Surrogate Orphans
Deborah was having fun with her new toy. She was the beta tester for Buzzles, the therapeutic infant surrogacy lifestyle companion. She picked a female, which she market tested as a non threatening option. She dressed it in pink. The pink dress matched her furniture in her cookie cutter shoe box condo. She grabbed the accessory soother from her bag and placed it into her companions mouth. It cooed. For a moment, Deborah forgot about how miserable she was.
She spoke in baby talk, “Whose a good girl? Whose a good girl? You are!” The baby had a realistic squinch while it pulled back the corners it’s mouth. Deborah was proud of their newest tech: chemically controllable muscle fibers. The trace electrolytes in the soother triggered a smiling response from an actuator inside the head. The voice module made giggling sounds.
Deborah had worked on getting the perfect frequency, volume and cadence to trigger her target demographics dopamine response. She knew it was a toy, it was addictive, nonetheless.
An alarm sounded on her phone. The message projected onto her oculars:
<<The Temple elevator arrives in 10 minutes>>
She took a breath, grabbed Buzzles and placed her into the chest under the coffee table, giving a command “Rest, 9 hours. Return with mood, cranky.”
She grabbed her grape flavored, sugar free Ambien from the counter. The advertisement on her Stanley finished. Today was the day that I go viral, she thought.
<<Buzzles, coming soon. Experience all the joys of starting a family without any of the hassle of the reminder of your ex husband. Remember, Fem-law doesn’t just remove the man, it also removes the memory.>>
“Silly. You always send me the ad after I’ve already bought it.” She skipped into the elevator, which played another Buzzles ad while it took her to the plaza on the 254th floor.
The plaza was Debora's favorite part of her day. The simulated waterfall in the center had Bluetooth connections to her aurals. The splash of water was calming. She wondered if water actually sounded like that. Her friend Katherine appeared through the projection, waving excitedly and smiling,
“Deborah! I hear you got to play test the tech baby today, you lucky bitch you!”
“Therapeutic infant surrogacy lifestyle companion. We can’t use the B word due to IP infringement.”
Deborah noticed that while Katherine's voice and mouth were aroused, her eyes were blank. The Botox hid the human. Kat’s eyebrows in a state of constant surprise. She looked down and saw a Stanley cup hanging off her designer carabiner. Deborah judged her quickly. She thought oculars would make for a more natural look. She put aside her nitpicking to respond,
“It’s only been a day, but it’s been the best day of my life. People are going to love it!”
“Have you given her a name yet?”
“I’ve been stumped. It’s just too hard. I don’t know.” Deborah was about to daydream about baby names when she had to find a flaw, “New cup?”
“I know, right! It’s the double size. I used two packs this morning on my perk. You couldn’t get me to react to a man right now if you paid me.” Their mouths laughed. Their eyes wide and blank, eyebrows in shock. Deborah pulled out her Huawei and streamed to Tiktok,
“This is what the average day of a senior Amazon tech” Perfect vocal fry. She panned around the area and set a jump cut to the Stanley cup, then the two of them holding their hands in a peace sign, then sipping their Stanley branded Xanax. She cut away before their eyelids became heavy enough to express fatigue. Katherine saw her face unfiltered in the preview and recoiled,
“Oh my god, the light is so bright. Our foreheads look like they have a spotlight over them. I look so old.”
“Don’t worry, I can filter that out. There.” The finished cut looked perfect. She thought “I’m 5 months younger than you, bitch you are old.” Their skin on screen was soft, blurred and overly smoothed. Katherine's tiny liver spots were wiped clean. Deborah’s wrinkles were digitally removed; only took a few screen presses.
She looked through the collection of available songs and picked the one that displayed her mood, the vibe, and perfectly matched what she was feeling to the most popular trend of the day, according to the algo. She spotted two Indian men staring at her camera at the far end of the plaza, barely visible. They were dressed in white robes with a large disk around their necks. Katherine watched and squeaked,
“Eww, men. Can you clear those too?”
“Of course I,” The lights in the plaza flickered as a loud bang shook the floor. By the time they looked up it was too late. Inside the water fountain a large chunk of concrete flew forward. Deborah felt the movement of the air as the slab flew past her. Katherine disappeared and a fireball filled the void melting the plaza. The shock wave launched Deborah back into the elevator doors. The doors closed just enough to avoid the second concussive force. Fire crawled around the opening, melting Deborah’s clothes to her body. Her Huawei shielded her cheek and left a rectangular shaped border of undamaged skin.
Deborah came to. She didn’t know how long it had been there. She was in shock and felt no pain. The Ambien flowed through her body and along with the adrenaline shielded her nerves from the trauma. The plastic from her clothes were burning down to her bones. That Indian man was walking around in the rubble, prodding the people trapped under stone and tech and smelter. Occasionally, someone would move or groan, and he would pull out a knife to stab them till they stopped.
She didn’t know what to do, so she pretended to be dead. As best she could tell, she probably was. With everything going on around her, she could only think about her child at home. She had spent over 9 months working on it, and was scared at the idea that it would be stuck under her coffee table at home, alone. It’s mother and beta tester would never be coming home. No one would ever know the joy she helped create. She snapped out of her malaise when the Indian man stood over top her. He had a Zip drive hanging around his neck that dangled over her face, like a mobile. She caught his eyes with her. They less behind them than she did hers.
He pressed his toe into the charred area around her calf and melted Louboutin. She winced. He put his dagger into her neck and twisted slightly to keep the wound open while the laceration did it’s work. In her last seconds she just thought of a name,
“Deborah Jr would have been nice.”
