Part 1, The Ticking Clock

  Chapter 2 - Out of Credits

  Bar 5-7 is tiki themed, apparently. Tiki theming is limited to digital display behind the bar, rotating between a selection of abstract designs in green, yellow and blue, and some plastic novelty cups that they serve the same beer in as every other bar offers. Thankfully they aren’t playing the garish music some pencil pusher thought would fit the theme.

  I hop up onto a seat at the bar and tap my city-monitor to the station, causing the small LED to flash green. It's just early enough in the afternoon that most of the cogs aren’t out of work yet.

  “Just you?” asks the bartender, rolling sets of chopsticks between purple napkins.

  “I have a friend coming. Do you still have any of that special issue IPA? From the OKR cycle celebration?” I hang my satchel on the back of the bar stool.

  “Nah, all out. We’ve got the lager and the sour, nothing else at the moment.”

  “Sour will do.”

  “Sure thing cob.” The bartender takes a large step over their symbiont as they move down the bar to pour my request from one of the three taps, returning with it and a small dish of peanuts. I let my eyes dart to their symbiont once. Looks like a Pygoscelis species and appears to be busying itself being the heat pump cooling the bar kegs, too small for industrial uses but a good fit for smaller uses in food service or R&D applications.

  I rub my eyebrows, trying to erase the image of so many penned symbionts from my mind, soon the rest of my working fate is going to be tied to whatever symbiont I manifest.

  Arms wrap themselves uninvited around my waist! “Conrad!”

  “Meiko, stop, get off me!” I demand playfully, pushing her arms down over my hips.

  “Damn Conrad. Way to treat a friend,” Meiko pouts dramatically, rolling her eyes. Her long black hair is tied up in two buns at the nape of her neck, her black overalls banded with reflective safety orange and the logos of the electrical engineers.

  “Just sit down already,” I laugh, tapping the spot next to me.

  She taps her wrist to the station, LED flashing green, and sits sideways on her stool, “Let me see! Let me see! Did you go to the fancy apartments today?”

  Obediently I’m already getting my folio with the drawings out for her, I place it on the bar for her to leaf through at her own leisure. “I didn’t get to see inside any of the apartments, but they got sunlight and had some real fancy security,” I start.

  “Ii na. I’d love to be able to grow a pot plant, they’re technically not banned,” she says as she opens the folio and turns the first few pages. Half of them are sketches, or in various states of unfinished, but she finds the new Larus quickly. “Oh! What is it? What’s it do if an Executive has one?”

  “Larus argentatus, and it was only a Senior Director, and not much,” I reply, sipping my beer, “They can carry a single rider in flight, but not much use for that these days. Dad wants to do a paper consolidating our understanding of the last few named species into the genera as a whole.”

  “Mank-ass nepo babies,” laughs Meiko, “If it did anything useful you just know they wouldn’t be in management.”

  I give her a grin, “How’s the generators? Excited to be working there full-time soon now exams are over?”

  She leans on the bar and waves to try and get the bartender back, “We don’t know that yet. I might not bond with an electrical type.”

  “Aw c’mon, both sides of your family are electrical, your brother was too. It’s all but guaranteed.”

  “You got that…”

  The bartender cuts her off, “Nope, just the sour and the lager.”

  “Sour then. Are we ever gonna get it back?”

  The bartender scratches his nose, “Dunno, they imported it special for the celebration. That’s above my paygrade.”

  I pop a peanut into my mouth, “Drawings go away if there’s drink,” I warn, taking my folio back.

  “Well, no matter what I get, I hope the allowances are better. No more unbonded pay scale,” continues Meiko, leaning against the bar to watch me with her chin propped on one fist.

  “Yeah, and they’ll just take it all away again by ‘reallocating’ you into a larger apartment,” I growl.

  Meiko grins, “I’ll just talk Justin into marrying me. Once you get a child license you get a family sized apartment without having to pay for it.”

  I snort into my beer. “That serious now?”

  Meiko’s grin widens, “He doesn’t know it yet. I’m serious about getting a window though.”

  “Better hope you don’t get recruited out of the Company then. Long distance ain’t really a thing when you only get four days leave a year.”

  “What about you?” Meiko’s tone softens.

  I take a deep breath, “I dunno. We were serfs, my dad got his position during the acquisition. Murasaki’d never take a new employee into R&D with his symbiont, assuming I get the same thing.”

  “Maybe you’ll get what your mum had?”

  I grimace, “I hope not. I can’t think of anything worse than sparking a bidding war and not knowing where you’ll end up.”

  “You could get recruited by the big five, that might not be so bad?”

  I raise an eyebrow, “Yeah sure, leave all your family and friends? Who knows what rules they have, what they’re like? And no choice in the matter, as long as Murasaki likes the terms of your buyout. I’d rather get some cog-job, stay here with my dad.” I add ruefully.

  Meiko leans on her hand again, “Folks reckon the big five are pretty crisp. Rumors gotta come from something.”

  I sip my beer skeptically. If anyone knew what I could see, there’d be recruiters hunting me down, and it wouldn’t be the big five and it definitely wouldn’t be R&D. There were far worse fates than just being separated.

  “All I want is to bond something useful and normal like a Rattus or Columba, get a job that keeps me off the radar, and leaves me with some spare time to keep helping my dad drawing. Another week and we’ll find out if I get my wish,” I put down my plastic tiki-themed cup.

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  Meiko sighs, “That’s such a waste. You were top of our class, no one in R&D knows as much about symbionts as you, other than maybe your dad.”

  “Marks don’t matter much. Bond does,” I quip.

  “You coming out to the club later?” asks Meiko, “Justin’s up tomorrow? We were going to go party before… just in case.”

  “This was my last drink credit till payday.” I tap my city-monitor again at the station to show the LED remaining red this time. “Harris going?” I ask cautiously.

  She elbows me in the chest playfully, “Dunno, you should ask him yourself. I’ll give you a credit if you want another one?” she starts to unclasp the city-monitor on her own wrist.

  “No, shit, leave that on cob,” I chastise as I swing my satchel over one shoulder again. “I gotta swing by the lab anyway. And also, dero, no, I’m not coming off as desperate. I’ll think about it. I’ll message you.”

  I knew Meiko knew I’d say no. To be honest I hate the singular club some Murasaki exec thought would suffice as entertainment for the young people, but I was glad Meiko still invited me.

  “Hey Chuck,” I give security a playful salute as I pass through the turnstiles at R&D swiping my ID.

  “Cob. You’re back late?” replies Chuck, taking out one earbud. His Oryctolagus sits on the desk blinking blankly as he pats it one handed, its brightly colored ears tucked flat against its back.

  “My dad still in?” I ask.

  “Haven’t seen him leave. You staying long?”

  “Just dropping some things off. I’ll be quick.”

  “Better be, I can’t be arsed signing you in proper and my shifts almost over.”

  “In and out, I promise,” I’m already skipping past the glass doors.

  “Don’t get me in trouble!” he calls, putting his earbud back in.

  The Dorrien group lab is in the basement. Despite the taxonomy and formal description of symbionts and their powers being fundamental to any applied development, it doesn’t directly make money. And sharing knowledge, publishing papers like actual research? It all just sounds like information leaks to the jockeys.

  As I wait in the elevator, I tap a quick message into the hand-held interface to my city-monitor.

  Meiko said there’s a meet up for Justin tonight, you going? - CD, ID:SB0088907B

  The doors open, and the first thing I smell is burnt electronics, the must of old books, and acetone. It’s so familiar it feels like home.

  I pull a ring of keys from my pocket, and unlock the third door in the hallway, the name “Dorrien” handwritten in fading black pen on the plastic door card.

  “Dad? Oh hey Gilroy…”

  Gilroy looks up from his workstation near the door, long face and dusty blond hair tied up into a knot on top of his head. “Hey Conrad. How’d it go with Fitzgerald?” He takes his reading glasses off the bridge of his nose.

  “Data sheet is already uploaded. They only gave us two hours!”

  “Mank. I definitely told Dr Dorrien to put in for four-”

  “Yeah, I dunno if he forgot or some clocker just denied it. Anyway, what I got is there, you might have to ask for a second visit,” I drop my satchel on the desk between us, half stacked with books and preserved symbiont samples floating invisibly in their jars. Well… invisible to everyone else. The preservatives drain all the color from them, it leaches into the liquid. I’ve never told anyone, the same preservation method has been used for over four hundred years. It'd seem a little weird to suggest they should change it suddenly.

  Gilroy rubs his tired eyes with two fingers, “You’ll be gone by the time we can get on his calendar again,” he moans.

  “Hey!” I start, offended at the implication.

  “I’m planning for the worst. I need to get this paper out…”

  “I’d like to plan for the best, please. They’ll give a serf a job, no matter what I bond. You or Dad can sneak materials out to me,” my fingers linger on my folio and colored pencils as I unpack for Gilroy on the desk, “Is Dad still here?”

  “Yeah, he’s in the back somewhere.”

  My city-monitor buzzes and I glance at the message on the underside of my wrist.

  I’ve got the night shift. You going? - HC, ID:MRG2044987D

  As I walk through the bookcases overflowing with books that have survived digitization and specimen cases with empty floating jars, I tap a reply into the hand-held again.

  And assault my ears with that shit some exec thinks is music? - CD, ID:SB0088907B

  “Conrada, it’s late. Why are you here?”

  Doctor Armin Dorrien looks up from his microscope, tweezers in hand as he assembles wet specimen slides.

  “Why are you still here?” I reply in turn, coming behind him and leaning on the back of his chair to look over his shoulder at the slides.

  “These slides take six hours to set. If I don’t finish them now I’ll lose tomorrow, then I’ll be behind next week. I thought you were going out with Meiko?”

  He hunches back to his work as he speaks, eyes burrowing into the eyepiece of his microscope. Dr Dorrien is naturally grey haired, which makes him look older than his age, with a sparse beard that comes across as lazy grooming although I know it's a serious attempt at looking distinguished. I'm like him in a lot of ways.

  “I did, now I’m outta credits. I’m just dropping off the interview supplies for Gilroy. Security will get suspicious if I have lab equipment in my room again,” I explain.

  “Supplies?”

  “The Larus argentatus. I was out doing the descriptive protocol. You put in the request, remember? Did you seriously not ask for four hours?”

  “Oh that project! Here can you look at this for me…” he pulls back from the microscope, indicating for me to look down.

  “Dad-” I warn, drawing back from the chair a little.

  He makes a face, dropping his voice, “Not that. Just take a look, I’m still trying to work on a dye that will make symbiont tissue visible. What do you think? Your eyes are younger than mine.”

  I frown, and very slowly lean forward to do as bid. It’s white, just the backlighting. I give it a blink just to be sure and the field of view suddenly fills with red blood cells. My hand twitches, and I catch myself from adjusting the focus.

  “Nothing.” I pull back from the microscope faster than I should, tucking my hands in my pockets.

  Dad sighs, and begins to cap the bottles of colored liquids in front of his station. His Rattus symbiont is focused on the workstation, a cloud of sparking blue around its small paws as it leans on the screen and Dad’s notes write themselves into the digital lab book.

  “Maybe another week or two and you can start as a grad student? They might let you keep your pencils in your room then,” he suggests wistfully.

  My jaw tightens, I grab a lock of my own grey streaked hair and turn it around one finger. “The best case scenario for me is a Rattus, Dad. That won’t get me a grad student position in R&D. The worst case scenario…” I trail off.

  Dad turns to me suddenly, capturing me with his gentle blue eyes, “We don’t know what your mother manifested, all I remember it saying was ‘classified’. But that was Systems Biotechnica then, they were less… concerned with selling contracts. We’re with Murasaki now, even if it’s classified they’re big enough that they’ll keep on as many people as they can. Worst case… we’re serfs, they’ll find you a job no matter what happens.”

  “And if I do get bought out?” I ask.

  His lips tighten, “Hopefully you’re not hiding a pregnancy from me like your mother was. They almost didn’t let me get the child license when her new employer reached out after you were born seeking to transfer you back. It’ll be fine, it won’t happen.”

  I’d rather just avoid looking at his eyes, scared of what I’ll see there. In my gut, I know it isn’t going to be anything normal, nothing about my connection with other people’s symbionts is normal, let alone what my own might be like. It’s not that I’m against having an unusual symbiont, I’m against the values of whoever might be in the business of purchasing unusual symbionts.

  “How late you going to be?” I ask, changing the topic.

  “Another few hours,” says Dad as he turns back to his work, “You better be home when I get back?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be home?” I reply innocently. My wrist buzzes.

  You know we log these messages right? - HC, ID:MRG2044987D

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