Veil (18 page)

“Is that all?” Pollock asked.

“Actually, no. But those are the main points
that need to be considered when moving forward in designing it. The
other considerations can be addressed simply by addressing these
points. Especially in being able to manipulate and rearrange
neuroelectricity.”

“Give us one example of another
consideration,” Pollock pressed.

“Ok, well, as was explained in the book you
two compiled,” Hunter jabbed, “all the neuroelectrical vibrations
responsible for physical body movement will need to be artificially
muted during the upload, otherwise when you return the Witness to
its owner’s brain, that brain will be subjected to the vibrations
responsible for creating physical motion. Which will cause their
body to try to perform those motions, albeit in a very sped up
state. Like being in fast-forward.”

“Damn,” Schaffer sighed.

“Wait, why sped up?” Pollock interjected.

“Good question. It’s sped up because the Veil
process is quick when The Witness is returned to its owner after
they’re done shadowing. By default, Veil isn’t experienced in
realtime. It happens quickly, so the person has a memory of what it
was like to be another person. A very vivid, precise memory. But,
the hours and hours of experience they obtain through Veil are
condensed down to minutes. I guess you could upload slower and give
the experience in realtime
,
but I can’t
see any need to do it like that. The technology would certainly
allow for it, though.”

“Damn,” Pollock parroted Schaffer.

“Yeah, there’s a lot to consider here. And
without all this information, I could’ve never created the device
I’m now going to help you build.”

Or build for you. You fucking morons.

“I told you we were missing something
before,” Pollock attempted to joke with Schaffer.

“I will punch you again, Luke.”

“So, what was it like?”

“What was what like?”

“You know.”

“Oh. It was … well shit, I’m not sure if I’m
allowed to talk about it,” Schaffer stalled. He sat on the edge of
the bed and leaned down to put on his other sock.

“Why couldn’t you? I’m all cleared. You made
sure of that,” Hunter joked and pushed Schaffer with his
outstretched leg, like he was going to push him off the edge of the
bed. “Besides, Pollock told me what his was like. But his was so
boring.” He lied, of course. Pollock hadn’t told him a damn thing,
and he would've never tried to get it out of Pollock. Still, he
knew if he got it out of Pollock it probably would’ve been boring.
So, that wasn’t too much of a stretch.

“I’m not surprised. Pollock is boring.”

“And hot
,
but dumb
as a box of burnt hair,” Hunter laughed and rose to his knees
directly behind Schaffer. He put his arms around Schaffer and
leaned into him. He pressed his chest on Schaffer’s back and placed
the side of his head on the back of Schaffer’s head.

“You know I’m not gay,” Schaffer protested
and stood up, which knocked Hunter backwards. “Right?”

Schaffer walked across the room toward his
pants and shoes. He had a disgusting, pale frame. With hair in all
the wrong places, a non-athletic body, and awkward posture that
Hunter never noticed until he saw him naked. He figured Schaffer
was masculine enough and had potential
,
but it would take so many years to reach his potential that, by the
time he did, he’d be too old for it to matter.

Hunter figured Schaffer’s protest had more to
do with the fact that he just referred to Pollock as “hot,” but he
let it slide. He had bigger dicks to fry.

“Never said you were gay. And don’t really
give a shit.”

“Well I’m not.”

“Seriously, aren’t we too old to be having
this conversation? Obviously, it’s neither of our first times, and
we’re not at the frat house after a night of hazing that
accidentally turned into a big ol’ daisy chain.”

“I’m just saying,” Schaffer joked back. He
didn’t know what a daisy chain was but for some reason Hunter
always seemed to bring up frat boys. “Don’t be getting all touchy
ya big ol’ queer.”

Hunter laughed and flopped himself backwards
onto the bed. The back of his head landed on the pillow and his
knees were bent up. He patted the bed next to him and looked at
Schaffer
,
who gave one of his typical
shrugs and flung himself onto the bed. He twisted his body so he
landed on his back next to Hunter. His legs were outstretched and
he clasped his hands across his chest. Hunter flipped over onto his
stomach and crossed his arms over the top of the pillow, where he
rested his head and looked at Schaffer.

“Frak, it’s so hard to explain. It’s
incredible. Life-changing. I can’t even … hell, I don’t know where
to begin,” Schaffer fumbled. He looked awestruck and stared at the
ceiling without blinking.

“Come on, tell me what it was like,” Hunter
pushed.

“Ok, well, you don’t really experience
anything until you get back in your body. Because, well, once they
take your Witness out, everything kind of stops. But only for a
second. Because once they put you back inside yourself all the gaps
get filled-in and the only thing that’s missing is that second
between them taking you out and putting you inside someone else.
You can’t really notice it; it’s a blur. Kind of like when you wake
up and you know the time has passed but you can only vaguely sense
it. But, once they put you back inside yourself and it starts …
holy shit. Holy shit.”

“What?” Hunter was genuinely intrigued. He
turned onto his side and his body faced Schaffer. He used his arm
to prop up his head
.

“Well, first you get the chills and goose
bumps all over. Or at least I did. Like when you hear a really good
song. Like someone with a really, really good voice. It feels like
that. Except it lasts the whole time. These amazing chills and
goose bumps that last the entire time.” Schaffer shivered just
talking about it and recalling the experience. “And then everything
starts to kind of fill in. A little at a time. All the images,
sounds, tastes, feelings, thoughts, everything. Slowly at first,
while your brain gets used to the sensation, I guess. And your
brain feels really cold at first. Like liquid nitrogen cold. Like
dry ice. Almost too cold. But that passes. And before you know
it
,
you can remember being someone else.
You remember what their thoughts sounded like and what they
contained. Like how the voice in their head sounds and what all it
said. You remember how they thought. What it felt like to be them.
What their body felt like, what it looked like from their
perspective. Their feelings. What they worried about. What they
fantasized about. What they really thought about people they
interacted with. It’s so hard to explain.”

“Who did you shadow?” Hunter asked.

“I don’t know. Neither of us knew. Didn’t
Pollock tell you that part?”

“Oh, no … he didn’t.” Hunter had to think
quickly. “It didn’t dawn on me to ask. His version was so boring. I
didn’t want to hear more.”

“I bet. What a fucking tool,” Schaffer
smirked.

“Right.”

“But yeah, the subject was chosen at random,
and we weren’t supposed to know who he was. He didn’t know what the
project was about. We created a partition in the lab so he couldn’t
see us and we couldn’t see him. He didn’t know he was being
shadowed. We wanted the realest, truest experience we could have.
The subject still doesn’t know he’s been Veiled. I could probably
figure out who he was by piecing together enough
information
,
but his actual identity—his
name—didn’t get disclosed during my shadowing.”

“Interesting,” Hunter said and flipped over
onto his back. That time he positioned himself like Schaffer, with
his hands clasped across his chest while staring up at the
ceiling.

“I wish I could explain it. It can’t be put
it into words. Afterwards I felt like I was at this point. Like
right before history. Like history was about to start, and I got a
taste of it before it actually started.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know, really. It felt like it was
something so massive, so grand that it can’t possibly be contained.
I felt like the experience I had could change everything for
everyone. That’s what was so frustrating about hearing Pollock’s
version of his Veil. He acted like it was some friggen virtual
reality video game. When really … I mean … fundamentally it’s life
changing.”

“Did you say friggen again?” Hunter quipped
and elbowed Schaffer in the ribs. They both laughed.

The situation wasn’t too bad. He’d done far
more and far worse for much less in the past. Hell, he slept with a
girl once, so he could steal one of her
Prodigy
CDs. Back
when people still had CDs
.
Back when
The Prodigy
was still underground and not an embarrassment
to have in his music library
.

He would’ve preferred sleeping with Pollock.
Pollock was at least attractive and built and short. Short guys
were usually packing and Pollock sported a decent looking bulge.
Besides, he was pretty certain with the right amount of effort and
the right kind of coaxing, he could’ve had Pollock.

Eh, there was just too much highway to travel
to get things with Pollock moving in that direction. Too much
buddying up, too much drinking together and hanging out, too much
talking about pussy and sports—all to get Pollock comfortable in
that
way. The way that made straight guys comfortable
because, if they were messing around with another straight guy,
then for some reason it was somehow magically so much less “gay”
that they still got to consider themselves “straight
.
”

Good lord, the nuances of masculinity were oh
so predictably common.

For Hunter, all guys were so easy that it was
boring, and guys like Schaffer were the easiest. Sure, he could
eventually get the information he wanted from Pollock. There was no
doubt about it. But, Pollock was so dense that Hunter would have to
work too long to conjure up the kinds of conversations that would
eventually divulge the information Hunter was seeking.
And
all that work after already having to work so long just to get his
dick down Pollock’s throat. It simply wasn’t worth it.

Time is of the motherfucking essence,
faggots.

Schaffer, on the other hand, fancied himself
as smart and insightful. He approached every conversation as a way
to prove and affirm himself. No conversation would seem forced with
someone like that. You could bring up anything, any time, and if
they questioned it or seemed suspicious, there was always a way to
turn it back around on them. You could fly guys like Schaffer like
a “friggen” kite. And the whole time you were flying them, all you
needed to do was sit there and blow wind up their ass because they
were too busy making everything about themselves anyway.

Jesus
, Hunter thought,
if anyone
ever Veiled me, they’d think I was one sick fuck
. The thought
amused him.

“I’m messing with you. It really does sound
incredible. You’re right, life-changing. Who knows, maybe it’s the
future. You were so damn lucky to get to do it,” Hunter buttered
Schaffer.

“Yeah, I know. And I was thinking the other
day. You know how when we used your device and it extracted both
subjects’ neuroelectricity from Subject Two?”

“Yes. Of course I know,” Hunter responded
flatly.

“I mean, it’s not about that, but it got me
thinking. I was wondering, when you upload the Witness of the
person who will be performing the shadowing, why doesn’t the brain
of the subject they’re being uploaded onto … ummm … like…” Schaffer
stumbled. His words weren’t able to keep up with his thoughts.

“How come the subject’s brain doesn’t absorb
the information in the shadower’s Witness?”

“Exactly!” Schaffer snapped his fingers and
pointed at Hunter.

“That’s actually a good question. The theory
states that
,
although a Witness can
receive information from any brain, a brain can only receive
information from a Witness it created, from its own
neuroelectricity. Each Witness has a distinct signature, a
fingerprint if you will. Like a lock and key. A brain will only
accept information from a key that perfectly fits its lock.”

“Ok, can’t say I understand why that’s the
case at all, but I understand what you’re saying,” Schaffer
conceded.

“Hell, I don’t understand why the brain does
half the shit it does. But to me it makes sense as a system
overall,” Hunter genuinely sympathized.

“I guess it makes sense. I guess I have to
believe in it, since the design works. One more thing and that’s
it, I swear.”