The Methuselarity Transformation Read Free Page A

you’ll never be aware of dying.”
    “Is there anything else I should know.”
    “Yes, Mr. Takana, there are a lot of rules. The first and most important I told you yesterday: total secrecy. You must not ever tell anyone about this arrangement, not even your wife, should you ever marry, or your children. You will not be told the identity of your benefactor and he will not be aware of yours.”
    “Buyers...property. I guess that’s me. It sounds pretty horrible when you put it that way.”
    “It all depends on how you look at it. You will also be asked to take care of your body while it’s still yours. Our capacity to monitor your activities with the transducer system is extensive. We can tell if you use alcohol or other substances of abuse or if you engage in dangerous activities. We’ll be monitoring your location and can determine the speed and acceleration of your body in real time. We will ask that you use alcohol sparingly or not at all, avoid other toxic substances, and not engage in deliberately risky behavior.”
    Marcus had already planned a series of extreme adventures with the first of the money he would get. He’d become accustomed to breaking up his boredom with the thrill of high risk sports. This requirement could be a deal-breaker.
    “What about the bike?”
    “That will definitely have to go, starting now. Look,” Terra said, “This is a lot to take in. I can understand your doubts, but the opportunity we’re talking about can bring monumental changes in your life. The things that will become important to you months from now are likely to be entirely different from the things that have been important to you so far within the limited scope of your experience.”
    “Like what?”
    “Like unprecedented knowledge and all the power that comes with it. And opportunities for real and enduring relationships.”
    Marcus wondered whether Terra had any idea what he’d done the night before. She seemed to know so much about him. He felt the sadness that had overwhelmed him the night before closing back in on him, underscored by the proximity of the enticing woman bringing him this preposterous opportunity. He wanted more than anything not to be alone.
    “So...still in?” she asked, the words almost floating on her breath.
    “Yes.”
    “Good. Then we can proceed.”

2
    RAY METTLER SETTLED back in the soft leather recliner and watched the sparkling solution swirl in the bottle hanging above him. He felt a hint of warmth as the liquid flowed into his vein and found its way toward the right ventricle of his heart while the tiny particles it carried diffused into his blood and throughout his circulation. They would eventually find their way across the blood-brain barrier and bind to their targets in the neurons within his brain.
    The plushness of the leather felt pleasantly odd. Ray’s home was spartanly furnished, covered only in materials that could easily be wiped clean. There was little fabric anywhere. Even his bed covering was a smooth sheet of insulating polymer. Microbes were his enemies. Frequent antiseptic washes and laminar flow circulation kept his home swept as free of them as possible. Anyone entering passed first through a decontamination chamber and observed a strict dress code in keeping with the sterile milieu.
    Another unfamiliar sensation played across the small muscles of his lower jaw and the nasal folds above his mouth. It was a smile, his first in recent memory in a life beset by disappointment and failure and the ever present worry about whenhe would die, a worry that no longer needed to concern him. His imagination was now racing through a future that promised him immortality within a strong, eternally young body. He wondered what that body might look like, but especially what it would feel like to have physical prowess beyond anything he’d ever experienced even in his youth.
    Whose body would he eventually occupy? How will they have lived their life between now and that