The wasps flew off in opposite directions. After a series of evasive misdirections, they joined their bee, somewhat depleted but no worse for wear. The Orange Team continued on its way to Starke Enterprises headquarters.
THE GRAY TEAM beetle, with its wasp escort, located its prime destination, a series of fish farms between Lake Decatur and the city of Tendonville. Hovering a meter over the water, the beetle opened its carapace, allowing the breeze to scatter a pinch of green flakes across the surface of the pond. As the flakes swelled and sank, fish gathered to snap them up. Gray Team flew from pond to pond dispensing its load.
2.8
After twenty minutes of caroming through the unlit tunnels of the Chicago Public Transit, Bogdan Kodiak arrived at Elmhurst MacArthur Place Station. After decarring, he paused on the platform to remove his charter patch from his shoulder. A transit bee buzzed him, ordering him to move along, move along. He made his way through foot traffic to the stiles and swiped his way out. Before leaving the station, he put on a pair of mirrorshades and buried his hands in his pockets to keep anyone from reading him.
The Bachner Building, where the E-Pluribus office was located today, was an oblong tower grafted onto a multi-block trunk foundation. Before entering, Bogdan stepped in front of a kiosk board, curious as to the state of his anonymity. The kiosk board stalled a moment, trying to ID him, and failing to do so, launched a generic kiddie advert about portable pets. Bogdan snickered and left, confident that as far as the world was concerned, he was still a thirteen-year-old boy.
Inside the Bachner Building lobby, the directory requested that he remove his shades, but he refused. He asked the directory where the E-Pluribus elevators were. E-Pluribus always leased three entire floors wherever they camped, as well as two private elevator cars and three dixon lifts. A bee followed him as he walked to the bank of elevators. When he invoked his right to privacy, the bee informed him that it was a house bee, and that since he’d refused to be ID’d, the bee was authorized to surveil him.
One of the dixon lift cars was coming down, and Bogdan joined the crush of people waiting at its door. He knew how E-Pluribus spaced the cars and that if he missed this one, there wouldn’t be another for fifteen minutes. He was already late, so he took advantage of his small size for the second time that morning and threaded his way through the crowd. He didn’t recognize any of these people, which meant they were daily hires. When the car arrived, Bogdan almost made it aboard, but instead got stepped on.
“Owww!” he cried.
“Sorry, little guy,” said a man in front of Bogdan, “but you’ll just have to wait your turn like everyone else.”
“Oh, yeah?” said a man behind Bogdan. “Then how did you get in front of me, pal?”
“What are you saying, myr?” said the first man.
“I’m saying I don’t care if you trample the kid, myr, but don’t you fecking shove me!”
“Myren, myren,” Bogdan said, afraid of becoming trapped between them, “there’s no need to fight.”
“Not unless you’re the one cut out of a day’s payfer,” said the man at the front, who was trying to jam himself into the overcrowded elevator car, which made several unsuccessful attempts to close its doors.
“Relax,” Bogdan told the men. “If E-Pluribus issued you an invitation for today, we will honor it. Irregardless whether we use you or not, we will credit you a full day’s payfer.”
“What do you mean ‘we’?” said the man.
“I work for E-Pluribus,” Bogdan announced breezily.
Everyone looked at him, and a woman inside the car said, “Like on a permanent basis?”
“Yeah,” Bogdan said. “I have an employment contract. I am a senior demographics specialist, grade three.”
“People!” the woman commanded. “Inhale!”
A sliver of space opened inside the car. The woman grabbed Bogdan by the lapel of his jumpsuit and pulled him in, the doors closed, and the car began to ascend. When everyone exhaled again, Bogdan found himself for the second time that morning pressed against a wall. Not by a couch, this time, but by an ample bosom. He closed his eyes and drank in its damp, honeysuckle fragrance. Numerous hands took little rubs at his head, but at the moment he didn’t mind. As the elevator rose, people asked Bogdan how much E-Pluribus paid its employees, whether there were benefits, what kind of qualifications and genetic tests were necessary, and especially—were there any current openings. Snuggling in his tender pillow, Bogdan answered all questions as vaguely as possible.
“I’ve heard,” said the woman, “that they’ll make us insert these—ah—devices to register our—ah—responses.”
“That—ah—is true,” Bogdan said.
“What are they like?” she said nervously.
Bogdan smirked. “Not to worry, my dear. They’re small and harmless. They’re called visceral expression probes, which sounds a lot scarier than they really are.” Actually, he and the other regular employees called them potty plugs. And they called these people day holes. “After a couple minutes,” he continued, “you won’t even know it’s there.”
The elevator halted at the 103rd floor and opened its door to the E-Pluribus lobby. And what a lobby! The regulars called it the Temple, and it was the same basic arrangement E-Pluribus used wherever it rented space. The effect was one of vastness, and the intent was induced awe. For Bogdan, this space had long ago lost its novelty, but he still enjoyed seeing the effect it had on newcomers. He backed out of the lift and watched his fellow passengers step onto the limpid blue lobby floor. The floor seemed to extend for kilometers in all directions. Far on the horizon, it was bordered by giant stone columns, some broken and crumbled, some still joined by stone lintels. Beyond these lay a restive green sea.
“Oooo,” said his female companion.
The cool air was spritzed with salty sea smells. Lightning crackled in the distance, and thunder rolled beneath their feet. Subliminal music swelled.
Of course it wasn’t as though people had never visited a sensorium before. These days it took more than smoke and laser to make an impression, and if anyone knew how to impress humans, it was E-Pluribus. At the sound of a trumpet blast behind them, the daily hires turned to behold, not their elevator car, but a mountainous, stone ziggurat rising high into the yellow sky. At its truncated peak, nearly as high as the pink clouds, stood a gigantic corporate logo, the E-Pluribus Everyperson.
The Everyperson was one of the most familiar logos in the United Democracies, and this was its full-on version. It morphed rapidly and continuously, changing its sex, age, ethnicity, facial features, hair, and clothing into every conceivable combination. It was hypnotic to behold. People said that if you gazed at it long enough, you’d eventually see all fifteen billion inhabitants of Earth. Everyone but yourself.
People said that if you gazed at it long enough, you’d see ghostly images of your beloved dead, your departed parents, children, and spouses, your lost lovers, rivals, and friends, and everyone you cared for who predeceased you.
People said that if you gazed at it long enough, you’d see all the people you might have become if only you had made the right decisions or had better timing, connections, or luck.
For a corporate logo, it was a doozie.
On the stone steps beneath the Everyperson stood a pantheon of vid idols: thousands of the most celebrated hollyholo simstars of all time. This was the famous E-Pluribus Academy, the largest, most extensive stable of limited editions in existence. Bogdan’s elevator companions gushed with delight. At the bottommost tier, Annette Beijing stood alone and waited for their attention. She wore the loose-fitting house togs she popularized in the long-running novella Common Claiborne.