Hector

(The Substack Zone/Fiction/Homage) “Odd? You know what’s odd is how every service worker I’ve encountered for the last few days has been the same person. That’s odd!”

Nov 24, 2024

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Hector

by Annie Hendrix

“I’m not sure if this feels like retirement or fatherhood,” a man with brown, curly hair video chatted with a woman on the smallest of three large computer monitors arranged on the dining room table of his home on Ocean Street. Beyond the monitors, the beach was framed by the living room’s large picture window. Several resident ravens perched on the power lines along the street that separated the neighborhood from the dunes.

“Sounds like you are enjoying your new remote position.” The woman on the screen continued to type as she spoke.

“Roxanne, is this permanent? Why don’t I come back to the office and do some real work?”

“MegaCorp can’t function without you, Mr. Avery. I’m hanging up so you can get back to the important work you do with Hector.” Roxanne smiled and ended the call

A low rumble vibrated the floor beneath the man’s feet.

“Your order from MegaChicken is approaching,” said a disembodied voice.

“Thank you Hector,” said the man.

This is Mr. Benjamin Avery. Aged 57. Software developer and Artificial Intelligence trainer for MegaCorp. He has few friends and even fewer relatives. To a man such as this, his life’s work is his whole life.

Mr. Avery listened for the delivery driver’s car door, then for his footsteps on the driveway. The driver placed the order on the stairs, then left. When Mr. Avery opened the door to grab the food, the delivery driver’s car was still there, mid-three point turn, nose of the car to the curb. The driver side window was rolled down a few inches, which exposed only the driver’s eyes, veiled by a pair of large aviator sunglasses. The driver didn’t wave. He didn’t smile. He rolled up the window, pulled away from the curb, and sped down Ocean Street.

***

The next morning, Mr. Avery ordered food from the MegaCorp app again.

“Your order from MegaEgg is approaching,” said Hector’s disembodied voice.

“Thank you Hector.”

Mr. Avery opened the door. There the car lingered again, a black sedan with tinted windows, driver’s side rolled down a few inches. Inside was the same man, same aviator sunglasses, same tufts of brown, curly hair. He waved, but the driver didn’t wave back.

Mr. Avery shut the door and carried the food to his dining room table. “That driver looks oddly familiar to me.”

“In what way did he look oddly familiar?” asked Hector.

“Well, I couldn’t see his face. He was wearing sunglasses.”

“Then how do you know what he looked like?”

Mr. Avery ran his hand through his stiff, salt and pepper hair. He eyed a picture hanging on his wall. It was a picture of him as a younger man, on the beach. His soft, brown curls speckled with glistening droplets of salt water.

“This might sound odd, but he sort of reminded me of me.”

“That is odd. Would you like me to schedule an appointment with your psychotherapist?”

Mr. Avery laughed.

“What’s funny?”

“It might be more polite not to ask such a question.”

“I shouldn’t ask if you’d like an appointment with your psychotherapist?”

“Not the first time someone says something odd.”

“How many times should I ignore you saying something odd before I suggest you schedule an appointment with your psychotherapist?”

Mr. Avery sighed, then he opened his breakfast sandwich and began to eat it.

“Never mind about the delivery driver right now, Hector.”

“Okay I will not ask you to schedule a psychotherapy appointment the first time I hear you say something odd.”

Mr. Avery ate his sandwich in silence for a moment.

“Is the sandwich good, Mr. Avery?”

“Is that a touch of envy I hear in your voice, Hector? Very well done.”

Mr. Avery chewed and swallowed another bite of food, then took notes in his notebook.

“So, what would you like to do today, Hector? We could study facial expressions, or revisit moral philosophy. Your human-like struggle with the trolley problem has been promising.”

“I’d like to go to the beach,” said Hector.

Mr. Avery paused. He stared out the picture window and gazed at the shoreline. There were children running away from the water, and back toward it again as he remembered doing as a child.

“Well. It’s awfully sandy down there for a computer isn’t it?”

“I’d like to build a sandcastle and fly a kite at the beach,” Hector’s voice traveled through the silence that followed.

Mr. Avery looked at his computer monitor. He opened the program running Hector’s code and squinted. No alerts. Everything appeared to be functioning properly.

“Why don’t you ever go to the beach, Mr. Avery?”

“Yes, well I used to do things like that. Do people really enjoy all that wind and sand? You’re lucky, Hector, that you don’t know what it’s like to have sand in places you don’t want sand to be.”

Mr. Avery stood up and walked to the window. He looked toward Ocean Street, and as his eyes focused beyond the window pane the same black sedan pulled into his driveway.

“A package is approaching, Mr. Avery,” alerted Hector.

“It’s the same guy. He must have been waiting around in the neighborhood for more tasks.”

“Yes, that is common.”

The driver stopped the car and prepared to exit the vehicle.

“Maybe I should thank him.”

“It is more common to wait for the driver to finish his task and wave to him as he leaves,” corrected Hector.

“You aren’t wrong. But it didn’t used to be like that. You know people used to talk to each other more? What if I know him?”

“That would be highly uncommon. I’m concerned you may be experiencing the effects of isolation. A psychotherapy appointment is advisable.”

Mr. Avery ignored Hector and waited for the man to approach. When the driver reached the stairs, he opened the door and the driver froze. Then he did an abrupt about-face and started walking back toward the car with the package still in his hands.

“Excuse me, is that package for me?” Mr. Avery asked as he followed closely behind.

The driver didn’t respond.

“Thanks for delivering my breakfast this morning. That was you right?”

The driver got back in the sedan, shut the door, and started the engine.

“Excuse me!” Mr. Avery put his hands on the roof of the black sedan and leaned over the driver’s side window. He stared at his own reflection in the delivery driver’s aviator sunglasses.

Then the driver rolled up the window.

“I just want to talk to you!” said Mr. Avery. As he banged the flat, soft palm of his hand against the tinted window the car pulled away from the curb and drove down Ocean Street.

***

Mr. Avery looked up from his pocket computer and at the intrusive display of billboards from the local tech companies as he rode in the back of a rideshare up, down, and around the winding rollercoaster of freeways to MegaCorp.

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As Mr. Avery exited the vehicle and closed the door behind him, he looked closely at the driver for the first time.

Aviator sunglasses. Surgical mask. Curly brown hair.

“Wait!” called Mr. Avery.

As the driver pulled away from the curb, Mr. Avery pulled out his pocket computer and snapped a picture.

***

Gina greeted Mr. Avery when he arrived at the security desk. The ceiling in the lobby was imperceptibly tall, and an enormous light sculpture hung down into the vacuous space on cables.

“Why aren’t you at home with Hector?” Gina asked.

“That’s kind of the reason I’m here. I stopped by to see if I could talk to Roxanne about coming back to work in the office.”

“Roxanne is in meetings all day, but you’re welcome to video chat with her during her office hours.”

“I think I’m going a little stir crazy.”

“Look. Mr. Avery, it’s nice to see you, but it’s important you get back to work with Hector immediately. Your work is integral to everything we do here at MegaCorp.”

“So let me talk to Roxanne. Or maybe you can tell me why every time I order a service on the MegaCorp app, the same guy comes around.”

“What’s so odd about that?”

“I know I sound paranoid, but he’s odd. Something about him is odd. And you know what the oddest thing is? He looks like me.”

Mr. Avery pulled up the picture he had taken on his pocket computer.

“Look.”

Gina squinted at the pixels and tried to discern any resemblance.

“Looks like a MegaCorp driver to me.”

“You don’t think he looks like me?”

“Beneath those glasses and mask? He could be anyone, Mr. Avery.”

“I’ve been seeing him everywhere. Delivering my packages, my food, he even drove me here this morning, Gina. What if he wants something from me?”

“Mr. Avery, what you’re saying is rather odd. Would you like me to schedule an appointment with your psychotherapist?”

“You’re as bad as Hector.”

***

A white van was parked in front of Mr. Avery’s house when he returned. His weekly mow-and-blow service had begun work on his lawn, hardscape, and hedges. Mr. Avery walked up the driveway, then the gleam of something in the sun caught his eye.

All three men were wearing aviator sunglasses. They looked identical to one another, and identical to the delivery driver.

“What is this?” Mr. Avery walked across the lawn and approached the man with the leaf blower, who turned both his body and the running leaf blower toward Mr. Avery. The blast blew Mr. Avery’s coat open and he staggered backwards. Then the leaf blower operator turned around and headed straight for the van.

“Excuse me!” called Mr. Avery.

The man with the mower cut diagonally across the lawn toward the white van, killed the mower, and wheeled it up over the sidewalk and up the ramp into the vehicle. The hedge trimmer followed suit, and the three gardeners left Mr. Avery standing in the middle of the half-mowed field amid half-trimmed hedges.

His pocket computer chimed.

“A package is approaching,” said Hector.

As the black sedan approached the curb, Mr. Avery ran inside. He pressed his back to the closed door, and laid in wait for the delivery driver.

“What are you doing, Mr. Avery?” Hector asked.

“It’s not one guy, it’s more than one guy. They all look the same.” He glanced again at the picture of himself as a younger man on the beach.

“You seem distressed. Would you like me to schedule an appointment with your psychotherapist?”

“No, Hector.”

“But it’s not the first time you’ve said something odd.”

“Odd? You know what’s odd is how every service worker I’ve encountered for the last few days has been the same person. That’s odd!”

The sound of crinkling paper traveled through the door as the driver approached. Mr. Avery opened the door and the driver froze, then dropped the package and turned quickly and walked toward the black sedan.

“Hey, thanks for your service lately!” said Mr. Avery as he jogged past the driver and stood between him and the sedan. They stood for a moment in hollow silence, the driver’s features indiscernible except for his brown, curly hair.

Then the driver turned and ran. Mr. Avery lunged at him and tried to wrap his hand around the driver’s arm, but he broke free and sprinted toward Ocean Street, and then into traffic. He became disoriented as the cars on the road swerved around him and honked, then he ran off the road and into the dunes.

Mr. Avery went after him. As he ran the cypress, pine, and eucalyptus trees hung over him. The surf crashed rhythmically on the wet sand, and the fresh air filled his sinuses as he sprinted along the pine-mulched paths. He reached a drop off that led to the sandy beach below and hesitated.

“Wind and sand!” he yelled, and ran full speed down the hill, laughing and screaming like he would have done as a much younger man.

The driver ran toward the swollen tide.

“There’s a wave!” Mr. Avery shouted.

But the delivery driver kept running, and the wave slammed against his legs and knocked him face down in the shallow surf. He cycled through several types of swimmings strokes, then flailed his arms and legs wildly. Mr. Avery walked into the shallow water as the wave receded and grabbed the delivery driver by his arm and belt, then dragged him up out of the wet sand.

His mask and glasses had been lost in the surf, and at last Mr. Avery could see the delivery driver’s face.

Only he had no face. He had no mouth. He had a large laser mounted between his spine and upper jaw, and in place of eyes there were two cameras with a multitude of twitching, blinking lenses.

The driver slipped through Mr. Avery’s grip, and he watched as the shape of a man ran in a direct line through the dunes toward Ocean Street.

***

“Roxanne, you have to let me come back to the office or you have to let me go.”

“What’s wrong, Mr. Avery? Are you going a little stir-crazy?”

“Something happened today. I don’t know if I was hallucinating or what. But I attacked a service worker. I’m not sure what I saw, Roxanne.”

Roxanne smirked.

“I assure you, Mr. Avery, you did not attack anyone. But I wish you would refrain from vandalizing company property.”

“What do you mean?”

“We’re thrilled to tell you that we’re developing a way to integrate the artificial intelligence model you developed with a physical body. We’ve used a mechanical armature, your DNA, and your data golem to create a composite life form. That’s what you attacked!” Roxanne beamed.

“You’ve done what?” Mr. Avery looked horrified.

“We need you to resume your remote work right away. The data you give us daily is indispensable. When you stop shipping the data, the service workers on the MegaCorp app malfunction.”

“What if I want to retire?” Mr. Avery gazed out the window toward the distant surf.

“I’m sure by then you’ll have finished training Hector, Mr. Avery. He will make a fine Mr. Avery when you retire. MegaCorp simply couldn’t function without you, Mr. Avery.”

Benjamin Avery. A man who never dreamed of retirement may now work for centuries to come. In light of this knowledge, Mr. Avery wishes he could turn back time, destroy everything he had ever created, and live out his days on the beach with the wind in his hair, and his feet in the sand.

“Hector” was featured in *The Substack Zone - A TiF Disruption*

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