Bios

The superintendent gripped tightly onto the fire extinguisher as the receptionist guided him up the stairs. When they had finally reached the presidential suite on the top floor, much of the room had already been engulfed in fire. The receptionist swept her own extinguisher back and forth as if she were vacuuming up the flames. Intense heat burned their skin, but neither paid it any mind.

It took them fifteen minutes to douse the last of the embers. Almost all of the furniture had been reduced to ash. Even Mr. Faux’s prized grand piano hadn’t been spared. The superintendent set down his extinguisher. Skin on his forearm had begun to melt away, revealing the metallic skeleton that lay beneath. Unfortunate, he thought. Repairs would be difficult.

“Have you also been injured, Rachel?” he asked the receptionist.

“Eh, just a bit,” Rachel replied. “It could’ve been worse.”

“Perhaps.” The superintendent glanced around the room. “Although, I would have preferred to have avoided this scenario as well.”

The receptionist patted him on the back. “Shit happens,” she said. “Don’t beat yourself up over it too much, John.”

“I have no purpose in doing so. Physically harming myself would disrupt productivity.”

“I didn’t mean that literally...” Rachel shook her head. She didn’t understand why Mr. Faux had programmed Johnathan to be so out-of-touch. Maybe he felt sociability was an unnecessary trait for someone working in Johnathan’s position. Or, most likely, the old man had finally lost his touch.

There were rumors that Mr. Faux, the CEO of Infinity Enterprise and the owner of the very hotel they were in, had suffered from alzheimers. Rachel had met the man only a handful of times. He rarely left his presidential suite. Johnathan was the only one on the staff that was allowed to enter his room. Normally, Rachel would have been decommissioned had the administration found out she was there.

But Mr. Faux had been long gone. Along with all of the other hotel guests.

“Rachel, would you please scan the area to discern the source of the fire?” Johnathan asked her. She nodded, activating the Command System only the hotel’s custodian had access to until he had ceased functioning. An electronic layout of the room appeared before her. The cause of the fire: an electrical outlet.

Johnathan examined the offender, prodding it with his index. It sparked at his touch. “This is a bit concerning,” he said after a moment of thoughtful silence.

“What is?” Rachel asked.

“I fear this will not be an isolated incident,” Johnathan explained. “The power coursing through the circuits is far too high for the wiring to handle. At best the hotel will experience a power outage. At worst…”

“Fire,” Rachel finished. While their bodies were able to withstand extreme temperatures, if the entire building were to burn up, it would be unlikely mean none of them would survive.

Abandoning the hotel was not an option either considered. Not only did it go against their very programming, they were physically unable to leave. They were the hotel’s property. The company had taken precautions to protect their merchandise from being stolen. The chip implanted inside their motherboards prevented them from leaving without shutting down their consciousness.

“That damned Faux!” Rachel cursed. To think that she still belonged to a man who likely was long dead by then. The years of repressed resentment she had towards him only began to fester. It certainly wasn’t normal for her model to experience such things. Johnathan knew this, they were both created in the same Infinity Enterprise factory in 2055, yet he never reported what he still considers to be a “defect”. He himself doesn’t understand why he hadn’t.

“Mr. Faux may not have been the perfect man, but I do believe he had the hotel’s interest at heart.”

“How the hell do you figure?” Rachel asked him. “We’re trapped here. Weren’t we just slaves to him? Machines that did whatever the hell he wanted us to do?”

Johnathan turned to look at her. “Do you truly believe freedom is attainable for anyone?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?” she asked coldly.

He pointed out the transparent door that led out onto the private balcony. From their floor, they could see the expanse of New York City. There was no one walking the streets, no cars blaring their horns in endless traffic. The once grey skies that were choked with air pollution now glowed a bright blue in the summer sun.

“Mr. Faux often told me that humans were simple creatures,” Johnathan said. “He said that they fooled themselves into believing they had power. Where are they now?”

Probably dead, Rachel thought. The mysterious virus that ravaged through the city three years ago had claimed the lives of humans from all walks of life. Old, young. Rich, poor. Black, white. It was indiscriminate. Even Mr. Faux himself had succumbed to it despite all of the political power that he held.

If he had met such an untimely end, what hope did she have? And as far as she knew, she was the only one of her kind who had yearned for independence. To be something more than a receptionist.

“I am not saying that the human race has gone extinct,” Johnathan said. “But the possibility of them retaining what they once had is slim.”

“If that’s the case, what are we still doing here in this hotel?” Rachel asked. “We might not have a reason to leave, but do we have one for staying?”

The question surprised him. It certainly was paradoxical. With the humans gone, they truly had no obligation to remain at the Marriott Hotel. Was it simply out of sheer habit? No. It was something more, but he could not place his finger on it.

Almost as if the universe were preventing him from dwelling on such a question, an object on the mantelpiece fell to the floor and shattered noisily. Rachel picked it up.

“What the hell is this?” she asked Johnathan.

He absently turned the item over in his hand. “It’s a radio,” he said. He had seen Mr. Faux fiddle with the item on multiple occasions, but he never quite understood why he owned such a thing given how outdated the technology was. And Mr. Faux didn’t seem like the type of person who was an antique collector.

“Think you can get it working?” Rachel asked him.

“Why the sudden interest?”

“I feel it might offer me some closure… learning a bit about Mr. Faux,” she answered.

He nodded. Perhaps that may be for the best. Besides, neither of them had any hope to

Since the elevators had ceased to work, they both climbed back down toe flight of stairs to the supply room on the first floor. Johnathan combed through the drawers until he found all of the necessary tools to fix the device. After an hour or so of this, it hissed back to life once he tapped the power button.

Rachel took the radio from him and immediately fiddled with the dial. He noticed something odd about the way her hand shook. Had it been from the injury she sustained from the fire? He would have to examine her later.

Rachel looked up at Johnathan, her face unusually pensive. “Say, what was Mr. Faux like, exactly? You know, since you used to talk to him and all.”

“He was very self-absorbed,” Johnathan said. “However, near the end of his life, his personality changed rather suddenly.”

“How so?” Rachel asked.

“He seemed content. He no longer shouted at those he ordered about. I suppose you could say that he was… nicer?”

They both sat in silence for a moment, listening to the oppressive white noise leaking from the radio. It may have been the first time either of them had such a lengthy conversation with one another. Johnathan was about to point this out when Rachel clutched at her arm. Dark tendrils snaked up where her artificial veins should have been.

“Are you all right?” Johnathan asked.

“...I think so.”

He grabbed her wrist and examined her. It appeared to be the early onset of Shutdown Syndrome. The machinery inside her was failing to supply the organic part of her body with necessary nutrients. Unfortunately, there was no way for them to treat it with their current supplies.

“How long have you been like this?” he asked.

“A few days,” she replied.

“That is why you wished to leave…”

She said nothing but nodded solemnly. Johnathan was at a loss of what to do. It seemed as if he were experiencing Mr. Faux’s death all over again.

“Why did you not tell me?” he asked.

“If I had, would there have been anything you could have done?”

No. No there wasn’t. Or so that’s what he initially had thought. Johnathan glanced over at the materials strewn haphazardly on the shelves. They weren’t ideal instruments, but they were sufficient enough for the task.

“I will remove your chip,” he said.

“You mean--”

“Yes. Your chances of survival--while slim--are best if you left the hotel. Mr. Faux’s laboratory is just across the river. You should be able to find the material needed to treat your ailment.”

Her face seemed to express a range of emotions, none of which he could easily discern. Relief? Anxiousness? In either case, removing the chip was no easy task, and there were severe complications if done incorrectly. However, Mr. Faux had taught Johnathan enough about their biology to be able to conduct such a procedure, even in the most dire of circumstances. If anyone had any chance of success, it would be him.

He grabbed the tools he had stored in the far corner of the supply room, then pulled up a chair for her to sit on. She closed her eyes as he carefully opened the panel on her right temple.

“Can I ask you a question, John?” Rachel kept her head straight as he worked on her in silence. “If you had the choice to do something else, what would you do?”

“Career-wise? I would hardly have the capability to do anything else.”

“Obviously. I meant if you did, what would you want?”

He thought for a moment, but nothing struck him as appealing. He never even considered whether his current occupation gave him much joy either. The time he spent with Mr. Faux, at least, wasn’t displeasing. “I would still prefer this job,” he finally said.

“Such a boring answer.” Rachel smirked at him, but he had been too engrossed with the task at hand to notice.

“Then what would you want?” he asked. “It is hard to believe you enjoy being a receptionist.”

That wasn’t far from the truth, but her somber expression betrayed her. “It’s not as if I hated it,” she began. “I took my work seriously. It was always interesting to see so many different people from all over the world come and check into the hotel.”

Johnathan couldn’t understand the contrast between her slight smile and the cold inflection of her voice. “So you would prefer the occupation you had been assigned as well?”

“No. While I was fond of what I did, I can’t help but wonder how many of the people I had met have died. Those parents who traveled here from Europe with their three daughters, the old man from Wisconsin who always seemed drunk but had been surprisingly sweet, the college student who was attending a comic convention with his younger sister.”

“I didn’t know any of these people personally,” she continued, “but it hurts to think about them.”

“I was unaware that had been troubling you.” Johnathan said softly. For some odd reason, he felt as if he shared Rachel’s worries. He began to wonder whether he would actually have favored being assigned as a receptionist.

Noticing his hands had stopped, Rachel gave him a sideways grin to ease the mood. “I’m sorry. I must be distracting you with these weird questions. I’m just a little nervous.”

“No, not at all.” In fact, he thought, he seemed to have a better understanding of why he detested the sight of the empty lobby. Shaking from his melancholy, he continued about removing the chip from Rachel’s circuits.

The entire process took almost an hour to complete. After rewiring the last of her circuitry, Johnathan closed the panel and let out a deep sigh.

“I hope you find your destination safely, Rachel,” he said. He sounded almost disappointed to see her leave.

She stood up. “Say… why don’t you come with me?”

The thought had certainly crossed his mind during their discussion earlier, but he shook his head. “I still have the chip, remember?”

“Oh. Right. I’m sorry.”

“No need to apologize. I haven’t much need to leave anyway.” The lie spilled from his lips a little too easily.

“Thanks. For everything.” She smiled sweetly at him. With that final, parting gesture, Rachel exited the room. It was the last time Johnathan would ever see her.

It had been almost three days since she had left the hotel.

The power had finally shut off. It was the best scenario he could have hoped for, but a part of him couldn’t help but feel despondent. Much of the discussion he had with Rachel still weighed on him. What was he still doing at the hotel? Should he have attempted to leave with her after all? And what of the staff? Should he have convinced them as well?

The old radio he had helped Rachel fix sat at her desk. He had developed the habit of momentarily abandoning his work to search for a signal. It offered him some relief from the mundane routine he used to enjoy.

A man’s voice sounded over the white noise of the radio. Johnathan was momentarily startled, as if what he was hearing must have been his imagination. He leaned in closer to hear what was being said, though much of it was a garbled mess.

“Entering local airspace… ETA five minutes… preparations for NH-1 are complete… confirming authorization for drop...”

Johnathan couldn’t understand what this pilot was receiving authorization for. In fact, in the three years since the humans had left, not once had he heard an airplane fly over the hotel. Perhaps it meant that people had finally chosen to return. He turned the dial again, a part of him wishing that were the case.

“Authorization confirmed. Blast radius estimated to be eight kilometers. Turbulence is expected to be mildly affected. Over.”

And then the air was filled with white noise once more. Johnathan shut off the radio. The mixture of the sensations he’d been feeling the past few days exploded through his body. He finally understood what it was. He looked out the window of the front entrance. Clouds littered the sky, making it difficult to catch any glimpse of the fast approaching bomber plane.

Perhaps Rachel had made it out of the city. Perhaps she was able to find the life she had been searching for. That possibility alone brought him some comfort in the face of destruction.

He closed his eyes. Five minutes, the pilot had said. Five minutes.