Kunta & The Machine

The man who left me with the machine told me to obey it. Told me that if I jumped when it said jump, typed what it asked, and didn’t think any more than his company needed me to, my money would be waiting for me on the other side of that metal door he shut behind him. Pitch darkness remained. Was this room six by six feet, or was it tinier? The only things that occupied it were me, a wide plasma screen, a chair and desk the man said I would need later. I saw my reflection on the screen for a split second as it began to glow.

Then the machine spoke. Text instructing me to breathe in, then out. Then hold my breath. Hold. And then breathe normally again. Even these small actions were being carefully monitored I knew. Heavy on my head was an EEG-reader, black but speckled with shiny metal buttons. I stood tall, though it weighed on me.

The machine had me walk around. The machine asked me to raise one hand, before raising the other, before clapping them, and clenching them into a fist, and then swinging those fists in the air, and then returning them to rest at my sides. Open my eyes. Close my eyes. Sometimes, the machine needed these baselines too. As I fulfilled its desires, I reminded myself how much money my cousins claim to make from this strangeness. A real man ought welcome all strangeness, so long as you can call that strangeness work: so long as it leaves your pockets fatter, your debts lighter, make your child happier, give you a real reason to be on this earth... then brother you better work so long.

The machine sat me down. Connected to the desk was an adjustable chin rest; a cold metal rod with a wooden plank attached on top. I slouched forward as I sat to keep my head on that plank, and my neck from straining any longer. My arms bent ninety degrees at the elbow so they could operate the keyboard necessary for this segment of the brain wave scan. When prompted, I told it twelve different stories from twelve different memories; typing...typing... typing...

I cycled through all the machine’s tasks. The screen would set and rise, I would stand and sit. Whenever I thought I had seen just about all the machines instructions, a new one revealed itself. Today, the EEG headset sounded a jarring BEEP that the machine told me to listen to, before a soft buzz. Shush. Thud. Pop. I knew the machine must be greedy, desiring every brainwave I can offer. When the man opened the metal door at the end of the day, I cursed the screen. As he unbuckled the reader from my skull, I tapped my feet and rubbed my hands and winced quietly the way a full-to-bursting bladder makes you. The engineer then pats me on the shoulder for another good day’s work. He speaks with his back turned away from me, staring at the smaller screen of his laptop. My head also bows to face the screen. He shows me the wages that have been transmitted to my account, and then raises his hand toward the exit. I, I know what I want to say to him today, what I’ll want to scream to him tomorrow. I say...I say.....

“Thank you.”