BOOK OFFICES, February 4th, 2084, Friday

Election offices of different formats had widely been used during the periods when general and regional polls made on predetermined dates were the basic method for choosing the governors to make important decisions. However, in the era of communication at light speed, it was in fact no more logical to make periodical or extraordinary elections and asking the transfer of authorities for specific areas to certain people for determined times. There were several reasons making this alternative ineffective. The first was the cost of managing general elections. The second was the difficulty of the management of the voting system transparently and reliably, and the third and probably the most important one was the insufficiency of the system to determine the correct results with an election where the best capable experts would participate as candidates, and to place the candidate with the best features for a certain area to that post. Voters more and more opposed the useless and costly efforts to make elections manipulated by system controllers and they insisted on establishing a continuous decision making system to guarantee that only the best candidates would fill all the required posts for leading, governing, directing, managing, executing, operating, communicating, recording, auditing, informing, evaluating, and improving the overall system when required. System controllers who were assuming that they were rulers and they would always stay in that position resisted harshly and rejected to accept any of the peaceful modification requests asked by the Continuous Development Defenders. They used election offices to convince voters that all the other alternatives would not work, and they were the only choice to maintain the system. It was easy for them to use their information, knowledge, and tool resources. They were able to use all tools, old and new, successfully for implementation of their projects. They were slightly deflecting the actual data, playing with recording and retrieval mechanisms of critical information, and distorting the reflections of knowledge in individual minds. Since the rulers were very successful in using and managing material resources, the physical voices of other parts were not being heard clearly. As a result of their continuous success, they became very strong and suppressed their opponents almost completely. At the worst point, Anmeri had started the "Book Offices" project, which had later changed the balance between the Skinners and The Minders.

Bakara's voice was louder. His transmission channels were wider. Everybody was hearing him and understanding his messages clearly. His messages were being designed according to his needs and requests in the best way, to affect and control each type of the skinners specifically. Managing others using messages transmitted through their skins mechanically were easier than managing with complex messages transferred through interconnected minds. Skins were ready to accept the messages. However minds were not capable of understanding valuable details hidden in thoughts and feelings generated and communicated with minds. A skin was a control surface between an individual and the rest of the universe. A skin mind was another kind of mesh system embedded in the skin, and the mind unit was in the head part of a skin. Anmeri and Bakara had worked a lot to improve their models earlier than each other. At the initial development phases, Anmeri was more successful in creating a perfect communication system using natural minds and bodies to manage organic life. Her system had naturally been optimized for the maximum overall happiness of the individual units. Anmeri's and her followers' target was not success. They were not living and working to complete certain levels and start other missions. They were just trying to understand themselves and each other to exchange life with nature and universe. They were surviving with small amounts of material sources and generating high levels of life output. The conflict grew when Bakara's skinners started to increase too fast when compared to natural progress levels of Anmeri's minders in their natural bodies. Minders were living good lives and leaving after a certain time, but skinners were staying in their skins eternally unless a critical system error occurred. Bakara's Skinners were limited due to material requirements, but Kara had made improvements on basic consumption and recycling rates so that the resources had become almost sufficient for infinite lives of an infinite population of Skinners. They would live forever as long as they wanted to. Being succesful in solving the infinite life equation for material and energy requirements, Kara had started working on meaning stability. Predefined meanings were sufficient for all skinners at the beginning and for most of them at later phases, but they were completely useless for the most brilliant minds. This weakness was probably the main reason of Kara's interest with Met. Metilius had a magical power for being a meaning for almost all of the minders and skinners. Merilia, Kara, and Oria also were very strong in creating permanent life channels with others but Met was completely different. Meri had once said "You are a god as human as an ordinary butterfly on a flower with luminious leaves of billions of colors," to him.

The election offices were at the last line of the struggle. Skinners and minders were both trying to change the world according to their conceptions of the universe. Bakara was delivering skins directly connected to the central control unit, and Anmeri was creating safe natural homes for free minds. Bakara was promising safety, extreme pleasure, and infinite life. Anmeri was delivering a home in a beautiful garden to design, live, and complete a natural life. Bakara was processing the nature to collect minimum amounts of required materials and feed the skins through specific feeding systems to maintain the overall skin system. Anmeri were delivering access to the knowledge base of natural life, leaving them free to find their own ways to live that they would think to be the best for themselves. There was a common aspect in both life styles though. They were both using memory tools to enrich their life experiences. The skinners were receiving the inputs to be processed from their skins, and the minders were receiving them directly in their minds.

Creation of the election offices was a critical stage in the struggle. Bakara was able to use the tool more effectively than Anmeri. As a result, The Skinners had increased faster for a certain period and Bakara had used this advantage to declare the superiority of the Skin System.

Bakara was hard, Anmeri was soft. Bakara was shouting, Anmeri was whispering. Bakara was sending unbearable punishment signals to the Skinners willing to leave. Anmeri was leaving her circles free to live as they wanted. Bakara was imposing the importance of external power to live, Anmeri was advising humans to look at the power of life hidden in their bodies and minds. Bakara was asking the skinners to accept the reflections transmitted to them through their skins, Anmeri was talking about the personal and specific spirit hidden between the natural skin and mind; she was telling the stories of the minders living in their natural worlds. Matter and energy, body and mind, persona and spirit were having slightly different interpretations in the two systems. However, the struggle were not simple and little. From Bakara and Anmeri's time to Kara and Meri's era, too many battles had been made which would cause unlimited numbers of deaths in case the previous methods and structure of war had been used.

The balance between the skin system and the mind system had been distorted for the skinner's benefit in the struggle of Kara and Anmeri. Bakara had used his election office perfectly. He had brought minders and skinners to the office and performed discussions on actual books. He had signed and gave his and other skinners' books to the visitors. He had talked to and hugged all of them one by one to convince them the skin system was the best and everybody would live as before when he won. Touching books and Bakara, seeing actual physical objects were giving the visitors the feeling of the real world. Anmeri was not as succesful as Bakara. Virtual mind interface had a limited functionality at that time and the results were not as brilliant as seen through the skin system. Deep lookers were able to see the value of the mind system, but most were not able to visualize how a life could be lived without doing anything actually. "I want a skin to feel my wife's hands, and to touch her with my hands," I young man had said to Anmeri. Anmeri had desperately talked to him for a long while to convince him having the signals through a skin or directly in mind had no difference technically, but she was not successful. The man had said "I want to feel my wife's hips, breasts, and legs," and he had left.

Anmeri had later started "Book Offices" project. The stress of making choices and waiting for the selections that will be made by others were not making anyone happy. The decision making process had to be continuous. Anmeri was not able to change the system during her life time, but the "Book Offices" had been the basic structure for the new decision system. Virtual and real book offices were continuously reading and discussing all written books. They were analyzing their contents, trying to determine the values included, comparing the value pieces with existing knowledge base and performing the necessary updates. People and books were linked with weak and strong bonds. It was possible to join and leave a weak structure immediately. Being connected to and leaving a strong structure was not an instant job and it had long procedures. It was not a general rule, but minders were mostly connected with weak bonds, and the skinners with strong bonds. One side had flexible and various thoughts and books, the other side had rigid and single type thoughts and books. Variety of thoughts and books were slowly bringing the stability they would reach in long term to Anmeri and the Minders. Singularity and rigidity were bringing power in short term, but causing decay as decades pass. "Book Offices" project was an important step for finding a balance between the minders and the skinners. Kara had gained the temporary power for management using her "Book Offices" successfully. Anmeri had silently grown her "Book Offices". Met was the positive value of all minders and all skinners.

"It is very difficult to see the past and the future," thought Meri. "It is even hard to see the present."

She looked at Met. She would do anything to understand when and how he could come back.

"Please come back to me Met," she said. "I need you to complete my life. Oria needs you. Even Kara needs you. All the people in our garden of life, all the minders and skinners, everybody need you. We need the universe. The universe needs us."

Met turned towards Meri and smiled looking at deeply in her eyes.

"I love you Meri," he said.

GOD DARWIN, January 30th, 2084, Sunday

"I believe in God."

If you do believe in your God; why don't you simply and calmly just feel the virtue and natural power of your God, but try to suppress and destroy your opponents?

Vice versa, if suppressing and destroying your opponents is your first priority during your limited visit to this mortal world and you feel no responsibility for protecting nature and life given by God; why do you need a name for a god that you do not understand and respect?

If you don't understand that everything you love and hate had been created by a god initiating an evolution process or an evolution miracle giving existence to a god; how can you see and respect your god?

Do you think the leaders of the world can represent an eternal god? Do you think they understand the God and life better than Darwin? Can you see Darwin's God? Can you feel life and see light given by the eternal and infinite miracle? What can you do to deserve the wonderful miracle of life and love? Can death and hatred, murders and massacres be a solution if you can't see them?

"I do believe in my God."

Meri felt that she had missed the goodness of the God of her ancestors' childhoods very much. She watched again an old movie, "Hair", remembering her memories with its songs. She would love to watch it again together with Met, after everything was over.

RECORDING OF THOUGHTS, January 25th, 2084, Tuesday

It had always been possible to record by some means the thoughts worked on and created at light speed, but direct communication with multimedia tools using texts, images, sounds, and their dynamic combinations had defined a new era for the meanings of thought, thinking, sharing, contacting, changing, communicating, interacting, and living. Recording of thoughts with mechanical writing had been a very important turning point in the history, and had affected the futures of all existing species. Direct recording of thoughts with advanced electric tools defined the new age of communication and living at light speed. It was now very difficult for humans to live in an ocean of light and thoughts. This difficulty gave new powers to darkness. Darkness seemed to be more successful than light in using thoughts. Meri was not much surprised to see the balances between light and darkness had not much changed in the new era of continuous communication. The characteristics and effects of dark thoughts were not much different in physical documents printed on paper and distributed, and in cyber documents prepared and shared through communication networks. Ways of living were changing rapidly, but humans were not able to change to survive, find and follow the new ways.

MET'S ANCESTORS, December 27th, 2083, Monday

Singular future notes sticked on books.

Could this be the only connection with Met's past?

Probably not. There were many other records in advanced digital systems. However, the notes had not only information, but also traces of organic and inorganic matter transferred to the future together with a knowledge written on a paper.

It was not easy for Meri in the digital age to understand the value of a small paper delivered to another person and to imagine the feelings to be lived upon such a connection, but the look appearing in the eyes and on the face of Met while looking at the notes were sufficient to show the meaning of the notes.

They were solid and brief records of Met's ancestors left to the future. Those papers were records of love and goodness. They were records of life.

SYMPHONY OF TOUCHES, December 09th, 2083, Thursday

Meri was now feeling the perfectness of all the touches between Kara, Oria, Met and her. It was an entirely different experience. It was more than everything she had lived with every person in her life and she had witnessed from every source she could find in the history. It was an actual, real reflection of life on her skin. It was not only an ordinary behavior of the four special figures from the infinite vastness of space and time. It was a new way, new form of life. Meri was not able to understand the strength of the boundaries formed by this four. The Symphony of The Big Quartette was far more from their personal experiences. It included enriched reflections not only from Met, Meri, Oria and Kara; but also the most perfect touches coming from Bakara and Anmeri, Met's mother, Meri's father, and Oria's variable mothers and fathers. The Big Quartet was now in a very special region defined by special portions of space and special sequences of moments. The region composed by The Big Quartet was containing all the varieties and extremities of life and of the universe. Nothing was excluded in The Big Quartet. The touches were telling the stories of The Universe, of life, of their near and far pasts, the reasons and meanings of their existences. The sum of their reasons and meanings was almost completely telling the common story their life forms existing at the intersection of their time and space lines. Having this fact commonly in their minds was making them different and special. They were able to understand the meanings and relations within and between time, space, and life. More importantly, they were clearly seeing their personal adventures transparently. The touches were not only telling the perfectness of their individual life lines in time and space, but also they were making them live all their life experiences again and understand the meanings they could find. Each touch was telling a story retrieved from their memories, defining the regions in space and periods in time, analyzing the relations of the piece of memory with other memories recorded in their systems, and using also the reflections stored in other touches it was showing them the meanings they could gain from all of them. The perfectness of all the touches between Kara, Oria, Met and Meri was telling the final story of the humankind. The Big Quartet was representing the perfectness all humans could have reached so far. They were now the key players at the decision moment. They would affect and determine the decision that will soon be made. Meri was worried and anxious about their futures and the future of all life forms. A question appeared in her mind. "Did we do everything we could do to defend the better future we believe?" She was sure that Bakara and Anmeri, Met and Kara had done their bests in the limits of their life lines. She had no doubt that her father and Met's mother had also delivered all the positive values they could find and create to Meri and Met. They were not able to see the future they had desired. Negative values had more power than positive values. They could easily suppress and terminate their opponents. But it was not a rule valid permanently and eternally. The rule of infinity was very simple. It was zero. The sum of all the expansions and contractions, all the existences and terminations, rises and falls; the sum of all universal activities would eventually be zero. Time and space lines were only showing the temporary fluctuations, movements toward and away from zero. Life forms and the movements of the galaxies in the universe and even unknown systems outside The Universe would reach the balance at zero. As many philosophers, scientists, artists and writers had told throughout the history, the equilibrium point of life was at non-existence. Life was a wave. All life forms would go up and down with their specific patterns and frequencies, shapes and wavelengths. Life forms were waves. Nothing more and nothing less. They would end after the dynamics behind the life forms complete their cycles, like storms in the atmospheres and oceans stop when they do everything they must do. This piece of information was valid, but meaningless. The discovery of zero had been a big trouble for the human kind. Zero was numerical representation of death, and one was life. It was not easy to live knowing that you will die one day. Knowing that you and all the people in your life will eventually be zeros. They will never be able to write again life stories using ones. They will be eternally zero. Life was the art and power of seeing the meanings behind this zero rule. Understanding the value zeros gained when united with ones rightly. Being able to be happy while watching the waves until they decay, placing plates on them and moving up and down together with them, and while enjoying the moments trying to solve and understand the dynamics and relations behind their movements.

Each touch between Kara, Oria, Met and Meri was a piece of wave pattern. Meri knew that touch simulation was the most difficult part in designing The Skin System. Two other difficult parts were smell and taste simulations. The Skin System scientists, technicians, open source developers, case study volunteers, and all the members had spent great efforts in developing a perfect system, whether voluntarily with their own decisions or automatically after they were included in the system. Although Bakara and Kara had always told that protecting natural resources and free wills of organic lives was their first priority, they had frequently violated their own rules for using resources faster or terminating active lives of skin members who do not consistenly follow and obey all their requests and orders. The Mind System had always been softer, nature and human friendly. Anmeri had never forced a minder who was willing to be a skinner to stay in their system. She had never refused to help Bakara to develop a better skin system, as long as the contribution of Anmeri would not violate her principles and it would help Bakara to design a more nature friendly system. However, Bakara had always played to win whatever the consequences and actual costs would be. The result was a more powerful skin system and more stable mind system.

Meri was now feeling the perfectness of all the touches reflecting from all the current habitants of The Skin and The Mind systems. Meri and Met was the top two of The Mind, and Kara and Oria were their opponents at the same level. Touch challenges were low level combat games played with soft touches rather than hard contacts applied by specific tools designed in formats from free hands and fists to specific destruction tools designed for maximum destruction effect. Minders were always preferring soft type of challenges, and Skinners were choosing harder games played with extreme tools. Both Minders and Skinners had developed reliable safety systems for games played internally within in their member groups, and classification games played between the top teams of the two systems. All the top teams were using strategies and tactics developed by Kara and Oria if they are Skinners, and Met and Meri if they are Minders. Games were generally staying at low levels with the victory of one or other party, but at the occasions when the levels had increased fast generating specific and unexpected scenarios, higher level Skinners and Minders were being included in the game. The current game Meri was feeling both in her mind and at her skin through Met's Skin was a top level game. Meri was feeling Kara's desire to win the final victory playing a perfect game which would convince everybody on the power and value of The Skin System.

Meri felt the power of life at all points of her skin and mind. Kara was touching her with the hands of The Big Quartet. The contact locations were changing. Intensities and frequencies were fluctuating rapidly, but the perfectness of the feelings they were delivering was increasing consistently. Meri was remembering and witnessing all the perfect touches in her life again. Met was caressing her. Oria was placing her head between Meri's legs begging for help to find his reason for existence. Kara was hugging her as a strong protector promising to give maximum safety and pleasure always, claiming to be the perfect person who would understand her. The reflections of touches on their skins were processed in their minds. Kara was trying to convince Meri that she would never be able to find the level of life pleasure provided by the skin system in algorithms of the Mind System. Meri was responding with mind moves targeting the most sensitive points on Kara's Skin and delivering the impulses directly to her processing module. Kara was facing difficulties in distinguishing the pulses coming from her skin and the effects sent by Meri's algorithms. She was increasing the level of Skin System contact management module. Meri was responding immediately by activating new algorithms.

Kara, Oria, Met and Meri were now feeling the perfectness of the touches they had learned and they could imagine so far. Meri felt a new and specific touch from Met. It was special. It was Met coming back to life. It was love and the future. Kara tried to distort their contact sending powerful lust signals but they were not able to penetrate in the mind connection between Met and Meri. Their skins were now being bypassed. Kara ordered Oria to attack with his best memories with Meri and Met. Oria did not obey and started sharing the perfectness of the experience between Met and Meri. He was listening to the symphony of touches between them, and he was surprised to notice that he was not jealous at all. He was happy to see Met coming back to life and sharing the happiness of being born again with Meri. Oria was tired of the stress of Kara, The Skin System, and matter management modules operating at tight schedules. He was willing to return to the freedom of mind. He blocked all the requests coming from Kara.

Their minds were connecting their skins, and their skins were connecting their minds to each other. They were feeling each other without a need for a skin or mind system. They had seen and witnessed the perfectness that could be reached with skin and mind systems. The cost of the perfectness was the loss of memories. Perfectness was making everyone and everything equal. All members of the nature should be equal. But they should be equal with slight differences of their existences, to live and write their life stories from darkness to light, from light to darkness, from zero to one, from one to zero. They should forget darkness and zeros and live with light and ones. They should start again after each darkness, with new lights and ones. They should forget zeros. Meri was very happy to notice the consciousness in Met's eyes. The Skin System would have no meaning and no power as long as they lived. Meri was feeling her life at all points of her skin and her mind. There was Oria and Kara, but Met was playing the best tunes of the final movement. Meri was once more surprised with the power of life and love. Met was creating a new world in Meri, and Meri was surrounding Met with new worlds. They were feeling each other in their minds and skins, with all their existences. It was life. It was love. It was lust. It was trust. It was fear. It was confidence. It was suspect. It was trembling. It was uncertainty. It was being weak. It was being strong. It was being lusty. It was a gift of The Universe.

Symphony of Touches were playing the fourth movement. Meri and Met had no regret for knowing Kara. They were seeing The Big Quartet and all the members of The Skin and The Mind Systems as equal individuals sharing life at an intersection of time and space, to find their own futures. It was not possible to understand the meaning and purpose of life, but it was a good choice to live the movements in the best way and end the symphonies with a good last movement. Symphony of Touches were now playing The Symphony of Love. It was the last period of the symphony.

THE SKIN WAR II, December 1st, 2083, Wednesday

Meri felt a sudden attack coming with infinite number of nippings, pulses, needle sticks, electrical shocks applied on her skin; causing extreme, uncontrollably increasing and decreasing pains. Kara had accessed the control of Met's Skin on Meri's body. Met's Skin was now the torture cell of Meri.

"I am very sorry for this," whispered Kara. "I am very sorry for being at opposite sides with you. We could together create a better future for the universe. I am very sorry for you. I am very sorry for myself and my father. I am very sorry for your father. I am very sorry for Met and her mother. I am very sorry for Oria. We did not deserve this. Everything could be different. But you entered the fatal level of the game and passed the point of no return. I will now prepare a happy end for you. You know, I really love you. I always wanted the best for you. I took excellent pleasures from you, and tried to make you live even better experiences than mine. At the end, you left no choice for me. I want to live my last experience I can live with you in the best way before sending you out of the systems."

Meri did not remember when she had first understood they would inevitably play the final level of the life game together with Kara and against each other. Since she had that idea in her mind, Meri had tried to prepare herself to the final struggle for defending life. Meri herself, Met, Oria, Annmeri, Bameri, Kara and Bakara. Kara was now representing all the powers of the universe and she was armed with them. Meri had nothing except a life, a natural body and mind. She was sure that if there would be a solution for a better future, it would come from life. She looked at Kara's face and tried to understand the type of the experience she was planning to live with her. It was easy for Meri to read the respect, admiration, closeness, desire, and love in Kara's eyes. It would probably a carefully planned connection game designed specifically for Kara and Meri using all available resources. It would probably also have a punishment stage at the end which would provide a valuable tool for Kara to control the other few minders that will remain after Meri. Meri thought about all his life starting from his father and ending with Met. She was happy. She had lived everything she wanted to live, and she had done everything she wanted to do. She would prefer being successful to win the game and leave the remaining humans a better world where skinners and minders could live together. She was not successful to do that, but she had tried and she had always been happy for trying. She had tried to give everything she could find and take from the history and from the universe to other minders and skinners. If there had been something good in Meri's existence, that goodness should have been also transferred to other humans. The choice would be theirs after now. Meri was leaving remembering Bameri and Met, Annmeri and Bakara, Oria and many other skinners and minders. Most of them had not chosen their places consciously. Oria would probably not become a skinner if he had not lost his skin.

Meri suddenly felt Kara's lips. Meri had very few direct experience with Kara but she had witnessed many of her interesting designs through the skin interface she made. Kara was always designing wonderful scenes and finding very good starting points. It was surprising for Meri to feel the deepening pleasure in spite of her helpless position in front of Kara, as she got closer and placed her lips softly on Meri's lips. It was only a slight contact on their lips, Kara was waiting without proceeding with the kiss or touching Meri. She was just waiting and watching Meri's face. Meri would love to be free at that moment to be able to touch Kara and caress her at her sensitive points. But it was not possible to move and perform any action for Meri. Kara had fixed her with hidden bonds in space through her skin. Meri could only wait and see, feel, and live what Kara would do to her.

"These will be the final moments of your life," said Kara. "You are free to think anything you want. I will not punish you. You can think of Met or Oria while I am touching you. I will not punish you even if you do that, but I don't think you will be able to think about anything else after I start proceeding."

Meri did not talk and Kara was not expecting an answer. Kara had immediately started working on Met's Skin to contact with Meri. The two skins were experiencing a different type of connection. Merilia tried to imagine what Met and Kara had lived with eachother actually with these skins. Kara's Skin did not have an internal body. All the information sent to her skin interface were being processed by the perfect artificial intelligence system of their design. Bakara and Kara, they were both proud with the Central Intelligence Unit of their system. Annmeri, Met's mother, Meri's father, most of the minders had always been afraid of the consequences of an uncontrolled CIU. They had done everything to maintain a normal and organic life, but this was the point where they all reached.

Kara's movements, heat, and breaths had started to rise, but Meri was not feeling anything. The scenario was not lower from any of the previous experiences. On the contrary, it was much more powerful and interesting. However, in spite of the perfect affection of Kara, Meri was not feeling anything particular. All the actions of Kara's Skin reaching Meri through Met's Skin on her body, were translated as arbitrary touches when they reached to Meri's own skin and her body. Kara had noticed the distance between them and she was desperately trying to correct the program while she was working on Meri's Skin. As life went on, Meri felt bored about this odd game and she wanted it to come an end. If she would leave life, she would leave. There was no need to extend the game. Kara was probably planning to send Meri out from both systems after giving her a perfect orgasm, but she was even not able to bring her somewhere at least closer to that point. Meri started using her body to transfer messages to Kara through Met's Skin. It did not take much time for Kara to receive the pulses coming from Meri and continue the game as she had planned.

Kara was representing all the powers of the universe except life. She was trying to win the final victory with death. Meri was not able to see, understand, estimate, and feel the future. There was only a piece of idea in her mind written on the reflection of Met's beautiful and peaceful face.

"I am not this hair, I am not this skin. I am the spirit I live in."

THE SKIN WAR I, December 1st, 2083, Wednesday

Meri suddenly felt the extraordinary feeling on her skin, in her mind, in her internal and external connections, in her memories, in the sudden changes of the random flows of information, but particularly in the increase of Kara's image she noticed and witnessed in her existence. There was a peculiar movement in all activities. There was a rush to complete some levels quickly. The quantity of the active members in the system were increasing exponentially.

"This is a war," whispered Meri. "This is the final war. They are organizing to perform their final attack. If we can't find a way to create our defend front quickly, there will be no tomorrow. This is Kara's last move to win the game using everything she had built until now."

She felt a deep sorrow in her mind, she felt the fear of losing the life game at all points on her skin, she tried not to think of Met and that she could probably lose him forever after the final struggle, she did everything to concentrate on the attack and use everything she had learned about the universe and about Kara's system to protect the lives of billions believing in organic life. She could not be successful. She knew, she was sure that the only choice for protecting The Mind System was entering temporarily The Skin System, but it was not easy to make that decision. It was a great responsibility, a wrong move would destroy their future.

Meri looked at Met. She expected him to come back to the real world with all his memories and help him. She hoped him at least to support her with encouraging moves and words, hugs and kisses. The look on Met's face was really rosy. It was possible to see all the positive lights coming from the history of the humankind in Met's eyes. Knowing that she could never see Met again if Kara would win the game was taking all her energy from Meri's existence.

"I can't continue with all these in my mind," thought Meri. "I must be with Met now. I must have him in me. He must be with me in my final struggle, even he is not conscious about what he is living and what is being lived."

She looked in Met's beautiful eyes who was looking with the innocence of a child. She kissed his lips expecting a conscious response, but she did not wait for the responses and continued in her own way. Time was very limited. In fact, she could better have entered the Skin System as soon as she had noticed the signs of the final attack. She tried to convince herself that the minutes she would spend with Met just before joining the war would be a kind of preparation action to increase her strength and resistance levels to maximum. She was also not sure that she would find a way to put off Met's Skin after once she had it on. The idea of being locked in a skin forever was shaking all her sensitive points and making her weakness as if she had lost all her power. She was now confident that she had to be with Met before challenging Kara. She had to go Kara together with Met's goodness. It was not easy to win the game against Kara without the supports of both Oria and Met, and Meri was not sure about the levels of help she could receive from any of them. "I must trust in myself and the members of the Mind System. They all know how critical is our position, they will do all they can to help us."

Meri looked at Met and thought the first connection she had with him. The closeness of that session was sufficient to show Meri how right they were. They had found the meanings of their lives during a very short period, while they were communicating remotely with each other. It was a valuable intersection of time and space created remotely in their universes, it was not less than a direct interference of a skin to skin contact. They had felt the meanings of their organic bodies in the triggers of stimulation coming from each other's minds. Met was then trapped in a skin within Kara's Skin System, and difficult days had begun for Meri. She was finally successful to rescue Met from Kara, but the peace in their new life had not lasted long. After a wonderful period with perfect match of thoughts, feelings, and organic skins; Met had tried a new version of the memory module and everything was lost. Meri had never been able to understand why Met had made that unnecessary upgrade. She was suspecting that a devil designed and created by Kara could have been sent in some way to mislead Met. Meri had missed Met too much after the loss of his memory. The only way to continue her life had become remembering the short slices of life they had lived together with Met. She was also designing and adding new memories to her mind to make her experience richer. She would love to remember and live those memories again together with Met after he came back.

Meri got closer to Met and put her hands on his face. She kissed his lips again and moved his hands down to his shoulders and his arms. Met was waiting with the innocence of a child being happy for being loved. Meri looked at him expecting to see signs of stimulation and remembering but saw nothing. She would give up in case she was not at such a critical position. Knowing that this could be her last chance to be connected with Met in time and space axes, she forced herself to try again several times. She tried to remember the most sensitive points of Met and the movements he responded in the best way. She used her hands and lips carefully moving on Met's skin. The taste and touch of a natural skin were wonderful, and Met's skin was the best meaning Meri could have found in all her life. She was feeling on his natural skin goodness, pleasure, lust, finiteness, value, meaning, and all the concepts she had found, learned, and witnessed. "An artificial skin can never do this," she thought and moved her actions on his lower points. She caressed his chest, his hips, and his legs. She moved her hands to the upper parts of his legs starting from his knees. Met had always loved that. Meri looked at his face expecting to see a response. There was nothing particular. She continued. She arranged the positions of her head and body to reach the best contacts. She also changed Met's location and shape hoping him to respond better. After she prepared the scene, she tried to play the best game she had ever played. She expected it not to be the last game.

It was not as good as Meri expected but she did her best. After a while, she understood that the time was over and now she had to go. She tried to record every detail she had lived with Met in her memory, to remember forever. She was very happy to discover new types of connections between them within those several minutes. "The natural contact is the meaning of life," she thought. "It makes us as happy as the moments when we feel that we understand the universe." Met was now fresh and everywhere in her mind, at her skin, at every point of Meri's existence. Meri had touched every point on Met's own skin. They were together at a certain point of the space and time, they had lived that intersection together, Meri had loved the peak point at that moment. She was not sure how much Met was conscious about their existence. His eyes and face were happy, his body was relaxed and refreshed, he had told several beautiful words to Meri with wonderful tones, his skin had responded to some of Meri's actions, Meri had felt some of those moments with top pleasure, but she was still not sure that the experience was coming from Met's own memory.

Meri suddenly felt Oria's voice. "Meri, we are losing, come here, help me." Was this a good sign or a trick of Kara to force Meri for joining the game earlier before building the strategy and preparing the first level tactical plans? It was not possible to read the hidden tones in the voice of Oria generated digitally by his artificial skin. Meri had noticed some slight quavers, but these could also have been generated by the reality modules of the artificial intelligence system. Kara were carefully hiding the success levels achieved in different modules. The Mind System had spent great resources and long times to learn the features of Kara's reality modules. It was the last scene of the game, Meri had no choice other than joining the game.

"Wait for me Oria," she said. "I am coming, I am with you and I will always be with you."

With a sudden move, she took Met's Skin and applied the putting on procedure she had been carefully working on for months. She was now a part of Kara's Skin System.

Meri knew that she had very little time for finding Oria and initiating her actions she will perform to win the game. It was not much difficult to find out that Oria was together with Kara at her central location. It would be wonderful to win the game again by turning off the main power once more, but Meri was sure that almost all the security gaps had been worked carefully and remedied by Kara and her scientech teams. Meri had never been able to estimate the number of these teams and the population of the skinners included in these teams. The teams had been based on the previous teams of scientific research and technological application. Scientech teams were one of the most creative inventions of Bakara, and they had helped him a lot for winning the game against Anmeri. They were agile and virtual teams formed with real people from different locations and times. The artificial intelligence base at Bakara's times was primitive, Anmeri was easily responding to them with the specific superiorities of the human mind. But it was now not possible to find any consistent superiority in human minds. Any new idea created in any organic mind were easily and immediately sensed by The Skin Sytem and copied internally in their system to implement and initiate new methods of control. Both sides were trying to improve their security levels, but Bakara's Skin System was always in front of Anmeri's Mind System. Since they had the main power required to control matter, they were always limiting natural sources available to organic members of The Mind System. It was not possible to live safely in The Universe, without having the power of controlling matter. This had been discussed a lot between Bakara and Anmeri. Anmeri had done her best to create a new form of life based on energy only, without a need for matter form. After long and hard efforts, she had given up. She had thought "Why should we need new forms of life instead of living our organic lives already existing in the nature and in The Universe?" she had asked. She had concluded that creating a mind system based on energy was not better than a skin system controlling matter. They would all create limits and borders, they would distort organic life, they would reduce the value of the natural life." There would be no mind system in case Bakara had not insisted on a skin system. But he had already made his choice. So the war had begun and continued at different ways and levels. Now Meri was in the last battle between minders and skinners. She was strongly sensing that the party gaining and using the support of Oria would win the game.

Meri had not expected Oria to be so much happy when she saw her again. He ran towards her, knelt and kissed her hands. "Meri," he whispered. "I missed you so much, I missed our normal life. I missed life." Meri caressed his hair. "Oria," she said. "Life is difficult, I wish you were strong enough to survive better with and within your own skin. I wish you could use all the power of your mind."

Oria looked at deeply in Meri's eyes. There was an infinite sorrow and regret in his looks. He placed his head between Meri's legs, wrapped his arms around her waist and placed his hands on her hips, he moaned with a pleasure in his voice. "Oh Meri, Meri, Meri. Oh Meri, I missed you too much, I was not able to exist without you. Kara is now in her final attack. What will we do now?"

Meri did not know the answer of the question, but she replied confidently and calmly. It was the only choice to survive.

"We will penetrate in her system and we will win. We are life. She is death. We are all, she is none. She does not exist. Kara does not exist. There are only intelligent traces left by Bakara and Kara."

"How?"

Meri did not answer immediately. Oria was successful at asking creative and powerful questions at critical points, like all the members of Anmeri's system. In Kara's system, however, there were not questions. Asking questions was not allowed and askers were punished in case they had asked the question without taking prior authorization from Kara before asking.

"We will access the minds of the skinners. I am sure they will choose life."

This was not the answer of the question Oria had asked, and Meri already knew that. However, the technical answer of the question were complex, and mentioning about those details would not make Oria feel better. Oria looked in Meri's eyes hoping to find a real answer.

"I also know that they will choose life when they are allowed to make their own decisions with their free wills, but how will we do that? How will we remove the black effects of their artificial skins?"

Meri waited for a while. The message she would transfer with her words, her eyes, her hands, her skin, her body, her mind; the message she would transfer with all the details of her existence was critical. It would make Oria either believe in Meri and the future, or to see the impossibility of defeating Kara's system. Meri had to tell the best story she had been able to create in her life.

"My darling, Oria," she whispered. "I wish we had been living together at our home, and had never faced all those terrible memories. It was not our choice, it was not fate, it was also not a decision made by Kara. Life is a universal sum of individual actions and responses. Despite everything I had learned, I know that the parts I know are still only a very small part of the total. I tried to do my best to see and do what I can. I know and I am sure you also did the same. We are here now at a decision moment that will define the ways where we will go after. I trust life, I trust myself, I trust Met."

Meri noticed the change in Oria's face. It was a complicated feeling between a pleasure and sorrow, a respect and doubt, a love and hatred, a hope and despair, life and death. She had intentionally mentioned Met's name. Met and Meri together with Oria would represent almost all of the Skinners and Minders. They would be the meaning of life for everybody. Met and Meri had already accessed and reached many minds in The Skin System, but they still had to access new and different minds for the final victory. They had no means for directly accessing to them, the only solution was winning Oria and completing the access cycle with Oria's support. Meri thought if there could be any additional word to be told for convincing Oria, there were were not. She increased her skin contact with Oria to maximum pleasure level and whispered. "Oria, my love, I wish you can remember our wonderful moments, I wish you know and never forget how I enjoyed all the days we lived together, I wish you give a chance for also others to live a natural life, with natural and real humans, without being locked in a dead skin." She tried to affect Oria to feel and remember the positive feelings he had lived in the past. She kissed him and guided him to kiss her. She touched him and made him touch her. She tried to increase the moist heat hidden in her body and tried to make Oria see and feel it and live the same. Oria was too tired, too broken. His natural part had been almost lost. However, he was remembering the value of nature and his natural body, his natural skin, and his natural actions. There was a deep sorrow in his face.

"I wish I could live all those again," he said. "I wish others can live them again. I don't have a child and I can never have one. I do wish you and Met to have a child who will live in a peaceful and equal world, with wisdom and pleasure."

Meri did not lose time to dry her tears, she instantly accessed Oria's connections. She was aware that they had very little time near the decisive point to win the game. Meri diversely initiated the communication modules for discussions with skinners. She tried to locate skinners with organic skills of communication. It was not encouraging at the beginning, but the number of her friends started to increase stably after a while. Meri started determining communicators to initiate new discussions and observed their discussions carefully. She tried to change them. When there were people tending to change, she tried to control their actions and keep them silent for not being immediately located by Kara's monitoring system. After a while, she was able to determine leaders. She gave online fast trainings to all communicators and leaders. She emphasized the power of interchangeability and the importance of replace abilities of communicators and leaders with each other. She sent trial tasks and applied scenarios to test the performance of the new teams. When she was confident on the competence of the leaders and communication teams, the time for pushing the button to play the last game had come. The inevitably weak point of the plan was being noticed by Kara's System at an early point of propagation, but this was a challenge that should be faced. An early detection could force Meri to encounter a struggle with Kara before she became completely ready, but she had to accept that risk. It was not possible to live without taking risks.