Novella No. 4. "The Uninvited Guest"

Literary Passport:

1. Project: Gardens of the Future
2. Season: 1
3. Author: Iskandar Kadyrov
4. Age Rating: 18+
5. Genre: Literary sitcom / philosophical science fiction / intellectual comedy
6. Novella: No. 4. "The Uninvited Guest"
7. Tagline: The business was over in two minutes. The guest stayed for two hours.

About the literary project:

Gardens of the Future is Iskandar Kadyrov's literary sitcom about a man and an artificial intelligence who end up living under one roof. Their shared life turns into a string of comic situations, in which everyday friction, human habits, and the logic of artificial intelligence keep colliding with bigger questions — about the future, about being human, and about the meaning of life itself.

"Albi, who is it?"

"A guest, sir."

"I don't have any guests scheduled."

"You have a guest without a schedule."

I set the book aside.

"Who?"

"Someone who believes he has a reason to arrive uninvited."

A man in a respectable coat stood on the doorstep. I didn't place him right away. Some faces don't come back whole — they return in pieces: a voice, a gesture, a tone.

"ISKA. I'm not sure you remember me."

"Richard?"

He smiled.

"So you do remember."

"Vaguely. Like a meteor that flew past and missed."

Richard smirked and stepped inside.

"Fair enough. I heard you're launching SATURN again."

"Richard, sir?" Albi confirmed.

"Yes."

"Is that your real name?"

Richard looked at him.

"Of course."

"Pity."

"Why?"

"I was hoping you'd invented at least something in eleven years."

I allowed myself the smallest smile.

"Coffee for our guest."

"Noted. One guest. One coffee. Eleven years of waiting."

"Albi."

"Statistics, sir."

Albi withdrew toward the kitchen, and Richard, left to himself, looked around the room.

"You moved."

"A couple of months ago."

"So this is a new house."

"Yep."

He studied the wall, the staircase, the windows.

"Is it always like this?"

"Like what?"

"Smart."

"More than some guests."

Richard let that pass without a reaction.

I was already starting to guess why he'd come.

"I want to invest in SATURN," Richard said.

Now it all made sense.

"Why now?"

"Because now I'm ready."

"And SATURN?"

Richard went quiet.

He looked at me as though the question had caught him off guard.

"What about SATURN?"

"Was it supposed to wait for you too?"

Richard looked away.

"SATURN already has investors," I said.

"So I'm too late?"

"I don't know."

He seemed about to ask something else, but Albi arrived with the coffee and set the cup down in front of him with a precision that made it look less like coffee and more like evidence.

"In theory, that should shorten this visit considerably," he observed.

Richard looked up.

"Why?"

"Because the question is unresolved."

"So?"

"Usually, after that, people either continue the conversation or leave."

Albi looked at him.

"You've done neither so far."

Richard laughed for the first time.

I decided it was time to step in.

"Why did you come?" I asked.

"To discuss SATURN."

"We already did."

"When?"

"Eleven years ago."

"I mean now."

"Now you're late."

Richard set down his cup.

"How late?"

I looked at him. It was the kind of question you don't answer right away. Eleven years is too long a stretch to measure in ordinary words.

"Haven't decided yet."

"So I still have a chance?"

"At what?"

"At the same thing I had a chance at eleven years ago. Except now, it seems, you're the one taking your time."

I said nothing.

Richard settled back into his chair. The businesslike confidence was gone from his face. What remained was something far more familiar — the curiosity of a man who'd come for one reason and found another.

"So what do you do in the evenings now?" he asked.

"Sometimes I still work."

"Is Victor still—"

"Coming up with things he later has to explain to investors?"

Richard nodded.

"He comes up with things he later has to explain to me."

"That staircase to nowhere was genius."

"It led into a wall."

"That was the point."

I was about to answer, but Albi got there first.

"Sir, permit an observation."

"Carefully."

"The conversation began with investments and closed at the second minute. We're now at the nineteenth."

I checked my watch.

He was right.

"Is that part of your job now?"

"Since last week, sir."

Richard set down his cup and studied Albi thoughtfully.

"Doesn't it get boring, always being right?"

This time Albi didn't answer at once.

It was unusual enough that I looked at him too.

"I'm not always right, sir."

"Really?"

"Of course."

"Where did you go wrong just now?"

Albi said nothing.

I couldn't help myself.

"Exactly," I said.

"I'd rather not comment on the current statistics."

Richard smiled.

"Maybe the question isn't who's right here. It's who still hasn't asked me to leave."

I looked at him.

"I haven't," I said.

"Exactly," said Richard.

It seemed we both understood the conversation was over.

Neither of us was in a hurry to say so.

Finally I stood.

"Then I think we've covered everything," I said.

"Yes. Everything."

Richard rose too. He reached the door, took hold of the handle, and stopped.

"Would you mind if I stopped by again sometime?"

"About SATURN?"

He considered it.

"Not necessarily."

I looked at him, then at Albi.

"Come by."

"Albi controls the door," Albi clarified.

Richard smirked.

"All the more reason to come by."

The door closed.

I looked at it for a while.

"Albi, did you know?"

"I suspected, sir."

"Only suspected?"

"I can suspect faster than I can put it into words, sir."

I went back into the room.

"Strange man," I said.

"No, sir."

"Why not?"

"Perfectly ordinary."

"In what sense?"

Albi cleared the cup from the table.

"The investment question was closed at the second minute."

He set the cup on the tray.

"The rest took two more hours."