Robyn's Egg Read Free Page B

Ultima, which was the first time Moyer heard of the company doing such a thing for anyone. Petro’s gregariousness helped until his skills came up to par, and so did his uncanny ability to get inside information to fuel the office gossip mill. It didn’t take long for Petro to fit right in — a talent Moyer envied more than he would ever say. Moyer suspected Petro was related to someone in the company with a title and an office, a nephew or second cousin perhaps. It was the only explanation.
    “Oh hell, that reminds me, Robyn has us scheduled for a poke-and-prod-fest tomorrow.”
    “I beg your pardon?” Petro said.
    “She has her sights set on a free baby, and the government has a call out for DNA.”
    “Ah, the DeepSeas Initiative.”
    “You got it,” Moyer said. “I've tried explaining to her that we don't stand a chance. When the government puts out the call for genetic material, they’re searching for the elite. What do Robyn and I have to offer? Neither of us is particularly athletic, nor brilliantly smart. But I can't talk her out of it. Her mind is set. And because of it, I have to endure hours of testing and probing, standing naked in front of a battery of technicians.”
    “I feel for you, my man. Kelsey had me go to a few of those during the Mars Initiative. After all the testing was done, I was able to get my hands on our ranking. We were so far down the list it was embarrassing. But it’s better than winding up a contestant on Anything For Baby .”
    “I suppose. Still, you should have seen the way the techs looked at me last time,” Moyer said. “I’m standing there naked as the day I was decanted and could see the disdain on their faces. I was wasting their time and they wanted me to know it. A pair of them smirked, barely able to contain their laughter. I wish you could talk to Robyn. Maybe she would listen if it came from someone else.” After a moment, a short bitter laugh escaped Moyer’s lips. “Who am I kidding? We argued about it last night, her term for it, not mine. I barely got a word in. Did you know she lost her job as a result of the Mars debacle?”
    “No, I didn’t. Is she working?”
    “Yes, though not in her field. It’s rather a sore subject.”
    A young waitress clad in a pink acetate uniform sidled up to the table to take their orders. Petro leered, taking full advantage of the garment’s translucence. His eyes moved over the waitress’ body, gleaning as much detail as he could manage. Moyer directed his attention to the shifting images of menu specials shown on the video wall. They ordered food and Petro continued leering as the waitress walked away.
    The waitress returned a short while later with their meals and a scanner. Petro picked at his food as if its arrangement was more important than its flavor or nutritive value. Moyer checked his ticket to assure the order was correct, and held out his arm, pulling back his sleeve to expose the hologram on his wrist. After scanning in the code, the waitress gazed at the screen. Her smile faded. “Sir, it says you have insufficient funds.”
    “No, that’s impossible,” Moyer insisted.
    “It must be a misread,” Petro chimed. “It happens all the time.”
    Moyer offered his wrist again. The girl scanned the code, waited a moment and wagged her head.
    “How can this be?” Moyer muttered.
    Petro extended his arm to the waitress. “Here, add it to mine.”
     
    A torch of pain braised Robyn Winfield’s knees while she scrubbed travertine floors with a brush. The seams between tiles cut into her flesh like hot wire. A month earlier, she had her own office and people cleaned her floors and emptied her trash; that was before the recession and the last wave of job cuts, before Robyn had been repurposed and put to productive use – the phrase the Labor Counselor used during their meeting. The counselor was a prim, humorless woman in a masculine suit with a plaque on her desk that read Productivity is next to Godliness