Chapter Three: The Bears Carry My Throne

Their memories would not belong to Lin; they would enter a public archive from which designated recipients could retrieve them free of charge. The first bidder was a retired firefighter. He offered the memory of receiving his medal so that a child with post-fire amnesia could recover the route by which he had escaped. The second was a mother willing to forget her son's birth so that her son, mute after trauma, could recover the lullaby she once sang him. A third offer came, then a fourth. The application count passed 170,000. None of them could guarantee a profit, yet they were willing to lose something all the same. The price broke loose. One hundred thousand. Three million. Eighty million.