Advance Detective

Fight For It

Ergo, John Price would want the plug pulled. Case closed.

I log into the system, and enter my choice.

Except, it turns out the case isn't closed at all.

Karen knew which decision I'd come to – she had lived with me for close on twenty years; even after the divorce there was some contact, or at least, that's what the records give me to understand. The point is, she knows how I think (or maybe that should be thought?), and she had an objection order in place just waiting for me.

Which means, this is not going to be a clear cut case of me saying my future self would want to pop his clogs, and then vanishing myself in a puff of evaporating electrons.

If I want me dead, I'm going to have to fight for it.

I can't get over how real this all feels. Just like real life. My lungs move, fill with air. I can hear sounds, taste and smell and touch things. And the so-called 'real' world can see me, too. We're just separated by an endless sequence of thin glass sheets, that's all. I'm trapped in a cage made up of all the computer screens in the world.

Karen is in front of me, standing behind what looks like a thin glass window. Up till now we haven't been able to talk to one another. Now that the case is going to the courts, the rules are different.

I don't have to justify my decision to kill John Price. Of course I don't. That's not the point. As his walking, talking advance directive, I have complete powers of advocacy over his life. I had them from the moment it became doubtful if he would ever regain a significant degree of consciousness, at which point my files were dusted off and my simulated self was switched on.

No, Karen couldn't make a case around whether I'm making the right decision or not. That wouldn't wash at all.