Reliving

Sandra was exceedingly careful as she strapped the man to the table and began attaching wires to his head, chest, and arms. It was a very delicate process to begin with, and trying to act it out upon a dead body was another matter entirely. Not that this was her first time doing so, of course, but experience only took you so far when it came to touching the icy cold and fragile skin of a corpse. It still made her uncomfortable, and she still hesitated every time she had to do it. But at least she didn't break them as often anymore.

It took a few minutes to get the body fully wired, but once it was, Sandra rushed to the sink and washed her hands in warm water. She couldn't wash away the memory, but at least she could wash away the clammy feeling on the tips of her fingers. With clean hands, she moved back to the lab, where her assistant, Mica, was waiting patiently against the secondary table next to the body's. Without a word, Mica laid on the fresh table, and allowed herself to be strapped down and wired up, just as the man's body was. She no longer had the nervous, shifty eyes which she had had when they had first attempted this procedure. Sandra found that relieving. She didn't have to stress as much about what she was about to do.

With two bodies wired up to the larger machine in the center of the room, Sandra moved over to the computer which was the head of this mechanical nervous system they had created. She watched the screen as she began the simulation, observing what would be found, and ensuring that Mica's brain wasn't overloaded.

A series of electrical pulses shocked through the man's body, designed to reinitiate the mental process for a short period. The heart was forced to pump, blood rushing through the upper body to feed the brain. As its own functions restored, the data that the brain transmitted was sent not through the man's bodies, but out of the body, through the transitionary machine, and into Mica. A minute after the process began, Mica let out a small gasp, and Sandra knew that they made it past the first step.

On her screen, she watched Mica's brainwaves, as they were distorted by the interference, until they were readjusted to accept the new input. Then there was data flying across her screen - a series of numbers that, when studied later, the two would be able to translate into memories. But this was only a backup.

On the table, Mica's eyes were wide as she relived the final moments of the man's life. The final two minutes and three seconds, precisely, as that was the length of time that they could keep his body functional to study. And they only had one shot, so those two minutes and three seconds had to be studied intensely. Fortunately, Mica had a picture perfect memory, which is why she was the one on the table. She would experience the patient's final moments, so that the truth of their death, what experiences were had, and what they were thinking could be attained.

It wasn't exactly legal. But the investigations bureau could hardly argue their results.