They Owe It All to Buggets and Atalanta Starr
A little science-fiction for your Tuesday
Tony took the escalator down to the corner store. His gaming chair had run out of chlorobars and stuffpockets, and his stomach was rumbling. He snagged a bottle of Dopa Cola and emerged from the store’s small frozen-foods section with a box of Buggets. “Do you have these in honey ranch?”
The clerk’s name was Tak, according to the branded, athletic-fit polo shirt he was wearing. It was probably short for Takashi or Takeo. Something like that.
“There’s an order coming in tomorrow,” Tak said.
Tony used his smartspecs to check his credit balance and perused the list of accepted currencies taped to the side of the register: BitCoin, DogeCoin, McDollars, WalMarks, PizzaPizzaPesos... AmeriDollars were way down at the end of the list. “Do you take HJs?” he said.
“I can convert them.”
Tony put his selections on the counter.
Tak blessed the Buggets and the bottle of Dopa with his e-wand. “Will that be it?” he clicked for the total, and the tally appeared on the overhead.
“Do you want it now?” Tony said.
“A marker’s fine.” Tak held out his phone. “I’m saving for something.”
Tony entered his HJE code into the phone and let it scan his thumbprint. The phone beeped when it was done.
“How do you want your change?” Tak said.
“McDollars are fine.”
He sent the change to Tony’s account. “Have a good day.”
###
Takvor paid for Tony’s Buggets with a handful of WalMarks and checked the surveillance cameras for approaching customers. The courtyard was empty, so he used his phone to see what the purchase done for his Hand-Job Exchange portfolio. A few of his markers had lost value. One or two had shot up. The new marker was low-average, $32 AmeriDollars. Tony skills were highly reated, but he’d given out a lot of markers, and the odds of him being able to redeem them all before he died were not favorable. The new value of Takvor’s portfolio appeared at the bottom of the screen.
Takvor raised his fists above his head and shook them in silent victory. He ran a search for the marker of his dreams, the one he’d been saving up for, and clicked “Purchase.” All the markers in his portfolio disappeared, replaced by a singleton: Atalanta Starr. For the first time in his life, Takvor felt rich.
###
Tony read the ingredients of the Buggets on the way back up the winding escalator. Crickets and mealworms, mostly. Processed, textured, formed into bite-sized pieces, breaded, and flavored with buffalo sauce. The front of the box announced that a packet of JeezCheeze! was included inside. Tony frowned. There was never enough JeezCheeze! to get the right amount on every Bugget. Invariably, he’d have to scrape the inside of the packet clean with the fifth-to-last Bugget and eat the last four plain.
The escalator deposited Tony on the seventy-seventh floor, and the slidewalk dropped him at his apartment. He palmed the door open and let it shut behind him. The Buggets went into the gaming chair to heat while Tony ordered more stuffpockets with the McDollars the store clerk had given him for change.
That clerk, that damned clerk...
Tony stripped off his street clothes and entered the shower. He stood under the thin spray of reclaimed water. The last hand job he’d given, to a somewhat tipsy Cheesecake Factory waitress, had netted a five-star review and a positive comment: “Nice guy, good hands!”
Tak the Clerk had stashed Tony’s marker away like he was hoarding dragon’s gold. Tak the Miser. Scrooge McTak. Tak-a-Jerk could keep the marker as long as he wanted, but it would be cold comfort compared to Tony’s hands.
Tony rotated in front of the bathroom’s blowers until he was dry. He spritzed himself with body deodorant and cleaned his teeth. He saw pink when he rinsed his mouth. He had brushed too hard.
The gaming chair played a little song to let him know the Buggets were hot. Tony opened the packet of JeezCheez! and took his game off pause.
###
Takvor wasn’t sure what he wanted to do with Atalanta’s marker. He could keep it as an investment, sell it, trade it, or — Oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, God! — travel to Beverly Hills, announce himself at the actor’s door, and ask for redemption.
Atalanta Starr had only issued five markers in her life, four of them before she got really famous and the last one a donation to a charity auction. Three of them had never been redeemed. Their HJE value was high based on rarity alone. If Takvor opted for redemption, she could offer to buy the marker from him, and he might get enough to pay off his college debts or open a second store.
Or he could be a gentleman. He could bow deeply, sweep off his hat, and present Atalanta with the marker’s crypto key, requesting only a smile and perhaps a kiss on the cheek. She might find him charming and ask him out for drinks. Later, she’d invite him to the Golden Globes after-party. They would fall in love and — through adoption, of course — add to her flight of children.
Takvor cued up one of Atalanta’s early movies and researched the cost of a trip to Los Angeles.
###
The JeezCheez! had barely lasted through a third of the Buggets. Tony had half a mind to ride down seventy-seven floors to complain. Sans JeezCheez! all Tony could taste was buffalo sauce and crickets. He dropped the Buggets back in the chair and filed them in the freezer under ‘leftovers.’
Tony focused on his game. It was a space-adventure designed to make everyone trapped on Earth feel like there was hope somewhere. He mined some gold, planted some corn, and defended his base from giant locusts. The locusts reminded him of the Buggets.
The game wasn’t enough. His only contact with the human race over the past three weeks had been with a jerk named Tak who wouldn’t appreciate a good old-fashioned if one walked up and bought a snack from him.
Tony switched to the entertainment channel. There was a news alert. A famous actress had died suddenly of a drug overdose. Too young, they said. So talented. So nice.
She probably had good hands once, too.
###
Takvor was devastated. Atalanta Starr was dead, and his portfolio was worthless. All that work, all that scrimping and saving, destroyed in a single drugpuff. It brought him no joy that four other traders were in similar states. They weren’t real fans. Maybe they’d seen all her movies, even the bad ones, but had they shelled out a year’s worth of PizzaPizzaPesos for the techno album she’d made on the sly and released under her real name? Possibly. But had they been a click away from buying a ticket to Los Angeles so they could show up at her door with her marker and friendly smile? No. A thousand times no!
Takvor put the register to sleep and leaned on the counter, head in hands. He didn’t hear the door open.
“Nothing.” Takvor shook his head. Tears were streaming down his face. “I have nothing.”
“Bet I can cheer you up,” Tony said.
He had a nice smile, Tak noticed. A nice face. Tak wiped his eyes and smiled back.
Fini
News: My favorite sci-fi convention in the universe is coming up soon. Boskone 60. I’ll be there as a participant and hopefully get some volunteer hours in, too. Meantime, I’m forging ahead on a new manuscript. Like everything else, it’s a bit of a departure from the stuff before it.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the story. It’s just a little thing, a weird idea about how the world is changing around us.
I wish you happy days and blue skies. -Rob