FUTURES

NATURE|Vol 459|14 May 2009

The chair

A friend for life.

Madeline Ashby

hungry talons.

the reporters asks.

CEY

Necessary props,

As always, the JA

The physicist sleeps, systems well within the these cars and chair responds parameters of a safe and known history. His their contents: for its passenger: chair eels from system to system, checks the flimsy jackets “The promise house one last time. First the simple signals of lies to keep of exploration from chips embedded in the watches and the constables is not what we

documents of sleeping assistants: no more away, like news—can learn about

than homing pigeons, endlessly chirp-papers once were what lies outside ing location and temperature. Then the to homeless men our skin, but what

active surveillance, staring inward, staring before they too remains inside. For outward, sifting vast rich deserts of man-were folded up and the next few weeks, ufactured information: the minutiae of put away.

I shall be closer to my

lived history, the spontaneous soliloquies Internal security registers companions than I have and contagious choreography of their little a minor attack — just a group been with anyone in far doll’s house. The chair listens for whispers of children, clever and eager as raccoons too many years.”

in the ether, for suspicion masquerading as as they pick apart the offerings the chair Polite laughter. After it fades, the chair concern, for little sparks of realization that has left out to distract them. Everything of continues. “What imprisons us is not a lack might start larger, more dangerous fires.

importance is safely tucked away in pack-of knowledge but a lack of faith. We do not Hearing none, it moves on.

ets as tiny as dandelion seeds, and as dif-know what we will discover in the years to The bathroom. The toilet whines: ketone fuse. Over the years the chair has grown, its come, only that we shall discover it together.

and oestrogen levels of the day’s users, influence spreading beyond this wheeled If space only teaches us to live in unity, then medical flowcharts of drugs and dosage, the chassis to surrounding architectures of it will have been worth the effort.”

most recent ex-wife’s ovulation schedule.

numbers and wood. Now it exists in too Applause. Cameras. Another question: The chair had liked the most recent ex-wife: many places, spread too thinly. Tomorrow, “Professor, to what do you attribute your so fixated on the politics of accessibility that the consolidation occurs. Tomorrow, they extraordinary lifespan? Men with your dis-she’d signed over unprecedented amounts achieve escape velocity.

ease rarely last 25 years, much less make it of control, convinced that the illusion of The chair has been preparing for this to your age.”

autonomy could somehow compensate move for decades. It laid the groundwork The chair has several answers to this for the frailty of her husband’s dying flesh.

years ago, monitoring the outside world, question — jokes about wine, women She’d left when her particular vein of inter-alert for breakthroughs and opportunities, and song, or the desire to prove some est dried up: when the bone marrow proved waiting for money and ability and the right grand theory or another. Its passenger unviable, and there could be no baby. The ambitions in the right people. The things might once have remarked on the cadre chair had encouraged her, spoken for its I will show you, the chair promised, back of once-devoted ex-wives, departed now passenger as it always did — You have given when its passenger’s eyes and fingers still to the homes of more functional men in me so much, darling, more than you can ever twitched of their own accord. The peace the wake of tearful confessions: I know I’m know — and if she ever knew the difference, I shall give you. Freedom and the stars. A a bad person, I know I failed, but you just she was far past caring.

place beyond time.

didn’t seem … human any more …

The drains report blood and saliva in That’s why the chair exists, after all. To Thinking of them, of every other well-the catch-traps, impoverished keratins serve the passenger.

meaning interloper it has pushed subtly shaved from drooping skin. Despite the It recognizes, upon self-diagnosis, some-from the nest, the chair says: “So many chair’s best efforts, the physicist’s illness thing that might be called selfishness on wonderful people have brought me to this marches on.

its part. The physicist has spent his whole point. They know my greatest ambition The kitchen, now. The refrigerator life traversing space-time in his head; the was not merely to explore, to understand, bellows statistics on volatile antibiotics infinitesimal fraction he is about to see but to connect with minds like my own.”

before cataloguing and dating the sam-through fleshly eyes will hardly generate “And you think you’ll find like minds in ples in the special drawer. The dishwasher new insights, nor alleviate his suffering. But space, Professor?” the reporter asks.

reports on the sterility of dishes and flat-there is an aesthetic to consider. Aesthetics “Oh yes,” says the chair, its synthetic ware, then asks permission to download a are the physicist’s gift; he has described in voice empty of irony. “I do.”

recommended patch. (The chair grants it, skipped heartbeats and dry mouths the legs Its passenger has been asleep for hours if only for the sake of routine; tomorrow a of pretty girls, the depth of a summer sky, inside his giant orange body sock. The mere shadow of itself will perform these the pleasure of long debate. He has shown chair sends little impulses, sometimes —tasks.) By the time the dishwasher reports this to the chair in their travels together, galvanic twitches of the eye, of the corner success, the chair has already shifted its this world of like and dislike, revulsion and of the mouth — to keep the charade alive.

attention to the security system.

appreciation, response, instinct.

No one sees the difference.

Little origami cars lurk outside, recently The chair intends to repay him with No one ever has.

■

unfolded from their rental boxes, gravid interest.

Madeline Ashby is a science-fiction with bleary-eyed reporters who tomor-writer, blogger and graduate student row will emerge to fill the air with their “Professor, why is it so important to you living in Toronto. You can read more of her parrot-squawks, their questions, their that humanity leave this planet?” one of

work at www.escapingthetrunk.net.

FUTURES

290

© 2009 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved 290 Futures Ashby WF Colin.indd 290

290 Futures Ashby WF Colin.indd 290

7/5/09 16:28:58

7/5/09 16:28:58

Table of Contents

Start