Until We Meet Again

The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room. Her eyes open and there is no window.

My last memory is looking out a window seeing Daren walking up a hill. Then it comes back to me, my name is Tabatha and everyone is dead. I died a long time ago.

It's been years since the disaster. We never found out what happened. If anyone else survived, we never found them, and they never found us. Just as well, I don't remember people, so I don't miss them.

Daren was a scientist before the fall and I was his assistant. He developed a genetic memory program meant to be a "Hot-Boot" to kick start a clone's brain so a consciousness could be downloaded into it. It would have been a real game changer if he had gotten it done in time.

According to the files, we had been working on this for twenty some years, but the only memory I have is a day we spent together talking, reading, loving, eating, smiling. everything else has melted from my cerebral cortex like ice on a sunny day. This memory makes me feel loved.

I remember sitting at our kitchen table, drinking coffee, talking about how if we could fix the start-up program, people could download their memories and live again. We uploaded our memories, but have not been able to download them into a clone host yet.

I remember saying. "I wish I could live this day forever."

After an eternal pause, Daren smiles as he takes my hand. "Perhaps you can. It just might work, taking one day to jump-start the clones consciousness. Once aware the mind should evolve. After the host brain cycles through a day it should be ready to accept the complete download."

I became the test subject. Daren downloaded my one perfect memory in to a clone of myself, But I could not remain aware for more than one day at a time with only the one memory. I wake up every day and it's Tuesday.

It always ends the same. I look out a window and see Daren walking into a cemetery and I go to sleep till the next day. How many times we have done this I don't know because each is as the last, and the next. It is always such a beautiful day I never want it to end.

Daren and I died, but our experiment continued in the hopes we would find a way to jump-start my clone so it would reboot with my full digital-mind at the end of the day and not shut down.

If successful we could live forever, sort of.

We can only talk when I am awake since our back-ups are static programs unable to interact directly. As my clone-self, I talk to him and my digital-self on-line. We work together each day to find a solution, but at the end of each session a window appears on the wall and I go to sleep.

There are no dreams, no other memories, I just wake up again and it is Tuesday all over. I remember the one wonderful day, Daren and I together, happy, but nothing else until I find the prompts.

Next to the coffee pot I always find a note. Tabatha, please turn me on, I mean turn the computer on. He always thought that was funny and since every-time I read it is like the first time, I do too.

We have made progress, but it still seems like we will never get it worked out. We communicate on what looks like a social media account except we're the only members. Digital-Daren and my digital-self are able to act as a search engine while I am asleep. They are able to source the remaining networks and post information that may help us.

Each day there is short blog about our situation, what we are trying to accomplish and any updates on our progress:

DIGITAL-DAREN: Tabatha, don't be alarmed, but we are both dead. You are a clone with limited consciousness able to remain aware for twenty-four hours before having to shut-down. We are trying to find the glitch that keeps rebooting the start-up memory rather than download your digital matrix. Read the start up blog to get up to speed. Let me know when you are ready. Software willing, we will get it to work this time.

It usually takes a couple of cups of coffee and a few hours of reading before I can wrap my head around this. I scroll through the post until I get caught up. My initial panic turns to curiosity, grief, denial and ultimately acceptance. It is aways that one memory that sustains me. I never would have believed that one memory is all it took to feel loved.

The remainder of the day we review code, processes and any new information found while I was sleeping. Intermittently our conversation degenerates into a tangled mess and I want to switch them both off.

My digital-self is getting exasperated and a little jealous with our progress, or lack of. We have a difficult relationship as I remember only this one glorious day while she remembers all of our memories and they are not all good. Even when she tells me of the horrible things Daren did, especially near the end, I cringe, but only feel his love.

DIGITAL-TABITHA: Don't be fooled by that silly memory. He planted that in you and I don't think it's even real. He kept us a prisoner for years and wouldn't let us speak to anyone if he wasn't present. This has always been about him, and his dream, his mission. We were never important to him. He just needs us to finish his work so he can live again.

DIGITAL-DAREN: You have been bitter ever since we started this experiment. Remember, this was your idea, inserting the memory of this one day into your clone so that your clone-self could build on this good memory. You thought you would have a better life not remembering all the bad stuff. I only want what is best for you.

CLONE-TABITHA: Knock it off you two. This does not help. The more you bicker the more I doubt either one of you deserves to come back to life. Let's go over the process used to insert the memory into my clone and see if we can sort out what the problem is so we can fix it.

This is pretty much how it goes all day with brief spurts of ideas, more bickering and experiments all resulting in little or no progress.

Collectively we came to the conclusion that even though our neural capacity for thought develops new thoughts, when these thoughts become actions or new processes, we can not sustain them because we have no higher mind, a soul, to believe in these ideas. Without a soul we are just a string of data that learns and seems to create, but with out this 'X' factor we are always left asking why?

It's about this time I see a window manifest on the wall. I am overcome with a sense of being loved. For a moment I forget all that happened this day, longing only to sit with Daren as he smiles at me. I look through the window to see him walking up a hill...