“Opinion polls have shown that law-abiding citizens don’t mind being watched by the authorities. All they want is a decent job and a chance to have some fun: a comfortable, orderly existence. Forget about the radicals and the fringe groups. There‘s no question that the public is on
our
side. Indeed, this the moment when we Brethren can stop and ask ourselves: how will the new system benefit our own lives?”
Michael paused so that he could examine the crowd sitting in front of him. Most of the Brethren looked surprised by his question, but a few of them nodded slightly as if to say:
Yes. That’s right. What’s in it for me?
“The Panopticon will create a stable society where it’s easier to manipulate behavior and stifle dissent. But what are we going to gain from the new system? History has shown us that a severe dictatorship creates a resentful and rebellious underclass. A better goal is combining control—with prosperity. The problem with Bentham’s Panopticon is that his prisoners don’t work. His old-fashioned prison completely ignores the economy.
“It’s time for a
New
Panopticon. Imagine a vast office—an enormous room—filled with billions of cubicles. In my system, there’s one electronic cubicle for every citizen in the industrial world. And within each cubicle, what are our citizens doing? Making products or providing services. They are productive citizens who fill out their time cards and don’t complain.
“Once we realize that our true goal is a cooperative workforce, a great many issues become clear. It doesn’t make a difference if we’re talking about doctors, accountants, students, short-order cooks or steel workers. They’re all going to be in their invisible cubicles, watched by our surveillance cameras and controlled by our social parameter programs.
“Do we care how our workers decorate their cubicles? Are we concerned if they spend their free time watching television or digging in their garden? Of course not. It makes no difference what church they attend so long as their faith doesn’t transform their lives. They can vote and slap bumper stickers on their cars so long as their political candidate doesn’t really change anything. If an economic crisis occurs, we’ll have the government print money and make superficial modifications, but the basic structure will remain the same.
“The New Panopticon allows us to control the behavior of people both as workers and as consumers. Our citizen in the cubicle is essentially powerless, but he is still able to express himself at the shopping mall. Freedom of choice becomes the freedom to buy, and our
new system gives us powerful tools to manipulate consumer behavior. When our citizen walks through the streets, billboards will recognize his face. Eventually, a centralized computer base will know all our citizen’s previous purchases and will make sure he’s never offered a product that will challenge his view of the world. It will be like listening to a radio station always tuned to music that sounds pleasantly familiar.
“So this is what I’m proposing—not a prison of sullen, unproductive prisoners, but an interconnected structure that creates obedient workers and trained consumers. This world-wide system will guarantee more money and comfort for yourself and your family. We’ll get the stability of the old Panopticon—with a happy face.”
Most of the Brethren were smiling and nodding. Mrs. Brewster turned her head back and forth as she watched her influence melt away.
“My plan can become a reality if we don’t waste our resources on limited strategies. Instead of waiting for people to join the system, we need to create a worldwide sequence of threats and emergencies that impels citizens to voluntarily give up their freedom. And why would they do this? That’s easy to answer. Because we’ve turned them into children scared of the dark. They will be desperate for our help, terrified of a life outside their cubicle filled with predators and danger.
“We can achieve this goal in a few years if we’re ruthless enough to consider every option. We need strength, not diplomacy. We need leadership, not committees. We need to stand up and say: ‘No more half-measures. No compromises. We’re going to do everything necessary to create a better world.’
“I stand before you as a faithful servant: ready to obey
your
orders and create
your
vision. This isn’t a dream that might come true. What I have described this evening is an inevitable reality … if you’re ready for this next step. All it needs is your approval and support. Thank you.”
Michael bowed his head slightly, folded up the speech and slipped it into his pocket. The room was completely quiet, but he avoided looking at the audience.
One person began clapping—slow, insistent—and others joined in. The sound grew louder as it echoed off the walls of the cloisters. When he glanced up from the podium, he saw that Mrs. Brewster was staring at him. Her hands were clenched and mouth was a tight red line.
She’s the first to die, Michael decided. I need to start a list.
W
earing a paper hospital gown, Maya sat on the edge of an examination table at a walk-in medical clinic in East London. A collection of dog-eared magazines was stuffed into a wall rack near the sink, but she had no desire to read about
The Secrets Men Won’t Tell You
and the
One-Week Bikini Diet
.
When Maya and the others returned to London, she still felt a burning pain from the leg wound she had received in the First Realm. The clinic staff cleaned the wound, checked the stitches she had received from a Cairo doctor and gave her prescriptions for antibiotics and pain pills. For the last twelve days she had been recovering at Tyburn Convent. The Benedictine nuns had served her bland food while they whispered variations of the word—
rest
. Well, she had rested enough, and nothing had changed. The wound was still bleeding, and images from Hell still floated through her dreams.
It was about two o’clock in the afternoon and the sounds of the busy clinic filtered through the walls. Doors were pulled open and slammed shut. Someone pushed a squeaky cart down the hallway while two nurses gossiped about a man named Ronnie.
Maya ignored this background noise and concentrated on the screaming child in the next room. It seemed obvious that someone was deliberately hurting the child. Maya’s clothes and sword carrier were hanging from a hook on the door; her knives were in her shoulder bag. She should get dressed, walk into the next room, and kill the torturers.
One part of her mind knew she was thinking like a crazy person.
This is a clinic. The doctors are here to help people
. But a dark compulsion made her slip off the table and take a step toward the weapons. As she reached out to touch the sword carrier, the screaming stopped, and Maya heard the child’s mother talking about a dish of ice cream. She heard footsteps in the hallway. The door popped open and Dr. Amita Kamani entered the room. The young physician had trimmed her hair since Maya’s last visit to the clinic, and she was wearing a pink T-shirt beneath her white lab coat that read:
Children Are Our Future
.
“Good afternoon, Ms. Strand. So how’s the cut doing? All healed up?”
“See for yourself.”
Dr. Kamani pulled on some latex gloves, sat down on a stool near the table, and began to unwrap the bandage around Maya’s leg. One of the nuns at Tyburn Convent had put on a fresh bandage about two hours ago, but it was already sodden with blood. When Dr. Kamani peeled the gauze off, she could see that the stitches still held, but scar tissue had not appeared.
“This is not a normal healing response. You should have come in earlier.” Dr. Kamani dropped the bandages into a trash bin. She opened a cabinet, took out disinfectant and surgical cotton, and began to clean the wound. “Does it hurt?”
“Yes.”
“Can you describe the pain?”
“A burning sensation.”
Dr. Kamani handed Maya a disposable thermometer, then checked her pulse and blood pressure. “Did you take the antibiotics I prescribed for you?”
It bothered Maya that she was the patient and this other woman was treating her. “Of course I took the medicine,” she said. “I’m not a bloody fool.”
“I’m just trying to help you, Ms. Strand.” Dr. Kamani glanced at the thermometer. “Your temperature and pulse rate are in the normal range.”
“Stitch me up again and give me some more pills.”
“There’s nothing wrong with the stitches. I’ll give you a prescription for a stronger antibiotic, but that might not help. As I recall, you said you were in a car accident during a holiday in Egypt.”
“That’s correct.”
Dr. Kamani took out some clean gauze and surgical tape. She sprayed a yellow liquid on the wound and began to put on a new bandage. “When you were in Egypt, were you were in contact with a sick animal or any kind of toxic chemical?’
“No.”
“Did you use any illegal drugs?”
Maya wanted shout out an explanation, but she stayed silent.
A citizen can never understand you
. Her father had told her that hundreds of times, and it was especially true at this moment. What could she say to a person wearing a white lab coat?
I traveled to a city surrounded by a dark river. The wolves tried to kill me, but I stabbed and cut and beat them down
.
“Just fix me up and make the wound heal,” Maya said. “I’ll pay you double what I did last time—in cash.”
Dr. Kamani pulled off the gloves and began to write on her clipboard.
“All right, I won’t ask any more questions. But we are going to run some medical tests before you leave the clinic today.”
“Will the test results be placed in a computer connected to the Internet?”
“Of course.”
“I won’t allow that.”
Kamani looked surprised, but her voice stayed calm and reasonable. “If you wish, I’ll make a note to the staff. They’ll leave the test results in my message tray and I’ll keep them out of the database. If I do that—if I break the rules—you have to promise you’ll come back here.”
“I promise.”
Dr. Kamani started to open the door, then paused and closed it again. “Although you told me you were in a car accident, I don’t believe that’s accurate. Your wound indicates you were stabbed with a knife, and your behavior follows the pattern of someone with extended exposure to significant trauma. Perhaps you were raped or physically abused. I strongly recommend some kind of psychotherapy combined with medical supervision.”
“We don’t do that.”
“And who is
we?”
“My—My family.”
The doctor’s face showed pity and concern. Maya knew that her father would have been insulted by Kamani’s reaction; it implied weakness, and Harlequins were never weak. Mother Blessing would have stood up and slapped her.
“You’re in pain, Ms. Strand …”
“What’s the next step?” Maya snapped.
Dr. Kamani opened the door and stepped into the hallway. “Stay here in the examination room. A nurse will take blood and urine samples.”
—
After the tests, she left the clinic and took a shortcut past Spitafields Market to the Liverpool Street tube station. These days, East London was filled with high-rise buildings and trendy restaurants, but for hundreds of years the neighborhood had been a dark, crowded slum—the home of new immigrants and outsiders. This was where her father had met his first Traveler, a Jewish mystic named David Rodinsky who lived in the attic of a synagogue on Princelet Street. Maya had been introduced to Rodinsky when she was a little girl; he was a strange, stooped little man who knew over twenty languages. A few years later this
tazdik
had vanished from a locked room and was never seen again. “We guard the Travelers, but we don’t always understand them,” Thorn told her. “The only thing you need to understand is our obligation.”
Perhaps the relationship was clear for her father, but in her own life, the obligation had become compromised by different emotions. She was supposed to be cold and rational with no real attachments to another person. Most of the time, she could play that role, but there were moments when she wanted to be back on the plane from Cairo to London. During the long flight, Gabriel had wrapped her up in a blanket and embraced her as if she were a sick child. They spoke about the First Realm in a cautious manner, trying to step back from the pain of what had happened there.
—
Maya found Linden sitting outside the falafel shop in Camden Market, guarding the staircase that led to the upstairs room. A carrying bag for a tennis racket was propped up against the wall, but Linden didn’t resemble a man of leisure. His broad shoulders and broken
nose made him look like a retired football player—someone once known for his rough play and penalties.
“What did the doctor say?”
“The wound is healing, but it’s taking some time. Where’s Gabriel?”
“The Traveler is upstairs, meeting with a group of Free Runners. They are figuring out a safe way to establish a communications network.”
“That’s very ambitious.”
“It is clear that he has a plan, but he has not explained it to anyone yet. He wants to hold a meeting of the Resistance in a few weeks.”
Maya grabbed a chair and sat down beside the Frenchman. When she shifted her leg suddenly, she felt a jab of pain. Don’t show any weakness, she told herself. No one can use an injured fighter.
“You’ve been guarding Gabriel for a long time. I’m healthy now and can accept the obligation.”
“I would like that very much,” Linden said. “I need to solve some problems back in Paris. Apparently, a pipe is leaking in my flat. I can not have a stranger fixing it.”
“I could take charge for a few days.”
“As you recall, there was a problem with your
objectivité
. As Mother Blessing told you, Harlequins cannot have an emotional connection with the people they are guarding.”
“I was sick during the trip back to London. I’m better now. I haven’t even spoken to Gabriel for the last six days.”
“Yes. I noticed that. You have finally started to act in the correct way.” Linden looked over at the canal and made his decision. He picked up the tennis racket carrier and handed it to her. “Here is your weapon. A steel frame holds a sawed-off shotgun with a six-round ammunition drum. Insert your firing hand in the opening.”