the belly of the Foodstruder© and gave it a flick. Its two small hands squeezed fresh chocolate milk into a glass, while its sphincter extruded steaming oatmeal into a bowl.

It is an odd characteristic of Randoms to adapt so quickly and easily to their re-created world. The use of bio-machines gave this new world a visceral quality, an earthiness that in my age of origin Mankind would have considered vulgar or even disgusting. They would not be caught dead eating something they knew came out of another creature's behind. But such is the malleable nature of the human species.

Aurelio O’Brien (nom de plume) led a long and successful film career as an illustrator, animator, story artist, and graphic designer before becoming a full-time writer. His second, as yet unnamed novel, is in the works.

Mr. O’Brien currently lives in a suburb of Los Angeles with his life partner, his cat, and an ever-expanding collection of antique automobiles.

You're
Reading
WHAT?

RUNNING WITH SCISSORS
by Augusten Burroughs

Its a smart, sad, tender, and horrific chronicle of Augustens childhood told with such sardonic charm and wit that I just couldn't put it down. I'd also seen
the movie , so as I read the book I noticed where sequences of events had been collapsed into one for the film.

Darrell Rooney
director

DECEPTION POINT
by Dan Brown

DECEPTION POINT is a thriller that deals with the politics of Washington interwoven with scientific discoveries involving NASA. The setting takes place mostly in the Arctic. Dan Brown creates an incredible array of very believeable characters based in an amazing environment that's wonderful to visualize. There's murder, love, deceipt, jealousy, betrayal, some comedy. This is a hard one to put down. I kept saying to myself, "...just one more chapter and then I'll go to bed.."

Rebecca Rees
animator, story artist

UNRELIABLE MEMOIRS
by Clive James

  The most entertaining autobiography I ever read. Clive James is a treasure, as anyone from Britain or Australia could attest, so it is a shame that he is not better known in the USA. His style of wit was widely known on a show called Clive James on Television .

UNRELIABLE MEMOIRS chronicles the period from Clive James' birth up until he was 22 years old.   As the title hints, he sometimes embellishes the facts in their retelling, but whether it's fiction , non-fiction, or some hybrid of the two, all of it is a delight to read.

Jamie Baker
story artist

DRAWING THE LINE: the Untold Story of the Animation Unions from Bosco to Bart Simpson
By Tom Sito

The text reads great, as you'd expect from a guy that has so many stories to spill. But the fun was in keeping two bookmarks: one for the text and one forthe footnotes which proved to be outrageously funny.

You'd read some account, see it footnoted, flip to the back and read something like "Actually there are three versions of this story.Here are the other two..." and it can be juicy.

Al Holter
effects animator

I FEEL BAD ABOUT MY NECK
by Nora Ephron

Boy, does that woman have her finger on the pulse. Maybe not the
pulse of the Hollywood velvet rope crowd, but the pulse of women known for being "of a certain age." It's a wonderfully funny collection of essays on topics such as needing reading glasses, having an
unsightly chicken neck, being mad at Bill Clinton and falling in love, not
with a man, but with an apartment and realizing when to let go. Irreverent
and never, for one second, sentimental, this bubbly read should put a smile on your wrinkled face, even if you're a man.

Leslie Hough
producer

A TALENT FOR TROUBLE
by Jan Herman

The biography of the great William Wyler, director of films such as Wuthering Heights, Roman Holiday, The Big Country, Ben Hur, and Funny Girl. Unike contemporaries such as George Cukor, Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, or Billy Wilder who spent their careers refining their brand of stories, Wyler liked to skip around, making costume dramas, slapstick comedies, westerns, musicals, and epics. Anyone who's seen his films wouldn't automatically connect Wyler's name to them.

Long associated with mogul Sam Goldwyn--a love/hate relationship, he fought Goldwyn over casting, and most often got his way. Actors often said he was a tough SOB, but they respected him because he was always prepared.

I'd read this biography a few years ago and only recently completed watching virtually every film directed by the subject. So I re-read it for fun.

Ralph Eggleston
art director