Thursday, September 1, 2016

Library Of Man

pulse-trace-163708_640.jpg
Pulse Trace, Public Domain, downloaded from pixabay.com

Library Of Man
by Larry Heyl CC BY-SA

My com buzzed. “There’s been a breakthrough down at the lab. Come at once. Our subject is dying”.

Fortunately I was on my way already. In less than a minute I flew through the door. My assistants were attaching electrodes to the subjects temples. He was 117 years old, his life force diminishing by the minute. We weren’t killing him. He was just dying. It happens to all of us.

Everthing was ready and we were waiting, drinking coffee. Then he flatlined. There was nothing for us to do except monitor our equipment. The recorder kicked in. Everything seemed to be working. Within minutes it was over. He was gone.

“Now for the test”, I said. My assistants hit the play button. In a darkened corner the hologram started. Everything was fuzzy. “Fast forward a few years”, I said.

It looked like a birthday party. Kids were sitting around the table with a birthday cake on it candles ablaze. The cake got big and the candles were extinguished. One of my assistants said, “I hope he made a wish”.

Fast forward again and we saw a soldering iron touching a circuit board. I said, “That must be his workshop where he modernized our com units.

“Bring us up to yesterday”, I said. We saw feet on a gurney being wheeled through a door. It was eerie seeing the lab appear. The very room we were standing in was duplicated by a hologram and we were looking at it.

“It worked”. We cheered. Time for some champagne.

At the time of his death his life flashed before him in a second. And we just recorded it. All of it. Now we can start building the library of man.

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