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From the rogue cowboy point of view
,
still active on the
control room vid-screen
display
,
Henry
, Anand, and the other control technicians,
continued t
o watch as the rogue cowboy
stumble
d
out into the
main street.  Anand was
expecting him to move quickly inside the Saloon
and claim his prize,
so these steps ba
ckwards were unexpected.  Anand
then
realized
the rogue cowboy was wounded.  H
e had been shot in the exchange with the deputies.

“What’s going on here?” Anand asked out loud.

Anand
realize
d
this was more than a feud between locals.  The deputies tha
t were involved in the gunfight were
hosts
, and they
were
actively being controlled remotely.  The guards had been r
epresented by green dots on the central display
, and that
meant that they were in compliance with their remote players.

“There a
re players involved in this.”  Anand
said, answering
his
own question.

Anand’s brain buzzed
with possibilities.  This was more than a local vendetta.  This gunfight involved complicity from the players.  Maybe it was all engineered by players.  The events were continui
ng to unfold at a rapid rate.  Anand realized he needed to do something
quickly to get control of the situation.

On the
control room
map display,
they
watched a green dot emerge from the Marshal’s offic
e which also served as the
jail building. This was now the only green dot on the main street
.  A
ll the other
green dot
hosts were still hiding in the buildings.  This new green dot began a slow and purposeful walk down the main street
,
and towards the rogue cowboy.

“The fight is not over,” Anand said continuing his dialogue with himself.

“Who is that?” Anand
asked pointing to the new green dot that was walking down the main street of Squabash.

Henry obediently clicked on the green dot and a new host information display window appeared on the central
display
screen.  The information widow followed the green dot on its slow progression down the main street.  The data on the information display read:

Name: Tommy Chin

Role: Dirk Redburn - Marshal

Age: 24

Sex: Male

Popularity: 98%

Player Control: 99%

Viewers: 22

“Now we have one
who
is still alive and
is
still being controlled remotely.  Can
you trace the remote player?” Anand
asked.

Henry
, who
looked
very
stressed
, said,
“I am working on it
.
”

Henry clicked loudly on his work-station interface.  While wait
ing for Henry to run his trace, Anand
watched the
control room
map display intently.   From the rogue cowboys view
window, which was still active, he
could clearly see Marshal Dirk Redburn walking towards the rogue cowboy.  When
Redburn
was within range he came to a stop.  His broad white oversized cowboy hat shaded his eyes.  Marshal Dirk Redburn stood with his right hand poised over the gun strapped to his right leg.  The gun handle
was painted with a red stripe.

“Can you bring up the Marshal’s point of vi
ew on the display?” Anand asked
.

Henry clicked and a new window opened showing the host view from the perspective of Marshal Redburn.  From this view
they
could see the rogue cowboy.  The rogue cowboy looked pale and young inside a black cowboy costume.  The right side of his shirt was wet.  The white bandage that was covering his right arm
,
from elbow to
hand
,
was stained with bright red blood.  The image settled and was steady.  The Marshal had stopped moving.

On the
control room
map display the green dot
,
representing the Marshal
,
had also stopped moving.  The cowboys stood facing each other on Main Street only a few yards apart.  It was a classic quick-draw gun fight
.  It was the
type of gun fight
the players and host had recreated
multiple times
each day at Wild West Alive;
only this time it was real.

Each of the cowboys waiting for the
other to make their first move.
  Anand
looked back at the red dot that represented the
r
ogue cowboy
.  He
noticed
that
the informa
tion on the display was changing.  As he watched the display, he
could see the synaptic activity counter
was
drop
ping
steeply
,
and then
it
level
ed off. 

Henry was busy, but Anand
distracted him anyway,
“What does this mean?
” Anand asked.

He then continued, “Why
did his Synaptic activity counter drop?  Is the rogue cowboy dying?”

Henry looked up from his work station monitor.

“Here,” Anand
touched the central vid-screen display
indicating the statistics next to the red dot and then said, “The
synaptic activity has dropped to less than
fifteen hundred
.”

“Oh,” Henry responded
, “He’s gone into his meditative trance.  That is what they do when they are ready for a remote player to take control of their body.  He is running on autopilot now.”
 

Then almost as an afterthought Henry
said, “The trace
we are running on the other host; w
e have not yet identified the user controlling the Marshal, but the data is coming in now.  The Marshal is being controlled by a player in San Francisco.  We should have the players name in another couple of minutes.”

Anand
d
id not need to hear the name.  He already knew it.  Anand took his
shirt off and stepped over to the Synaptic Suit that was setup next to Henry’s work-station. 

“I’m Synapping in,” Anand
said, “I am taking control of the rogue cowboy.”

* * * * *

Bright light crashed into Anand’s eyes and he was momentarily blinded.  The transition from the dim blue-green light of the control room to the bright mid-day sun of Squabash left him disoriented and off-balance.  As he struggled to open his eyes, he could hear cri
es from off to his right.  The s
aloon girl and the village girl w
ere calling out to him in both w
estern slang and Chinese.  Anand could not understand what they were saying.

The strong taste of blood in his mouth made him gag.  Anand needed to quickly orient himself to this host.  He knew that the Marshal might draw and fire any second.

Anand stretched and flexed his arms to verify the remote interface device was working properly
.  A
t the same time
, he
mov
ed
his hands away from the gun on his hip
.  He did this
so the Marshal w
ould
not think he was making an
y
aggressive move
s
.

The host’s left arm felt strong, but
the
right arm responded sluggishly.  Pain was not transmitted from the host’s body through the interface device, so it was hard for Anand to discern how badly the host was wounded.  It was obvious however, that the host’s body was suffering due to the slow response on the right side.

Anand
thought
how antiquated this inte
rface felt compared to the new n
eural transplant that he had recently experienced back in the botanical garden
s
in Los Angeles.  Using the old fashioned interface device, Anand could manipulate the host effectively, but he was only getting rudimentary feedback from the sensory receptors.  It was a poor comparison to the new
s
ynaptic implant device.  Anand could not feel the vitality of the host.  He was not fully integrated with
the host
body. Memories of his fleeting interface with Sahdna welled to the front of his mind, but he quickly pushed them aside.  He needed to focus.  The future use of this new technology, their new technology was in jeopardy.

Anand tried to lift the host’s arms above his head to indicate he was ready to surrender but the right arm would not lift.  So, instead, he held his left arm straight out in front with the palm facing out.

“Stop” Anand cried, “Stop, this gunfight cannot continue.  My name is Anand Ramasubramanian
.
I am the senior technician at Wild West Alive and I have Synapped into this ho
st.  This is no longer a rogue c
owboy.  The situation is now under control.”

Marshal Dirk Redburn was a blurry image that slowly sharpened as Anand’s eyes adjusted to the bright light.  Redburn was standing close; too close.  At this range, any shots fired would not miss.  As Anand’s eyes continued to adjust, he
could see Dirk Redburn’s mean C
hinese features and thin beard.  Redburn’s eyes were shaded by his broad white hat.

“Draw,” was all Redburn said in response.

Anand called out loudly “I know who you are.  I know you are controlling the Marshal.  I know you staged this entire gunfight.  If you shoot this host, it will be murder and I will take it public, I will expose you.  My team in the control room is recording this and there are over
three thousand
viewers watching us right now.  The players know this is real, they know the difference.”

The Marshal stood silently.  The old style interface device does not transmit emotional response, so if the remote player was
either
surprised, angry or both
.
Anand could not tell by looking at the face of Marshal Redburn.

After a long pause the remote player spoke through the voice of Tommy Chin
,
a.k.a. Marshal Redburn, “I have recordings too.  Do you think we funded your research and did not monitor your activities?  If you go public with your tapes, then I will go public with mine. You and Dr.
Sa
…”

Before he could say her name Anand drew his six-gun.  In retrospect, he would convince himself that he calculated the cost to her reputation, her career, and the success of their new technology. All that she had accomplished, and all they had accomplished working together would b
e
tainted by scandal.  Her family would turn their backs in shame
,
and her community would cast her out.  But in truth, Anand did not think.  He reacted.  It was a reflex action.

When Anand reacted, the six-gun leaped into the left hand of the host and started firing.  The blast from the muzzle pounded into Marshal RedBurn’s chest knocking him back on his heels and shutting him up.  The next shot brought him to his knees.  Marshal Redburn managed to draw his red-striped gun from his kneeling position in an effort to try to return fire, but when Anand fired a third shot,
and
Redburn’s gun dropped from his hand.

Anand stepped his wounded host through the small cloud of black gun smoke that had formed in front of him and stood over the broken body of Tommy Chin
,
a.k.a. Marshal Dirk Redburn.  Anand looked at the host who was now badly wounded.  Anand wondered if the remote player was still connected, and then he fired again at point blank range.  After that, the gun just clicked and clicked as the hammer fell on the empty shells in the cylinder.

“Synaptic Interface between a human controller and an animal host is possible to achieve.  The challenge lies in finding sympathetic human reflexes and or sensory perceptions that can be integrated to the Animals unique physiology.   Consider a tiger, for example, the animals tail motion could be mapped to a human’s sexual response.”

- Dr Sa
hd
na Singh