Chapter 49
The floor is quiet, only a handful of people in early for the weekend push. Lights are half-up, coffee machine humming. Tom is at his station, coat still on, scrolling logs.
I walk in feeling like I barely slept, moving on autopilot.
Feels like a lifetime away since I was a kid and looked forward to Saturday’s.
“Morning Tom,” I call out.
Without looking up, Tom mumbles a greeting. “Man, this was supposed to be my day off. Kid’s got a tournament today. Coach texted me last night, said if I miss another one, he’s benching my boy for ‘lack of parental support.’”
I drop my bag on my workstation.
“No such thing as a day off right now. Not till May 5th.”
Tom sighs, spinning his chair.
“Tell me about it. But damn, my son’s been killing it this season. Scored two goals last game, assist on the third. Kid’s got this nasty left foot curl now. You should see him fake out defenders, like they’re standing still.”
Smiling tiredly, I boot up my terminal.
“Sounds like a beast. But then again I don't know zilch about soccer.”
I wouldn’t know a left foot curl from a penalty kick.
Tom laughs. “You serious? Never played?”
“Basketball growing up.”
“Yeah with your tall ass.”
“Even then I wasn't really super into it. Soccer was never my thing.”
“Don't feel bad,” Sarah cuts in, giving me a small conciliatory smile. “I don't know anything about soccer either.”
Grinning, Tom shakes his head. “That’s cold. Well, when this launch crap calms down, you gotta come watch a game. Kids’ team is fun. Parents bring beer, everybody yells. Good stress relief.”
I nod, already deep in the logs. “Yeah… maybe. The last thing on my mind right now. But you never know. I'm just trying to keep all this together and it feels like it's falling apart right from under us.”
“Speaking of…” Tom whispers, leaning over. “Which log set are we rerunning today? The one where it froze mid-fold?”
Exhaling, I answer Tom as my eyes find the file: ClutterDrift_TestRun_2059-04-04_14-22-07
“Yeah. Clutter drift’s still spiking latency in multi-object scenarios. Visual parse confidence drops below 0.78, and it falls back to the old heuristic… assuming rigid mass. I don't know what the hell is causing it.”
“Last thing we all need right now is a lawsuit,” Tom cuts in, prompting me to fold my mouth with a nod.
“Yeah I know,” I admit.
Tom leans in, frowning at the monitor. “Is it worse when the tester’s reaching or shifting stuff around? Like, does the human motion make the color matching go haywire?”
I nod. “Stupid thing is still second-guessing when color profiles overlap and tactile feedback conflicts. Only thing I figure is to reweight the fusion layer and lean harder on live fine-tune instead of pre-trained fallback.”
Jenna, one of our female co-workers, pokes her head around the corner.
“Lincoln, phone call for you. Line two, main station.”
“Do you know who it is?” I ask.
“The boss,” she answers.
I freeze for half a beat, then stand as Sarah stares at me warily.
“Ooooo. Whaddya do?” Tom teases.
“Does there ever need to be a reason?” I snide.
Here we go.
I pick up the phone at my workstation on the other side of it since it's L-shaped.
“This is Arnoldson,” I state confidently.
“Need to see you up here Arnoldson,” the boss's grave voice sounds on the other line.
“All right. I'll be there in a minute.”
I hang up, prepping to leave my floor.
I step off the elevator onto Level A. The corridor is quieter than usual, weekend hush, only a few admins milling about. Tobias Voss’s office door is already open, the man himself visible behind his massive glass desk, silver hair catching the light like polished steel.
Tobias looks up as I knock lightly on the frame.
“Come in,” Tobias says. “Close the door.”
I do, standing rather than sitting, too wired to relax.
Tobias steeples his fingers, fixing me with that unreadable calm.
“What the hell is going on with Auralis?” Tobias asks, straight to it. “I’m getting pings from the board about behavioral drift in the last sim logs. Talk to me.”
I exhale, trying to stay technical. “We’re chasing persistent clutter drift in multi-object scenarios.
Especially when a person’s moving unpredictably through the mess in the room.
The visual parse confidence drops below threshold, and the system falls back to the old pre-trained heuristic instead of sticking with live.
The heuristic keeps assuming rigid mass, so soft objects like light fabric get massive torque overcorrection. ”
Tobias’s eyebrow rises, unimpressed. “English, son. Simpler. Straight to the point. What the hell is breaking?”
I swallow. “In messy rooms, like if there’s clothes on the floor, or…
overlapping objects, especially if there’s a person there, moving around, the robot second-guesses its grip.
Uh… thinks a lightweight item is heavier and compensates too hard, which…
causes it to end up whipping things around. Smashed a lamp in yesterday’s run.”
Tobias leans forward, hands flat on the desk now. “So it’s turning my million-dollar companion into a goddamn wrecking ball WITH a person in its vicinity, because it can’t tell leggings from a goddamn brick?”
I wince slightly. “Essentially, yes, sir. We’re reweighting the fusion layer and pushing it to trust real-time data over old assumptions. I… we should have it locked by—”
“We’re not waiting till May 5th,” Tobias cuts in, standing slowly and leaning on the desk. “I want the first batch, Arnoldson. Clean and functional units, ready for field tests by April 21st.”
“Uh…” my heart locks up.
“I gave my word to some of my associates that they would be able to try them firsthand ahead of the crowd. This way we could be getting some real feedback from real homes, early. Now you’re telling me that the damn thing is broken?”
The small headache I felt coming on earlier magnifies. “Sir…”
“I trusted you to have this ready… and it seems to me… that you did something to sabotage it.”
“Huh? NO! Sir, definitely not. I wouldn’t—”
“I need it ready. April 21st Arnoldson.”
My voice tightens. “Sir, that’s… two weeks early. We’re already red-lining the team. We need the full window to—”
“Two weeks ain’t gonna kill you, son,” Tobias says, calm but steely. “You should already have this shit figured out! We shouldn’t still be having problems this close to shipment. Those robots should be packed and ready to go. That’s what you assured me before. Unless your word means nothing.”
My jaw works. The stress falls over me like a lead blanket. I feel it in my chest, my temples.
“Understood,” I say quietly. “We’ll make it happen.”
Tobias nods once. “Good. Keep me posted. Do not fuck this up Lincoln… or you and I are going to have some issues.”
Turning to leave, my legs wobble as I arrive in front of the elevator to take back down to Level B.
I try to stand upright in the elevator, but my body betrays me.
I double over, hands slamming onto my knees, gasping for air as my heart hammers like it's trying to break out of my chest. I want to scream.
I want to cry. I want to punch something, anything, to make this stop.
It feels like the very thin wire stretched to its max inside my psyche is about to snap.
“I can't. I fucking can't. I can't…” I start to say, recognizing I'm heading down the plummet for a mental break.
Slapping myself once in the face, I straighten up and take a deep breath, body trembling and shaking. I can't take a breath.
~~“You have the most beautiful mind I've ever seen”~~
My body shivers as I fight to take a breath.
~~”Being with you is like a piece of heaven. I might not understand everything you say, but I'm grateful to share it with you. And… I'm so… so proud of you. You're going to be a badass inventor or something one day.”~~
Taking one final extreme and relieving inhale, I release the tension out of the breath as Gabby's words wash over me.
Words I’ve always held dear to my heart ever since she uttered them. Words that fed my soul.
She always believed in me even when she didn't understand. I don't understand why I sought to have someone who could comprehend my work when all along that wasn't what was most important.
I needed someone who would still be in my corner and encourage me, motivate me.
Gabrielle has been that for me.
Even when she was missing me and my hours bumped up at work, even when I was too tired to make love to her, she would still be there to pet my hair, to kiss me, to tell me everything would be okay.
I wish she was here now.
Mercifully, my breathing slows back to homeostasis as the elevator doors slide open.
And there, stepping off the opposite elevator, Morris in his little carrier, looking confused but determined… is Gabrielle.
9:00 a.m. sharp.
On her day off.
My stomach drops.
She isn’t supposed to be here today. What the hell?
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