Avatars of Anasazi Indians walked through the doorway bearing baskets. Others moved through the rooms on their daily business, speaking to one another in their native tongue. Children ran past Sebeck, laughing. He could hear water flowing and song. Anasazi civilization had come back to life around them.
Price whistled behind him. “O-M-F-G ...”
Sobol’s avatar appeared to gaze approvingly on the scene.
“This structure contained six hundred rooms and rose as high as six stories. It was the tallest man-made construct in North America until the steel girder buildings of Chicago in the 1880s. The Anasazi supplied it with a network of eighty-foot-wide irrigation canals. They built four hundred miles of ruler-straight roads linking their capitol to seventy-five outlying communities. They flourished here for centuries.”
Sobol walked up to Sebeck and leaned on his cane. “Why did they perish, Sergeant? And so suddenly at the height of their achievements?”
Sebeck turned to observe the spectral avatars of ancient Anasazi priests coming into the great room in a procession, chanting. Like long departed spirits.
Sobol moved to let them pass. The priests didn’t notice him or Sebeck, but continued chanting as a spectral fire raged in the central fire pit, casting shadows that did not include either Sebeck or Sobol.
Sobol watched the priests closely. “Their fate holds important lessons for twenty-first-century man—because we are not exempt from nature’s laws. When the survival strategy of a civilization is invalidated, in all of human history none have ever turned back from the brink. When presented with disruptive change, without exception they perish.”
Sobol raised his arms, and with a wave of his hands the entire D-Space scene vanished—leaving only the real-world ruins again. And silence.
Sobol walked up to a ruinous window and looked out across the moonlit desert landscape. “But Anasazi civilization encompassed only this small region. By contrast our industrial civilization encompasses the entire earth. And should it falter, the resulting conflicts have the capacity to exterminate all human life.”
Sobol gestured where the Indian priests had stood just moments before. “They made a simple enough mistake. The same one we’re making. They founded their society on resource extraction, and in doing so, inflated their population beyond the carrying capacity of the land. They cut down all the trees and expanded arable land with irrigation projects. Until finally there were no more trees. And their topsoil washed away. And when drought came, their highly centralized society fell apart in bloodshed in a few short years.”
Sobol walked to the edge of the now cold fire pit and poked it with his illusory cane. “Instead of adapting, their leaders clung to power and strove instead to be the last ones to starve to death. The Mayan civilization in South America did the same, and I expect our own civilization will do likewise. The people behind the modern global economy will prevent any meaningful change until it’s too late.”
The avatar looked to Sebeck. “But the question that needs to be answered is whether civilization’s inability to adapt is a failure of leadership—or an unwillingness in humanity itself.
“Your quest comes at a critical time in human history, Sergeant. It’s time we knew whether a durable democracy is possible—one whose laws are not just guidelines. One where individual rights cannot be ignored by the powerful. I leave this for you to prove. The Daemon will continue to expand, regardless. Whether it encompasses a distributed democracy or a ruthless hierarchy is up to people like you. Prove that the collective human will can prevent its own destruction, and you will have justified humanity’s freedom. Fail, and humanity will serve the Daemon.
“So that all may know you . . .” Sobol aimed his cane at Sebeck’s call-out. A bright D-Space light flashed on his call-out, and an icon appeared next to his network name. It depicted a towering cloud with an opening at its base, like a gateway. “This quest icon will be your mark. Your high quest is to find the Cloud Gate. You will have succeeded when you pass through its arch.”
Sobol raised his other hand and a new, glowing Thread extended from it, racing south over the horizon in moments. “Your path leads not through the land, but through human events. It will lead you always into the heart of the changes now under way. And yet unless others lead the way, you will never reach your journey’s end.”
Sobol lowered his hand and stared into Sebeck’s eyes. “Good luck, Sergeant. For the sake of future generations, I hope we meet again.”
With that Sobol vanished, leaving only the new Thread behind. Sebeck nearly collapsed with the overwhelming burden now upon him. He turned to face Price.
Price stared up at the high quest icon now adorning Sebeck’s call-out. “You lucky bastard. . . .”
Chapter 5: // Getting with the Program
Sebeck moved through the crowd in a regional shopping mall. The place was packed with couples hand in hand talking on cell phones. Teens texting. The plaza looked new, with familiar anchor stores and all the usual retail fronts strung between them.
Sebeck had ditched Price back at the hotel. He needed time away from his troubles. Time to think. Getting lost in the crowd felt good—even though he could still see the new Thread just above him in D-Space. It always appeared ten feet in front, beckoning.
He tried to forget the Thread and his quest and instead watched faces passing in the crowd. Just a parade of mundane concerns. As though the Daemon didn’t exist.
Before long Sebeck spotted a familiar call-out approaching him, and Laney Price soon emerged from the stream of people. He and Sebeck stood face-to-face while shoppers surged around them. Price was munching on a churro. Snippets of conversation floated past them and faded away. They were anonymous in a sea of humanity.
“Needed a little ‘me’ time?”
Sebeck pushed past and kept walking through the crowd.
“Where did the Daemon dig you up, Laney?”
Price stayed on his heels. “Similar to your situation. Life delivers us to certain crossroads, and before you know it—bam—you’re serving a globe-spanning cybernetic organism. Same old familiar tale.”
Price noticed that Sebeck was ignoring him. “These people give you comfort, Sergeant? Walking among them like a regular person? Does it bring back the good times?”
Sebeck cast a look back at Price. “What if it does? Maybe it’s good to see how normal the world is. That there are still people who just want to go shopping.”
“Yeah.” He took another bite of his churro and spoke around it. “Too bad this place will probably be an empty shell ten years from now.”
Sebeck cast a frown back at Price. “How do you figure?”
“You heard Sobol. Modern society is heading off a cliff, and John Q. Public is out here stomping on the accelerator.”
“Have another churro, pal.”
“I’m just saying. So you dig all this?” He gestured to the overhead jumbotrons displaying clothing ads of fashion models flying through rainbows.
“It doesn’t matter what I think. Everything here exists because people want it. What gives Sobol the right to decide for them?”
Price shrugged. “Well, the public doesn’t really decide anything now—they just select from the options they’re given.” He stuffed the last of the churro into his mouth and chewed furiously. “Factions have a slang term for the general public. They call them NPCs—as in ‘non-player-characters’—scripted bots with limited responses.”
“That’s just obnoxious.”
“Is it? These people have only limited decision-making ability.”
“And we’re not Sobol’s puppets?”
“Okay, I think I know what’s going on here.” He balled up the churro wrapper and tossed it into the orifice of a trash can shaped like a robot. “You think these people are free, and that the Daemon is gonna take that freedom away.”