LifeGames Corporatoin

by Michael Smorenburg

  When she recovered her breath, Nancy proceeded;

  “Leon’s made lots of progress with Roger, but Andrew… the other doc, is arguing over diagnosis. Andrew feels it’s an extreme case of bipolar behavior… schizophrenia, but Leon’s sticking to an awakening of a personality from a past life.”

  “If Leon’s right… my guess is it’s something in the LifeGames program.”

  “Andrew says they’ve found traces of antipsychotic medication in the man’s blood… yet no prescription on his file. Leon says antipsychotics suppress dopamine receptor activity… whatever that may mean.”

  “And…?”

  “I don’t know enough about it, it’s all third hand and over my head anyway, but to them it’s a big deal. Means there’s a rat somewhere.”

  “At least the guy wasn’t Cleopatra or Napoleon—that’s the usual claim.”

  “Truly…! But there’s hope yet, besides Fernando, Leon has uncovered a further two former lives that Roger can recall under hypnosis. He says he was an Indian Squaw who lived around thirteen hundred and the other personality was in the armies of Genghis Khan.”

  “Well the Genghis thing would explain Roger’s current occupation,” Catherine observed.

  “Wouldn’t it,” Nancy agreed. “It seems that our Roger is quite the warrior.”

  “Has Fernando come up with any more revelations?” Catherine encouraged.

  “Yeah, he’s a regular mine of information, turning up facts that only a handful of specialist historians know.”

  They both shifted uncomfortably in their seats and Catherine suggested a change of scenery, “Night cap?”

  “Good idea,” Nancy agreed.

  Settling their tab, they headed for a popular late night Jazz Cafe where the aroma of brewing coffee mingled with the hubbub of festivity.

  Time was of no concern to either of them as it was a Friday night and they were both traveling in Catherine’s car.

  Nancy continued her story as they drove along the highway, “Leon’s slowly made Roger come to terms with the fact that he harbors a personality from another epoch. Leon tells me that it’s the most detailed past-life regression he’s ever encountered. I mean… it gets weirder and weirder… Roger’s got Fernando’s neck scars, there are the historical…”

  “Neck scars?” Catherine looked appalled… darting her eyes from the road to Nancy and back to the road again, her face a mask of shock.

  “Didn’t you know about it, Cath? Roger has a rope-burn scar around his neck, but he doesn’t have a clue how it got there and it isn’t recorded on his military file!”

  “God-Jesus… Nancy, you’re giving me the creeps,” Catherine shivered.

  “You want me to stop?” she asked.

  They drove on in silence for a few moments, each contemplating.

  “Actually Nance, there is something I was going to mention earlier. I was thinking of doing an on-line run… at LifeGames. I’m a little hesitant now. I’m not really sure that I want to find a Fernando somewhere in my past! My mother certainly wouldn’t approve.”

  It was a tonic, the air of dread evaporated.

  “Don’t be silly Cath, we’ve run perhaps millions of people through the program with no problems. Ken always says that you’re much safer on-line than you are out in the real world. I can’t disagree.”

  Between glimpses back to the road, Catherine managed to convey a look of pull the other leg and they giggled again.

  “No, I’m not being paid to say it! Seriously, Leon went into a lot of detail explaining to me about Roger’s regression and besides, Roger has been the only person to have anything go wrong.”

  “Oh, come on Nance,” Catherine tut-tutted.

  “Okay, okay. I must be sounding like a used car salesman. I’ll grant you that we had some teething problems, but then again we’re working with computer software and they’re notoriously full of bugs and viruses and God knows what else. Roger has been the only one to experience any lasting problem. The Pentagon is our largest client and you know how finicky they are. They wouldn’t endanger anybody’s life; anybody from their own side that is.”

  Catherine offered her an incredulous look for the third time.

  “Okay, okay. But face it Cath, you’re a skeptic.”

  “For beware…” Catherine wagged her index finger in the air to lend her words solemn authority as she quoted the closing words of the Desiderata, “…the world is full of trickery,” her voice possessed all the philosophic resonance she could muster.

  “You’re right I suppose,” Nancy agreed, “being a skeptic is good, I’m legendary for it.”

  “Sorry I side tracked us, you were going to tell me about Leon explaining something?” Catherine re-focused.

  “I was?”

  “Uh-huh,” Catherine hummed in a seductive lilt.

  “Oh yes, it’s the wine. Leon was saying that, in a tormented spirit like Roger’s, there’s an enormous confusion. In Leon’s telling of it, the man’s participation in the program must have brought all of his violent past to a head, there must have been a particular vision that triggered Fernando to come out of his subconscious. Who knows? Perhaps Fernando the priest wanted to confess Roger for his sins?”

  “Don’t you think it’s a little odd that it hadn’t happened to Roger before? How much more realistic can the game be than a real war zone, where they say the guy has spent a lifetime?” Catherine argued.

  “True,” Nancy thought about it a moment, “Perhaps you can use it in the next phase of the advertising and PR campaign, Cath, ‘a program so realistic it’ll leave you four times the man you were before’!”

  They erupted into the evening’s umpteenth chorus of hilarity and Catherine was forced to halt the car short of the parking lot to catch her breath.

  “We shouldn’t be doing this, you know,” Nancy was suddenly struck by the idea that Catherine was driving intoxicated.

  “So sorry, mom… I didn’t mean it… it just happened—and it’s only round the corner.”

  “We’ll get a cab after this,” Nancy insisted.

  “You’re right… I’ll pay.”

  “We’ll share the fare. What was it you were going to do on-line?” Nancy inquired.

  Catherine spat out the first answer that leapt through her mind, “Ken would kill me if I told you!”

  “If that were true then I’d have been a corpse ten times over tonight Cath, “I’ve been spilling the beans to you all night and I’ll beat this out of you if you make me,” Nancy plucked on Catherine’s own line.

  “Promises, promises,” Catherine was not to be outdone.

  They locked the car and made their way, arm in arm, toward the Cafe.

  “Well?” Nancy insisted.

  “Well what?” Catherine responded cheekily.

  For some reason not clear to herself, she was looking for a way out of telling Nancy about the planned cyber-sex game. Oddly, she could not fathom her own uncharacteristic embarrassment.

  Nancy gave Catherine a hard spank on the rump to prick her memory.

  “Oh that!” it gave Catherine a remarkable recovery from her amnesia.

  “Yes, that!” Nancy repeated firmly.

  “All right, all right, I’ll tell you when we sit. You find a spot, I’m going to the little girl’s room.” Inexplicably, Catherine still wanted to delay.

  “I’ll join you.”

  They spent a few minutes retouching tear-streaked mascara, sporadically giggling.

  Then, having found a seat and with medical grade espresso on order, the two settled in, Nancy rubbing her hands gleefully in anticipation of the details to the secret that Catherine had held out on.

  She could delay no more;

  “Cyber-sex”

  “You are shitting me, lady!”

  “I swear.”

  “Are you nuts?” Tickled by the tipple, she said it with a laugh. “I didn’t know we had that program.”

  “You don’t… well, not yet anyway. That’s what y
our programmer and Ken are up to.”

  “Anton Lim?”

  “I think that’s the Anton Ken talks about,” the dizzying sensation of disclosure slowly ebbed, leaving Catherine invigorated.

  A freshness and conspiratorial level of friendship was now reached, the pair tittered like pubescents, their professional caution hurled to the winds.

  “I want details, baby… Where…? When…? How…? Come on, out with it.”

  “Not much I can say yet, Ken’s very economical with details; I guess with all his problems, this one’s not a priority.”

  “Hmmm… ” Nancy remained flushed. “Don’t worry, he’s a dog… it’s a priority.”

  “The little I’ve gathered, they’re patching some external code into a main sequence program, but there are some integration issues.”

  “It’s kinda cold though, isn’t it? Very premeditated, a very mercenary way to get your kicks.”

  “There’s a charm in that…” Catherine suggested, “It’s not the only way I’d like my sex, but for a lark, I’ll try it once.”

  “I’m not sure I’d be that brave.”

  “With your boss…? On the other hand, it could pay dividends I suppose.”

  “He’s your boss too… well… sort of.”

  “Hmm way to go Nance… give me cold feet.”

  Their mood almost sobered, but neither of them wanted the buoyant mood to end.

  “So… who’s your lover?”

  Catherine jolted with shock at the directness; she’d never disclosed her orientation or private life, the moment to discuss it had never before arisen.

  “What’s your fantasy…?”

  Catherine’s mind raced at the question. Usually she was an open book, she’d tell anybody anything at any time, but something in this fragile sisterhood was too precious a gem to risk on truth’s rejection;

  “Really?” She’d said it before she thought it.

  Nancy had seen the surprise, “Was I too forward?”

  “No… you just caught me unaware. Don’t be silly, I’ve got nothing to hide, of course I’ll tell you.”

  Then Nancy realized her own error; “No… oh, no… not in reality. In the game! Who’s your lover in the game? What’s the setting?”

  They both burst into laughter and it broke down another small barrier.

  “I’ll tell you… I seriously will, but you must promise to still love me,” she laughed to pretend she didn’t mean it.

  “Scout’s honor,” Nancy saluted, and they laughed again.

  “I haven’t focused on it. I don’t really think I’m getting that choice.”

  “Ken!” Nancy said it on impulse.

  “What?” Catherine genuinely missed it.

  “I suggested Ken… He’s conceited, if he’s picking, that’s what he’ll pick.” Nancy paused; navigating a sea of morals was always hazardous, especially when alcohol has the microphone, “Honestly…? I saw something spark the very first day you came to the office.”

  “You’re kidding?” Catherine looked mortified, “I don’t think…” before she could finish, Nancy cut her off.

  “I don’t think anyone else has seen it; both of you hide it well.”

  There seemed little point denying it.

  “What’s in it for him?” the alcohol asked, “Oops, sorry,” Nancy apologized, “Too many questions… none of my business.”

  “Okay, time to stop being coy. Ask away, if I don’t want to answer anything then I won’t answer, ok? I’m a big girl.” Warmth and trust building between them; “Ken’s wants to watch.”

  “Just watch?” Nancy cocked her head.

  “JUST-WATCH!And only Ken… he said he can arrange it; I’m game.”

  “Men!… Bloody voyeurs.”

  “Who isn’t?” Catherine flashed a smile.

  Nancy didn’t answer.

  “I’ll confess it… I’m nervous. It’s a boundary I probably shouldn’t cross. Not with him and perhaps not like this… a first cyber sex experience,” Catherine re-emphasized.

  “Probably the safest sex,” Nancy quipped.

  Catherine held back; on impulse she almost said, “How about two women?” Instead she offered, “I don’t know, Nance. What if it sends me loopy?”

  “A bit late for that!”

  Catherine laughed at her exaggerated and crazed rolling eyes, but she snapped back to a serious expression;

  “Honestly Cath, there’s nothing to worry about.”

  “Apart from hospitalization…?”

  “I’d do it…”

  “Oooh… now there’s something to watch,” Catherine said reflexively, the alcohol lending her tongue its own disobedience.

  “You’re welcome,” Nancy went with the lure of decadence.

  They were reacting to one another’s comments with knee-jerk honesty and, being so freshly acquainted into full friendship, it continually fractured the flow of their conversation.

  Catherine knocked their stuttering segues into mild embarrassment on the head;

  “Why are we being so coy? I reckon most people are exhibitionists. Damned to hell and all that.”

  “You mean voyeurs Cath, I’m not sure I’m an exhibitionist…. But I think all of us like to look; look in on lives; it spawned reality shows and celebrity obsession.”

  “What I’m thinking about is several steps past that.”

  They both laughed heartily and easily.

  The two had come a long way in a short evening; they’d started as good acquaintances and blossomed into a real friendship and heady intimacy.

  Their bond continued to grow from crescendo to concern, from laugh to honest revelation; every breadth of human emotion poured out and shared until the Eastern horizon grew pink and the blossom of a new day promised.

  Chapter 9

  The bearded man was dressing for battle. He donned a light smock made of smart fabrics, all manner of nano-telemetry microdots and Wi-Fi feedback gauges impregnated into its weave. Below the fabric, gel patches the size of halved Ping-Pong balls studded his body in strategic locations. He looked more like a hospital patient prepped for surgery than someone dressed to kill.

  As she watched through the one-way observation window, Catherine noticed the man had a rare and unsettling intensity of lethal intent to his stare; his eyebrow a single solid bridge. He’d looked at her through the glass, directly into her eyes, and much as they assured her it was impossible to see through the mirror, his eyes still bored into her mind minutes later.

  She guessed him in his mid forties, but with muscle tone twenty years younger. Before they’d dropped the slip over his head, his alley cat body was a network of deep scars and thick welts; a battlefield of healed trenches and old impact sites where projectiles and shrapnel had done their work.

  She’d nudged Ken, horrified, “What’s this guy been up to?”

  “Stamp collecting,” Ken whispered.

  “Seriously…!” her tone begged urgency for a reply.

  “He’s probably been in more skirmishes than you’ve had shopping trips.”

  “Jesus! He sure bought some nice souvenirs.”

  Earlier Ken had briefed her that this would be a Spetsnaz building clearing exercise—Spetsnaz were the elite of the elite in Russia’s army Special Forces who have undergone countless grueling training programs to earn their stripes.

  As Catherine watched, they were slinging the man into a webbing of straps that were then hooked onto a set of enormous hoops all connected to form a massive double-volume gyroscope.

  The construction had the appearance of Copernicus’ model of planetary motion with the Commander slung in its center as the sun.

  This would be a commercial run, not a Time Dilation trial, Ken had explained.

  “Why the gymnastics equipment?” Catherine frowned, “I thought you said they just lie and twitch?”

  “The gyroscope? You do remember details,” he complimented. “This is going to be a very physical routine. We could do it with the God Hel
met, with transcranial stimulation, but then we wouldn’t be able to assess his musculoskeletal condition. He needs to be in peak physical condition and this is still the only way to test that to breakdown.”

  The team was ready and the exercise could begin.

  Once he had secretly placed the re-engineered drug into the patches, Ken had given his permission to resume trials, bringing the Time Dilation facility back on track.

  For Ken, the previous six weeks had been overwhelming and stress-filled.

  Alex King, the private investigator charged with setting up a Colombian connection, had needed access to far more technical data and specifications for the pharmaceutical re-development than Ken had on hand. Ascertaining them through third party consultants while trying to retain anonymity had proven almost impossible, but eventually they had been delivered.

  Eventually, when the deal was struck and the Colombians invested, Ken was able to step from his own shadows, into their murky world.

  During their argument, in the minutes prior to his death, Craig had mentioned what the solution to the drug’s problem would be.

  Ken had passed the information on and the fault had quickly been found and eliminated.

  Alex had arranged for the drugs to be manufactured in bulk; Ken’s only task was to attend the drug trial. To remain incognito, he’d prepared an elaborate disguise and faked a broad Scottish accent. As far as he’d been concerned, remaining undetectable was the only test necessary for the use of the drug. The drug was a three part concoction, entirely benign and of no interest to any food or drug administration. Only once the two active ingredients were mixed and spun through a centrifuge would the catalyst be added, and it would take on its required neuropsychotropic characteristic.

  He’d observed two trials performed on unsuspecting subjects. Their doses massive, they’d died in hallucinating terror. Ken had watched the autopsies where, thankfully, no trace of the drug had been revealed. Once satisfied, he’d paid the laboratory in the blood diamonds they’d requested before slipping out of the country on a private jet.

  With the adapted formula for creating the psychotrop under lock and key, Ken would have no need for anybody else to know the true secrets of Time Dilation. Each of the components could be manufactured in separate facilities and stored apart. The drug was potent enough to only rarely need brewing. Vast quantities could be fixed to gel patches in a very short time.