The Star Whorl (The Totality Cycles Book 1) (4 page)

     :So, we gave it all up,
to spend our life time-currency in fulfillment, in pursuit of all that we
wished and dreamed, doing all the things that we all ever wanted to do. We have
taken that lesson, and made use of our most precious commodity, made the most
of ourselves, because we are free to do so.

     :Right?

    
Huh – so the latest
Reform to motivate the populace back into some semblance of a labor-reward
model has failed,
he mused, flicking his vuu’erio tennae. The rest of the
Sweeper’s words were like thorns in his mind. Here was the question – with life
and time being so precious, why was the populace squandering it? Did people
really need to have something to give their lives meaning, direction?

    
Is the populace meant to
be used by others, and without that exploitation, can their lives have meaning?

     Having no answers, he
continued sifting through the various accounts of the Gu’Anin Magistrate
Council’s Employment Reform. But the rewards had held no lasting fascination
for the jaded public, and while a small fraction of the population had given
the Reform a try, they had quickly become tired of the structured activities
and the remunerative compensations that they could obtain for themselves, once
the glyphs were known and could be reproduced. Since the Unveiling Event, no
glyph of something non-living could be kept veiled, or completely secret.
Maybe
that is why they are making such a transparent attempt to convince us that the
Unification has had negative consequences.
He ate as he trolled, searching
for other items of interest. The personal recounts of those who had tried the
Reform work-rewards system were amusing, but he was still vaguely disturbed.
Several such attempts to revitalize the world’s dead industries had been
instituted, but each one had failed.

    
:The Flutterer

     :I have read many of your
stories, your personal accounts of despondency. I cannot advise, nor would I
presume to try – I can only tell you what I have done with my freedom to do
nothing.

     :I have given myself
purpose. It may be frivolous, or silly, or even idiotic, but it drives me,
gives me something to do. I spend every waking time-mark in its pursuit. I want
to create beauty, something so beautiful that it will last the ages. I tried
the Employment Reform, but it interfered with my purpose, so I left, went back
to my pursuits. They tried very hard to convince me to stay, but beauty and its
creation is what I live for, and no reward they offered could replace it.

     Then there were somewhat
more disturbing tellings.

    
:Sleeping in the Outer
Limbs

     :The recruiters for the
new Employment Reform hassled me this turn. They wanted me to work, to spend my
time doing something ‘meaningful’. And I asked them, ‘Why should I?’ It is my
life, to do with as I wish, even if it means doing nothing at all. They told me
I could be ‘part of something greater’, and I asked them what was so great
about what they were a part of? They did not like that. They told me that I was
a drain on society, a parasite, that I was wasting my life away, and I said
that I do nothing but use Nil’Gu’vua, that is open to all citizens, and how
could that be a drain? Nil’Gu’vua is forever, it is all around, it is there,
for everyone, like air. Was I a drain on the air? They asked me one more time,
but not as nice, and I asked them why should I be the bottom of their power
structure, just so they could be the top? And why should I slave away for them,
like a mfanya, when I didn’t need their rewards, or the remuneration of leisure
time from doing their work, when I already had all the leisure time I wanted,
to waste or whatever I wanted to do? It is my life, to waste. And the work they
offered benefitted no one but them, to once again set up a competitive system
that chewed through lives and supported an authoritarian power structure much
like those of the Malkia. I told them to go away, I was busy sleeping.

     :They didn’t like that.
But they went away.

     There were many such personal
accounts, and they made Kreceno’Tiv more than a little uneasy.

    
Why the persistence?
he
wondered, clacking his elytra-pace as he stuffed another roti-wrap into his
mouth. He could not seem to eat them fast enough to quiet the gnawing at his
middle.
Why not just leave people to their own non-pursuits? Is it so
devastating that no one wants to work because they don’t have to?

     Sighing, he looked at the
platter, and saw that it was empty.
Vuu-blitz
,
he thought,
repeating the glyph that his mother had used and filling the platter again. He
took out his assignments and began with the hardest, while his mind was
relatively fresh. And it was not long before Ro-Becilo’Ran contacted him over
an assignment in one of the lectures that they shared.

Whorl Ten

     Kreceno’Tiv sighed. He was
irritated with himself, and things in general. It was the end of the five-turn,
and Ro-Becilo’Ran had convinced him to come back to the line for the
Bustani,
for another fruitless dark-turn of standing and waiting to get in with little
hope of actually doing so. His friend had waved away his protest of not wanting
to cross paths with Gotra Pelani’Dun.

     “You can’t avoid her forever,
especially not when she’s in most of your lectures,” his friend had laughed.
“You might as well get used to her being around. Just take reassurance in the
knowledge that in Tertius, you can change any lecture that she happens to be
in, so that you won’t have to interact with her at all.”

     “That doesn’t help me now,”
he had groused, but had given in when Ro-Becilo’Ran became insistent. Unless
there was another tracking glyph set on one of his other friends, hopefully the
chances of seeing her would remain vanishingly small.

     His hopes had been in vain.
Somehow, she and her group of friends were directly ahead of his group in the
line, and he saw why immediately – many of the girls that associated closely
with Gotra Pelani’Dun had formed attachments with males from his group of
friends. He did not comment on any of it, only moved to the opposite end of the
merging groups, trying to stay as far away from her as possible without making
it too apparent that he was doing so.

     Gotra Pelani’Dun, however,
seemed as determined to get near him as he was to keep his distance. It was
like a slow, ridiculous dance, and he did not relish doing it all the dark-time
that they were wasting in the line.

     Ro-Becilo’Ran edged nearer
to him, detaching himself from Ropali Galici’Bel long enough to spare him a
word.

     “She’s here, as you feared,”
he said, casting an eye and vuu’erio at Gotra Pelani’Dun, who had somehow moved
closer, seemingly by chance.

     “I noticed,” Kreceno’Tiv
replied sourly, scowling. “I don’t find this particularly fun, Becil, though it
might be high amusement for the rest of you.”

     “Oh ha, it’s no fun for me,”
Ro-Becilo’Ran acquitted himself, though the laugh in his voice gave lie to the
words. “So you’ll be leaving, I take it?”

     Kreceno’Tiv moved his
shoulders, irritated. “Why do we come here, Becil? We never even get close to
the entrance, much less into the
Bustani
itself. Why do we even bother
with this?”

     “What else is there to do
that we haven’t done a thousand times?” Ro-Becilo’Ran countered. “All the old
entertainments hold no savor, and there aren’t any new ones being made,
anymore. We could make our own, but why bother? This is all that there really
is, Krece. What alternative do we have to the
Bustani
?”

    
Is this all that there
is, though?
Kreceno’Tiv wondered, hearing and feeling the familiar despair
in his friend’s words. Was Ro-Becilo’Ran so far sunk into that despair that he
would rather waste marks and marks standing in an endless line than face the
prospect of having nothing unique to do?

    
Am I?
he asked
himself, even as he held in a wince at a too-familiar chemi-scent, one that he
never wanted to experience again. He unconsciously moved, distancing himself
from the sphere of its influence. Ro-Becilo’Ran gave him a half-amused,
half-sympathetic look as he resumed his place beside his pre-mate. He raised a
hand in presumed farewell.

     Irritated beyond
rationality, Kreceno’Tiv flicked a vuu’erio tennae at him and turned to move
from the line. But he was brought up short by Gotra Pelani’Dun, who had placed
herself right into his path.

     “Oh ha,” she said brightly,
as if surprised to see him, as if she had not been subtly pursuing him all the
time he had been there. “I didn’t expect to see you here!”

     “I was just leaving,” he
said brusquely, angling his body to move past her. He felt the response to her
Gotra-pheromones, and hated the feeling. He purposely resisted it, fending off
the glyph of it from entangling with his. He was quick enough that there was no
outward change to his physique.

     “So soon? The dark-time has
just started!” she protested, moving subtly to intercept him. The glome of her
chemi-scent strengthened. “Why come all the way here, just to leave almost
immediately?”

     “I was wondering the same
thing myself,” he near-growled, casting a dark look over his shoulder at Ro-Becilo’Ran,
who was studiously ignoring the conversation.

     “So stay,” she said
cajolingly. “We should talk, you and I.” Her large eyes became beseeching in
the way that he used to find so enticing, but just made him feel irritated now.

     He sneered. “Nothing to talk
about.” He turned and worked his way around to the edge of the boulevard, where
he could glyph-conjure his transport. She did not follow, as near as he could
sense, though he did not turn to look. The ride home was long, even for the
single transport, and he vowed not to be talked into going back to the line.

    
I won’t believe that
there is absolutely nothing else worth doing,
he thought, leaning back and
closing his eyes. But the despair, ever-present, whispered otherwise.

Whorl Eleven

     Kreceno’Tiv got off the
Secondus transport after Ro-Becilo’Ran. But this time he paid attention to how
the artifact-glyph of it changed as he disembarked, denoting his interaction
with it coming to an end, as his Long-Travel Proctor had made a parallel
between the two. Capturing the change on his view-glyphographic to study later,
he waved to his friend, went inside and immediately started on his assignments,
including the comparison between the transport glyph and the incomplete
Long-Travel glyph.

     After a late meal with his
parents, he went back to his data-trolling once he had finished his assignments
and had gone through his exercise regimen.

    
The assignments took longer
than usual
,
because of that report,
he thought.
I’ll have to go
to sleep soon and I want to finish checking my forums before that.
As he
sifted, he noted something – not quite right in the Spheres. Parts of the data
interlinks had gone – dark. Not many, and not very large, but there were
definite absences, unexplained and unremarked. The Crier was gone, as was the
Happy Hedonist. As were others, others who were not as verbose or profound, but
just as prolific.

    
And almost all in the
lower ability strata
, he thought, perusing the subSpheres. Very few others
on the links were talking about it, and none in the higher strata – for though
the Unification had destroyed the rigid separation between castes in the real
world, in the dataSpheres interlink those divisions were very much alive, and
in evidence by the way users of the Spheres tended to group and affiliate
themselves. Anyone could visit any stratum they wished, but there were strong
discouragements against that, cliques and groups tending to passively exclude
those not like themselves by virtue of topics they chose to focus on, and the
responses to comments contrary to their views. There were those, like himself,
who dabbled in all the strata, treading lightly and saying little, merely
observing and consuming views and experiences without sharing their own. They
were called Alighters or Sifters, as opposed to those who immersed themselves
fully in their strata or famiya or Genii interests, called Burrowers.

     And in the lower strata,
certain notable voices and commenters had gone silent, without explanation or
notice of absence given. There was no furor about this, at least not yet.

    
No, no outcry, just
others eager to take their place in prominence,
he thought, knowing that
the same would have been true for those in higher strata, had they also gone
silent. But the silencing was not happening at the higher strata.

    
Why is it happening at
all, but especially at the bottom Nil’Gu’ua levels, which is far too
reminiscent of the times of the Malkia, to my thinking?
he wondered,
feeling a cold, slimy apprehension lodge in his chest.
They were not
espousing any radical or seditious ideas, or anything close to that. So, what
has happened to them?

     His discreet inquiries
turned up nothing besides derision by those who had moved into prominence with
the absence of the personalities that he had noted. Discouraged and tired, he
de-Nil-ized his view-glyphographic and went to seek his own rest.

Whorl Twelve

     The Mji’Hive boulevards were
teeming with people at almost all levels. Only the ancient sub-Hives that
housed the Gu’Anin Magistrate Council and the local division of the Solidarim
were off-limits, forbidden for loiters to cohabit. From the Outer Limbs to the
lowest landform, Bolsho Undum, the crush was a comfortable, heavy, familiar blanketing
presence, weighing down his thoughts. But the despair made the crush stifling
in some ways, compounding one sense of useless listlessness with another until
the whole thing seemed to weigh on the mind like the belly of the swollen sky. Kreceno’Tiv
brooded as he stared out of the transport window membrane. He made his eyes
semi-compound, saw the tangled masses of glyphs of the crowds with his
secondary retinas, though no one individual stood out, their personal glyphs
held private. But their mere presence had a cumulative effect, and the overall
glyph of the city was alive with the glitter-dun miasma of the people. He could
feel the effects moving wet-chill over him, turning his mood darker, grimmer,
his thoughts spiny. The despair was almost palpable, astringent-bitter to his
mind. It was like a stalling of the soul, a stagnation of self, endless turns
of dissipation without passionate pursuit or purpose to give a million lives
meaning. He leaned back and closed his eyes, for the translation between
Junction levels was, as usual, long and boring, with only the Guhan Sun-form to
look at, and the boulevards on both landforms were congested within the Mji’Hive
sub-Hives with the sheer number of idle citizens. Citizens not doing anything
or going anywhere, just sitting or standing and watching whatever was going on
around them. The static crush inevitably spilled out onto the levels of the boulevard
itself, slowing the flow of transports. And over it all, the despair seethed
with a life of its own.