[ WP ] In a time/place that has recently abolished the death penalty , a corrupt prison comes up with a novel solution to overcrowding : a 'specialist ' who 's job is to talk inmates into committing suicide .


 2172 
 
 Dr Royce squinted his eyes to look through the camera monitoring prisoner 0. He was struggling in his straightjacket this morning in a futile attempt to tear away from the chair restraining him. Last week he somehow got loose and attempted to smash his own skull against the padded walls. Four prison guards had to restrain him before he could be sedated, one of them was missing a large chunk of flesh in the end. A regular prisoner would have been beaten half to death for that. Zero wasn ’ t, he was too valuable. America ’ s best kept secret. 
 
 0 ’ s name used to be Miles, and he ’ d tried to kill himself 15 times before being placed in that padded room. Miles had no lawyer, no family, and no friends. The state of Virginia and the entire U.S. considered him legally dead. All that was left now was 0. There was no record of what he did, you couldn ’ t even find it if you tried, and even Dr. Royce didn ’ t know much about him besides the penchant for self destruction and his first name. He had tried asking him once, during a daily forced feeding, while everyone shuffled between their duties in the padded cell. There was no response, only sadness pouring out from the glassy eyed look of an animal. On some days he could swear the despair was palpable, reaching into him, clawing at his sanity. The two years until retirement couldn ’ t pass sooner, his ward was killing him little by little even without the sync. He grazed the bumps of circuitry on his neck and felt shivers run down his spine. The projectors in his contact lenses lit up with a handshake query and he jumped up in terror. “ I should really stop playing with fire, ” he thought to himself, quickly closing the prompt screen. Royce was a scientist at first, one of the best sync scientists in the entire United States, and sometimes; in the lonely tedious hours of watching 0; curiosity would tug at him. It was like that inexplicable feeling you ’ d get when next to a cliff. 
 
 “ What would it be like to jump? ” 
 
 “ How would the fall feel? ” 
 
 “ What would the landing b- ” 
 
 The third thought would be cut off by the brain checking itself: “ You don ’ t want to kill yourself you idiot, why are you even thinking these things. ” 
 
 Human beings were all prone to random urges of self destruction. He was no exception, he just needed to look down the cliff every day. 
 
 “ I wouldn ’ t do it anyway, I only sync with family ” 
 
 For a sync scientist, Royce was very conservative. He was at a 30 % sync with his wife, and a 5 % sync with each of his children, and when he did sync with them, they were 30 years old. By then, each of them had a strong sense of identity. Even then, he didn ’ t like it, they had to beg him to do so, unity was all the rage with society nowadays. The human capacity to create something beautiful and warp in the most disgusting ways would never cease to amaze him.This technology was meant for family members and loved ones, leave it to the liberals to distort everything holy left in this world. Large groups of people had recently begun to sync together at 100 %. The process turned them all into one person. There were of course limits, thats what his research was on, he was just surprised that it became applicable in his lifetime. 
 
 A sync between two people would create an entirely new person, much more intelligent than a regular individual. 
 
 A sync of ten would create something that could outperform even modern day AI. 
 
 At thirty cognitive functions would return to that of a regular individual. 
 
 At a hundred the overloaded input would turn a person into a drooling mess. 
 
 The fascinating point was the fifty mark. At 50 the only thing left was the primal essence of a group of people. Consciousness replaced by one predominant emotion, completely pure and self refining. 0 Was the last of fifty. Melancholy diluted down to its purest form, occupying every neuron, every thought, every experience in what was left of this man ’ s consciousness. 
 
 Royce looked at the list of syncs for today. There were 30 total. Prison mainframes had sync over-rides for every inmate in order to administer empathetic rehabilitative programs. They seldom worked. When they failed, Royce would sync the most violent inmates with 0 and watch the fireworks. 0 was the abyss, and it was Royce ’ s job to throw the unwanted into it. 
 
 He accessed the neural network of prisoner 77,216. Cameras blinked on to show him dozing in his cell. 
 
 A small prompt lit up. 
 Handshake? 
 
 - Yes 
 
 Subject? 
 
 - 0 
 
 %? 
 
 - 05 % 
 
 Confirm? 
 
 - Yes 
 
 Are you sure? 
 
 - Yes 
 
 This procedure is mind altering. Are you sure? 
 
 - Yes. 
 
 Royce turned off almost every screen until the only light in the room was emitted by 0 ’ s monitor, he had stopped thrashing about as the sync began. Every speaker was muted for total silence. Royce closed his eyes and laid back on his chair. One minute passed, and then… somewhere in the prison… he heard a scream.
