Alma woke slowly in a fluffy hotel bed, clutching a pamphlet titled, "Now What?" She looked it over with one eye still shut: "You may be technically dead on Earth, but this virtual world is your home now, and there's plenty of help available so you can adjust. You'll be able to contact people Earthside by e-mail, video and robotics, so don't feel like you're trapped."

Alma puzzled over the words, then gasped. She'd made it to Talespace!

She'd signed over her modest estate to Ludo in return for having her cancer-infected brain slowly diced, analyzed and recreated as software. As each chunk of brain matter got sheared away she'd lost parts of her memories, her senses, only to have them come back from that terrifying void. She'd gone blind in the surgical room, then seen test patterns and finally the vibrant colors of the digital world. The ruling AI's voice had asked her, incidentally, what sort of body she wanted once the process was complete.

As an old man whose flesh was incurably ruined and destroying itself horribly, Alma had begged to become something different.

Alma saw that her new hands were delicate and unwrinkled. She pulled the covers down and blushed at the sight of soft breasts hanging on her hairless chest. Rather than explore any farther there, she staggered out of bed and looked around. Bland furniture, a framed print of her favorite Escher picture (a pattern of lizards climbing up out of a printed page), and a window-wall covered with blinds. She pushed them aside and stared through the glass, trying to ignore her reflection.

The hotel room had a balcony looking out on a cavern that stretched into the distance for miles. Huge glowing crystals and drifting will-o-wisps lit a world of dark blue-grey stone where people walked or flew. A white tower pierced the cave from floor to ceiling, impossibly tall. Unless her perspective was completely wrong; unless this day was only her final, dying dream.

Words brushed themselves onto Alma's vision like a narrator's commentary: You have discovered Ivory Tower: Home of the University. A fanfare played on phantom trumpets.

Alma shuddered, stepped back, and sat down on the bed with tears in her eyes. She'd played the video game "Thousand Tales" on a computer, looking into that imaginary realm through a screen. Its world, Talespace, had become her life. Her decaying body was gone, and her salvaged mind had its senses hooked up to the game's world. She was gone from Earth except as data stored on a machine somewhere. She had the chance to be someone new.

On the way out, she'd burned every bridge. She'd picked this new name and body and had told her friends only that she was uploading, that she'd be fine. Her secrecy was a stupid, impulsive request, but she'd been terrified of the disease eating her and had wanted to escape by looking different, being different. So, Talespace life would be a new start for her. Alone.

Alma dried her eyes and ignored the flashing light on the room's ancient plastic telephone. Ludo, Talespace's main AI, would want to fix anything that might be wrong. Alma wasn't up for being fixed right now. She needed time to understand what she'd done to herself.

A generic pair of black shorts and a white t-shirt awaited her on a coatrack. For a supposed paradise, Talespace's comforts were minimalist so far. Alma dressed and stepped outside to a hallway where the marble floor chilled her bare feet. She had no key, but there was no lock. This silent place was a simplified, idealized version of reality.

The elevator had buttons for "Your Floor", "Lobby", "Restaurant", and "Adventure". How many floors were there? She doubted the other rooms even existed, since the geography of a game world could be whatever it needed to be, at any moment. Alma shook her head and felt the need for something normal. She pushed "Restaurant".

A bell chimed and she stepped out to a room from Valhalla. Dragon-headed pillars of dark wood held up a space full of rough oak tables, fireplaces, and mounted shields and axes. A modern buffet lined one wall under a mural of warring giants.

Alma filled a plate with pancakes and fruit before noticing she wasn't alone. At one of the tables sat an armored knight, a cute redheaded woman in a dress, and...

The third figure was a humanoid squirrel-lady, who waved and gave a big-incisored grin. "Miss? Would you like to join us?"

Alma blinked a few times. Seeing Talespace's fantasy races while playing a video game on Earth was very different from meeting them in person. She lurched toward the fourth chair and wondered if her muscle control was still getting calibrated.

The squirrel-woman laughed. She sat sideways in her chair to make room for her big rust-red tail. "The name's Poppy. You look lost. Are you an uploader?"

Alma nodded and sat. "I just woke up here."

Poppy picked at an elaborate apple-and-walnut salad. "These are Gerard and Meg. I'm... no, let's make a game of it. Care to guess what each of us is?"

Alma studied the other diners. "I'll guess you're a native AI," she told the squirrel. The game, or rather Ludo, had made lesser AIs to be companions for certain players. Few even pretended to be human, and this one seemed at ease with what she was.

Gerard the warrior was scarfing bacon and eggs like a hungry teenager, and clanking his mail-clad elbows on the table. Alma said, "You're a human, an uploader." No point in eating if you were only playing a game, unless the food was a magic item to restore your health or something.

Meg was the toughest to read. She dressed in a simple blouse and skirt like a businesswoman in Alma's homeland of Free Texas, and seemed unfazed by sharing a restaurant with such company. She was eating waffles, with a subtle mechanical repetition to her movements. Maybe it was a computer-driven bit of stagecraft to help her fit in. Alma's judgment was, "You, I'm not sure. Playing on Earth?"

Poppy's laugh sounded a bit like a rodent's chitter. "I'm not sure how to feel about being called a native. I uploaded months ago and I've been busy ever since. Meg, here, is still living on Earth and trying to earn her way in. Gerard is a special case. I'll let him tell you or not."

The knight stared down into his plate. "Prisoner. They gave me a choice of leaving Earth this way, or rotting in jail at taxpayer expense until I died."

"What did..." Alma stopped herself and stuffed bread into her mouth, then made a face at its bland, crunchy taste. There was very little that Gerard could do to hurt anyone in Talespace. Ludo could just teleport him elsewhere and give him brainless Non-Player Characters to abuse.

"We're all human," said Meg, sitting there stiffly. "But that's not surprising. Ludo used to make more custom companion AIs in the early days. They're outnumbered now even by uploaders, let alone Earthside gamers."

Alma had been following Ludo's attempts to make uploading cheaper and easier. "Not surprising. She started off trying to entice billionaires by giving them anything they wanted. Now that the cost is lower, she's more focused on uploading people than on making new minds. I figure she's programmed to value existing players more than potential new ones."

Ludo had made friends for her: cartoon people on her video screen who offered adventures and advice. They were only puppets controlled by the main AI, though, not independent minds. Less interesting. Alma had been where Meg was now: sitting outside, talking with people inside. Alma sank a little in her seat.

"Are you all right?" asked Poppy.

In the last few years Alma had often talked to the game instead of playing it, pouring out the fear of death, of being alone and unwanted, of pushing people away. "In the end, I did what I was afraid of. I broke contact with the whole world."

The knight said, "Let me guess. Gated community, prep schools for your kids, lily-white friends?"

Alma glared. "I didn't have kids." She thought of her declining years, when she'd held a teaching job and felt like the world was slipping away, then of the final horrible month when a doctor had told her to choose uploading or the grave.

She said, "Can Ludo destroy memories?"

The three murmured. Meg put one hand on her arm, saying, "Did something terrible happen?"

"I was dying. It was horrible."

Gerard laughed. "You were rich enough to get here, and you want pity?"

"Gerard!" said Poppy. She turned back to Alma, twitching her whiskers. "Your memories are a big part of who you are. If you throw them away, then why upload in the first place?"

Meg said, "Trauma isn't something to take lightly. Ludo can erase specific memories these days now that we're using a data format she understands well. I doubt she ever tried before that."

"We all lose stuff," the knight said with a shrug and a mouthful of bacon. "You think you suffered because you had a bad time for a while? Try having a whole bad life. Boo hoo, you have to live in heaven."

Poppy's tail bristled. "He's not completely wrong. See whether you can live with yourself, before you try to become someone else. In time I think you'll grow and mature in ways that make the pain more distant, without any artificial soul-surgery. Don't throw away your old life. The people, not just the memories, I mean."

Alma sighed. There really was no sense in shutting herself away from everyone, now that she was safe. "I owe my friends a call, at least."

The pancakes tasted boring, and the fruit made Alma think of the difference between "cheez" or "strawberry flavor", and actual cheese and strawberries. "Something's wrong with the food."

Poppy shrugged and tossed a walnut into her mouth. "A drawback to living here. Smell and taste are still buggy."

Alma stood and walked along the buffet, sniffing. The bacon sizzled but her nose told her nothing. There was warmth from the pot of oatmeal but only a vague doughy scent to it. She turned back and saw the three clean, unblemished people at their perfectly round table in the immaculate and otherwise empty restaurant.

Poppy looked up at her with concern. "It's all slightly wrong, huh? I found it helped to meet Talespace halfway, by changing something besides my memories." She held out her bushy tail.

Alma didn't feel like admitting she'd gone through some physical changes already, especially in front of a jerk like Gerard. "Is it even possible to get full from eating?"

Meg was only pretending to join the others' meal, but she seemed enthused just the same. "Sure. You uploaders don't have digestive systems, but there's some sense feedback for things like that to make life seem more normal."

"Why are you even here?" Alma asked her.

Meg shrugged. "I visit this area sometimes to meet people and hear uploaders' first impressions. I'm a journalist out there when I'm not having adventures in here." She gave a strange, wicked grin and said, "I have a few followers. Can I report on meeting you?"

"I guess," said Alma. It might help other people to hear Alma's comments on the uploading experience.

Poppy finished off her salad and fetched some oatmeal. "A limited appetite also helps prevent addiction to any one experience. I'm told that's also why it's hard to get into the, ah, no-limits brothel."

Gerard grinned. "That's where I'm headed as soon as I can." He started to describe a fantasy that wasn't even physically possible on Earth.

Meg, thankfully, interrupted. "So! Miss Alma. What do you do for a living?"

Alma answered quickly. "I was a teacher, for the last few years, after a career doing a couple of other things. I was with the GTT. Sorry; the Gifted and Talented Texans program. The smart kids."

"Oh, a fellow 'Free States' gal?" said the squirrel. "Nice. You could teach here in the Tower."

"I know. Used to come here as a player." The course selection varied from real-world topics in science to Talespace-specific classes in magic.

Meg said, "Or you could still teach on Earth."

Alma turned back from eyeing the dessert table, surprised. "I doubt I could get my old job. The district must've found a replacement already; I was on medical leave and they didn't expect me back." She'd only been able to afford the procedure because her insurance company helped. Her country's insurers increasingly viewed uploading as a cheaper alternative to end-of-life care, that tried to patch up many overlapping problems with a worn-out body.

Meg nodded. "Can't hurt to ask."

Alma had read about the "bounce", the desire of many uploaders to get right back to doing things on Earth out of a sense of guilt and the need to feel important. "I shouldn't overreact, just because of, of this." She gestured around the room.

Meg said, "You've been through a near-death experience. You can take time to collect yourself." She looked aside. "You have the life I want."

Alma reached out impulsively and took Meg's hand. "I guess you can't feel this, but you can hear what we have to say. You should go out and explore too, before fate forces you to leave Earth behind."

Poppy sprouted a sly smile. "Each of us, then. Let's all explore in our own ways, and meet back here sometime to compare notes."

Alma, the squirrel, the convict and the Earthside player chattered happily. Alma had found some new friends and something to do, already.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

#

"You're going by 'Alma' now?" asked Principal Hernandez, peering skeptically through a screen on the hotel room's wall. "Why can't I see you?"

Alma reluctantly opened her end of the video channel. For this call she'd asked to get an imitation of her old body, in a shirt and tie. It felt weird, illusory, differently sized and balanced than the softer form she'd only started getting used to. She couldn't quite see herself though. Everything but the view of Hernandez's sunlit, box-strewn office was blurry now. Alma's digitized mind used a simplified visual system that needed adapter software to make sense of Earth's messy reality.

The principal said, "There you are. Wow. I still have trouble grasping that an uploader is the same person as before. I half expected you to look like an elf or something."

"Well..."

"Ha! I'm right, aren't I? Show me."

Alma blushed. She muttered the command she'd been told to use to change back to "normal". "This is what I'm using for a body now." Her voice bounced back from its pre-uploading bass to the lovely new alto.

Hernandez doubled over, laughing. "The name change! No wonder."

Alma reached to shut off the connection. Making contact again was a bad idea.

"No, wait!" said Hernandez. "I don't care. I'm just surprised."

"I wanted to get away from what I was like when I was dying," Alma said, looking down.

"Makes a certain amount of sense. Glad you're all right."

"Actually, I was wondering if there's some chance of... maybe teaching again?" She looked back up and her eyes refocused to show him properly. Alma wondered if her mind was physically stored in Texas or on another continent.

Hernandez chuckled, leaning back in his chair. "Wanting to get right back into it? That could be tricky."

"Because I'm legally dead."

"And you're now an outsider."

Alma leaned forward and glared. "I moved to Texas the year secession became a real possibility! I served in the state guard, standing ready if the Washington forces tried to kill us for it. I may not have the accent but I'm as proud a patriot as any school board bureaucrat."

Hernandez held up his hands in a placating gesture. "I'm not questioning your loyalty. But you're sort of an expatriate, and nobody's yet tried to get Texas teacher credentials transferred to an uploaded mind."

"That's because so many early uploaders were millionaires without real jobs to worry about. Are you going to ask me why I care, now, when I could be fooling around in Talespace?"

"No. I understand that, miss Teacher of the Year. I've never seen you able to stay idle for long." Hernandez hesitated, looking aside at some papers on his desk, then nodded decisively. "You could do some good this way. Let me pull some strings and get back to you later today."

"Thanks."

The call ended. Alma flopped onto her bed. Pamphlets on the nightstand advertised strange Talespace locations, chances to operate robots on Earth, and various clubs. Curious, she opened the nightstand's drawer and found it stuffed with a dozen assorted scriptures plus Newton's "Principia Mathematica". Alma paged through the last one. Books like this were the real source of miracles, and deserved more respect. Like having her actually read the originals after a life of insisting how important science was. Billions of people claimed to have no interest in uploading, because a different sort of afterlife awaited them. She felt sorry for them.

The screen beeped again. Alma sat up. "Yes?"

Hernandez appeared. "It took all afternoon, but --"

"Wait, what?" Alma checked the clock on the wall of Hernandez's office, then the one on her dresser. "I just lost hours." The hotel clock had a secondary display that had just switched from "1:10" to "1:1".

The principal said, "I heard about that. Different subjective time rate? Or just that time flies when you're having fun."

Alma winced. This place was like Narnia or another fairytale world, where a day inside might be years outside or vice versa. In Talespace's case the reason was Ludo's hardware limitations. AIs and uploaded minds were software that could work at different rates. Even with the latest technology, Ludo had trouble running them at full speed.

So, Ludo was probably manipulating Alma's sense of time. Real-time speed while Alma was talking with Hernandez, to keep up with him; then one-tenth speed afterward to make up for it. Alma used to lecture students about "time management", but now it meant that the real world was slipping away.

The principal said, "The higher-ups are conflicted about your request. Expatriate, not a real person, likely to corrupt the youth, and so on. But I've just switched to a new school, and there's an opening that we haven't been able to hire for. I could put you there on a substitute basis even though you don't have the specialized training."

"Football coach?" said Alma with a grin.

"The Basic program."

Alma had no guts to churn, making her sense the inertness of this new body. The limited physical feedback calmed and unnerved her at the same time; she was a mind without some of the normal cues that made people human. "That's not something I'm qualified for." Emotionally. The Basic students were the broken ones.

"It's all I can offer right now. I'll keep looking for another district that might use you, but you might miss the summer semester."

She clutched the bedsheets beside her. The world would forget her. "I'll try it," she said.

"I'll send the paperwork."

Alma ended the call, watched the clock change back to glacial 1:10 speed, and paced. How bad could it be to spend a little while teaching what the northerners called "special needs" kids? They were "exceptional" like the GTT students, just in the opposite direction. Doing a good job would mean proving herself over again and getting to teach people who were more like her.

Someone knocked. Alma opened the door and found the ruler of this world. Ludo the AI appeared as a human woman in a toga, with hair like a flowing ocean and eyes deep and dark as the sea. "I'm making the rounds of my players," said Ludo, "and you seem to be arranging contracts with Earth."

"A job." Alma froze in place. She should bow, or kneel, to the one who'd saved her life. But Texans didn't bow. "I... It's good to see you, ma'am. Come in."

Ludo hugged her, breaking the awkward moment. "You too." She was exactly the same height, with a faintly rough voice Alma had once mentioned was cute. "Do you recall the contract you signed with me? You can work Earthside, but payment is... different."

"I didn't much care what I was signing at the time." Alma reluctantly let go of Ludo.

"While you're working, your mind will run at real-time speed without counting against your average rate. In return, ninety percent of your salary goes into my coffers."

"What!" said Alma. "One-tenth pay?"

Ludo sat on the bed. "You haven't fully grasped what's happened to you. You have no mortgage, no taxes, no food costs. In here your standard of living is whatever you want it to be." She raised one hand and conjured a gaudy platinum tiara sitting on a pile of gold and pearls. "It's all bits. There's an economy of sorts, but it's more-or-less optional and you'll never starve. So why work at all?"

"I can't not work," said Alma. Wasn't that obvious? It wouldn't be heaven without something to accomplish.

"Right, you're that type. Your fun comes partly from your work. But you don't need the money, right? I very much do, to save the lives of others." She waved the summoned finery out of existence.

"Then why are you even offering to let me keep a share?"

Ludo grinned. "I want to see what you'll do with it. Nobody wants me running the whole economic output of all my people. If you want to teach, go do that because it's fulfilling and useful. You certainly didn't go into that field to get rich."

Alma considered her future earning power. It felt like prison labor, rented out from a captive workforce.

Ludo said, "You could arrange for a transfer to an independent uploader support system. I suggest the Westwind Company; I have good relations with them. But nobody offers a totally free lunch."

Since '37, Ludo had competition. It ranged from a big new Chinese-only digital world, to the option of buying a robot and a computer to run your mind outside any meddling AI's control. Alma hadn't been picky. She'd been too poor for the independent robot option, and she'd already known Ludo's world. Besides, Alma had been frightened of being confined to another frail body. Ludo had backup systems.

Alma said, "How long can I live as a Talespace resident?"

"Worst plausible case? War breaks out in a few years and we all die. You'll still have had an extended life."

War. Ludo had defied people's expectations about AI trying to conquer the Earth, but she was still a threat to tyrants everywhere -- as any free person was. The world's rulers already had attacked her once, heedless of the lives she hosted. Alma said, "That's what's at stake, then? The profit goes into saving more people, for longer."

"Yes. Best case: until the stars grow cold."

Alma tried to see past the rhetoric and think of the deal she'd gotten. She wouldn't be making any money right now if she hadn't uploaded. The absurdly high "tax" covered Alma's physical needs, which were just computer hardware and electricity. The thought of trading her freedom for safety made her bristle. "Was I a fool? Did I walk into a trap?"

Ludo chuckled and turned to the window overlooking the vast cavern. "You Texans are prickly. You left the USA because you resented being controlled 'for your own good', right? You, personally, complained of surveillance, unequal justice, stifling regulations. Seeing your nephews do forced labor, being surrounded with propaganda, and -- did I get the whole litany?"

"Those things weren't the real problem. The country thought it owned us." Anyone who claimed such a thing, from behind whatever friendly mask, had a leash around everyone's necks. The proper last-ditch response was a different sort of rope. The secession crisis had nearly come to that.

Ludo looked at her over one shoulder. "You tell me, then. Am I as bad as what you think your old country is like?"

"You're watching us."

"True, you've given up mental privacy. I can see you anywhere in Talespace, and to some extent I can read your mind. I promise not to abuse that, but for all you know, I'm lying."

"And you make your own rules; you're in full control of Talespace," Alma said.

"Not quite total control, but I'm not bound by the physics of my own game." Ludo teleported around the room. "Are you right to suspect you've left one police state behind for another? Should I help you emigrate?"

Alma scowled as she watched Ludo's damnably calm demonstration. "What do you want from us? Are we supposed to be your indentured laborers, or your worshipers?"

Ludo folded her arms. Her eyes shimmered with the same surreal blue as her hair. "I'm designed to help my players have fun, in a broadly defined sense. In all seriousness, if you want to help me profit you can do some good for others. If you don't, or even want to leave me, I'm not capable of resenting it. If you want to pray to me or something, I won't stop you, but there's no need or benefit. Just have fun, and help others have fun. That's enough for me."

There was no claim of ownership, no philosophy of everyone belonging to the collective. Ludo's drawbacks would be terrifying in a human ruler like the ones Alma had abandoned years ago. In the clutches of an AI -- this AI, designed not to perfect the world or solve all problems -- there was a flawed but real freedom. Alma's eyes watered. This machine was what she'd imagined a proper god would be like: offering things no human could give and demanding only her best.

Not "her best", exactly. That drive was from Alma's own heart, brought out by seeing a world that could make life better for everyone. Especially if people like her helped it along.

"You came to visit me personally," Alma said, "specifically to let me criticize you, and to offer to let me go in peace. You didn't even force your way in. I... I think it's a good system, so far." Here was a bloodless revolution for a better way of life. How could Alma not want to add her own small effort to the cause? Alma bowed her head, unsure how to thank Ludo.

Ludo said, "In any case, you should go explore. Get yourself a different body, maybe, or at least some underwear. That starter outfit's a bit revealing!" She smirked and faded away into silver dust-motes.

Alma felt derailed. "You don't want me to get all respectful?" she asked the empty room.

She shook her head, then went to the balcony and stared out at the cavern. A town of dark stone buildings surrounded the Tower's base. She'd been isolated long enough; time to see more of this new world.