He turned and looked back down the crowded street. At that moment a giant blue-gold shape slid under his feet, rushing silently along within the mercury stream beneath the diamond plate. The girl arguing with the Sublimers turned, glancing at the street as the blob went gliding past. As she looked back to the two young glowing people she caught sight of him watching her. Her gaze settled on him for a moment and the flicker of an expression - a glimmer of recognition? - passed briefly over her face before she started talking to the Sublimers again. He hadn’t had time to look away even if he’d wanted to.

He was wondering whether he ought to go over to her now, wait and see if she stepped back into the thoroughfare and maybe approach her then, or just walk away, when a tall girl in a glowing gown stepped up to him and said, ‘May I help you, sir? You seem taken with our place of exaltation. Do you have any questions you’d like to ask? Is there anything I can do to enlighten you?’

He turned to the Sublimer. She was almost as tall as he; her face was pretty but somehow vacuous, though he knew that might have been prejudice on his part.

Sublimers had turned what was a normal but generally optional part of a species’ choice of fate into a religion. Sublimers believed that everybody ought to Sublime, that every human, every animal, every machine and Mind ought to head straight for ultimate transcendence, leaving the mundane life behind and setting as direct a course as possible for nirvana.

People who joined the cult spent a year trying to persuade others of this before they Sublimed themselves, joining one of the sect’s group-minds to contemplate irreality. The few drones, other AIs and Minds that became persuaded of the merit of this course of action through the arguments of the Sublimers tended to do what any other machine did on such occasions and disappear in the direction of the nearest Sublimed Entity, though one or two stuck around in a pre-Sublimed state long enough to help the cause. In general, though, the cult was regarded as rather a pointless one. Subliming was seen as something that usually happened to entire societies, and more as a practical lifestyle alteration than a religious commitment; more like moving house than entering a sacred order.

‘Well, I don’t know,’ Genar-Hofoen said, sounding wary. ‘What exactly do you people believe in again?’

The Sublimer looked up the street behind him. ‘Oh, we believe in the power of the Sublime,’ she said. ‘Let me tell you more.’ She glanced up the avenue again. ‘Oh; perhaps we ought to get off the street, don’t you think?’ She held out her hand and took a step back towards the pavement.