In a golden shimmer, the bland government man materialized on the pad, coming alive in his cheap suit, carrying a faux leather case. Right on time, of course. My nose wrinkled as a wave of ozone rushed outwards from the pad. As usual, he said, “Hello, Mr Mayor.”
“Welcome back to the reservation,” I replied, completing my part of the ritual. We walked to the office building, his wingtip shoes giving him problems in the sand.
“Why is the telepad so far away from everything?” he asked. I took his question as rhetorical, but it wasn’t an accident. It was one of the main goals when the founders drew up the plans for this place, years before I was born. The walk didn’t bother me. The res is the only home I’ve known in my 65 years, and I still enjoy walking in the sands I played in as a child.
Getting no reply, he tried to engage again. “That breeze feels like opening an oven door.”
My only response was mopping my crinkled brow with a handkerchief. I managed a small smile despite my nerves. I’d deceived him before, and I could do it again. Everything depended on it.
The admin building was no shabbier than it was on his last visit. But the car museum in the lobby was dustier. When I was a child, the museum got a few visitors — the reservation’s primary source of income — but now it was the rare researcher or eccentric enthusiast that toured the old vehicles.
I suppressed a grimace at the baby doll just outside the door. Everything was supposed to be put away, but I didn’t want to call attention to it by kicking it aside. His attention was either elsewhere or nowhere, and the doll faded behind us as we headed upstairs to my modest office. Later, I would find out who had left it and give them a stern lecture.
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In the office, my thumb on his pad certified my reports. They were lies, but I was well-practised, and the government man wasn’t one to ask real questions. It was a necessary deception to keep our community alive. Next, I used my thumb again to acknowledge the transfer of money — the handout — to the reservation’s bank account.
Every time, I dreaded the question, and it arrived as expected. “Are there any residents who wish to leave?”
There’s a thin line between overselling and appearing too indifferent. “Why ask? The old people are all staying, and there are no more young people. You know that.” My cheeks were burning with indignation. “You took them.” If he was ashamed of that, he didn’t show it.
The man was oblivious to my anger. “I’m required to ask,” he said in a flat tone of disinterest. “Besides, why not leave? Why wait here to die off? You and your friends could go anywhere. The world is full of beauty and culture. Have breakfast in New Orleans and lunch in Paris. Fish the Yangtze. You can still be home for dinner.”
“The minute I leave here on that pad, I’ll be dead. You will be, too.” The thought of his molecules being torn to pieces didn’t make me feel that bad.
His attention was mostly on reorganizing the contents of his case. “So I wasn’t here last time?”
My temple throbbed with my rising blood pressure. That happens when I’m being patronized like a child talking about an imaginary monster. “You aren’t even the man who woke up in your home this morning. He died teleporting to work. Then again, when you came here. You’ll die again when you leave.”
“I … see,” he said, looking at me with eyes that called me a crackpot. It had been several years since he’d tried to convince me that teleportation didn’t kill you and replace you with a duplicate.
My contempt for this fake spilled out. “My people are the only real humans left in the world. You are all copies. Fakes!” The lid of his case closed with a snick. “Even the babies teleport home from the hospital, I hear.” Thinking of those poor babies made my eyes sting with nascent tears.
After I fell silent, he glanced up with a smart-alec grin and said, “They should walk home? My daughter was born in Asia, and I live in old South Africa. How else would you get her home?”
“Have you ever heard of the Ship of Theseus?” I asked.
With a slight sneer, he shook his head, “I’ve never been interested in any of your old vehicles. From the look of the museum, I’m not alone.” He glanced up at nothing — I imagined it was a message from some unseen implanted display. “I’m afraid I have to go, Mr Mayor. A pleasure as always,” he said unconvincingly.
We shook hands, and I wordlessly escorted him through the deserted museum, across the sand, and back to the telepad. With another upward glance, he murmured a command to an unseen person.
With a second whiff of ozone, he died in the usual golden shimmer, and I turned to go home. It is against my nature to lie, but we have far fewer of us old-timers than the government thinks. We must keep our handouts to support the children they will never know exist. The real children.