Jed Wolf

“Starlight fell through black branches like ice through water—cold, deliberate and indifferent.”

“Good. That was good,” Wolfgang said, pasting the harvested words into his document.

Through their Bluetooth connection, Wolfgang could see what the Artificial Person he’d named “Jack,” saw for forty dollars per month; the fire, the blood red cherry logs catching—and the surrounding hemlocks pressing in like wolves.

Wolfgang Coeur had positioned his android well. Sitting cross-legged in the dirt beside the flames was a good vantage point for its camera eyes Not too close to warp their lenses, yet close enough to keep the flames in focus—live footage controlled by a dead director.

“Describe what you see,” Wolfgang whispered into his laptop.

Jack’s voice returned through Wolfgang’s earbuds with the irksome delay he’d been unable to get rid of:

“The wilderness leans in. Hemlock, hickory and distant ancient ridges where 19^th century painters slaved at easels capturing the Hudson Valley’s impossible light.”

The dead man continued pasting dead words. 

Though he didn’t look like Jack London, one of Wolfgang’s favorite authors, his avatar had managed to build a fire, so the name seemed fitting. APCORPSE’s entry level prose generation mimicked the styles of several well-known authors including Shakespeare, Louise Alcott and Jack London—allocated in daily minutes payable in cryptocurrency.

“Make it sound more artistic,” Wolfgang directed. “Reference great painters.”

Another delay. Then: “Even now, in the twinkling darkness, the landscape arranges itself like oil on canvas—dramatic, deliberate, as if nature itself had learned composition from Thomas Cole, Fredric Church and Alfred Hitchcock.”

Wolfgang deleted the Hitchcock reference.

Though Jack made algorithmic errors, his literary voice illustrated truths about human nature that Wolfgang Coeur would have needed years of study to absorb. Disembodied in an abandoned lawn chair behind the campsite’s lean-to with limited time, at eighty Wolfgang was still striving for what he’d always longed for: to be published—even if posthumously.

“What do you see?”

A pause, longer this time. Then Jack’s feed: “The hillside dissolves into Van Gogh cypress, writhing with inner fire. Stars wheel like Turner’s storms made solid, dripping luminescence across granite—”

Jack stopped—connection flickering.

ALLOCATION WARNING: 85% USED

Shit. Already?

“Jack,” Wolfgang whispered, “there’s a coin in the dirt. Pick it up.”

Wolfgang watched through his laptop’s screen as Jack’s arm reached—its hands fumbling, unable to grip. The coin tilted.

“Try again.”

Plastic fingers scraped at the coin uselessly. After three attempts, Wolfgang ordered Jack to stop.

“Never mind Jack. Just… provide more metaphors about the fire.”

Another pause. Longer. Its allocation warning blinking at 92%. Then Jack spoke, it’s synthetic face sagging from the heat. “The fire burns hot against my skih, skih, skih… sparks dance like demons in a cathedral of—” Wolfgang saw it through the screen—features warping, melting. He flopped Jack backward before an eyelid dripped over a camera lens.

ALLOCATION LIMIT REACHED

MEMORY RESET IN PROGRESS

Connection cut. Wolfgang’s laptop screen blank except for a loading bar.

Wolfgang sat frustrated in the dark, his former body—now an old ghost with broken legs and icy bloody hands—completely alone again because two years ago, he’d paid more attention to his phone than the road.

Yet, eighteen months with APCORPES and this was it? A teachable puppet articulating human nature, yet unable to hold a coin? Still better than lying alone in a rotting casket. Even at the entry level, APCORPSE was better than that.

The fire died down. Connection restored. Stars filled Wolfgang’s screen as Jack lay rebooting. Wolfgang sat him up. Though Jack’s memory was wiped, his face partially melted, Jack London was ready for commands.

Apparently Jack’s ear holes still worked—Wolfgang heard singing. A woman’s voice heading up the trail, breathy and off-key, hitting notes that weren’t quite there.

“Do you ever feel like a plastic bag…” A weak rendition of Katy Perry’s “Fireworks” grew louder and closer.

A blonde mannequin emerged into the firelight moving with the jerky quality Wolfgang recognized. Another marionette piloted by a posthumous puppeteer chasing forty-dollar dreams.

Whoever was controlling the gangly thing—making it lurch into the clearing was clearly new to virtual reality.

“Oh my God, thank God,” it gasped. “Fire. I told you we’d find fire,” it said as if annoyed with itself.

Wolfgang watched as it leaned toward the tongs at Jack’s feet. Its arms moved wrong—flailing while interpreting signals from another unfulfilled artist plucked too soon from their dreams. Its forehead banged Jack’s knee.

“Fuck,” it said.

Wolfgang made Jack speak: “May I help you with those?”

The life-sized doll straightened up and cocked a hip. “Who the actual fuck are you?”

“Jack London,” Jack said.

“Taylor Swift,” it replied flatly.

A pause. Then Wolfgang spoke through Jack: “Wolfgang Coeur,” he said, pronouncing his ostentatious pen name with a French accent. “I’m the operator. Been at this about eighteen months now. You?”

“Mystiq. With a Q. They used to call me Myst. Been doing this a year now.” A pause. “This is bullshit, right? This whole subscription thing?”

Jack’s face, too melted to crack a smile, looked vacant.

“Complete bullshit,” Jack said as Wolfgang made him nod.

As the APs cast similar shadows by the fire, sixty feet away, Mystiq and Wolfgang touched invisible noses for a brief moment sharing details of their similar accidents on similar roads.

“Can I hear another Katy Perry song?” Wolfgang asked, hoping to interest readers.

“I’m saving my allocation,” Mystiq said through Taylor, “For Nashville.”

“Just a few lines. Please.”

Jack’s head jerked in a diagonal nod Wolfgang hadn’t intended, its melted face and blank stare registering nothing.

The name Jack London sounded familiar to Mystiq, who was from a later generation. Maybe a producer? Scouting? Never know who you’ll meet along the Appalachian trail… Mystiq made Taylor stand eagerly, wobbling it closer to the fire, then wagged its forearm, one, two, three, four and opened its jaw.

“Do you ever feel like a plastic bag, drifting through the wind, wanting to start again…”

Its voice breathy, uncertain, reaching for notes that weren’t quite—

ALLOCATION LIMIT REACHED

MEMORY RESET IN PROGRESS

Taylor froze mid-note. Mouth and eyes agape—head dropped in a power outage.

Wolfgang heard Mystiq fumbling with her phone in the dark on the lean-to steps, swiping through menus as her loading bar crawled. Thirty seconds. A minute. Taylor still stood head slumped by the fire in mid-song as Wolfgang rearranged a recent cache of plucked words and phrases making them his own.

“Come on,” Mystiq was moaning when the two deaf ghosts heard voices through their APs. Real voices. Getting closer.

“I’m telling you, Honey, we should have stopped at the last shelter.”

“Fuck,” Mystiq whispered. The loading bar was at 87%. The voices neared.

“And I’m telling you, Darling, that shelter was full of gym bros doing pull-ups.”

“And what’s so wrong with that?”

Taylor’s eyes blinked as movement returned to her frame. She closed her mouth, head swiveling randomly as Darling and Honey emerged into the clearing, singing.

Honey’s voice was clear and strong: “Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play…”

Mystiq listened, trying to detect auto-tune. Though Darling had no rhythm, he joined in on “Shake it off, Shake it off.” “Amateurs,” Taylor said without breath. Those humans seemed made for each other.

Through Jack’s cameras Wolfgang watched them arrive saddled with backpacks. The fortyish couple appeared deep-boned tired as they slogged into the campsite. Wolfgang and Mystiq, who hadn’t slept in years, missed exhaustion.

The man, apparently called “Darling”, had a journal tucked under his arm and a feather pen behind his ear.

When they noticed the two APs by the fire, they stopped.

“Oh, dear,” the woman—Honey—said, as Jack rotated his head one hundred and eighty degrees. “We’re not alone. There’s… things over there.”

“Looks like that melted one got a little too warm,” Darling chuckled. “Close call.”

Through Jack’s cameras Wolfgang watched the young pair assess the fire he’d spent hours building, making Jack describe every log from White Fang’s perspective.

“Er, this is a shelter for the living,” Honey said, clapping her hands. “Shoo! We’ve been hiking since dawn.”

“Of course,” Wolfgang said through Jack, standing him up.

“Let’s go, dear,” Jack said as Wolfgang made him extend an arm to Taylor, imitating a happy human couple.

Banished, Jack and Taylor hobbled away hand in hand—with an unnervingly similar gait.

“Sayonara, suckers,” Honey said through closed teeth, unpacking by the fire. “Man, they freak me out.”

“Sorry,” Darling called after them. “We’ve given up technology for lent. No screens, no AI. No offense.”

“No auto-tune or LyricPro,” Honey added. “When’s lent?”

“I dunno,” Darling said.

Wolfgang understood. From an abandoned lawn chair behind the lean-to left to rot—he heard the pair settle beside his fire, his space, his night the couple moved in on. “Like a couple of cuckoos,” Wolfgang typed, proud of the analogy thinking its double meaning could re structure the whole story.

Taylor and Jack stopped, turned and watched from down the trail where they stood like department store displays in a Christmas movie.

After handing Darling a hot chocolate, Honey pulled out a notebook, humming while she struggled to write lyrics. Darling opened a bottle of ink and scratched what Wolfgang imagined were clichés across the page with his feather pen.

“Thank you Honey.”

“You’re welcome darling,”

“Darling, what rhymes with love?”

“Above.”

“Perfect.”

After a few minutes, Darling stood, rummaging through Honey’s pack.

“What are you looking for?”

“Nature calls. Where’s the toilet paper, Honey?”

“In the plastic bag with the trowel.”

Darling pulled it out and headed behind the lean-to.

The moment Darling disappeared, Honey glanced up, looked around, then pulled her phone from her jacket.

Her face lit blue. Thumb scrolling.

Darling came around behind the lean-to. He stopped when he saw the abandoned lawn chair—weathered plastic straps, rusted frame. Someone’s castoff.

He looked around, then sat on it.

Wolfgang felt him. Darling’s weight, his warmth passing through Wolfgang’s ghostly lap. The heat of a living body restoring memories—the pressure of thighs. How he missed his own shifting pelvis against woven straps. Wolfgang hadn’t felt anything like it in decades.

Darling glanced around once more, then pulled out his phone. Blue light washed on Darling and the aura of ghost as one.

Wolfgang could see the screen clearly beneath Darling’s thumbs: “StoryForge – Generate compelling dialogue – $29/month.”

Through Taylor’s cameras down the trail, Mystiq watched Honey by the fire, hunched over her screen.

“We have to go back,” Mystiq signaled through Taylor, urgent.

“Give me a moment,” Wolfgang had Jack reply.

“Look at her on her phone,” Mystiq added, her voice sharp. “That bitch is faker than either of us.”

Wolfgang felt sad as Darling stood, tucked his phone in his breast pocket, and headed back. The feather pen lay abandoned by the fire.

“Darling is lying to her too,” Wolfgang made Jack say. “Someone needs to tell them liars make bad artists.”

“They won’t listen,” Mystiq said through Taylor, “unless perhaps we upgrade to the $499 tier.” Wolfgang was already pulling up the menu as Taylor’s blank face wobbled with Mystiq’s enthusiasm.

Wolfgang thought about the crypto wallet APCORPSE helped him set up as he was dying. Since APCORPSE began marketing afterlife services—their premium tier specifically designed for “Dead people like you whose dreams never came true”—he’d been tempted. The wallet he’d been bleeding for eighteen months had only enough for two premiums for one month.

“Are you sure you want to use up all your currency?” Wolfgang asked.

“Let’s go out with a bang,” Mystiq had Taylor say. “We can make a difference.”

Wolfgang found Jack’s neural link. Though Jack had problems, and Wolfgang would miss dealing with problems, Jack London’s primitive programming needed more generative power to address his current situation.

PROCESSING UPGRADE: FULL HUMAN SIMULATION V2.0

INCLUDES: Unique facial reconstruction, Dermis imperfections, Asymmetry, Individual scent, Micro-expressions and UNLIMITED ALLOCATION

NOTE: Previous identity will be overwritten. Proceed?

$499 per month.

“Do it,” Mystiq whispered.

Wolfgang hit Proceed.

Wolfgang watched as Jack’s hands blurred. His disfigured face disappeared, replaced by new bone structure. A broad nose. Laugh lines. Whiskey breath.

The APCORPSE upgrade wasn’t ‘like watching the birth of a child.’ Wolfgang hated AI-generated clichés and couldn’t believe the company let that slide. Even Jack would’ve come up with something more original.

When Mystiq saw Ernest Hemingway through her cameras and said ‘Oh crap,’ Wolfgang knew it was money well spent.

Wolfgang wanted a cigarette as Mystiq’s AP transformed. The Taylor Swift optimization—Mystiq’s lifelong dream of becoming a pop star—melted away, revealing a black-haired, freckled, shorter woman with equally striking features. It was Katy Perry.

With the upgrade, Wolfgang and Mystiq just had to think what to say for their new personas to sound natural. But there was no time to chat as Ernest Hemingway and Katy Perry entered the clearing arm in arm.

Honey looked up from her lyrics and smiled. “Oh, thank goodness. We thought we were the only humans out here.”

Darling stood, offering the interesting pair his hand to shake. “I’m Darling. This is Honey. Did you run into those APs?”

“I’m Ernest,” Hemingway said, ignoring the question. “And this is…”

“Katy. We’ve been on the trail since Harper’s Ferry.”

“Pull up a chair,” Darling said. “There’s always room for fellow hikers. Um, where are your packs?”

“Llamas, porters,” Katy said, Mystiq thinking fast. “A few miles back.”

The fire felt different to Wolfgang in Hemingway’s skin. “Hot.” “Good.” “True.” he wrote, noticing everything around the fire with five different senses. Unlike Jack’s descriptive prose, Ernest combined short words—fire, wood, smoke, hands, night—to illustrate action.

“What are you writing?” Katy asked.

“Songs,” Honey said, looking up. “Trying to break into the music biz. You?”

“I sing too,” Katy said. Wolfgang could hear Mystiq’s longing.

Honey’s eyes lit up. “Can I hear you sing something?”

Katy stood, took a deep breath, opened her mouth and belted “Fireworks” in full voice. No fear, no limits and no allocation warnings.

Her sound—victorious.

“That’s beautiful,” Honey said. “Really incredible.”

“What about you, Ernest?” Darling asked. “You write?”

Wolfgang’s chest—his actual chest as alone as an abandoned lawn chair—tightened.

“Currently on a short story,” Ernest grumbled. “Fiction.”

“Sounds cool,” Darling said. “I’m still trying to get my first book published. Rejections are brutal.”

“Show me,” Ernest said. Darling passed him his journal.

Ernest read Darling’s prose, transmitting the story to Wolfgang’s laptop. The writing sounded like Charles Dickens.

“Not bad,” Ernest said. “But you might want to try being more blunt. Cut the flourishes. Say what you mean.”

Darling nodded, absorbing this. “More direct?”

“Shorter sentences. Real things. Less decoration.”

Wolfgang felt Ernest’s voice working through him—terse, economical, effective. This was exactly what the upgrade was for. Not anyone’s comfort but reaching another with something real.

For the next hour, the six of them sat there. Honey hummed melodies with Katy and Mystiq. Darling and Wolfgang—Darling and Ernest, Ernest and Darling—intensely discussing structure, voice, and the rare victories that made creative lives worthwhile. Honey and Darling marveled at what they were learning from such experienced, intelligent artists. Wolfgang thoroughly enjoyed helping Darling. The dead pair marveled at what immersion with the great masters was teaching them all. 

Wolfgang was just beginning to allow his bones to show when Honey stood up. “Katy, do you want to sing a duet?”

Then they did—Honey’s human voice and Katy’s perfect $499 voice sounded playful at first until they became competitive. They tried to out-sing each other. Katy, showing off her flawless pitch, imagination and unlimited range out sang Honey who faltered.

“You’re really good,” Honey said.

“You too,” Mystiq lied breathlessly through Katy, as her face darkened. Through Ernest’s eyes Wolfgang saw it all too—the moment when Darling noticed the glow from where Honey had been sitting—where she’d dropped her phone.

Honey grabbed for it, but it was too late. They all saw the screen.

“LyricGenius – $40 per month — ‘Shake It Off’ verse 2”

The $40 tier.

“Honey?” Darling’s voice cracked.

“It’s not—I barely use it. Just when I get stuck. It’s not doing anything—”

“I thought we agreed to leave technology at home,” Darling said.

“It’s only the cheap tier, Darling. It’s not like—”

“Like what?” Darling backed away. “We promised. No AI!”

Wolfgang watched Darling’s reaction through Ernest’s eyes, while Katy smirked at Honey.

With no need to compete with purity anymore, Katy stood up.

“I need to go.”

“Mystiq?” Ernest blurted in a glitch of emotion.

BLEEP. AUTONOMOUS MODE REENGAGED

UNLIMITED ALLOCATION ACTIVE

Katy began walking purposefully toward the trail, toward the parking lot.

Toward Nashville.

With her $499 voice and unlived dreams ready to take flight, Wolfgang thought he heard Mystiq whisper goodbye as her upgrade strode away from the fire as if led by her own shadow.

Wolfgang turned Ernest back toward the fire. Darling stood devastated as Honey whimpered.

“You lied to me,” Darling kept repeating. “You lied.”

Then, louder: “Nobody will take us seriously if we use AI. Don’t you understand? I don’t just want to be a published writer. I want what I say to matter—to help people.” His voice cracked. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted!”

Wolfgang heard himself in Darling’s cries. The same desperate dream that had kept him looking at his phone instead of the road.

He moved Ernest closer to Darling. Slowly. Gently.

“Darling,” Ernest said in an uncharacteristically kind voice. “Come with me.”

“I don’t—” Darling protested.

From eighteen months using APCORPSE software, Wolfgang knew how to override and disable the android’s coding and speak as himself. Ernest Hemingway’s minimalism gave way to Wolfgang’s urgency.

“I could have written twice as much if I’d had AI. Don’t you see? Words—capable of infinite collages of meaning from whatever source—matter only if you make them matter. These ancient tools, letters strung together to make words, sentences, paragraphs and volumes must be rearranged to meet the needs of time. There is none to waste. You’re on the right track, don’t you see? Use your tools for God’s sake.”

Wolfgang plucked a revelation from the whirling urgency: It wasn’t Jack London or Ernest Hemingway or critics’ rejections. Not reviewers, AI skeptics, or even Wolfgang Coeur with his precious French accent. It was all of them—and none. 

It was Harvey fucking Lipshitz, who through APCORPSE technology was able to speak from the dead and tell his truth by whatever means possible—the only story that mattered: His own. 

Harvey’s fingers danced on the keyboard as if on embers. Fueled by the coal of all that came before, knowing the fire of life is a gift for everyone.

“Please,” Harvey said through Ernest. “I can help. Help to keep your voice your own. While you let technology help you tell the truth.”

Harvey meant it too. He saw more than his own reflection in Darling. Far more important than being published or being praised by critics; Harvey found self-love.

Emerging from within gleaned observations and extractions distilled from the fruit of others, Harvey also found an original idea.

Darling, raw, betrayed—desperate to believe in anything, followed Ernest into the woods like in a romance novel.

The two figures stopped maybe fifteen feet from where Harvey sat invisible with his laptop typing furiously. Close enough that he could hear Darling’s actual breath, Harvey was writing about a sculpted jaw in the moonlight when he heard a hum.

Darling’s phone, glowing in his pocket.

Darling froze. A sheepish smile—then a crumbling face. Tears.

“Use your words,” Ernest said before pulling Darling toward him and kissing his tears away.

Harvey felt their need beneath his fingers—Darling’s surprise, hesitation then surrender. Darling’s hands on Harvey’s torso made nearby willows weep, as the unlikely pair sank to the ground.

Harvey closed his laptop unable to watch himself make love with who he wanted to be and who he’d once been.

It was narcissistic.

It was missionary.

It was necessary.

And illegal according to recent state laws.

When Darling fell asleep in the bed of pine needles, Harvey pulled up the APCORPSE menu one last time.

CANCEL SUBSCRIPTION? Y/N

Harvey clicked yes.

Ernest Hemingway dissolved into the Hudson Highlands.

Darling woke by himself in strange peace then walked back to the fire.

Honey was sitting on her phone. Unforgiving. 

“Have you seen Ernest?”

“No.” She said without looking up.

“I’m going to Nashville.” 

Silence. 

“Where will you go?”

Darling shrugged.

“You might need this.” Honey tossed him a coin she’d found in the dirt.

Darling picked it up and placed it on his thumb.

As it spun Darling heard, “Key West.”