HE CAN KEEP IT

I stuck my finger in my ear and pulled on my lower lip while balancing on my right leg. But the reboot sequence didn't work. I prodded around just behind my ear. That explained it. My memory chip wasn't in. It wasn't on the little table by the door, on the dresser, or on the microwave. If I only had my memory chip handy I would've known where it was. I needed what I already lost to in order to find what I had lost! What ever happened to clappers? I felt again at the slots at the base of my skull. Still forlornly empty. I kept hunting.

Socks, underwear, old restaurant receipts, and tattered coupons for free travel flew about the room as I whirled through my cushy, upscale apartment. All the drawers hung open. Various items of clothing and remnants of documents drooped over the edges of over-turned furniture. It had to be somewhere! I mean I last had it...can't remember. That was on the chip.

I checked my watch. The company meeting was coming up soon. But what time would it start? Reflexively, I stuck my right thumb in my mouth and pulled at the skin of my right eye with my left pinkie finger. This is what I had to do to access the files on my memory chip. The action brought up a visual overly on my retina ( that means I could see it but no one else could ). That provided a file listing that I could point to and select with my left index finger, in the air, but only while grabbing my left butt-cheek with my right hand. Of course, the visual never came up because...ah...gimme a sec...oh yeah, because the flipping memory chip was still missing!

Sounds stupid, eh? Let me tell you it was typical. This is the way it was when implantable chips first started out. The only command protocol that worked reliably was Human Interface Command Kinesthetics System ( HICKS ). You see at the time, no one completely understood the way people and machines worked together. Thinking a certain thing or moving certain way could always be relied upon to fire neurons a certain way. The memory chips took advantage of that. But to be sure you didn't accidentally fire a command sequence while sipping your Starbucks coffee, you had to do something unusual. And that's why I went through all the crazy motions. Nobody would dream of doing such things in ordinary behavior. And that's why the HICKS protocol worked.

My HICKS protocol wasn't doing diddly for me just now, so I grabbed my coat and left the apartment. There was an outside chance I left it at the

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