Mind_Hack.exe Ch. 07

"Who's Bekka?" Adam asked.

"Shut up dude," Dan said not unkindly. He was eyeing Nevyn warily. "Let's circle back to what you said about the uprisings."

"Oh that," Nevyn said proudly. "Well I needed an excuse to get our top secret findings into everyone. What better way than to give people a scare and create a temporary global dictatorship?" Nevyn slowed as he noticed the look of horror on the two pretty women's faces. "Hey, I can't claim soul responsibility for all the atrocities that were done during that awful time. I just spurred it along at the beginning, hopping into influential anti government types and winding up the locals. It was too easy frankly, way easier than writing code for all those years prior."

When his guests continued to sit in stunned silence, Nevyn continued. "So I had the means, I created the opportunity to put it into action, and now we're at phase two. It's actually been ready for a little while now, but I really hoped you would be here to join me when I initiated it."

Finally Dan broke his silence. "I'm terrified to ask, but, what's phase two."

Nevyn was still smiling, but there was no joy in it, only a cold resolve. "Everyone with an implant will get to experience what it's like to be me. Going from body to body, life to life as I have for centuries. Everyone will get a chance to walk in another man's shoes. Everyone will get to experience all walks of life, man, woman, young, old, rich, poor, from the most powerful CEO, to the homeless vagabond on the street. Humanity will finally gain the empathy they have been sorely lacking all this time. They will take care of lives that are not their own in the hopes that a person is taking care of the future body they will be in later."

For once, Adam understood before Dan. "You're going to force a mass swap on the world?"

"Exactly!" Nevyn crowed. "Everyone in POM's worldwide system has been backed up. That took a long, long time, but they are all here, ready to be shuffled."

Dan was breathing hard as he realized what Nevyn had meant about his sister being set free. She would be free, but would be shuffled into a sea of billions of bodies. He stared into Nevyn's eyes. "You're fucking crazy. This is not what we had in mind when we came here to overthrow POM."

Nevyn nodded. "But it's so much better. And yes, after all these years I might be a little crazy, but I believe in this. I honestly feel it could be humanity's last hope for a peaceful existence."

"But won't people become just as self absorbed in their new bodies?" Adam protested.

"That's why I've set a clock to reshuffle everyone every few days. The time will always be random, but will be at least past 48 hours and not exceed 96. Don't you see? It's perfect."

"And then you'll what?" Dan asked menacingly. "You'll switch everyone back to their original selves after a month or so?"

Nevyn gritted his teeth. "I said I wanted people to experience my life, one that has lasted centuries. So no, more than a month."

"What about the kids?" Adam pleaded. "Someone different will be in their parents' bodies. Someone that won't care about them at all."

"I planned for that hiccup a long time ago." Nevyn became chipper again as he explained. "I've heightened emotions during swaps. Dan, surely you must have realized this the first time you hopped your sister and let a man have sex with you. You would have never let that happen in your body. You might not have let it happen in your sister's, but your body's desires were elevated and went along with its normal biological response to those desires. Every child will be okay because the love that the original parent felt will still be inside that body, and the new occupant will feel that love even more so and will watch over that child as if they were their own."

Adam was grasping at straws, anything to make Nevyn rethink this madness. "But couldn't someone just come here to your computer and change everyone back?"

Nevyn shook his head congenially. "Adam, my final version of Mind Hack doesn't run on my computer. It's hidden in the far reaches of the internet, protected by the most advance encryption system the world has ever known, devised by myself and the finest computer science minds of the past several decades. And once it's initiated, all other versions of Mind Hack will become obsolete and will become inert."

"You're a monster," Dan said bluntly. "Adam and I will stop you."

Nevyn was in arm's reach of both of them, but he didn't look at all worried. "You can't. No one can, well, I mean maybe someone could but I'm not sure if they're still alive and..." but the rest of the thought would be left unfinished as his body gave way to a violent shudder.

"Adam, now!" Dan yelled as he leapt forward, throwing his arms around Kirkwood's body, trying to restrain him. Nevyn stopped shaking and Adam got up to help, but before he could assist, he watched as the woman's body Dan was in began to shudder as well.

After a few seconds, the shudder subsided and the woman that had been Dan looked at Adam with a wicked grin. When she spoke, it was Nevyn's voice. "It'll be hard to stop me if you can't touch me. But just in case, let me show you another trick, Adam."

The woman touched Kirkwood again, which cause his body to elicit yet another shudder. Nevyn had passed back into the man's body, then he looked at the body Dan must still be in. "Dan, please restrain Adam from coming after me while I walk over to the computer."

The woman moved quickly behind Adam and held both of his arms behind his back. "Dan, stop! We need to keep him from doing this!"

Nevyn patted the top of Adam's female head. "He'll do anything I say for the next few minutes. It's a little side affect people acquire after I hop out of them. Now if you'll excuse me, I want you to witness this." Nevyn triumphantly walked to his desk of monitors and tapped for several moments on the keyboard. At the last second he paused before hitting the execute button and met Adam's eyes. "I hope we meet again someday. But I suppose even if we do, we probably won't know it." He hit the button, and everyone eighteen and older all around the world fell momentarily silent as each individual consciousness was sent arbitrarily to another random body somewhere on the planet. After a brief pause, the world collectively gasped and opened new eyes.

*****

Author's note. Thanks to those that read Shudder and Mind Hack all the way through, your comments helped it get finished. I'll be taking a hiatus. Have loved creating this universe and would like to see it through by adding either Shudder: The College Years, or the aftermath of Mind Hack. Not opposed to eventually doing both, but will start on whatever I get the most feedback from. Thanks again for reading. Kripto