That Scottish Play

 

Is this a dagger

“Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me—”

 

“Stop what you’re doing, BAGEE.”

 

DAGEE rose from his folding chair in the darkened theater and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

 

BAGEE froze mid-gesture, one enormous metallic paw extended into empty air.

 

“Why?” BAGEE said, his voice modulator flattening the word into something halfway between confusion and irritation. “What did I do now?”

 

“It’s not what you did,” DAGEE sighed. “It’s what you’re not doing.”

BAGEE slowly lowered his paw.

 

“Like what? I’m reading the soliloquy exactly as requested.”

 

“That’s the problem. You’re reading it. You’re supposed to emote it. Macbeth is—”

 

BAGEE abruptly straightened.

“I thought you said we weren’t supposed to say his name. Something about bad luck.”

 

“You can say his name if you’re referring to the character,” DAGEE replied patiently. “You just can’t say the name of the play when you’re referring to the play.”

 

BAGEE tilted his massive head.

“But it’s the same word.”

 

From the front row, Cathy Gene burst into laughter.

“Are you two going to survive opening night?” she asked, wiping a tear from her eye.

 

“Of course we will,” DAGEE replied. “I just need BAGEE to loosen up a little instead of standing there like a monolith.”

 

“Well,” Cathy Gene said, gesturing toward the towering android, “you did give the lead role to a six-hundred-pound quadruped AI industrial unit. When he stands upright he’s over nine feet tall.”

 

“I know,” DAGEE muttered. “But casting was limited.”

 

“Limited?” Cathy Gene leaned forward, grinning. “You have Larry, Curley, and Moe playing the three weird sisters.”

 

“They’re service droids,” DAGEE said defensively. “And they make excellent weird sisters.”

 

“And the Chancellor?”

 

“Lady Macbeth.”

 

Cathy Gene snorted. “You are absolutely asking for double, double, toil and trouble.”

 

“They’ll be fine,” DAGEE said, waving the concern away. “Now—back to the dagger.”

 

He turned toward BAGEE.

“Remember: Macbeth has just murdered Duncan. His mind is unraveling. The dagger is a hallucination. Fear, guilt, paranoia. Reach for it like your sanity depends on it.”

 

BAGEE processed this for several seconds.

Then he raised one massive paw.

“Understood.”

 

He stepped forward with surprising delicacy.

 

“Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.”

 

The giant android reached slowly into the air.

 

“I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.”

 

His servos began to tremble.

 

“Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight?…”

 

For the first time, something resembling genuine fear crept into his voice synthesizer.

 

DAGEE leaned forward in his seat.

“Yes… that’s it…”

 

BAGEE’s enormous frame began to shake.

 

“Or art thou but
A dagger of the mind—”

 

The theater doors burst open 

“OUT, DAMN SPOT!”

Chancellor Gates stormed down the aisle, scanning the room.

 

DAGEE slumped back in his chair.

“Chancellor… wonderful projection, but wrong scene.”

 

“Oh.” She blinked. “Sorry. My cat got out again.”

 

She pointed accusingly toward the stage.

 

“I could swear I saw her run in here.”

 

BAGEE slowly lowered his paw and stared at the empty air.

After a moment he spoke.

“Director.”

 

“Yes?”

 

“If I may ask…”

 

“What?”

BAGEE turned his massive head.

“If the dagger is imaginary… why is it currently licking my foot?”

 

From somewhere in the rafters came three metallic voices:

“Double, double—,” Said Larry

“Toil and trouble—” Said Curley

“Who let the cat out” Said Moe. 

DAGEE rolled his eyes.

“Places, everyone,” then he muttered under his breath. “This production is cursed.”

 

This story was written for the Flash Fiction Friday prompt Monologues and Monoliths on Tumblr.

Thanks for Reading

TTFN

Frank aka Foxxfyrre