I guessed wrong. She doesn’t want Gene Extension. She wants hibernation, another achievement of life science that’s been commercialized. At about fifty degrees below zero, drugs and an extracorporeal circulation system reduce the metabolism down to 1 percent of normal. Someone hibernating for one hundred years will only age one.

“Life is tiring, and tedious. I just want to escape,” Jian Jian says.

“Can you escape after a century? By then, no one will recognize your academic credentials. You won’t be used to what society will have become. Will you be able to cope?”

“The times always get better, don’t they? In the future, maybe I can do Gene Extension. By then, it will surely be more affordable.”

Jian Jian and I leave without saying anything else. Perhaps, one century later, we can meet again, but I didn’t promise her anything. Then, she will still be her, but I’ll be someone who has experienced another hundred years of change.

Once she is gone, I don’t hesitate. I take out my cell phone, log into the online banking system, and transfer five million into the Gene Extension Center’s bank account. Although it’s close to midnight, I still receive a call from the center’s director right away. He says that the manipulations to improve my genes can start tomorrow. If all goes smoothly, it will be over in a week. He earnestly repeats the center’s promise of secrecy. Out of the Gene Extended whose identities have been revealed, three have already been murdered.

“You’ll be happy with your decision,” the director says. “Because you will receive not just over two centuries but possibly eternal life.”

I understand what he’s getting at. Who knows what technologies may arise over the next two centuries? Perhaps, by then, it’ll be possible to copy consciousness and memory, create permanent backups that can be poured into a new body whenever we want. Perhaps we won’t even need bodies. Our consciousnesses will drift on the network like gods, passing through countless sensors to experience the world and the universe. This truly is eternal life.

The director continues: “In fact, if you have time, you have everything. Given enough time, a monkey randomly hitting keys on a typewriter can type out the complete works of Shakespeare. And what you have is time.”

“Me? Not us?”

“I didn’t go under Gene Extension.”

“Why?”

After a long silence, he says, “This world changes too quickly. Too many opportunities, too many temptations, too many desires, too many dangers. I get dizzy thinking about it. When all is said and done, you’re still old. But don’t worry.” He then says the same thing Jian Jian says. “The times always get better.”