Belgrade Noir

“We’ve run into a lot of problems,” the director muttered, moving to a section in the corner of a large, well-lit underground room that reminded Marija of the automatic photo booths she had seen in old movies. “Mainly legal in nature: in this sphere, things develop rapidly, but bureaucracy decides on the rules and lags behind hopelessly. EU directives covering artificial intelligence and robotics have become obsolete ever since the first computer passed the Captcha test. They can’t understand, they just can’t understand… But, somehow, we will get to the bottom of it. Mr. Lero has a good legal team.”

“Do I… need to come in here?” she asked.

The thin man smiled and nodded. “This won’t take long,” he said. “We’ve perfected the scanning so well that what used to take hours may now be accomplished in just under fifteen minutes. But this is not the key — your DNA is the basis for the print, while the scanning results are actually used for the finishing touches. The main thing is to capture the personality of the subject — your personality: the inner rainbow of the mind, your special light, whatever you want to call it. Recording and storing it in the mainframes that occupy the whole underground floor beneath us. Yottabytes and yottabytes of data — all that makes you, one, unique. And now, thanks to the algorithm for which this will be the final test, one more — doubled.”

Yes, she thought, entering a small room, the door slamming closed behind her, this algorithm wouldn’t exist without my husband.

She examined the memory foam mattress lifted upright at an angle on a shining hydraulic stand. She sighed and began to undress. At one point, as she neatly folded the black blouse and the tight pencil skirt Isak loved so much, she thought that the director was probably watching her on the screen out there. She shrugged her shoulders and went to the mattress. The time for shyness had long passed. Soon all employees in this company would have access not only to the image of her naked body but also to all her memories and thoughts. Isak explained to her that she shouldn’t worry, that this database — the data that made her her — would not be accessed by anyone without the appropriate password, a password that only the director of Alter Ego and Isak would have. She knew that for the commercial realization of this process one of the key conditions was the protection, safety, and inviolability of client data, but then again… how many people would be willing to risk exposing themselves to such an extent?

“We can start now,” she heard the director’s voice through the speaker. “Buckle up, please.”

She did. The hydraulics hissed, the color of the lights changed, the bed began to shift its incline, and Marija closed her eyes.

“Do you even know why you are doing this?”

Marija sat on the terrace of a restaurant overlooking the promenade near the Sava River with Tamara, her best friend.

“You know,” she said thoughtfully, “a few weeks ago we had a bad fight.”

“You and Isak?”

“Of course. I wish I could have a fight with Aleksandar.”

“Let me guess: you’ve been thinking about where your relationship is going?”

“Well, yes,” Marija answered. “I complained that he’s so closed off, that whenever I bring up my divorce from Aleksandar and our happy future life together, he just shuts down. I told him how much this was tearing me apart — how much it hurts me — that I completely give myself to him, that I sacrifice myself…”

“And?”

“Imagine what he said! Wait, I’ll try to remember exactly how he put it…” She frowned slightly after taking a sip of her cocktail. “Something like this: What are you actually sacrificing? Your relationship with your husband? As far as I know, it was ruined before we met… Would — if the situation were different — you sacrifice your relationship with your child for us? He went straight for the jugular.”

“That’s awful,” said Tamara with a smile. “But he’s your awful guy.”

Marija finished the last of her cocktail and lit up another cigarette. “You know, I shouldn’t have told you all this. About the experiment. I mean, it’s all still very top secret, a big project for Isak’s company, but you’re the only one I can really trust—”

“Don’t worry,” her friend cut in, and waved the waitress over to order another round. “I always keep our secrets. What are your plans? How are you spending these fifteen days while waiting for… your replacement?”

Marija leaned back in her chair while Tamara ordered two more cocktails, and waited for the waitress to walk away. “Isak organized a trip. The first eight days — Madrid, Barcelona, and Lisbon. Then a week in the Côte d’Azur.”