Darl Bundren

The Network

One morning, a man awoke, suddenly unprepared to execute a crowd. Thought and emotion writhed within his head as his hands pulled at previously limp fabric until it contorted and settled against his scarred tan skin. At a rational level, he knew what should occur. First, resistors, disbelievers, and other assorted Luddites would make some sort of last stand: valiant in theory, but pathetic in practice. Next, the survivors would be herded into a pen; he would recite a speech he had given dozens of times and would give the Subversives one last chance to be saved and Plug themselves Into the Network. A few would always abandon their principles when faced with death. But the fervency of most Subversives had confused and impressed him: they were so determined to hold on to anachronistic ways of being that they would willingly, even proudly, sacrifice themselves in a futile stand against the March of Progress. Didn’t they know how selfish they were being? Every single Subversive had been amply informed of the mechanics of the Network and every one of them had made a choice to stay on the wrong side of the End War and thus History. Just as economies required new investment to keep people employed, the Network could not sustain itself absent further participation. It was truly humanity’s ethical obligation to keep the Network alive until the world’s top scientists could discover new populations from which to extract more Thought. Without sufficient Thought power, the Network would collapse, ending the lives of everyone linked into it.