Most of the psombies here were people incarcerated for crimes, their minds and proxxi disconnected from their bodies as they waited out their sentences in multiverse prisonworlds. Even in paradise, we needed correctional services. Their bodies were consigned to community work around Atopia in the interim, safely guided by automated psombie-minders.
While most of the psombies here were inmates, an increasing number were people who donated their bodies for community work while they flitted off and amused themselves in the multiverse. These people judged their bodies to be without enough value to even warrant leaving their proxxi to inhabit them. They’d effectively given up their physical selves.
“We’d better start a new special file on Patricia,” he said after a pause.
It wasn’t my place to argue. We continued walking.
“Shimmer!” he called out to his proxxi, who materialized pacing beside us.
Shimmer was a perfectly androgynous creature. As a synthetic being, sex was superfluous in the biological sense but still critical in others. It was Shimmer’s ability to understand aspects of both genders and fluidly understand their emotional dynamics that had made Dr. Granger famous. It was his lifetime’s work, although most people whispered that it was based on taking credit for his graduate students’ efforts over the years.
“Yes, Dr. Granger?” Shimmer replied. “A new log entry on Dr. Killiam? It’s already done, sir.”
“Thank you, Shimmer,” replied Dr. Granger, smiling at his proxxi. “Now please, I need to speak with this young gentleman privately.”
“Yes, Dr. Granger.” Shimmer faded away.
Dr. Granger looked sideways at me while clasping his hands behind his back as we continued to walk.
“Do you really think it’s possible?” he asked, returning to our discussion. “I mean, with the technology we have now?”
“I do. The project has been going on for some time, as you well know, using some of your own work. Conscious transference—a lot of people have been working on it. But the trick, of course, is to get it right, for you to stay you in the process.”
“And if I agree to support you, to support this, you’ll make sure I’m the first?”
As good as medical technology was, there was always the risk of the unexpected, of some accident sending you, suddenly and irretrievably, into the forever of oblivion. Dr. Granger wasn’t as concerned about his actual life, however, as much as he was about the immortality of his fame.
“Yes,” I replied simply. “It will take some time, though certainly not before the commercial launch of pssi.”
“Good, good,” he said, apparently satisfied. He smiled at the mindless faces of a group of psombies that we passed. “You know, Jimmy, you’re always working, you should find yourself a nice girl, find some emotional balance.” He’d started into his EmoShow routine now, his face serious and concerned. “I’m sure a good-looking young man in your position must have girls throwing themselves at your feet. But you should find someone special.”
Saying nothing, I nodded and we continued on our walk down to his offices.
I’d already found someone special, but I wasn’t going to share that with him.
For a long time, I’d had my eye on Susie. She was a special soul, her emotions and sensations finely attuned, and I’d always felt like we shared a special bond. I’d known her as a fellow pssi-kid, but she’d come to my attention—and become a celebrity—as a teen when she’d turned herself into a living piece of installation artwork by mapping the emotional and physical state of each of the world’s ten billion souls into her pain system. She literally felt the world’s pain; a bloated stomach when the Weather Wars flared up in India, a burning calf for food riots in Rio, a painful pinprick when terrorists blew up a monorail transport in California.
Susie bravely bore the pain of the world like a Gandhi of the multiverse, imploring people to change their ways. Her impassioned pleas, featuring her painfully writhing nubile body, had been happily broadcast on obliging, bemused world news networks as the latest and greatest from the magical world of Atopia.
Her star had risen and, in turn, made her an object of both ridicule and inspiration. After a short while, though, the world had gotten bored and gone back to its media mainstay of killing and maiming.
For Susie, however, the project hadn’t been a fad, but her calling in life. Even when the world had turned off, she’d kept going. In the process, she’d gained a small but die-hard following of hippie flitterati that protected her from the harsh mockery of the world she reflected, forming an almost impenetrable sphere of free-floating flower children that inhabited the metaworlds around her, like petals on a suffering daisy.
I’d been trying to reach Susie for some time, but it was difficult to get through her protective entourage. I needed a way in. My security systems had recently flagged some unusual and illegal splintering activity from an old friend.
It seemed I had found a way.
“You’re in tight with Susie,” I explained at a lunch with Willy McIntyre.
The light dawned in Willy’s face, realizing why I’d asked to meet with him.
I’d kept the reason for our meeting secret, and upon arrival, I’d enclosed us in an extremely tight security blanket.
His needs began to spin the cranks behind his eyes.
“If you help me,” I suggested, “maybe I could help you.”
“Sure,” he replied slowly, trying to hide his greed. “And what do you think you might help me with?”
“I could help you,” I answered, “by getting access to higher-order splintering.”
“Oh yeah? So what, you could double my account settings or something?”
“Much, much more than that,” I laughed. “I could show you how to fix the system to have almost unlimited splintering. You’ll blow everyone else in the market away.”
He glanced at the glittering blue security blanket around us. “Nobody else knows what we’re talking about, right?”
“Absolutely, Willy. I’m the security expert, remember?”
10
Identity: Patricia Killiam
I wondered how many ways this unpleasant specimen of humanity had inflicted death upon his fellow man—fellow man being something of a stretch given his own state of being. That said, Sintil8 projected the image of an attractive and urbane gentleman, his elderly face smiling warmly from under a manicured wave of properly graying hair. Intelligent eyes sparkled at me darkly.
“Nice press conference today.” He flashed a mouthful of perfect teeth. “Such a wonderful thing you are doing, saving the world.”
The sarcasm was as thick as his Russian accent.
“Thank you,” I replied simply, refusing to rise to the bait.
We studied each other.
“So, Patricia, what exactly would you like me to find out for you?” he asked, his voice equal parts soothing and menacing.
“These storm systems, for one,” I replied cautiously. “I want to know if this is some kind of new weapon. It seems the sort of thing you’d know about.”
He laughed. “I see.”
We were sitting in a sumptuous penthouse atop one of his many skyscrapers dotting the landscape of New Moscow. Views from the top of the world stretched out brightly below us in the midday sunshine, and I caught glimpses of the Moskva River snaking out into the smoggy distance below.