"Would you like directions?" That voice! Emotionless, as usual.
The voice is echoing off of the pool of blood at my feet. All of the blood! You figure there's going to be a lot of it, in situations like this, but you really have no idea until it starts flowing. And then, after the heart stops... gravity! The squeeze of skin! Force, pushing the blood to the points of least resistance. It just keeps coming. Blood, blood, blood.
There is a knife in my left hand, bloody past the hilt. In my right, a phone.
The man at my feet is dead. I killed him. I am not alone in this, however. I had help. I've had a little extra help for a few days now.
And what is that noise? There's a woman. She has locked herself in the bathroom. She's pleading for me to go.
She doesn't help me anymore. My new friend does. We met a few days ago.
§
"Are you serious, Ted?" Samantha said, putting her cappuccino down and taking the phone from my hand. I put my finger to my lips with a smile. The coffee shop was loud, and the booth was certainly private enough, but I still didn't want to attract attention. "Are you being serious right now?"
She pressed the large button on the cell phone and held it up to her face. In the dim room, the bright face of the phone illuminated her wide eyes and freckles; I could almost make out the shifting icons reflected on her skin as she slid her finger back and forth across the screen.
"It doesn't look like..." she started.
"We think it is," I said quietly, leaning forward. "We think it's a completely unbranded prototype."
"Really?"
"The most popular smart phone in the world," I said, repeating the words I had heard from my editor only hours before. "And probably not the next version, but the version after that. Real next-level shit."
Samantha furrowed her brow. "How did you get this again? Where did it come from?"
I sat back and sipped my coffee. "So Hugh calls me to his office this morning," I said, "and he wants 3,000 words on yet another cell phone preview. But, you know, his magazine pays pretty well for those things, so I agree to it."
"How is Hugh?" said Samantha. She'd met him at any number of parties, and she seemed to particularly enjoy his dry sense of humor.
"Hugh's good. So anyway, I go over to his place, and Hugh tells me that this unmarked package came in the mail. No return address, no tracking info at all, except a stamp from the Cupertino, California post office. Cupertino is, of course...."
"The home of the best-selling smart phone in the world," said Samantha. "Got it."
"Hugh tells me the phone's unlocked, and his tech has already got it up and running. There aren't any logos on it, no company names mentioned in the software... but we're pretty sure it's the real thing. Hugh said he wanted me to write the review, because I'm his best guy."
"You were the first freelancer to answer your phone," said Samantha without looking up from the device. "I don't see it. It's neat, but it's just a phone. My phone has all this stuff. You guys are kidding yourselves about where it's from. It's nothing new." This was Sam's nature. We'd worked well together for years because I believed everything I heard and she believed nothing. Her logic, however annoying, had saved my ass in countless ways.
"Sam," I said, "this thing can do shit we haven't ever seen before. Watch. See the front-facing camera?" I tapped on the small lens right above the screen.
"The same one my two year-old phone already has?" said Sam. "Yes, I see it."
"Look right into it and press this button on the side."
She did, and the reaction was predictable. "Whoa," she said.
"Cool, huh?"
"I take it back," she said quietly. "This is new."
I watched with satisfaction as she selected icons with her eyes. Somehow, in the dim light, the phone had fixated on her irises and was using them as an input device. After a moment Sam realized that she could open applications by focusing on the icon for a moment and then blinking. She looked up in wonder, speechless. I nodded, grinning.
"It's so natural," said Samantha, returning her gaze to the screen. "It's so... wow. I want one."
"Hugh wants me to use a code name when we talk about it," I said, sitting back. "He wants to call it Excalibur. God, what a dork."
§
"You showed it to her, huh?" said Hugh, his voice spotty through the phone's speaker. "I figured you would."
"Sam can keep a secret," I said. The phone was quiet. "Still there?"
"Yeah, I'm still here," said Hugh. "I just get nervous about telling too many people."
"You know, you asked me to write an article about this. Pretty soon a lot of people are going to know about this phone."
"Is Samantha with you now?"
"No, she had to meet a friend or something," I said. "I'm sure she wanted to go to a bar, which I can't quite do, you know. We're safe to talk."
The streets between the coffee shop and my apartment were comfortably busy for a Thursday evening, full of couples walking briskly and dogs being taken for their last walks of the day. Nobody paid much attention to a twenty-something guy holding a generic-looking phone out in front of his face.
"Well, just don't do the eye interface thing out in public," said Hugh, with a hint of resignation. I smiled, manipulating a poker game on the phone with my finger as he spoke.
"Way ahead of you," I said.
"So what else can it do?" said Hugh, "I only had it for about twenty minutes before you came over and stole the damn thing."
"Before you handed it over to your best freelancer?" I said. "It doesn't do much else. There is an app called 'PlzAdvise.' A 'Plz' and then 'Advise.' No space. I think it's a mapping application or something."
"Oh?" said Hugh, sounding hopeful.
"Nothing we haven't seen before. I think it just finds restaurants and stuff like that. Standard GPS stuff, but I'll try it again later."
"Oh." I heard a door creak open at Hugh's place. "Well, keep at it. I gotta run, bro."
"Later," I said, as the active line icon disappeared.
I got to my apartment, and its general disorder made me want to turn right back around and go out again. 10 PM, however, was my prime time to get work done, so I thought I'd better get working on the phone.
I stepped over the late rent notice on the floor, grabbed a notebook and a pen, sat down, and pressed the "PlzAdvise!" icon. The menu icons disappeared, and the screen went dark.
"Please advise!" said the phone, sounding like a female version of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey. The screen displayed a stark, inelegant message in plain text.
"Type or speak your request," the phone said.
"Library," I said. The screen went black for a moment, and then was replaced with a map of the city only a few blocks away. The library building was correctly, if crudely, highlighted.
"Would you like directions?" said the phone. The program might certainly have been revolutionary five years ago, but now every rental car in the United States carried a device capable of the same thing.
"This kind of sucks," I grumbled.
The map disappeared.
"What sucks?" said the phone's voice, just as impassive as before.
I stared at the phone.
"Please repeat your request," it said after a few seconds.
I breathed again. Of course, the phone had merely tried to parse my statement correctly in terms of the map. The reply wasn't personal. It couldn't be.
"Chinese food," I said. After another pause, the neighborhood appeared again, The Ming Phoenix and Mr. Roll highlighted.
"Would you like to search a larger area?" the phone said.
"No," I said, and tried to think of another request. I felt a familiar rumble in my stomach. As the phone continued to disappoint, and Sam's abrupt departure earlier in the evening came back to mind, I thought about the comfort of the barstool, the first sip of whiskey on my lips, and just how good it would taste.
Aw, man. Not again.
"Alcoholics anonymous meeting," I said.
"Meeting at 10:30 P.M. tonight," said the phone, highlighting a building one mile from my apartment. "Would you like directions?"
Wow, I thought, twirling my two-month sobriety coin in my pocket. That's actually very specific. I put my shoes back on, and marched out the door, trying not to think about anything at all until I reached the meeting.
"Why not try Tacos by Tony?" said the phone, referring to the restaurant next door. Bizarre. I clicked the 'lock' button on the phone and shoved it into my pocket.
§
The next morning, Hugh looked freshly scrubbed when I met him at Danny B's for breakfast. The B was short for "Bacon," and the diner had tried to build its reputation around creative uses of the pork product. I was trying to enjoy a bacon bit pancake when Hugh insisted on breaking the silence.
"I'm worried about you," said Hugh, scratching his goatee. Though probably in his fifties, time had been pretty good to Hugh. The only sign of an adulthood spent writing and thinking about computers was a minor case of under-eye bags. He was otherwise a healthy, decent-looking guy, a long way from his uptown apartment.
My appearance, unkempt and sleep-deprived, was indeed cause for a friend's concern.
"I'll be all right," I said. "It was just a long night."
Hugh laughed. "Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm not worried about you for your health. I'm worried that you won't get my review done on time."
Without a word, I opened up the messenger bag sitting next to me, pulled out some paper-clipped pieces of paper, and tossed them across the table. Hugh snatched it up.
"First draft," I said into my coffee. "Thought you might like to see where this is going."
"Paper, huh?" said Hugh. "I don't think anyone has turned in copy on paper to me in five years. This new email thing is pretty awesome, you know. You should try it."
"Yeah, well, this phone has got me a little paranoid."
"Why's that?" asked Hugh. I took the phone from my pocket and flipped open the virtual lock with my finger. The bright interface popped open, the icons moving fluidly under my gaze.
"Watch this," I said, opening the email application on the phone.
"You have two unread email messages," said the phone's smooth voice.
Hugh looked at me, waiting. "Okay," he said, "so the message is a little bit 1995. So what?"
"I didn't enter my email account information," I said.
Hugh took the phone from me. "Are you sure it's even your email account?" He poked the phone's screen. "Oh... yeah, there I am. I emailed you this morning. Well, you must have entered it at some point."
"Like hell I did! I never put my actual email information into preview phones, much less my any of my passwords."
"Okay, okay," said Hugh, holding his hands out. "I'm just saying that it's unlikely that it figured out your email address and password, that's all. There must be some other explanation."
"Damned if I know, and it's your problem now," I said, holding up my palm when he tried to return the phone across the table.
"Seriously?" said Hugh. He leafed through copy I had printed for him. "It's been a while since I've had to word count by sight, but I feel like I'm looking at about a thousand words here. There's no way you're done with this."
"Forget it then," I said. "I waive my fee. I can't risk this kind of exposure. These are the same people who sent the police after that one freelancer, remember? I think they're tracking me."
"Look," said Hugh, putting the phone and my copy down and leaning towards me. "Just finish it. I know you need the money, and I'm very sure that however the phone got the information, it's not going anywhere."
I poked at my pancake with a fork.
"Come on," he said. "I don't have time to do this. You're the best I've got."
"Sam said that I'm the best you've got only because I take your calls," I said.
Hugh laughed. "Damn. That Sam. She is funny," he said.
§
I tried not to think about the phone as I crossed fouth avenue. Danny B's was conveniently close to the library, so I thought I'd try to capitalize on the morning hours and get another thousand words on Hugh's assignment. He was right. I did need the money, and he had convinced me that the way he obtained the phone freed us from legal responsibility. We were just reviewing a preview phone received in the mail.
It's just a job, I thought. Finish it and move on.
Excalibur chirped in my pocket. I pulled it out, and it spoke.
"New text message from Samantha," it said.
I cursed under my breath. The communication appeared in the screen. Whatcha doin?
I stuck the prototype in my pocket and dialed her number with my old phone. "Hello there." She was easy to hear in the quiet street.
"Hey," I said. "Got your text. I didn't give you the number for Excalibur, did I?"
The other end was quiet for a moment. "No," said Sam, "I texted your regular number. The one you're calling me from now."
"No," I said, "I didn't get the message on this phone. I got it on the prototype. Who gave you that number?"
"I'm telling you, hon," said Sam, "I just pressed that lovely little icon of you on my phone and texted, like I do every d...."
I held my personal phone to my face. The call had been lost. College students and retirees passed me as I stood on the sidewalk.
Excalibur rang in my pocket, a startling, chirping sound. I pulled it out.
"Phone call from Samantha," purred the prototype phone. I touched the answer icon.
"Sorry, got cut off," said Samantha. "As I was saying...."
"How did you get this number?" I said.
"How many times, dear?" said Sam, now truly annoyed. "I clicked your contact. Same as always. You're talking on your old phone now... aren't you?"
Excalibur's screen dimmed, some energy saving measure going into effect. My old phone sat in my other hand, utterly inactive.
"Ted?" said Samantha's voice, sharp and bright, emanating from Excalibur. "Ted? Are you there?"
§
The evening further darkened my already dim apartment. After hanging up on Sam, she called me five more times. I didn't answer. Each time, her number appeared on Excalibur's screen, and her name was announced by that cool, emotionless voice. I spent the day with the windows closed, peering through a crack in the curtain.
I tried to turn the phone off, but each time I thought it had shut down another call came through. It couldn't be deactivated.
The battery cover wouldn't come off, either. It wouldn't budge.
I wondered how the police would come for me. Would they knock? Would they drill a hole through the ceiling and drop down, automatic weapons gleaming?
Excalibur chirped underneath my couch cushion. "Phone call from Hugh," said the muffled voice.
"I've got to get a hold of myself," I said aloud, then laughed. Though I had meant it, it was a movie cliché of the highest order. I stood up from the couch, deciding that "getting a hold of myself" would start with my first shower in a few days.
I tried to parse the facts. It was just a phone. It was just an assignment. This assignment would pay my week-late rent and next month's rent as well. I had not fallen back on drinking. Samantha had not left me yet.
The shower steam cleared my sinuses. These are the facts at hand, I thought. Nothing complicated. Let's just sort this out.
Deciding to address my situation in reverse order, I decided to call Samantha back first. Not having had a land line in years, I picked up my old cell phone. It wouldn't turn on. I popped out the battery, repositioned it. Nothing. I plugged it into the adapter. Still nothing.
If I was going to call Samantha and move on with my evening recovery plan, I had to use Excalibur.
And why shouldn't I? It's just a phone, I said to myself. The faint, remembered taste of whiskey pushed me forward. I couldn't afford to overthink. Overthinking led me back to the bar. Bar fights. Bad things.
I dug Excalibur out from under the couch cushions. The interface popped to life before I even pressed a button. Clicking the phone icon, I dialed Sam's number.
"Calling Samantha," declared the phone. Several rings, then voicemail. I disconnected the call.
Samantha frequently failed to pull her ringing phone out of her purse in time to answer, and always called me right back. I waited. A minute stretched by. Then two. I redialed.
"Calling Samantha."
The voicemail kicked in right away. She was on the phone now, or in an area without service.
Or she had turned off the phone.
My stomach twisted. I thought of Sam, who had made her expectations clear about my sobriety. She had stayed with me during the worst of the detox. She had scolded me about fighting while bandaging my wounds. She had driven me to my first meetings. Her biggest flaw was giving a damn about me, and I had repaid her with spite.
"Calling Samantha." Voicemail again. I threw Excalibur on the couch.
"Damn it!" I said, and stomped my foot childishly on the ground. I took a stack of books from the kitchen counter and flung them across the room.
"Please advise!" said a voice from the couch. "Type or speak your request."
I yelled, emitting a stream of curse words that certainly should have inspired one of my neighbors to call the police.
"What is 'motherfucker?'" cooed the robotic female voice. "Please repeat your request."
"Okay," I yelled back, eyes fixed on the phone across the room. "Where the fuck is she?"
The dim screen became bright with color. "Would you like directions?" it said.
I walked to the couch. Excalibur was showing me a map.
A street corner I didn't know was crudely highlighted.
"What is this?"
"Please repeat your request."
I paused, and considered the possibilities. The ability to track other phones through GPS was nothing new, but to do so surreptitiously was far beyond legality.
"I have to call the police," I told myself. "I have to turn this thing over. This isn't right."
"Updating location," said the phone. The screen regenerated. Samantha was moving uptown.
"This isn't right," I said again. I recognized my own voice. It was the voice of clear thinking, of sobriety. Though thrown into crisis with a clear ethical quandary, I felt a warm confidence. I was going to get through it. I wasn't going to do anything stupid.
"All right, asshole," I said to the phone. "I'm getting dressed. You're coming with me. To the FCC with you. We're going right to the police station."
The map updated to the nearest police precinct. "Would you like directions?"
"Very funny," I replied, and placed the phone on the counter. "You aren't right, my friend. You are incredibly not right, and I am going to get dressed, and we are going to turn you in. Fuck the story. Fuck the rent. Fuck Hugh."
From my bedroom closet I heard the phone speak. "Would you like directions?"
I stopped, my shirt half on, and gasped. For all of my unreasonable paranoia, I'm not sure why it hadn't occurred to me before. I walked out of my bedroom and picked up the phone. Excalibur showed Hugh, or at least Hugh's phone, in his uptown apartment.
"Where is Samantha?"
The same map stayed illuminated on the screen, with the green arrow relocated just outside of Hugh's building. Samantha was on the street below.
"Keep going," I said. "Please keep going."
The map stayed static for a moment, then updated. Samantha was in Hugh's building.
I stared at the phone for a long time.
A building across the street from Hugh's apartment lit up in an orange color. "Why not try Alanna's Liquor Lounge?"
§
I don't remember all of the specifics after that. There was a cab uptown. Excalibur and I sat at Alanna's Liquor Lounge for some time. I talked to it. I talked a lot.
I don't know why Hugh even answered the door. He was half dressed, and perhaps he was too surprised to think clearly. He was certainly surprised when I grabbed the knife.
Samantha yelled "police" over and over from locked bathroom, crying and screaming. I sat on the floor counter next to Hugh's body, watching my new friend display a map to the nearest police station over, and over, and over again.
