Simulacra

So, full disclosure to those of you reading this:

I'm dead.

Murdered, to be painfully specific. And I know who did it.

I remember his face.

So, just go to the cops, right? Simple. Two problems with that.

One: Still dead.

Two: No one can hear ghosts. Or digital ghosts.

Which is exactly what I am. A digital ghost. A copy of me, or at least of what I used to be. I know what you're thinking. Likely none of this makes sense to you. And it all must be very confusing and far-fetched, so I'm going to backtrack a ways to explain how this came to pass.

It started out as such a good idea.

Harmless. Or at least it seemed that way. Hell, to a lot of us it even seemed 'safe'. A tenuous grasp on immortality became a strong grip in an iron fist seemingly overnight. A sure thing. I admit, I had been skeptical at the idea of 'Simulacra' as much as the next person; but what is one person's doubts against an unceasing tidal wave of targeted marketing, advertising and propaganda?

The Genus Corporation: 'Makers of the Future'.

You know, the 'We Can Remember It For You Wholesale' kind of cutting edge yet morally ambiguous company. They had created the Asimov-8 Model androids that made everyday life no longer a chore, or at least that's what the full sized ads on blinking digital billboards would have you believe. So many of us had trusted the daily tedium of our lives into cold robotic hands that when the next technological advancement from Genus came along, we were chomping at the bit to try it. Then came the announcement. It was on a Wednesday, I believe.

A large digital advertisement, blinking crisp and clean across countless billboards, screens and devices across the world. A smiling woman watching her children at play in her carefully manicured backyard. A timelapse scene then played out where the children slowly aged, and had children of their own, while the mother remained watching: ageless and perfect, as if time itself had frozen her solid at the peak of life. She would turn towards the camera, still smiling broadly. A small metallic device implanted against her temple, blinked with a steady tiny orange light.

Then came the tagline: 'Live To See The Future - Simulacra'.

The ad lasted no more than thirty seconds. But in the next thirty after it crash-landed directly in the line of sight of every consumer on the planet, thousands of fingers flew across simulated keyboards and touchscreens, immediately making appointments at their nearest Genus office to experience this wonderful new innovation. It promised what had eluded humans for so long: to be an immortal God.

And in our boundless greed, we fell for it.

Simulacra was nothing short of miraculous. An implant, grafted into your prefrontal cortex that would create a virtual copy of what was essentially, you. All of your memories, your experiences, carefully culled and digitally uploaded into a massive cloud storage vault.

'Think of it as mortality insurance or a digital soul' is the way I heard someone describe it once. If something terrible happened to your body or it became sick and withered away, as was the way of all mortal flesh, the physical implant could be transplanted into a new body. So long as the implant survived, part of you would always exist somewhere. And to many people, that was a great comfort.

I was no exception. Just like the others, I arrived at the Genus Offices just in time for my appointment. I was ushered out of the sterile lobby into a small, windowless office. Instead of the analog savagery of glass reflecting the world without, a huge plasma screen that spanned the entirety of one whole wall, depicted a peaceful seashore with calmly rolling waves. There was nowhere that technology couldn't take you. Now, it could even usher you past death. Suddenly the seascape faded away, replaced by the digitized image of an employee of Genus, dressed in a crisp white high-collar jacket. The representative smiled, dead eyes staring unblinking, while they proceeded to explain the process for installing the Simulacra implant.

Quick.

Relatively painless.

You might experience swelling.

Or insomnia for the first few nights.

The warnings were recited in an emotionless, clinical tone, as if they were simply listing off the ingredients for making a sandwich. The representative looked up at me past an ocular implant that spanned from temple to temple.

"Do you understand?" she said. "Good." A quick response before I barely had time to nod in agreement. "I will need you to fill out these forms before we begin." A digital hand gestured towards a tablet that sat on the desk before me. I lifted it up and carefully began to scroll through the words on each page cluttered with circuitous medical and technical jargon, before authorizing each form with a definitive thumbprint on the intake pad. Her smile only faltered once, when she noticed that I had paused in reading the fine print, and I looked up at her. A look of halting confusion was quite obvious on my face.

"Wait. This says that any digital uploads of self and/or memories are intellectual property of the Genus Corporation. So, you'll own me...?"

"It's only a standard form." Her smile quickly replaced as if it was on an endless loop. "The Genus Corporation doesn't own you, per se, simply your copy. For security purposes. We would never want a copy of someone falling into the wrong hands or using the proprietary technology for illicit purposes." Something about the whole idea stuck cold deep in the pit of my stomach, but nevertheless, she continued to read the form in an attempt to assuage my fears and apprehensions.

"It is a vast cloud of data, of course. But even a cloud has its limitations. We hope to store millions in the cloud for future transfer. However, if your Simulacra is not transferred back into its implant in 72 hours, post-detachment, we will be forced to delete the copy to make sufficient space for others. The next paragraph outlines this..."

"Post-detachment?" I interrupted with a raised brow.

"Death, in layman's terms." Explained the calming voice with an unsettling smile.

Delete the copy? Post-detachment?

A harsh and stark reality. But not inaccurate. As an information broker, I was well aware of the limitations of storage and how useless, dead-end files would need to be deleted to make room for new ones. Hell, I did it on a daily basis. So while it seemed like a distant threat, it was distant enough that I still pressed my thumbprint onto the intake pad, signing away my consent to be digitally copied and housed in the world's largest cloud storage. With the forms completed, the tablet was retrieved and ushered out of the room by an employee who looked eerily similar to the one on the screen from earlier.

No sooner had that one disappeared, than two more appeared with a similar blank look and pristine white smocks wheeling a small metal table with some instruments and what I only assumed was the device.

"Relax. We will begin the installation now." The employee on the left spoke flatly from behind a sterile mask. The installation went as promised, quick and relatively painless. Though that may have had more to do with one of the liquid-filled syringes that sat lined up on the tray as a precursor to the upcoming procedure. I did experience insomnia the first few nights, but I chalked it up to the constant flow of data from my brain to back up all my existent memories and experiences to this point. They tell you to expect all these things. All of these side effects. They don't really tell you what to expect in the instance of a catastrophe or an accident.

And they certainly don't advise you what to do when an angry client caves your skull in with a length of steel pipe in a heated debate over your finder's fee. I have to say, it is odd watching your own death. Watching your physical form crumple under the weight of someone's unbridled rage.

The blood is brighter red than I expected.

At the moment of organic flesh failure, when my real authentic soul wriggled out of its mortal coil to go beyond whatever waited for such genuine things in this life, my detached digital soul remained all that was left behind. An imitation of what no longer existed. You reach out to try and help yourself only to have your hand pass right through any physical barrier. You try and scream at yourself to get up, but no voice comes from nonexistent lungs.

This must be what it is like to be a ghost. Frustrating. No wonder they knock over dishes and slam doors.

I suppose I was still in shock when some passerby called after finding my body and the police had come and retrieved it, carting it away in a plain white Coroner's van.

No lights. No siren. Don't really need them for the dead.

I retreated to the confines of the cloud, watching myself from this strange vault of digital heaven as my body lay on a cold metal slab somewhere below. The implant at the side of my head had borne the brunt of the attack, not to mention the pulverized bone and brain beneath. The device flickered helplessly, straining to reconnect to my copy. Attempting to download it back into my battered flesh. I could still hear them, in broken phrases, when the coroner came to examine me.

"Blunt trauma to the skull. Implant damaged beyond repair. Sending the serial number on the unit to Genus for research."

It was then that a horrible realization sank in. Not only was I a digital ghost, I was a fugitive digital ghost. With no implant to sync to and no body to call home. And I had 72 hours to figure out how to find a new one, not to mention to track down who killed me in the first place.

Just 72 hours until I would be 'removed to save space'. And counting.

Sometimes even miracles had their downsides.