Science Fiction - Daily Short Stories
The Success Machine - Henry Slesar
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- 23 Sep 2024
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The Success Machine, by Henry Slesser The personnel of AT&T winked, chittered, chortled, chuckled, and burped a card into the slot. Callahan picked it up and closed his eyes in prayer, "Oh Lord, let this one be all right." He read the card, "It was pink," subject, 34-580, aptitude rating, 3-4-5-7-7, psychological class 45, last personal, VAC analysis, 3-5-9-8, rating 19, current rating 14, analysis, subject demonstrates decreased mechanical coordination, decrease in work energy per man hour, marked increase in waste motion due to subject's interest in non-essential activities, such as horse racing, indication of hostility towards superiors, recommendation, fire him. Callahan's legs went weak. He sat down and placed the card in front of him. Then, making sure he was unobserved, he broke a company rule and began to think. "Something's wrong," he thought. "Something is terribly wrong. Twenty-four pink cards in the last month, twenty-four out of forty, that's a batting average of..." he tried to figure it out with a pencil, but gave it up as a bad job. "Maybe I'll run it through the average OVAC," he thought. "But why bother? It's obvious that it's high, there's obviously something wrong." The intercom beeped. "Ten o'clock department head meeting, Mr. Callahan." "All right, Miss Blanche." He rose from his chair and took the pink card with him. He stood before the action-shoot for a moment, tapping the card against his teeth. Then his back stiffened with a sense of duty, and he slipped the card inside. The meeting had already begun when Callahan took his appointed place. Grim switch, the material OVAC operator, looked at him quizzically. "Damn your eyes, Grim switch," he thought, "is no crime to be three minutes late. Nothing but a lot of pep talk for his five minutes anyway." "Pep!" said President Moss at the end of the room. He slammed his little white fist into the palm of his other hand. "It's only a little word. It only has three little letters, P-E-P-Pep." Moss, standing at the head of the impressive conference table, leaned forward and eyed them fixedly. But those three little letters, my friends, spelled out a much bigger word, a much bigger word for General Products Incorporated, they spell profit. And if you don't know how profit is spelled, it's M-O-N-N-E-Y. There was an appreciative laugh from the assembled apartment heads. Callahan, however, was still brooding on the parade of pink cards which had been emerging with frightening regularity from his think-machine, and he failed to get the point. "Naughty, naughty," Grim switch whispered with to him archly, "Boss made a funny. Don't forget to laugh, old boy." Callahan threw him a Sub-Zero look. "Now let's be serious," said the boss, "because things are serious. Some where, some how, somebody's letting us down." The department heads looked uneasily at each other. Only Grim switch continued to smile vacantly at the little old man up front, drumming his fingers on the glass table-top. When the president's machine-gunning glance caught his eyes, Callahan went white. "Does he know about it?" he thought. "I'm not making accusations," said Moss, "but there is a let-down someplace. Douglas," he snapped. Douglas, the treasurer, did a jack-in-the-box. "Read the statement," said the president. "First quarter, physical year," said Douglas dryley, "investment capital $17,836,975,238.96, $84,967,442,279.55, liabilities $83,964,283,774,60, production costs are Moss waved his hand impatiently. "The meat, the meat," he said, Douglas adjusted his glasses. "Total net revenue, $26,876,924.99. On paracen," the president screamed, "let's have last first quarter, you idiot!" Douglas rattled the paper in annoyance. Last first quarter, fiscal year met revenue, $34,955,376.81, percent decreased, never mind. The little old man waved the treasurer to his seat with a weary jester. His face, so much like somebody's grandmother, looked tragic as he spoke his next words. "You don't need the account of act to tell you the significance of those figures, gentlemen." His voice was soft with a slight quaver. "We are not making much PROFIT. We are losing M-O-N-E-Y, and the point is, what's the reason? There must be some reason." His eyes went over them again, and Callahan feeling like the culprit slumped in his chair. "I have a suggestion," said the president, "just an idea. Maybe some of us are just not showing enough P-E-P." There was a hushed silence. The boss pushed back his chair and walked over to a cork blind wall. With a dramatic jester, he lifted one arm and pointed to the white sign that covered a fourth of it. "See that?" he asked, "what does it say?" The department heads looked dubious. "Well, what does it say?" repeated Moss. "Act!" the department heads cried in chorus, "exactly!" said the little old man with a surprising bellow. "Act! The word that made us a leader! The word that guides our business destiny! The word that built general products!" He paced the floor. The chairs in the conference room creaked as the department heads stirred to follow him with their eyes. "Act! Is our motto! Act! Is our password! Act! Is our key to success! And why not? The brains do the thinking! All of us put together couldn't think so effectively, so perfectly, so honestly as the brains. They take the orders, designate raw materials, equipment, manpower, they schedule our work, they analyze our products, they analyze our people." Kallahan trembled. "There's only one important function left to us, and that's ACT!" The president bowed his head and walked slowly back to his seat. He sat down with great fatigue evident in his voice. He concluded his polemic. "That's why we must have pep, gentlemen, pep. Now, how do you spell it? P-E-P-P!" roared the department heads. The meaning was over. The department heads filed out. Kallahan's secretary placed the morning mail on his desk. There was a stack of memos at least an inch thick, and the personal manager moaned at the sight of it. " Production report doesn't look too good," said Miss Blanche crisply. "That we get a flood of aptitude cars from Morgan today. Grim switches sent over a couple. That makes eleven from him this month. He really has his problems." Kallahan grunted. He deserves him, he thought. "How did the meeting go?" "Huh?" Kallahan looked up. "Oh, fine, fine. Boss was in good voice, as usual. I think there's an envelope from him in the stack." "What?" Kallahan hoped that his concern wasn't visible. He riffled through the papers hurriedly and came up with a neat white envelope engraved with the words "Office of the President." Miss Blanche watched him, frankly curious. "That'll be all," he told her curly. When she had left he ripped the envelope open and read the contents. It was in Moss's own cramped handwriting, and it was a request for a three o'clock "Man to Man" talk. "How, Lord," he thought, "now it's going to happen." President Moss was eating an apple. He ate so greedily that the juice spilled over his chin. Sitting behind his massive oak desk, chair tilted back, apple juice dappling his whiskers, he looked so small and unformidable that Kallahan took heart. "Well, Ralph, how goes it?" He called me Ralph, thought Kallahan cheerfully. "He's not such a bad old guy." "Don't grow apples like they used to," the President said. "This hydroponic stuff can't touch the fruit we used to pick. Say, did you ever climb a real apple tree and knock them off the branches?" Kallahan blinked. "No, sir. Great as Thrill in the world. My father had an orchard in Kennebunkport. Apples by the million. Green apples, sweet apples, delicious by Baldwin," he sighed. "Something's gone out of our way of life, Ralph." "Why, he's just an old deer," thought Kallahan. He looked at the boss with new sympathy. "Funny thing about apples?" "My father used to keep them in barrels down in the basement. He used to say to me, 'Andrew,' he'd say, 'Don't never put a sour apple in one of these barrels,' 'cause just one sour apple can spoil the whole darn lot." The boss looked at Kallahan and took a big noisy bite. Kallahan smiled and namely, was Moss making some kind of point. "Well, we can't sit around all day in reminisce, say Ralph. Much as I enjoy it. But we got a business to run, don't we?" "Yes, sir," said the personnel manager. "Mighty big business, too." "How's your side of it, Ralph?" "Old personnel of that comin' along nicely." "Yes, sir," said Kallahan, wondering if he should voice his fears about the brain. "Marvelous machine, that. Most marvelous of them all," he asked me, "sizes up a man beautifully. And best of all, it's one hundred percent honest. That's a mighty important quality, Ralph." The man was getting worried. The boss's conversation was just a little too folksy for his liking. "Yes, sir, a mighty fine quality. My father used to say, Andrew, an honest man can always look you in the eyes." Kallahan stared uncomprehensibly. He realized that Moss had stopped talking so he looked him squarely in the eyes and said, "He must have been a fine man, your father." "He was honest," said Moss, "I'll say that for him. He was as honest as they come. Did you ever hear of DiMaggio?" "It sounds familiar. It should. DiMaggio was a legendary figure. He took a lander and went out into the world looking for an honest man. And do you know something? He couldn't find one. You know, Ralph, sometimes I feel like DiMaggio." Kallahan gulped. "And do you know why? Because sometimes I see a thing like this." The boss's hand reached into the desk and came out with a thick bundle of pink cards. "And I wonder if there's an honest man left in the world." He put the cards in front of Kallahan. "Now, sir," said Moss, "let's talk a little business. These cards are all pink. That means dismissal, right? That's twenty-four people fired in the last month. Is that correct?" "Yes, sir," said Kallahan unhappily, "and how many cards went through the personnel of act this month?" Forty. "So that's twenty-four out of forty. A batting average of…" The boss's brow puckered. "Well, never mind. But that's quite an unusual record, wouldn't you say so?" "Yes, sir, but so unusual that it would call for immediate action, wouldn't it?" The president's face was now stormy. "Yes, sir, but I checked the brain. Did you, Ralph?" "Yes, sir, and the maintain of acts that it was perfect. There's nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong. You call twenty-four firings out of forty-nothing?" The old man stood up, still holding the core of his apple. "Well, I don't understand it either, Mr. Moss. Kallahan felt due on his forehead. Nothing seems to satisfy the brain any more. It seems to develop higher and higher standards or something. Why, I'm not sure it wouldn't even fire." "Who?" said Moss, thunderously. "Who wouldn't it even fire?" The thunder hit Kallahan squarely. He swallowed hard and then managed to say, "Anybody, sir, me, for instance." The president's face suddenly relaxed. "I'm no tyrant, my boy. You know that. I'm just doing a job. That's all." "Did I hear you're shopping for a car because I've been at it for ages? Such a time-suck, right?" "Not really. I bought it on Carvana, super convenient." "Oh, then comes all the financing, research, am I right?" "Well, you can, but I got pre-qualified for a Carvana auto loan in, like, two minutes." "Yeah, but then all the number-crunching in terms, right?" "Nope, I saw real numbers as I shopped, found my dream car, and got it in a couple of days." "Wait, like you already have it?" "Yep." "Hmm. Go to Carvana.com to finance your car the convenient way." "Hey, your job. Do you ever have to deal with a nose roller? How about a snub bully? Well, if you're installing a new conveyor belt system, dealing with the different components can sound like you're speaking a foreign language. Luckily, you've got a team ready to help. Granger's technical product specialists are fluent in maintenance, repair, and operations, so whenever you want to talk shop, just reach out. Call clickgranger.com or just stop by. Granger, for the ones who get it done." "Of course, sir. Well, all I want you to do is keep your eye on things. It could be a coincidence, of course. It's the logical explanation. He narrowed his eyes. What do you think, Ralph?" "Me, sir," said Ralph, wide-eyed, "I don't think, sir. I act, sir. Good boy!" The boss chuckled and clapped his hand on Callahan's shoulder. Moss was momentarily satisfied. The personella vac burped. Callahan picked up the car with a groan. It was pink. He walked over to the action chute and dropped it inside. As it fluttered down below, Callahan shook his head sadly. "Thirty-one," he said. He placed the next personnel record into the information chamber. He flipped the lever and the personnel vac, now hot with usage. Winked, chittered, chortled, and chuckled with amazing speed. The burp was almost joyful as the card popped out. But Callahan's face was far from joyful as he picked it up. "Pink." "Thirty-two," he said. The next card was from Grim Switch's department. It was subject number 52098. The number was familiar. Callahan decided to check the file. "Sam Gilchrist," he said, "couldn't be anything wrong with Sam, while he's a blinkin' genius. Flip, wink, chitter, chortled, chuckle, burp." "Pink." "Poor Sam," said Callahan. He fed the other records through quickly. "Pink. Pink. Pink." At the end of the day, Callahan worked laboriously with a blunt-pointed pencil. It took him fifteen minutes for the simple calculation. "Sixty-seven tests, twenty-three-okay, forty-four." Callahan put his hands to his head. "What am I going to do?" Grim Switch followed Callahan down the hall as he came out of the boss's office for the third time that week. "Well," he said fortuitously, "quite the teachers pet these days, eh, Callahan?" "Go away, Grim Switch." "On the carpet, eh, temper a little short, don't worry." Grim Switch's beefy hand made unpleasant contact with the personnel man's shoulder. "Your old friends won't let you down." "Grim Switch, will you please leave me alone?" "Better watch that think machine of yours," Grim Switch chuckled, "might fire you next, old boy." Callahan was glad when Morgan, the production operator, hailed Grim Switch away. But as he entered his own office, Grim Switch's words still troubled him. Grim Switch, he thought that fat piece of garbage, that big blow-hard, that know-it-all. Almost savagely, he picked up the day's personnel cards and flipped them carelessly. Grim Switch, that louse, he thought. Then he had the idea. If Grim Switch was still chewing the fat with Morgan, then his secretary would be alone. If he called her and asked for Grim Switch's record, no better yet, got Miss Blanche to call. Why not, he thought, after all, I am the personnel manager. Sure it's literally irregular, he is a department head, but it's my job, isn't it? Callahan flipped the intercom and proceeded to call Miss Blanche. His hand shook as he placed Grim Switch's card into the personnel vac. The machine, though still heated by the day's activity, seemed to take longer than usual for its chittering, chuckling examination of the pin-holed facts on the record. Finally, it gave a satisfied burp and proffered the result to Collins' eager hand. "Aha!" cried the personnel man gleefully. He walked over to his desk, wrote a quick note on his memo pad and placed both the note and card into an envelope. He addressed it to "Office of the President," then he dropped it into the action-shoot. When it was out of sight, he rubbed his hands together in happy anticipation. When Miss Blanche announced that President Moss himself was in Callahan's outer lobby, the personnel manager spent a hasty minute in straightening up the paper debris on his desk. The old man came striding into the room, exhibiting plenty of PEP, and he seated himself briskly on Callahan's sofa. "Sharp eyes, Ralph," he said, "sharp eyes and a quick wit. This business demands it. That was a sharp notion you had, doing a run-through on Grim Switch. Never trusted that back-slapping fellow." Callahan looked pleased, trying to do a job, sir. "Put your finger on it," said Moss. "Hit the nail on the head, it's just like my father said. Trees go dead on the top." "Callahan," the boss leaned forward confidentially, "I've got an assignment for you. Big assignment." "Yes, sir," said Callahan eagerly. "If Grim Switch is a sour apple, maybe other department heads are too. And who knows? It knows," Moss pointed a finger at the personnel of ACK. "I'm rounding up all the aptitude records of the department heads. They'll be in your hands in the next couple of days. Feed 'em in, root 'em out, spot the deadwood, Callahan. Act." "Act," echoed Callahan, his face flushed. The old man got up and went over to the brain. "The marvelous machine," he said, "honest, that's what I like about it." As Moss went out the door, Callahan could have sworn he saw the personnel of ACK wink. He walked over to it and fingered the lever. It was turned off, all right. It was an interesting week for Callahan. Morgan, the production man, was fired. Grim Switch came up to see the personnel man and tried to punch him in the nose. Fortunately, he was a little too drunk and the blow went wild. Sea Grum, the ship of ACK operator, was fired. Douglas, the treasurer, was permitted to keep his job, but the personnel of ACK issued a dire threat if improvement wasn't rapidly forthcoming. Wilson, the firm's oldest employee, was fired. In fact, seven out of General Products' twelve department heads were greeted by the ominous pink card. Callahan, no longer plagued by doubt, felt that life was definitely worth living. He smiled all the time. His memos were snappier than ever. His heels clicked merrily down the office hallways. He had P.E.P. Then, the most obvious thing in the world happened, and Callahan just hadn't foreseen it. His record card came up. "Have you run through the stack yet?" Miss Blanche asked. "Um, just about." Callahan looked at her guiltily. He pushed his glasses back on the bridge of his nose. "A couple more here," he said. "Well, we might as well finish up. Mr. Moss would like to have the schedule completed this afternoon. It will be. That's all, Miss Blanche." His secretary shrugged and left. Callahan went to the personnel of ACK with the record in his hand. The file number was six-thirty. "Don't let me down," he told the brain. He placed the pin-hold card into the machine and flipped the lever. It winked, chitter, chortled, and chuckled with almost sinister softness. When the card was burped out at the other end, Callahan took it out with his eyes firmly shut. He walked over to the action-shoot mechanically. His hand hesitated before he dropped it inside. Then he changed his mind, walked back to the desk, and tore the pink card into the smallest possible shreds. The intercom beeped. "Mr. Moss wants you," said his secretary. "Callahan?" "Yes, sir." "Don't ask so innocent, Callahan. Your report isn't complete. It should have been ready by now." "Yes, sir." "You're not acting, Callahan. You're stalling." "No, sir." "Then where's your personnel of ACK report, Callahan?" "Hey, where is it?" Callahan wrung his hands. "Almost ready, sir," he lied. "Just running it through now, sir." "Speed it up. Speed it up. Time's a wasting, boy. You're not afraid. Are you, Callahan?" "No, sir." "Then let's have it. No more delay. Bull-by-the-horns. Expected in an hour, Callahan. Understand?" "Yes, sir." The boss clicked off. Callahan groaned audibly. "What can I do?" he said to himself. He went to the brain and shook his fist helplessly at it. "Damn you!" he cursed. He had to think. He had to think. It was an effort. He jerked about in his swivel chair like a hooked fish. He beat his hands on the desktop. He paced the floor and tore at the roots of his hair. Finally, exhausted, he gave up and flopped ungracefully on the office sofa. Abandoning himself to the inevitable. At that precise moment, the mind being the perverse organ it is, he was struck by an inspiration. The maintain of acke bore an uneasy resemblance to Callahan's own think machine. Wilson, the oldest employee of general products, had been the operator of the maintenance brain. He had been a nice old duffer, Wilson always ready to do Callahan a favor. Now that he had been swept out in Callahan's own purge, the personnel manager had to deal with a new man named Lockwood. "Lockwood wasn't so easy to deal with. Stay out of my files, mister," he said. Callahan tried to look superior. "I'm the senior officer around here, Lockwood. Let's not forget that. Them files is my responsibility." Lockwood, a burly young man, stationed himself between Callahan and the file case. "I want to check something. I need the service records of my brain. Here's your requisition paper. "I haven't got time for that," said Callahan truthfully. "I need it now, you fool." Lockwood said his face like a rushmore memorial. "Be a good fellow, can't you?" Callahan quickly saw that wiggling wasn't the answer. "All right," he said, starting for the door, "I just wanted to help you." He opened the door just a crack. "Sure enough," Lockwood responded. "How do you mean help me?" "Didn't you know?" Callahan turned to face him. "I'm running through an aptitude check on the personnel of ACK. Special department head check, Mr. Moss's orders." "So?" "I was just getting around to yours. But I figured I'd better make sure the brain was functioning properly." He grew confidential. "You know, that darn machine has been firing everyone lately." A little rock slide began on Lockwood's stony face. "Well," he said, "if that's the case. I knew you'd understand," said Callahan very smoothly. Eagerly, the personnel manager collated the records of the personnel of ACK. They were far more complex than any employee record, and it took Callahan the better part of an hour. Any moment, he expected to hear the president's angry voice over the intercom. His anxiety made him fumble, but at last the job was done. He slipped the record marked by a galaxy of pinholes into the brain. "Now we'll see," he said grimly. "Now we'll find out what's eating this monster." He flipped the switch. The personnel of ACK winked. It was several minutes before it digested the information in his chamber. Then it chittered. It chortled. It chuckled. Callahan held his breath until the burp came. The card appeared. It read. Subject. P.V.8. Rating nine, nine, eight, seven, memory rating nine, nine, nine, five, last personal, vac analysis, none, current rating one hundred, analysis, subject operating at maximum efficiency, equipped to perform at peak level, is completely honest and does not exhibit bias, prejudice, or sentiment in establishing personnel evaluations, cumulative increase in mnemonic ability, analytic ability improving. Callahan walked slowly over to the action-shoot as he finished reading the card. However, it read, "Because of mechanistic approach to humanistic evaluation, subject displays inability to incorporate human equation in analytical computation, resulting in technically accurate but humanistically incorrect deductions, recommendation, fire him." Callahan dropped the pink card into the shoot. In half an hour, the action wheels of general products concluded their work, and the personnel of vac had went for the last time. The End of This Success Machine by Henry Schleser. Okay. You can do this. I know, I know, Karvana makes it so convenient to sell your car. It's just hard to let go. My car and I have been through so much together. But look, you already have a great offer from Karvana. That was fast. Well, I know my lessons played in my heart, and those questions were easy. They're almost there, now to just accept the offer and schedule a pick up or drop off. How'd you do it? How were you so strong in letting go of your car? Well, I already made up my mind, and Karvana's so easy. Oh, yeah. True. And sold. Go to Karvana.com to sell your car the convenient way. If you're a facilities manager at a warehouse, and your HVAC system goes down, it can turn up the heat. Literally. But don't sweat it, Granger has you covered. Granger offers over a million industrial-grade products for all your operations, including warehouse HVAC maintenance. And even better, they offer access to experts and fast delivery, so you and your warehouse can both keep your cool. Call 1-800-GRANGER, click Granger.com, or just stop by. Granger, for the ones who get it done.