Book 4: Chapter 31: Strategies
Bob
July 2334
Outskirts, Eta Leporis
We sat around my VR library, drinks in hand, all contemplating the future. Garfield, Hugh, Bill, and Bridget were represented in video windows rather than actually being here. Fairly low-res, too. Not quite Minecraft, but certainly below movie-level quality. My temporary relay station was just about maxed out with this meeting.
Bridget was staring into space, silently nursing her drink, and no one had been willing to break into her private contemplation. Abruptly, she sat forward. “I admit I’m getting into metaphysical speculation here, but what if there was only one me around? What if I was taken offline, backed up, and the backup was restored there? And later, the process was reversed, and the backup from here was loaded into my original matrix?”
Hugh stared at Bridget in apparent surprise. “Closest continuer. The idea being that there will only ever be one Bridget. So you have continuity.”
“In the same way that Star Trek characters had it when they got transported around,” Garfield replied.
“You guys have really got to let go of Star Trek,” Bridget commented. “Although in this case, it is sort of relevant. They were disassembled, right?”
I waggled a hand so-so. “There were some attempts to soften it, like that Barclay episode where he found the crew trapped in the matter stream …”