Halo

will be on the way.  Or if you have a question, just state it.

Someone will answerAleph or one of its communications demons.'

Gonzales asked, 'Yeah, they told us that.  Are we monitored

at all times?'

Showalter said, 'Yes.  In fact, there's a real-time hologram

in Operations that shows everyone's movements, not just visitors

but residents as well.'

'Seems an invasion of privacy,' Gonzales said.

Horn said, 'We don't look at it that way.  If you can't

accept such simple necessities, Halo will be most uncomfortable

for you.'  He smiled.  'Not that you're likely to be here for

long.'

Gonzales said, 'I can't imagine people putting up with total

surveillance for long, frankly.'

Horn said, 'It seems to us a small price to pay for an

unpolluted world shared to the benefit of all.'

Showalter looked from Horn to Gonzales.  She said, 'We are a

far island in a hostile place.  We cannot afford some of your

illusions:  the independence of the self, unconstrained free will

 those sorts of things.'

A shutter retracted from a window ten meters square as the

elevator entered the living ring's inner space.  Far below lay

sun-lit valleys thick-planted with trees and shrubs and flowers,

broken by one barren space where grayish slurries squirted out of

huge pipe ends to flow across scarred metal.

'Our city,' Showalter said.

#

Eight people were gathered around a u-shaped table of beige

silica foam.  Showalter sat at the center of the u, with Horn to

her immediate right, Gonzales and Diana beyond him.  To her left

were a youngish woman, then two men in late middle age, one white,

one black.

At the open end of the u, the table fronted a screen that

covered its entire wall, floor to ceiling.  The screen had been

lit when Gonzales and Diana arrived, showing another room where an

indeterminate number of people sat on couches, chairs, or slouched

on cushions on the floor.

Showalter said, 'Let me introduce you all to one another.

Everyone has met Horn, my assistant.  Next to him are Doctor Diana

Heywood and Mikhail Gonzales, who arrived yesterday.'  They both

smiled and nodded.

'Lizzie Jordan,' Showalter said, pointing to the woman to her

left.  'Hi,' Lizzie said.  She was blonde, thin, with high

cheekbones; she had a smear of gold dust inset below her left eye

and wore rough beta-cloth overalls gapped to show part of a tattoo

between her breastsa twining green stem.  Showalter said,

'Lizzie heads the Interface Collective, and thus will be the

person you'll be working with most closely.  The people you see on

the screen are also members of the collective.  They have a

proprietary interest in all matters pertaining to Aleph and Halo

and have the right to be present at inter-group meetings, and to

speak to whatever issues are entertained there.'

Diana said, 'I understand.'

Gonzales nodded.  He knew from Traynor's Advisor that

communal decision-making was the norm at Halo, but he hadn't

imagined it would be so thoroughgoing.

'Next to Lizzie is Doctor Charley Hughes,' Showalter said.

'He will be doing the surgical procedure to upgrade your neural

sockets, Doctor Heywood.'  The man said, 'Hello' and looked

intently at Gonzales and Diana.  His sparse gray hair stood up in

spikes; his face was pale, thin, deeply-lined.  He had been

smoking constantly since they arrived, one hand cupping a

cigarillo, the other supporting the smoke-saver ball at the

cigarillo's burning end.

'And Doctor Eric Chow,' she said.  The black man next to

Charley Hughes smiled.  Chow was a big man with hands the size of

small shovels; he had a round face, very dark skin, a broad nose

and big lips; he wore his hair cropped short.  Showalter said, 'He

heads the Neuro-Ontic Studies Group and is Doctor Hughes's primary

consultant on the treatment planned for Jerry Chapman.'

She paused and turned to the screen showing the IC members.

A window opened at the left side of the screen, and a figure

appeared.  Its arms and torso were clothed in gold; its face

shimmered with a formless brightness.  Around its head and

shoulders, a nimbus flared, red, blue, yellow, and green.

'Hello, everyone' the figure said.  'And welcome, Doctor  and

Mister Gonzales.  I am a localized manifestation of Alepha

simulacrum for your convenience and mine.'

Gonzales noticed that next to him, Diana was smiling, while

all around him there was silence, as all in the room and on the

screen were intently watching the screen.

#

The IC's viewing window had closed, but the simulacrum's

portion remainedin it, the creature of light sat watching.

Showalter, Horn, Diana, Lizzie, Charley, and Gonzales sat around

the table.

Showalter said, 'This is  Chow's meeting, and I won't say

much in it.  However, I should remind you of certain realities.

This project does not have high priority in the overall context of

SenTrax's responsibilities to Halo City; thus, while we support

this experiment's humanitarian goals, we are not prepared to delay

other projects.'

Horn said, 'We cannot divert a significant amount of people

to promulgation and we are not or do not want to encourage any

behaviors which might adversely impact other SenTrax outcomes.'

Lizzie laughed, and Gonzales, poker-faced, looked at her and

thought, yeah, this guy's laughable all right.  Gonzales

recognized the performative chatter of the bureaucratic ape, a

mixture of scrambled syntax and pretentious buzzwordslanguage