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The book: In a world devoid of God and nature, a revenge-seeking church uses nanotechnology to create their own versions of heaven and hell on earth.
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Some people thought that when you died, the last feeling you felt in life was what you'd be feeling for eternity. If you went out watching paint dry or during sex, you'd be yawning or fucking forever. But what about those who'd be stabbed to death, those whose houses would burn down? Those innocent would go to hell without the fun of getting there. Life really wouldn't be fair, and it wouldn't matter who was right as long as they were in the right place at the right time. What about those who'd be buried alive? And here they were, the undeserving, stuck in a timeless afterlife. Like life had just been a prologue, an overdone intro to something much more important, something worth wasting your short life being good for. Lines of medical tables ran along the stark white walls. And on each one a subject lay unmoving. A dim light was aimed across only one side of the room, illuminating those of them who still cared that it shone. Heaven on one side and Hell on the other. EEGs accompanied each table, electrodes stuck to each shaved head. Virtual Reality coiled around their heads and bodies, virtual corpses. And each corpse lay consenting, condemned through black and white disclaimers. Black on one side and white on the other. Ministro moved down the line, slowly inspecting each one for any sign of individuality. But they could have been clones the way they all lay there, arms folded in X's across their chests. The only way you could tell them apart was that one row was smiling all across, each smile the same size, and the other was frowning. Black twitched, trying to pull the VR off. "What are those for?" Ministro asked, gesturing at the headpieces. "They still need stimulation," the director explained, shoving a syringe into one of those struggling arms. Ministro looked away until he was done and watched him take the VR glasses from the victim's head. "Helps them remember where they are," he said. At this he offered Ministro the VR. Ministro hesitated, took it, and brought the view up to his eyes. Images of both afterlives flashed fast-forward before him. At first just symbols of fire and clouds, Satans and Gods, their expressions the same. Then he saw images of torture victims, glass in their mouths and death in their eyes like they wanted it more than happiness by now. Finally he realized that the images were coming from a feed downstairs. He brought his hands up desperately to his face, groping for the headpiece and flinging it onto one of the metal beds. "Watch this," the director said, pulling the glasses off another of those heads. The head's expression didn't change, that smile stuck at the same degree. The eyes still moved erratically like those of someone who was dreaming, but these eyes were wide open. Then they closed as if catching up, and the victim addressed his director. "Oh, it's so nice to see you again..." Then he went on, mumbling something to a nearby nurse. Ministro was struck by that voice. It wasn't one he'd heard before, save for from other mouths. It conformed for the staff or torturers, less like talking to a person, more like punching foreign codes into some stupid machine whose understanding was limited to only the most literal commands. Ecstatic but still reserved, and on the edge of something. It had a distinct quality, yet it sounded familiar to Ministro, something in it inherently his own. He heard it change just for him. "Hello!" the voice's owner squealed, unnervingly childlike, unrealistically optimistic. Ministro extended his hand and the grinner grasped it roughly. Then, looking around like an owl who has to turn its whole head to see in other directions - inhumanly - the subject appeared to be taking in the hell and asked, "Isn't it beautiful here?"
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