MEMMORIA | ONC 2020

001: Planet Earth.

A pink light glowed in the brick walls squared-room at the top floor of the Callum building, one of the most scientifically advanced residences in the city. The whole condominium had digital screens that reproduced a landscape chose by the owner, instead of windows. It was all an illusion, quite far from the smoky and dusty reality storming outside, but indeed, something people preferred. The thirty-seven-floor building was made of a steel skeleton, and it was rather old, but it had been remodelled many times during the years and updated with the top technology that ruled every season. Only people with some thick money card lived in there.

"Transference completed," spoke the robotic voice of Sally, the AI that lived inside the operative system in Agatha's flat, as the whole pink turned into a normal white coloured light.

A black-bearded man was lying flat over a tiny bed of white sheets, oblivious to the world around him, and the helmet he wore in his bald head.

Memmoria.

The last one of its kind in the whole Sulis Colony.

Memmoria was the word Arthur Ezra used to name the most revolutionary invention of the XXXI century.

A powerful device in a helmet shape, capable of collecting, storing and altering the most valuable thing of a human being: memories.

"Mr Eddie, time to go."

Agatha's raspy voice retorted in the almost empty room, only filled with the bed, a vital signs monitor, and a small transparent table with a transparent chair. She took off the Memmoria helmet from the man's head, whose eyes opened instantaneously.

"You have to go now," she said as her bony hands placed the helmet over the table. Her long arms covered by black sleeves of a leather simulation fabric. Not a single wire, but many small electrodes placed on the bald man's chest.

The man sat up, his legs crossed over the slim mattress, as the world around him seemed to spin. Agatha grabbed a plastic bag from the table and placed it on his face.

A hideous smell bathed the air as the guy emptied his stomach inside the bag. The flimsy shaped girl sighed in discontent.

"I told you not to eat."

"Aghh...I was hungry. You said it wouldn't hurt."

"It didn't hurt during the process. Only after."

"Why?", he cried with a loud moan.

"Because your brain is now overstuffed with neuronal activity. You can take pills for that."

She stood up taking the bag full of vomit and throwing it inside a bucket under the bed. The man tried to stand up but he was still dizzy.

Agatha knew the right protocol was to wait at least four hours until waking up the subject, but...That wasn't a clinic, and she was not a doctor specialized in memory transfer.

Besides, it was illegal. The sooner he was gone, the better.

After the chaos that started to create the anarchic organization STE with the first Memmoria helmets seven years ago, Sulis government destroyed each and all of them, and also "finished" anyone who got in their way. It had been tragic, especially because the Memmoria helmets provided more answers than any other scientific research ever did -curing mental illnesses by memory replacement, reducing the stress level in people by planting new memories with new experiences, reducing the level of violence, healing many physical illnesses, advances in technology, medicine, education- but when one person decides to turn the right in wrong, the good ones always suffer the worst consequences.

Now, this was the only way of helping people. Doing the good behind the curtain, and risking your skin. But also getting really good paid for it.

Perks of doing illegal stuff.