“It says I’m being considered.”
The ‘bot shook its head. “Considered, is not is.”
“I already have a mentor.”
“In waiting.”
“Do I look like the type of person who fails?”
The robot wanted to answer all humans are failures, but carefully shrugged. “I can only give you access to which you’re entitled.”
Pablo followed the A8 down a long silver corridor into a small airless room, where he was set up on a laptop. The robot signed him in and stepped back.
“You’re limited to dentistry through the ages and attendant themes such as health and nutrition.” The sneer was difficult to miss as the ‘bot waved the synced pass card for Pablo’s clearance and quietly closed the door.
Pablo set out his notebook with two pens and three pencils, wondering where the cameras were as he slipped off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. He ignored the beeping patient calendar reminding him that Maxine Duong was scheduled for an eleven AM check-up and put the lucky marble near the pens, searching the year by year list of new restaurants in the Bronx since 2030, finally locating Needleman’s; there’d been no new restaurants since 2085. Wanting to protect the existing restaurants, overwhelmingly family-run, Grandma made opening new ones especially difficult.
Clicking on the link took him to a dully colored page, Needleman’s. Food You Know. Established 2036. The waiter was right about that. Pablo scrolled through the familiar menu. Hot and cold sandwiches. Soups of the day. Desserts. Black and white cookies, of course.
None of this food, in its original form, was available anymore, Pablo thought, looking at a handful of pictures from the gallery. With rare exceptions, farming had turned to genetically engineered foods. How did you make genetically engineered pastrami, he wondered. He shrugged, figuring you could if you could, but something didn’t sit quite right.
The bakery, for instance, where they got the “mouth-watering” rugelach, whatever that was, was in Manhattan. Maybe bakeries had returned to downtown New York. He cross-checked and didn’t find any new bakeries in Manhattan since just before the attack in 2072. Maybe this bakery had somehow survived. By transporting mouth-watering rugelach every day through Manhattan to the Bronx when few people ever crossed the border?
Frowning, Pablo rolled the marble around his palm. And the knishes. Also from Manhattan. He checked Yonah Shimmel. Closed. He grunted. Hard to get the best knishes in the world from a place which didn’t exist anymore.
He leaned back, thinking, then clicked on Who Are We. Needleman’s Inc., 2034, but there wasn’t a link. Pablo finished making notes and waited for the A8 to return.
“Find what you wanted?” The A8 leaned over to sign him out.
“Almost.” Pablo could feel the robot shuddering at the rare touch of a human hand on its body. Not quite forbidden, but there better be a damn good excuse for a human manhandling a robot. Pablo slowly withdrew his fingers from the ‘bot’s wrist. “I need to look up a business.”
“If it’s within your clearance.”
“It’s a restaurant, nutrition for The Family.”
Pablo turned up his hands innocently and gave the robot the name. He stood in the corner while the A8 checked. The ‘bot returned, disappointed; it preferred to be helpful. Unlike humans, it needed a purpose.
“That’s coded.”
“Sorry?”
“The original business license is security coded.”
“But it’s just a deli.”
“Since it’s security-coded, I can’t explain that.”
Pablo smiled disarmingly. “You’re so knowledgeable. There must be only finite reasons for a restaurant being coded.”
The A8’s eyes revolved; the human was in need of assistance. “Theoretically, either the contents or the personnel would require security clearance.”
“In your estimation,” Pablo bowed respectfully, “would deli food fall under that category?”
“Unlikely since this was before the extensive crop damage beginning in 2061.”
“So it’d be the personnel. Were any of the workers Jew refugees requiring special attention?”
“The workers are all native born.”
Pablo frowned. “Your thoughts and insights then? Purely theoretically, of course.”
The ‘bot’s eyes settled squarely on Pablo. “Theoretically, the workers might not be human.”
“What would they be?”
If the ‘bot were allowed to have a face, it would be sketched with pity at this inferior lifeform. “They could be part of the early A1 class. Theoretically, of course.”
• • • •
AZHAR PRODDED THE burning sock with a stick. Each night since coming home, he’d torched another piece of clothing from the bag hidden behind the washer in the basement, innocently adding them to the trash fire in the backyard. The black socks were the last; he was so intent watching the smoke curl around the dancing embers that he didn’t hear the shouts from the house.
Still holding the blackened stick, Azhar rushed in through the kitchen as Omar shoved past the white-faced Jalak up the staircase.
“You can’t leave,” she yelled.
They glared at Azhar, approaching in bewilderment.
“What’s going on?” he asked hoarsely
Omar fled into his room while Jalak slammed their bedroom door in Mustafa’s face.
“What’s going on?” His loud knocks were answered by crashing glass and Jalak’s wailing moans and prayers.
His sons’ room was filled ceiling to floor with religious artifacts, quotations from the Quran, three crescent moon and star flags and the ubiquitous five-foot high Fazat Allah victory poster of the Grand Mufti, crushing the map of Europe beneath his foot. In the corner, Abdul huddled on his bed as if an overnight guest, a few color photos of Club Madrid football star Said Abdella taped over his pillow.
From his bed, Omar stared at Mustafa with pure hatred; he thought of Clary, as if he ever stopped.
“Talk,” Azhar said sternly.
Omar turned away in disgust. Azhar gestured for Abdul to wait outside. The boy shook his head, glaring at his brother.
Finally Azhar stepped toward Omar. “I said talk.”
The boy clenched his arms around his knees, scowling. “It is the Holy Warriors.”
“Isn’t it always?”
He sneered. “I have been ordered to live at the Martyrs Home.”
“Why?”
The sneer twisted deeper. “Why else? To continue my education.”
“Is that common?”
“No,” Abdul called out. Azhar silenced him with a look.
“Is that true?” Mustafa turned back to the eldest
