Memories of Us, for Us
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Chapter 1
The waves are a force of change. Eternal. Magical. Ferocious. Instantaneous. As it had been that day. Long ago it seemed to me. I, reliving that memory being played back in my head or databa- whichever one it is, I am not so sure. What I am sure of, was the power of the wave; when it collapsed around me, and twirled me in its wake, and I was little more than a smoothened stone in the short shore of the sea. Sun on top, lazily humming, my body laying in a heap, languid but alive. Breathing in the saltwater and air as a new-born sucks in those first breaths of life.
“Mr. Baduman, can you tell me how you are feeling at this time? What you are feeling. How you are feeling it? It is important for you to revisit these basic emotions in every possible manner. Because believe it or not, they are the key to you achieving your full … humanness.” Dr. Lekstewart fiddled with his white-gloved hands, periodically tapping the rims of his glasses up to the hook of his purplish nose. He took another second to comprehend Blake’s post-operation condition.
“Your body is you, aged 40. Your mind, however, I can not think to age it with a number, but rather..” On this note, the doctor let his eyes scan the ceiling of the ornate room then through the grand archways that peered out onto the balcony and over New Accra. The cluster of skyscrapers connected in intricate rings of walkways and levitated streets. Bursts of green roofs, and vertical forests climbing each floor of the city in the sky.
“But rather,” Lekstewart’s gaze returned to Blake. “We can only qualify it with the inputs we have accumulated in the time since, and by inputs, I know you know that that means data. Data of your life. As you allowed us to record and track every moment of it. In your case, stored in a private server facility. So that you would one day be with us today, and I would sit before you as I am now. Welcoming you to the world you knew. But knowing it as another slightly different person. Akwaaba.”
Blake raised his eyes to look at the doctor’s narrow face, scorned with age, but eyes twinkling with menacing wisdom.
“I can guess that you would want to look at yourself?”
“No. I — I can’t now.” Blake’s voice was hoarse. Carrying a frequency he wasn’t familiar with.
