He wandered down the dirty streets of the city that had been his home for two years. Portland had been one of three US cities that had flourished during the heyday of the Quantum Combat Chassis. The scientific breakthrough that had allowed human beings to control machines in real time across great distances had been the greatest boon of the 21st century so far. It had been a godsend for a city like Portland that had rampant unemployment and a growing caste of Korean immigrants fleeing the meltdown of their nation. Many of them quite skilled and educated, they had helped turn the remote piloting industry into a bread winner. As with most things however, with a decade someone else was doing it cheaper and better and the wave moved from Portland to Texas and finally out of the United States altogether. They could do it all cheaper in the Orbitals and the Open Territories. Hamstrung by treaties and citizens leaving in droves for colonies on other planets, the nations of the world became great centers of customer service and little else.
Gault did not have a bachelor degree in physics and little actual real pilot training but his quick mind is what allowed him to become an RCP. The use of Quantum Entanglement and other theories eluded him at the best of times but he knew enough to be able to remotely pilot almost any kind of vehicle. Portland, like Houston and Atlanta, had maintained their RCP centers and leased them to corporations for everything from conflicts to space exploration. Unfortunately the latter was a seven year training program before you were allowed to even handle a satellite and the Explorer’s Union was an international and interplanetary beauty contest. They shunned the combat pilots and especially those who had been disenfranchised by the rebellion of their machine. After all if a man could not control a simple robot, how could he be trusted to fly a trillion dollar space ship? The fact that no ship or car or train or any other device other than the combat robots had gone OTR seemed to reinforce that the mercenary dregs fighting the corporate and small time wars were not real pilots at all. They were excluded as no longer necessary in a world that had sanitized many of its baser desires and left behind the chains of human oppression as it moved into the stars. Gault thought that as all total bullshit of course. There were still bar fights on the colonies and people got killed over sleeping with the wrong man’s wife. Even with pills and injections people still had sexual urges, people still hoarded items and animals, and people still got into all the same trouble in their sanitized and evolved world as they did in the lizard brain one.
“You’re just bitter.” He said out loud and noticed that his feet had carried him ten blocks down to the Nippon-town. His senses were suddenly assaulted by sights and sounds and smells that overwhelmed his bruised brain and shell-shocked psyche. He could smell the spices of the food market and he breathed them in. Nearby the soft perfume of a street walker warred with the hard edge scents of old women working in a sewing shop. Suddenly, here in this alien place he felt alive and he had no idea why.
He received a beep from his mobile and looked down at the device as he pulled it from the pocket of his worn khaki jacket. The message on his personal MDD was telling him that his belongings were in storage for thirty days, free of charge. The reason for this is that he had been evicted from his company housing. Gault had preferred the company housing over one of the high rent and low comfort private places especially because he figured he would never have to leave. Another message followed the first, telling him that his company supplied girl friend Sally was wishing him well in his new life. She would be moving on to, but he could tell that message was personalized from Sally and not some standard message. Sure she had done this a time or two but Sally had a kind heart, kind enough that he had renewed his contract with her twice during his employment. Gault felt the sinking feeling again as he realized there was so little to Cadmus Gault that a single unfortunate incident had managed to strip away most of his significance. He had skills and experience no one wanted and indeed many people loathed. He would be lucky to get a job moving freight let alone an actual Quantum controlled machine.
A final message came in informaing him that Patch, his one eyed company supplied dog had been returned to the kennel with a thank you for having paid the no-kill fee. Patch would be given to some needy family and, Gault hoped, live a long life. The tears threatened to come again and Gault bit his lip hard. He had after all more in common with Patch than with most humans. At least Patch was going into a fine retirement.
Gault looked around the street and tried to get his bearings. Vehicles motored past him and the quiet hums of electric engines seemed incongruous to the asphalt streets that been designed for their gasoline powered predecessors. Electronic and environmentally safe lighting advertised for the small businesses and few corporate superstores that lined the street. Despite coming from a nation that still thrived on corporate commercialization, Portland’s Nippon-town was anything but. Most everyone here was a small business owner or a franchise mercenary who would change his or her corporate allegiance if their needs were not met. One franchise that stood out however, was the Hibachi Burger. Gault had never been in the place or in fact to any Hibachi Burger location but he had always wanted to. The food was all real, no soy meats or fake fish. Although expensive, the franchise was popular with the meat eating crowds of those left on Earth. On many days there might even be a desultory protest by members of the Sanity movement but his luck was holding a little and he saw no holo-signs outside.
Waiting for a break in the traffic, Gault made his way across the street and to the doorstep of the Hibachi Burger. Their sign gave him the hours of operation, some standard corporate slogans and art, as well as a warning that they cooked with real everything. Peanut allergies and the lactose intolerant beware. Gault grabbed the metal handle of the glass door, opened the door, and walked inside.
Once inside and with the door closed the sunlight was replaced by bad fluorescents and a few anachronistic lamps supposedly reminiscent of Medieval Japan. An attractive hostess in a barely nothing dress escorted him to a dark corner and an equally appareled waitress took his order. On a center stage near the hibachi tables a woman in an orange cheongsam dress and white stockings sang songs from an old Anime show. Gault remembered it vaguely from his youth and wondered if he had a copy of it somewhere.
Twenty five minutes after he was seated, Gault was served two spicy tuna rolls and a real beef burger, rare and bloody. A generic Japanese beer washed it all down and Gault ordered another once he was done with the food. He relaxed in the corner, pleasantly buzzed and his appetite sated for the first time in years. Although appeased he did wish Patch was still around; he would order a burger to take him to the pooch. Patch would definitely have liked that.
Two hours after setting foot inside and only three and a half hours after losing Jersey, Camdus Gault stepped back outside into the world. He was surprised that he could even think the name of his rig considering how devastated he was. If he missed Patch, he missed Jersey that much more. It was impossible to spend so much time with a rig and put so much of yourself into it without there being some feeling of loss. Losing Jersey this way was worse than having it destroyed. After all, if it had been destroyed the corporation would be allowed to break out a new model to let him have. It was all part of the insurance. The international laws governing combat robots allowed them to be replaced on a one for one basis. However, even though Jersey was now running around loose with no human controller, it was still considered in service under international law. Gault could not be hired to pilot another combat robot or even purchase the rights to one as long as Jersey was still around. Since most of the rogue combat robots disappeared into the wilderness of whatever Third World battleground they had been fighting over, most were never seen again. In fact Gault knew of only two pilots who had been re-franchised through the destruction of their robots.
The whir of afternoon traffic assaulted his ears and Gault figured it was time to find a hotel. After all he had been up all night with Jersey, fighting over a petroleum find somewhere in India. Gault was so wasted from stress, lack of sleep, and the beer that he could not even recall where the deposit was located. Running a hand over his pale face and feeling the growing stubble, Gault turned his body south and began heading towards the row of cheap hotels that bordered Nippon-town.
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