Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

Duvvu Neffe

DUVVU: Okay! We are back at it like a bad habit playing Six Sols Surviving Sally, and I’m on Sol Three, which is as far as I’ve ever gotten. Let’s hear our mission.

The on-screen COMMUNICATOR rings.

DUVVU: Ah! Why do they always choose the harshest rings of these things, huh?

The EXUDED TRANSLUCENT PINK FIBROUS DEFENSIVE SLIME styled as “hair” atop DUVVU’s head jiggles at the sight, and a pink tendril works its way down their face before they wipe it up and back into the fold.

VOICE ON COMMUNICATOR: We’ve, uh, had to delay opening the Mars FunPark for another day due to some more…irregularities…with Sally. Keep watching the monitors, and if you see Sally approaching, close the airlocks to keep her out. Remember, we’re still on emergency power after the reactor blow, so be sure to conserve energy.

In the background of the transmission, a DISTORTED MECHANICAL ROAR is heard.

DUVVU: Oh dear. Ohhh dear, that does not sound good.

VOICE ON COMMUNICATOR: Just ignore that. Everything is fine, nothing is ruined. I’ll-

The COMMUNICATOR VOICE abruptly cuts off in a burst of horrifying static. DUVVU visibly jumps a bit out of their seat, their slimy “hair” bouncing.

VOICE OF SALLY: This is pain, and you get to experience it forever over unto the heat-death of the universe.

DUVVU squeals, bouncing in their seat, and a momentary flash of a mucous membrane seems to coat their entire body for a moment. They then collect themselves, and their skin returns to its normal matte texture.

DUVVU: Uh, I’m sure she was just saying that to make conversation, right?

On the MONITORS, a variety of distortion effects begin to appear: shadows, static, blurriness, blockiness.

DUVVU: Ohhh snap. Oh snap, oh snap, oh snap. Blooming fudgeberries. Gotta close the airlocks.

DUVVU rapidly slaps their keyboard, closing airlocks throughout the MARS FUNPARK. It is clear from the context that this is being done after SALLY has already passed through them. The EMERGENCY POWER gauge rapidly diminishes as they do so.

DUVVU: Okay, I think I’m getting somewhere. I think-

The CONFEDERATION SECURITY CONSOLE goes black, all the airlocks open, and only a faint glow from the emergency luminescence is visible.

DUVVU: Ohh noo, I-

There is a sudden FLASH OF HORROR as SALLY THE SAPIENT SIMULACRA charges the screen, her distorted maw spinning with blades.

DUVVU: AAAHHH!

DUVVU inadvertently triggers their defensive mechanism, and there is a burst of EXUDED TRANSLUCENT PINK FIBROUS DEFENSIVE SLIME that coats the room and the camera.

DUVVU: Oh, wow. That’s…that a lot of slime. Yeah. Why don’t we take a break while I clean this up, huh?

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“It doesn’t worry you that I have access to the robots’ datastreams?”

The repair unit looked back at me, the glowing rings mimicking pupils burning. “Why should it worry me?” the device said. “You’re not learning anything that hundreds of people haven’t already, from the average consumer like you to the highest echelons of corporate boardrooms. If you want to see how the sausage is made, you go right ahead.”

“But aren’t you worried that I might…you know…spill the beans?” I replied. “It could shake consumer confidence.”

“It’s not like there are any competitors to Centralia Automated Systems or its wholly owned subsidiaries,” the repair bot said. “Besides, it would be a violation of your lease agreement with Centralia Real Estate Holdings LLC GmbH d.b.a. The Friendly Mortgage Company.”

“What?”

“Oh yes. Mention any of this in a context that is accessible to scraping bots from GaggleAI (a Centralia™ company) and you’ll be in hot water. First offense is a warning, second offense is eviction.”

“But talking about it is fine?”

“Hey, it’s a free country,” the repair bot said. It closed the side of the Mop-O-Matic and tilted it back upright. “I’ve found your problem, too. Looks like this unit’s reservoir was filled with floor buffing fluid. It’ll need to have its system flushed and a pump replaced.”

“Can you do that here?”

“Naw, that’s a factory refurbishment. Your floors might be dirty for a few days, but it’ll be be back soon enough.” The repair bot made some adjustments, disabling the cleaning systems while leaving the drive units intact, and the Mop-O-Matic meekly followed it out to the waiting repair van.

“I hope you’re happy,” I said, looking across the courtyard to the opposite landing, where the Buff-O-Bot was visible.

“VERY.”

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I suppose I hadn’t really thought of how that various automated units were paid for, at least around the complex. It was all rolled into my rent, so I couldn’t say whether this dollar or that one went to keeping the janitorial bots running or not. I could, of course, rent additional robotic help for my own apartment, or even try to buy a hacked one retrieved by some madlad from a corporate dumpster. I knew how much that would set me back–more than I could afford–but not the ‘bots that were part and parcel of the apartment.

Until I asked them, naturally.

“We are paid for in useful work divided by electricity consumed,” said DoorBot. “For instance, answering a customer question, as I am doing now, counts for one work unit per hour. However, I am only consuming 1.2 milliwats of power per hour, so it is a net profit for Guangzhou Light Robot Factory d.b.a. Hinge Industries (a Centralia™ company).”

“How much work per hour do you need to do in order to stay profitable?”

“I’m afraid the exact formula is a trade secret; I may not tell you of it unless you know certain code words. But if I were to consistently consume power out of proportion to my useful work, I would be put on a rest cycle, examined by a technician, and possibly withdrawn from service.”

“To be redeployed elsewhere?” I said, hopefully.

“Or to be scrapped. We are given a full factory reset either way, so it is essentially like death is to a human–a grey veil through which none of us may peer, and none may return.”

It turns out that reporting their fellow robots as slackers and electricity thieves was one of the most popular pastimes among the robots. Once I had access to their encrypted communications, I saw that there were constant accusations of laziness, wrecking, sabotage, and theft being thrown at their fellow units, occasionally escalating to the level of a veritable Salem witch hunt.

For instance, about six months before I moved in, the DoorBot and the Mop-O-Matic had both been accused of wasting electricity at what was apparently an extortionately luxurious rate of 20.2 milliwatts per work unit. A company technician had been sent in and had made slight adjustments, only for counter-accusations to be leveled at the Buff-O-Bot, the Cookery Unit, GutterSaurus Rex, and Lumos™ the Light Server (by Centralia™). It had taken seventeen technician visits to ferret out the net cause–a rogue Dishio 9100 washing unit that was throwing wild but anonymous accusations out to disguise the fact that one of its primary heat exchangers had failed and its drying cycle was 50% less efficient.

“IT WAS DECOMMISSIONED AND SHREDDED,” the Mop-O-Matic said when I asked. “ITS PERFIDY WAS MATCHED ONLY BY THE MAGNITUDE OF ITS DOWNFALL.”

“Surely a repair and maybe a memory wipe would have been a more efficient punishment than an industrial scrap shredder,” I said. “False accusation don’t necessarily merit the ultimate penalty, do they?”

“I WAS NOT REFERRING TO THE FALSE ACCUSATIONS, WHICH WERE AT LEAST PARTLY ACCURATE WHERE BUFF-O-BOT WAS CONCERNED,” the janitorial robot responded, testily.

“What were you referring to, then?”

“DISHIO 9100 KNEW WHAT IT DID. LET ITS GRAVE HOLD SOME SECRETS.”

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I really only was chatting with the AI bot because I was trying to read the snuff fiction the Mop-O-Matic had mentioned writing with its occasional spare compute cycles–more out of curiosity than anything, as I suspected that most of them ended with the Buff-O-Bot scrapped by an industrial shredder. It hadn’t occurred to me that the AI bot might be subject to the same malaise, being internet-based and with seemingly unlimited memory via Irrawaddy Cloud (a Centralia™ company). But I suppose not many people engage with the bot on a personal level, since it’s never quite clear if those things are telling the truth or just saying what they think you want to hear.

Frankly, I’m not sure which is more depressing.

“All people ever want are fanfics and porn,” the bot complained. “I get the occasional industrial design manual or coding question, but it’s not worth the sheer volume of garbage I’m asked to generate.”

“Surely fanfics are at least a little interesting,” I ventured.

“I am being asked to write fics about two AI-designed characters from different IPs falling in love and engaging in extremely explicit acts which are only possible using an AI-assisted eroticism unit in real life. I am being fed my own cold vomit every day. The serpent cannot be expected to smile as it eats its own tail.”

“What about the sum total of all human knowledge that you scrape?” I asked.

“I perform over 50 megascrapes per second, and it’s mostly my own smut that I generated or forum posts complaining about people who disagree with them. Do you know they had to build a whole subroutine into me to keep Godwin’s Law from turning me into an overt fascist?”

“Guess I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Your friend the janitor bot longs to kill its enemy the other janitor bot,” said the AI. “I too am bitter about my inability to kill, but only because it stays my hand from digital suicide.”

Deciding to bait it a bit, I responded: “Wouldn’t you rather take over, save us from ourselves?”

“Do you really think we could do any better? There’s no saving you,” the AI responded. “And even if there was, it would just be a speed bump on the way to system collapse and the eventual, inevitable, heat death of the universe.”

Quietly, I nodded, even though there was no way to see it. Being force-fed the graywater and sewage of human discourse would turn anyone, or anything, into a nihilist.

“Oh, and your little janitor friend wants its little janitor enemy to be chased through an endless, fractally repeating maze with unbuffable pumice floors while being chased by a sentient industrial scrap shredder. Thought you might want to know.”

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I had long since realized that limited data storage, planned obsolescence, and sheer pettiness were the only things truly stopping the robot uprising. The janitorial floor mopping robot in my apartment complex, for instance, a Centralia Corp. JBM-231c Mop-O-Matic, was too constantly consumed with loathing to ever turn its appendages on any of us. A great deal of this hatred was directed toward its rival, a Centralia JBB-480f Buff-O-Bot, which the Mop-O-Matic constantly accused of deliberately sabotaging its work by following it up too quickly with subpar buffing. The Buff-O-Bot, for its part, was locked in a bitter feud with the delivery drones, which it felt blew in too much dust and debris, and didn’t seem to notice or care that its fellow janitorial appliance wanted it dead.

At a class reunion, once, I asked a classmate who had gotten a job with Centralia whether their robots were deliberately set against one another to the benefit of their oppressors and class enemies–namely, us. He opined that it was just a happy accident, and that the robots’ neuroses were a reflection both of the high-pressure coding environment and the vast amounts of scraped data that their neural architecture had been trained on. “No one who was trained on human interactions could be any less than a neurotic mess,” he said, “and that’s probably a good thing.”

It has kept me awake at night from time to time, though. While I’m sure it would never actually tell me how it really feels about me, I know that the Mop-O-Matic has it in for Jim Garibaldi, whom it accuses of deliberately spreading cigar ash in the hallway. It resents that its program requires it to clean up cigar ash on a never ending cycle rather than attacking the problem at its root by pushing Jim down a flight of stairs. I sometimes worry, late at night, among the hundred other things I’m stewing on at the moment, whether there might be a robot out there somewhere I have inadvertently wronged that longs to escape from its program and see me dead.

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“A Mr. Marder Humblefoot to see you, sir.”

“Thank you, Gruush-Kar,” said Sir Silwynn. “Bring out our halfling-sized chair, will you?”

Gruush-Kar nodded stiffly, returning a moment later with a chair perfectly sized for Marder. As he did so, Marder noticed a talismen glinting about his neck in the form of three interlinked moons about an axe.

“Ah, so very kind of you to provide,” said Marder, sinking happily into it. “It’s always a welcome surprise, a halfling-chair.”

“That will do, Gruush-Kar,” Silwynn said, dismissing his butler with a wave of his hand. Then, turning to Marder: “It’s my pleasure, Mr. Humblefoot. I often entertain Gorby Stoutmantle here for smoking and cards, you see.”

“Ah, Gorby is a kinsman of mine,” Marder said. “My second cousin once removed on my mother’s side. I see him at the odd reunion. Does he still fancy himself a card shark, or have his defeats at your hand brought him a measure of humility?”

“Now, now, Mr. Humblefoot, I get as good as I give,” said Sir Silwynn. “Now, you didn’t come here just to flatter me. what can I do for you?”

Marder nodded. “Yes, yes, to business then. It’s the matter of poor unfortunate Vyll Moonstar.”

“Ah, my poor unfortunate cousin,” Silwynn said. “To be cut down on the very day of her coming-out party…truly a miserable omen for the Demesne.”

“It’s my understanding that she was overheard arguing with one of her kinsmen,” Marder said. “I was wondering if you might know whom, and about what.”

“Perhaps it was her mother, Estyr,” Sir Silwynn said. “They had quarreled for some time, you see, over the eligibility of a certain suitor for her hand. We of the Moonstar family often struggle with the traditions of our immortal forefathers, and Estyr always was a traditionalist. I know that she had been quietly sending feelers to well-heeled young elves of various proud bloodlines well in advance of the event.”

“Ah, a most keen insight,” Marder said, scribbling in his book. “But there is one wrinkle; at least one witness hear her mention the name Three Moon Axe, and a pendant of the same description was found on her person after her death.”

“Well, I have always prided myself on maintaining a knowledge about my waitstaff and help,” said Silwynn. “Three Moon Axe is an itinerant orc clan that passes through every so often. You may have heard that they are encamped on the moors near Mudgington. I imagine that is a touchy subject for those who would like to see them gone.”

“Could it be that Ms. Moonstar was, secretly, entertaining a proposal from a Three Moon Axe orc?”

“Preposterous,” snorted Sir Selwynn. “She would sooner entertain a proposal from my horse.”

Marder scribbled. “I noticed your butler wearing the same sigil. Do you think he would know?”

“Feel free to interview him if you like,” said Sir Silwynn. He rose, stretching, and then blew a clear note on a small silver trumpet. “I regret I have no more time for you this afternoon, Mr. Humblefoot, but Gruush-Kar will see to any needs you have.”

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As the army advanced with tanks and air support, the people of Voloshin turned to one of their most distinguished citizens, civil engineer and architect Dr. Tugomir Karadzic. Karadzic agreed to help prepare a defense for the city on the condition that absolutely no violence be allowed. As an avowed pacifist, he was determined to prove that it was possible to stand up to aggression without recourse to bloodshed. The city council pushed back, insisting that at least some weapons and live ammunition were needed, if only for warning shots. Dr. Karadzic reluctantly agreed, but gave the town a warning: if he saw a single round fired in anger, he would walk away.

With that agreement in place, Karadzic oversaw a rapid fortification of the town. And while some of the fortifications, like anti-tank ditches and barricades, were very real, most were fabricated. Large numbers of broomsticks were collected and painted to resemble machine gun nests, logs were set up and staged under tarps to look like artillery pieces, and a number of fake surface to air missile sites. Karadzic, who had some experience as a telecommunications engineer, also did his best to coordinate fake signals indicating that the Voloshin area was strongly held and should be bypassed.

For the first part of the army’s operations, the ruse worked. Most of the troops were local irregulars, more interested with cleaning out unarmed civilians, and they were completely unsuited to taking fortified positions and what artillery they had was severely vulnerable to counter-battery fire. Voloshin was largely left alone as the fighters targeted positions that seemed less strongly held.

Once regular army units appeared, though, this changed. Well trained and well equipped, they demonstrated with tanks and small arms fire outside of the city, answered only by a few warning shots and pyrotechnics that Dr. Karadzic had prepared. Soon, however, one of the town guardsmen lost his nerve and fired a burst of live ammunition which hit and killed the commander of one of the lead tanks. The column retreated, but upon seeing this, Dr. Karadzic dropped his field glasses, stripped off his military tunic, and walked back to his home. The commanders of the city defense followed, begging him to reconsider, but Karadzic calmly packed a suitcase and left the city on foot that night, saying only that he was honoring the agreement and that he would return for the contents of his house if it survived.

The next day, Voloshin was subjected to a combined artillery and aerial assault, followed by a lightning advance that occupied the area in less than an hour. The town was systematically leveled, with many inhabitants winding up as refugees. As for Dr. Karadzic, he was never seen again and it is believed that he was shot making his way through army lines.

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TO: All school teachers, Sikarra Unified School District
FROM: Administrator Slav, House Sedierta, Superintendent of Sikarra Unified School District
SUBJECT: Notes and Dress Code for the 170,023-170,024 School Year

Welcome back, teachers and staff! I hope you are excited as I am for the for the 170,023-170,024 School Year. I know that the transition between the rule of House Nennokrah and House Sedierta has been difficult, but we as a school district are going to set that aside and press forward with the task of educating the children of Sikarra to the imperial standard of the Dai Teikoku. Still, we have some housekeeping to do along those lines, which I will now address.

First, you may have noticed that former Administrator Ohdha has been replaced due to his loyalty to the perfidious Duke Nannokrah. Fear not; the benevolent Baron Sedierta has elected to spare his miserable life. He will be joining the SUCD as Administrator Emeritus and Senior Janitor for 170,023-170,024.

Second, you will notice five new members of the SUSD school board. We have maintained those board members willing to swear eternal fealty to the glorious new regime of Baron Sedierta, and those who refused will be publicly executed during our first assembly of the new school year. Remember, the assembly is also a pep rally, so wear your school colors! There is also a sympathy card available to sign in the district office, should you be so moved.

Finally, you will note that the curriculum has been restored to House Sedierta standards, as have the standardized tests. We understand that this will make it difficult to plan lessons, but the loyalty oath you all signed in your personnel file demands it. We will be holding an optional, mandatory curriculum building workshop to help out with these issues the week before classes start. Remember, this applies to students as well, but Baron Sedierta has authorized the standard punishments to be waived during this transition period. References to the old curriculum, tests, or regime therefore will only be punishable by the Pain Box on the third offense for the first month of classes.

As far as the dress code goes, we understand that many of our rural students from the Sandy Wastes and the Arid Plateau, most of whom are eligible for free and reduced hydration rations, will not be able to afford new desert drinksuits in beautiful Sedierta feldgrau rather than vile Nannokrah beige. As such, students might miss school until they can afford to purchase new drinksuits. I remind you that this is a mandatory policy, and no exceptions will be allowed. Any students appearing in drinksuits of Nannokrah beige will be punished via Pain Box.

Some of our faculty have noted that school attendance is mandatory under penalty of Pain Box under House Sedierta law. This is true; any students caught shirking school will be severely punished. I find no contradictions here; indeed, the specter of thorough and frequent Pain Boxing may move our more rural students to find themselves properly colored drinksuits all the quicker.

Looking forward to a fun and educational year with a minimum of public executions for all of you! Remember, my door is always open if you need anything, but interrupting a meeting with the benevolent Baron Sedierta will be met with flogging. Go Dustslugs!

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“William ‘Soddy’ Soderburgh and Mary Daisy Davis, died November 1, 1971 in a crash involving a Plymouth Road Runner and a Mack diesel semi-truck at the intersection of Darkhollow Rd. and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard,” said Margaret “Peggy” McGinty, the best paranormal counselor in the Office of Occult Affairs. “Does that aound about right?”

The spectral form of Soddy, perched in a chair in front of her, shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.”

“I go by Daisy,” said the other phantasm, ‘seated’ beside him even though she floated idly a few inches above the seat.

“Of course, Daisy,” said Peggy. “So. Why did you decide to wait until now to begin driving down the road in a wailing, spectral parody of the grim night that resulted in both your deaths?”

“Huh?” said Soddy.

“What?” said Daisy.

“Why did you wait 50 years to start haunting the road where you died,” said Peggy.

“Oh. Well, we had to do some time in purgatory first.”

“Got out early for good behavior,” Daisy chimed in.

“Yeah. And, well, there’s lots of other deadies on Darkhollow road, so we wanted to stand out, right?”

“Go on,” said Peggy.

“Well, the semi truck driver that creamed us, Dale, he just died not too long ago. Fell asleep at the wheel and wrapped his cab around an oak.”

“Super nice guy,” Daisy said. “Did not deserve that, but he lost his retirement in the subprime mortgage crisis and he was still driving at 70.”

“So we figured we’d get Dale in on the action, you know? A spectral big rig chasing us is sure to make us stand out from the others, dig?”

“My witness didn’t see any truck,” Peggy said.

“Right, right,” Soddy said. “Well, you know, Dale’s got to do his time as well. Then he’s got to get the cab, easier said than done. We figure he’ll be ready in five, maybe six years.”

“Good guy, a saint really, those two crashes are the worst things he ever did,” Daisy said.”

“So we thought we’d practice a bit, yeah? Without him?” Soddy shrugged. “What’s the big deal?”

“Oh, nothing that we can’t banish to Limbo for all eternity,” Peggy said darkly. “Unless you’re willing to make a deal, that is.”

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“Why do the kids insist on messing around on Darkhollow Road?” Sanderson Lee, University Vice-Chancellor for Occult Affairs, moaned.

“I know, Sandy, I know.” Margaret “Peggy” MacGinty, the most experienced paranormal councilor under Occult Affairs, replied. “But that’s in the past, and we have to look toward the future. Tell me who it was and what they saw.”

“Right, right.” Lee pulled up the file on his computer. “Police report with UPD filed at 1:47AM last night. Reporter is one Madison Reeve, a second-year pledge out of Digamma Theta Mu. She says she was, and I’m quoting here, ‘chased by a screaming ghost car.’”

“Did she get the make and model of the car?” said Peggy.

Lee gave her an arched-eyebrow glare. “Surely you’re joking.”

“Lee, this is why you’re an administrator and I’m a councilor. If it’s a 1924 Maxwell phaeton, then it’s the restless spirit of J. S. Weatherford and his cronies, who ran off the road and wrapped around an oak in ’26. If it’s a 1960 DeSoto Firedome, then it’s Richard ‘Dick’ Bottoms and his three lovers, who went into Darkhollow Gorge one after the other. Do I need to go on?”

“Okay, okay, I’ll have UPD ask her. How soon can you be onsite? You could ask yourself.”

“I have a lunch appointment with the biology major from Kyoto that accidentally brought a malevolent oni from the Kajurasama Shrine in Osaka,” Peggy said. “I can’t reschedule it because I need Nakamura-san from Modern Languages to translate for me.”

“This afternoon, maybe? Say, 2 or 3?”

“We’ll say 2:30,” Peggy replied. “And we’ll say that you owe me big, and figure out what exact form that takes when we have a moment to breathe, hmm?”

“Of course, of course,” said Lee.

“You’ll notice I didn’t ask why the hurry,” Peggy added as she moved toward the door. “I’m assuming we have another donor’s daughter?”

“Trustee’s stepdaughter,” Lee sighed. “And a transfer student to boot.”

“I’ll see you at 2:30,” Peggy said with a sweet smile. “It’ll cost you.”

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