THE MOMENT
"Well well well...," a voice spoke as the screen came to life. A golden, faceless mannequin in a red suit stood on a white background. His arms were crossed and he stared down at Justin from the wall-sized monitor. The mannequin himself was almost as tall on screen as Justin was in real life. There were no eyes on the figure, only slight indentations where they should be, and he had no mouth. A single point hinted at a nose; but, despite his lack of features, Justin felt very much that he was being studied. After an extended silence, the figure sighed and slumped his shoulders. "...Well?" he asked.
"... are you talking to me?" Justin asked aloud as his mind tried to process the situation. He'd been on the lookout for medical supplies and food; but, he might have found something that could help a lot more.
"Technically, you called me; so, YOU are talking to me and it's already taking too long. What do you want?" the figure asked.
"Who... what are you?" Justin asked. He'd already assumed the mannequin was an AI creation; but, he was curious if the AI itself knew that.
"Why are you calling people you don't know?" the AI asked. But, this time, he leaned forward closer to the screen as if to get a better look at Justin. "Wait a minute, you're not with the military. I can't answer your questions until I know who you are," it said.
"My name's Justin, I'm a scavenger. There hasn't been a military in over 75 years...," he answered with a shake of his head.
"HA!!!" the mannequin blurted out, followed by several smaller chuckles. "Sorry, it just makes me happy when I'm right!" he giggled, then cleared his throat.
"My name is Helios, I am an AI operating on behalf of the most powerful corporation in existence: Sharp Development," he said.
"Sorry...," Justin shook his head. "Corporations fizzled out before the military. I've never heard of Sharp Development, I doubt they're around anymore."
"Well, I'm here, so clearly you're wrong," Helios replied. "Sharp Development is a multiversal corporation. We have branches on millions of alternate Earths. We tried to open on this Earth; but, your military leaders didn't want any of our help."
"Alternate Earths are... real?" Justin asked. The question almost felt silly coming out, as if he already believed in parallel realities. He decided that question could wait and chose a more important one. "What kind of help were you offering?"
"Resources," Helios shrugged. "Anything you need, Sharp Development can give you. We trade in everything."
"What??" Justin asked. A brief flash of doubt crossed his mind. Had he actually died when he entered the base? "And the military didn't want your help??
"Something something...," Helios spoke with a casual, dismissive tone as his body changed shape. He morphed from the mannequin in red to a short, stocky, silver-haired army general with a wall of ribbons pinned to his chest. "We don't need no handouts...," Helios was in the shape of the man long enough to make his comment before he morphed back to himself.
"We DO need your help!" Justin nodded eagerly. "Our settlement is barely hanging on." If Helios was telling the truth, Sharp Development sounded like they could help the whole world, not just his settlement. But, he wanted to start small and make sure he got help for those closest to him.
"Ah, so you want to take advantage of all that Sharp Development has to offer?" Helios asked with a smile in his voice, if not on his face. Justin was already growing used to Helios speaking without a mouth.
"Yes, please!" Justin nodded.
"Now we're talking!" Helios replied. Justin watched Helios reach into a floating black hole that appeared next to him. He withdrew a red clipboard, then shoved it into a second hole. Justin was so distracted that he didn't realize a golden, red-sleeved hand was sticking out of a black hole next to him with the same clipboard. "Just fill these out and we'll get you squared away," Helios said. Justin accepted the red clipboard and matching pen and began going over the forms. He read through them before signing anything. And, he was glad he did.
"You want my soul??" Justin asked.
"What?" Helios looked surprised, then shook his head. "Oh, sorry, I reused the forms I had ready from the last time. We've updated our policies since then." He reached out of the black hole again to take the clipboard from Justin. Within seconds, he handed him a new clipboard. He scanned the fine print again; but, it made no mention of soul ownership.
"Wel...," Justin sighed and nodded to himself after studying it for several minutes. "...it should be alright if you don't take souls anymore...," he chuckled as he leaned over to sign it on the dusty desk. It was meant more as a joke than anything; but, Helios replied anyway.
"Oh no, we still do," Helios said. "We've established more generous policies; but, souls are just like any other commodity. And, as I said, Sharp Development trades in everything."