I wrote a short-short science fiction story that appeared in the latest Business 2.0, as part of a feature that Pesco did on futuristic technology.
Rennie stood among the sculptural displays of ready-to-eats at D’Agostino’s, thinking There are way funner things for a 16-year-old to do on vacation in Manhattan than go grocery shopping. But that’s how it goes: Over lunch Dad had announced that he had to catch a supersonic back to California for a second lunch with clients. Come evening, Mom was so pooped from sightseeing without another adult to ride herd on Gemma, Rennie’s kid sister, that she crashed at the hotel with the brat and sent him out to buy dinner.
Rennie knew exactly what he wanted: a big tube of SteakyPaste Extreme! SteakyPaste was blue and swirled with gold, tasted better than a Big Mac, and gave Rennie hard, fast twitches that demanded he burn off his energy playing Ultima Extreme! Just try finding SteakyPaste at D’Agostino’s, though. The store didn’t even have aisles — it had sophisticated “food experience clusters” that made him feel 1 inch tall and a million miles from home.
He pushed purposefully past the shoppers and snatched up a blobby bag of Lynne Cheney’s Special Recipe Beef Burgundy. The dandruff of smartdust around him blinked and zizzed as the motes established a connection between his personal area network and the slippery packaging, which faded to white and then began to crawl with messages:
SPEW! BEEF BARFANDY — THE TIMSTER ORLANDO FL TRUSTED (*) — 100% CRUELTY-FREE PRINTED ORGANMEAT — VEGANCARNIVORE AUSTIN TX TRUSTED (***)