Mindscan

"Do you have an outline?" asked Erica. "Sample chapters?"

The thing about being the eight-hundred-pound gorilla is that you rarely had to remind people of that fact. "I don't need them," said Karen flatly.

I swung my eyes back to the wall screen in time to see Erica nodding. "You're right," she said. "You don't."

"What's the biggest advance ever paid for a novel?" asked Karen.

"One hundred million dollars," Erica said at once. "For the latest Lien book by Barbara Geiger."

Karen nodded. "St. Martin's still has the option on my next novel, right?"

"Right," said Erica.

"Okay," said Karen. "Call up Hiroshi there. Give him seventy-two hours to make a preemptive bid that exceeds a hundred million, or you'll go to auction. Tell him I need fifty percent on signing, and I need it within a week of closing the deal. Once you get the check, I'll have you disburse funds from it on my behalf as needed — but for starters, I should have some walking-around money, so get me a hundred thousand of it in cash."

"How soon can you deliver the manuscript?" asked Erica.

Karen thought for a minute. "I don't get tired anymore, and I don't waste time on sleep. Tell him I'll deliver it in six months; he'll be able to have it in stores for Christmas 2046."

"Do you have a working title?"

Karen didn't miss a beat. "Yes. Tell him it's called Nothing's Going to Stop Me Now."

The one disadvantage of having Deshawn, rather than Malcolm, as Karen's lead lawyer was that he did need to sleep. Karen had six guest bedrooms in this mansion of hers, and Deshawn was off in one of them, sawing wood. Malcolm, meanwhile, was using the wall screen in the boardroom to read up on legal precedents, and Karen — being true to her word — was in her office, making notes toward her new novel.

And that left me in her living room. I was trying out her leather-covered La-z-boy recliner. I'd never liked leather upholstery when I was biological, because it always made me sweat, but that wasn't a problem now. As I leaned back, I stared at the gray blankness of a wall screen that was turned off.

"Jake? I said softly.

Nothing. I tried again. "Jake?"

What the—?

"It's me. The other Jake Sullivan. On the outside."

What are you talking about?

"Don't you remember?"

Remember what? How can I hear you?

"Do you remember me? We talked a while ago."

What do you mean — 'talked'?

"Well, all right, it wasn't with words. But we communicated. Our minds touched."

This is nuts.

"That's what you said before. Look at your left elbow. Are there three small X's scratched just below it, on the outside of your arm?"

Whaddaya know … look at that. How did they get there?

"You put them there. Don't you remember?"

No.

"And you don't remember communicating with me before?"

No.

"What do you remember?"

All kinds of stuff.

"What do you remember recently? What happened yesterday, for instance?"

I don't know. Nothing special.

"All right. All right. Umm … let's see … Okay. Okay. Last Christmas. Tell me about last Christmas."

We actually had snow — there hadn't been a white Christmas in Toronto for years, but I remember we actually had some snow on Christmas Eve, and it stayed through Boxing Day. I got Mom a set of silver serving plates.

I was flabbergasted. "Go on."

Well, and she got me a beautiful chess set with onyx pieces. Uncle Blair came over for Christmas dinner, and—

"Jake."

Yes?

"Jake, what year is it?"

Twenty Thirty-Four. Of course, we're talking about Christmas, so that was last year: Twenty Thirty-Three.

"Jake, it's 2045."

Bull.

"It is. In fact, it's September 2045. Uncle Blair died five years ago. I remember the Christmas you're talking about; I remember the snow. But that was over a decade ago."

Bullshit. What is this?

"That's what I'd like to know." I paused, my mind racing, trying to sort it all out.

"Jake, if it's only 2034, as you claim, then how did you come to be in an artificial body?"

I don't know. I've been wondering about that.

"There was no uploading procedure that long ago."

Uploading?

"Immortex. The Mindscan process."

Nothing, then: Well, I can't argue with the fact that I am here, in some sort of a synthetic body. But — but you said it's September.

"That's right."