The Second Sphere

I slowly came out of my dream-state and realized that I was on a toilet, slumped against the wall. The bathroom stank. Several stalls down, someone still struggled with a bowel movement.

Thoughts of whimsical Quincy Laslow danced through my head. His threats were asinine. The very idea of putting contracts over and above hardworking employees was completely foreign to me. Then again, who the hell was I to judge? I’d done plenty of moronic things in my life. And I didn’t have the pressure of running a multi-trillion-dollar corporation.

Ogling the past only brought up thoughts of my dead wife, which then led me to another dose of Love. The dance of people entering the bathroom continued beyond the door to my stall. More shuffling feet; another stall door opened.

In 2008, I let a woman run away with my heart. It wasn’t the first time, but it was certainly the last. Her name was Sofia Lucht, and she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, the most loving and caring person I’ve ever known. We married at her parents’ home in suburban Maryland a year after we met. Soon, we had a daughter, Lila, and she was everything that I’d imagined a child to be, full of joy and unconditional love.

I put in for some domestic time and started working out of Langley, my desire for a rush restrained by new commitments. I lived the life of a family man and enjoyed every second of being around my wife and daughter. The workdays were shorter, filled with meetings in boardrooms and communications with men in the field, but with immeasurably less stress. I got to sleep in my own bed, and Sofia and I talked about having a second child.

About a year after Lila was born, after forgetting I’d applied, I got a call from a recruiter at Laslow. The recruiter told me that management liked what they saw on paper and wanted to get me in for an interview and a battery of tests. It felt like a tremendous opportunity, one with higher pay and the potential for actually accomplishing something. Psychologically hardened, no test could match the intensity of real field action for me. They hired me immediately. It was a match made in heaven, professionally.

Not so for my family life.

I was gone a lot, to say the least, which put something of a strain on the relationship with my family. Being abroad for months tested my wife, and left my daughter wondering whether her father was real. But what could I do? I’d never quit my addiction and I loved the work.

And the work got noticed.

Laslow replaced the CIA as the source of reliable information for intelligent decision-making. It was well known in most circles that when the President needed to make a choice between two unpleasant, but strategically important options, he read Laslow briefs first.

So it surprised no one on the inside that we were the ones who struck the final blow, assassinating Bai Boutou, outside of Beijing. He was hidden in a compound about the size of four football fields, counting the days until his kidneys failed. One of the things I’ll always remember about that life on earth was that I was there when we got him, all thin and unrepentant as he was. Striking that final blow, the one that brought about peace after fifteen years of war, helped mythologize the Laslow Corporation and brought a few centuries worth of guaranteed government contracts.

When the transfer era arrived, thirty years after the war ended, my marriage descended into bitterness. For Sofia, the idea of attaching herself to corporations for life extension was horrifying. She was disturbed that I, a person she thought to be good at heart and well intentioned, could believe that man-made immortality was in any way moral. We fought endlessly about our future, as I tried to convince her that we needed to spend eternity together.

I knew what I wanted and thought I understood all the consequences. I was in the first ten thousand to get the procedure done, mostly because I wanted to work, and Laslow knew how valuable I was. It all seemed to make perfect sense.

When I came home with that first Transfer in 2043, we were in our sixties. I’d chosen a transfer that was as close to the way I’d been when I was 25. Dark hair and skin, deep set brown eyes. Maybe that scared Sofia when she saw me walk through that door. But I knew that I wouldn’t be able to look in the mirror for eternity only to see a stranger.

Over the next nearly thirty-odd years, as she aged, Sofia’s heart broke. I continued to try to convince her that there was no reason for her to die, that our love was so strong that we could make it forever. But her convictions were firm. She couldn’t understand why I chose unnatural, endless life over my moral center. To me, it wasn’t a choice. It was only instinct, the will to survive.

Watching her get old and die was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It was the anticipation of it all, the idea of letting go that was so difficult to deal with. Even though her body aged, her mind remained quite clear until she died in 2080, one hundred years after she was born.

I was left alone. By that time, Lila was in the midst of a successful writing career at a daily in upstate New York. Even though she had plotted her way into transfer, she couldn’t understand why I had chosen my career over the deepest personal connection I ever had. There was no argument I could make that would satisfy Lila, and, truthfully, there was no argument that satisfied me, either. I was a coward in so many ways. Over time our relationship healed. But still, every now and then, I felt Lila’s resentfulness toward me, as though I should’ve gone with her mother to the great life to come.

I did another dose of Love and felt so high that I thought I might lift right up off the ground, above the stalls, and out of the Laslow Building. A toilet flushed, and there was the whoosh of a zipper, a door being opened, and more shuffling feet. The water flowed, and I heard a man humming a sweet little tune.

I tapped my fingers along the wall. I thought of how many times I’d been in this bathroom to get away from the pressure of work. I felt the shame burn my skin. But I couldn’t keep the drive away from my chip.

My tongue was heavy. I needed a few minutes before I could go back out to face reality. As a person who considered himself responsible, I knew that I needed to be out there for all of the analysts who depended on me. I couldn’t hide in the bathroom.

I stood. My equilibrium was off, and I dropped a shoulder against the stall. I took a long breath, opened the door, and dragged my feet toward the sinks. I had no desire to look in a mirror. But I had to make myself presentable.

I needed control. You’re pathetic, I thought, as I washed and dried my hands. My job was on the line and the first thing I did was get high. The life that I’d spent hundreds of years building could vanish in the next few days if I didn’t dig deep, set aside my weaknesses, and come up with a solution. I needed to come up with transformative intel to prevent my life from cracking into pieces. As I left the bathroom, I realized that I still didn’t really know how I was going to get it.