Chapter 1

Harry collapsed.

His sweaty hands grasped the railing in his lab, reaching for a hold to pull himself up and reach the panic button.

Finger by finger, his hands slipped and his body hit the cold metal floor.

As he lay there, his life slipping away, he thought about his life. He had seen and achieved much becoming the youngest recipient of the noble peace prize for his ground-breaking discoveries in automation that fuelled much of the expansion into the solar system and space colonies. His name was whispered among academic circles for his genius making him one of the few leading scientists of the 22nd century.

His discoveries had gifted him obscene wealth that in a dying world granted him every privilege and luxury from an orbiting home outfitted with pools and tennis courts, the best life-extending medicine or even state-of-class labs with all the latest toys.

Sadly, wealth wasn't everything.

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Harry's eyes strained open.

Florescent lights blinded his eyes as he tried to raze his hands to cover his face. His arms lifted a fraction then fell limp to the bed.

He scanned the room, the white walls of the private hospital were strangely comforting.

Not dead yet then he thought to himself with only mild sarcasm. Doctors began fussing around him and connecting him to various leads and sensors. He could feel the medicine strengthening his weak body. The solutions were rare and therefore cost a fortune to manufacture; but it was the only thing keeping him alive.

"My disease?" he could barely recognise his voice. It sounded so weak and feeble as if he had aged a century in a matter of days.

A straight-faced doctor peered over him and nodded. "The lesions have returned. This time it has spread to your heart and brain."

"Surgery?" the word was painful to speak, not just the physical pain of his parched throat but also the promise of months of recovery where he would be waiting for any sign of the disease making yet another comeback. He had been down this road before and still he dying.

Harry had every medicine and advantage of Earth's mightiest technology at his beck and call but the disease, whatever it was, kept coming back.

"Mr More, I'm afraid it's too late for that. This latest attack has caused critical damage to your nervous system. The nerves in your right arm has died and your muscles are decaying faster than we can regenerate them. We're flushing your systems but we're losing the race."

"How…." His voice cracked and lost the rest of the sentence. He drew his strength and persisted. "How l – long."

The doctor sighed. "A month. Maybe two. But you're going to be strapped to that bed the whole time."

He sat quietly for a moment.

Death.

It was such a simple word to be so … final. He wasn't yet 40 and about to begin his next adventure.

The doctor started talking again however Harry struggled to hear him.

"…other options…. Euthanasia…. Avatar programme…"

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It was only the next day he could consider his options. His brain was finally freed from the terror of his looming demise and he could think through his options.

Option 1 – He could die. Yes not very imaginative but all things have an end. Not very desirable.

Option 2 – Find a cure. He had dedicated much of his fortune for several years to fund the best medical research departments around the world but still no luck. The slim possibility of a breakthrough in the immediate future was not very comforting to stake his very existence on.

Option 3 – Experimental. There were always those crazy and ambitious enough to try what others wouldn't even consider, if he was generous enough with his donations. These could range from cybernetics, uploading his consciousness into a mechanical body or even a human clone to become an organ donators wet dream.

Technology had advanced far enough to the point where what was science fiction now was the reality, for those wealthy enough, however it was not perfect. Human-to-human consciousness transfer had been promised as a method of semi-immortality for decades, however it was deeply flawed. Some anomalies with human genetics resulted in data corruption that made it an impossibility.

Harry used one hand with great effort on his holo-tablet looking at his various options. A research paper caught his eye – The Navi of Pandora. He had heard much of the mining operation on Pandora. There were multiple deep space operations that various mega corporations controlled but very few had come across such varied and intelligent life such as the Navi.

He started to read more about how the scientists had made contact in ingenious ways such as the Avatar project, using native and human DNA to create vessels in which human consciousness can be temporally uploaded in.

That raised the question – why can't the transfer be permanent?

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"Sir are you sure about this?" Katy Sole, his CEO who managed his stake in many companies and was responsible for monetising many of his discoveries sat next to him. Her holo-tablet is ready to make her boss's drastic ideas come in reality.

"It's only money"

"You're selling your stocks, liquidating assets. The value your getting is barely 40 cents on the dollar. Why not wait and sell slowly to maximise the value?" She tried again to persuade him with little effect.

"Money means very little where I'm going."

"But if we…"

"No." His voice was firm despite the weakness his illness still inflicted on him. "Talk to me about the preparations. I have a week before the procedure and I need every second of that to prepare for this next stage of my life."

Katy sighed again. "I've placed the orders, and created a special research team to create everything you need but it's a long list and even with your budget, taking it with you to Pandora is a tall order. The cargo fees alone will shock you."

Harry laughed however it soon became a coughing fit.

"If the ship doesn't have enough cargo space, buy a bigger ship."

"They not cars you can find spare on every street corner, they are…"

"Then build one. I don't care about the cost. Get it done."

She silently handed over her holo-pad, "Sign her" Her voice resigned to his wild desires. It was going to take months, even a year to put together his insane requirement, with several technologies only theoretical possibilities. I mean automated mining drones, Earth didn't need those with all the cheap labour available.

Harry relaxed, despite Katy's objections, he trusted her more than this fortune – his very existence lay in her hands.

With the little time he had left before his existence ended, to be transferred into a being that was only now artificially conceived using his and DNA taken from the Navi, he had to know as much as possible.

He found the greatest source of knowledge to be Dr Grace Augustine who had written several academic papers and books about the native's culture and language.

He tried to read the language but he needed to a teacher to guide him. Fortunately, there was a large database of interactions to draw from. "He pressed a button and recorded a message for Katy. "The Navi language, I want all the footage of the native analysed, I want their movements and language to be fed through our machine learning programme to create a training model I can use when I arrive."

He looked at the images of Pandora, and for the first time in a long time, he was hopeful. His fingers traced the vibrant wildlife and the floating mountains.

A good place to call home.