threatening” mumbo. I thought you told me that the Demi-Monde is only a computer game… that it’s only a simulation. Surely if the shit hits the fan in a computer simulation you still have the ultimate power. You can always pull the plug.’
‘We had the ultimate power, Miss Thomas,’ said the General quietly. He turned to the Captain. ‘I think, Captain, it might be useful if I give Miss Thomas a little more background to the Demi-Monde.’
The Captain illuminated a screen at the side of the General’s office to show what appeared to be the picture of a crudely drawn dartboard. ‘This is a map of the Demi-Monde. It is, as you can see, a circular world stretching thirty miles across, which is home to thirty million NowLive Dupes. Each of these Dupes is, thanks to the colossal processing power of ABBA, a discrete, unique and independent individual who thinks, acts and interacts just like their Real World doppelganger would think and act if placed in a similar environment.’
‘I’m having a problem with the word “think”. Are you saying that these Dupes of yours have some form of intelligence?’
The Captain smiled in a condescending way that Ella found hugely irritating. ‘It’s only ersatz intelligence, but to neoFights operating in the Demi-Monde it does appear that the Dupes have the capacity to think and behave independently. And DemiMondians don’t just interact with neoFights, they interact with each other.’ He took a deep breath, then continued his dissertation. ‘The Demi-Monde was planned from the OutSet to be a world that was intrinsically unstable and discordant, as only in this way could we be sure to provoke the type of war conditions we needed for our training. To do this we designed in a number of “Areas of Tension”: the notable ones being race, religion and population density.’
Ella found all this a little depressing. The USA had spent the last two hundred years trying to overcome the problems created by its citizens being drawn from different racial backgrounds and having different religious beliefs, and here was the US Military studying how to exacerbate these differences in order to provoke war.
The Captain used a laser-pen to indicate five segments of the map that radiated out from the centre of the circular world like slices of cake. ‘There are five equally sized Sectors in the Demi-Monde: the Rookeries, the Coven, Rodina, the Quartier Chaud and NoirVille. Each of the Sectors is racially and religiously distinct. To the north we have the Rookeries. This Sector is populated by people of Anglo-Saxon descent – an equal mix of Americans, of English and of Germans – who speak English and have an ascetic religion…’
‘Ascetic?’ asked Ella.
‘It’s a religion built on the denial of pleasure called UnFunDaMentalism, a creed that your friend Heydrich has made his own. However Aleister Crowley, the black magician who was so famous in the first half of the twentieth century, is the religious leader we placed in the Rookeries so there’s little wonder that UnFunDaMentalism has become suffused with aspects of the occult.’ He gave Ella a glance to check that she was following everything he was saying. ‘To the west of the Rookeries is Rodina. This Sector is largely Slavic in ethnicity: it’s a mix of Russians, Poles and Ukrainians. They speak Russian in Rodina and they follow – followed – an avowedly atheistic creed called RaTionalism which looks, as the name suggests, for rational explanations of the creation, the purpose and the oddities of the Demi-Monde and rejects supernatural interpretations. Since Heydrich’s coup RaTionalism has become an underground religion: UnFunDaMentalism is now the only official religion in the ForthRight.’
‘The ForthRight?’
‘The name Heydrich gave post-coup to the state that unifies Rodina and the Rookeries, the state he now controls.’
‘That’s a pretty ballsy thing for Heydrich to have done.’
A nod from the Captain. ‘But then Heydrich’s a pretty ballsy sort of guy and he was helped by a Russian?- Singularity called Lavrentii Beria.’
‘In real life he was head of Stalin’s secret police, the NKVD,’ added the Professor helpfully. ‘A really nasty piece of work.’
‘Thank you, Professor,’ said the Captain testily. ‘Heydrich and Beria staged a revolution, assassinated the leaders of the two Sectors – Rodina and the Rookeries…’
‘Henry Tudor and Ivan Grozny,’ murmured the Professor.
‘… purged their political rivals and took over. The whole revolution is called the Time of Trouble, or as it’s more simply referred to in the ForthRight: the Troubles.’
The Captain moved his pointer around the rim of the DemiMonde. ‘Clockwise from the Rookeries we come to the Quartier Chaud where the inhabitants are of Mediterranean stock – mainly French, Italian, Venetian and Spanish – and where they all speak French. The Chaudians, as those who live in the Quartier are called, have a staunchly hedonistic outlook, they believe the pursuit of pleasure is the primary duty of mankind. Their religion is called ImPuritanism.’
‘Who’s in charge there?’ Ella asked.
‘Maximilien Robespierre, the guy who ran the French Revolution, aided and abetted by a Singularity called Tomas de Torquemada who, when he was alive, was head of the Inquisition and tortured people on behalf of the Catholic Church. But the real power in the Quartier is in the hands of the Doge of Venice, Catherine-Sophia, who seems to be giving our Singularities a run for their money. There’s been something of a schism in the Quartier Chaud of late: for some reason Venice and the rest of the Quartier Chaud are at each other’s throats.’
‘Not a holiday destination then,’ observed Ella drily.
‘Well, funnily, for the sexually liberated, it is. The ImPuritans have a pretty free-and-easy attitude and as almost anything goes in the Quartier… well, it did until…’
There was a cough from the General, who obviously thought there wasn’t any need for the Captain to elaborate. ‘Moving on. The fourth Sector is NoirVille: the population here is mostly a mix of Arabs and Africans. The religion followed in this Sector is HimPerialism and the language Arabic.’
‘HimPerialism?’
‘Yes, it’s a religion based on male supremacy and the subjugation of women… terribly misogynistic, I’m afraid to say.’ He ignored the look of disgust on Ella’s face. ‘We believe this developed because the gender mix in NoirVille is skewed towards men: NoirVillian men outnumber NoirVillian women by two to one. There are some very strong characters in this Sector. Shaka Zulu…’ He paused. ‘Have you ever heard of him, Miss Thomas?’
Ella shook her head.
‘He was the man who created the Zulu nation at the back end of the eighteenth century. A remarkable man. It is his HimPis – his regiments – who have taken control of the black market in blood.’
‘Blood?’
‘We’ll come to that in a moment, Miss Thomas. NoirVille is also home for the WhoDoo religious cult, which the sociologists studying the Demi-Monde have been getting a real kick out of. They’re into…’
Another cough from the General. The guy must be consumptive.
‘The last Sector…’ said the Captain hurriedly.
‘Lemme guess,’ said Ella, ‘we ain’t gonna be meeting Benny the Bouncy Bunny in this next place, are we?’
‘I’m afraid not. The fifth Sector is the Coven. The Coven is largely Sino-Japanese, with the gender mix skewed in favour of females. The religion of the Coven is called HerEticalism, which teaches that peace and prosperity will only come to the DemiMonde when men accept a subordinate position to females within society.’
‘Sounds sensible to me.’
The Captain ignored Ella’s aside. ‘Unfortunately this feminist bias has been taken to extremes: the Coven is a virulently anti-male Sector and avowedly pro-lesbian. As you might appreciate, HerEticalism is the antipode to HimPerialism: the two hate each other. HerEticalism has spawned a radically feminist terror wing called Suffer-O- Gettism – or to give it its full title, Make-Men-Suffer-O-Gettism – which is dedicated to the use of violence to achieve the triumph of women in the Demi-Monde. Funnily enough, despite this vehement gender bias, the Coven, under the tutelage of the Empress Wu – a very strong-willed woman and the only woman ever to be Emperor of China – has become a hotbed of radical thought. Most of the more unorthodox thinkers in the Demi-Monde have made the Coven their home, Karl Marx being one of them.’ The Captain clicked off his laser-pen. ‘And that, Miss Thomas, concludes my ten-cent tour of the Demi-Monde.’
‘You’ve forgotten the nuJus, Captain,’ the Professor observed. ‘On top of the various peoples that the Captain has described we also introduced some nuJu seasoning into the racial pot.’
‘Ah yes, how could I forget the nuJus? The Professor is quite correct, there is a quasi-Jewish element in the Demi-Monde – the nuJus – representing a sixth of the total population and spread evenly over each of the five
