The Pieces of My Self

39 - The Apparition

ARTOIS MANGALOTTE

The Presidential Palace, 16 June 2174, Thursday

Life is like a chocolate soufflé: it can taste great if you're careful how you make it.

I dipped my spoon into the breakfast dish and savored the bittersweet mouthful. My father could make it in his sleep—the soufflé, not the good life. His restaurant catered to people like Oliver Fleming, who had money, but couldn't care less about ordinary folk. He struggled financially until the flood took him, and Fleming didn't lift a finger to save him or others.

I knew firsthand some of my father's cooking tricks. The soufflé is only as good as the ingredients you use, especially the chocolate. You must be careful how you beat the egg whites, because that's how the chocolate soufflé rises. And the whites have to be coaxed. Father used a dab of cream of tartar to make the whites stand on end. You have to carefully stir the whites into the chocolate without mixing. Finally, you need to cool the mixture before putting it into the fire. With every step, you must avoid a collapse.

The delicate dish made me think about the future of Loumissala and how the fragility of power, the purity of stock, and the need for at least a dab of revenge are intertwined. My granddaughter was the spoiler who could collapse my regime.

I summoned my avatar.

"Yes, Artois?"

The image filled the digital mirror—the half-silvered face on the French door leading from the dining balcony to the living room. The face smiled, untouchable beyond the glass. A digital imp.

"Call me by my title!"

This was the first time the avatar had addressed me by my given name. The thing is a piece of my soul. But it is also my servant! It must do my bidding. And it should therefore show more deference. More gravitas. More respect. Unfortunately, Knightly was the only one who could tune the behavioral parameters, and he was dead.

"What progress have you made finding my granddaughter?"

"We have no new leads, Mr. President."

I could feel my blood pressure rising. "What about Project Purity?"

"We proposed a metric for purity, and it awaits your approval, Mr. President. It will allow you to grade your subjects based on their merits."

"Yes, I saw that. But I have questions. Can DNA measurements be circumvented? What if nucleotide sequences can be spoofed?"

"We did not consider that, Mr. President."

"Then you are a fool."

The image continued to smile. "If there are issues with your project, Mr. President, perhaps they stem from the way we were constructed. The root of our being. We are no better, no worse, than you."

"You impertinent jackass! You piece of techno shit! You—"

The image morphed into a simple reflection of me. I looked old, still dressed in my morning robe. I wiped spittle from the edges of my lips.

"Come back here!"

My reflection dissolved and a new one formed, like the reverse movie of a burning painting. A haze in the mirror thickened, then became an oval shape. The shape became a head without a face.

It was a monstrous image. There were no eyelids. No lips. No skin. No hair. It was a skull with red meat still clinging to the bone, animated by saccadic eyeballs and a probing tongue.

A hideous head. It spoke with Knightly's voice: "Hello, Artois. Remember me?"

I was startled, but not afraid. After all, these were mere pixels and synthesized audio. The image couldn't hurt me, but I could learn from it. Perhaps understand how to kill it. That was my soldier's instinct.

The face faded to a scene of the Butterfly Room, where I heard only its voice: "I am not a ghost in the machine, Artois. I am more like a vengeful echo."

With that, it vanished into smoke, but the voice continued:

I bequeath to my first child

All that I am,

And all that I'll be...