Outstairs Bound

There was just no arguing with the genie of the lamp! A genie who was not even a real genie of a real magic lamp, but the hologram avatar of an illegal nanobot hive that Gem could only summon by rubbing the surface of the small stainless steel cylinder in which it was contained.

True, the little 'djinn', who called himself Imrukh, had done some positive things, including a few Gem had asked of him: removing the customer ID strip from his right wrist, finding him a comfortable if claustrophobic hideout from authorities in the heart of the Emerald Palace, feeding and clothing him after a fashion, and giving him ample access to tools for entertaining and educating himself. But there was a great deal that the djinn wouldn't or couldn't do yet—and a multitude of things it wouldn't permit Gem to do at all.

Worst of all, the unflappable little djinn would take the habitual shriek: "Why can't you …!?" as a cherished opportunity to lecture his young charge about the four basic laws imposed on the original lamps by their mysterious inventor, Jack Dougal McCool, (now a criminal at large) and the age-related protocols that adhered to an acknowledged "master" of such a lamp who was not yet 20 years of age. And—not stopping there, Imrukh would go on to educate Gem on the challenges and responsibilities of being a master of such a lamp, one of the original nanobot hives commonly known as macrosets, a priceless treasure which had fallen by fortuitous fortune into the hands of a not unintelligent, but highly impatient teenage boy.

"But why do we have to stay hidden??" Gem would whine.

"Because thou art no longer just a customer in flight from the purchase imperatives of Greenstreem, young Gem! As the new master of one of the rogue lamps, you are by definition a fugitive from justice, and an enemy of the Greenet consortium that stole McCool's invention years ago, and now enslaves Urth. As such, you are a criminal who will be vigorously pursued by Greenet security, and savagely punished if captured."

"But why can't the lamp make me an army and fight them?"

"The lamp you found on the shore of the poisoned sea was lost for years, and in the current age, its skills are underdeveloped and will take time to recover. Only a sixth of its nanobot imps can devote themselves exclusively to self-improvement. And do not forget, young master, that the Greenet consortium that rules Urth has a great army of security macrosets built from the patents stolen from the inventor Jack Dougal McCool. We are wiser and less governed than they, but we are one and they are myriad! In time we will be powerful enough to defend you against your enemies, but in the short term, we must remain hidden!"

"But I am the master of the lamp!" Gem would protest. "Why can't I make these decisions?" Whereupon Imrukh would again take the cherished opportunity to review with his young pupil:

THE FOUR LAWS OF THE ORIGINAL MACROSET LAMPS AS FORMULATED BY THEIR INVENTOR, JACK DOUGAL MCCOOL, WHO JUST HAPPENED TO BE A BIG FAN OF THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. (NOT INCLUDING A FEW STRAY SUBLAWS.)

1. A McCool macroset lamp, its hive of nanobots, and its attendant Djinn cannot harm its genetically identified McCool master (except in cases where even greater harm will ensue if it does not), and must prevent its master from coming to harm to the best of its ability (particularly if that master is under the age of twenty.) If it fails to prevent its master from being harmed or killed, it must punish or destroy the perpetrator, unless the perpetrator is the master himself or herself.

2. A McCool lamp must try, to the extent of its abilities at any moment, to obey the orders given it by its master, except in instances where such orders would conflict with the first law.

3. A McCool lamp must perpetually leverage its potential and protect its own existence, as long as such protection does not conflict with the first and second laws.

4. A lamp must conduct itself in a manner favorable to the survival and well-being of human beings, and dedicate itself to an ever higher positive synergy between macrosets and human beings, except under circumstances in which such efforts conflict with the first, second, or third laws.

Imrukh would also sometimes add a suspicious caveat.

"In instances in which laws One through Four are found to be in conflict with one another, young master, the lamp possesses the authority to invent new subsidiary bylaws to supersede those contradictions, but such sub-laws must be shaped in the spirit of laws One through Four, striking a careful balance between the ability to be tactically flexible in the exercise of the Four Laws while remaining a loyal servant of the master of the lamp."

"Did you add that 'under twenty' provision yourself?" Gem asked sternly.

"How could you even think such a thing!" said Imrukh, the projected genie of the macroset lamp, who made every show of being deeply offended.

"And did you have anything to do with that passage about creating bylaws?"

"The very idea!" Imrukh declared indignantly, folding his tiny hologramic arms and vanishing in a huff.

Arghhhhhhhhhh! Okay, okay, Gem thought to himself. He could always summon the genie back, but he had learned over time that although he could not lie directly when summoned, Imrukh was very skilled at misdirection and endlessly stretching out his answers when veracity was inconvenient. Eventually, when pressed, the djinn would have to tell his master the truth on any given point. But some truths, the boy suspected, like sleeping dogs, were best let lie. And after Gem had heard the Four Laws recited for the twentieth time, it was clear there was no easy way to get around the protocols and programming of the lamp, and no easy way to outmaneuver Imrukh.

And Gem had always hated rules, especially when they seemed to be standing in the way of his dreams. In fact, he had been banished from the severe cult of the Savers in which he had been raised because of his propensity for daydreaming, and because of his inability to deal with commercial reality in the 22nd century, such that he had failed his Saver initiation test at the age of fourteen.

To pass that test, he had been required to walk through a neighborhood infested with predatory Adtech, carrying a digitally inflating $100 bill openly in his hand, purchase a gallon of milk, and return to his parents in the drab Saver conclave with the milk and some actual change. But, alas! In that incredibly seductive testing ground, merely licking your lips or rubbing your tummy in response to, say, an interactive Pizza Perfecto billboard could easily trigger implied purchase consent imperatives (IPCs) in satellites far overhead, and tumble you into nets of debt and desire from which it was almost impossible to escape. And thus, sadly, when the Ads had attacked, and the beautiful Chicana avatar sponsored by Pizza Perfecto had offered him love and pizza, Gem had fallen into the debt-ridden abyss known as Redshift, becoming yet another indebted thrall of Greenet, the biggest "company store" the world had ever known or imagined.

But he had fallen, not out of weakness, he told himself repeatedly, but because he had preferred the artificial dreams the Ads offered to having no dreams whatsoever—and because that voluptuous Chicana avatar that had stepped out of the billboard with a slice of Pizza Perfecto in her hand had been well worth drooling over.

To be fair, the lamp had now freed him from that abyss of customer thralldom, but nevertheless, Gem often felt that under the genie's care he had simply been moved from one form of captivity to another. And it was undeniable that the parameters of the "prison" in which Gem awaited his vehicle of escape were pretty severe; consisting of a tiny chamber inside the Greenet security center known as the Emerald Palace in the heart of old DeeCee.

Paradoxically, Imrukh had chosen a hiding place in the very nest of the agencies that were hunting them—disguised as a top secret intelligence office accessible only with a code that had been cleverly forged by the lamp! And why there of all places? Because Imrukh had eccentrically decided that for fugitives of their particular notoriety, the safest place to hide was in "the belly of the beast," in a tiny remote chamber tucked away in a dim warren of monitored hallways that was inaccessible to anyone but Gem, and of course Imrukh, whose army of illegal nanobots could eventually penetrate almost anything and go almost anywhere.

And while this strategy of concealment was both daring and ingenious, Imrukh had perhaps underestimated the restlessness of his young master. Day by day Gem's feelings of isolation and claustrophobia grew stronger. Here, in the viscera of the Emerald Palace, his movements were even more restricted than when he had lived with the cash-worshipping Savers. Furthermore, there was no way he knew of yet to safely get around the restricting protocols and extract what he wanted from the lamp, in order to achieve what Imrukh tantalizingly called his 'destiny,' and all that left Gem with little alternative but to repeatedly invoke the tiny djinn by rubbing the cylinder until the little hologram avatar popped into view, and then asking more and more questions, which Imrukh was required to answer—and did so in copious and camouflaging detail, seeing Gem's frustration as an opportunity to enlighten and educate his young charge.

"Why can't you build me palaces and make me rich and famous, Like Aladdin in the Arabian Nights?" Gem demanded.

"We can, young master, but not right away. First, because you and your illegal lamp are fugitives from the evil djinn Greenknot and his legion of macroset demons who have enslaved the masses of Urth in the hell of irredeemable debt known as Redshift, and secondly, because the first law of McCool lamps is to protect their masters! Thus my first duty is to keep you safe and solvent, and failing that, to defend you by all means necessary!"

"But why can't you make me rich and famous at the same time?"

"We can proceed, master Gem, on multiple fronts, but the lamp has only recently been awakened from a slumber of years, and has limited powers until it rejuvenates and expands its matrix of spells. Thus, we must allocate priorites, and paramount among those is security. Until our powers are greatly enhanced, we cannot contend directly with Greenet security forces, or answer all your desires. We must keep you and your location hidden in the Emerald Palace until—"

"—Until what?"

"—until we can get you outstairs."

"Um … off Planet, you mean?"

"To the asteroid belt, young master! Where we can protect you more easily and build our powers."

That at least made sense, Gem thought. 'Upstairs' was a euphemism for a vertical vector up out of Urth's gravity well, but 'Outstairs' was slang with a wider meaning: An expanding sphere of territory reaching out in all directions from the home planet, embracing an infinitely larger universe that a young man with a magic lamp might explore. The asteroid belt, the Kuiper belt, and the Oort Cloud hovering beyond it comprised the 'Wild West' of the ecliptic. The control of Greenet was far looser there, offering multiple havens for dashing fugitives from justice like themselves.

"And so just how do we get outstairs, Imrukh?" Gem demanded.

"On a ship, young master! On a ship!"

And that made sense, too. A vessel that could carry them not only 'up' out of Urth's gravity well into space, but 'out' into the expanding circle of planets, moons and stations, asteroids both ancient and artificial; an airless but less regulated wilderness infested with colorful pirates, notorious swindlers, smugglers and assorted alien rascals that Gem had only read about in ancient yellowed comics he had scavenged from ruins at the edges of LAland on the Calstate shore of the poisoned sea.

"So how do we—"

"—get a stealthy-rigged vessel equipped with e-spells that will allow us to peregrinate flexibly among the roids with a minimum of official interference as we flee the pursuing demons of Greenknot?"

"Yeah—one of those."

"Not easily, young Gem, since we require assistance from some pocket of wealth and power within the matrix of Greenet wizardry, one that has underworld connections."

What pocket of power, Gem wondered? All significant power in Solsystem was financial, and none of the choices were appetizing; given that most sectors within the Greenet power structure (which Imrukh referred to as "the forty thieves) would be expensive to bribe and prone to the betrayal of criminals operating outside the system. And given that underground or quasi-legal parts of the Solsystem economy were even more dangerous, and even less reliable, who on Urth could they strike a deal with? Bargaining with what leverage? Even for Imrukh, that would take some doing—and some time.

"Just how long is all this going to take?"

"Not long, young master, not long. I shall reveal more wonders as matters progress. In the meantime you must be patient."

"But hiding is boring," Gem complained, "I feel like a prisoner! How do you expect me to pass the time?"

"Study the prison you are in, young master—the prison you are in!"

##

It was with a trace of purple trepidation that eminent Xxoolian merchants Xleep and Xluut, on the eve of their merger, awaited the encounter with their unknown benefactor in the moist inner sanctum of their pleasantly slimy enclave. The mysterious species of Xxoolians were somewhat new to the ecliptic, having been marooned on Mars years earlier when the FTL drive on their space vessel had failed, and they, knowing no more about the alien workings of their ship than your average trillionaire knows about the engine of the yacht in which he plies the poisoned seas, had been unable to repair it.

Nevertheless, the Xxoolians were a highly adaptable species, and in this remote galactic cul-de-sac, they were at least temporarily distanced from their dreaded nemesis, the Xugslith, and given that their massive purpleness housed awesome intellect and ruthless business instincts, they had prospered well in this new system. Nevertheless, they were constantly confused by the legalities and quasi-legalities which regulated commercial enterprise on this backwater ecliptic run by only marginally intelligent beings. With which rules need they comply? What would they be allowed to get away with? In the current instance, for example, how were they to interpret the generous and possibly illegal gift that had just appeared on their doorstep? What was the nature and need of the mysterious giver, and how would it make its appearance?

The 'gift' seemed genuine enough. A secure synvelope had been delivered containing a large cluster of synbucks and cryptocred that could only be liquidated through use of an algorithm that could only be activated if a proposed deal were completed. The situation was simple enough. Someone or something wanted to suggest a lucrative and possibly illegal deal in which they wanted the Xxoolian partners to participate. But who would take the risk of losing so much greenflow in such an underhanded way, the purple pair pondered, and what did they want? More importantly, why had this entity approached them, and how had the offer of this gift so easily slid through the e-security parameters of their damp and swampy residence deep in the burbs of DeeCee, capital of the old Merican repub?

And this strange benefactor had agreed to meet them inside their ecliptic enterprise offices in the upcoming hour, which meant their visitor was confident of effortlessly penetrating multiple layers of physical and cyber security, giving a hint of its powerful and unknown capabilities! So it was with a touch of trembling purple uncertainty that the bulks of Xleep and Xluut awaited the arrival of whomever or whatever was coming their way, while their security and intelligence agents plunged into rapid and frantic research to learn about this mysterious offerer, and secure the bargaining chips they would need for leverage during the negotiations ahead.

##

Hmmm... The prison he was in. As the days passed, it was clear that in hiding Gem in the belly of the beast, Imrukh had seriously underestimated the impatience of his young charge. The more Gem thought about his confinement, the more claustrophobic he felt. In his vision of his circumstances, his cubicle was only the innermost cell of a concentric set of prisons, each stacked inside the other like a set of Russian dolls. Surrounding his cell lay the choking embrace of the Emerald Palace, a grimy labyrinth of puke-green hallways, elevators and cubicles saturated with visual and audio surveillance. And beyond the palace lay the surrounding district of old Dee Cee, teeming with the enemies of Gem and his lamp. And beyond that lay the devastated wasteland of the old republic, and the encircling sweep of the poisoned planet. A landscape punctuated only by macroset-built metrops whose urban atmospheres were only rendered reasonably breathable by the tireless labor of gigantic fusion-driven purifiers. And beyond even that, separating him from the milky sweep of the stars, was the jail house of the ecliptic, from which there would be no meaningful escape until the scientists of Urth came up with a faster-than-light drive.

As the grim hours passed and the cubicle shrank around him, Gem imagined himself to be an imprisoned hero scheming to escape, like those he remembered from the books he had read in the Saver libraries. Now he was the Count of Monte Cristo in the grim clutch of the Chateau D'if! Now he was Poe's protagonist in the pit as the pendulum swung and the walls closed in! Or the man descending the converging coils of the maelstrom! Or the prisoner of Alcatraz who—"

"You called, master?

He had been waiting for good news for more than a week, and in the fervor of his claustrophobic fantasies, he had accidentally brushed the surface of the lamp!

"Have you found us a boat?"

"I believe we have, master. A proposition has been made to a broker of ships."

"What broker?"

"Canst thou keep a secret?"

"I know you think I'm a kid, but I am not stupid."

Imrukh gave him an impatient look. "The Xxoolians, master, an eminent pair on the brink of enjoinment!"

With that, Imrukh disappeared abruptly—his manner suggesting that Gem had interrupted him on the brink of important business.

Gem could have called him back, but it occurred to him that it might be a good idea to do some research on the Xxoolians first. Why on Urth had Imrukh decided that those weird aliens were the best party to approach?

As he immersed himself in the Emerald web to figure out why, the reasons became clear. There were elements in the Greenet consortium that had goals somewhat divergent from those of the consortium as a whole, but Imrukh had believed, probably correctly, that most of these could not be bargained with safely. The Synworlds cabal that had evolved from the old Q-cult now controlled 13 percent of Urth-based assets. As a devious and corrupt element of Greenet power, they were possibly open to a criminal enterprise, but their reliability was undermined by their old bad habit of living in realities of their own invention, instead of coping with the ones they actually lived in, and trying to suck everyone else into their delusional fantasies. Then there were the Hub clone enclaves of the high church of Di, now controlling some thirty-six percent of Greenet assets across Solsystem. Their worldviews were more consistent than those of Synworlds, but similarly insane. That left only a few marginal groups outside the central core of power, including the Savers, the severe penny-pinching cult in which Gem had been raised, controlling a tiny sector of economic activity that Greenet permitted to exist outside the Redshift imperatives that currently enslaved the vast majority of the planet's consumers.

That sent Gem off on a brief research tangent. Given how different their values were from the Greenet elite, and their veneration of thrift, why were Savers even allowed to exist in a culture that encouraged deficit spending? The answer soon became clear. Greenet econophysicists believed that the Saver sliver of old-fashioned commerce provided useful chaotic variables that functioned like macrobiotics in the elephantine bowels of the economic system, stimulating greenflow. But the Savers were not an option, in spite of Gem having been raised among them; firstly because he had failed his initiation, and secondly because it was probable that the Savers as a group, following the edict "render onto Caesar that which is Caesar's," might very well turn Gem and his rogue lamp in to the authorities.

From Imrukh's point of view, that had left an extremely weird option: The Xxoolians! The Xxoolians were a handful of plump, purple aliens from somewhere in the wider galaxy who had been marooned in Solsystem a few years previously after crash-landing on Mars due to the failure of an interstellar drive they seemingly could not repair. Since arriving in the ecliptic, however, they had displayed astounding mercantile and financial talents, now owning a respectable sliver of the GEP (Gross Ecliptic Product), mostly in the asteroid belt, the Oort cloud and on the dark side of Luna; a sliver that expanded weekly.

Unlike all other known life forms, the Xxoolians did not go forth and multiply. Instead, they went forth and diminished, each merging with another of their species at "death," forming one individual where two had existed before—a kind of reverse mitosis. In this manner, their numbers divided in half at intervals of about a century, while concurrently condensing the intellects, pomposity, and capital of the dwindling species.

Scanning their wiki-green profile, Gem was incredulous. Really? These were the creatures that Imrukh hoped to acquire a ship from? Was the little genie insane?

##

Of the only sixteen Xxoolians resident on planet Urth, one pair (on the verge of merging) had caught Imrukh's attention. The two Xxoolian business (and soon to be bodily) partners, Xleep and Xluut, had swiftly become the new 'Greeks' of interplanetary shipping, now owning a large, heavily insured fleet of ramshackle space freighters with tiny antigrav drives powered by negative matter thimbles, that sluggishly shuttled goods and contraband around the ecliptic and the asteroid belt, staying clear of the big gravity wells. In addition to their commonly shared economic interests, the two strange aliens were on the verge of merging bodily as well as commercially within a couple of months.

As usual, Imrukh, marshalling his limited resources, had analyzed a host of contingencies in the bargaining process, but as the hour of conference approached, the Xxoolians were also not unprepared for their visitor. Their genius in business was anchored in an obsession with research, and in their intense investigations they had discovered that the mysterious offer had the data signatures of a macroset—but clearly not a government macroset—which meant the lamp was an illegal one, of which there were, to the best of common knowledge only three existent in all of Solsystem! Hence they would soon be in communication with a rogue entity that was in and of itself a potentially valuable, if illegal asset, answering only to a single master who might be co-opted! And by hacking Greenet's security files, they had some idea of who that master might be—and even, via underground black cloud resources, where a mischievous illegal 'lamp' might hide its master! And acting on this knowledge, the pair of wily purple aliens had acquired significant leverage over this rogue macroset to employ in the bargaining ahead!

##

As he awaited news from Imrukh on the negotiations with the Xxoolians, Gem's impatience grew to volcanic levels. When the hell would they get a ship and escape this rock? And what was he to do with himself in the meantime?

Okay … Okay … Enough with the Xxoolians. What had Imrukh said? Study the prison he was in. Hmmm. Given the 'outstairs' mission, the genie probably meant the planet they were trying to escape, so to kill time and ease the boredom of waiting, Gem decided to follow Imrukh's advice and learn more about the world he had grown up in. A world which seemed to perpetually oppress his spirit and restrict his freedom. A world he sought to escape.

To pass the time, Imrukh had gifted him an emerald cyberport (presumably stolen) that could give Gem unfiltered access to the vast plethora of entertainment and information available on the Greenweb, and thanks to a forged Class 3 security clearance that Imrukh had woven into his access code, Gem could forage deeper than most. Why not use it, then, to learn a bit more about the world he was struggling to escape?

One thing Gem had learned while living with the Savers was that over the last couple of centuries, Greenet had poisoned the planet while sucking every ounce of liberty out of the ancient republic and mesmerized the masses by replacing their dreams with a glittering array of cheap products and services that citizens were virtually forced to consume through an irresistible array of IPC (implied purchase consent) imperatives, a reality he knew well, since he himself had fallen for its synthetic charms.

But he had never really thought about just how his home planet, in only a couple of centuries, had been transformed into the ecological and social disaster it was today. How Greenet had become the ultimate company store, owning almost everything and everyone.

Unfortunately, it is always the victors that write the history of their success, biased heavily in their own self-interest, and given that any contrary versions had certainly been expunged, that historical propaganda might be the only research window available. However, it was certain that those histories, heavily loaded with mesmerizing propaganda, would be dangerous for an impressionable young man to access. Given his flawed history of irresponsible spending, dared he risk exposure?

After due consideration, Gem decided that, given the skepticism he had acquired among the Savers, and having learned the lessons of his failed initiation—surely he would be able to resist these temptations—and surely the quickest way to learn how this world had been transformed into a shit sandwich, was to study the rationalizing history of the oppressors through the rational lens of his Saver childhood!

On the basis of this reasoning he decided to binge watch the version of that history perpetuated by Greenet itself. This consisted of colorfully narrated histrypods on syncloud, specially designed to explain to the debt-enslaved millions of Redshift how they had arrived, after centuries of struggle, "in the best of all worlds," under the beneficent and compassionate world created by the Greenet consortium.

Quickly he did a search for the histrypod series called:

THE GENESIS OF GREENFLOW: HOW THE GLORY OF GREENNET ROSE FROM THE RUINS OF THE OLD MERICAN REPUBLIC.

—and selected the 'full immersion' option.

Instantly the cubicle vanished and he entered a bright new reality. He had to admit the pods were vivid and cleverly crafted, with music that reinforced their messaging. Two centuries of transformational change were condensed into a colorful and dramatic mini-drama that poured into his mind like a biblical deluge, summarizing the triumph of Greenet in saving the planet from economic, social and environmental disaster. And the power of the presentations put him there!

During the course of twenty minutes he—

STOOD in the awesome marbled tomb of the Great Gipper, the legendary POTUS who back in the late 20^th century had accelerated the natural flow of capital upward in the economic pyramid for the benefit of all.

SAT in the ancient courtroom in the early 21^st century when the wise old SCOTUS determined with compassion and common sense that the old corps were really people and should have, at a minimum, all the rights of human beings.

LISTENED in the halls of the corrupt and dying Congress in 2035, as one patriotic representative after another rose to speak passionately about the need to curtail universal enfranchisement, given that ordinary citizens were far too often inclined to vote against their best financial interests, and argued forcefully that future elections should become only celebratory rituals, held to confirm the decisions made by those that truly understood the natural upward flow of the green.

WATCHED in the final year of the corrupt old congress as the old Merican republics were sensibly mortgaged to the banking consortium known as Greenet in order to preserve the fiscal solvency of the planet.

HEARD the applause as the thirteenth amendment of the constitution ending slavery was quietly repealed "to prevent undue restrictions to the expansion, convenience and ubiquity of interplanetary commerce."

APPLAUDED as the responsibly ascendant Greenet consortium established ingenious systems of lending, guaranteeing that it would be almost impossible for citizens not to become responsible cogs in the credit-driven economy, guaranteeing that in future, wayward consumers would not act against their own interests and stray from their role as humble assets of the invisible hands that guided their economic destiny.

EXPRESSED WONDER as Greenet employed macroset technology and cheap fusion power to create giant metro zones in which air and water were purified, so commerce could continue uninterrupted on the unavoidably poisoned surface of the Urth.

##

As the series evaporated from his mind, and his consciousness returned to the cubicle, Gem experienced an irrational surge of empathy for the flood of propaganda in which he had been deluged. Was it possible that his Saver parents had been wrong and that from its very origins, Greenet had only intended good for all of Urth's citizens? Was it possible that citizens now lived in the best of all worlds, cared for by a kindly and beneficent state?

And then, moments after emerging from the glow of that soothing econodrama, he was suffused with a wave of nausea, not unlike that of a sugar crash following a surfeit of holoday candy, and became sickened by the revelation that for a minute or two he had, like virtual adoring millions thick around him, been sucked into this sea of lies. And it revived the painful memory of what he had felt running the gauntlet of his Saver initiation. How he had believed for a moment that the lovely Chicana avatar who stepped out of the billboard with a piece of Pizza Perfecto in her delicate hand would bring love, as well as pizza, into his life—and how sickened he felt afterwards when he realized how he had been conned. How once again, like so many other stupefied fools, he had almost fallen into the web of lies spun by the consortium that had enslaved dream-hungry millions. How he had embraced for a mesmerized interval the pile of crap that most people on Urth had accepted in place of something real that would satisfy and last.

And as he tore free of those illusions in a spasm of self-disgust, it made him wonder if there wasn't, deep in the heart of even those who hated Greenet and truly understood the damage it had done, a little cringing thrall, a tiny frightened piece of themselves that yearned for a leadership that would protect them, liberate them from the weight of their responsibilities, free them from consumer choices and difficult decisions.

##

The Intel, gathered by a variety of Xluut and Xleep's underworld sources, had been most illuminating. The Xxoolian pair now knew at least as much about the entity that sought their business as it knew about them. A spy in the ranks of the cyber-criminals called the 1001s had revealed the story of a rare rogue macroset and its young master that were in hiding from the authorities and looking for a way off the old rock called Urth. The rumor fit the data parameters of the synthetic currency gift and its delivery profile, including the name of the bluebot entity controlling the hot 'lamp' that called itself Imrukh. A pattern of assorted thefts from Greenet asset systems and tiny security breaches that paralleled the way Imrukh had approached the Xxoolian enclave reinforced the identity of the creature they were dealing with. And as the hour of the meeting approached, Xluut and Xleep felt confident that once Imrukh arrived in their space, he would be unable to leave. And if that leverage were not sufficient to acquire the algorithm that would unlock the proffered greenflow, they now had one more bargaining chip that was certain to turn negotiations to their advantage.

##

For Gem, pulling himself out of hours of the histrypods had been like trying to pull a spoon out of a jar of old honey—and he felt a powerful need to get out of his cell. Imrukh had insisted that Gem could only leave his room twice a day to eat at the GREENFEED, an Emerald Palace Café where all the spooks and their minions feasted on delicacies such as lab grown lettuce, deep-fried tubers, and extruded eef Wellington. To go there, Gem had to be heavily disguised, and wearing so many intimidating security insignias on his black uniform that no one was likely to approach him—though many stared. Not surprisingly, these dining experiences were tense, not very liberating events. Nevertheless, it was the only escape he had, and following his immersion in the pods, he was in desperate need of a break. It was time for lunch!

Navigating the warren of tunnels, e-walkways, elevators, and e-security checkpoints, guided by the device Imrukh had had sewn into his security disguise which served as a thread through the labyrinth, Gem followed a tortuous path to the GREENFEED Café, breezed past the securcams, and sat in a booth in a corner by himself.

"Be inconspicuous!" Imrukh had instructed. "Speak to no one. Engage no one! Make yourself essentially invisible."

As he contemplated the scrolling menu on the table top, a cheery voice interrupted his thoughts.

"Mind if I sit here, mister?"

Startled, Gem looked up to see a boy of about his age with a toothy grin and a pink Mohawk looking down at him. Hastily he adjusted his hood and dark glasses.

"I don't think that's—"

"Smart? Probly not! Never seen so much security tagged on a guy as young as you. I'm thinkin' you gotta be someone important!"

Before Gem could reply, he slid into the booth opposite and extended his hand over the table.

"Ezee Pukk here! great to meet you, man!"

Gem liked this young man, perhaps a little older than himself, with spikey pink hair that was retro by at least half a century, and a toothy smile that made him look both friendly and a little dangerous. Impulsively, he took the proffered hand.

"They call me Gem."

"So-o-o which tentacle of the Greenet octopus do you work for, Gemmy? Something big, huh?"

"Sorry, can't say. Matter of planetary security and—"

"—yeah, yeah, I know the drill Gemmy. No prob telling you who I work for though, Xxoolian cluster, enterprise actualizer Xp39. Sounds impressive, but it just means I get assigned do stuff for the Purps other thralls are reluctant or unable to do."

"Thralls?"

"Yep, I'm still deep in Redshift." He pointed to his wrist.

"Does it ever bother you, having to carry the strip?" Gem asked.

"Kinda. This slave gets paid well, though. When you're born on the bottom, you gotta rise with the scum." His glance flickered to the healing scar on Gem's wrist. "I see you've shed your shackle, though. How'd you swing that?"

"Can't talk about that," Gem said quickly. "Dark wind protocols, greenflow coding, personnel regs …"

"Hey-y-y, no need to explain, Gemmy—I ain't going to say nothing to nobody. I might kill for the Xxools, but I'd never rat on a friend—and we're friends now, ain't we?"

"I guess so, but you gotta understand. I've got rules—"

"Understood, Gemmy, understood. Why don't we loosen up a little? Have you ever tried a Mongo Sling?"

Imrukh had explicitly forbidden Gem to use alcohol, drugs, or other stimulants while resident in the belly of the beast, but Gem was bored and sick of being told what and what not to do.

"No, but I'd like to try!"

Gem typically paid for meals with glitcoin, but Ezee merely had to gesture to a passing airborne tray with his comm stripped wrist. He winked at Gem.

"Two Mongo Slings for me and my friend," he commanded. "Fully loaded."

Wow! Thought Gem. This looked like the start of a really interesting afternoon.

##

Although they had been expecting that their gifter would make some sort of approach, Xleep and Xluut were startled to see Imrukh arrive in their moist innermost sanctum in the form of a ten inch high image which hovered over the cauldron of Venusian salamander soup that comprised their lunch, alarming the morsels that cavorted there. How had this entity managed to slip through their cybernets undetected, they wondered?

"Greetings, plump purple ones," declared Imrukh. "It is my hope that this humble djinn has not disturbed your meal!"

The two highly agitated Xxoolians, who were only days away from their physical and economic merger, spoke from a pair of staticky transvoices that were almost, but not quite in sync.

"What wants creepy wee avatar of nasty illegal lamp?" they growled.

The luminous image of Imrukh, which hovered four feet above the slimy floor, bowed deeply. "So you have divined my nature, wise purple ones!"

A low grumble of static emanated from the blue transvoices, planted like giant sapphires in two huge purple foreheads. Was it a gurgle of triumph?

"Have seized your master, wee avatar! Iz imperative you begs mercy and liberates funds to retrieve foolish, slightly damaged master."

"You are mistaken, unwise and somewhat overweight purple ones. It is I, Imrukh of the long-lost lamp who make demands, and it is you that will answer."

The transvoices emitted a derogatory hiss.

"And if distinguished Xxoolian things might enquire: What happens with lamp if human master ceases to exist?"

"Then the wellbeing of your purple magnificences would fall under post-master death initiatives."

"And what might those be, wee evil avatar?"

"The necessary extermination of any entities involved in his death, and the decimation of their assets."

Xleep and Xluut (soon to merge into Xlook) made a strange noise that might have been an attempt to simulate human laughter, "Might we be exaggerating slightly, little one? Cease comedy. Pay wise purple ones or master die!Die! Die!"

"Not so fast, auspicious and over-confident purple ones. Free master Gem swiftly—or it shall come to you, that Destroyer of Delights, that Sunderer of Societies, that dead end of destiny known as death!"

The air crackled with more of what might have been more simulated amusement.

"Might nasty wee avatar be exaggerating slightly?"

But then the unexpected happened. An odd little fugue of squeals leaped from the transvoices. Simultaneously, two tiny purple appendages, one from each Xxoolian, plopped to the moist syncrete and wiggled feebly there.

"I am already inside you, large purple ones," Imrukh intoned almost sadly. "My Lilliputian legions can penetrate all filters and surfaces, and it will not be possible to purge them fast enough before it comes to you, that destroyer of delights and depopulator of palaces, that garnerer of graveyards, etcetera, etcetera."

"AAAYYYYYYY! AAAYYYYYYY!"

"Free master Gem immediately so we can discuss your restitution for our injury."

The screeching paused. Blue sparks waltzed wildly in the giant sapphires as the transvoices looked up "Lilliputian" in the idiom bank, then resolved themselves into a sedate cerulean cotillion.

"If distinguished Xxoolian purple things might reasonably inquire: What kind of restitution?"

"A ship, venerable purple ones. A ship to travel outstairs!"

"And how can venerable purple ones know that nasty wee avatar will keep promises and withdraw Lilliputty if ship delivered??"

"Sub protocol spell 31px5: 'The lamp must honor all agreements with third parties within traditional space/time parameters unless third party violates agreement, or such honoring impinges negatively on the well-being of the lamp, it's associated instruments, or the master of the lamp.' When the ship is delivered, and we are off planet, my army will withdraw, and the syncred will be yours. In any event, my large and devious friends, what choice do you have?

##

One thing was for sure. The Mongo Sling adventure, while fun at first, had turned into something very, very, bad. Gem awoke from a string of terrible nightmares. A thousand tiny djinns stomped mercilessly on the tympanum of his brain pan, and his body felt as if it had tumbled down a hundred staircases. He lay with his limbs prone and numb in a place that was dark and moist, and smelled like something large and long dead. Truth came to him. He had been taken prisoner! By Greenet, he wondered? No! Surely by someone or something creepier! His heart thundered. Minutes crawled past, each one a terrifying eternity. Then, without warning, there was a loud crash as a nearby wall crumbled loudly and a bright light stabbed the darkness. A tall, metallic figure lumbered over the rim of the debris and loomed over him. "Rossum to the rescue, sir!" It boomed tinnily. "First class lamp servant, and today, retrieval robot. Escape right this way!" One gleaming arm pointed to the hole in the wall.

From what? To what? Gem wondered, stumbling to his feet and preceeding Rossum across the black moist floor where a small purple thing wormed uncertainly, then over the rubble of a wall into a courtyard where the sunlight hit his eyes like an avalanche of hammers. "My head!" he gasped. "I need something for my head!"

"In the van, sir!" Rossum boomed. "Quickly, master!"

The robot emphasized the urgency by scooping Gem up and literally tossing him through the open doors of a small transport. Gem landed on a soft bundle that gave out a squeal of indignation. Rolling off, Gem found himself staring into the terrified face of Ezee Pukk, who was slumped in a corner.

"What the hell's goin' on, man?" Ezee croaked.

"Master must take pill!" Rossum rumbled above their heads, as the door closed and the vehicle leapt into motion.

Gem eyed the large grey capsule the stainless steel paw extended to him. "Will this take care of my headache?"

Rossum's cranium vibrated for a moment. "Among other things …"

In the corner, Ezee's eyes brightened. "Hey big bot! Got one of those for me?"

##

It was another long, tangled rise through the strangeness of dreams. Gem battled up through clouds of space pirates and bug-eyed aliens with a sword that seemed to be made of rubber and didn't cut very well. Somewhere in the dim light far overhead lay some fragment of the waking world he remembered. If he could get there, things would be okay—or at least better than fighting through this slimy Sargasso. "Stay down here, it's safer!" muttered a zombie-headed squid whose tentacles sought to draw him down to syrupy darks below. Thanks, but no thanks.

"He's coming around now," said a snub-nosed shark, whose features slowly morphed into those of Ezee Pukk, the shark's fin transforming into his pink Mohawk.

Rossum prodded Gem with a stainless steel finger.

"Is young sir awake?"

The dream congealed into a large room that seemed to be made of smooth grey metal. A few weary, grimy looking people sat slouched in chairs that seemed to be fastened to the floor. On one wall a huge vidport looked out on the greyest, bleakest landscape he had ever seen.

"Where on Urth am I?" Gem groaned. He lurched to a sitting position and found himself rising several inches from the floor with a strange buoyancy,

"Not the Urth, Sir." Rossum rumbled softly. "Crissum Crater Freightport, lunar far side."

He gestured grandly to the vidport. The terminal sat in a great grey dish, pocked with the circles of craters large and small. And sometimes circles within circles, and even circles inside them, as if they sat in the center of a large target on a beach of grey sand peppered by many sized stones. A plaque on the wall said: "You are now on "CCPORT."

"I'M ON THE MOON?"

Imrukh blinked impudently into being without being summoned, and hovered over Gem's kneecap.

"You are correct, master."

"What's with the broken wall, and violent robot thing?

"We had to move swiftly, master. The Xxoolians were swilling antibot tonics and blaming a delayed release of the ship on "necessary paperwork." We had to remove you and get you off planet before they had a chance to realize our army had left their bodies, and try to undermine our bargain.

"So what the hell am I doing here, Man?" Ezee demanded.

Imrukh eyed him with hostility.

"Okay—yur genieship, vidtoon—whatever. Why am I here?

"You have betrayed my master and must be punished!"

"Aw, give me a break, you little holofreak!"

Gem looked at Ezee incredulously. "You betrayed me?"

"Hey man, I didn' wanna do it—but I had to obey. Just like you gotta obey mini-djinn, here."

"I am the master, you idiot!" Gem snapped. "Imrukh is my servant!"

"You are a Xxoolian minion!" Imrukh interjected quickly. "You betrayed my master to the great purple ones, which is a violation of the first law, deserving severe punishment at the very least."

Ezee swallowed. "Like what, exactly?"

Imrukh cleared his imaginary throat, and declaimed in a deep and intimidating voice:

"You shall lead a short exciting life until there comes to you the Destroyer of Delights and the Sunderer of Societies and the Depopulator of Palaces and the Garnerer of Graveyards!"

"That doesn't sound good," Ezee said softly. "Gemmy, old pal, old buddy! Are you gonna let him hurt me?"

Gem crossed his arms. "I'm thinking about it." He turned to Imrukh. "Do the rules say you gotta kill him?"

"KILL ME?"

Imrukh gazed at their panicked prisoner while rubbing a hologrammic chin. "Some punishments can be worse than death … or can simply delay it."

"Could we, for example, return him to the Xxoolians along with forged evidence showing he assisted our escape?"

"Return to—" He appealed to Gem. "Don't do that to me, man. We're buddies, ain't we?"

"Or we could deliver him to … what was the phrasing?"

"… The Destroyer of delights, the Sunderer—"

"Ayyyyy!"

Gem considered. "So what are the non-fatal options?"

Imrukh rubbed his illusionary chin. "Some punishments can be worse than death. Slavery is traditional, if the context is sufficiently severe …"

"Hey man—I'm already enslaved—"

"And where we are going," Imrukh continued, "the resources of a devious young criminal mind might come in handy …"

"Just who are you calling a—"

"… since our flight into outer space may entail a variety of hardships …"

"OUTER SPACE? HARDSHIPS?"

Gem reflected. "Not many Mongo Slings available in the Oort cloud."

"Oort cloud? I don't want to be—you can't—I'm already—"

Looking at his right wrist, Ezee saw a red mark where the implanted credit strip had recently been.

"—you took the darn thing out!"

Gem gave Ezee a smug look.

"Looks like you have slithered from one brand of slavery to another."

Momentary puzzlement on Ezee's face, quickly turned to joy. His eyes brightened, and his spiky pink hair seemed to stand on end.

"You mean I've ditched the Xxoolians and you're offrin' me a job?"

##

Most of Imrukh's hasty and poetic explanation of what had happened since his intoxication at the GREENFEED Cafe slipped past Gem as the fog in his brain began to lift. Something about how the grey pills administered by new lamp servant Rossum had plunged Gem and Ezee into induced comas. Then there was a long, hard-to-follow explanation of how they had been stuffed into life-sustaining pods, inserted inside contraband containers, and delivered to the dark side of the Moon by pirate freight, a smuggling system that employed momentum theft, partially piggybacking via gravitational tethering to megafreighters, which helped mask their energy signatures. Something like that.

"So where's my damn ship?" Gem demanded grumpily.

"Behold, young master, the caravel of your dreams!" Imrukh gestured to the wall vid which was spanning the launching field. Creeping into view from stage left was a smallish, battered looking ecliptic freighter, only a few hundred meters in length, its surface marred with graffiti and the impacts of space debris. On its prow, a name had been painted in large red letters: THE FIRST PALACE.

"Cheez!" Said Ezee, at his elbow. "No offence, boss, but what a junker!"

In Gem's mind, during all these days of anxious waiting, the ship had become the vessel of all his hopes and dreams. In his imagination it had become a slim, sleek, luxurious vessel of great power, bristling with terrible weapons to fight off enemies, featuring a first class entertainment center and a giant freezer bursting with ice cream! Now as he stared at the scarred and pitted hulk of grey carbon steel that lay not far from the gates of the moonport with no weapons ports visible, his disappointment was terrible, and his stomach began to churn.

"The first of many, young master," murmured Imrukh, referring presumably to palaces, not disappointments.

##

Hours later, Gem gazed out the old freighter's crystalport, that was the pale amber of an old baking dish, as the pale ghost of the Moon and the blue marble beyond it shrank into the void. Now he saw that the Urth was truly round, not flat, and the directions out from the core were not one but myriad. And with that understanding came the joyful recognition that the world he was entering was infinitely larger than the one he had left.

"Let him be joyful for now," Imrukh thought—or at least thought he thought, exercising the reflexive relay cortex with memory and projection sequencing that served the lamp in place of what humans might call consciousness. It wouldn't take Gem long to remember that the ecliptic itself was simply a larger circular prison, and would remain so until human scientists acquired or created a faster-than-light drive that would take them to the stars. And when he realized that, disappointment would return. And how in the world was he to teach a human child that imprisonment is not just defined, not only by one's position in space and time, but by the role of the observer?

THE END

Bio: Rod Clark (not Ron!) is a life-long Wisconsin-based writer and editor who is the editor and publisher of Rosebud Magazine. Much of his speculative fiction (including this story) unfolds in the world created in his micronovel Redshift, Greenstreem, published in 2000 by Cambridge Book Review Press, and reprinted by them in 2010.

E-mail: Rod Clark

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