Here is a sample previewing the opening chapters of the 5,700 word short story titled Firing Henry. This cautionary tale takes place at a far distant point in a dystopian future long after the events of The Golden Ellipse have unfolded. I hope you enjoy this sample. Scroll down for links to download the full short story.
Watson’s ten-year milestone in cubicle hell loomed one month to the day from his current slumped repose. Through the years, the trim, dark-haired loner had endured more of his coworkers’ cake and ice cream gatherings than he could count. So many, in fact, he could recite verbatim the canned speech his boss made before foisting crappy corporate gifts onto humiliated milestone cube-dwellers faking gratitude. Some pulled off the charade better than others, but Watson knew in his heart that feigning appreciation was not part of his DNA. He would probably lose it altogether and stab his cake fork between the boss’ beady eyes.
Watson’s mental refuge from that ignominious fate, or worse, came wrapped in a promise to himself that he would be long gone before his ten-year date. While waiting for his magic exit to manifest, he kept breakrooms full of cake-eating losers at arm’s length behind a well-groomed chestnut-brown beard and jet-black horn-rimmed glasses, like wearing a disguise.
How could he already be nearing a decade?
Day after suck-filled day, he languished in obscurity, working in a specialized division of the Kobayashi Corp., whose misanthropic mission statement read like a veiled threat: ‘Replacing humans with non-humans in every imaginable walk of life.’
His division earned its bones, informing people that their services were no longer required. Watson was aware of the paradoxical nature of his job. It helped that he did not care.
Known as ‘The Terminator,’ a nickname he despised, his bearded grim reaper reputation nevertheless preceded him when visiting factories, farming co-ops, military units, restaurant chains, even adult-oriented industries. The line of well-equipped male and female bots replicating human behaviors down to raised goosebumps at precise climactic moments proved one of Kobayashi’s best sellers. Impressive technology, to be sure, but not for him. ‘Real or no deal’ was his motto. If he prefers to sit at home alone since Deirdre passed away, that is his business.
Draining dregs from his cup, he taps the flashing button on his screen to stop the grating buzz of a new communication from his boss marked URGENT. “I wonder what the little bastard wants now?”
A high-pitched laugh from Vickie, his head-chopping neighbor, resonates over the cubicle wall, “Watson, it looks like Gates pegged you for a new field assignment. The Terminator rides again!”
“Shut up, Vickie!”
Cursing his nickname while skimming the communication, angst over his awkward cake and ice cream date fade from Watson’s frontal lobe. His prick-without-a-dick boss had ‘volunteered’ his services to travel off-world and fire an android named Henry.
His job title, Corporate Terminations Representative, entailed heartless human dismissals—from doe-eyed college grads to over-the-hill codgers clinging to relevancy—not sulking androids commandeering abandoned rigs in the vacuum of space. Those terminations were handled via a remote server by an anonymous white-coated tech whose loafers never left Mother Earth.
Watson swivels his squeaky chair from his dual monitors onto his suit-wearing pumpkin of a boss, Mr. Gates, eclipsing his cubed opening, a shit-eating grin widened across his smug face.
“Mr. Gates, I left the Space Force years ago. Can’t you get someone else?” Knowing everyone within earshot was listening, “What about Vickie? She loves outer space.”
“Nonsense, Watson, I already told my bosses you had what it takes. Now quit whining and get fitted for a suit. That’s an order!” Gates pauses with a mean look crossing his troll-like countenance, “I assume you don’t already have an enviro-suit hanging in your closet?”
“Why would I have an enviro-suit? I have not traveled off-Earth in well over a decade.”
“It’s like riding a bike, Watson. You leave in the morning. Take the rest of the day to settle your affairs. You live alone, right?”
“You know Deirdre passed from the virus over a year ago.”
“Oh, that’s right. We knew that.” Gates extends his small stubby hands and presents a new holographic iPad still in its box, reminiscent of a breakroom anniversary ceremony—only with a better gift. “This tech contains the intel you’ll need regarding the rogue Series-8 Model who refuses to self-terminate. Your job is simple, Watson. Rocket out to the space station where the motherfucker refuses to cooperate and fire him. I don’t care how you do it; just get it done!” Seeing his employee’s blank stare, Gates offers his version of a motivational speech, “Chin up, young man. This could lead to bigger and better things for you. Unless you want to spend the rest of your life firing assembly line workers and strippers.”
Wheeling his pudgy frame to head upstairs to his corner office overlooking the reimagined San Francisco skyline, “See you at the Kobayashi launchpad bright and early, 4:00 a.m. sharp!”
Halfway down the row of cubes, Gates turns, tapping his greasy temple with a stubby index finger, “I almost forgot, be sure I get that iPad back after you return; I promised it to my kid—the little fucker can’t get enough toys.”
“I’ll try not to bleed it on, sir.”
With the coast clear, Vickie pops her head over the five-foot divider like a prairie dog, her coal-black eyes shooting daggers from her tawny, heart-shaped face, “I heard you throw my name out there to Gates. Don’t volunteer me for that shit—I want to live—unlike you. That’s why he picked you for this assignment. If you read your daily briefs, you would already know this Henry Model-8 went rogue about a week ago. No one knows how or why. I hear old man Kobayashi went ape-shit when he heard the news.”
“An 8-Series thinking for itself, that could be dangerous. Is there still time to run away and join the circus?”
Vickie rests her chin on a thin arm draped atop the cube wall, gazing with a wistful look in her eyes across the gridded sea of workspaces, “I remember my mom taking me to the circus as a child. I cried when I learned the animals were all fake.”
Watson’s paranoid mind linked his delegation to the dangerous mission to an acrimonious relationship with Gates. Neither wanted to fake their way through an anniversary ceremony, but suffocating in space was not the escape he had in mind.
After dumping his workload on Vickie and settling his affairs, he prodded the egghead fitting him for an enviro-suit for any pointers on the life-preserving set of duds.
“Try not to puke in your helmet with the visor down.”
After passing a routine physical, the mission planner assigned to his trip would not vouch for his surviving the space flight, let alone the Series-8 confrontation.
“Avoid a direct physical altercation with Henry; that will end badly for you.”
The following day at 0400, Watson arrived at the Bay Area space portal in a driving rainstorm. Mr. Gates was a no-show. Good riddance. He knew the asshole could not drag himself out of bed that early in the morning. At 0445, he dons his ill-fitting suit for the first time, plods out of the ready-room with his helmet visor up, and heads toward Launch Bay 19 inside the deserted facility. A sleepy tech greets him at Bay 19 and relieves him of his metal suitcase. Tamping down an urge to turn and run like hell, he steps into the cavernous space and takes an up-close look at his ride. With its swept-back wings and tail fins, the sleek silver missile looks fast while resting atop a horizontal metal rail. A second tech directs him to the autonomous single-seat spaceship’s narrow cockpit with its bubble canopy angled open. [END OF SAMPLE]
Find out how the story ends for Watson when he confronts Henry for the first time. This story has a surprise ending not to be beleived, so I do hope you download Firing Henry on Amazon, Apple Books, or Kobo. We are working on the Nook edition for this short story and the rest of the PTB catalog. I will announce when those become available for this short story and the other short stories in the growing PTB Multiverse catalog.
