Exurbia: A Novel About Caterpillars (An Infinite Triptych Book 1) by Alex McKechnie Page B

devoted were going about their evening chores completely oblivious to the scene in Fortmann’s chambers. Would they have been bothered if they knew? It might degrade his status as a man of purity, but they would accept it eventually. There is nothing in the Chapter’s charter which stipulates abstinence.
    ‘Things are coming together, aren’t they?’ he said. ‘Really coming together.’
    She nodded.
    ‘Everything is aligning.’
    She nodded again. He is in a cultish mood now.
    ‘Just a few more moves, and we’ll be in a winning position. It doesn’t matter what they do after that, it’ll be too late.’
    ‘After 261?’ she said.
    ‘After 261.’
    ‘But the syndicate,’ she said. She had often thought it, but never found the right occasion to put it to him. Now, naked in his chambers, it seemed ridiculous not to speak her mind.
    ‘What about the syndicate?’ he said, apparently entertained.
    ‘Won’t they send out a military unit to stop us? They could just vapourise the planet if they wanted.’
    He turned to check if she was being sincere. ‘You surprise me,’ he said.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Well, what do you think Exurbia will look like, after the Up?’
    She shrugged.
    ‘Tell me. Honestly.’
    ‘I think,’ she said, carefully, ‘that the first thing to go will be national divisions, then personal divisions.’
    He nodded. ‘Go on.’
    ‘And then there won’t be any need for Governance and Governance will dissolve. There might be some last minute military resistance from the Bucephalian forum, but it won’t be of any consequence.’
    ‘Why?’ he said, stroking her hair then. ‘Why won’t it be of any consequence?’
    ‘Because most of the citizens by that point will have fused into a single conscious unity, and that unity will have control of the planet’s defences.’
    He nodded emphatically. ‘You’re damn right,’ he said. ‘And the wiremind will have built defences we can’t even dream of, and we’ll have control of those too. Now imagine some pushy military unit turns up from the syndicate hub. They wouldn’t last ten seconds in local space against whatever technology we’ll be using by then. We’ll wipe them out like insects.’
    He was laughing then, his eyes wide.
    ‘Hell-haunted insects, we’ll rip them apart before they can even get near the planet. And they’ll send another wave, a warfleet, and we’ll rip that apart too, child’s play. And do you know what comes after that?’
    She shook her head slowly.
    ‘We stretch out our fingers across Exurbic space, out beyond the solar system, out to the syndicate hub and we give them a proviso. They can either join the Up, or face extinction.’
    ‘ Extinction?’
    ‘Extinction. They’re outmoded, obsolete. They’ll only initiate little pathetic uprisings every few years or so. Most of them won’t join us out of choice. They’ll need persuading. And what better incentive than eternal life?’
    ‘Eternal life,’ she said. ‘Or extinction?’
    ‘Just like the gods of old Erde. Eternal life or extinction.’
    Is he addled? It’s so hard to tell on nights like these.
    Fortmann sipped at his zapoei and stroked the girl's hair. Everything was orienting now. Unfolding , as the poem went, just as it should.
    ‘What do you think it will feel like?’ she said in a small voice.
    ‘What?’
    ‘When it happens. Stratification, the Up, all of it. What will it feel like?’
    ‘It will be sublime.’
    ‘Will it hurt?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Will we die?’
    He sat up. ‘Die?’
    She nodded.
    ‘Of course not. Haven’t you been listening to a word I’ve said?’
    ‘I’ve been listening. But we’ll just be a drop in an ocean, won’t we? We’ll just be part of a huge whole. What room is there for me in there? What room is there for a single mind in a thing like that?’
    These are her true colours then , he thought. This is the timid little girl beneath the assured and taciturn exterior. He took his glass with him to the