Eight pink hexagon lined cylinders hovered by, through black conveyor belts to inspection. Keepers of the bioluminescent essence of great number. “Math Wardens,” Jamie the dwarf whispered. “I seen ‘em once before, in Oklahoma, during that Paperclip fiasco. Much cruder than these. They still needed living brains back then.”
“What should we do?” Janie the cook with fearful eyes, uncertain of any situation where bravado alone won’t pull you through.
“Smash ‘em,” Jamie glanced back at her, nervous eyes scanning the room. They were in a large, empty space like a warehouse. No rabbit guards, no border machines, no bureaucrats in sight. No sense of breath or living presence, no tingle of awareness on the back of your neck. Alone. For now.
“Idiot!” Janie scolded, quick to jump the trigger on an opportunity to chastise. “We need those minds!”
“No,” Jillian said quietly, coming out of a trance, fluttery eyes readjusting to ordinary perception. “He’s right. We should smash them. Run copies of the minds, keep them in back brain until we’re clear. Then upload into another transbiologic substrate.” She smirked. “Why else d’you think I came along?”
They moved like penumbra, creeping behind any form could temporarily lock on, like liquid lightlessness oozing along. Slinking and slithering without body or presence of life, traveling in the back brains of any passing by, hopping from body to body, brain to brain, mind to mind, in a long chain sequence that eventually led them to the inspection room. A gruff glass man with a goat’s head looked the pink cylinders over, nodding in affirmation. When he spoke, it was like the sound of wind roaring with gentle violence through a valley of violins. It was beautiful. They almost forgot what he was saying. “Everything checks out, gentlemen. Move them along to the transfer station.” Guards, machines and the J, Letters snapped into focus almost simultaneously, seven seconds after the glass goat man had recited his rapturous, horrible judgment.
“We gotta get to ‘em before they move!” Jamie squealed in agony. “That’s it! Hijack those three, now!”
Thought, memory, repositories of experience shifted and J, Letters found themselves caught in the bodies of three guards. A fourth was marching back to his post, feet moving with trained utility. The three guards nodded at the goat man, carted off the brains in the direction of the transfer station, took an unlikely left as soon as they were out of his sight.
“Give me some time,” the shortest guard said quietly, his body melting and reforming visibly beneath the Plexiglas faceplate. Dissolve/reform. Ancient Chinese secret. “Okay,” Jillian said quietly, her face dripping with unused potentials, becoming one thing only again. “Waves are collapsed. Give me some time.”
“Hurry up and do your thing.” Jamie the dwarf was for the first time clearly spooked. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“You and me both,” Janie offered her own awkward support.
“Okay,” Jillian shook her head free of lingering ghost memories. “Okay. Find out which one is which and feed them to me.” She picked up one of the pink cylinders… “This is… Heisenberg?” Jamie and Janie set about determining the identity of each cylinder, announcing their discoveries and blind guesses to Jillian as they went along. “It’s okay, Erwin. It’s only going to be for a little bit. Then you’ll be you again. We can forget all about it.” Jillian went on talking to each mind, coaxing them into storing themselves behind her eyelids.
At last the task was done, and J, Letters began moving out of the facility in a counterclockwise spiral. Jillian squeaked. “Um.”
“What?” Jamie the dwarf demanded. “We’re almost out.”
“They merged.” Jillian managed.
“Who? What?”
“The minds. They merged. In me. I can‘t separate them again. They‘re all one person now.”
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