Date: March 15, 2026
From: donotreply@un253results.gov
Subject: United Nations A/RES/78/253 Employment Aptitude Exam,
Results, Howard R. Roark
Body: It is our unpleasant duty to inform you that you have not scored
highly enough in the
mandatory employment aptitude exam to become eligible for
employment. As this is a broad spectrum test that measures not only
current ability to generate new and original thought, but also your potential for future creative ideas,
there is no option to retake the exam.
This email will be followed by others with additional information on how to subscribe to basic
subsistence as mandated by the same UN resolution 78/253.
Please do not reply to this email.
After re-reading it several time, Howard put his phone back in his pocket. Pulling down the brim of his hat, he shrugged into the bitter wind blowing down the New York City canyons and headed back to his apartment.
As he walked, he considered his options. The traditional path to architecture was now closed to him. With this tagged to his social security number, no one would consider him for a university slot, much less hire him to build something. For that matter, no one would employ him for anything. Not architecture, not drafting, not coding, not picking up trash. All of the mindless jobs had been handed over to machines: construction, cleaning, crop picking, everything. The only thing left that required a human at the controls were things that required a spark of the creative and most of those worked around the question, "What should the robots do?" The UN Aptitude Exam, the 253, was designed to discover those among the teaming masses best able to answer that question. It had determined that Howard was not one of those people.
He could close himself into his apartment for the remainder of his life. Many did. They watched the shows put out by the Vid-bots. They participated in the discussions hosted by the Mod-bots. They ate the food put out by the Chef-bots. The only thing that got them off the couch was to clean themselves and occasionally their apartments. The Shower-bots and Sweep-bots were not economical for the subsistence class. For many it was freedom. Freedom to want nothing, to expect nothing, but to depend on everything.
"I am," Howard muttered to himself, "a man who does not depend on others." And so locking himself in his studio with only his murphy bed for company was not an option. Not for Howard.
He had heard of others who had headed out to the wilds. What was left of them. Places where others were not. Northern Quebec. Eastern Siberia. Atacama. Places that no one wanted to live. Places where it was hard to live. Hard to find shelter. Food. Water. He had heard that most who tried, failed. He had also heard, however, that those that succeeded, well, they stood alone against the others of their time.
One in particular had gone out, sending back only his name.
Howard asked himself, "Who is Rick Deckard?"
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