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“The money must belong to someone,” I said uncertainly.
“It was from a numbered Swiss account,” said the bot. “If there are no transactions on the account for a period of fifty years then the money will pass to the bank.”
That did put it all in an interesting light. Of course I could still find myself in prison for having large, unexplained sums of money in my possession. But then I was a prisoner anyway… or was I? “That’s very generous of you. I now really need to go out and do some shopping,” I said, keeping my voice even. “I won’t be away long.”
“Alas, it is really not safe out there, especially for a wealthy woman. I will do anything here to please you, Signorina Andrea, but I ca
“Is that your real name?” I asked, with a dawning of real hope. Programming mnemonics were usually tied to the names, especially for deluxe bespoke bots like this one.
“Alas, no, Signorina,” said the bot. “I have a programming block forbidding me to reveal that. Or it, like my heart, would be yours.” The Harry’s Bar unit cocked its head in one of those oddly human gestures that bots sometimes make. “And your di
Part of the floor changed conformation to form an enormous table covered with a white brocade cloth. The bot bustled about laying fine silver and crystal glassware. All right! I wasn’t too sure about actually sticking metal in my mouth, but it would give me time to think, and maybe it would absorb some alcohol. To someone who had asked for a Caesar salad, the food was a surprise. “Tournedos a la Rossini,” said the bot.
“What?” It smelled good.
“A crouton of day-old ciabatta, filet, paté foie de gras, and a shaving of white truffle.” The bot gestured expansively. “White truffle, of course, because this is an Italian dish. Then drizzled with a fine sauce made from Madeira. Enjoy, Signorina.”
The dish certainly looked impressive enough. And it came complete with some really classy wine. I hadn’t been able to afford wine too often. Most of the Californian vineyards were nu-homes these days, and of course there were no more imports from France or Spain. This wine was, needless to say, from Italy. It had probably cost more than I earned in a month, with having to be transported across Asia.
I ate. There was no point in panic. Yet. Anyway, I have always been quite practical. I’d rather panic on a full stomach. The food was… sublime. Taste buds that I had never even known I had woke from their twenty-five year slumber and came to the party, and drank more of the wine than they ought to. Around me the livvy played the Italian hillsides and olive groves. The view, all the way to the jagged Ligurian coastline, was breathtaking.
A part of me said: “If this is prison, bring it on. I could get used to this.”
But deep inside another Andrea was saying, “You have to get out of here, now,” and threatening to start screaming. Not all of the livvy programming in the world has yet managed to do away with the need of humans to sometimes see and touch and speak to other real humans. They used to think that we’d all just disappear into virtual worlds and die there, but well, something about humanity just doesn’t work like that. We are social animals, I guess. I had to get out. But I wasn’t entirely sure just what I could do. I was trapped inside a conformational sphere. The highly plastic material of a nu-home would, according to the adverts, stop just about anything short of a thermonuclear explosion. It was a big selling point. I wasn’t going to kick or cut my way out. I had to somehow get its cooperation, or at least fool the Harry’s Bar unit. Computer logic and bot programming had never been my strong subjects. OK, maybe better than math. I never tried looking up “boys” on those modules. Well, after the math experience it didn’t seem worthwhile. I thought as I ate, and drank another glass of that classy wine. I mopped the last of the juices up with the crouton, and the bot took the plate.
“And did the Signorina enjoy her meal?” said the bot.
I decided to try humoring it. I didn’t have to lie, at least. “It was the tastiest and tenderest synthasteak I’ve ever eaten, Giova
The lights actually flickered right off and the broken Roman colo
Then the livvy reset and the colo
I nearly threw up on the table. Meat. Dead animal. Not textured vat protein. I’d put dead animal into my mouth. “Need to brush my teeth,” I said desperately, getting to my feet, trying not to retch. It was what you were used to, I suppose. But I was going to get out of here before I had to get used to it. Somehow I had to get out of here. The house was already forming a basin with an electrobrush. The water had to go somewhere. Could I follow it out? Or send a message? I already realized that the crazy bot wouldn’t let me call anyone.
I suppose I let the situation get on top of me. I sat down and started crying.
“Cara mia! The toothbrush it is not your liking?” asked the ever-solicitous bot.
“No!” I said fiercely “It’s not the toothbrush. I want to go out.”
“But Signorina!” protested the bot tragically. If it had hair it would have pulled it out. “It is not safe. The contessa never went out, and I could not do for her what I can do for you, because her house it was of bricks and mortar. But the nu-home is wonderful. I can make it appear to be anywhere. I can change it into a wondrous palace. I can make it like a tropical island paradise. I just ca
And I am still stuck inside a sphere, I thought, no matter how you contort the walls and show pretty pictures on the inside. Stuck and eating meat. Growing old-perfectly cared for, of course. And drinking too much, without ever seeing another real human or touching one. And I couldn’t even beat the Harry’s Bar unit to death with a frying pan, because in a nu-home there were no frying pans. Just the structure of the building, which my “protector” controlled. A hollow shell to keep me safe inside until I went mad or died of old age. Already I was longing for people. I didn’t think before that they meant much to me, but now I wanted to talk to, to look at, to touch other humans. Not livvies or a crazy bot. Livvies are fine when you have a choice. I wanted someone human, real. Marcus, so I could act all twentieth-century and fling myself on his chest and make it his problem, not that he’d have been any use. Or one of my girlfriends so we could at least go livvy-shopping together. Even one of the boys I’d chased as a hormonally challenged schoolgirl.
Boys…
Boys and mathematics. Search that sometime.
I did. There was a mathematician called Werner Boy who gave his name to a weird topological thing called a Boy’s surface. My mind groped through a fug of wine and cocktails for the details. The math module had showed me pictures, if not quite the ones I’d had in mind. It had also shown me an inky-footed computer ant… crawling around. I hadn’t really understood it, but the Möbius strip I had managed to get. And the little computer ant had run around the loop first and only come back to its own footsteps on the inside of the loop. And with the twist that made it into the Möbius strip on both sides. Inside and outside. The math article had said something about making a model of a Boy’s surface by “cutting” the top off a sphere and by sewing three rolled Möbius strips onto it… Well, something like that. I didn’t understand one word in ten.