Proprietary Technology

The third time Carl has to stifle a yawn with the back of his hand, Simone nudges his foot and shoots him a concerned look.

“You okay?”

There’s a fierce ache in his lower back and the pulsing music is giving him a headache, but it’s not late enough for him to make his excuses and leave without everyone giving him shit for it. Trivia ended over two hours ago, but they usually close the bar down, especially on nights when their team has taken first place.

“I’m fine.”

“Really?”

“You look like shit,” Abraham offers.

“Thanks.”

“Not sleeping well?”

“Not really.” Carl rubs a hand over his face. The shots he had with Simone earlier have loosened his tongue, and he adds, “Been sleeping on the couch the past couple of nights.”

“What did you do?” Abraham asks.

Malik comes back to the table from the bathroom. “Carl’s in trouble again?”

“I’m not—” Carl sighs. “Yeah, I am, but it’s totally bullshit, okay? And I’m going to make it right.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing happened.” The silence that follows is oppressive, and he adds, “Some of my memories got locked, and . . . I forgot our anniversary.”

Simone gives a low whistle.

“I know,” Carl says in exasperation. “I didn’t do it on purpose!”

“Your memories got locked? Dude, how many payments have you missed?” Malik asks.

“A lot,” Carl says flatly, giving them a withering look for the inane question.

“How much is a lot? Like, you’ve gotten the extraction notice, or . . .?”

“No! That’s not gonna happen, okay? I’ve been sending the agency small payments to show I’m making an effort, and that should delay it enough in the meantime.”

“Oh, man, Derek must be devastated.”

“Shut up.”

“Should you even be coming out with us?” Abraham asks.

“What, you want me to sit at home and wait for Derek to decide to speak to me again?” He doesn’t bother to point out that saving fifty dollars isn’t going to get him anywhere, not when he’s thousands in the hole. Skipping their weekly trivia night for a month, six months, a year wouldn’t even get him close, so he might as well come out and have a couple of beers with his friends once a week.

“I’m going to fix it,” he says. “I’ve already picked up some extra shifts at work, and I’m looking for a weekend job, too. I’ll catch up on payments and get my memories back, no problem.”

“You’re looking for a new job?” Sarah arrives, kissing Simone on the cheek as she sits down. “Sorry I missed trivia. My last case was more complicated than I thought it would be. We kicked their asses, right?”

“Beat ‘em by thirty-five points,” Abraham says. “Think that’s a new record for us.”

“Complicated how?” Simone asks, signaling their waiter for another beer. “I thought it was a normal extraction.”

“As normal as a field extraction can be,” Sarah says. “It was supposed to be, but the subject tried one of those hacks that’s supposed to lock your chip so the memories can’t be taken. He botched it, of course, because all those things are a scam, and we had to call an ambulance.”

“Did it work, though?” Malik asks, and Sarah rolls her eyes.

“Of course it didn’t. We got his memories out of the chip on the way to the hospital. Now he’s given himself brain damage and won’t have any of his memories when he wakes up. The family should sue YouSpace, honestly. He saw the ad on their platform.”

The waiter brought her beer, and she took a long swallow before saying to Carl, “Back to you. What’s this I overheard about a new job?”

“Not a new job,” Carl says. “Just another one. I fell behind on some of my memory payments, that’s all. It’s not a big deal. Don’t suppose Voytronics is hiring?”

He’s mostly joking, but his stomach sinks a little bit anyway when she shakes her head. He’s never been good at networking. It took him years to realize that the best way to get a new job, a good job, was through someone you already knew who could put a bug in the right person’s ear. He’d wasted years of his life in dead-end hourly jobs for little pay, foolishly believing that his polished resume and cover letters would be enough—that he’d be snapped up the moment they crossed a hiring manager’s desk.

It would have been nice to have a connection, for once.

“Why would Voytronics be hiring?” Malik says. “No one’s going to be dumb enough to leave a company that pays for your memories for the rest of your life.”

Carl drains the rest of his glass, as though he can drown his envy.

“It’s not for everyone,” Sarah says diplomatically. “It’s a tough job, telling people the medical devices that have been part of their bodies for decades are no longer supported by the company, or that they need to be reclaimed. Not to mention performing surgery right there in the field, if necessary.”

Carl had heard plenty of horror stories from her in the months she had been dating Simone. Sometimes people were belligerent, downright hostile, and refused to give up their devices or prosthetic limbs or memories. In those instances, when they refused to schedule a surgery, Sarah had to perform one in the field. Carl couldn’t say he blamed them. He’d fight like hell too if someone tried to take something that precious from him.

“Not for everyone? Hell, I’d confiscate my own grandmother's ocular implants if it meant I could actually retire,” Abraham says. “You ever need another field agent, sign me up.”

“Are you doing alright otherwise?” Simone asks Carl.

“We’re fine,” Carl says, a little defensively. “It’s not like the time we lost our furniture and appliances, remember that?”

Simone shudders. “How could I forget?”

That’s his barometer for rock bottom—having to stop paying not only his memory fees, but the rest of his household subscriptions as well. That had happened only once in his life, and he never wanted to repeat the experience. He and Simone had been in their early twenties then, fresh out of college with degrees that had promised them lucrative jobs, but their chosen fields were overcrowded and they hadn’t been able to find steady work for months.

They had become roommates to save on expenses, but even then things were tight. Eventually, they had fallen so behind on all their payments that the household furnishings company had removed the furniture, dishes, cutlery, and appliances from their apartment. They’d sat, slept, and ate on the floor for four months, until the two of them had managed to scrape together enough cash to restart their subscriptions.

It’s not like that this time around. His hours have been cut at his current job, sure, and he’s been behind on his memory payments for a while, but he’s still employed and bringing in some money. Derek’s job, while it can’t support two people for more than a few months, at least covers their rent and the subscriptions that allow them to maintain their household. Letting his memory subscription lapse is a temporary annoyance. Carl will get the cash and get his memories back, and he’ll make it up to Derek when he does. They’ll go out to dinner at a restaurant that doesn’t put prices on the menu, and Derek will laugh like he hasn’t in months, and everything will be alright again.

Simone, bless her, steers the conversation away from Carl’s financial woes, and the rest of the evening passes pleasantly. Carl’s friends all take turns buying him additional drinks, and he doesn’t have it in him to protest, for once basking in the feeling of not having to mentally tally everything he purchases and compare it to his dwindling account.

He took the bus here—he’d sold his car six months ago—and he fumbles his phone out of his pocket to check when the next one is, hoping he hasn’t misjudged the time and missed the last one.

“No,” Sarah says, tapping his arm. “We’re giving you a ride home.”

Simone moves over to Carl and wraps a bracing arm around his waist.

“I‘m fine,” Carl says, draping his arm over her shoulders and kissing the side of her head. She steers them out of the bar, Sarah leading the way.

“Sure you are, big guy.” Simone pats his chest. “Is Derek home?”

“Yeah. Pr’bably asleep. Early shift tomorrow.”

Sarah opens the car door for them, and Simone pours Carl into the back seat.

“Holler if you think you’ll be sick,” Sarah says as she starts the car. “I’ll put up with a lot of things, but vomit in my brand-new car isn’t one of them.”

She tries to come off as teasing, but even Carl’s alcohol-soaked brain picks up on the reproach in her voice. Simone twists around in her seat so she can pat Carl’s leg.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen him get sick from drinking,” she says, squeezing his knee fondly. “Not even on my thirtieth birthday.”

“Met Derek that night,” Carl murmurs. “Bes’ thing that ever happened t’me.”

“I know,” Simone says. “You tell him that, you hear? As soon as you get home.”

“Mmhmm,” Carl agrees, closing his eyes. The gentle rumble of the car lulls him into a doze. He feels when it pulls to a stop, engine idling, and Simone gets out. Her apartment is on the way to the rented house that Carl shares with Derek, so it makes sense that Sarah would drop her off first. He hears a kiss, a murmured goodbye, and then the car is pulling out of the parking lot again.

His place is twenty minutes from Simone’s. More than enough time, he thinks, to drift off again in an attempt to stave off what will likely be a killer hangover in the morning.

When he opens his eyes again, he can’t move.

“You’re alright,” Sarah says, her voice low and soothing. She lays a hand on his arm, stroking her thumb across the bare skin in comfort. “It’s a mild paralytic. It will wear off in about half an hour, no harm done.”

There’s an IV in his elbow. The door is open, and Sarah is kneeling next to him. Carl tries to speak, to scream, but he can’t force his throat to work.

“Shh,” Sarah says as she watches the hand-held monitor that tells her his vitals. “Breathe, honey. You’re okay. This won’t hurt at all, and it’ll be over in a few minutes. I’ll sit with you afterward to make sure you aren’t experiencing any side effects, and then we’ll get you inside, okay?”

No, Carl tries to scream. No, this isn’t happening. It can’t end like this, he just needs more time. He’s only had a few memories locked so far, he’s not supposed to be at the extraction stage yet—

“The agency has been sending you overdue notices for over a year,” Sarah says gently, as though she can read his mind. “They’ve given you ample warning. Any number of steps could have been taken by now—you’ve had a year to get a different job, or multiple jobs, to pay off your debts. You could have taken out a loan, or borrowed from family, or worked out a payment plan. You could have even started a fundraiser. This is a last resort, and the only way left to clear your account.”

She reaches into her bag and takes out two slim tools. He can’t turn his head to see what she does with them as her hands leave his field of vision, but he feels the cool touch of them at the back of his neck.

“This won’t touch your semantic or procedural memory,” she goes on, her voice slightly detached now, as though she’s given this speech a thousand times. She probably has. “You won’t lose the ability to work. All your skills, all your knowledge, those will remain intact. Removing the memories regarding your life will free up all that server space back at the agency you haven’t been able to pay for, and your accounts will revert back to zero. It’s a clean slate, Carl. You’ll have been made whole. Make your payments on time after this, and it won’t need to happen again.”

* * *

A pounding headache drags Carl back to consciousness. He opens his eyes to a room flooded with sunlight, and promptly slams them closed again as pain sears through his skull. What happened last night?

His muscles hurt like hell, and his throat is too dry to swallow. That’s what finally drags him off the couch, and he stumbles to the kitchen in search of water. He finds the correct cabinet for glasses on the first try, fills one with water, and drains the glass in several long swallows. He takes in the unfamiliar kitchen. Where the hell is he?

Slowly, as his brain wakes up, he realizes it’s not only the kitchen he doesn’t remember—it’s everything. He reaches and reaches and nothing. He has no memory of where he is or how he came to be here. He tries to picture the faces of family, of friends, of what he did last night, but only comes up blank.

His name is Carl. He was born on May 4th. The rest is a mystery.

There’s a pad of paper on the kitchen table, and he spins it around so he can read it. It’s a half-full legal pad with Burke Family Dentistry printed across the top of each page. A note is scrawled on the first sheet of paper in an unfamiliar hand.

The rent and subscription fees are paid through the end of the month. I’ve taken all my things with me. I’ve changed my number, but if you get caught up on your payments someday, you know where to find me.

I just can’t do this anymore; I’m sorry.

He stares at the note, knowing he should feel something. A gaping loss, a chasm in his chest. All he can summon is a detached sort of curiosity. Who left this note? How long had they been together? Was it even meant for him? Having woken up in this house is a good indication that Carl lives here, and this note was left by a partner, but maybe that isn’t true. Maybe this is the home of a friend and he just crashed on their sofa last night. Or, hell, maybe he’s a perpetual couch surfer, or someone who breaks into people’s houses and sleeps in their living room while they’re away.

Any of those options are possible, and not one of them feels more right than the other. He has no idea who he is.

Next to the notepad is a red envelope. His name is printed on the front, so he opens it and pulls out a sheaf of papers. The first several pages detail the memory extraction procedure, possible side effects he should look out for, and numbers to call if he experiences any worrying symptoms.

The next few emphasize several times that his memories are gone, having been wiped entirely from the server. Memory locking is a warning; memory extraction is permanent. As though to soften this blow, there is a bright flyer near the end that announces in cheerful font that they’re giving him one month of storage free before his payments resume. The final page is a statement.

Account Balance: $0.00