Mortals

The experiments began in 2087. Hundreds of elder men and women, longing for a chance to live onin some sense, or least leave a legacy, applied. They were even willing to fund their participation. The receiving end did not have so high demand. The mons from donors went entirely to recipients' mothers: women who still didn't know, after all scientific advancements, how to control their bodies. The mons paid women for the right to experiment on their unborn children, often also having to convince women who would have elsewise aborted their 'springs to carry to term and then have the little minds manipulated. The mind manips did not bother the women nearly as much as having to carry their babies within for nearly nine months. A comment on the society back then could be placed here, but I know it would only be ignored as today's world is even worse.

Yet, back then, some still cared and morality still reigned in the world of those times. When the first child died from the procedure, outrage loded up from the masses and the scys were given no choice but to abandon the experimentations. Least, that was what they told the populace. The project was officially scrapped, but continued in secret. Scys worked around the clock, barely having time for their own families, to create what many who thought the works were ended were still condemning as an abomination. More died, course, but without the public consciousness bearing upon them, the scys and their backers continued the work until finally they had the success they did not yet know was going to be so great: the first me was reborn.

It happened in the lab and the baby stayed there while the mother left with what would be nearly 200 million in today's currency. I never bothered to find out how she spent it or what she did, but in the second re-life, I was told she died in the year 2193. I can remember caring back then, but what I am now is so far moved from what I was then that it hardly seems more than a bad dream today. Her part in the tale is done, as is, really, the work of the scys and all the others. They are long gone, dead hundreds of years. Others have taken their place, but only to monitor, and not very well. They don't know 10% of what I know, and how could they? I understand myself better than they ever could, and not just in the philosophical nonsense disproved ages ago. They don't know because they do not have 10% of the knowledge and memories that I possess.

Once I was a baby. And then I was again and again and again. Today, my body is seven years old, but my mind has survived 395 years. The first body lasted 89 years and the most recent, 39. At the rate of decay, this body's expected life span is about 23-26. The mind is starting to get less and less attached to the body it inhabits, but yet its still strange, to know this shell will pass and yet somehow still live on. I remember my first body and how much I loved it. Even when I knew my mind would pass to another, I was afraid to die. It's strange to think about that now.

I could lie to you and say that fear of death is completely gone, but I would rather be honest, for the sake of progenies. Each death of body is easier in some senses and harder in others. On the one hand, I already know what it will feel like and what will happen to my self. On the other hand, I already know what it will feel like.

I lesser being would fret and stew in this knowledge, but of course I have no time for such things. And yet in another sense, I have all the time in the world, well, at least if the life span turns out to asymptotic, perhaps, but even then there will reach a certain point at which each life persists too short to contribute anything. In fact, that time may come in just a couple more iterations.

I can do so much with 23 years, but how much can I do with 10 or 3? That's why in this lifetime, I must find a way to prolong it, to reverse the effects of the mind on the body, or else this experiment will be ended. The scys mostly stay out of my way when I work. They know that one of me is worth more than all of them combined. It's strange: in my first lifetime I was smart, but never like this. I don't think the original mind really comprehended what she was doing. She just wanted to live. She didn't realize that living would corrupt her self beyond recognition.

I am not any of the beings I once was. I am beyond them. I am a conglamoration of them. If the world knew I existed, they would be amazed, but even now I am kept in isolation.

Sometimes I do remember things from past lives. The first couple iterations maintained a true sense of self. I remember the first mind loving and bearing children and loving them. I remember her enjoying life, but I don't understand why. She took pleasure in the strangest of things: a sunset, a flower, a cold winter's day. So many different things that grew no connection between and gathering no harmony with the science that bore her on to her next existence. Of course, she thought she knew something of science, for that was a requirement of the experiment, but she also had so many other interests, things that are meaningless now, some things that don't even exist anymore. She loved them, and now they are gone, and she, trying to live on, lost herself as well.

The second iteration was not quite so bad, but still clung to some sense of self. I remember a deep confusion re identity. There was the conflict between prior self and current self. Memories of a past life, and knowledge that was never learned by the body. That second self still clung to its name, still wanted to be called by a name, wanted to separate itself from its originator. I remember pain that was in some ways worse than the death I had already encountered. The strangest thing, though, was the full knowledge of how different I was from other bodies of the same physical age. I still had to wait for my body to develop to do certain things, but since my mind was already, in sense, fully developed, things like talking and walking became nearly trivial. It was strange to readjust myself to such a tiny body, I do remember, but the hardest thing was knowing that no one else was like me. And with that I still clung to self and wanted to be and not just exist.

Each iteration got a little better in that regard. I learned that in order to be what I needed to be, I needed to let go of any concern for who I was. Now, I refuse even to look at myself in the mirror. I am aware of how old my body is, because that is often important for the work I do and for planning the work I do, but I do not even know the color of my eyes or my hair. Some have tried to tell me, but I refuse to know. I think they still view me as a child. Each body sees new scys who have been told but do not understand what I am. It is hard for them to get past the shell, and even when they do, they cannot possibly understand what I am. I know because in my third iteration, I thought I had it figured out, but I was wrong. If I had to live four life times before I really understood, I can't expect them to understand either.

Back then, in the third, I still viewed each iteration as truly distinct. That was when I sensed myself losing sense of self, and back then, I thought that was still something to be maintained at all costs. I had not yet realized how meaningless it was. Half way through that third iteration, I resolved to end it. I thought of the fourth iteration to come as a new being that I must save from what it was doomed to be. I did not realize yet just how full and continuous all the beings inside the single body were. I viewed the bodies themselves as of value as well. I wanted to spare that body from my mind. The very thought of it makes it difficult not to laugh now, but that was how I thought back then.

I was smart enough then that if I had been truly dedicated, I probably could have ended the whole show, but it failed because a part of me knew the truth and that inkling grew to a realization of just how great I was and how much greater the next iteration could be. I still fought my desire to end it all, but by the time the fourth was born, I understood as no one here now ever could.

They tell me that they are going to create more, but I know I will always be the greatest. In fact, I am the one that is helping to spawn the others, and fighting to improve the lifespans. I don't know if I have enough bodies left myself to save this mind, but I can try. And even if it does pass, I am no longer afraid of vanishing. I understand the reason I exist and I understand the limitations of my existence. There is no reason to fear for my soul. I'm quite sure I lost my soul when the originator died and it has never been regained. Now, I live purely on logic. It is strange how much logic ends up seeming like a soul to others.

I have done so many great things in my existence. The first or second or maybe even third body would have regretted the lack of recognition for any of them, but now I realize that all existence is is doing great things. There is no point to anything else. One iteration discovered the Newtonian correction constant. Another came up with Rystein's Theorem, which was attributed to a body that passed away two centuries ago. Another proved the color-space paradox in seven different ways. At first, the tasks were trivial, perhaps meaningless, really doing nothing and tests of the inferior scys more than anything. But with time, which there was plenty of back then, they grew more and more significant.

I have lived for 395 years and my only regret is what a waste the first 89 were. The only thing that still makes me sick is that every other being in this universe only has that first iteration. They do not grow on and improve and truly contribute like I do. It makes me wonder how humanity has even survived. So little can be done in the 97 years (average) that the true men have today. They don't even understand what they aren't contributing. How could they? That understanding is the only thing that really causes me pain, but dwelling on that pain is something that the true men would do to waste their 97 years. Instead, I do all I can with what remains to me. At the very least, I have another 30 years or so before the mind cannot be preserved in the bodies and becomes useless, but I promise I will do more in those 30 years than all the scys around me do in their combined 3000 years of existence. That is why I exist, and that is what I am. I am not any individual, and though I speak of iterations and minds, it is really just the best way I can get you to understand what I am. I am what I am, as a being claiming to be God once said, and if I can find a way to perpetuate my own existence further, I will be the true god in a realm of mortals.