The room sits on the second floor of the embassy annex, in the corner of an old stone building where the radiator runs under a tall window. Below it, on the ground floor and in the vaults, is the Shomcut branch that keeps the compartment. A few weeks have passed since the lander came down. The bed was carried up from another room, and the desk has a lamp, a kettle and nothing personal.
Theodora is about thirty, with dark hair parted in the middle and pulled back off her face, heavy brows and a mouth that rests closed. She wears a black leather blazer over a white shirt, and her nails are painted a deep red that has chipped on two fingers.
She comes up the back stairs from the bank side at the end of her shift with her coat over one arm. At the service door she knocks twice, waits, then pushes it open a bit.
Theodora
Hi. Sorry. I asked downstairs first, so this visit is cleared. I have had your account for years and I have never seen your face, and it got strange. Can I sit down for a while?
Vlad
opening the door fully Sure, sit on the couch. You are Theodora, right?
Theodora
coming in and sitting on the edge of the couch with the coat across her knees Theodora, yes. Theodora Brassard. My initials are on every form that has gone through your compartment, so you have seen more of me than I have of you.
Vlad
And what do you want to say?
Theodora
How you are. That's all. You have been up here weeks and I kept thinking about it downstairs.
Vlad
I don't feel really well. I am homesick and I can't live without a social life. And I genuinely hate this bank. It has taxes everywhere, it has difficult procedures.
Theodora
The fees are indefensible, I hear it at the counter all day. Where is home for you?
Vlad
It's in my family and my friend. I now remember that my friend does not support the idea of letting clones live because they have not been born in a natural way and I am not sure how to contact my family back in Romania.
Theodora
setting the coat down beside her Do they know you exist?
Vlad
No. The cover story is that I went missing. I mean, the original went missing. I am not sure what memories are of the original and what are only mine.
Theodora
Then the missing man's family is grieving and you are in a room above my counter. quiet for a second Do you want them to know?
Vlad
No, we need to fight against the extreme attitudes first. I think everyone was born equal in rights and dignity. But many people don't believe that's true. And even if it's not practically true, it is an essential core belief to ensure we all survive and get treated with respect.
Theodora
I believe it too. Your account is the only one in the branch with no tax on it, and that is because the paperwork calls you mission equipment.
Vlad
So, not a full human.
Theodora
On the form, no. To me you are a person I have looked after for weeks, a friend.
Vlad
Why didn't you came more often so we can have a chat and not feel this bad?
Theodora
I thought I would be intruding. No one told me you wanted company, and I did not want to be one more person walking into your room.
Vlad
I wanted company. I am more extraverted that I seem in here.
Theodora
Then I will come after my shift most days, if you want. I finish at four.
Vlad
I would like that. And I wanna be able to go out, either by myself or with someone I like. I used hang out with my friend and those walks made me happy. Now I feel like I am locked in.
Theodora
You cannot leave the annex without losing the protection, that is the whole arrangement. The grounds have a garden at the back, walled, and the staff use it. I could walk there with you.
Vlad
Yeah, let's go there.
Theodora
picking her coat back up off the couch Come on, then. It gets dark early, so we have about an hour of it.
They go down the back stairs and out through the service door into the walled garden. The gravel path runs along the wall, and Theodora walks on the outside of it, closer to the gate.
Vlad
This is better.
Theodora
It is. glancing at him as they walk You have gone quiet since you got here, though.
Vlad
Yeah. It means so much to me that you considered spending time with me.
Theodora
It costs me an hour I would have spent on a bus. slowing to his pace on the gravel You are easy to sit with.
Vlad
The ECB simulator the bank gave me was extremely difficult. There was a scenario called "solve the eurocrisis".
Vlad
The first thing I did as soon as Greece turned red is to decree allowing removing odious debts, which involves complicated negotiations and going through long menus, and then once I finally pass the negotiations, private banks start to complain.
Vlad
I silence them and focus on Greece first. I cancel the odious debt on Greece and satisfy all demands, but then Germany complains and it's a cascade of adjustments.
Theodora
The game is built by the bank, so it wants you to take the troika route. You lend the money, you attach the conditions, Greece goes back to amber in three turns and the score comes out fine.
I played it the other way and got within one turn of the end. Cancel on the small country first, the way you did, and feed Germany's confidence bar while you do it, otherwise the cascade starts and every menu after that gets longer.
And leave the private banks talking. The silence button is in there because it feels good to press. It moves them into the hostile column, and then they refuse you when you need them to roll the short debt over.
Vlad
What it means to roll the short debt over?
Theodora
A country borrows for one year, and at the end of the year it has to pay it all back. It does not have the cash, so it borrows again from the same people to pay them and that is the roll. If they say no, the money runs out that week.
Vlad
And what do you do with that besides decreeing to cancel debt countries cannot pay and telling banks that the debt is no longer valid?
Theodora
You are the central bank in there, so you are the one printing. The main lever is buying the debt yourself off the private banks, which keeps the country funded when no one else will lend.
The rest is the interest rate and the emergency money you hand to the commercial banks so they stay open.
Vlad
In the game I have also seen the option for "isolate euro", that is, set different exchange rates for different countries.
Theodora
That one ends the euro, which the game counts as a loss no matter how well the rest went. Different rates means separate currencies again.
I tried it once to see what happens. It gives you a nice screen and then the run stops.
Vlad
What nice screen?
Theodora
A map with every country back in its old colour and its own rate next to it. Then a line saying the monetary union has ended, and the run closes.
Vlad
pointing at a bench after walking for a while Do you want to sit?
Theodora
sitting down and putting her coat over the back of the bench Yes.
Vlad
sitting near her So, how did you get to this place, at the Shomcuta Bank?
Theodora
I studied finance here and the bank took the whole graduating year. I started on the counter, and the vault came later because they needed someone who could keep a mouth shut.
Vlad
Did you like finance?
Theodora
I liked the mechanics of it. What we actually do at the branch is sell products to people who cannot afford them.
Vlad
I though so, I have watched the rates of the bank and the incredible fees.
Theodora
The fees are where the branch makes its money. And most of the accounts here are held in euro, so every time someone moves between the two we take a cut on the conversion as well.
Vlad
I don't know how to do accounting, but I can, theoretically, try to plan the economy.
Theodora
turning on the bench to face him Plan it how?
Vlad
In any given place, there is a finite amount of resources that can be used to satisfy people's needs. Since the primary goal is to ensure that everyone has a decent standard of living, resources must be distributed in a way that is very close to people's actual demand.
To determine the actual demand, we need to collect data. This is done via registration of needs. Needs can be registered automatically using scanners, cards, or estimates for things like housing and healthcare, and manually, using reports.
Every single of those data points is aggregated to form a picture of actual economic demand. Out of the actual demand, we can allocate facilities and adjust minimum production requirements.
Theodora
So the scanner at a shop counter tells you what to build next year. What happens when the number comes back wrong, or when people register for more than they need?
Vlad
We start an audit to find out how much of the resource is actually being consumed. Since most reports are automatic, it's not easy to multiply resource needs.
Theodora
That sounds like it would work for bread and shoes. I would want to see what it does with a thing only four people in the country want.
Vlad
Four people register the need and four of the thing get manufactured and delivered.
Theodora
Here the factory would look at four orders and refuse the run.
Vlad
No economy is unplanned. All economies are planned, including capitalist economies. The primary difference between all economic orders is how planning works.
Theodora
The bank plans a year ahead, that is true. But the plan is built only for our needs.
Vlad
Exactly, the bank's plan is built for its own profit. Here we build for the complete or near-complete satisfaction of people's needs.
Theodora
nodding slowly And who decides what counts as a need?
Vlad
The consumers themselves, and cooperatives.
Theodora
Then it comes back to the registration again and every part of this rests on people filling the thing in honestly.
Vlad
Yeah. I explained the full economic theory in my work, so I am not going to repeat it.
Theodora
I would read it, if it is somewhere I can get at.
Vlad
It's on my website, the constitution of Fluid. Anyways, how have you been feeling last time?
Theodora
Tired, mostly. I live alone and the shifts are long.
Vlad
I noticed you use a lot of makeup. Your eyes have the pink paint above them and your mouth is almost red.
Theodora
The branch expects it. There is nothing written down, and every woman on the floor turns up looking like this anyway.
Vlad
You know that I like natural looks more.
Theodora
smiling a little You will get that on my days off. It comes off the moment I am at home.
Vlad
I can see you are compassionate, you always help me and consider the fact that I cannot go to work and I cannot work at other's websites. I wanted to say thank you, although it felt like I was going to say thank you to something part of the arrangement. Nelly brought me here.
Theodora
You can thank me, the arrangement covers the compartment and nothing else. Nelly is the officer who signed you in?
Vlad
Yes, she brought me back to Earth even though I must have been executed.
Theodora
She took a risk that could cost her everything. Is she able to visit you here?
Vlad
Last time she said that no, that she can talk to me on the phone, but she cannot be encountered appearing close to me.
Theodora
That makes sense, she would be traced straight to this building. quiet for a second Is a phone call enough for you?
Vlad
I think yes.
Theodora
It did not sound like enough.
Vlad
You got my feeling so easily.
Theodora
You relaxed when you said yes. People only do that when the answer costs them something.
Vlad
How did you decide to aid in what was Nelly doing?
Theodora
The request came down as a numbered account with a legal note on it, and I was the one on the shift that week. I read the note, worked out what was actually being asked, and took it.
Vlad
What makes you care about me?
Theodora
Your letters. Short lines, then a long one, then a short one again. None of it read like a file. looking down at her hands I knew there was a person up here and that I had the clearance to walk in.
Vlad
But you did not walk often.
Theodora
No. I told myself it was not my place, and went home instead.
Vlad
Why did you tell yourself it was not your place?
Theodora
Because I am the teller and you are the account. Crossing that is how people at the branch lose their clearance.
Vlad
So, you decided to risk it so I can feel better.
Theodora
I could not keep walking past the stairs. turning her hands over in her lap Every evening it got harder, and now I gave in to it.
Vlad
I invented a story for my pseudonym, Gottlieb Zasdorf, which I identified as a name in Anno 1800. It is a king who built dense and grandiose cities and enforced policy with an iron fist. He is of Hungarian origin.
Theodora
laughing The name arrived with the file and I never once wondered where it came from. I didn't know I have been stamping forms for a Hungarian king all this time.
Vlad
Nelly asked what should be my pseudonym be and I chose a generated name I had in a game I played. I am Vlad and of course I removed my first name.
Theodora
Vlad. saying it once, quietly Good. I understand why the other one exists, and I will keep typing Gottlieb Zasdorf Tulna on every transaction, the same as always.
Vlad
I used to talk to strangers on the bus, and most of the time it was either the youth or the elders. There were almost no adults.
Theodora
The rest of us are thirty and have nothing left over by the time we sit down. I put headphones on and I do not look up until my stop.
Vlad
I noticed that too, that most people who focus on the road are at either extremes. I am twenty-two years old and shifted to twenty-seven years old due to the alternate future cloning process if you know what that is.
Theodora
Twenty-two in the body, twenty-seven in the head. thinking about it So the five years are memories of a future the original never reached.
Vlad
Yes. If the original survived, I wouldn't have ended up like this and we would have never met. But we all knew that Titan was energy poor. The Institute of Genetics in Germany has done some really bad decisions.
Theodora
The file on my side gives me a classification and a bank reference, nothing about who made you. shaking her head I did not know Titan was in it at all until you said it just now.
Vlad
On Titan, the original and five clones, including me as a clone, have been sent to research that place even though we know it was not a survivable place. Maybe I could have thought better and not have become a volunteer.
Theodora
The man who signed up for that is dead. You have the memory of the decision, and the decision was his.
Vlad
I know. One of the common complaints we had was that we were monotone, there was little variety. We were close to being the same person. dropping his voice I wished I could have cried about this many over, but what to do when the extremists believe that there is no difference between the act of cloning and the act of being a clone?
Theodora
moving closer on the bench You can cry here. I am the only one in the garden and I have no reason to report it.
Vlad
closing his eyes It's hard for me to cry.
Theodora
putting a hand on his shoulder You are a person, and a person should not be kept in one room above a bank. I want you out of there and living somewhere properly.
Vlad
How can we do that? I am not sure.
Theodora
You are stateless, so no papers come through the normal route. What Quebec does give you is residence, and residence can sit somewhere other than an embassy room.
Vlad
It's really difficult to be stateless. Why aren't clones granted citizenship? Why the citizenships of the generated humans that were perfectly fine were revoked?
Theodora
The law that made them citizens was passed in one decade and taken back in the next, by a government that ran on taking it back. Clones were never inside it at all.
Vlad
I wanna be recognized as a person by everyone, not just you and Nelly. I don't wanna stumble upon people who want clones and genomic humans to be exterminated because they have not been born naturally by their definition.
Theodora
All I can do is keep the account open and the name clean, which is small next to what you are asking for. shifting her hand slightly I want the same thing for you. I have no way to make a country agree.
Vlad
slightly faster, more frustrated Our existence, that of the generated humans, is always a fight against those who dare to threaten our existence or devalue us as second-class citizens. There seems to be no end to this.
Theodora
I would be angry as well. If I had to argue for my own existence every year I would have run out of patience long before now.
Vlad
How can we argue that every single one of us is born equal?
Theodora
You cannot argue it. Nobody has ever proved it from anything. It is something people decide to believe and then build the rest on top of.
Vlad
I believe in that not because it can be proved, but because it's the only way we can treat everyone equally.
Theodora
When they hired me I had no opinion on any of this, I signed what was in front of me. looking at him You keep pulling out parts of me I did not know were there.
Vlad
There are so few jobs that fit me. IT is the best match, but I am not an expert when compared to the best programmers. I once thought about becoming a bus driver as contingency, but that also doesn't fit.
Theodora
Right now none of that is open to you, because a job needs a status and you have none. What you have is the account, and what goes into the account comes from me.
Vlad
How does the bank tolerate the fact that you subsidize me?
Theodora
It goes out as maintenance on a diplomatic asset. On paper the bank is servicing the embassy, so the money never looks like a person receiving it.
Vlad
You wanna make my life better, but I don't know how to make your life better.
Theodora
You already have. sitting back a little I came out here tired and I am less tired now.
Vlad
I want to thank you again for everything you did.
Theodora
putting her arms around him on the bench Stop thanking me. Just come down to the garden with me tomorrow.
Vlad
I don't wanna go back to my room.
Theodora
Then we stay out a while longer.
Vlad
What would have happened if I didn't meet you?
Theodora
I would have gone on signing the forms and gone home, and none of this would have reached me. I would have been fine, and I would have known nothing.
Vlad
squeezing her back a little I didn't expect you to hug me like this.
Theodora
Neither did I. loosening her hold without letting go You looked like somebody who had gone for days without being touched.
Vlad
I can't let go of the gratitude I have toward you.
Theodora
holding on I am grateful as well.
Vlad
What are you going to do now that we're friends who've got to this point?
Theodora
Downstairs I am the teller and you are a reference number, and I will keep being that all day. Then at four I come up the back stairs and I am this instead. The two do not have to meet.
Vlad
What if you will be thinking about me while on shift?
Theodora
I will think about you and serve the next customer anyway. letting go slowly Keeping my mouth shut is the one thing this job did teach me.
Vlad
looking at the sky You know, it's getting late.
Theodora
reaching for her coat on the back of the bench It is, and my bus goes at half past. I will walk you back to the door first.
Vlad
Is your bus Go Transit?
Theodora
pulling the coat on That one is Toronto. Here it is the RTC, the 800 along the boulevard, and it drops me four streets from home.
Vlad
standing up from the bench That is far...
Theodora
standing with him Four streets is nothing, I do it twice a day.
Vlad
starting to walk toward the building
Theodora
walking with him to the service door, then stopping and putting her arms around him once more Tomorrow at four. Go up and get warm.
Vlad
wrapping his arms around her I will.
Theodora
holding him a moment longer, then stepping back toward the gate Good night, Vlad.
Vlad
Good night, Theodora.
Theodora
pulling the gate closed behind her and going out toward the boulevard