Last Supper

“Bon appetit!” Robbie places the plates before me and Fred. Fred has his napkin tucked into his shirt, partly being ironic, partly not -- Fred’s a neat freak, despite his rough appearance. The time that I accidentally stepped on his shoe and scuffed it up still lives in his mind, despite my profuse apologies and spit-shining both his shoes to a gleam with a few pieces of toilet paper.

Fred holds his fork and steak knife at the ready. “Yum-yum!”

Robbie lifts the metal dome off Fred’s plate first. No surprise: a huge Porterhouse bloody rare, a twice-baked potato, and a glop of green beans smothered in cheddar cheese, the exact mess he’s talked about for the past four days. After lights out he’d start speaking from his bunk above me. “I can just taste ‘em. Those beans, just like me Mam used to make every Christmas. Only day of the year I ever ate vegetables at all. Ever!” Then he’d laugh and smack his lips. “Give me meat and taters any day. Any day!”

Every damn night that gluey mouth sound. Smack-smack. Fred’s an okay guy, but he literally has a big mouth. He looks better now that he has a beard.

I thought he’d shove the smothered beans into his craw first, but he starts sawing away at the steak with the insufficient ridged knife provided.

“Yum-yum!” Fred hesitates with the dripping meat held before his open mouth, stretching his anticipation just a moment longer.

I can’t watch the carnage.

Robbie squeaks over to my side of the table and lifts the dome with his claw. I must admit, I’m impressed. My salad looks impeccable, the greens fresh-picked and practically glowing, the cherry tomatoes left whole as I’d specified, a smattering of roasted sunflower seeds, all tossed in a vinaigrette.

Fred peers over at my plate, masticating with his mouth open. “What are you? A cow?”

I take up my plastic fork and spear a tomato. “Moo,” I say.

“Your beverages.” Robbie places a pint of beer before Fred, the head still frothing. I don’t drink anymore, but for a moment I wish I’d ordered one as well.

Fred takes a quaff, then sighs. “Damn that’s good.”

Robbie places the glass of ice water with lemon by my plate. “Will there be anything else?” Robbie doesn’t have a mouth, just a light that’s supposed to flicker in time to his words, but even that is a bit wonky, flashing slightly out of sync. The first night Fred had suggested we might capture Robbie and hold him hostage, but I pointed out they’d probably just send in one of the newer models, the ones totally devoid of personality and thus cruelly efficient.

I must admit, obsequious Robbie has grown on me, but then, I’m one of those who talks to my houseplants.

My poor houseplants. They’re all dying or dead by now.

“That’ll be it, Robbie,” I say. “Thanks.”

“You’re very welcome, Miss. Bon appetit!” He wheels to the door and it slides open and shut. Beyond the door is darkness.

We’ve tried to guess where we are, why each of us was drugged to wake up in this stainless steel room with a toilet and sink hidden behind a wall, a bunk bed, a desk with a wooden chair.

I’ve no idea what I’ve done. In school they taught us the State was our Father, our Protector, our Guardian Angel. But at home, my latest set of foster parents regaled me with stories of what would happen if my behavior forced them to return me to the care of the State. I learned to be a very good little girl.

Right now, Fred is absolutely destroying his bloody steak. I’d never noticed what big teeth he has. “I’d like to go to space, wouldn’t you?”

“Not particularly.” The Earth receding in all that empty darkness. No thanks.

“I would! What an opportunity!” Still chewing, he gulps more beer. “I think we’re being rewarded.”

“Rewarded? By holding us in a cell?”

Fred looks around as if seeing the place for the first time.”It’s not so bad.”

“And Robbie telling us it’s our last supper. What’s that mean?”

“It’s our last supper here, that’s all.” He shrugs. “I have a good feeling about this.”

I play with my beautiful salad, my stomach tight with tension.

“It’s gonna be all right, you’ll see.” Fred gulps down the rest of his beer, then wipes his mouth and burps. “‘Scuse me.”

I wave his politeness away. I mean, I’ve heard the guy take a dump and worse. Besides, what’s a burp between friends?

Fred a friend? I have to admit I've grown to like the chump. He’s like a gross older brother or something, someone whose thoughts and behavior appall you who also feels like your loving protector.

I don’t like to remember the blur of State-sanctioned placements, people who claimed they loved me betraying me over and over - through unwanted touch, through neglect, through providing me only with the bare minimum and keeping the rest of the support money for themselves. The last family locked me in the basement.

I’m so accustomed to the ache I barely notice it anymore. Which has made this experience very confusing because despite the terror of involuntary confinement, I find myself almost happy in moments just being with another human. Even if it’s Fred.

Also, if I’d been left here alone for these past two weeks alone, well, I might be stark raving mad by now.

We finish our food in silence, then Fred retires behind the wall and I try to ignore his sounds.

Suddenly, the door slides open and two men with covered faces enter so quickly I’ve barely had time to stand up before they grab me and steer me out of the room.

“Hey! Hey!” Fred’s yelling. I picture him jumping up off the toilet pulling up his pants but he’s too slow for the shutting door.

Darkness. Their gloved hands are tight on my upper arms and it’s almost as if I’m being lifted forward through the utterly dark halls. We take turns I can’t see. I try to keep track of them, like maybe I’ll have to find my way back. Suddenly the cell and Fred feel like sanctuary.

“Where are we going?” I look up from one to the other. The hall is so dark.I can barely see.

“Cooperate,” the one on my right says, looking down at me, and my stomach sinks. Its eyes glow red.

I’ve only seen them on the news, the Imperial Guards, mechs without even the semblance of humanity except in their physical form.

I collapse a little and the two guards practically carry me along between them.

The way seems interminable. Finally, we stop and a door whooshes open. I’m pushed into a white room outfitted like a doctor’s office. A swivelling stool, a row of cabinets, an examination table with stirrups.

I try to turn around then, but one of the guards spins me back around. I stand on trembling legs and wait.

A door opens in the opposite wall and Fred enters. Except now he’s wearing a white lab coat and black slacks and shiny brown oxfords.

“Fred!” I have the urge to run to him, but stop myself.

“You may leave,” he says, and it takes me a moment to realize he means the guards. They hesitate. “Watch from without. But I don’t think there will be any trouble. Right?”

I shake my head no. I’m utterly confused. Is this really Fred?

The door behind me slides open and closed.

Fred smiles and says, “Would you like to sit?” And to my surprise, he slides the stirrups back into the table and lifts himself onto it, indicating I might sit on the stool.

I sit. “You are Fred, right?”

“The one and only. But that’s about the only true thing I've told you, except I really do like steak and potatoes and beans like me Mam used to make.” He smiles, then scratches his beard. “Can’t wait to get rid of this fur. Ugh.”

“What is this?” I look around, trying to find cameras. “What's going on?” I feel like crying, like screaming.

He pulls a pad out of his lab coat pocket and riffles the screen. “Single, parentless, unattached. You have an extraordinary ability to exist alone.”

I realize I’m shaking my head. Below my fear is a righteous anger. “Why?”

“I wanted to get to know you. What better way than to pretend to be caught in the same stressful situation?"

“You’re crazy.”

“Crazy like a fox!” Fred smiles, revealing a bit of green bean in his teeth.

“I want to go home!” I stand so abruptly the stool scoots out behind me and crashes into the wall. I want to grab him by his lapels and…

Fred jumps off the exam table. “Careful now. You wouldn’t want me to call them in again, would you?”

Those red eyes and sharp gloved hands. I retrieve the stool and sit again, blinking back tears. What a fool I’ve been.

“It was a test, a test you passed with flying colors.”

Despite myself, a small bubble of hope rises in my chest. Once a good girl, always a… “What did I pass?”

“You didn’t turn on me or give in to despair. My coarse manners annoyed you, but you didn’t become intolerant. You are self-sufficient, but your kindness seemed…real." He consults his pad again. “Your isolation makes you perfect.”

“I’m not…” And I remember my houseplants, how every long weekend they kept me company until I could begin work again from home on Monday.

As if reading my mind, Fred says, “Your plants are fine. We left them with your neighbor with a note you hoped she’d care for them because you had to move away suddenly…”

My stomach is churning. I’m glad I ate so lightly. “What if I refuse to participate?”

Fred shakes his head dolefully. “This study is State-sanctioned. You wouldn’t want to disappoint the State, would you?”

The stories of what the State will do. People “move away” all the time. I slowly shake my head.

“And admit it,” Fred says, leaning forward conspiratorily. “You enjoyed being with me. At least, just a little.”

I swallow hard. “You’re just like all the others.”

“What others?”

“Everyone pretends to be what they’re not in order to get what they want. You’re no different.”

He tilts his head. He seems genuinely confused. “But this is an amazing opportunity!”

“Opportunity?”

He clasps his hands. “To give your life a larger purpose! Your name and likeness might some day join the Pantheon of Heroes!” His eyes gaze up at his imagined dream.

My imagined nightmare, to be so seen by so many.

“And I tell you, after this, you won’t be alone. Won’t that be nice?”

Nice?

The acidity of the tomatoes and the vinaigrette burn in the back of my throat .It’s all I can do to stand up and lurch towards him blindly.

He blinks at me stupidly. I can no longer hold it in.

My vomit splatters his brown oxfords.

When I finally stand up, wiping my mouth, the expression of horror on his face almost makes me laugh, but then his furious glance chills me to the bone. “I’m sorry.”

He practically runs from the room.

A few moments later, a floor cleaning bot whirs in to clean up my mess. I sit on the exam table and watch it work. The fear is detaching me from my body. I examine my hand, trying to remember it’s me.

When it’s finished cleaning, the bot beeps and retracts its brushes, then scoots out the door. A few moments later, Fred enters, wearing a Hazmat suit, only his face uncovered.

I want to say, “Overkill, don’t you think?” but the sharp set of his mouth silences me. “I didn’t mean….”

He waves his hand. “We will start you on an anti-emetic as soon as possible. We mustn’t let small mishaps swerve us off course, right?” He riffles through his pad. “Tomorrow, surgery.”

My heart drops and I shiver. “Surgery?” I swallow what little saliva I have. “I…I thought I was going into space?“

“No worries. It’ll be painless.”

“Painless?” My lips feel numb.

“The mech will be in space, but you will experience everything it does and vice versa.” He grins. “I almost envy you!”

I can’t feel my body.

“You’ll never be alone again. You’ll be paired with your mech.”

The room is swimming. “For how long?”

“For how long?” he says. “Why, dear girl, forever.”

His Hazmat suit makes a crinkly noise. I barely feel him pressing my finger to the screen of his pad. “A mere legality. You’re confirming your participation, correct?”

I can’t feel my head but I think it’s nodding.

“Please confirm verbally. Out loud.”

My mouth moves and sound comes out. “I confirm.”

Fred is suddenly leaning down, his gloved hands on my shoulders.“You won’t regret this. This is a landmark day.” He stands and turns in a circle, looking up. “You all hear that? A landmark day!”

He holds up my arm as if I’ve won something.