The Writer's Forum

His eyelids felt heavy and unwilling to open but he forced them to open. It was then he realised that something was wrong. He couldn’t place exactly what was wrong but something primal was welling inside of him. Fear, but what was he afraid of? He was never afraid of anything. There was nothing in his life that he had ever needed to fear. He lay for a while, his limbs too heavy and lazy to move. When all of his motor function returned he forced himself upright with all the grace of an ice skating hippo. It occurred to him that it was taking an inordinate amount of effort just to perform even the simplest tasks. Why this was so he was not sure; but what he was sure of was that this room he was in was not his bedroom.

Above him was a high blue vaulted ceiling not unlike what one would expect to see in an old church. Another glace revealed the entire room was blue and smooth, devoid of any life and feature. His addled brain could not figure out where he was or how he came to be here. Thousands of questions swelled in his mind. His brain felt like it was dancing the jig inside his skull. It was a most unusual feeling one of those feelings that he never expected to feel. It was then that he realised his vision was changing Bright Yellow invaded the relative calmness of the blue he had been seeing. Then everything was yellow and unlike anything he’d ever seen before. The room was not blue and featureless but yellow and crammed with odd and useless looking objects.

His mind was in overdrive. He had woken up in a room that was not his own. He was surrounded by loads of useless objects and the room was yellow, even though it had first seemed like a featureless and calming blue room. His head was spinning faster than a Catharine wheel firework. He was so lost in his thoughts that it was a considerable time before he noticed that there was someone else in the room.

He attempted to speak but before he could summon up the energy to perform this task he was interrupted. A man, covered head to foot in white, was standing next to him. The man appeared to be talking to him.

“Mr. Cree-ate?” The man asked, which was a surprise to Hal, if only because the man had pronounced Hal’s name correctly.
“Don’t attempt to talk! You could damage your voice box beyond repair. I am Physica Marsh; you are in the interment centre. I will explain more when you next revive, I must anaesthetise you now.”

Even though he was warned, suddenly the room began, the bright and overpowering yellow, became mixed with the blue that Hal had earlier seen and began to swirl around him like a cosmic blender. His head felt like a dead weight and he dropped back into the position in which he awoke. After 3 minutes of enduring the cosmic blender the bright yellow faded, replaced with shades of blue, that got progressively darker until they were shades of grey and black. Finally Hal had a sensation that can only be described as an explosion in his mind, which made him black out.

Hal Create was the ultimate boring man. He would trundle off to work early in the morning and then go to the pub for a quiet drink, always on his own, before dragging himself home to a TV dinner and an early night. Now don’t be fooled into believing that Hal owned a TV, he didn’t. Hal just had no need for TV or for any fancy cooking equipment, or any cooking equipment for that matter, except a microwave. In fact, Hal’s entire flat was as plain and featureless as a piece of paper. Hal didn’t own a washing machine, radio, computer, camera or mobile phone. The only technology that he required was: his taxi, a microwave, an alarm clock, a smoke alarm and a home phone line.

Hal lived in a particularly boring area of Neath in South Wales. Nothing spectacular ever happened. Most of the time Hal wondered just how the hell he ended up there; but then remembered that he moved there because he wanted to get away from the fast life of being a London cabbie. Now I say fast life, but Hal’s life as a London cabbie was only fast by comparison of being a cabbie in the South Wales Valleys. Sure Hal’s taxi moved faster on the open roads of his local valleys but you try and find someone wanting a taxi from Pen-something-or-other-wych, it’s close to impossible. If you think that Hal doesn’t earn much money, you’d be wrong. Hal was at least smart enough to negotiate a yearly salary that didn’t matter how many customers he had. It wasn’t spectacular. It was modest, average, just like Hal.

Now to the normal human, being a London cabbie may not be the worst job and it may be quite busy for all we know, but the one odd thing was Hal moving for a slower pace. It is understandable if you are growing old and want to settle somewhere quiet with your family, but Hal is a 37-year-old single man. Hal was also very plain. Hal spoke to no one except the taxi company’s dispatch people. Hal ate the same things everyday with no variation. Hal was BORING!

Hal was also of mean intellect. Well that probably isn’t true. It is more accurate to say that he was average. Not smart and not stupid, average. As long as he could remember it was something else that he was consistent with. Every exam, every school report, every class, every grade, C. Never C-, never C+, just plain C. Even his Head teacher would say that it was astonishing that his grades never changed.

Hal’s father was also nobody. Hal’s Father worked in some factory somewhere and lived his life going through the motions. He was a boring and had about the same level intellect as his son. As a child Hal used to sit and wonder if his boring existence was hereditary.

Well now that you know who and what Hal is, it is only fair to tell you what Hal was doing prior to his very surreal awakening. The last thing Hal remembered was taking his standard four-minute shower, drying himself off and going to sleep on his single bed. Now although it may seem odd that Hal not only doesn’t socialise but that he only owns a single bed, well there is a reason. Sex. Hal was afraid of it. Passing on his genetics was Hal’s one and only neurosis. Hal didn’t like the idea that he may pass on his genes if his and his father’s boring nature was hereditary. To Hal that was stone cold logic. To you and me, it’s just plain strange.

Now as you may have guessed, Hal’s awakening was a bit of a shock to him. Imagine every day of your life being exactly the same as the previous. Now imagine what would happen if you woke up to the world Hal had woken up to. What would you do? I’m sure most people would try and dismiss it as a dream. Not Hal. Even Hal’s dreams were boring. So boring that he could never remember them. At this point I’m sure that you are feeling sorry for Hal but you must remember that Hal actually doesn’t think that there is anything wrong with his life. I wouldn’t go so far as to say he actually enjoysal Hall it, but it is close to enjoyment. Never-the-less, I’m sure that everyone can understand exactly why Hal’s mind went into overdrive.

After his black-out, the next thing Hal remembered was that there was a blinding light, even though his eyes were closed. What Hal didn’t realise until later was that he could not longer trust his senses. He could see what he would call a white, smooth wall in front of him. He could hear nothing, he could taste nothing and most extraordinarily he could feel nothing. It felt to Hal as if all his senses had shut down. This in itself would be odd, but it was not that which was bugging him. If his senses weren’t feeding him information why was he seeing the white wall? As most people know when you close your eyes or lose your eyesight you see black, you see nothing.

Hal spent what felt like an hour with nothing but his thoughts and the white wall for company; that was until his head entered the ultimate dizzy spell and his sight was restored.

“Mr. Create? You should be able to speak now but please listen to what I have to say before you do.” The ever predictable Hal reacted to this a he would any instruction. He followed it.

“You have been the subject of an experiment. You were drugged during the night and brought to a secret testing lab where you were placed in stasis. It is 275 years since you were abducted. We have reanimated you because we need your help.” For 2 hours Physica Marsh explained all the where’s and why-fore’s. Physica Marsh even answered all Hal’s questions.

From what Hal had been told, the government sanctioned his abduction because he was nobody and would not be missed. Hal was the perfect guinea pig for potential life preservation technology. The problem was it didn’t work. Hal had died one year after being placed in the stasis chamber. So Hal had been put back in the stasis chamber to preserve his body until a time when science could explain why the stasis chamber had failed to reanimate him. It had taken 275 years for science to advance to such a time that the scientists assigned to Hal’s case found out that he wasn’t dead but his heart was beating at the rate of less than one beat every 5 minutes. Physica Marsh also explained that due to the long period that some of his muscles went without oxygen they had to be rebuilt; that was why Physica Marsh had told Hal not to try to speak.

Again I’m sure any outside observer can imagine the trouble Hal must have had taking all this in. Hal’s mind was in overload. The most unremarkable man was in the middle of the most amazing adventure all because he was unremarkable. It took about 10 minutes for Hal to absorb all this information and it was then that he asked the question that was most pressing in his mind.

“Why rebuild my muscles? Why not leave me to die?” Physica Marsh fixed him with a cold but sincere stare.

“You are Humanity’s last hope.” Well now Hal’s mind was so far in overload he felt as if it could destroy the entire landmass of Ireland, twice.

“Say what.”

“100 years ago we humans decided that sexual reproduction was inefficient and held too many risks. Over 93% of the population had some form of STI. To maintain the human race we developed cloning as a viable means of procreation. However there was a problem. Governments became God, deciding who could and who could not be cloned. This limited the growth of our race but ultimately saved our planet.”

“So what’s the problem?” Enquired Hal eagerly.

“Our clones are breaking down. We’ve all been cloned so many times that the genetic structure has become irreversibly damaged and degraded. The clones die after about 30 years. We need a new sample of a human to spread throughout the human gene pool.”

“Why?”

“So that there will be enough genetic diversity to avoid risking inbreeding. You see it’s like making a copy of a copy of a copy, eventually the copy is useless. There are less than 3000 humans left. Yourself and several other ‘volunteers’ will donate genetic material. The DNA will be used to fertilise a female egg which in turn will be then be inseminated into a mother-to-be. You and about 17 others will help the human race to survive. Your stable genetic structure should prove to be dominant and therefore nullify any unstable genetics.” To Hal this was preposterous. Did they not know? Was there nothing in any file that said that Hal Create was a loser because of his genetics? Did they really want a load of losers like Hal to be mankind’s salvation? It certainly sounded like it.

Hal glanced round the room. It was rather unremarkable for an infirmary. No monitors or screens, not even any instruments. In fact it was a room with no windows, smooth walls and one raised platform that contained the mattress he was lying on. It had been an hour since Hal’s informative chat with Physica Marsh. Since then Hal had paced round the room several times looking for a way out which didn’t seem to exist. Hal’s room, nay cell, was an empty and featureless box with no clear door.

Since he discovered his cell had no visible exit Hal turned his mind to the great and cosmic practical joke that had been played on him. Hal had successfully avoided passing on his genes to a next generation, the only thing he was ever successful at, and now his genes would be used to save humanity. The cosmos may have thought it funny but frankly Hal was offended. Fate had dealt him a bum hand all his life and he’d been happy with it and this was how he was repaid.

The sense of irony was not lost on Hal he was unremarkable at everything and he would equally unremarkable at not passing on his genes. In fact he would not do anything. In some twisted way Hal would actually be successful in not passing on his genes someone else would do it for him. This train of thought left Hal totally oblivious to the fact that someone had entered the room. It was Physica Marsh.

“Hello spaceman!”

“Sorry Physica. I was a little lost in my thought. Where’d you come from?” Physica Marsh looked a little puzzled.

“What do you mean?” Asked Marsh quizzically.

“I mean there are no doors so how the hell did you get in.”

“Well technically I never left and was never here. I’m a hologram so what you see is a representation of the real me projected by the Hologram Generation Unit in the walls.” This confused Hal further, if Physica Marsh was a hologram then how’d he get in the room in the first place. He quizzed the Physica Marsh hologram on this matter.

“Well I’m afraid I haven’t been completely honest, you are not actually here either. Your body was never repaired properly. We are actually in a neutral location regulated by computers. I am connected to a computer, as are you.”

“So why did you bother speaking to me like this?”

“Ethics. It is not correct to just take your genetic material even if it does save humanity. We want your permission to use your body and genetic makeup to save our race. However to do this we will have to remove you from stasis which will effectively kill you.” This presented Hal with a difficult truth to face. Either go back to a dreamless sleep he may never wake from or he could die and save humanity. Whilst coming to term with this news Hal’s body, or at least the representation of his body, mutinied and started laughing heartily. Something deep inside Hal certainly thought that the entire situation was funny. It took some time for Hal to regain his composure, but when he did, he was able to do something he never thought he would ever do. He took a risk.

“I’ll do it I’ll save humanity!” The words that had just stampeded out of his mouth sounded absurd but strangely Hal felt comfortable saying them, even more comfortable than he was with his old and boring lifestyle.

“Okay I’ll start the reanimation procedure. You’ll have about an hour once the procedure finishes. You will be able to die before that if you wish, we have drugs that can kill you but make it like falling into a peaceful sleep.” Hal knew the words were meant as comfort but was still unnerved by them. What comforted him most was the idea that in 1 hour he would be dead. It was morbid but Hal had never feared death, he had embraced it as a fact of life. To die by saving the rest of the world had somehow validated the life of this most un-extraordinary man whom fate had reward for not failing but also not succeeding.

Hal felt like he blacked out but he had in fact opened his eyes for the first time in what he thought was 275 years and they took their time adjusting. When he finally saw his first sight in 275 years it was not what he expected. Hal was in a room that looked like in had come out of a hospital in his own time. Many questions swelled in his mind before he realised which was most pertinent.

“Did it work? Was the reanimation successful?” It was then that a young nurse appeared by his bedside. She fixed him with a quizzical stare and shouted.

“We need a doctor over here NOW!”

Now you would think after what Hal had just been through nothing would surprise him. You would be wrong. Hal had awoken in his own time. The first face was one he recognised it was that of the nurse he used to drive to work every morning. He felt odd though as if something was not right. Hal felt no pain and so got up. It was, as he turned round to look at the bed next to him that he realised what was wrong. He was staring at the occupant of his neighbour’s bed; it was Hal’s body.

The nurse he first recognised was standing over the bed along with another nurse and a doctor who was pronouncing the Hal look-a-like dead. Inexplicably he started crying. It was at this moment that he realised the something was wrong. Hal’s sound was not right; it was deeper than it had been. Hal called over a nurse and realised that his voice was much deeper than it had previously been.

“What have you done to me?” The nursed fixed him with a stare that seemed to ask what planet he was one. Without a word she proceeded to call a doctor who explained what had happened to him.

“Mr. Bodworth, you were in the back of this man’s taxi-cab.” He said pointing to the now dead occupant of the bed next to his.

“The taxi crashed and both of you have been in comas. It is amazing that you have been seemingly unaffected by this massive trauma, for that matter you should not even be up. Your muscles were in atrophied and should not of recovered this fast. How are you feeling?” Hal’s meagre interpretation of the doctor’s expressions troubled him to his very core. What was going on?

“I’m not Mr. Bodworth, I’m Hal, Hal Create.” Hal grew more troubled by the look of concern growing in the doctor’s face. Hal proceeded to explain what had happened to him. His long tale received even more new expressions from the doctor’s seemingly endless supply of new expressions. At the end of his wondrous tale the doctor very calmly ordered Hal to sit down.

“Mr. Bodworth, I believe what you are experiencing is called Dissociative Identity Disorder. It means that your memories and sense of personal identity are not all correct. It has been caused by the inability of the brain to cope with the strain of losing months of life in what has seemed to you like instants. There are treatments available but the course of treatment is long-term, intensive, and invariably painful. I’m going to call a psychiatric consultant for you.”

As we know Hal is not a very clever or strong man but frankly his escapades had pushed him to breaking point. Hal grabbed the doctor by the scruff and lifted him a clear foot off the floor. Even though he knew it was not his body he liked it. This body was stronger and better built that his old one. Unfortunately for him Hal had been lost in the thoughts of the possibilities of this new body when he was injected with a sedative. When he awoke this time he was strapped down. A new fresh-faced doctor was looking down at him.

“Ahh, Mr. Bodworth you are back with us.” It was the face of Physica Marsh. Hal was now more confused than ever before, what was the Physica doing in the 21^st century?

Marsh walked from the room in which Hal was being kept to a building where no one ever went. In this building he went into a room where he saw a dark figure lounging on a black leather sofa with a cliché glass of scotch.

“Well Mr. Johnson, you do have a flair for the dramatic and cliché don’t you?”

“Ahh, Marsh how are you? You’re back much earlier than expected. Everything went according to plan I take it?”

“Well, yes and no. The transportation of consciousness worked. Unfortunately, the former Mr. Bodworth died after a brain haemorrhage. Mr. Create on the other hand remembers everything and seems to have survived the process intact. He remembers enough to at least have him sectioned. No-one will ever believe his claims. He’ll never be released.”

“So what are the practical uses for the consciousness swap?

“Well, Sir, I expect that because Mr. Bodworth was already mentally disturbed his mind could not take any more trauma and that is what caused the haemorrhage. So with that in mind we could use it to allow those who are suitable to continue life, but in a new body. When you reach a certain age, like 70, or if your body was damaged beyond repair, you just swap your consciousness with that of someone with severe mental disorder that can’t be cured, or even a clone, if the technology advances that far.”

“So what you’re saying is that we can become immortals?”

“Well it needn’t be as unethical. As the transportation rewires the brain we could use it to transfer the mind of a brain dead person who has a perfectly healthy body into that of a mentally healthy but physically dying body. We could save thousands of lives each year!”

“Yes we could but we would be able to name our price. This is a business and a business could really benefit from having it’s scientists live for hundreds of years. Think what we could accomplish. We could charge the rich for a life saving operation and use that money to advance scientifically further than anyone in the world in just a short time.” At this point Marsh’s face found the disappointment that had been building for some time. What could he say? He was being offered a way to live longer than anyone else in history. There would be a price of many lives but wasn’t there always a price to pay for advancement? It was mid-way through this trail of thought that Marsh realised he should break the silence.

“I will continue to monitor Create and ensure that mental health stays at a safe level so that we can clinically prove that the transfer is safe.”

“Keep me informed Marsh. We will need to start the program next year.”

“I promise that I’ll do as much as I can, as long as you tone the melodrama down a bit.”

Johnson just smiled and drew on his cigar.