by Gavin Smith
‘Typical hacker nerds,’ Mudge muttered. ‘Invent the system but can’t think of what to do with it.’
‘Are you just here to piss everyone off?’ Morag demanded.
‘No,’ Mudge snapped. ‘I’m trying to get some of you to think.’
‘So what would you have God do?’ Rannu asked. Mudge was silent.
‘Will your god obey us?’ Balor asked.
‘If we want it to,’ Pagan said.
‘What do you mean "if"?’ Mudge asked.
‘That’s a lot of power to wield,’ Pagan said.
‘So who else do we trust to wield it?’ Mudge demanded.
‘It could be autonomous,’ Pagan said.
‘So we give what is effectively an alien information form autonomy as well as omnipotence in the net?’ Mudge asked.
‘I am against that,’ Balor said simply and forcefully.
‘So back to my original question: who do you trust?’ Pagan asked.
‘Me,’ Mudge said.
‘Brilliant. We’ll just hand total control of the net to an alcoholic junkie with no social skills,’ Pagan suggested.
‘I have social skills and you could do worse.’
‘I wanna see Mudge’s social skills,’ Morag interjected, grinning.
‘It’s not Christmas,’ I told her, also smiling. Some of the tension was beginning to bleed off.
‘Few people are worthy of my social skills,’ Mudge grumbled. ‘So who’s in control? You?’ he asked Pagan.
Pagan shook his head, flailing his dreadlocks around. ‘No, I don’t trust myself, and I wouldn’t trust the circle that made it. I wouldn’t even trust Morag,’ he said. I glanced over at Morag, who didn’t even look slightly offended.
‘Why not?’ Gibby asked. ‘You seem all right, a bit cracked but a nice enough guy,’ he drawled.
‘He helped make God; he probably helped come up with the idea in the first place. Clearly he’s a fucking megalomaniac with a god complex,’ Mudge said.
Pagan glanced at him irritably. ‘I’m not sure that I completely agree with Mudge’s diagnosis but that amount of power would certainly provide temptations that I don’t think I could control,’ he said.
‘Like taking over the security lenses in the changing room for the Austin Firecrackers’ cheerleaders,’ Buck said. He was obviously thinking out loud. We all took a moment to look at him. He raised an eyebrow and nodded sagely.
‘Yes, that would be the extent of my ambitions if I had that degree of power,’ Pagan said.
‘I’ll do it,’ said Balor.
Morag, Pagan and I all said no at once.
‘I’m serious. I have experience of command, and humanity needs a strong leader,’ he said. I think he was serious.
‘Balor, that is not going to happen,’ Pagan said.
Balor turned to fix him with his uncovered eye. Pagan didn’t flinch. ‘Only the strong should lead,’ Balor said. ‘Do you see anyone stronger?’ I couldn’t help glancing at Gregor, who was just watching the exchange, his head cocked at an odd angle.
‘No,’ Morag said.
Balor turned his fearsome head to look at her. ‘Why is that, little girl?’ he asked dangerously. I was really beginning to worry about Balor’s attitude towards all this.
‘I notice I’m just a whore or a little girl whenever the menfolk don’t want to listen to what I have to say, but isn’t the whole point of this to not have people like you in charge? Haven’t we had enough of warriors being in command?’
‘Arguably the problem is we haven’t had enough warriors in command,’ I said.
Morag looked confused.
‘Because if we had warr— soldiers in command then they would be less likely to send people off to die needlessly because they would know what it was like,’ Pagan explained. ‘Though historically it hasn’t always quite worked that way.’ He turned to Balor. ‘The problem is, you’re a good leader, but you would always negotiate from a position of strength and your opinions on people living and dying are a little ... unorthodox.’ Though to give Balor credit, at least he wasn’t casual about it.
‘Yeah, but he has a point,’ Mudge said. ‘Humanity needs strong leadership. I mean who here doesn’t believe in an interventionist god?’ I put my hand up. Nobody else did but Buck and Gibby at least looked confused. I was surprised I was the only one.
‘Lot of believers in the room,’ I muttered.
‘Isn’t this where God went wrong?’ Mudge asked. ‘He told us we had to have faith but didn’t help us on the ground in the fight for survival where it would’ve mattered. We can do something about it: we can use the net to take over other systems like the orbitals, put us or God.in control and show people the way ...’ he said, petering out towards the end. Presumably he must’ve known how he was sounding.
‘And the way is?’ Pagan asked.
‘Get rid of the Cabal, start delivering food and resources and medical care to the people who need it, stop tyranny, that kind of thing,’ he said, though I don’t think he was even convincing himself.
‘I don’t think you’ve thought this through,’ Pagan said.
‘Well, I wasn’t expecting to have to set the parameters for a new god when I got up this afternoon,’ Mudge snapped back.
‘Surely we would become the new tyrants?’ Gibby surprised me by pointing out.
Mudge considered this. ‘Maybe so, but I’d rather have a benevolent fascist than a greedy one in control. We can’t leave this down to people, we can’t just show them the way. That’s been tried by religions throughout history and people fucked it up and we ended up with the FHC.’
‘We’re only making God, not creating a new religion,’ Pagan said, smiling.
‘Really? Didn’t you want to be high priest? Isn’t that why you’re so jealous of the high priestess over there?’ Mudge asked. I saw Pagan’s face darken. Morag was glancing between the two of them.
‘Besides, if people fuck it up then isn’t that an argument for making it autonomous,’ Gregor said.
‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’ Mudge said.
‘Yes, I’d like to get out of this smelly cargo hull and get on with ruling the world, if that’s all right with you,’ Gregor replied sarcastically. If he was anything like the old Gregor then he must be pretty pissed off because he rarely used sarcasm.
‘It’s an argument for a strong leader,’ Balor said.
‘We should protect, not control,’ Rannu said, meeting Balor’s eye and holding it. After several moments of warrior bullshit Balor finally nodded. Mudge shook his head.
‘Whatever. That doesn’t change the fact that if you want something done you have to do it yourself. Not set some vague guidelines and hope that everyone interprets it right. I’m sorry, kids, but humanism and being nice isn’t going to save the day. You want to stop the war, then control the weapons and be prepared to use them because his lot,’ he said, nodding towards Gregor, ‘might not be so quick to down tools as we’ve been led to believe.’
‘Yeah, if we think like you then we’ll want to take control of you first,’ Gregor spat.
‘I’m not convinced that’s not what you’re trying to do at the moment,’ Mudge retorted.
‘We’ve told you that’s not what’s happening,’ Morag said.
‘As far as we know, you’ve been co-opted by one of them. You’ve said you’re on their side. How are we supposed to believe what you say?’ Mudge asked.
‘And me? Am I co-opted?’ Pagan asked.
Mudge considered this. ‘No,’ he said finally, ‘you’re just a deluded old man.’ For just a second I saw the stricken look on Pagan’s face, then he was back to looking angry.
‘I’m sick of being controlled,’ I said.
‘Which is great, but what are the options?’ Mudge asked. ‘Obviously humans trying to sort it out themselves doesn’t work.’
‘How is that obvious?’ I asked. ‘It’s having people like the Cabal in control that doesn’t work - well for us and apparen
tly the majority of people. They would probably consider themselves strong leaders. I know Rolleston would.’
‘So we have to be more benevolent than those arseholes, look out for everyone, not just ourselves,’ Mudge said.
‘Maybe that’s how it would start. Look, we’ve abdicated responsibility to our leaders for too long; we need to take responsibility for ourselves,’ I told him.
‘Which sounds great but is meaningless in terms of implementing it,’ Mudge said.
‘We don’t implement anything,’ I said. ‘We just tell the truth.’
‘What do you have in mind?’ Pagan asked, taking an interest.
‘Starting with the war, we have God reveal every secret there is on the net. Programme it to reveal the objective truth to the best of its abilities. We then have it so it can arrange a system-wide and completely secure referendum—’
‘Tyranny by majority,’ Mudge pointed out.
‘Got a better idea?’ I asked.
‘Take control, murder the Cabal, negotiate peace with Them and then try and make things fairer,’ Mudge said.
‘I think you’re forgetting who you’re talking to. If you take control of the net the first thing you’ll do is have a crate of vodka and a crate of drugs delivered to you before continuing your quest for the perfect prostitute,’ I pointed out.
‘Shame your mum’s dead,’ Mudge said and grinned. I felt a surge of anger at his attempt at humour but let it pass.
‘Do you really want to rule the world, Mudge?’ Gregor asked gently. I saw Mudge falter.
‘Well ... I thought, not me but...’ he said.
‘Who then?’ I asked. ‘We’re it, man. I ain’t doing it, Pagan won’t, you don’t trust Gregor or Morag. Balor’s a psychotic. No offence.’
‘Offence taken,’ Balor said quietly.
‘Rannu?’ I asked.
‘I don’t want to,’ Rannu said.
‘That leaves Buck and Gibby,’ I replied.
‘Hell yeah!’ Buck said. ‘I always knew I’d amount to something.’
‘He’s not serious,’ Gibby said. Buck looked genuinely disappointed.
‘Do you have any idea how dangerous telling people the truth about everything would be?’ Balor asked quietly.
‘He’s right,’ Pagan added. ‘Lies are used for protective purposes as well as to deceive. This could - this will - cause chaos.’
‘It will tear our society apart,’ Balor said and then grinned. ‘I’m warming to this plan.’
‘I don’t care,’ I said and poured myself another drink. ‘You’re right about lies, but we need to grow up sometimes, and as for our society, what we have now’s not good enough.’
‘But—’ Mudge began.
‘We could argue about this from now until the Cabal finds us. If this works it will mean a huge change for everyone. We could never cover every argument and counter-argument. Either we act or we don’t act,’ Rannu said.
‘But we haven’t come to a decision,’ Pagan said.
‘We’ve got two ideas: either we use God to control the net or we programme God to tell everyone the truth about everything,’ Morag said.
‘And destroy society,’ Mudge added.
‘You value tyranny by majority so much, let’s vote on it,’ Balor said, his voice all but a whisper now.
Morag shrugged. ‘All those in favour of ruling the net?’ she asked.
Buck’s hand shot up. After some consideration Gibby’s went up as well, then Balor’s. I watched Mudge struggle but he didn’t put up his hand.
‘All those in favour of telling the truth?’ Morag asked. I put my hand up; so did Morag. Rannu predictably followed her. Gregor put his hand up as well. Pagan was still thinking. Mudge just shook his head. Finally Pagan put his hand up.
‘So whatever happens, it wasn’t your decision?’ Pagan said to Mudge.
‘Damn straight, just abrogating my responsibility again,’ he said, staring at me.
‘What about the Demiurge?’ I asked Pagan.
‘What about it? If they meet, I have no idea what will happen.’
‘We could programme God to resist it?’ Morag suggested.
‘Should we?’ Pagan asked.
‘Yes,’ I said. The others nodded.
‘Do Rolleston and his people know about God?’ Mudge asked.
‘We’ve no reason to believe so, unless he had intelligence resources in New York,’ Pagan answered.
Balor shook his head. ‘Our discussion was clean, unless Rannu reported in before he changed sides,’ he said.
‘No, I always keep stories about my targets trying to create God out of my official reports. It makes me sound less insane,’ Rannu said without a trace of humour.
‘Besides, who’d believe it?’ I asked. ‘So as far as we know, the Cabal has no reason to rush Demiurge into the net?’ Pagan and Gregor nodded. ‘Will they respond with Demiurge?’
‘That may be the only thing capable of destroying the net,’ Morag said. ‘It would be a very destructive fight and they would have little to gain.’
I could see that Pagan wasn’t convinced but he didn’t say anything.
‘So how long to set God’s parameters?’ I asked.
‘Three to maybe four hours’ work,’ Morag said. Pagan nodded in a resigned manner.
‘Then what?’ Mudge asked. ‘You just release it into the net?’
Pagan considered this. ‘That’s one way of doing it, but it would take a while because of its size, and during the initial stages it would be potentially vulnerable. A node of some kind, a place capable of downloading huge amounts of information very quickly, would be ideal, but we’d have to do it at source.’
‘Like a site?’ I asked. Pagan shook his head.
‘Like a media node?’ Mudge asked.
‘Perhaps,’ Pagan said. Mudge grinned.
‘Mudge?’ I said. He looked over at me with a raised eyebrow. ‘I don’t want to kill anyone else.’ He nodded.
Morag was staring at me.
25
Atlantis
Casually dressed and heavily armed, I had more drugs in me than in a Carrion’s dispensary; just enough to keep me upright, make the pain tolerable and stop the nausea from overwhelming me. I leant against the transport cockpit’s door frame. Gibby’s hands moved across the keyboard, playing something almost bluesy, Buck accompanying him softly on the guitar.
Through the window I could see our lights play over the reinforced concrete of the Spoke as Gibby used the enormous structure to guide his ascent. Below us we could see the Mountain Princess, docked close to several similarly sized ore transports, becoming smaller and smaller.
Morag came and stood by me. Pagan was in the back taking care of Atlantis air traffic control. He and Morag had spent the last six hours setting God’s parameters and getting the program ready to run. The rest of us had spent it sleeping and prepping kit in preparation for Mudge’s half-arsed plan. I’d thrown up some blood as well. I wasn’t sure how real any of this was at the moment - me dying, God, any of it. I think I was just functioning on nerves, a cocktail of drugs and good whisky. The good whisky was almost finished.
Morag was looking out. Light shone through windows in the Spoke and from its aircraft hazard lights, and searchlight beams stabbed high into the night sky. We passed the landing decks growing out from the tower like fungus. We passed balconies of rich revellers who waved at us, unaware that if even half of what Pagan and Morag had said was true then their world was going to be changed tonight. We manoeuvred past other transports, many of them much larger than ours. We passed copters, aircars and various other aircraft, though we kept well clear of shuttle air paths. We rose past factory levels, shopping levels, garishly lit entertainment levels and accommodation levels. We passed huge viz screens mostly showing adverts for things that nobody but Balor could have afforded, and if he wanted he would’ve stolen them anyway. On one of the screens there was footage from the war but you couldn’t see the faces of the soldiers. Tha
t was good. I didn’t want to see the suffering faces of people I could be about to betray. Morag took it all in with a near-fixed expression of wonder on her face. I split my time between looking out the window at the tower of light and looking at her.
The Spoke was suddenly obscured by cloud. I heard the engines of the transport change tone as Gibby and Buck pushed it back further from the Spoke until the aircraft hazard lights were just a glow in the distance. I knew the transport’s sensors and their vehicle interface software would have created a three-dimensional topographical map of the Spoke which they were using to pilot. I heard a sigh from Morag. She turned to head back into the cargo bay.
‘Wait,’ I said. She stopped, turned, and I nodded out the window. When we rose out of the clouds, shaking off the last wispy tendrils of water vapour, Atlantis was a thin neon tower against the deep-blue backdrop of the night sky. It was reaching up as far as the eye could see towards space. Morag craned her neck to look up through the clear composite bubble of the cockpit. I was glad I saw this before I died. I was glad Morag saw this before she died. I wondered about the people who could afford to live here. Did they still appreciate this or was it all just commonplace to them? I hope they still appreciated it. It didn’t bode well for their souls if they didn’t feel awe at this feat of engineering and beauty.
There was less traffic up here, though more of it was security. These were the executive levels - various corporate enclaves, office and living spaces in the same areas. Higher up were the lift docks and more landing areas for the heavy commercial traffic. I heard the turbines whine again and Gibby and Buck’s music change as the transport pushed back even further from the Spoke. Looking up I felt I was looking at the edge of space. Using my optics I could just about see where the building ended and there was only the cable structure leading to orbit, High Atlantis and the asteroid tether.
‘See it?’ Gibby asked Morag, and pointed upwards. She looked up. I couldn’t make out what he was talking about.
‘No,’ she said, her face screwing up in concentration. Buck’s tune changed, as did the display overlaid on the cockpit windscreen. It showed the same part of the Spoke but now much magnified. I could see the huge multi-storeyed elevator sliding down the cable at speed. It was lit up like a Christmas tree. I’d seen Christmas trees on vizzes.
