Impressions of a Past
The story I wrote for my first year thesis, aka the best fiction I've ever written.
1st Incident
The first thing he can remember is the desire to die. As soon as his eyes awakened, there was an immediate feeling of desperation, a need for consciousness to cease and for his spirit to return to where darkness did not exist. The first breath he took was a choked one, spluttering up disgusting water from his lungs, as he frantically looked around for something, anything to let him loose. There was nothing but pitch black darkness to be seen and the sensation of lukewarm water enveloping everything but his skull. His torso started to convulse from shock and adrenaline. He tried to move, tried to get free but his legs were immobile and his arms couldn’t stop twitching. As his body spasmed, the water started to rise and slip droplets into his mouth, filling his lungs once again with the sickening liquid. He tried to pull himself free, grabbing at his left arm with his right hand and trying to force himself out of this predicament, but he felt tubes restricting him, tearing against his skin. There were no thoughts in his brain but the need for this to stop, the desire for anything to make this end as the water kept rising. The breathing was so frantic that he’d have no chance of coping when his nose eventually went underwater. He couldn’t stop shaking as he frantically swung his right arm, hoping to unleash something, not realising that his panic was making the situation worse. He pulled and pulled and pulled until the flesh on his wrist tore open, infecting his nostrils with a metallic scent as blood squirted out of his veins. There was nothing to see, no way for him to know the extent of the damage but he felt the pain intensely as his wound pulsated. His desperation didn’t end with a single injury as he dug around his mysterious prison with the unleashed right arm, diving his hand underwater to see what lay beneath. For the first time, he processed the fact that he had legs as his fingers grazed the muscles of the right thigh. He could feel another tube connecting to the tissue of his calf, that same plastic feeling that had led to the decimation of his wrist, and tried to pull at it with the agonised hand. There wasn’t enough leverage or strength left in that arm and even if there was, his attempts to figure out how to move the lower half were futile. Feeling the water envelop his chin, he panicked once more and raised his right hand back to the surface, quickly grabbing the tube on his left wrist and digging his nails into it. As his eyes started to fade again, he ripped the second one out and experienced his first taste of blood. At that moment, the man discovered how to scream.
“Your name is Connor Mason. You are 29 years old. 6’2, 185 pounds. You were born in San Diego, California on the 5th of May 2208. Your parents are Sandy and Jack, both deceased. You were raised Roman Catholic and sang in your church’s choir. You were your high school’s star quarterback and the valedictorian. You got married to Ashley Baker, now Ashley Mason, after you graduated from Stanford University with a degree in exercise physiology. You weren’t drafted by any professional football team and worked in construction for a couple of years while playing semi-pro. You moved to Ganymede in 2234, when you were 26 years old. Your wife stayed at home. Your assignment was to help aid the colonial efforts of Genexus by providing protection for the scientists and terraformers. You did three years of hard work, protecting our facilities from insurgents and making a life for yourself on this moon. You did not extend your contract but you were a beloved member of your unit and a useful member of Genexus’ private security. You were killed in an incident involving a terrorist about 15 miles away from your stationed base. Your dog tags are on the bed beside you.”
He immediately jolted out of bed, experiencing the sweats that come from a nightmare. He could practically taste his blood on his lips and feel the strain on his lungs as he awakened, trying to get himself together. He stood up and his legs wobbled, unable to find real balance. There was a throbbing in his wrists as he grabbed onto a nearby surface, grimacing in pain as he tried to keep himself stable. He noticed the bandages and the wet patches of blood coating part of the white fabric. As he tried to move, there was a feeling of lightheadedness, an inability for his retinas to maintain focus as his body swayed around and the arrival of vomit maneuvering its way up his throat. There was a forcefulness in his action, a built in determination to not concede his task, to force movement when it seemed impossible to do so. He shuffled a few feet, biting down on his bottom lip as he did, and tumbled down to the chrome coated floors. Thankfully, he remembered the correct way to fall and bent his knees and elbows in order to land as gracefully as possible. As the tip of his scalp grazed the floor, his back smashed down on the solid structure and his legs bounced upon their impact. He tried to get up again but couldn’t. He struggled the best he could but the pain and struggles of movement drained his remaining energy. As his eyes began to fade, so quickly after they’d opened, he saw the image of a woman in his mind’s eye. Black hair, a hybrid of brown and green eyes, pale dark skin and the most radiant smile in the universe. He could practically reach out and touch the dimples on her cheeks, she was so vivid in his head. The last thing he thought before he faded completely was “why me?”
“You are not the original Connor Mason. We made you from his genetic tissue and implanted his memories into you, thankfully for all of our sakes, he had his memories uploaded to our computer system. You will remember everything except the moments he had no recollection of entirely such as birth or the earliest stages of childhood, or the last 48 hours before his death. If all of these memories aren’t clear now, they will be within the next few days. Regardless, the next few months where you’ll be travelling through the Milky Way will give you plenty of time to reflect and regain your ability to recollect. We don’t know exactly how your new memories will function long term as this specific situation hasn’t happened before, but your short term memory is operable and you’ll be able to retain information for at least six months or so, beyond that is something we don’t know about yet. As you are still a soldier for us, even if not the one who initially came on deployment, you have an assigned task to fulfil. Your job is to go home Connor, go home to your wife, to your friends, to everyone in your life that you’ve not physically seen in three years and let them know you’re alive. Talk to them, tell them the stories of your time on the most exciting moon colony in our little corner of the universe, wax poetically about the beautiful forests and view of Jupiter in the night skies. You need them to see your face, feel your presence around them, see the man that they believe never passed away. After that, your life is yours, you’ll be amicably released from the remainder of your contract, with some extra pay on top of that of course, and you’ll be allowed to do whatever you choose with however long you can live. You might not be the original, but you’re all they have. How would your loved ones cope knowing they’d never see your face again? We’ll give you a few days to get adjusted to physical movement, you woke up too early in your pod so it might take a little longer than expected for you to be up on your feet, but you will. I promise, Connor. If you can try and think about what you remember about your life, the images, the sounds, the textures of your past, that will be very useful for your development. Just take a second and remember.”
He sat alone in the viewing area of the SSV Orion, gazing upon the stars as their light enveloped his body. His fingertips grazed the scarring over his left wrist, looping around the sensitive tissue over and over again. He remembered everything physical now, how to walk, how to shit, how to apply a blood choke, how to program an omni-tool to fit his ideal specification needs. He could precisely locate the bone in his neck that was fractured in his final football game, even though all of his bones were forged perfectly by the cloning facility. He remembered the feeling of adrenaline that came from a good fight, the lingering taste of a well done artificial steak on his tongue, even the tingling sensation of someone touching the back of his neck. He saw the memories flash before his eyes whenever he deviated from his focused meditation, remembering his adolescence and college experiences like they were still happening to him, the raucous parties and abuse of technological privileges. He remembered how it felt to score the winning play, the looks of desire from the die-hard fans around the college campus, the satisfaction that resonated within him whenever he truly achieved his best. Most importantly, he remembered how it felt to love and be loved. He thought of his wife, the original’s wife, a woman he’d never physically seen or touched in this body, and felt a shiver down his spine. There was an unnerving feeling of nervousness whenever he thought about her, the conflict between the photographic memories of their time together and his own conscious awareness that he’d never really met her. He had been on this ship for two and a half months now and these were the final hours before the Orion docked with Luna and began the transition process of sending the passengers down to Earth. He could remember the sensation of water against his chest as he thought about the planet, the times he spent swimming off the coast of the Maldives and splashing around outside of his home with his wife, and also the crippling anxiety he felt from suffocating in that small pod. The veins in his neck popped whenever he thought of that place and it seemed like his flesh was slicing itself open again. He needed to calm down and lose himself in the stars while he still had time to himself. Everyone else was preparing their things, getting ready to transport their luggage and make their contacts, ensuring that they were ready for their layover on Earth’s singular moon. He had nothing to carry, nothing to prepare for other than the mission. This left him with a feeling of weightlessness, emotionally similar to the time he frequently spent in the zero gravity chambers, and left him feeling prepared for what he had to do, at least until he remembered her face again. As he calmed himself down and cleared his mind of anything that wasn’t essential for the moment, there was a glimmer of blue that reflected against the window, stinging his eyes with its brightness. For a second, his eyes couldn’t truly take in the sheer scale and beauty of what he was looking at, but there it was, the place he’d never seen with these eyes before. Home.
2nd Incident
Ventura, California had transformed a lot over the years, a victim of rapid gentrification and technological manipulation, with historical buildings and cultural spaces being shifted into the urban landscapes that defined so much of 23rd century Earth. Hovercraft and electric power shuttles raced in between miniature skyscrapers, to the extent where you could barely see the water from within the city anymore. He remembered the feeling of disillusionment towards the changes to his home, even just within the years following his high school graduation. It seemed like everything was shifting so rapidly, the downloaded memories did not prepare him for the darker tones and immaculate textures of what used to be a simple beach town. He hoped that as his shuttle travelled through the streets, looking down at the few who chose to walk on the digitised pavements, that he would find something to cling onto. The moon was beautiful, remarkably unaltered by terraforming beyond the domes that kept space pilots and adventurers breathing, but it wasn’t home. It didn’t seem like this was at first either. Ventura was not a large town even with the expansions over the centuries and with the speeds of the shuttle, he would approach the outskirts rapidly, getting closer to the house he’d never stepped inside with this body. The panic started to swell within his chest again as he processed the extent of the unresolved issues and the burden of his task. He hadn’t seen his wife in three and a half years. Neither his original self or his current one had communicated with her directly in almost a year. He didn’t know what he’d be walking into, all he knew was that it would take every ounce of his being not to break down into tears and ask her for guidance. There were years of connection between the two. They’d met in college, been together for a decade. He’d missed the scheduled 10 year anniversary call before his original’s death, too busy drinking and partying with some of the rich settlers on the moon. The taste of vodka appeared on his tongue and his throat felt the burn like he was chugging down a bottle of it. He had to keep reminding himself that this was not his wife, not really, as he was a duplicant, an artificial construction designed to fill a purpose. This body had never been with her, this consciousness had not spent a second in her company. But she felt so real and so loving to him, even now when her touch remained a distant memory for both him and his original. In the reflection of the shuttle window, he kept mouthing his own name at himself, watching his lips construct the word “Connor”, trying to associate the name with this body. There was a feeling of death within his spirit as he remembered his purpose. As so many people do when faced with the sudden onslaught of horrific thoughts, he shut down a little bit, closed his eyes and pretended that he was in another realm where nothing could hurt him.
He arrived at the door to his beach house. The house that he’d taken out numerous loans to purchase in the final year of college, thinking smugly that everything would work out perfectly to pay them off. It had, in the long run, although it cost more than money to free his family from the debts. The door had the same paint he remembered, although it was a more rustic shade of red than he was used to. There were no immediate neighbours and the beach was private, meaning that the beautiful sands and shimmering ocean were all his and Ashley’s. Most people moved to Ventura now for the tech industry, preferring to live in the state of the art penthouses in the middle of the new city. The buildings continued to rise and their ascension helped the urbanites forget how blue the ocean was on a summer’s day, leaving plenty of room for himself and Ashley to frolic in their own little slice of paradise. Ashley was far more of an old soul than he was. She was afraid of the concept of space travel, she hated travelling on the sonic freeways and felt immensely uncomfortable in large cities. As painting continued its 21st century shift towards completely digitised canvas, she still brought out the old brushes, painting with real colour and oil, onto hundreds and thousands of gigantic portraits. She was the kind of person who lived in the past, most comfortable with a simple, quiet life away from the noise and industrialisation. He wondered what her new paintings looked like. In their first conversation on Ganymede, testing out the deep space communication, she asked him not to take photos of the moon for her but to describe the locations he’d encounter as vividly as possible. Ashley was the type of woman who didn’t want to see the places herself, but imagine them and bring her own versions to life. As far as he knew, she never got to find out what it looked like for the sun to appear over Jupiter’s horizon, sending glimmering light onto the leaves of the trees. The original stopped telling her after a while, and the clone wondered why.
He walked to the door, noticing the specks of paint that were falling off, and prepared himself to knock. There was no doorbell anymore, just a ghost of one burnt into the faded crimson. He took his deep breaths, doing what he’d been taught by the doctors whenever the information overload became too much, breathing in the nose and out the mouth. The left wrist started to throb and both hands began to tremble, but he managed to breathe deeply enough to move his right hand and lightly hit it against the door. He waited for a second. In that tiny increment, he envisioned every conceivable outcome that her arrival could create and it did not help the shaking in his hands. The breathing had to continue, in the nose, out the mouth. It was all going to be okay. He would see her and the world would make sense, they had waited so long and been through so much that it had to be. Then, the door opened and Ashley arrived. She was the most beautiful person that had ever existed. The memories of her and the photographs he’d stared at didn’t do her any justice. Her eyes seemed to pierce his soul from the second they met directly, before any emotion could be processed between the two. It seemed like time had frozen, that the entire universe had stopped completely and left just the two of them. He knew that he loved her from that first second.
“Connor?”
He nodded his head. There was no way for him to produce the words directly right now. She leapt on him with a gigantic hug, having to jump up a little in order to completely sink her arms around his torso. He grabbed her and hugged her tight, ensuring that her feet left the ground and allowing her to rest her face against his shoulder as their embrace continued. She was so soft in his arms. After a little moment of their embrace, he felt her cry into his shirt and instinctively went to stroke her hair. The last time he did that was the last time she cried in front of him, the moment where she found out he was leaving for Ganymede. Even though she was angry, she needed his comfort, his touch, his solid embrace to ground her from the tragedy of their inevitable absence. He stroked her hair whenever she was upset or whenever she needed to sleep. It always seemed to work to calm her down a little. But this time, the tears didn’t stop and he could feel her fingernails digging deep into his back like she wasn’t sure he was actually there. They just stood there together on the doorstep, feeling the gentle gusts of wind blowing into their hair, hoping that the moment would never end.
When the tears stopped and Ashley’s tight grip on his back loosened, there was a moment of silent clarity as they began to physically separate. There were no words needed, at least not yet. What could be said after three and a half years of not feeling your person’s embrace? She noticed the scars on his wrists immediately and caressed them with her fingertips, looping over them like he had on the shuttle. In the first moment after their hug where they made eye contact, he reached over and wiped the remaining tears from her eyes, getting blue eyeshadow on his knuckles. Without saying a word, he leaned down and slowly kissed her forehead as tears started to run down his cheek as well. She let go of his wrists and put her hands on the side of his face. After his little kiss ended, they just looked at each other for a minute, with both unable to stop the tears from pouring and smiled. He moved over to kiss her cheek as she kept touching his face, feeling the stubble against her palms as she caressed him. After a few kisses there, he adjusted his position and placed his mouth close to her ear, smelling her hair for the first time in a lifetime. She smelled like strawberries, like she had when he first met her. That memory of the two of them meeting in the grass, joking around with a football and ending up kissing under the stars hit him like a flash. He could feel the way her lips felt on his that night and he wanted to feel them again. Suddenly, he picked her up again and moved her inside the house with all of his strength, pinning her lightly against the wall and kissed her with the most passion he’d ever felt. He kissed her like it was the last time he ever would, like it was the only way either of them could breathe. As the tears continued to run down their faces and fall onto the floor, they kissed and grabbed onto each other with animalistic passion, unable to contain themselves as they realised just how much they’d missed the feeling of the other. As they kissed, he thought about all the times they’d given up all inhibitions and just embraced their desire. He could feel them happening in real time as he kissed her here, kissing under the stars, sneaking out of a show to fuck in the bathroom as they couldn’t wait any longer, the first night they touched each other in this very house. He kissed her with an elemental passion, one that seemed to transcend space, time and identity itself. For that moment, all that existed was each other, no tragedy or absence or unresolved issues seemed to matter. They had each other again, even if it wouldn’t last forever. After they gave each other a spare moment to breathe, he leaned over to her ear once more and whispered “I love you” before she pulled him back into their embrace. They couldn’t let go of each other again.
He was waiting for her questions. It had been a few hours since their seismic kiss. They’d moved to the bedroom eventually and let out years of sexual frustration and desperation in a couple of hours, saying nothing but each other’s names until they were both physically too tired to move. They laid naked on their bed together, deciding to deal with the sweat soaked satin sheets when they could get the energy back to stand up. Still, there were no words spoken. The way he composed himself suggested a reluctance to talk, a quietness and reservation that she was not used to from her husband. He was already worried that she’d be able to spot the differences between himself and Connor. Eventually, she went to the bathroom and he managed to stand up as well. He took off the sheets and reached for the closet for the replacements, remembering exactly where they were like it was the most natural action in the world. If he didn’t think about it, he’d never have known that these memories weren’t his, that this body or being had never felt the texture of satin before. But he did think about it. He went and put his underwear on and prepared himself for his stroll through the house, heading towards the washing machine in the kitchen. It was already night time, he could see the stars outside of their gigantic bedroom window and the crescent moon was beginning to truly shine. The moonlight over the ocean and the impeccable sands was breathtaking to look at, it beat every memory he had of this place. He left the bedroom door and walked down the hallways of the upstairs floor, staring at the photos on the wooden walls. Like with everything, Ashley’s decor choices embraced the physical and not the digital. The photographs were taken with film or at least printed onto it, all the images of their time together, images in Tokyo where they went on their honeymoon, the photo that Ashley’s sister took of the two of them upon their graduation from Stanford, images of his footballing accomplishments and her artistic successes. He stopped and looked at the new prints. There were only a few new ones, mostly shots of her at new galleries and museums with her recent paintings, ones he’d never seen before. In the background of one, he saw a painting of a forest. The painting showed sparks of sunlight shooting down and enlightening the leaves, forging them into iridescent shards of the divine. It was the last image he’d ever described to her of Ganymede, almost a year before the death. He felt a rush of shame hit him all at once and he rushed down to the kitchen, desperate to avoid the things he couldn’t remember.
When he came back to the room, Ashley was waiting for him, dressed in pink pyjamas as she paced near the window. As soon as he leaned over to touch her, she distanced herself.
“What happened to you?”
He didn’t know how to react. Even after months of preparation, of learning all the possible outcomes and the calibrated responses, his brain seemed to shut down. When he didn’t say anything immediately, her reaction got angrier, like she’d been suppressing feelings of discontent. She was never the type to scream or lash out but to shut down within herself, unleashing her frustrations through brief convulsing and absent gazes. She asked the same question again, and got the same non response. He just looked down at the floor like a sad dog and completely halted himself, preparing his lungs and his spirit for the first in a series of hard conversations.
“There were things I didn’t want to say over the calls. Things I couldn’t say.”
“What does that mean?”
“I had to see you. It couldn’t wait any longer, there was no way I could stay on that moon for another minute without you.”
“Why didn’t you at least let me know you were coming home? If you have all these things to say to me, why couldn’t you have told me you were alive, that you weren’t separating from me millions of miles away? Instead, I think you’re dead, that I’ll never hear anything about your status ever again, and then you just show up at our doorstep like nothing’s changed, like you’ve not been gone for years and years.”
“I was afraid that if I told you, you’d tell me not to come home.”
“Why would you think that?”
“I wondered if some wounds were too big to heal. There were so many mistakes, so many things that went wrong. I thought you’d hate me if I just tried to call you and talk about my day or what my operations were like, after all that time of not calling. So I came home early, discharged honourably, and hoped you’d still be in this house.”
“Why did you stop calling me?”
He didn’t know. There was no part of him that could make sense of the memories in his head, the memories of the original’s disregard for her. Even before his death, he had not communicated with his wife in several months, rescheduling video calls, barely utilising omni-tool software to leave messages, until so much time had passed that he didn’t seem to acknowledge her existence at all. It was the one thing about the past Connor that this one didn’t understand. He didn’t understand how someone could ever let go of this person in front of him. So he took a deep breath and began to lie to save her from the truth.
“I missed you too much. Whenever we called or chatted, it took me days to recover from the heartache. I would get back on track mentally and then I’d fuck it up because I couldn’t resist talking to you another time. It had been so long since we’d actually been able to feel each other and I could see your hatred for our methods of talking every time, in addition to the pain in both of our eyes. I felt like I was never going to be okay again, knowing that so much time had passed when I couldn’t hold you, when I panicked and made a stupid decision and fucked our future. So eventually, it became easier to just stop. To reschedule or not send anything or just try to forget you, so I could do my job and not drink myself to sleep every night. And that doesn’t make it right, it’s not and I should have apologised the second I saw you. But when your eyes met mine Ashley, I lost myself, lost my ability to speak all over again. I forgot about everything that happened, I just felt the need to kiss and love you with every part of me. So I’m home, to tell you that I love you, to tell you that I’m alive, to tell you that I won’t blame you if you officially want to be done with me. But more than anything, I want to tell you that I’m sorry for leaving, for being the worst husband in the universe. I’m so sorry.”
There were no words spoken for a long time. Ashley stared out of the window, not moving or making a sound. His hand reached over to stroke her hair silently, doing it for a few minutes before realising that it wasn’t the right moment. He didn’t want to move, to cause any disruption, so he stayed with her and watched the waves hit the shore.
“You painted Ganymede.”
“What?”
“You painted the description I told you about. The forest, the way the sunlight hits it. It’s so rare to see the sun from Ganymede so whenever it arrives, it’s the most transcendent thing in the galaxy.”
“That’s how you described it to me when you first talked about it.”
“You always capture the essence of something, even without seeing it. It looks more like the forest in my mind than any photo of it. I hope we can go see it in person someday.”
“You never used to comment on the paintings.”
“A lot of things have changed. I’d be crazy if I didn’t tell you how amazing your work is now that I have the chance.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“You know, I painted more than just that one.”
“I would hope so, you had three years without me interrupting.”
“We can go see them tomorrow once we’ve gotten some sleep.”
“You think we’ll get any sleep?”
“Probably not. But we should try, we aren’t kids anymore.”
“Why can’t we be for one night?”
She smiled again. Her smile made him feel radiant inside. She wasn’t ready to embrace him again, not yet, but there was time for that. For now, they sat and looked at the waves until their eyes couldn’t stay open.
3rd Incident
He woke up with the fear of forgetting. He was over halfway through the timeline that his first doctor had prescribed him with. Soon, there was the very real possibility that the only memories he’d have left would be Connor’s, all of the actions that did not occur in this body or with this soul. Since he left the facility on Ganymede and began his preparations for travelling back to Earth, he had thought about everything that had ever happened to his predecessor, all the things that felt like his but weren’t. The worst thing, aside from the moral conflicts he faced over Ashley, was the conflict over religion. Even at his most disrespectful and debaucherous, his original self was a Catholic, raised amongst churches and chapels, a man who prayed to his God every night before killing and colonising. There were never any doubts for Connor. He had a Creator and he was divine and he blessed the universe upon every being that walked amongst it. He knew so vividly. In this body, he could feel that same spirituality looking back upon the divine experiences. He could feel the goosebumps crawling up his spine when he thought of the first time he felt like God was watching over him, like he was standing there right now. But this body knows his creator. He met him. He talked to him. He gave him a purpose. He knows why he was made and it has brought him nothing but guilt, angst and indecision. Whenever he stands on the beach late at night now, unable to sleep while submerging his feet into the wet sand, he remembers that the God his memories draw him towards was not the being that gave him life. There was no divine purpose for this Connor, and soon, he might forget that he ever made that revelation. He might forget that he ever came home to see Ashley.
They’d spent the last two weeks together. They’d left the house once in order to go to the gallery in Santa Barbara where she had her own specific exhibit, she’d waxed poetically about the process behind the dozens of new paintings, how she’d specifically approached different environments and her experimentation with colour. Ashley had a tendency to obsessively talk about her interests and loves, to the point where if he wasn’t careful, he’d lose his opportunity to get a word in. But he grasped onto every single sentence of hers, carefully listening to the way she enunciated each syllable, how her face changed and her hands moved when in the midst of a particularly passionate ramble. He was noticing things and embracing aspects that weren’t in the backlog of the memories, and he wanted to remember every piece of them before they faded away. It was funny in a way, he’d spent all that time on the Orion trying to sort through his memories, grasp onto every tangible experience or essential moment between the two of them, but one day, they’d be all he had left. He never thought he’d care too much while on the Orion, the future felt vague and uncertain, his task gave him anxiety and the image of Ashley filled him with a longing that’s indescribable, but he viewed his mission as a simple task and never truly allowed himself to feel like Connor. But he has his face and his voice and his memories. His wife sees the face every day and thinks that he’s the person she did all of those things with. She sees Connor when she looks at him, she’s allowed herself to believe completely in that fact. The guilt was eating him alive for that false hope, knowing that soon, he’d have to leave as well.
There were good times at their home together. He’d refused to go into the water, for reasons relating to the pod, but they’d built sandcastles and watched movies and even brought out a few dusty board games from the attic to have fun with. It was nice to see that her competitive spirit hadn’t died after all these years away. She never could take a loss, even with simple things like fake arguing over which one of them had rights to a catchphrase, delaying their plans by hours because she wanted to hear that she was right. Ashley was fascinating to him in many ways. She hated real fights, she shut down at them, yet when it was anything vaguely comedic or something that didn’t define their relationship or life choices, she could spit hellfire in order to come out the victor. This came across in her actions harder once she had won. She was a notoriously bad loser, to everyone that ever knew her, but she was a much worse winner. Ashley taunted harder than anyone he’d ever met and he’d spent years of his life in a dugout with soldiers. She was completely and utterly intolerable once she’d come out the victor and it infuriated him in the best way. So in any of their board game experiences across the fortnight, he had to dig down deep and use all of his childhood memories to gain any advantage he could. He mostly failed but whenever he won, he’d get back at her for her taunting by eviscerating her, to which she’d respond by demanding an immediate rematch and getting silently grumpy if he lost again. There were no memories of time like this in his head, no silly games or fake arguments about nothing. It was always serious between them when it wasn’t sexual, arguments, major life decisions, awkward silences, time spent apart due to career pursuits. There was never any time for game nights, or there was never any effort made by him to create them. He wanted these memories to stay, he wanted to never forget how much her reactions made him smile. He needed to remember this part of her forever, even if he lost everything else in the process.
Ashley looked at him differently now. He couldn’t explain it. There were glances from her that felt completely alien to him, a general feeling emanating from his wife that he couldn’t recollect in the slightest. There was a paranoia that came from this, the fear that he’d somehow been discovered as an imposter, as an empty husk imitating the flesh and mannerisms of her beloved. But it didn’t seem like a look that was suspicious or inquisitive, there was something kind and considerate about her composure around him. Whenever she looked at him this way, like he was more than just the husband she remembered, guilt wreaked havoc with his brain. At those moments of bliss between the two, he could almost believe that he was the original Connor, that his distant memories were his own and that he could continue their life together. Unfortunately, even in the good moments, his inability to separate himself from the anxiety and realities of his situation meant that despair and shame would come back onto his periphery. He considered going somewhere to talk about these feelings but realised that he didn’t have the time to waste. Before he started to forget he needed to let her know, to tell her the truth and reconcile with the inevitability of her sadness. It haunted him that his last memories may be defined by the heartbreak of a woman he loved. He loved her. Not Connor. He knew that it wasn’t just emotional associations with memories anymore, it couldn’t be. For the first time in his brief existence as this lifeform, he felt confident in a facet of his identity and it broke his heart that he’d have to go against it in order to breathe.
They slept together one more time before he woke up with terrors, shaking and drenched with sweat. It was the middle of the night and there was a cool breeze in their bedroom, making goosebumps appear over his arms and chest. For a second, he felt as light headed as the first time he stood up in this body, and was terrified that this was the first stage of shutdown. He didn’t want to die yet. He had things left to say. Time couldn’t suddenly run out in a flash, he couldn’t have ran out of moments to spend with his love, they got only a few together. Please don’t die, please don’t be gone yet. Please, please, please, please don’t fall apart until we can say goodbye. He couldn’t stop thinking about death as he seized up from panic. He could remember everything about Connor from the time he was three years old, every second of his life until the moment it ended. He thought constantly about dying, about the moments in his mind he couldn’t unlock, and now that death seemed to be approaching, his brain went into overdrive, attempting to resist the overwhelming darkness that had taken his original away. He reached out to a God, one who he knew didn’t forge him from the heavens, one who he couldn’t find the strength to reconcile with, and prayed for the first time in this body.
After a while on his knees, hunched over with his vertebrae pointing towards the ceiling, he felt her cold hand on his head, lightly grazing his hair and moving his face towards her. He didn’t know what to say and cried into her chest, sobbing like he’d been holding it back for decades. He cried into her and remembered all the affairs that his original had committed on her on Ganymede, all the lies both versions had told her, all the mistakes that each consciousness had committed, and he practically howled into the soft fabric of her pyjamas. She didn’t say anything, she didn’t have to, she just held him and directed him back towards the bed so he could lie down. When his back was on the mattress, she placed her entire weight upon him, grounding him with her presence entirely. She used to do this after football games, when his frustrations or physical damage were significant, and it would always make him feel a little better. She whispered for him to breathe, in the nose, out the mouth, and cuddled his torso as he tried to stop crying. They just stayed there together for a while, letting the panic end naturally. As soon as he was able to speak, he just couldn’t stop saying sorry, trying not to choke up as he did so. He was getting ready to tell her everything, it felt too late not to. But the words wouldn’t form, his tongue felt immobile and his vocal cords seemed momentarily shredded. Eventually, he got up the courage to move, stretching his arms, cracking his neck and moving towards the window as he prepared for the words that would change their lives.
“Connor, what do you remember about Tokyo?”
He couldn’t react at first. Their honeymoon in Tokyo was a disaster in many ways. After a few nights of bliss in the Japanese capital, Ashley reacted badly to his decision to take out loans for the house without telling her, with his adamant response being that the draft would ensure that things would be perfectly fine. His original self used to escalate things and reacted petulantly, spending a couple of nights at local bars, drinking synthesised liquor and getting into fights with implanted bartenders. Eventually, they went home early, leaving a few days before they were supposed to, not seeing the temples or exploring the mountainsides, just resigning themselves to a few hours of awkward silence on a cheap Transatlantic shuttle. It was their worst moment as a couple before he left. Before he died.
“I remember the sunset. The sky was consumed by a variety of colours, purples, reds, pinks, all across the horizon. It reminded me of one of your early paintings, it was so vibrant and reality defying. We never saw anything like that in California. But mostly, I remember that you were next to me on our hotel’s balcony when that first sunset happened. I remember putting my hands in your hair, the feeling of your arm around my waist, the feeling of transcendence that came from being with my wife in this beautiful place. I knew that I’d made the right decision to kiss you under those stars, that committing my life to you was the best thing that ever happened to me. And I knew then, that however long we had, even if I knew that we’d only have such a short period together, I’d embrace them and step forward into a tragic future because I loved you so much.”
“You’ve never said anything like that to me before. I’ve never heard you talk about that sunset, I could barely remember it until now.”
“I’ve made a lot of mistakes, done so much wrong, filled the world with nothing but shit. I did and said terrible things to you Ashley. But you were never a mistake, you were always the brightest light in my life, even from a million miles away. I’m sorry that I failed you. That I wasn’t there.”
She moved over to him and held his hand again near the window, trying to get him to look at her. They made eye contact and saw the tears in the other’s eyes, the little lines of red streaking across their sclera, and instinctively went to wipe each other’s tears. There was a little laugh as their arms bumped into each other, falling into a mutual embrace through their tearful chuckling. He whispered that he loved her and she whispered the same thing in return. This was the best way to end it, a final memory of her that he could cling onto for however long he had left. He took a deep breath and knew what he had to say.
“I need to tell you something.”
“What?”
“I’m not your husband.”
“Connor, what are you talking about?”
“I just look like him. They gave me his voice, his face, his memories even, and told me to become him.”
“What do you mean?”
“Your husband died. Connor, the one you married, was killed on Ganymede several months ago in an operation gone wrong. And they made me because they didn’t want you to know. It hurts because I remember everything so clearly, everything feels like me, like I made these choices and that I got to experience these moments with you. But I was designed with a purpose, to lie to you, to make you believe that your husband had returned home, so that there would be no repercussions on their end. I’m not Connor, I want to be, I wish I could pretend to be so you didn’t have to feel pain, but I can’t keep it a secret anymore. There is already so much guilt from these memories, I can’t take anymore, not when it comes to you. I’m sorry, I’m so so sorry.”
She lost her ability to stand. He managed to catch her and guide her towards the ground as softly as possible. It was the worst feeling he could remember experiencing, being the arbiter of destruction, making her realise that she’d never see the original version of her husband ever again, that all hope was futile and that she’d have to cling onto the last regretful memory of their time together as a goodbye. He remembered the two last times he saw her before his original’s death. The first was the physical goodbye, their crying hug as he prepared for the initial burst of space travel, the way she clung onto him begging for him not to leave her. For a second, he felt like he was back at that spaceship, desperately wanting to run away and join her for their life together. So many errors made in their past. The second was the goodbye over call, where he shrugged through the conversation with apathetic reluctance, never fully engaging, never trying to connect with her on a deeper level for their hour of conversation. How must it feel for her to remember that final goodbye, to be haunted by it for the rest of existence? He wanted to run away and not have to face the consequences of what she’d say once she processed this news, not have to deal with any more burdens but these consciousnesses had run away from enough. He would stay, he would hold her if she wanted him to, and he would continue to love her, even if she could never see him as anything more than a hollow replicant of a dead spouse. He waited besides her, for as long as it took.
“Why did you tell me?”
“I couldn’t cope with the guilt. In my heart, you’re my wife, we’ve had everything together, all of these moments but I know in my head that it’s all artificial. The way I’m designed, I don’t have forever to tell you this. These memories we’ve had over the last few weeks, they’ll fade away sooner than later. Death haunts both versions of us and soon all that will be left are the memories of Connor’s, the ones that have no soul to guide them forwards. So I’d deserve hell if I lost my opportunity to tell you the truth.”
“Do you know why I asked you about Tokyo?”
“Why?”
“Because my husband would have shut down at the first mention of it. He would have tried to start the argument back up or complain about cancellations or just not looked at me for a while. He wasn’t a romantic and he didn’t do anything to show me that he cared. He never played a game or joked around or kissed me like he’d been waiting to forever. You weren’t ever like him. And I loved you anyway. So a part of me knew, and a part of me just wanted to believe he’d changed after so long.”
“I loved you too, even though I wasn’t him.”
“You gave me a proper goodbye with him. That’s something that will always matter. I’d have done anything for that and you brought it to me. I don’t know what to do now that he’s gone, but at least I know, and at least I got to feel what it was like to be loved by him. Loved by you.”
“I wish we’d loved you better.”
“We all wish we’d done things differently. Regret is all we have sometimes. I wish I’d forced him to stay. I wish I’d been able to fly with him to that moon. I wish I was there to bury him when he passed, to hold a funeral instead of spending months wondering if he was even breathing. Look at us, both just sitting here, staring at the past with desperation to make it different.”
“I’ll understand if you never want to see me again.”
“Stay for a little while longer. Just a moment or two, while you can still remember what it’s like to be with me here.”
“Okay.”
They sat together, staring out of the window as the wind howled outside. They weren’t quite touching, burdened by lifetimes of tragedy and heartbreak, but they didn’t move away, refusing to leave the little bubble they’d found together. Memories flashed before both of their eyes, the sunset in Tokyo, the final goodbye before leaving for Ganymede, that first kiss against the wall. They thought silently about their last two weeks, trying to vividly capture everything they’d seen, done and felt before it all faded someday. He reached out his hand for hers, hoping that they could face the uncertainty together, that they’d be able to get a little more time. After a second, she grasped his hand tightly and leaned her head against his shoulder, closing her eyes while listening to the sound of the waves.
4th Incident
They walked down the paved granite path heading away from the civilian ship. A long journey had finally ended, the months of space travel gnawing at both of them as they had to adjust to Ganymede’s different gravity. His body could take it, hers took a while longer to get used to the harder movement as she sludged along. It was a difficult decision for her to finally go to Ganymede with Connor. She didn’t the first time and it had battered her over the course of months and years, especially following the revelation of the original’s death, but she couldn’t make the same mistake twice. They didn’t know if his long term memory would remain intact for the duration of the trip back to Jupiter’s moon, if he’d already crossed the threshold and would be fine or if he’d start to degenerate sooner instead of later. But the risk was worth it. He couldn’t shake the idea of not knowing his death, of his memories suddenly installing a divide between the original’s and his own. That missing space, the fragment of time between his death and rebirth haunted him like the suppressed memories of a trauma victim. He needed to step foot in that forest and find the spot of his death, the place where his unit set up a little grave to memoralise him forever. He hoped that it would comfort the lack of knowledge, give him a bit of release and freedom approaching what could be the end of his time as a human being and understand that he was now the only one left. With his face, with his feelings, with his memories, he would become an individual. She decided that she had to go in order to find her husband’s grave, have that little moment of catharsis and grief that comes from the funeral of a loved one, and be able to start her life now that he’s no longer here. The realisation that they could not stay on Earth came not long after the revelations, scheduling a commercial transport to the colony of Ganymede only a month after Connor had first landed back on Earth. They existed and rebuilt themselves as a couple in their own right, testing the new Connor’s opinions on a variety of different things, talking about subjects and enjoying the world in a way that the original never had. The differences and changes revealed themselves further and further as their relationship progressed honestly, without any of the burdens of deception or a lifetime of bad choices. It took a while for them to become intimate physically again, with the closest they got for a week being hand holding and cuddling on their lounge’s sofa, but after a night of drinking 22nd century wine and cooking, they ended up back in their bed like it was their first time together. After that night, they talked about Ganymede and Connor was open about the indiscretions of his predecessor, helping contextualise the unanswered questions she had about his absence and his distance. He talked about the pod and the scars on his wrists. The fear of water he still had, even though his original self was an accomplished swimmer. And most importantly, he talked to her about his own identity, not feeling like he’s a real human being and worrying that he’ll never get to before the time runs out. She talked about the isolation she’d faced over the years because of his separation, the distance she’d taken from friends, the dynamics she’d let slip through her fingers because she had no ability to properly communicate. She talked about the work she’d been doing, how so much of it had been influenced and defined by her loneliness, angst and grief, even in places that it seemed the most unexpected. It was hard for her to cope with not knowing and she begged at night to anything that would listen for some answers. In the hardest conversation of the night, she talked about wanting to kill herself because it felt impossible to go to bed and wake up to nothing. It felt like the darkness would never end. He held her tightly while she talked about this, focusing intently on her words and waiting till she’d gotten out everything she’d needed to say before he properly tried to console her.
In the midst of her confessions, Ashley suddenly talked about all the differences between her husband and the current Connor. She was constantly surprised about his skills as a listener and his quietness, he never seemed to raise his voice, composed himself as if he was half his size, was far more physically and emotionally attentive even if it seemed like his mind tended to be in other places entirely. She didn’t know what to do with all these things and balance her memories of what her husband was like, and the realities of what this one is. It was as overwhelming for her to experience externally as it was for him internally and it led to a greater understanding between the two. Both confessed about the need to see the grave, to feel like he was gone in order to reconcile with the past and build upon the future, even if he only had a little while. Neither committed to anything together in the long term, they didn’t know if they’d have one, but they made the decision to take the chance and try to resolve their pain side by side. She was terrified of space travel so Connor taught her all the tricks, all the ways to cope with it. In return, Ashley helped him deal with his fear of the water, bringing out an incredibly old flotation device shaped like a duck for him to lean on while getting used to the calm waves. While neither was comfortable with the process of dealing with their phobias, the support they received from the other was monumental. It made them feel capable of facing the greatest obstacle ahead.
When they went to leave, they journeyed from the same port that the two of them had said goodbye at. The location made her eyes water as she remembered how much it hurt then, how it was the last time she ever saw him alive. For a second, when she looked at this Connor, she forgot the differences and the artifice. She clung onto him desperately and re-lived that horrific memory in real time. He was able to snap her out of it and remind her that this wasn’t the past, that for now, they are in the present and able to forge their futures. They stepped into the shuttle, a nameless freighter that shoots up Californians to Luna three times a day, and clung onto each other desperately as the safety straps were attached and Ashley’s feet started to tremble. The initial shakes of takeoff were completely overwhelming and if it wasn’t for the mandated oxygen masks, she’d have screamed through it. But then, after a few minutes, she got to see Earth. The blues of the oceans, the faded greens, the sparks of oranges highlighting the crust. It was everything she’d ever imagined it to be, surpassing the visions from painters and the centuries of photographs. He smiled as he saw the astonished reaction of her face through the mask. For that second, fear was replaced by wonder.
On the Orion, they occupied their time similarly that they did in their beach house. Elaborate competitions, movies, long conversations and the occasional kiss or two. At the end of nights when Ashley had fallen asleep, he recorded a series of voice notes on his omni-tool, the one he was going to give her when the memories started slipping away from him. He would talk about everything, the memories of the old Connor were included, ones recontextualised by this one’s perception of them, but the majority were spent on the short time they’d gotten together. He recited every detail so he could remember as much as her, giving her something to have forever once there’s nothing left of him but a face. It was easy to picture walking down the shore late at night, overwhelmed by depression and grief, and deciding to put on one or two of these notes in order to feel grounded, to remember the feeling of unconditional love and adoration even when it seemed like life wasn’t worth living, even if there was never a chance to hold that person again. He hoped she’d hold onto them forever, even when she found someone new and opened her heart up to another love, another person who could make her heart warm. While he recited these messages, he imagined her finding love with someone else, being able to laugh for the first time since the permanent departure. He could see it so clearly in his head, the sheepishness she always had when she showed her paintings to a person for the first time, the reluctance to get up and dance with someone at a party but ecstatic joy when she started to move, the delighted smile on her face when the veil gets placed over her again. He remembered their wedding and hoped she’d get to find that bliss again where the realities of death never came to mind. She deserved to find it, even if he wouldn’t be there to see it.
They arrived on Ganymede after several months of long travel and after getting used to the gravity, they walked for several hours, avoiding the beaten path and heading towards the forest where their destinies collided. He knew where the spot was, deep into the main woodlands a few miles from the base he was stationed at. It was the most beautiful place on the rock and it was the last thing the original ever saw. He wants to see it through his own eyes, understand what it might have felt like in the last seconds of space and time, to confront your own mortality as the world slips through your fingers. It’s the one thing about him that he’ll never be able to remember. They started to slow down as they came closer to the resting place, embracing the textures of the trees, feeling the bark against their palms and staring up at the sky. As soon as they reached the section of the forest where his body was laid to rest, the sun started to shine, with the rays of light hitting the leaves in the way that both of them always dreamed it would, in a way that surpassed memory and imagination completely. It was angelic.
They made it to the little wooden cross, with the name Connor etched into it. It stood over a pile of rocks and had a decaying Polaroid nailed onto it. She bent over and cried into the dirt, reaching out onto the wood and grasping it like it was his hand. He stood immobile for a little while, feeling the weight of the forgotten memories harder than ever before. His chest felt like it was having a heart attack and his legs had turned to concrete. She quoted a prayer and left a beaten up copy of the Bible at the floor of his grave. As he stared at the sunlit leaves, she said goodbye to her husband and slowly turned away, unable to look at it for any longer. She looked at him for the first time since seeing the grave and didn’t see the face of her husband anymore.
He felt her feet stand on his, a method she’d always used to gain some leverage in the early stages of their relationship when he was more open to the sillier side of her. He didn’t know how to react to everything going on, staring at his own face nailed to a grave, feeling the weight of two men’s memories as he finally understood what it felt like to die. It took a little moment following the revelation he’d been searching for before he made eye contact with her, seeing the sunlight lighten her dark hair and make those glimmers in her eyes brighter, and he began to whisper unintelligibly. He knew what it felt like to die finally and he knew what it’d feel like to remember nothing but the distant past, he didn’t want it for him, he didn’t want to go, to lose the feeling of her feet against his forever. But this felt like the only place he belonged, the reason he was created in a test tube and developed in a pod, the space that determined why he got to live at all. He wanted this to be the place where he said goodbye to her, where he let her live and destined himself to wander amongst the stars until his final breath. The declaration of intent started to come out of his mouth but she placed her index finger onto his lips, stopping him from continuing. She grabbed his face and pulled him close, kissing him like he first kissed her. As the sun shined down on the two of them, they embraced all the seconds they had left together, embracing the living memory while it lasts.