Picture it and write: Storage

by joetwo

Hi there! This is my offering for this weeks Picture it and write on Ermilia’s blog here. Once again; the picture is not mine I only use it for inspiration. Anyway Enjoy.

Storage

Five…Four…Three..Two…One. As if a switch went off the body moves her hand, this one is a woman, already beginning to tear at the soft polymer membrane that makes up her mould. That is how things work. I make you a mould, pour in a cocktail of nutrients and engineered cells, wait a few weeks, then download your mind into your fresh new body. When you are born you rip the mould to shreds, you literally break the mould. I have always found that funny; even before my upload. But then I haven’t changed that much.

I supposed I still think of myself as human; I was born one. But I have spent so much more of my time as a machine. Existing in the quantum foam of the computer. And I have been active all that time, unlike all the others in storage, one of us had to be. The council called me ‘Captain’ but in reality I was so much more. I was the ship, I was all its senses, inside and out, I was its engines, and the life-support systems and even the little repair robots that scurry around so much. It has all kept me very busy I can tell you. There was even a couple of time when my quick (I’m talking nanoseconds here) thinking saved the ship and everyone one it. But I won’t bore you with those details; they’re all in my report.

I know some people back home don’t like the idea of us; that we should stay “normal” but like me ask them, do they know how dangerous space is? The human body can barely survive the month-long trip to Jupiter let alone the three hundred year voyage here. There is just too much radiation. Even if we were frozen in the heart of the ship we’d be damaged beyond repair by the time we arrive. This way is so much better. Save the mind in a multi-redundant memory storage system; fly there safely on autopilot (Thank you! Thank you!), land on the new world where it is nice and safe and build fresh bodies for our minds to be put into and live in.

I say ‘our’ but that is not strictly true. I won’t be joining them. Being a machine does things to your mind; you see things differently, at much greater scales, and so much faster. I couldn’t imagine living in a body again. It’s not even possible to do it; there is too much of me now, all that would remain would be a ghost, a shell of what was there, I don’t want that. Who would?

So I am here to help. I will be very useful to them. A nearly infinite resource. I will be glad to still be of service. After all I protected them this long. I am even helping them be born again. I kind of feel like a dad again. Maybe they’ll look at it the same way.

Oh! Look at me rambling on! I have been nearly three whole seconds talking. This one has ripped a nice big hole in her mould and she is breathing again. No need for the laser-scalpel this time. Good.

Everything looks ok from here, vitals are good, download looks successful. She is a little dazed, but who can blame her? I just put in a call to Gerald; telling him that another one has woken up. That makes fifty humans wandering around now. The place feels so much more alive.

Ah! The woman! I will have to say something. Now what is her name? Elizabeth Zhao. Hmmm! Robotics engineer! Maybe she could help me! I have been thinking. The disembodied voice is just too impersonal. Maybe she could build me a nice android; something more human so I can talk to the crew directly, on a personal level. I’d like that. They might like that too. Best to wait until she is recovered though!

Things are certainly looking a lot more exciting!

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