Crossing Infamy

Chapter 9 - Kalix

Time: 16:00.
7th hour complete.
Total customers helped: 6
Total products sold: 5
Total successful repairs: 2
Calculating score...

The message popped up on my eyeview, showing me my stats for the past hour alongside a 3D animation of a little robot with the Cache Crash logo on its chest dancing around on the counter in front of me. It's part of an augmented reality game I invented to pass the time in between customers, also functioning as a sort of reward system for doing my job well.

The algorithm keeps track of the work I do, whether that's selling products, fixing customers' broken tech, or anything else, and uses those metrics to calculate a total number of "points" I earn each hour. I can use those points to unlock upgrades for Sparky the Robot, then battle him against other characters in AR — my eyeview just plops them down on the nearest surface so it looks like they're fighting on one of the real counters or shelves. It also plays little animations like confetti or sparkle bursts whenever I successfully complete a work task.

Calculation complete.

16:00 Score: 101

New upgrade unlocked!
↳ ~ Magno-Shield ~

After selecting and equipping the new gadget, I scroll through the list of opponents I've created. Just as I've chosen one for Sparky to battle, the doorbell chimes, and a tall, middle-aged woman approaches the desk carrying a teleholo — a bulkier one than normal, a cube about the size of the hand she's holding it in.

"Hello," she says, with a tired nod to me. "You do repairs here, right?"

"Yep. What seems to be the problem?" I ask, glancing down at the TH.

"Bloody thing won't stop glitching. I've just been putting up with it for the past few weeks, but it's getting worse. Earlier today, it wouldn't let me get through a 10-minute news segment without freezing every five seconds. And it takes forever to load anything."

I nod. "Let me take a look."

The TH flickers on with the press of a button on the side, and a news program starts playing — or at least trying to. The interface is slow and freezes a few times, though only momentarily, as I navigate to Settings. I don't recognize this model, but it looks old — not old enough to actually start breaking down, but old enough that the corporation that produced it would really like you to buy a replacement. When I ask, the woman confirms my hypothesis — it was the latest, cutting edge Daintree Smart TH model... in 2109.

"The Big Five do this sometimes with popular products," I explain, opening up the developer menu. "They put these usage conditions hidden throughout the code, basically telling certain functions to stop or slow down once the device has been used for a certain number of hours. When people ask, they say they're actually trying to preserve product life by prioritizing more important components, or something like that, but really, they just want to annoy you into buying a new one."

After a quick search for these conditions and a few edits, I restart the TH. It reopens to the last used channel, A-News, which seems to be partway through the Daily Update program.

"Now, for our final story tonight," the reporter declares, "former Cortland employee turned anti-monopoly activist Jerrico Anderson was found dead outside his apartment earlier this afternoon. According to local police, the man fell from his 26th-storey window, and his death has been ruled an acc—"

I switched off the holo. "There you go. Should work fine now."

The rest of the day is fairly slow, with only three more customers coming in — two buying discount phone chargers and one dropping off a laptop to be fixed. According to the older gentleman who brought it in, it's the third time the thing's broken down to the point of needing repairs in the past year. At this point, he'd be better off cutting his losses and buying a new, holographic system.