The problem with the man, he had decided, was that the man's teeth were far too white. Whiter than his lab coat. Not even the white that you would find in a teeth whitening commercial, nor even in a bleach commercial. No, when the man smiled, his teeth looked like pristine blank paper. Like spaces unused.

"Mr. Clerke?" the paper-teeth man said.

Clerke put down the magazine he had been pretending to read. "Yes?"

The paper-teeth man smiled and exposed those holes in the world. "Excellent," he said, briskly making a check mark with the stylus on the tablet he held. "Thank you so much for waiting. I'm Dr. Dowland, and I am so glad to meet you. Right this way, if you please."

Dr. Dowland showed him past the small nurses' station and into a series of faceless corridors. As he spoke, Clerke couldn't help but notice that no matter how many turns they took further into the facility, the corridors looked the same. The same black and white alternating titles, like a sliver of a chessboard. The same framed painting on the wall: bored and abstract boats in a harbor. How will I ever find my way out again? he thought.

"I'm sure they explained how Project Thamyris works, yes?"

Clerke nodded, then added when he realized that Dowland, walking ahead of him, would not see, "As much as I needed to know, I guess."

He could hear the paper-teeth. Hear the nothing of them even though he could not see them. Dowland said, "Yes, the two most important things to remember are one: that the procedure is very short, and two: the procedure is practically painless. Here we are."

They were in a room not unlike any doctor's examination room, albeit one that had a chair. It was like a dentist's chair or an optometrist's chair but with nothing in the way of arms that would swivel in to provide service. There was just the device hanging from the ceiling above the chair. It would come down, then it would go back up again, just like the video.

"Please have a seat," Dowland instructed, paper-teeth all at attention. Once seated, he handed Clerke the tablet and the stylus and tapped a space on the screen. "There," Dowland pointed, "are the bids that we've received and accepted on your behalf. I don't mind telling you that you're one of the best we've had in the project in some time. You should be proud."

Clerke looked at the figures on the screen. I should be proud, Clerke thought. And then thought it again for good measure.

"Once the procedure is complete, the payments will be electronically delivered to your accounts per our agreement," Dowland said, like an automaton. Like a speech rehearsed specifically not to sound rehearsed, echoing through an uncanny valley. "And of course, there are royalty payments should anything directly related to your extractions be put to use. They will be delivered automatically as well, should the time arise." Pause. A rehearsed to be unrehearsed pause. "If you have no questions, please sign on the space."

Clerke did so. I should be proud, he thought.

Dowland smiled again, then began to lower the machine. "Relax, Mr. Clerke. It will all be over in just a moment."

- - -

When Clerke walked in the front door of his apartment, he put his hat on the top of the rack, then removed his coat and hung it up as well. He put his briefcase down by the front door and loosened his tie.

Directly adjacent to the foyer, his wife was sitting at the kitchen table, reading glasses perched on her nose. She did not look up as he approached. She was reading through one of her books. "How did it go at the dentist?" she asked.

Clerke stopped, one hand on the icebox handle. "Dentist?"

"You said you were going to the dentist tonight. Everything all right with your teeth, then?"

Clerke resumed, poured himself a glass of milk. "Teeth?" Something about teeth. "Yes. My teeth are fine." He stood in the kitchen and drank half the glass. He placed on the table, then placed his hand over his wife's belly. "How is he?" Clerke asked.

"Restless," she said, not looking up. "Always restless."

Clerke nodded, "Is Liana in bed?"

His wife nodded. He kissed the back of her head, then walked down the short hall into Liana's bedroom. Her bed was up on posts, to give her more room to play. A ladder led up to the bed and to a place to sit beside the bed. She blinked at him slowly. The city's lights blinked at him through the blinds. Sleepy. "Hi Daddy."

"Hi honey," he said, smiling. "All ready for bed?"

"Uh-huh," she said, "I was waiting for my story."

His smile faltered a little. "Your story?"

"You know, daddy," she said, "our story. Last night the hero had reached the tower. What happens next? Did he find the princess?"

Clerke's brow furrowed a bit. "He…" He looked about a bit. "We'll talk about the hero's story some more…another night. Daddy's very tired. Why don't we…read through a regular fairy tale tonight?"

She gave a low awww, but was too tired to put up much fight.

He plucked a book from the shelf under the bed and climbed the ladder, then sat in his place. He opened the book and thought distractedly, as he flipped through to find the right story, that at some point in the past this had felt like being in a cockpit. What a funny thing to have thought, he thought.

He smiled at his daughter and put a hand on her forehead. "I should be proud," he said. Then he cleared his throat, and read her a fairy tale. A regular one.