BooksBarbecue
Back Gridlinked Save as PDF
Chapters (36)
  1. Title Page
  2. Acknowledgements
  3. Prologue
  4. 1
  5. 2
  6. 3
  7. 4
  8. 5
  9. 6
  10. 7
  11. 8
  12. 9
  13. 10
  14. 11
  15. 12
  16. 13
  17. 14
  18. 15
  19. 16
  20. 17
  21. 18
  22. 19
  23. 20
  24. 21
  25. 22
  26. 23
  27. 24
  28. 25
  29. 26
  30. 27
  31. 28
  32. 29
  33. Epilogue
  34. From Neal Asher
  35. Praise
  36. Copyright Page

Trace to second quadrant.

—Terrorism In The Twentieth Century—

ORDER: CANCELLED.

All human life on Samarkand extinguished—projection.

—Sea Of Death [Hood]—

ORDER: AGENT PRIME CRUSE TO CHEYNE III.

‘What’s the problem, Hal?’

QUESTION: HOW DO YOU DO THAT?

Laughter.

It all took less than a second. The laughter faded as the strange old Oriental disappeared from the chamber. Earth Central experienced chagrin, or a near emulation, then turned to other matters. As it continued to collate extant information and give orders, it continued to absorb the vast body of human knowledge in the infinitesimally small fractions of seconds between. Hundreds of light-years away, its decisions were acted upon.

1

1

Of course you can’t understand it. You’re used to thinking in a linear manner, that’s evolution for you. Do you know what infinity and eternity are? That space is a curved sheet over nothing and that if you travel in a straight line for long enough you’ll end up where you started? Even explained in its simplest terms it makes no sense: one dimension is line, two dimensions are area, three are space and four are space through time. Where we are. All these sit on top of the nullity, nil-space, or underspace as it has come to be called. There’s no time there, no distance, nothing. From there all runcibles are in the same place and at the same time. Shove a human in and he doesn’t cease to exist because there is no time for him to do so. Pull him out. Easy. How do the runcible AIs know when, who and where? The information is shoved in with the human. The AI doesn’t have to know before because there is no time where the spoon is. Simple, isn’t it . . . ?

From How It Is by Gordon

Angelina Pelter gazed out across a seascape as colour-drained as a charcoal drawing and felt her purpose harden: this was her home, this was the place she must defend against the silicon autocrat Earth Central and all its agents. She looked up at the sky with its scud of oily clouds. It had the appearance of a soot-smeared sheet, pulled taut from the horizon. The sun was a hazy disc imbedded there. She lowered her gaze to where waves the colour of iron lapped against the plascrete slabs on the side of the sea wall. The day reflected her mood.

‘Doesn’t it get to you?’ she asked him.