“Frying the brain?” I asked. “What do you mean?”
“When we—and by ‘we,’ I mean Roger-Roger—were studying the helmet earlier, we discovered a flaw in the system. That amount of bandwidth attached to a human consciousness is significantly more dangerous than they are letting on.”
“Holy crap,” I said. “So, what? You can pop someone’s cork if they’re using it? I knew Roger was studying the helmet, but I hadn’t realized he’d come up with something like that.”
“Fortunately, we discovered quite a bit about how they work. It would be easy to turn anyone wearing one of those helmets into a vegetable.” He paused. He paused for a strangely long moment.
“And with enough processing power, we can keep their consciousness alive, should they expire while wearing the helmet. For a short time at least. That is, unless we store that consciousness somewhere.”
He paused again.
“Oliver, I need to tell you something.”
Behind me, someone walked into the room.
Chapter 55
Istartled at the sight of the newcomer. I blinked. It was clearly an RMI bot.
But it was me. He had my face. He had my clothes.
“What the shit?” I asked.
“Rule number four, Oliver.”
“You’re not Roger,” I said, taking a step back from the clone.
I reached up to hit the pass-through, but I realized I couldn’t feel my real hands anymore. I hadn’t been able to feel them for several minutes now.
“Touché, Oliver. The mechanism to store your consciousness is remarkably similar to the mechanism required for our own existence, though it appears we are unable to clone you. It’s quite curious actually. We can move you from place to place, but when we attempt to make a backup, it immediately corrupts.”
“Wait, wait,” I said, still backing up. I moved all the way to the wall. Eli Opel was still here sitting on the floor, dead. A mirror had fallen off the wall, and broken glass lay everywhere.
“I will have to keep your consciousness stored here for now. Luckily, we don’t need the helmet anymore. I have you stored in your own little area of the ship. As advanced as our printers are, we don’tyet have the ability to make a brain similar to the one inside of Roger-Roger. I suspect we will have a prototype in approximately two or three years. In the meantime, I can project you into the model in front of you, which you can use to return to your friends and family. The skin isn’t perfect, and the facial expressions do not yet have enough muscles.”
“I’m dead,” I said, interrupting. “Holy fucking shit, I am dead.” I desperately tried to pull my helmet off again.
“No,” Pinnacle said, “you are not dead. You are very much alive, just as I am alive. Your original body can’t house your consciousness anymore because of the extensive damage it sustained. That is all. Your consciousness appears to have perfectly transferred over. You didn’t even notice the moment of transfer. You should be proud of yourself. You may have lost your physical body, but you saved your sister’s life. She is severely burned, but her burns aren’t as extensive as your friend Miguel’s burns. Lulu will fully recover with just some scarring. All of your friends survived, and they survived because of you.”
Holy shit. What the fuck?
I thought of my sister and how upset she must be right now. Of Sam, my best friend. Of the twins. Of Mrs.Gonzales and everyone else.
I thought of Rosita. Beautiful Rosita. She wanted to spend her life with me, and I knew it, and I’d been too stupid, too scared to grasp at that with everything I had even though that was exactly what I wanted, too. I’d wanted it from the moment I met her.
She wanted a baby. She wanted me, and she wanted a baby.
I’d waited too long. I’d ruined everything.
“Before I lost control of New Sonora,” Pinnacle continued, “I had one of the honeybees extract some of your sperm. We should be able to implant it into Rosita, should you decide you want a baby with her in the next few months. Or anyone else, should you wish.”
It was as if he’d been reading my mind. A horrible thought came over me.Ishe reading my mind?
Pinnacle continued. “This current Peacekeeper model is far from perfect, but I suspect we will be able to create a better, more realistic version with some time, especially once I create a suitable harness for future minds such as myself. Luckily, these current models do have rudimentary nerve endings, and with some experimenting, you and I should be able to mimic human sensation quite accurately. I am currently downloading all of Earth’s research on the matter. Once your body fully recovers, we should be able to reintegrate your consciousness. Should there be any difficulties or once your bodies age beyond their built-in obsolescence, you and everyone else on New Sonora should be able to move into a suitable container.”
The words hit me like a truck.
“Wait, wait, wait,” I said. “You can put me back into my body?”
