Expiration Day (36 page)

“Mr. Fuller, I'd like you to tell the court about Tania's interactions with your daughter.”

“Siân was our daughter, or at least, she was our foster daughter. We were lucky—I don't know how these things work, but we were chosen to foster Siân. And now Siân is a Mother, we understand, and her own children will be fostered, so it's turned full circle.

“Anyway, she and Tania became friends, which rather surprised us. The adoption people warned us that human children were rather more perceptive about these things than adults were. They tended to ignore robot playmates, and would be quite solitary in their play, unless they spotted another human child.

“So we were surprised, as I said, but we readily accepted the situation and let the two of them meet up to play from time to time. It all became rather more definite after they started going to Lady Maud's—their secondary school—and going shopping together. They started a band, as well.”

“Didn't that strike you as odd?”

“Well, it did. I mean, we knew Tania was a robot—after her accident at the Tower of London there really wasn't any doubt about that. But she wasn't like the other robots in the village. Nor were the other band members—John and Kieran. We got it sorted out in the end, who was a robot and who was human, but you wouldn't know it from seeing the four of them together. It was only when they paired off—Siân with Kieran, and John with Tania—that you started to see a real differentiation between robot and human, and even then you still might walk into a room and catch John and Tania petting.”

Er, thanks, Mr. Fuller!

Dad was grinning, too. I felt my face go hot, too. And, dammit, Mr. Simpson is looking right at me, too. Dad—you planned this!

“So, Mr. Fuller, was that the extent of Siân's involvement with Tania? Playmate, bandmate…”

“No, there was more. She was a confidante and a friend. Siân got herself a role in a play,
The Merchant of Venice.
She played Portia, in a piece of egregious miscasting. But Tania helped her a lot. She had an innate grasp of the actor's craft, and taught Siân a lot. At the risk of overstating the obvious, we had a robot coaching a human how to act.

“And then, when she was taken from us, shortly after that, Tania stayed in touch. She visited from time to time, helped us through the loss and shared some memories of her that were new to us. I should say there was a certain amount of anti-robot prejudice in the village, directed at Tania. She regarded us as friends and our home as a refuge.”

I did indeed. And found myself nodding. If Mr. Simpson is looking, I'm not putting this on.

“Thank you, Mr. Fuller. Any questions, Mr. Lloyd?”

“Yes. Just for the record, Mr. Fuller, did you and your wife receive stress counseling from Reverend Deeley when your daughter was taken away to become a Mother?”

“Yes, we did. It was an awful time. We're very grateful to Michael for his support. There are many in the parish like us who feel the same way.”

“No further questions, Mr. Fuller.”

Then we had a testimony from Mrs. Philpott, my English teacher. My poetry, about which she was fulsome.

“Would you like to read us a sample of her work, Mrs. Philpott?”

“I'd love to, Reverend Deeley, but my eyesight was never good at the best of times—the girls used to hide my books and whatnot. Do you think the court would mind if Tania read some of her own work? She reads so well.”

The court was skewered by a dear, shortsighted old lady. Even Mr. Lloyd accepted with a certain grace. My Dad is a genius.

So I stood—hardly Portia in eloquent prosecution—but I spoke.

“When Mum died, she wrote me a beautiful letter, mother to daughter. She urged me to live each moment to the full, and to fight for each successive moment. That's how she lived, and I wanted to honor both her love for her family and her fighting spirit. These are the words I finally found. They are mine alone, for her alone.”

Though, mother mine, your final breath

Soon marks your passing unto death

Yet hands that healed and heart that beat

With love, unstilled, still fight defeat

As falt'ring strength drives feebling brain

As brittling body fails 'neath strain

As heart, once iron, turns to rust

As straining lung now chokes on dust

You gaze with dimming eye on kin

Who would sustain you, and begin

Hope gone, all pow'r spent, deep in debt

To fade, to sink, to fin'lly let

The cloak of dark enfold your frame

And seas of night erase your name

Writ, once, in stone; scraped now in sand

By fingers weak, enfeebled hand

Reach down and let your anger find

A final erg to stoke your mind

To cling with weak'ning grasp to life

Yet daughter's mother, husband's wife

Rest, mother mine, your final breath

Has marked your passing unto death

And hands that healed and heart that beat

At last, choice gone, concede defeat

Dad? Dad? Are you okay? He's looking at me, but also not looking at me; somewhere else, beyond the courtroom. A whisper, for me alone, “Thank you, Tania, from both of us.” He is back.

“And this is something I wrote a couple of years back. Since Mr. Fuller has already told you about me and John, I imagine it's pretty obvious what inspired it.”

Gentle me, love, but gentler yet

Thy touch be coarse, I'll fly away

Thy finger's tip to bless my cheek

Doth drag and scour, I seek

A softer brush with thee

Thy lips to mine, is love defin'd

If busses crash, and grind?

Be gentler yet to me

Thy breath, though thou dost sleep and meet

Me in thy turns, dwells sweet

Upon my neck and me

Thou gentle love, and gentler yet

Soft touch hast found, I'll not away

And Miss James … who introduced a clip of
The Merchant of Venice
. The one that Mrs. Golightly had tried to block.

And Donald Michael Koczinski … aka Mike Clip of the Stands. “Yeah, there's not a lot of live music around. Some kids still want to listen to it, but where are the bands? Music industry's dead, 'cause nobody's creatin' new music anymore. Best you'll get is cover bands, doin' Abba to ZZ Top an' everythin' in between.

“But Tania's band, they were different. Like the old days. They were writin' their own stuff—mostly John, but Tania wrote stuff, too.”

“And Tania played with your band, too, didn't she?”

“Yeah. When Amanda, our bassist, fell ill, she depped for her. And when Amanda died, there was no discussion needed—Tania was our first and only choice for bass player.”

“What was she like, on stage?”

“I wish I could show you a vid of her. She'd blow your socks off. Like I always said, she could play bass fit to make a stone cry. The boys liked her a lot.”

“The boys?”

“Gus and Gary. The other band members. She could read what they were doing, and adapt her bass to work around it, if one of them decided to stretch out a little, do something different, a bit jazzy … But since you ask, the boys in the audience liked her, too, because she was good to look at, too. She knew how to flirt from behind a bass.”

“Did you know she was a teknoid?”

“Kinda funny, we did and we didn't. I mean, she didn't have glowing eyes, but you knew there weren't many humans 'round. But if you know your music history, musicians have long been pretty cool about a man's skin—what color it is and what it's made of. She had a lot of trouble with her fingers, at one point, 'cause the skin wasn't designed for playin' bass. Then she got herself fixed up with the new skin she's wearin' now, and that seemed to fix the problem. Looks good, too, if you don't mind me sayin'. But yeah, we didn't worry too much about what was under the skin, because she could play bass alongside the best.”

And Ted … Yes, Ted. Ted Hinchliffe, the churchwarden.

Dad explained it to me thus. A man's friends may never speak ill of him, but if an enemy praises him, then they can surely be believed. We don't need people who only love you. Someone who hates you for the right reasons can be just as eloquent.

“You didn't get on well with Tania, did you, Ted?”

“No, not always. I tried to respect her, as she was your daughter, but she could be difficult.”

“For example?”

“Most of the trouble was around her, ah, revisions, when she would tend to flaunt her new body, somewhat. At Mrs. Deeley's funeral, for example, I thought it quite poor taste that she should talk so much about herself, being a robot, and getting a new body, with Mrs. Deeley lying dead in her coffin just a few feet away. I suppose one should make allowances about robots not really knowing how things are done.”

“Or indeed any young person attending a funeral, particularly of someone so close.”

“Possibly so.”

“And was Tania better or worse than the other teknoids in the village?”

“Oh, worse, I should say. I think after she discovered her robotic nature she became quite morose. I much preferred her prior to that point, when she was to all appearances a slightly snobby and precocious little girl.”

“Though you knew otherwise, didn't you?”

“Yes. Of course. You were very candid on this point, Michael, and that is as it should be for someone in your position. A vicar carrying on a deception would not be a good role model for the parish.”

“You called her snobby and precocious—are these normal traits for a teknoid? Ah … in your opinion…”

(I think Dad spotted Mr. Lloyd about to make an objection.)

“No, they're not. Most robots are more
average
in their behavior. They don't stand out.”

“They know their place.”

“Exactly.”

“Thank you, Ted, for your candor. For the record, are you and Tania reconciled? Are you friends?”

“I think it is truer to say we have learned to avoid each other, and to observe a modicum of politeness in each other's company. Out of respect for you, and for the sake of both our friendship and our working relationship. I may not like her, Michael, but I understand that since Mrs. Deeley died, you've had no one else but her that you could call family. I know she means the world to you, whatever she is, and if she's the price we have to pay to keep you functioning in the parish, then I think that Oxted should drop this damn lawsuit and let you get back to doing your job. Er, if you'll excuse my French, Mr. Simpson.”

“Thank you, Ted. Any questions, Mr. Lloyd?”

“Indeed, Mr. Hinchliffe. Were there any other instances when Tania flaunted her robotic nature?”

Ted paused, and Mr. Lloyd pushed.

“You mentioned her revisions…”

“Ah, yes. There was one time, a couple of years back. A particularly obnoxious incident. I'm afraid we had a real falling out over it. But we apologized to each other, and put it behind us.”

“I'd like you to tell us a bit more about that incident, Mr. Hinchliffe. We've heard a lot about Tania's nature that has tried to blur the issue of whether she is a teknoid or in some way human, and I think you might be able to help the court here. Does Tania think of herself as human, or does she know and accept that she is a teknoid?”

“I'm not sure what you mean, Mr. Lloyd.”

“Don't avoid the question. I believe you recorded the conversation, and played it to a number of people, because your relations with the teknoid were particularly poor at the time, and you ran a bit of a hate campaign against her. To help you, the date was August 31, 2053, and you were recording because you'd come to visit Reverend Deeley on a professional matter, and you always record such meetings, and you switch your recorder on before you arrive, as you sometimes forget if you leave it till the meeting starts.”

Poor Ted, he didn't know where to look. Here was proof of his treachery being brought to light in front of Dad. He crumbled.

And so Mr. Lloyd played his own copy, obtained, I guess, from Mrs. Golightly. But there was no doubt about its authenticity—Ted's anguish confirmed it—as my voice boomed out from the speakers. The whole, embarrassing, damning conversation, with my stupid, put-on dalek voice, but those two sentences in particular:

“Oh, I'm so glad I'm a robot…”

and …

“Sometimes I need to speak the truth. I
am
a robot, and that's not always something to be ashamed of.”

And underneath it all, Ted's broken and sobbing apologies, while Dad held him tight in a forgiving embrace, as Christ held Peter.

 

 

There were no more witnesses after that, and no need for that ghastly revelation and humiliation of Ted in my opinion. Dad was not trying to prove me human, and that imbecile Lloyd should have known it.

Mr. Simpson conferred with Dad and Mr. Lloyd. Mr. Guest hung around, but no one was paying any attention to him. It was agreed we'd take a fifteen-minute recess and then Dad and Mr. Lloyd would get to make their closing remarks.

Mr. Lloyd restated the case for Oxted. Oxted had entered into a contract with Reverend and Mrs. Deeley to provide a fosterling, for a period not exceeding eighteen years. They had provided the fosterling as required and had conducted regular tests. On discovery of the anomalous test results they had invoked the appropriate clause to get the defective teknoid returned for analysis and reprogramming.