Robert Sawyer - Mindscan

What—what would you do with me, if you found me?

“Pardon?”

You want me shut off, don’t you? I’m an affront to your sense of self.

“Umm, well…”

I’m not sure I should help you. I mean, I don’t like being trapped here, but it beats t he alternative you’d propose.

“Look, whatever Immortex is up to, it has to be stopped.”

I … perhaps … if you’ll…

“I’m losing you. You’re breaking up…”

Someone coming … I…

And he was gone. I just hoped he had the good sense not to tip his hand—electronic, battery-driven hand though it might be.

The death of Karen Bessarian came as a shock to all of us on the moon. I mean, I knew intellectually that all these other shed skins were going to die soon, but to have one of them actually expire sent a ripple though the entire community.

I’d liked Karen, and I’d liked her books. Most of us here on the moon had not really bonded yet—we hadn’t known each other long enough. But Karen had certainly had an impact on a lot of lives, although how many of the tears I saw were for her, and how many were more selfish, because she’d driven home the mortality of these people, I couldn’t say. I felt doubly discombobulated, because Karen’s death came immediately on the heels of my own cure. I’m not given to spiritual thoughts, but it was almost as if there’d been some sort of conservation of life force at work.

I was pleased to see that a service was held for Karen. I knew Immortex wouldn’t notify anyone back on Earth of her death, but the company still realized the necessity of laying things to rest, literally and figuratively.

There wasn’t a lot of religion here in the cat heaven of Heaviside. I suppose that wasn’t surprising: people who believed in an afterlife weren’t likely to transfer their consciousness. Still, a very nice, small man named Gabriel Smythe, who had platinum hair, a florid complexion, and a cultured British accent, conducted a lovely, mostly secular service. Most of the other elderly people attended, too; in all, there were about twenty of us. I sat next to Malcolm Draper.

The service was held in a small hall with a dozen or so round tables, each big enough to seat four. It was used for tabletop games, little lectures, and so forth. There was no coffin, but a succession of pictures of Karen, and her lopsided smile, were showing on the wall screens. There were lots of flowers at one end of the room, but I’d arrived early enough to see that only a few bunches were real, gathered, presumably, from the greenhouse; the rest—hundreds of blooms—were holograms that the technician hadn’t turned on until after I’d entered.

Smythe, dressed in a black turtleneck and dark gray jacket, stood at the front of the room. “Karen Bessarian lives on,” he said. He wore half-glasses. Looking over their rims, he said, “She lives on in the hearts and minds of the millions who enjoyed her books, or the movies or games based on them.”

Quietly, a couple of servers had been moving round, handing out ornate goblets of red wine, which surprised me. Karen had been Jewish, but I’d only ever seen liturgical wine at a Catholic service. I accepted the glass offered to me, even though I still had a headache—I wondered when it would go away.

“But, more than that,” said Smythe, “she lives on bodily, back on Earth. We should feel some sorrow over what happened here, but we should also feel joy: joy that Karen transferred in time, joy that she continues on.”

There were a few appreciative murmurs from the audience, but also a few muffled sobs.

And Smythe freely acknowledged those. “Yes,” he said, “it’s sad that we will no longer have Karen with us. We’ll all miss her wit and her courage, her strength and her Southern charm.” He paused while the servers distributed the last of the goblets. “Karen was not very religious, but she was fiercely proud of her Jewish heritage, and so I’d like to propose a toast from the Talmud. Ladies and gentlemen, the wine you have is Kosher, of course. If you’ll raise your glasses…”

We all did so.

Smythe turned to the wall next to him, showing Karen’s face, a calm half-smile on it. He gestured at the image with his goblet, proclaimed “ L’chayim!" , and then took a drink.

“L’chayim!” we all repeated, drinking as well.

L’chayim! To life!

We were in Karen’s living room in Detroit, watching the wall-screen TV. The ringer for the phone sounded. Karen looked down at the call display. “Hmmm,” was all she said before touching a control. The videophone signal was shunted onto the TV monitor—which blew the picture up more than its resolution really could accommodate; maybe with her old biological eyes, Karen hadn’t noticed that.

“Austin,” she said, acknowledging the hawk-faced man on the screen. “What’s up?”

“Hi, Karen. Um, who is that with you?”

“Austin Steiner, meet Jacob Sullivan.”

“Mr. Steiner,” I said.

“Austin is my lawyer,” said Karen. “Well, one of them, anyway. What’s up, Austin?”

“Umm, it’s a…”

“A private matter?” I said. I got up. “I’ll go—” I was about to say, “get a cup of coffee,” but that was ridiculous. “I’ll go somewhere else.”

Karen smiled. “Thanks, dear.”

I headed off, feeling Steiner’s eyes on me. I went into another room—a room devoted to Ryan’s hobby, the remains of things long dead. I was looking around, vaguely aware of soft voices from next door, when I heard Karen call my name.

“Jake!”

I hurried back to the living room.

“Jake,” repeated Karen, more softly. “I think you should hear this. Austin, tell Jake what you just told me.”

Steiner’s face pinched even further, as if he’d just tasted something unpleasant. “Very well. Ms. Bessarian’s son, Tyler Horowitz, has approached me to have Ms. Bessarian’s will probated.”

“Her will?” I said. “But Karen’s not dead.”

“Tyler seems to think the biological version of Karen has indeed passed on,” said Steiner.

I looked at Karen. These artificial faces didn’t always display emotion well; I wondered what she was thinking. After a moment, though, I turned back to Steiner.

“Even so,” I said, “Karen’s still alive—right here, in Detroit. And the biological Karen wanted this Karen to have her legal rights of personhood.”

Steiner had thin, dark eyebrows. He raised them. “Apparently Tyler wants the court to decide if such a transfer is valid.”

I shook my head. “But, even if Karen’s, um…”

“Skin,” said Steiner. “Isn’t that the term? Her shed skin?”

I nodded. “Even if her skin has passed on, how would Tyler find that out? Immortex doesn’t reveal that information.”

“A bribe, perhaps,” said Steiner. “How much could it possibly have taken to arrange for someone at High Eden to agree to tip him off when the skin expired? Given the amount of money that’s at stake…”

“Is it a lot?” I said. “I don’t mean the whole estate—I mean the portion you left specifically to Tyler.”

“Oh, yes,” said Karen. “Austin?”

“Although Karen has provided lavishly for a number of charities,” he said, “Tyler and his two daughters are the sole individual beneficiaries of Karen’s will. They stand to inherit something in excess of forty billion dollars.”

“Oh, Christ,” I said. I’m not sure what price I’d sell my own mother for, but we were getting near the ballpark…

“You don’t want this to go to court, Karen,” said Steiner. “It’s too risky.”

“So what should I do?” asked Karen.