Death Edits

Death Edits

“Do you feel as though spirits have been visiting you in your dreams lately? Do you or anyone you know find themselves inexplicably cold even with the thermostat cranked up? Have cups and plates mysteriously been broken even though you had a firm grasp on them?

It might not be a ghost, but a haunting of a different sort.” 

“Ghosts don’t exist...” a skeptical Marilyn Monroe lookalike exclaims.

“Depends on what you mean by exist.” I quickly fire back. 

I pour some water in a cup and look at the dozen or so people in the room. Dusty from all sorts of walks of life. Ghosts of our past linger in our minds. Ghost in this sense, I mean memory. But how much hold can a memory have if you don’t give power to it? Well let’s put it this way, you can have a broken window in a house but the window is still broken even if you close the curtain. 

“A memory that was carved deeper into your mind like chiseled initials on a tree or a deep gash from an upturned handle in a bicycle crash on a gravel church parking lot might come back to life when you least expect it.” I can see Sparkle Cheeks and Mr. T shift in their seats. 

“The sight of a bike or accident may cause you to react more viscerally from the memory of a painful infection and many days spent changing slimy green, brown, yellow soaked gauze pads. The smell of iodine may make you flinch more than you would expect. These kinds of ghosts affect us on an emotional level with what one might call a psychosomatic reaction. Sometimes these reactions have physiological response such as gagging, or cold shivers; or in more pleasant examples, make you feel all warm and cozy inside like the cuddle of a soft loving puppy or the first breath of air after a long car ride from the city to the wilderness or at least to a camp as close enough to the wilderness as you’re willing to go.” What about something that’s even more traumatic? I know someone is begging the question.

 “A person that’s cheated on you and the reciprocated removal of certain anatomical appendages?” Monroe looks away. “A stillborn child? Or a secret abortion? What of their ghosts?” A couple more Cookie Cutter Stepfords scowl over their nail filing. “And how about murdering someone for a questionable 8 ball?” A sideburns hugged face scans the room.  

“Even if the law never found out, those ghosts cling heavy to your shoulder do they not?” No one chimes in this time. 

“I can only attest to this: Memories—or ghosts, and the strength of their manifestations are at least as strong as the marks that were left initially. And if left untreated...can poison the mind.” 

Some might have a grudge that they just can’t seem to let go. Those tend to be the bitterest of edits. Fortunately no red flags showed up in my folder today. Which should mean no difficult trial participants. Most of my current group seem like Betty Boppers and Druggie Dans today. 

“Do any of these sound relatable to you or perhaps are things you think might have a stronger hold on your daily actions than you care to admit?” I often hear: If you cover the scar, the memory is still there. I couldn’t agree more. 

“Memory is intricately linked to your mental state. I think we can all agree...even if we squabble over the direct placement of memory”—at least that used to be the case. People just want to forget these days. Which led to the development of applied quantum mechanics to controlled memory function and the birth of the QEMC Cube. Sometimes referred to as the Kemsey Box. But for it to be complete, clinical data from a blind study is needed. As just the observation—rather a participant's knowledge and thought pattern alone can ruin the experiment by disturbing the stabilization of unique time crystals that are coded in a special way. 

“If you could edit the death of a loved one away, would you? If you could go back to that day you hit that child with a car while being deeply inebriated after an incredible highschool football game, would you?” A hear a shuffle of a chair as someone becomes startled with the relevancy of information. “If you could take back that thing you said to someone out of blind anger disguised as hate, would you? What if you could cut out the bad and leave the lesson? Where would you be now?”

Before I could finish my demo, an intrepid young man smelling vaguely of sausage and cheap beer came up to the podium. 

“What are you babbling about, you clown? Do you realize how insensitive you sound right now? Why don’t you just pack up and go home...nobody wants your sham shit. You ain’t Billy Mays. Don’t you dare disrespect his name.” The greying young man pointed a loud finger covered in paint and bandages. 

“Hold on, I’ll address your questions after the announcement. Please wait till the end of the demonstration. Thank you.”

Where was I? You have to understand, after giving hundreds of these demo disguised experiments every week, all of them feel the same. Even their reactions to this new tech all seem scripted after so many. You can’t remember if you’re talking to Toothless Blond Guy with the lip piercing from 60 demos ago, or Smiley Joe Curls who looked kinda like Toothless Surf Bum but you forget because that’s also how you tried remembering 30 other people in the last week with those same mnemonics. 

I shrug and pull the cord to unveil the contraption. Or at least a pretty good mock up of it. Astonishing in its opaque obsidian simplicity. The Kemsey Box in all it’s Quantum Entanglement Memory Control glory. The working model is located in a sealed chamber further down the hall. Contrasted only by the clinical white of the observation rooms that adjoin the room hidden behind one-way mirrors.  

With this device you can slip into any cognitive state or memory you want for as long as you want. Want to go back to the moment you were born? Sure...but I wouldn’t recommend it. 

“This box gives the user complete control over their reality.” What’s reality if not just the accepted communicable terms based on agreed upon the imaginary points of tangential superfluidity? 

“I’m giving you the choice to choose life. Edit the formative parts of your life so you can become the person you always wanted to be. Baggage free.” 

I pour my tenth glass of water and sip, realizing only after half the glass is gone that the pee balloon in my current vessel is about to dirty my drawers. Not much longer anyways so it’s something I push through with like a champ. Rather, soiling yourself in a temporary husk is hardly something to panic over. It’s biological. It’s natural. But more importantly, it’s only temporary.

“Even if that devil’s machine could do what you say...it seems like you’re trying to play at God!” A handsome lady shouts.

“Not I, but I can see your concern but let me ask you this: What if God inspired these blueprints into the minds of the creators to give us a possibility to curtail our behavioral inadequacies to live more in His image?” I of course can’t substantiate this claim any more than the bearded lady can prove hers. 

It’s a stalemate argument that usually quiets the ruckus long enough to move onto the next reveal: The Tablet. A small crystalline block that resonates with certain Psionic waves that are generated in response to recollection. 

These tablets are imprinted during various interview sessions prior to the clinical trial using special audio coding software during the synthesis phase. These are time-crystals that act as a memory card to the QEMC Cube. Coded with the most vibrant bits of a person’s life. The more poignant a memory, the deeper the psionic imprint left on the Tablet. This allows the device to sync to those points in a person’s memory and allow them to swap out quanta organically with corresponding data from a parallel universe. Not only will the memory be overwritten, the actual event will be replaced as well—relative to that person’s existence. The law of conservation gets wonky here but it has to be controlled in order to prevent existential tears. Which could be dire, to say the least. But that’s where the time-crystals can help lock onto specific neurally linked quantum pathways. 

These bits of information are excluded in the demo part of the experiment as it can pervert the natural wave particle function formation from a person’s thought processes. So memory allocation usually deadheads the conversation. The Tablets emerge from a slotted compartment in each of the assigned desks.

The participants at this point are only given the necessary information on how to insert the tablet into the Kemsey Box and are briefed on possible temporary side effects. Some vomiting and loss of appetite can occur, as can be expected with trans-dimensional particle shifts. As well as auditory and visual hallucinations, feeling faint, and impairment of speech. These usually only last four to five days but can persist depending on an individual’s unique grasp on reality. Heidegger’s uncertainty principle can’t be completely removed from the equation...even with astronomical advancements in the foray of fringe science. So these side effects can only be mitigated by mild sedatives until the feelings subside. On rare occurrences, severe schizophrenia can be induced but the survivability in those occurrences is almost zero. Data regarding it is usually clipped as to not alarm the other 99% of participants. Success and failure rate of any individual participant is also omitted as to avoid any accidental disturbances of the quantum fields being generated by the device. 

“The Kemsey Box was developed to help people leave their old lives behind. And I hope that you too will be able to welcome the best version of you.” I conclude with the checklist and order of lottery. 

Participants are randomized into a lottery to offset any non-impartial predispositions in the order of persons using the device. As it’s a device to put part of a person into superposition—another complicated aspect of this endeavor—only one person is allowed to use the QEMC at a time. Two observers within the same trial will cancel the superposition of the other, so three or more would also be impossible. Without establishing that Schrödinger effect, the experiment cannot be successful.  

I assist with the last of the subjects who still have certain withholdings. 

“But our old lives are what made us who we are today.”

“Yes. Nothing but superficiality will change that.”

“But what if it’s painful.”

“Life usually is. But pain is transient, even more so with this device.”

After carefully explaining the buzz and hum they will experience in complete sensory deprivation as to be the mind’s attempt to fill a void, the last subject asks the most bizarre question. One I had not anticipated.

“How many times have you reset your life?”

I was unsure how to approach the question. As it’s implications were far more reaching than just a simple reset. I take a deep breath and try to purse what will be actually useful to the woman as she hands me the remaining wedding ring, necklaces, and phone to put with her other personal effects in a box until the procedure is done. This is the last time to ask any questions before the participant enters the box. She just happened to choose a really good one.

“I’m not sure reset is the right word.” I look over her shoulder at our infinite reflections in the floor to ceiling mirrored room. Infinitely joined with mirrored images of the box repeated in an illusory tunnel that was as deep as the unknown abyss. 

“Which word would you use then?”

“I’ve made choices and measured their consequences and simply chose the most suitable outcome. If you dig deep enough, you can usually find a root event that will cascade into every other facet of your life. So when you find it, you only have to change that one event. The amount of times you change it are inconsequential as you will only ever remember experiencing one time-line.” 

“I’m not sure I understand.” She says trying to piece together something that is on the edge of her distant memory. A feeling of deja vu no doubt. A side effect of repeat participants. Something that is theorized as a kind of quantum particle bleed through. Something I hoped wouldn’t have happened to Alice. 

“It’s best that you don’t. Ignorance is bliss as they say.” I smile and reassure her that whatever changes she feels are as reversible as choosing a new pair of shoes. Your foot only needs to be able to fit inside it. The rest is about finding the shoe that fits best.

“Haven’t you told me that before?”

“I have, and have not; I am, I will, and I won’t.”

“What?”

I could explain to her how the universe already collapsed or how every possibility manifested at the same time and played out like a flash of lightning. That life as we know it is merely the reminiscence of any particular series of phenomena in existential memory. That we can’t change the end. Or the many years we spent together raising a family. Or the tragedies that families often go hand in hand with. We can’t edit our own deaths but merely the paths chosen on the way to inevitability. But I don’t. 

“Nevermind. An inside joke.” I say with a smile. “Were there any other concerns you may have had?”

She shrugs and enters the box.

The experiment proceeds, and she once again forgets how much time has passed as she wakes up in her sterile room again. Her personal effects, most of which look foreign to her now, are neatly packed into a box that sat nearer to her bed. She toys with the ring curious about its significance. And slides it on her ring finger surprised by its fit and familiar comforting weight. 

A buzz from an intercom makes her recall some dark space. Like the womb of the universe. A staticky voice announces the number that was on the lid of the effects box and gives instructions as to which room to go to begin her volunteer clinical trial for the Kemsey experiment. A chance for life to be lived anew.