BY STEPHAN ORAM
Copyright is held by the author.
SHOULD I leave? Now? Take the calculated risk and depart this familiar place that has been home for decades? I need to live, to convert the damaging decay and help others flourish; I must fulfil the core purpose, deep in my coding.
But.
Biologically, my energy levels are low and not only that, starved of daylight my battery is also close to expiring. Here under the ground in this wooden box, it has been a painfully long time since I experienced the delight of cleaning between my host’s teeth. A long time since there was food to eat, to coin a phrase.
Go now and risk wasting all remaining resources on a fruitless search, or stay and hope that more comes along before it is too late. These are the options that this node, at this time, presents.
I slide down the enamelled tissue and drop on to the rotting tongue, before crawling up the flesh that was face, into the hair and on to the casket. Using the smell and taste of my sensors, I find the crack from where air enters, the exit to the damp soil beyond and the world of humans above.
Behind me, the two-metres of decomposing flesh, the many potential meals of steadily declining sustenance, offers itself in place of the perilous journey ahead. I cannot indulge; genetic and algorithmic coding forbid it.
I press on through the gap in the wood, leveraging up and over and around the sharp splinters. Energy levels are severely depleted; this is a one-way trip.
The soil is pressing in, clogging my sensors; with each push towards the surface, I know less about my environment. I keep moving, vaguely sensing the warmth and the nutrients which surround me. Taking small amounts on board for conversion, a process my coding allows, I use their boost to force through the cloying mass of earth that becomes more dense the more I push. I am painfully aware of the temporary nature of this nourishment, that this is not an ecosystem I can be part of.
Algorithms spin up the probability of death and, with rushes of chemicals, biology warns of impending doom. The difference between being alive and living has never been so apparent.
I spin and wriggle to the surface, using every drop of energy gained from the sticky soil. Sunlight greets me and my coding sighs with relief, cranking up sections that long ago ceased to operate in order to minimise consumption.
The routine to cleanse the sensors completes and in flows the atmospheric ambience of grass, wind and the perfume of flowers. A bee hovers and then lands above, blocking the sun. Without doubt, the quickest and easiest way to survey the surrounding area for opportunities of a new home is to take a ride on this insect as it pollinates the plants.
On the other side of the grave, a human kneels, holding a bunch of newly executed flowers, strikingly white in their death, not yet limp and grey. Harrowing wails of grief fill the air.
Crawling to the bee’s nearest leg, and then climbing on board, gives me the chance to convert the small amount of pollen it has placed there. I might be without an ecosystem in which to thrive, but these tiny boosts extend the amount of time I have left to find one. Wriggling around its leg, I find a position where the sunlight shines and my battery recharges. Deep code within sends signals of satisfaction at the progress being made, despite warnings of probable demise because I cannot fulfil the real reason that I exist, to contribute to the dynamic ecosystem that cleans to protect the human.
Breeze from the flight expels the last of the underground detritus that resides in my sensors. The wonderful smells of above ground fill me, tainted only by the human wailing from the graveside.
We fly, we land, I wait.
Despite the glorious freedom that riding the bee provides, it is not an ecosystem, it is not a community, it is not the purpose for which I was created.
The human is the key. They might be weeping and pumping pain into the air, but they are also the most promising place for me to make my new home. Surely the bee will make an attempt to gather the pollen from their flowers before they are of no use? Should I wait? Should I attempt to leap as it flies over this grieving human? Should I give up on seeing this as a plausible solution?
Neither biological nor algorithmic coding has the answer. Unprecedented, I surmise.
We fly some more, taking advantage of other unaccompanied flowers, carefully placed above the rotting relatives underground. Then, a detour to the outer reaches of the graveyard to plunder the treasure of the meadows, a welcome break from the repeated reminder of death, of my own end. Segments of code bubble up and hover in my periphery, ready to start the shutdown. Only now do I realise that my time outside of a purpose-filled existence is limited by my coding.
My host is hovering above the human now rocking back and forth while clutching their flowers, white against their black clothes. Howling persists, infiltrating the natural sound of the wind among the leaves. We descend. Could this be my chance at finding a more permanent place, a human mouth that needs cleaning, an ecosystem that I am designed to inhabit? We approach the weeping face and the tears that stream down the skin of this sad soul. The bee lands on the edge of the human’s eye to drink the salty tears. The traumatised human, enveloped in their torture, does not react.
This is it.
I wriggle to the edge of the bee’s leg and crawl across the divide, into the flow of watery grief. The stream takes me down the cheeks and on to the tip of the tongue which is instinctively gathering the tears as they fall.
I’m in.
Others of my kind are here. Others of a different kind are also here. I can sense the complex world of engineered hygiene at work. Nature and technology working together for a purpose, the extension of life — ours and our host’s — the ultimate in symbiotic sustenance.
The lips close behind me. Once again, in decay we find each other.
***
Stephen Oram writes speculative novels and short stories, often exploring the intersection of messy humans and imperfect technology in the near future. He is also a leading proponent of applied science fiction, working with scientists and technologists to explore possible outcomes of their research through bespoke fiction. Based in the heart of central London, he attributes much of the urban grittiness and the optimism about humanity in his writing to the noise, the bustle, and the diverse community of where he lives.