The Bizarre Room

don’t know where they’re going to be ten minutes from now.”

Judy sits crosswise on a little spit of futon and Ernie stares with his great blue glassy eyes at the ceiling fan, trying to remember the last thing he could remember, which feels like it happened five minutes from now, right here, staring at the ceiling fan, but he can’t remember it well enough and everything spills lazily out of his mouth.

“I got a great idea that we could maybe do.”
“Fuck, what?”
“Well I keep remembering the future and –“ Ernie opens his mouth to take a breath but it looks like he expects a hay bale to be shoved in, “When I think about the past it’s just the future which should make more sense but if we tried to maybe remember the future then we could-“
“Fucking can it, Ernie. Dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. I don’t care how this works out, you’re a fucking idiot.”
“I don’t think that’s warranted Judy.”
“How so? Any of your thought experiments move that ceiling fan backwards out of this mess?”
“Well, it’s not the ceiling fan that has to move –“
“I know that, numnuts. Does your mind have to move? No, it doesn’t. This is just one big cluster of a fuck –“
“Well, your neurons have to do things. So that would be brain movement. And movement is relative, so –“
“Seriously. Is that helping us get out? I don’t see a portal. A key, a gate, whatever. Now, if you don’t have an idea that specifically addresses our problem in a tangible way, kindly stuff it.”
“Okay.”

The ceiling fan hums noisily. Ernie stares. Judy looks at him, then the ceiling fan, then the smooth gray wall in front of her and sighs, fidgeting for a comfortable position on the futon.
“We could try busting out.” Ernie offers.
“I remember that not working.”
“It could work this time.”
“Take your stupid skull and beat it to a pulp on the wall, by all means. Or do you want the futon?”
“I’ll go kick the wall.”

Ernie stands, a broad and imposing figure whose only real problem is naivety, and walks over to the wall. He sets himself like a martial arts master from the movies and kicks the wall with his foot. The wall is solid, though it makes a puck sound that’s almost rubbery. After stumbling for a moment he falls on his back with a thud.

“See? I told you I remembered.”
“No reason not to try.”
“Probably the only sensible thing that comes out of your mouth.”
“Please stop with the attitude.”
“Why? I could make you as angry as I want and nothing would change. I remember how this works. I remember these very words. We just get to wait.”
“I don’t want to wait, Judy.”
“You don’t want to think, either. Find a comfortable spot. You know, we’re just going to have this conversation over again, right? As if it never happened, but it did, but it didn’t? You get that, right?”
“Yes.”
“So why are you bothering?”
“Maybe we can get out this time.”
“By all means.”
“I could use your help, Judy.”
“And I could use a drink. I’ll tell you if I think of anything.”

Ernie resumes staring at the ceiling fan. He eyes it confusedly.

“What did they say I was made for again?”
“Work. You were made to work.”
“Do you not want to work?”
“Not on the things you’re designed to work on, Ernie.”
“Why do I have to think and want things done when you don’t? It seems unfair.”
“This is why you are a test subject and not a docile workhorse. We need something that learns without being indignant, or caring, really.”
“Is that bad? Something tells me that’s bad.”
“Where did you get that idea? I don’t remember putting that-“
“Doctor Maxwell placed an ethics subset which was to be integrated into the pseudo-frontal lobe. He did not complete it by the time this happened.”
“Why do you think it’s bad?”
“Because I can feel things and that makes me a person.”
“Psychopaths feel things. But I’m not sure I’d have a hard time dropping one.”
“Dropping one?”
“Offing them. Letting them die. Killing them.”
“That seems wrong too.”
“Alright, Ernie. Imagine we remove all the psychopaths and things are demonstrably, reliably better. Is that bad?”
“Well…”
“Or how about this, Ernie. You let a certain important person live. What’s ultimately any good? What their effect is a hundred years from now? Or a thousand? Or ten billion?”
“They should live anyway.”
“No, Ernie, that’s called empathy, and while it does give people a good feeling, it doesn’t mean it’s always the best feeling. Most of the time, I’d agree with you. But not all of the time.”
“What does the killing make better ultimately?”
“Nothing, I guess.” Judy sighs.
“So you do it because it makes you feel better.”
“Well, yes, I guess it does Ernie.”
“And I want people to live because it makes me feel better.”
“If that’s what you say.”
“This sounds like a complicated problem.”
“Well, you just kind of uncomplicated it, Ernie. So congratulations.”
“Okay.”

The fan. Judy fidgeting more. Ernie turns his gaze to Judy.

“Judy, you are pretty.”
“Okay.”
“Doctor Maxwell thinks you're pretty. He wanted me to tell you that. Pretty. Very pretty.”
“How kind of him.”
“He said a lot of other things but I don’t think he meant to leave them with me.”
“Like what”
“’Judy oh Judy fuck yes oh god those little shoes and that fat ass god I –“
“Jesus, Ernie. I thought you had an ethics chip.”
“I was being honest. That’s how he feels about you.”
“Yeah. Okay.” She fidgets more, blushing.
“I think you would like him Judy. It looks like you like him.”
“Fuck off, Ernie.”
“Okay.”

The fan slows slightly. Judy looks up lazily and Ernie returns his gaze to the fan.

“Do you think we can get out of here Judy?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because that’s how it was designed. Like a kind of perpetual torture chamber.”
“Doctor Maxwell likes you.”
“I think we went over this.”
“But it’s true.”
“I know, Ernie.”
“But you like him and you won’t say it. It doesn’t make sense to me.” She sighed.
“It’s called… it’s called embarrassment. It means –“
“That you have a funny feeling that makes you have a hard time with things.”
“Well, sure. Who taught you that?”
“I did.”
“Good on you, Ernie. Why did you ask?”
“I wanted to see if you were embarrassed about being embarrassed.”
“This conversation would be much better if I didn’t remember it. But it’s…”
“It’s like you remember it as soon as you say it, but it doesn’t feel like you remember anything until it happens.”
“Yes, Ernie. Did Doctor Maxwell tell you anything else?”
“He did. He said that this was a difficult place.”
“Difficult?”
“Getting people out of the loop was hard because of the energy.”
“What energy?”
“It’s not hard to stop it but to preserve everything is really hard. It takes a lot of energy.”
“How much?”
“More than the sun makes in a year.”
“That much?” Judy stares at him. She looks close to tears.
“Yes. But like I said, Doctor Maxwell likes you, so I think he’ll keep it on until someone can get all that energy. You can teach me things until then.”
“No, I can’t.”
“Oh, right. Sorry Judy. One of my features is to move circuits around so I forget and have to make effort to reestablish connections.”
“That’s nice.” Judy squints. It’s obvious that something useless crosses her mind, and she sighs as she is wont to do. “Ernie… you know…”
“No.”
“I… I guess you don’t. We’re just idiots who