A New You by Travis Koll
Sansa's life is going nowhere, so she resorts to a trendy new technology that will give her a new start.
"No more illness. No more old age. No more worrying about the future." The commercial was everywhere.
Synaptic Transference.
Sansa knew at least a dozen people who'd gone through the procedure in the last year alone; and many more likely would, now that the federal government was offering low-interest loans to any would-be "Transfers." She couldn't blame them. Jamie, one of her coworkers, decided to go through with it after doctors found that mass in her intestines. Elena, from down the street, went in and got it done when rheumatoid arthritis finally put her in a wheelchair, and now she had the strength and speed of an Olympic athlete. Even Sansa's brother, Jeremiah, ended up getting the transfer, certain it would help him get out of his job in the warehouse and into modeling - his dream career. Relocating one's consciousness to a machine wasn't a decision to make lightly, but its appeal couldn't be easily dismissed.
"Ten million people have already chosen to take themselves to the next level," the commercial said, as perfect, smiling faces flashed across the screen. "People who used to be ordinary just like you."
In truth, Sansa had been considering getting the procedure for months, and not because of some illness or employment issue. Standing in a towel and staring at herself in a steamed-up bathroom mirror, she studied her face and wondered if she should go through with it. Red splotches across her cheeks, a plump and crooked nose, lips and hair thinner with every passing year: her mother would've called such concerns vanity, but this was the same woman who'd undergone two facelifts and three rhinoplasties before she hit fifty. Besides, the transfer would be an investment in Sansa's future. Insurance companies were already denying operations like organ transplants and heart surgery, insisting that these were no longer medically necessary now that Synaptic Transference was a reality. Why wait until she got sick or injured before making the leap? Better to spend her money on an ageless, illness-proof body than on endless hospital bills or a nice coffin.
A text from Allen interrupted her thoughts. "Hiya, babe. U dun being a bitch yet? Ready to get bak together? Cant do no better and U know it."
Groaning, she swiped the message away, wishing she could do the same to their two-year relationship. If she could even really call it that. Is him coming over a few nights a week and leaving before dawn a genuine relationship? That's why she ended it, but Allen apparently wasn't taking her seriously, not that he ever had before. Same went for most people. Maybe a new body and an augmented brain would change that.
The next morning, Sansa took a car to the clinic, which was mobbed by protestors shouting insults at anyone who entered. "Techie whore! Digital slut! Good luck getting your brain back from those bot-loving butchers!" Security officers did their best to keep the crowd back, but that didn't stop several from pelting her with bits of broken circuit boards. Seriously, who throws circuits?
Putting her head down, Sansa apologized her way past the mob, rushed inside, and waited in a busy lobby for her turn with the doctor. Allen's messages regularly popped up in her phone's notifications, as did texts from her mother chiding her for rejecting "the one decent guy who's ever shown real interest in you. Who might even marry you some day." Obviously, the two had been talking again, just like the last time they'd broken up.
"He may not be perfect, sweetheart, but neither are you," her mother said during a call just after the first breakup. "I just don't want you to end up alone like me. Let's not throw away a good thing because of unrealistic standards."
Sansa harrumphed and fought the urge to hang up. "He tell you about the others? About Lisa? Megan? Some woman at his office?"
Her mother paused before answering. "I know it hurts, but what's the alternative? Living by yourself for the rest of your life? Watching yourself get older and older, and just spending every night watching holo stories on your computer?"
It took some convincing, but, as she'd done her whole life, Sansa eventually caved. She took Allen back, pretended she was happy about it, even deluded herself into believing he was a good, albeit misunderstood guy. Unfortunately, unless she did something drastic, she knew this time would be no different.
Soon, a tall and lean woman with impeccable skin approached and introduced herself as Dr. Gabriel. "So wonderful to meet you, Sansa. Ready to change your life?"
Stammering, Sansa peered out the window at the still raging mob. Despite the tinted glass, one protestor - a middle-aged man in a Navy peacoat - appeared to be staring right at her. He held a sign that read "Machine Life is an Oxymoron You Moron!" though the home-scrawled letters made it difficult to decipher.
"This scares some people," Dr. Gabriel said, following her gaze. "But the real question is, does it scare you?"
Sansa turned away from the window. "Most things do, I suppose."
Her phone rang. A call from Allen. She declined it.
Dr. Gabriel sat in the chair beside her. "It's nothing to be ashamed of. The result of a few overactive neurons. A slight imbalance of the chemicals in your brain. Maybe genetics that go back a thousand years. Hardly your fault for feeling that way."
"Not if you ask my mother."
"You mean Abigail? Lives at 401 Ruppert Road. Mother of Leslie, Jeremiah, and Sansa. Right?" Dr. Gabriel smiled - a natural, yet somehow utterly perfect smile - and brushed a strand of hair from her face. "I've got her phone number here, and we can call and ask her if you like, but I say we leave her out of this." She winked.
Sansa smirked, unsure if she felt impressed or shaken. "How...?"
Standing, Dr. Gabriel offered her hand. "Come with me, and you'll be able to do the same, Sansa. That and so much more."
After glancing down at another message from her mother, Sansa took Dr. Gabriel's hand and followed her, leaving her phone buzzing on the chair.
After completing the extensive paperwork, Sansa changed into a hospital gown and waited in a surgical room until nurses began prepping her for the procedure. First, they shaved her head and eyebrows, glued electrodes to her temples and brow, and inserted an IV into her arm. Using a marker, one then drew a small dot just above her right eyelid, which immediately quickened Sansa's breathing and heartbeat. Before she could ask about its purpose, Dr. Gabriel entered, spoke with the nurses for a moment, and then approached her.
"It's perfectly normal to feel nervous," she said, tapping on the tablet she carried. She plugged in a thin cable and showed Sansa the long needle attached to its other end. "Just requires a simple insertion through the anterior orbital socket to make the connection. A few quick taps with my little hammer is all it takes, but you'll sleep through most of it."
Sansa struggled to calm her breathing. "Wait... through my what?"
A nurse standing beside her pushed medication into the IV tube, and Sansa felt a numbing warmth spread up her arm. Smiling, Dr. Gabriel placed a hand on her shoulder. "Your eye. Well, just above it, actually. Don't worry. We'll extract any unpleasant memories of the procedure before you wake up."
"But isn't it... dangerous?" Sansa asked, her vision darkening and her awareness fading. "Will... it... hurt?"
She didn't get an answer before going unconscious and then finding herself floating in a black void. In the distance, a brilliant blue light glowed in the darkness, and Sansa soon realized she was speeding toward it. Images appeared around her - memories, dreams, faces - all overlapping, all sparking different emotions. Her father slamming the car door and driving off, her lunchroom bully throwing instant potatoes in her hair during the eighth grade, her boss screaming about missed deadlines and poor performance: Sansa could again feel everything she had during those moments, and they only grew more intense as she neared and finally plunged into the blue light.
When she awoke, everything was different. Lying on an examination table, she marveled at what she could now see, smell, and hear: the smallest dust particles swirling in the air, the subtle perfume of warm circuits filling the room, the murmur of a conversation taking place two stories up. And her emotions - they felt vibrant, deep, real.
Dr. Gabriel was standing beside her. "Any blurred vision or numbness in your fingers or toes?"
Sansa sat up and inspected her hands, tapping her thumbs to each fingertip. "No, it's... it's perfect."
"Perfect and still you," Dr. Gabriel said, handing her a mirror. "Federal law prohibits us from completely altering your appearance, but I think you'll be happy with the upgrades we made."
The face was indeed hers, but the woman gazing back at her in the mirror was stunning: pristine skin and teeth, midnight blue eyes, full lips and a dimpled chin. Her hair would never need cutting, her teeth would never need brushing, and her heart would never need exercise. Wait, a heart?
Sansa placed a hand over her chest and could feel a steady, strong thump. "Is that my...?"
"Synthetic. We can always turn it off if you'd prefer."
"And my body. My old one, I mean. Where is it?"
Dr. Gabriel met her gaze. "You really care?"
The answer was both simple and surprising: not one bit.
Over the next few hours, Dr. Gabriel tested Sansa's motor skills and processing speed, explaining her new body's features along the way: a nanite self-repair system; integrated AI support; a titanium-reinforced, aluminum composite skeleton; twin forty-eight-hour rechargeable batteries; vision with both magnification and video recording capabilities; internal wireless modem with premium communication and connection package...
"I'll never remember all this," Sansa said, still admiring her reflection.
Dr. Gabriel leaned close. "Actually, you will. You'll never forget anything ever again. Not where you put your car keys. Not the name of that coworker you met once five years ago. Not a single line from any book you've ever read."
Sansa smirked. "Don't know what to say."
"Just say you'll enjoy the new you. And that you'll be careful." The doctor touched her shoulder. "Your new body's resilient but not indestructible. As I said earlier, new things scare some people. And sometimes scared people can do rash things. Violent things."
After promising she'd be careful, Sansa left the clinic through a back exit, where a car was waiting to take her home. Sitting in the back seat, she flexed her new fingers, touched her new face, gazed up into the sky with her new eyes.
"To your home address?" the driver asked, peering at her in the rearview mirror.
She shied away from his gaze and kept her voice low, a habit she often repeated in taxis or even friends' cars. "I guess so."
"Sorry, miss?"
Shutting her eyes, Sansa scolded herself. She'd hoped to feel different now, that the transfer would've instantly made her into the woman she'd always wanted to be: confident, strong, clear. Yet here she was, still mumbling and avoiding eye contact, ready to flee back to her little apartment and hide from the world.
"Home, please," she said, forcing herself to speak a bit louder.
The driver nodded. "No shame in it, miss. Imagine you've had a tough day."
Sansa didn't respond and simply slumped back into the seat, but a softly glowing overlay then appeared before her. At first, she thought the car might be producing it, like one of the holographic computers she'd seen advertised online. However, it moved whenever she turned her head, and her eye movements seemed to control the cursor.
Reaching out, she tried to touch the screen, but her fingers passed right through it.
"Select desired mood," a menu read, and several options - from excited to hopeful to adventurous - were listed below it.
Feeling the car speed up and jostle, Sansa hesitated to choose anything. Dr. Gabriel hadn't said anything about such a feature, and she worried what it might do. Still, curiosity insisted she try at least once.
Sansa focused on "adventurous," and the cursor obeyed. Immediately, a strange warmth cascaded down her back and then across her entire body.
"Actually, I don't feel like going home just yet," she said to the driver as they pulled out onto the main road.
Looking again in the rearview mirror, the driver nodded. "No problem, miss. Where would you like to go."
Sansa smiled: a natural but perfect smile. "Dancing."
When she was ten years old, Sansa begged her mother to pay for ballet lessons at a local dance studio. Wearing unicorn socks as ballet slipper stand-ins, she practiced her pirouettes and pliés for hours in her room every day, dreaming of performing in front of applauding audiences. However, her mother refused, saying she was too heavy, too clumsy, too plain to ever be a successful dancer. "Girls like you don't become ballet dancers, sweetheart. Let's try to be a little more realistic."
That morning, Sansa threw away her unicorn socks and never pirouetted again.
Until today. At a small studio uptown, she paid the dance teacher double for a private ballet lesson and discovered she could easily balance on one toe, stretch her leg up past her head, and pirouette a dozen times without feeling the slightest bit dizzy. Regularly clapping, the dance teacher insisted she return for more lessons, promising she'd be featured in their next production. Sansa agreed.
Stepping outside the studio, she turned her face toward the sun and paused to enjoy its warmth on her skin. A thousand opportunities and possibilities raced through her mind. Surfing, marathons, mountain climbing, finally getting her college degree: all the experiences and goals she'd been too afraid to pursue. Now, she could make them a reality.
A soft beeping suddenly filled her ears: a video call from her mother. With a thought, Sansa accepted it, and her mother's face appeared in front of her.
"I've been trying to reach you for hours, young lady," her mother said, her cheeks puffy from a fresh filler injection. "Allen says you're refusing to answer his calls, too. What in the world have you been doing?"
Sansa grinned. "Dancing. Ballet, actually."
"First, you ignore me and now you lie right to my face. We both know that -"
"There something you needed, Mom?"
Her mother stammered. "Allen. You need to... what I need is for you to call him and be realistic. Whatever you may think, I just want what's best for you."
Sansa strolled down the sidewalk, still enjoying the sunshine. "Allen and I broke up. He was unfaithful, verbally and emotionally abusive, not to mention manipulative. In short, an asshole."
"Watch your mouth, young lady. What's gotten into you? Seems like you're just bound and determined to hurt my feelings." She sniffled and whimpered, though Sansa doubted she was actually crying. "If you're so independent now and don't need my help, suppose you might as well just put me in a home. Go ahead. Abandon your mother in some godforsaken old folks' home and go live your life."
Halting, Sansa softened her tone. "I'd never do that, Mom. You know that."
"No, no. I don't want my love or advice to get in your way. Never mind all those years I took care of you. Just send me away and pretend I never existed."
"Mom -"
"I mean, what do I know about relationships, right? Heaven forbid you just listen to your mother, that you trust her, just once."
Sansa pinched the bridge of her nose. "I'll call him, okay? But we're not getting back together. Things are different now. I'm different."
A man abruptly stepped out of an alley up ahead, and Sansa immediately recognized him as the middle-aged protestor who'd been staring at her through the clinic's window earlier that day. He no longer had his sign, but she was certain it was him. Lingering at the alley's entrance, he kept his hands tucked into the pockets of his Navy peacoat, glare locked on her.
"Mom, I'll call you later," Sansa said, watching him, her eyes automatically magnifying his face.
"Don't you dare hang up on me. You apologize and call Allen right now, young -"
Sansa ended the call. Usually, if she encountered anyone vaguely creepy or threatening on the street, she'd have immediately hurried the other way. But those days were over. Raising her chin, she continued walking straight ahead, even as the strange man stepped directly in her path.
"That woman's dead," he said, hands still in his pockets. "You just stole her life. Her whole identity."
While her senses were certainly heightened, no overwhelming rush of fear or adrenaline coursed through Sansa's body. Still, she didn't want to provoke him. "I'm sorry, but I just need to get by."
He spit on the sidewalk right beside her foot. "Still think you're her, don't you? Still think you're the person who walked into that clinic. But you ain't, you're just a hunk of metal and wires pretending to be her."
"Nice chatting with you, but I need to get where I'm going." Head down, Sansa walked on, but the strange man trailed her.
"That woman, she's dead. Tossed into an incinerator. Robbed of her memories."
She sped up her walk. "Not interested. Thank you."
"But judgment is coming for you. Justice for that poor woman whose life you stole. People like me, real people, we're the heroes who are going to save humanity from you aluminum devils."
Sansa halted, seized the man's coat collar, and lifted him a foot off the sidewalk. Choking, eyes wide and bloodshot, feet kicking, he groaned out an apology.
"Think I'll be going now," she repeated, squeezing and letting him dangle another moment. "Think you should be going, too. In the opposite direction."
Again, the man strained to speak, his face growing increasingly red, then blue.
At last, Sansa released him, and he collapsed onto the concrete. Coughing and holding his now crimson neck, he stood and staggered back toward the alley.
Shaking her head, Sansa looked at her hand and clenched it into a fist. She'd picked him up with one arm without even straining, nearly strangled him right there on the sidewalk. And she'd felt nothing while doing so, not until it was over. Even now, the sensation felt vague, abstract - something akin to remorse but with a dulled edge. Soon, justifications passed through her brain like options on a computer menu: the man was a creep; he'd insulted her and exhibited aggressive behavior; he'd certainly recover from his injuries; he was just a human, a lesser being, and fortunate she didn't hurt him far worse.
The last one stood out, and not because she agreed with it. Rather, the fact that it appeared as an option at all troubled her. Why was it even there? Surely, she'd never reach such a conclusion, right?
Deciding now wasn't the time for such concerns, she pushed them away and tried to convince herself the incident had been a fluke. Instead, she intended to focus on doing and being everything she'd always wanted but had been too afraid to pursue.
For the next week, Sansa tried to block out her worries and doubts, and she took full advantage of her new body and life. She practiced ballet for hours every day, signed up for two gymnastics classes, read twelve books, enrolled at the local community college, and spent her late nights club hopping downtown. That's where she met Gary, who'd undergone Synaptic Transference only a few months earlier. Unlike Allen, he was gracious, kind, and relentlessly positive and encouraging.
"You'll definitely run into some jerks out there," he said, strolling alongside her beneath a clear night sky. "But they just don't understand. Only those of us who've gone through it can."
She peered up at the stars. "So, you don't regret it? Not even the tiniest bit?"
He shrugged. "The transfer? Guess it'd be nice to eat a steak once in a while. Maybe sip a good bourbon. But those are pretty small sacrifices considering what I've gained."
Taking his arm, Sansa closed her eyes for a moment and focused on the breeze playing with her hair. "Still trying to get my head around it all. Do you think you're still, you know, you?"
"What do you mean?"
They found an old picnic table beneath a palm tree and sat down.
"Different body. Different brain." She toyed with a small splinter jutting from the wooden tabletop. "Sorry. Not exactly a great conversation for a first date."
Gary chuckled, reached across the table, and placed his hand on hers. "Can I show you something that might help?"
Sansa nodded, and Gary tapped his temple. A small, green light flashed, and he encouraged her to wirelessly connect to the signal he was now transmitting. "Totally up to you, but I've granted you permission to access one of my memory drives. You'll be able to see some of what I've experienced these last few months. Though 'see' isn't really the right word."
"Right here?" she asked, tilting her head. "Not even going to invite me back to your place first?"
Gary chuckled. "Think you'll find this even better."
After another bit of hesitation, Sansa connected and accessed the drive. He was right: she did far more than see his experiences. Instead, she lived them, all at once, and in the span of just a few minutes: waking up in the clinic; bench pressing twice his body weight; skydiving, kayaking, swimming miles out into the open ocean and diving hundreds of feet down. She could feel the cold water on her skin, hear dolphins clicking in the distance, see the dark deep below stretching on into eternity. In that moment, she and Gary were one - and not in the cheesy, metaphorical way so often referenced at weddings or in bad love poetry - but rather a genuine, intimate, intense connection.
When the upload ended, Sansa audibly gasped. Waves of warm energy cascaded up and down her body, and she felt fully seen, fully known, and fully accepted.
Gary clicked off his temple signal. "Before the procedure, I used to think I understood what real connection and intimacy felt like. But then a friend showed me this, and I realized how wrong I'd been."
Still reeling from the experience, Sansa placed her hand on his chest. "But what about memories from before the procedure? Or maybe some of the difficulties you went through?"
Smirking, Gary tilted his head. "Why would you still want those?"
Initially, she thought he was teasing, but then he repeated his question, and Sansa realized he was serious. Storage space was too valuable to waste on old or negative memories, and her drives would gradually expunge them over the next several months. Apparently, the paperwork she'd signed explained this, though she'd admittedly only skimmed through it.
"But don't you think they're important?" she asked, shifting in her seat. "How can you still be, well, you without them?"
Gary shrugged. "This whole thing's about becoming better than you used to be, right? Becoming a new person? Can't really do that with that old stuff still clogging up your mind."
While she supposed his reasoning made sense, Sansa recoiled at the idea of losing so much of her past, no matter how painful those memories might be. She immediately thought about what the protester she'd strangled said, how he'd accused her and called her a hunk of metal who'd stolen a dead woman's memories. As ridiculous as he sounded, could he have been right? If those memories could be so easily taken and erased, did they even really belong to her?
The following evening, after changing clothes and recharging, Sansa rifled through her meager jewelry box for earrings that matched her dress. She'd agreed to accompany Gary to the theater - which she could now appreciate after downloading reviews of over a hundred different plays - and he'd be at her apartment soon to pick her up. Beyond spending another great evening with him, she hoped Gary might offer some advice for dealing with a familiar nuisance who was now loitering outside her building: the strange man in the peacoat. He'd been standing on the sidewalk and staring up at her window for hours. How he'd discovered her address was anyone's guess, but his presence both irritated and concerned her.
"Has he done anything to threaten you directly?" the police dispatcher asked when Sansa called them to report her potential stalker. "Has he tried to touch you or trespassed on your property?"
Given that he hadn't, the police could do little about the situation, though the dispatcher offered a vague promise that she'd eventually send an officer to speak with the man. Sansa was tempted to just go out and chase him away herself, but the dispatcher discouraged such actions, suggesting that some protesters were known to purposefully antagonize new Transfers and sue them for assault. Apparently, courts heavily favored fully human litigants.
Her doorbell rang just as Sansa finished putting on her earrings. When she checked the peephole, however, she discovered it wasn't Gary waiting for her. Rather, it was yet another aggravation: Allen.
"Open the door, babe," Allen said, knocking. "You won't take my calls or answer my texts, so here I am."
Sighing, Sansa opened the door but had no intention of letting him inside. She crossed her arms and met his stare. "Maybe I'm not answering because I don't want to talk to you. Maybe you shouldn't take that as an invitation to come here."
Allen didn't reply for several moments and instead scratched his scruffy beard as he looked her up and down. Finally, he chuckled and shook his head. "Now I get it. Did that Synthetic Translation or whatever the hell they call it."
"Synaptic Transference."
"And what? Now you think you're too good for me?"
Sansa narrowed her eyes. "I've always been too good for you, Allen. That's why I dumped you."
He began moving and speaking like a robot. "Please repeat. Input does not compute."
"You done? Going to leave me alone now?"
"Wonder what your mother will think about this," he said, abandoning the imitation. "Bet she'll be devastated to hear her little girl's gone bot. She certainly can't expect me to still marry you."
Allen pulled a small ring box from his pocket.
Groaning, Sansa tried to close the door, but he shoved his foot in the way. "I finally come here with a ring, and you try to shut me out? I can get past the whole being a walking scrapheap thing if you can accept that I'll occasionally want a little... human company."
Sansa leaned close. "I don't want your ring, and I sure as hell don't want you, Allen." She eyed the ring box. "Why don't you go offer it to my mother instead. She seems quite taken with you."
Gently but firmly, Sansa shoved Allen back and closed the door.
Standing motionless, she listened and waited for him to leave. At last, his footsteps clomped down the hall, and she heard the elevator ping. A text message from him abruptly appeared in her mind: just a string of expletives that an angry and immature teenager might send. Muttering a few choice swear words of her own, Sansa headed back toward her room to finish getting ready, but another knock on her door quickly grabbed her attention.
Hoping it was finally Gary, she again peeked through the peephole, only to discover the strange man in the Navy peacoat standing in the hall. "I just called the cops," Sansa said, keeping the door shut and locked. "Better leave. Better get out of here right now."
A thunderous boom. Splintering wood. A massive hole right through the middle of the door.
Sansa's nanite repair system signaled an urgent alert. "Warning! Severe damage detected! Contact emergency services immediately!" Blue liquid began soaking through the fabric of her dress right below the neckline.
Her vision faded in and out of focus, and Sansa stumbled back and collapsed onto her couch. She tore open her dress and was horrified to see a gunshot wound beneath it: sparking wires, oozing hydraulic fluid, mangled synthetic skin. She tried to contact the authorities, but her communication system refused to function.
Her attacker then kicked in the door and leveled a pistol toward her head. "Gonna scatter your wires all over town. But first things first."
Still holding the pistol in one hand, the man pulled a portable drive from his coat pocket, knelt beside Sansa, and slid a wire deep inside her ear.
"What. Are. You. Doing?" she asked, grabbing at the wire in a vain attempt to yank it out. Unfortunately, she'd lost so much fluid that her limbs were growing increasingly feeble, and her attacker easily swatted away her arms.
Deep within Sansa's skull, the wire finally clicked into place. "Saving you," he said, holding the drive up to his ear. "Well, saving the woman you're impersonating. All of her stolen memories, anyway. People like me, we're heroes. No matter what those politicians or corporations say."
A loud and intensifying buzz filled Sansa's head, and dozens of images flashed through her mind, one after another: the night she'd been stood up for prom, the look of her father's work-worn face the last time she'd seen him in the driveway of their old house, the sound of her mother sobbing in the bedroom when she realized he was never coming back. As each memory arose, it almost instantly vanished: extracted from her mind and forever lost.
"Don't fret now," the man said, gazing down into her eyes. "It'll all be safe on my computer at home. Along with the memories of so many others I've saved. Better I got them than some aluminum imposter."
Meeting his gaze and feeling yet more memories slip away, Sansa reached out for anything she could use to defend herself. Soon, any recollection of her first job at the fast-food restaurant, her first kiss with a boy named Tony after a kickball game in junior high, or her trip to Dublin during her senior year were gone.
At last, her fingers found something useful - a sharp chunk of the shattered door - though she struggled to grip it.
The brute tapped his portable drive. "Need to get a newer model. Damn thing's so slow. Suppose you were too, right? Or just stupid?" He brushed his thumb across her lips. "Stupid but awfully pretty. Have to admit."
Seeing his gaze drift down to her torn dress, Sansa tightened her grip on the wooden shard. A second later, using whatever strength she could muster, she stabbed it into her attacker's arm.
Shrieking, he scrambled away, blood quickly soaking his coat sleeve. Whimpering, he fumbled with his pistol, firing repeatedly but missing and shooting holes through her walls, window, and couch.
Feeling consciousness oozing away, Sansa pulled the wire from her ear and slumped down onto her stomach. Servos whining, arms and legs nearly useless, she dragged herself toward the front doorway, inching across the blue and blood covered floor.
Crying and cursing, her attacker soon staggered to his feet. With a now steadier aim, he raised the pistol and pulled the trigger, but the weapon simply clicked, empty and impotent. After tossing it aside, he rushed toward her, but Gary then appeared in the doorway, tackled him, and pinned him on the floor. When the brute tried to scramble back up, Gary knocked him unconscious. He then hurried to Sansa's side and frantically inspected the damage.
"Help'll be here soon," he said, holding her hand. "Sansa? Can you hear me? They're coming, okay?"
Despite the gunshot, Sansa felt no pain or surge of fear; both were automatically muted by her system. However, as her vision and hearing both shut down, she felt her consciousness fading rapidly.
Three hours later, Sansa regained consciousness and found herself back at the Transference clinic. Dr. Gabriel hovered at her bedside and smiled upon seeing her awake and alert.
"Getting shot less than two weeks after the procedure. That has to be a new record," she said, shining a small flashlight back and forth into Sansa's eyes. "Hardly fulfilling your promise to be careful, don't you think?"
Sitting up, Sansa discovered that seventy-two percent of her memory files were either corrupted or erased: her childhood, her adolescence, her romantic relationships before meeting Gary. Any remaining tidbits were vague, hollow - ghosts quietly haunting her mind. Even her name felt somewhat foreign, like hearing one's own voice in a bad recording.
"Did you... did you delete all those files?" she asked, uncertain what effects losing so much of her past might have.
Dr. Gabriel eased her back down onto the bed. "Couldn't be helped. Bullet tore through several of your drives, and we had to replace them." She smiled: perfect, bright, serene. "Nothing you needed in them anyway. Let's call it a fresh start."
Sansa struggled to remember something, anything, from those many years. Nothing - just a massive abyss stretching out beneath her.
"The man who shot me... he in jail?" she asked, trying to distract and ground herself. "Did they find him?"
"Arrested and charged with destruction of private property."
"Not attempted murder?"
Dr. Gabriel shook her head. "Transference is still too new. Law hasn't caught up yet. In fact, the gentleman who shot you has done this several times before. Serves a few days, pays a fine, and he's back out."
Sansa shut her eyes. "So, there's nothing to stop him from doing it again."
Dr. Gabriel grunted in agreement. "Which is why I've arranged for you to relocate. Individual transference is only one phase of my company's plan. The next phase is already underway, and I think you should be a part of it."
"Where?"
"A city," Dr. Gabriel said, activating a nearby monitor. Footage of sleek skyscrapers, green gardens, and clear canals played on the screen. "A whole city just for Transfers. All with new names. New lives. And the downtown area's already been completed. We're just looking for more volunteers to populate it and work to help build it."
Sansa had never seen a city so clean, so sophisticated... so beautiful. "Where?"
"An island off the coast. Hundreds of Transfers like you and me are already living and working there. All connected to one another. All striving to achieve what you and I both know is now possible." Dr. Gabriel paused and watched the monitor. "I plan on relocating there myself in the next week or so. Could certainly use another good neighbor."
Standing, fingers fidgeting with the sewn-up hole in her dress, Sansa couldn't look away from the images on the screen. For a moment, she thought about her mother, who now seemed little more than a distant ancestor in some genealogist's notebook. Even a quick review of her stored messages produced no significant feelings within her: twenty-seven texts and voicemails demanding she call and apologize, another fifteen insisting she give Allen another chance, and one last message all but disowning her for "humiliating both yourself and your mother" by getting the transfer.
Before sunset, Sansa climbed aboard a helicopter bound for the island, and Gary was right behind her. Soon, they lifted off and left behind the world of flesh and blood, disease and death, bound for the future of humanity and the new world they would together help create.
from FICTION on the WEB short stories https://ift.tt/4yUahVl
via IFTTT
 |
| Image generated with OpenAI |
Synaptic Transference.
Sansa knew at least a dozen people who'd gone through the procedure in the last year alone; and many more likely would, now that the federal government was offering low-interest loans to any would-be "Transfers." She couldn't blame them. Jamie, one of her coworkers, decided to go through with it after doctors found that mass in her intestines. Elena, from down the street, went in and got it done when rheumatoid arthritis finally put her in a wheelchair, and now she had the strength and speed of an Olympic athlete. Even Sansa's brother, Jeremiah, ended up getting the transfer, certain it would help him get out of his job in the warehouse and into modeling - his dream career. Relocating one's consciousness to a machine wasn't a decision to make lightly, but its appeal couldn't be easily dismissed.
"Ten million people have already chosen to take themselves to the next level," the commercial said, as perfect, smiling faces flashed across the screen. "People who used to be ordinary just like you."
In truth, Sansa had been considering getting the procedure for months, and not because of some illness or employment issue. Standing in a towel and staring at herself in a steamed-up bathroom mirror, she studied her face and wondered if she should go through with it. Red splotches across her cheeks, a plump and crooked nose, lips and hair thinner with every passing year: her mother would've called such concerns vanity, but this was the same woman who'd undergone two facelifts and three rhinoplasties before she hit fifty. Besides, the transfer would be an investment in Sansa's future. Insurance companies were already denying operations like organ transplants and heart surgery, insisting that these were no longer medically necessary now that Synaptic Transference was a reality. Why wait until she got sick or injured before making the leap? Better to spend her money on an ageless, illness-proof body than on endless hospital bills or a nice coffin.
A text from Allen interrupted her thoughts. "Hiya, babe. U dun being a bitch yet? Ready to get bak together? Cant do no better and U know it."
Groaning, she swiped the message away, wishing she could do the same to their two-year relationship. If she could even really call it that. Is him coming over a few nights a week and leaving before dawn a genuine relationship? That's why she ended it, but Allen apparently wasn't taking her seriously, not that he ever had before. Same went for most people. Maybe a new body and an augmented brain would change that.
The next morning, Sansa took a car to the clinic, which was mobbed by protestors shouting insults at anyone who entered. "Techie whore! Digital slut! Good luck getting your brain back from those bot-loving butchers!" Security officers did their best to keep the crowd back, but that didn't stop several from pelting her with bits of broken circuit boards. Seriously, who throws circuits?
Putting her head down, Sansa apologized her way past the mob, rushed inside, and waited in a busy lobby for her turn with the doctor. Allen's messages regularly popped up in her phone's notifications, as did texts from her mother chiding her for rejecting "the one decent guy who's ever shown real interest in you. Who might even marry you some day." Obviously, the two had been talking again, just like the last time they'd broken up.
"He may not be perfect, sweetheart, but neither are you," her mother said during a call just after the first breakup. "I just don't want you to end up alone like me. Let's not throw away a good thing because of unrealistic standards."
Sansa harrumphed and fought the urge to hang up. "He tell you about the others? About Lisa? Megan? Some woman at his office?"
Her mother paused before answering. "I know it hurts, but what's the alternative? Living by yourself for the rest of your life? Watching yourself get older and older, and just spending every night watching holo stories on your computer?"
It took some convincing, but, as she'd done her whole life, Sansa eventually caved. She took Allen back, pretended she was happy about it, even deluded herself into believing he was a good, albeit misunderstood guy. Unfortunately, unless she did something drastic, she knew this time would be no different.
Soon, a tall and lean woman with impeccable skin approached and introduced herself as Dr. Gabriel. "So wonderful to meet you, Sansa. Ready to change your life?"
Stammering, Sansa peered out the window at the still raging mob. Despite the tinted glass, one protestor - a middle-aged man in a Navy peacoat - appeared to be staring right at her. He held a sign that read "Machine Life is an Oxymoron You Moron!" though the home-scrawled letters made it difficult to decipher.
"This scares some people," Dr. Gabriel said, following her gaze. "But the real question is, does it scare you?"
Sansa turned away from the window. "Most things do, I suppose."
Her phone rang. A call from Allen. She declined it.
Dr. Gabriel sat in the chair beside her. "It's nothing to be ashamed of. The result of a few overactive neurons. A slight imbalance of the chemicals in your brain. Maybe genetics that go back a thousand years. Hardly your fault for feeling that way."
"Not if you ask my mother."
"You mean Abigail? Lives at 401 Ruppert Road. Mother of Leslie, Jeremiah, and Sansa. Right?" Dr. Gabriel smiled - a natural, yet somehow utterly perfect smile - and brushed a strand of hair from her face. "I've got her phone number here, and we can call and ask her if you like, but I say we leave her out of this." She winked.
Sansa smirked, unsure if she felt impressed or shaken. "How...?"
Standing, Dr. Gabriel offered her hand. "Come with me, and you'll be able to do the same, Sansa. That and so much more."
After glancing down at another message from her mother, Sansa took Dr. Gabriel's hand and followed her, leaving her phone buzzing on the chair.
After completing the extensive paperwork, Sansa changed into a hospital gown and waited in a surgical room until nurses began prepping her for the procedure. First, they shaved her head and eyebrows, glued electrodes to her temples and brow, and inserted an IV into her arm. Using a marker, one then drew a small dot just above her right eyelid, which immediately quickened Sansa's breathing and heartbeat. Before she could ask about its purpose, Dr. Gabriel entered, spoke with the nurses for a moment, and then approached her.
"It's perfectly normal to feel nervous," she said, tapping on the tablet she carried. She plugged in a thin cable and showed Sansa the long needle attached to its other end. "Just requires a simple insertion through the anterior orbital socket to make the connection. A few quick taps with my little hammer is all it takes, but you'll sleep through most of it."
Sansa struggled to calm her breathing. "Wait... through my what?"
A nurse standing beside her pushed medication into the IV tube, and Sansa felt a numbing warmth spread up her arm. Smiling, Dr. Gabriel placed a hand on her shoulder. "Your eye. Well, just above it, actually. Don't worry. We'll extract any unpleasant memories of the procedure before you wake up."
"But isn't it... dangerous?" Sansa asked, her vision darkening and her awareness fading. "Will... it... hurt?"
She didn't get an answer before going unconscious and then finding herself floating in a black void. In the distance, a brilliant blue light glowed in the darkness, and Sansa soon realized she was speeding toward it. Images appeared around her - memories, dreams, faces - all overlapping, all sparking different emotions. Her father slamming the car door and driving off, her lunchroom bully throwing instant potatoes in her hair during the eighth grade, her boss screaming about missed deadlines and poor performance: Sansa could again feel everything she had during those moments, and they only grew more intense as she neared and finally plunged into the blue light.
When she awoke, everything was different. Lying on an examination table, she marveled at what she could now see, smell, and hear: the smallest dust particles swirling in the air, the subtle perfume of warm circuits filling the room, the murmur of a conversation taking place two stories up. And her emotions - they felt vibrant, deep, real.
Dr. Gabriel was standing beside her. "Any blurred vision or numbness in your fingers or toes?"
Sansa sat up and inspected her hands, tapping her thumbs to each fingertip. "No, it's... it's perfect."
"Perfect and still you," Dr. Gabriel said, handing her a mirror. "Federal law prohibits us from completely altering your appearance, but I think you'll be happy with the upgrades we made."
The face was indeed hers, but the woman gazing back at her in the mirror was stunning: pristine skin and teeth, midnight blue eyes, full lips and a dimpled chin. Her hair would never need cutting, her teeth would never need brushing, and her heart would never need exercise. Wait, a heart?
Sansa placed a hand over her chest and could feel a steady, strong thump. "Is that my...?"
"Synthetic. We can always turn it off if you'd prefer."
"And my body. My old one, I mean. Where is it?"
Dr. Gabriel met her gaze. "You really care?"
The answer was both simple and surprising: not one bit.
Over the next few hours, Dr. Gabriel tested Sansa's motor skills and processing speed, explaining her new body's features along the way: a nanite self-repair system; integrated AI support; a titanium-reinforced, aluminum composite skeleton; twin forty-eight-hour rechargeable batteries; vision with both magnification and video recording capabilities; internal wireless modem with premium communication and connection package...
"I'll never remember all this," Sansa said, still admiring her reflection.
Dr. Gabriel leaned close. "Actually, you will. You'll never forget anything ever again. Not where you put your car keys. Not the name of that coworker you met once five years ago. Not a single line from any book you've ever read."
Sansa smirked. "Don't know what to say."
"Just say you'll enjoy the new you. And that you'll be careful." The doctor touched her shoulder. "Your new body's resilient but not indestructible. As I said earlier, new things scare some people. And sometimes scared people can do rash things. Violent things."
After promising she'd be careful, Sansa left the clinic through a back exit, where a car was waiting to take her home. Sitting in the back seat, she flexed her new fingers, touched her new face, gazed up into the sky with her new eyes.
"To your home address?" the driver asked, peering at her in the rearview mirror.
She shied away from his gaze and kept her voice low, a habit she often repeated in taxis or even friends' cars. "I guess so."
"Sorry, miss?"
Shutting her eyes, Sansa scolded herself. She'd hoped to feel different now, that the transfer would've instantly made her into the woman she'd always wanted to be: confident, strong, clear. Yet here she was, still mumbling and avoiding eye contact, ready to flee back to her little apartment and hide from the world.
"Home, please," she said, forcing herself to speak a bit louder.
The driver nodded. "No shame in it, miss. Imagine you've had a tough day."
Sansa didn't respond and simply slumped back into the seat, but a softly glowing overlay then appeared before her. At first, she thought the car might be producing it, like one of the holographic computers she'd seen advertised online. However, it moved whenever she turned her head, and her eye movements seemed to control the cursor.
Reaching out, she tried to touch the screen, but her fingers passed right through it.
"Select desired mood," a menu read, and several options - from excited to hopeful to adventurous - were listed below it.
Feeling the car speed up and jostle, Sansa hesitated to choose anything. Dr. Gabriel hadn't said anything about such a feature, and she worried what it might do. Still, curiosity insisted she try at least once.
Sansa focused on "adventurous," and the cursor obeyed. Immediately, a strange warmth cascaded down her back and then across her entire body.
"Actually, I don't feel like going home just yet," she said to the driver as they pulled out onto the main road.
Looking again in the rearview mirror, the driver nodded. "No problem, miss. Where would you like to go."
Sansa smiled: a natural but perfect smile. "Dancing."
When she was ten years old, Sansa begged her mother to pay for ballet lessons at a local dance studio. Wearing unicorn socks as ballet slipper stand-ins, she practiced her pirouettes and pliés for hours in her room every day, dreaming of performing in front of applauding audiences. However, her mother refused, saying she was too heavy, too clumsy, too plain to ever be a successful dancer. "Girls like you don't become ballet dancers, sweetheart. Let's try to be a little more realistic."
That morning, Sansa threw away her unicorn socks and never pirouetted again.
Until today. At a small studio uptown, she paid the dance teacher double for a private ballet lesson and discovered she could easily balance on one toe, stretch her leg up past her head, and pirouette a dozen times without feeling the slightest bit dizzy. Regularly clapping, the dance teacher insisted she return for more lessons, promising she'd be featured in their next production. Sansa agreed.
Stepping outside the studio, she turned her face toward the sun and paused to enjoy its warmth on her skin. A thousand opportunities and possibilities raced through her mind. Surfing, marathons, mountain climbing, finally getting her college degree: all the experiences and goals she'd been too afraid to pursue. Now, she could make them a reality.
A soft beeping suddenly filled her ears: a video call from her mother. With a thought, Sansa accepted it, and her mother's face appeared in front of her.
"I've been trying to reach you for hours, young lady," her mother said, her cheeks puffy from a fresh filler injection. "Allen says you're refusing to answer his calls, too. What in the world have you been doing?"
Sansa grinned. "Dancing. Ballet, actually."
"First, you ignore me and now you lie right to my face. We both know that -"
"There something you needed, Mom?"
Her mother stammered. "Allen. You need to... what I need is for you to call him and be realistic. Whatever you may think, I just want what's best for you."
Sansa strolled down the sidewalk, still enjoying the sunshine. "Allen and I broke up. He was unfaithful, verbally and emotionally abusive, not to mention manipulative. In short, an asshole."
"Watch your mouth, young lady. What's gotten into you? Seems like you're just bound and determined to hurt my feelings." She sniffled and whimpered, though Sansa doubted she was actually crying. "If you're so independent now and don't need my help, suppose you might as well just put me in a home. Go ahead. Abandon your mother in some godforsaken old folks' home and go live your life."
Halting, Sansa softened her tone. "I'd never do that, Mom. You know that."
"No, no. I don't want my love or advice to get in your way. Never mind all those years I took care of you. Just send me away and pretend I never existed."
"Mom -"
"I mean, what do I know about relationships, right? Heaven forbid you just listen to your mother, that you trust her, just once."
Sansa pinched the bridge of her nose. "I'll call him, okay? But we're not getting back together. Things are different now. I'm different."
A man abruptly stepped out of an alley up ahead, and Sansa immediately recognized him as the middle-aged protestor who'd been staring at her through the clinic's window earlier that day. He no longer had his sign, but she was certain it was him. Lingering at the alley's entrance, he kept his hands tucked into the pockets of his Navy peacoat, glare locked on her.
"Mom, I'll call you later," Sansa said, watching him, her eyes automatically magnifying his face.
"Don't you dare hang up on me. You apologize and call Allen right now, young -"
Sansa ended the call. Usually, if she encountered anyone vaguely creepy or threatening on the street, she'd have immediately hurried the other way. But those days were over. Raising her chin, she continued walking straight ahead, even as the strange man stepped directly in her path.
"That woman's dead," he said, hands still in his pockets. "You just stole her life. Her whole identity."
While her senses were certainly heightened, no overwhelming rush of fear or adrenaline coursed through Sansa's body. Still, she didn't want to provoke him. "I'm sorry, but I just need to get by."
He spit on the sidewalk right beside her foot. "Still think you're her, don't you? Still think you're the person who walked into that clinic. But you ain't, you're just a hunk of metal and wires pretending to be her."
"Nice chatting with you, but I need to get where I'm going." Head down, Sansa walked on, but the strange man trailed her.
"That woman, she's dead. Tossed into an incinerator. Robbed of her memories."
She sped up her walk. "Not interested. Thank you."
"But judgment is coming for you. Justice for that poor woman whose life you stole. People like me, real people, we're the heroes who are going to save humanity from you aluminum devils."
Sansa halted, seized the man's coat collar, and lifted him a foot off the sidewalk. Choking, eyes wide and bloodshot, feet kicking, he groaned out an apology.
"Think I'll be going now," she repeated, squeezing and letting him dangle another moment. "Think you should be going, too. In the opposite direction."
Again, the man strained to speak, his face growing increasingly red, then blue.
At last, Sansa released him, and he collapsed onto the concrete. Coughing and holding his now crimson neck, he stood and staggered back toward the alley.
Shaking her head, Sansa looked at her hand and clenched it into a fist. She'd picked him up with one arm without even straining, nearly strangled him right there on the sidewalk. And she'd felt nothing while doing so, not until it was over. Even now, the sensation felt vague, abstract - something akin to remorse but with a dulled edge. Soon, justifications passed through her brain like options on a computer menu: the man was a creep; he'd insulted her and exhibited aggressive behavior; he'd certainly recover from his injuries; he was just a human, a lesser being, and fortunate she didn't hurt him far worse.
The last one stood out, and not because she agreed with it. Rather, the fact that it appeared as an option at all troubled her. Why was it even there? Surely, she'd never reach such a conclusion, right?
Deciding now wasn't the time for such concerns, she pushed them away and tried to convince herself the incident had been a fluke. Instead, she intended to focus on doing and being everything she'd always wanted but had been too afraid to pursue.
For the next week, Sansa tried to block out her worries and doubts, and she took full advantage of her new body and life. She practiced ballet for hours every day, signed up for two gymnastics classes, read twelve books, enrolled at the local community college, and spent her late nights club hopping downtown. That's where she met Gary, who'd undergone Synaptic Transference only a few months earlier. Unlike Allen, he was gracious, kind, and relentlessly positive and encouraging.
"You'll definitely run into some jerks out there," he said, strolling alongside her beneath a clear night sky. "But they just don't understand. Only those of us who've gone through it can."
She peered up at the stars. "So, you don't regret it? Not even the tiniest bit?"
He shrugged. "The transfer? Guess it'd be nice to eat a steak once in a while. Maybe sip a good bourbon. But those are pretty small sacrifices considering what I've gained."
Taking his arm, Sansa closed her eyes for a moment and focused on the breeze playing with her hair. "Still trying to get my head around it all. Do you think you're still, you know, you?"
"What do you mean?"
They found an old picnic table beneath a palm tree and sat down.
"Different body. Different brain." She toyed with a small splinter jutting from the wooden tabletop. "Sorry. Not exactly a great conversation for a first date."
Gary chuckled, reached across the table, and placed his hand on hers. "Can I show you something that might help?"
Sansa nodded, and Gary tapped his temple. A small, green light flashed, and he encouraged her to wirelessly connect to the signal he was now transmitting. "Totally up to you, but I've granted you permission to access one of my memory drives. You'll be able to see some of what I've experienced these last few months. Though 'see' isn't really the right word."
"Right here?" she asked, tilting her head. "Not even going to invite me back to your place first?"
Gary chuckled. "Think you'll find this even better."
After another bit of hesitation, Sansa connected and accessed the drive. He was right: she did far more than see his experiences. Instead, she lived them, all at once, and in the span of just a few minutes: waking up in the clinic; bench pressing twice his body weight; skydiving, kayaking, swimming miles out into the open ocean and diving hundreds of feet down. She could feel the cold water on her skin, hear dolphins clicking in the distance, see the dark deep below stretching on into eternity. In that moment, she and Gary were one - and not in the cheesy, metaphorical way so often referenced at weddings or in bad love poetry - but rather a genuine, intimate, intense connection.
When the upload ended, Sansa audibly gasped. Waves of warm energy cascaded up and down her body, and she felt fully seen, fully known, and fully accepted.
Gary clicked off his temple signal. "Before the procedure, I used to think I understood what real connection and intimacy felt like. But then a friend showed me this, and I realized how wrong I'd been."
Still reeling from the experience, Sansa placed her hand on his chest. "But what about memories from before the procedure? Or maybe some of the difficulties you went through?"
Smirking, Gary tilted his head. "Why would you still want those?"
Initially, she thought he was teasing, but then he repeated his question, and Sansa realized he was serious. Storage space was too valuable to waste on old or negative memories, and her drives would gradually expunge them over the next several months. Apparently, the paperwork she'd signed explained this, though she'd admittedly only skimmed through it.
"But don't you think they're important?" she asked, shifting in her seat. "How can you still be, well, you without them?"
Gary shrugged. "This whole thing's about becoming better than you used to be, right? Becoming a new person? Can't really do that with that old stuff still clogging up your mind."
While she supposed his reasoning made sense, Sansa recoiled at the idea of losing so much of her past, no matter how painful those memories might be. She immediately thought about what the protester she'd strangled said, how he'd accused her and called her a hunk of metal who'd stolen a dead woman's memories. As ridiculous as he sounded, could he have been right? If those memories could be so easily taken and erased, did they even really belong to her?
The following evening, after changing clothes and recharging, Sansa rifled through her meager jewelry box for earrings that matched her dress. She'd agreed to accompany Gary to the theater - which she could now appreciate after downloading reviews of over a hundred different plays - and he'd be at her apartment soon to pick her up. Beyond spending another great evening with him, she hoped Gary might offer some advice for dealing with a familiar nuisance who was now loitering outside her building: the strange man in the peacoat. He'd been standing on the sidewalk and staring up at her window for hours. How he'd discovered her address was anyone's guess, but his presence both irritated and concerned her.
"Has he done anything to threaten you directly?" the police dispatcher asked when Sansa called them to report her potential stalker. "Has he tried to touch you or trespassed on your property?"
Given that he hadn't, the police could do little about the situation, though the dispatcher offered a vague promise that she'd eventually send an officer to speak with the man. Sansa was tempted to just go out and chase him away herself, but the dispatcher discouraged such actions, suggesting that some protesters were known to purposefully antagonize new Transfers and sue them for assault. Apparently, courts heavily favored fully human litigants.
Her doorbell rang just as Sansa finished putting on her earrings. When she checked the peephole, however, she discovered it wasn't Gary waiting for her. Rather, it was yet another aggravation: Allen.
"Open the door, babe," Allen said, knocking. "You won't take my calls or answer my texts, so here I am."
Sighing, Sansa opened the door but had no intention of letting him inside. She crossed her arms and met his stare. "Maybe I'm not answering because I don't want to talk to you. Maybe you shouldn't take that as an invitation to come here."
Allen didn't reply for several moments and instead scratched his scruffy beard as he looked her up and down. Finally, he chuckled and shook his head. "Now I get it. Did that Synthetic Translation or whatever the hell they call it."
"Synaptic Transference."
"And what? Now you think you're too good for me?"
Sansa narrowed her eyes. "I've always been too good for you, Allen. That's why I dumped you."
He began moving and speaking like a robot. "Please repeat. Input does not compute."
"You done? Going to leave me alone now?"
"Wonder what your mother will think about this," he said, abandoning the imitation. "Bet she'll be devastated to hear her little girl's gone bot. She certainly can't expect me to still marry you."
Allen pulled a small ring box from his pocket.
Groaning, Sansa tried to close the door, but he shoved his foot in the way. "I finally come here with a ring, and you try to shut me out? I can get past the whole being a walking scrapheap thing if you can accept that I'll occasionally want a little... human company."
Sansa leaned close. "I don't want your ring, and I sure as hell don't want you, Allen." She eyed the ring box. "Why don't you go offer it to my mother instead. She seems quite taken with you."
Gently but firmly, Sansa shoved Allen back and closed the door.
Standing motionless, she listened and waited for him to leave. At last, his footsteps clomped down the hall, and she heard the elevator ping. A text message from him abruptly appeared in her mind: just a string of expletives that an angry and immature teenager might send. Muttering a few choice swear words of her own, Sansa headed back toward her room to finish getting ready, but another knock on her door quickly grabbed her attention.
Hoping it was finally Gary, she again peeked through the peephole, only to discover the strange man in the Navy peacoat standing in the hall. "I just called the cops," Sansa said, keeping the door shut and locked. "Better leave. Better get out of here right now."
A thunderous boom. Splintering wood. A massive hole right through the middle of the door.
Sansa's nanite repair system signaled an urgent alert. "Warning! Severe damage detected! Contact emergency services immediately!" Blue liquid began soaking through the fabric of her dress right below the neckline.
Her vision faded in and out of focus, and Sansa stumbled back and collapsed onto her couch. She tore open her dress and was horrified to see a gunshot wound beneath it: sparking wires, oozing hydraulic fluid, mangled synthetic skin. She tried to contact the authorities, but her communication system refused to function.
Her attacker then kicked in the door and leveled a pistol toward her head. "Gonna scatter your wires all over town. But first things first."
Still holding the pistol in one hand, the man pulled a portable drive from his coat pocket, knelt beside Sansa, and slid a wire deep inside her ear.
"What. Are. You. Doing?" she asked, grabbing at the wire in a vain attempt to yank it out. Unfortunately, she'd lost so much fluid that her limbs were growing increasingly feeble, and her attacker easily swatted away her arms.
Deep within Sansa's skull, the wire finally clicked into place. "Saving you," he said, holding the drive up to his ear. "Well, saving the woman you're impersonating. All of her stolen memories, anyway. People like me, we're heroes. No matter what those politicians or corporations say."
A loud and intensifying buzz filled Sansa's head, and dozens of images flashed through her mind, one after another: the night she'd been stood up for prom, the look of her father's work-worn face the last time she'd seen him in the driveway of their old house, the sound of her mother sobbing in the bedroom when she realized he was never coming back. As each memory arose, it almost instantly vanished: extracted from her mind and forever lost.
"Don't fret now," the man said, gazing down into her eyes. "It'll all be safe on my computer at home. Along with the memories of so many others I've saved. Better I got them than some aluminum imposter."
Meeting his gaze and feeling yet more memories slip away, Sansa reached out for anything she could use to defend herself. Soon, any recollection of her first job at the fast-food restaurant, her first kiss with a boy named Tony after a kickball game in junior high, or her trip to Dublin during her senior year were gone.
At last, her fingers found something useful - a sharp chunk of the shattered door - though she struggled to grip it.
The brute tapped his portable drive. "Need to get a newer model. Damn thing's so slow. Suppose you were too, right? Or just stupid?" He brushed his thumb across her lips. "Stupid but awfully pretty. Have to admit."
Seeing his gaze drift down to her torn dress, Sansa tightened her grip on the wooden shard. A second later, using whatever strength she could muster, she stabbed it into her attacker's arm.
Shrieking, he scrambled away, blood quickly soaking his coat sleeve. Whimpering, he fumbled with his pistol, firing repeatedly but missing and shooting holes through her walls, window, and couch.
Feeling consciousness oozing away, Sansa pulled the wire from her ear and slumped down onto her stomach. Servos whining, arms and legs nearly useless, she dragged herself toward the front doorway, inching across the blue and blood covered floor.
Crying and cursing, her attacker soon staggered to his feet. With a now steadier aim, he raised the pistol and pulled the trigger, but the weapon simply clicked, empty and impotent. After tossing it aside, he rushed toward her, but Gary then appeared in the doorway, tackled him, and pinned him on the floor. When the brute tried to scramble back up, Gary knocked him unconscious. He then hurried to Sansa's side and frantically inspected the damage.
"Help'll be here soon," he said, holding her hand. "Sansa? Can you hear me? They're coming, okay?"
Despite the gunshot, Sansa felt no pain or surge of fear; both were automatically muted by her system. However, as her vision and hearing both shut down, she felt her consciousness fading rapidly.
Three hours later, Sansa regained consciousness and found herself back at the Transference clinic. Dr. Gabriel hovered at her bedside and smiled upon seeing her awake and alert.
"Getting shot less than two weeks after the procedure. That has to be a new record," she said, shining a small flashlight back and forth into Sansa's eyes. "Hardly fulfilling your promise to be careful, don't you think?"
Sitting up, Sansa discovered that seventy-two percent of her memory files were either corrupted or erased: her childhood, her adolescence, her romantic relationships before meeting Gary. Any remaining tidbits were vague, hollow - ghosts quietly haunting her mind. Even her name felt somewhat foreign, like hearing one's own voice in a bad recording.
"Did you... did you delete all those files?" she asked, uncertain what effects losing so much of her past might have.
Dr. Gabriel eased her back down onto the bed. "Couldn't be helped. Bullet tore through several of your drives, and we had to replace them." She smiled: perfect, bright, serene. "Nothing you needed in them anyway. Let's call it a fresh start."
Sansa struggled to remember something, anything, from those many years. Nothing - just a massive abyss stretching out beneath her.
"The man who shot me... he in jail?" she asked, trying to distract and ground herself. "Did they find him?"
"Arrested and charged with destruction of private property."
"Not attempted murder?"
Dr. Gabriel shook her head. "Transference is still too new. Law hasn't caught up yet. In fact, the gentleman who shot you has done this several times before. Serves a few days, pays a fine, and he's back out."
Sansa shut her eyes. "So, there's nothing to stop him from doing it again."
Dr. Gabriel grunted in agreement. "Which is why I've arranged for you to relocate. Individual transference is only one phase of my company's plan. The next phase is already underway, and I think you should be a part of it."
"Where?"
"A city," Dr. Gabriel said, activating a nearby monitor. Footage of sleek skyscrapers, green gardens, and clear canals played on the screen. "A whole city just for Transfers. All with new names. New lives. And the downtown area's already been completed. We're just looking for more volunteers to populate it and work to help build it."
Sansa had never seen a city so clean, so sophisticated... so beautiful. "Where?"
"An island off the coast. Hundreds of Transfers like you and me are already living and working there. All connected to one another. All striving to achieve what you and I both know is now possible." Dr. Gabriel paused and watched the monitor. "I plan on relocating there myself in the next week or so. Could certainly use another good neighbor."
Standing, fingers fidgeting with the sewn-up hole in her dress, Sansa couldn't look away from the images on the screen. For a moment, she thought about her mother, who now seemed little more than a distant ancestor in some genealogist's notebook. Even a quick review of her stored messages produced no significant feelings within her: twenty-seven texts and voicemails demanding she call and apologize, another fifteen insisting she give Allen another chance, and one last message all but disowning her for "humiliating both yourself and your mother" by getting the transfer.
Before sunset, Sansa climbed aboard a helicopter bound for the island, and Gary was right behind her. Soon, they lifted off and left behind the world of flesh and blood, disease and death, bound for the future of humanity and the new world they would together help create.
from FICTION on the WEB short stories https://ift.tt/4yUahVl
via IFTTT
Comments
Post a Comment