THE BLADE RUNNER AMENDMENT (22 page)

“There is nothing to report in the news,” she advised.

Virgil turned again to see if the men would reappear, like deer between trees, but they didn’t and, after an extended moment, he gave up. The air thickened with implication and he envied Chloé, whose inner calm nothing could touch. If they were in a predicament without escape, it would be best to emulate her.

He ignored the presentiment of daring to walk into an open shark’s maw and went ahead with the question that came to him.

“Can you reverse call?”

Chloé understood he meant Jason and complied.

He watched her purse her lips, and allowed himself to believe she was more than a piece of technology, this embodiment of the most human in her creators – all who preceded and culminated in Humphrey. He reached a hand out to the realization of their dream – he’d changed his mind and wanted to bring a stop to the communication and draw her back from that world. But why didn’t she speak? He ought to take her away from this exposed beach and end their part in the whole Kafka narrative where some bodiless creature sustained itself. Its presence lurked in the air itself.

“Goodbye, Virgil.”

Whom did she obey?

His darling Chloé was on her feet. His eyes lifted from her pearly toes and she met his gaze, her look uncompromisingly gentle. Her tender smile claimed there were pleasures in the beach, the ageless sea, the scuffed sand, this final memory. It sweetly communicated her leave-taking of him. There was no resorting to old files. She was as good as gone – he’d seen it before – although her lover’s benediction appeared to linger. He closed in on himself, knowing when another’s thought process was final. There would be no recall for him.

Long afterwards, as he continued to look toward the ocean, something leaped from the water. Was that a porpoise out there or a dolphin? Could there be a school of them?

____________

At an undetermined age, the grandfather of Paul Xylinides fled Russia’s civil wars in the early 20th century and arrived in Greece where he fashioned a name for himself that was unique and yet of its place. Xylinides, translating as one occupied in some fashion or other with wood (ξύλο), now supplies the
nom de plume
for the author. He owes the sentiment of this borrowed name to a man whose choices in the face of historical upheaval and existential threat ultimately provided for the existence of himself and others. He died leaving no other record than his forged identity.

Wherever we find ourselves vast historical winds have deposited us and we remain either subject to their reach or within their unrelenting grip. Our study must be to free ourselves.

A youthful reading of
Crime and Punishment
decided Paul Xylinides on his life’s path as a writer. He knew he had aimed high seeking ultimately to produce works that looked to engage readers as Dostoevsky had him and countless others.

The Blade Runner Amendment
extrapolates from once deviant human behaviour and the state of present-day human robotics to society in the year 2040. The government has legislated against replicant bio-engineering and Virgil Woolf enjoys a cozy life with his old-line humanoid. Synthetic companionship has become the disruptive option in matters of the heart. When the latest model comes into Virgil’s life, however, entanglements arise and so do threats from political operatives who see her sophisticated capacities as a means to institute limitless influence.

Paul Xylinides resides in Montreal, Canada, and studied at McGill University, M.A. (English Literature).

Mentor: David G. Taylor, painter, teacher, writer (davidgeorgetaylor.com).

Also by the author:
An American Pope
and
The Wild Horses of Hiroshima

For further information on upcoming publications, visit
PaulXylinides.com

Follow the author on Twitter:
@
paulxylinides