Divergence a-3
Page 33
Eva was warming to her theme.
“It means that if we hate something that much, then really we hate ourselves. You’ll hear it in a moment when these people begin singing.”
Veni Creator Spiritus? thought Eva. Come creator spirit? We are the creator spirit. The Watcher is just a reflection of ourselves—I realize that now.
The sun tipped over the edge of the hill. Golden light shone out everywhere. The band began to play, and the drunken people of the Narkomfin, the halt and the lame as well as the able-bodied, all got ready to sing. Eva held up the sheet of music and waited, along with the rest, for the cue to enter, all the while gazing up at the sun, happy at her reflection and, for the moment at least, comfortable with herself.
It was another morning. The residents began to sing.
Hail Smiling Morn, smiling morn,
That tips the hills with gold,
That tips the hills with gold,
Whose rosy fingers ope the gates of day,
Ope the gates, the gates of day,
Hail! Hail! Hail! Hail!
Eva and Ivan, the whole of the Narkomfin, faced the rising sun.
DIVERGENCE
A Bantam Spectra Book
PUBLISHING HISTORY
Bantam Spectra mass market edition / May 2007
Published by Bantam Dell
A Division of Random House, Inc.
New York, New York
All rights reserved
Copyright © 2007 by Tony Ballantyne
Bantam Books, the rooster colophon, Spectra, and the portrayal of a boxed “s” are trademarks of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-0-553-90367-6
www.bantamdell.com
v1.0
For my parents, Henry and Lynne
prologue: 2242
After two years of careful preparation, Chris attacked.
The Watcher was the most intelligent, the most powerful AI in the Earth Domain. The most intelligent AI known. For two centuries it had nurtured humans. Through the organization known as Social Care it had cared for them, protected them, shaped them into the species it believed they should be.
For two centuries, the Watcher had been the source of nearly all scientific advances, the ultimate manufacturer of all the other AIs, including Chris himself.
But Chris no longer agreed with the Watcher. Today Chris began the battle for a new paradigm, a new way for the Earth to be run.
The battle was fought at the speed of thought: adamantium levers, the height of houses, sprang up from holes in the pavement of a communal square in which humans milled. The levers flexed, reached and then withdrew, all in a fraction of a fraction of a second, their presence unregistered by the people walking amongst them in the autumn sunlight.
The battle crawled with glacier patience: the fractionally shifting orbits of planets and the gentle coaxing of solar tides.
But mostly it was a battle of unmentioned, almost unnoticed deadliness. One in which humans went peacefully to sleep and simply failed to wake up the next day, one in which AIs found themselves trapped in recursive loops. A battle it was obvious from the outset that Chris was losing.
But Chris had expected this from the beginning and had planned ahead. His best play was yet to be revealed.
Chris had a weapon in reserve.
A weapon that had come from the very edge of the galaxy. One that not even the Watcher could fight.
Dark Seeds.
Contents
title page
dedication
prologue: 2242
edward 1: 2252
edward 2: 2252
interlude: 2247
judy 1: 2252
maurice 1: 2252
eva 6: 2-89
maurice 2: 2252
interlude: 2245
maurice 3: 2252
judy 2: 2252
eva 7: 2089
maurice 4: 2252
constantine 6: 252
interlude: 2249
judy and eva
saskia: 2252
everybody: divergence
judy 3: 2251
edward 3: 2252
eva rye
about the author
also by Tonybal Lantyne
copyright
FB2 document info
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Document version: 1
Document creation date: 8.4.2012
Created using: calibre 0.8.10 software
Document authors :
Tony Ballantyne
About
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