Chapter 23: Creeping Doom

The goal of war is to create a battlefield your opponent is on, but you are not. Whether it's spears, crossbows, air strikes, or proxy wars, the idea is to fuck over the enemy while you stay safely out of range.

Empty Man understands this very well - the Guild does not. Like a child who thinks the point of a sword fight is to hit the other guy's sword, they relentlessly attack Empty Man's weapons, while leaving him untouched.

Empty Man lives in a world without consequence. Completely removed from the battlefield. This will not do.

1 Week Later - Huginn - Neo Ver Sigh

I sense a certain freshness. My home tastefully informing me that I have company. Hmm. Muninn must be back early. I know it's her, because the only way to approach Neo Ver Sigh is by flying boudoir, and she has the only one in existence. I suppose you could approach in a helicopter, if it wasn't shot down. Which it would be. Noisy peasant vehicle.

If Muninn is home early, she'll be thirsty. I head to the bar and mix her a drink. Well, I wave my hand and a drink appears. I wonder how that happens? I wave my hands a bunch. She could be really thirsty. I know I am.

Muninn strides in, grabs a drink, pops a pill in it, hands it to me.

"Thanks." I take a sip. "How was your meeting? What did Zonk want?"

"Something about tedium." drawls Muninn. "Or boredom. I wasn't really listening."

"Wise." I finish my drink. "I notice your fairy is dead."

Oh-So flashes me a dead-eyed, black-toothed grin. "Undead." she corrects.

"Gross." I feel a coldness spreading through my brain. It's painful, but I don't care. What did she put in my drink? It was either a powerful drug, or an extremely powerful placebo. I stumble. Sit on the floor.

"Something's wrong." gasps Too-Too. "Huginn! What's happening? Should I get help?"

Muninn slaps my phone to the floor. Stomps on it. Too-Too fades out. Muninn hands me a new phone.

"This is your new phone and your new symbiont." A nasty looking zombie version of Too-Too appears. "Do whatever it says."

"Okay." That sounds like a bad idea, but I don't care.

Zombie Too-Too gives me a disgusting grin. "Do you know any Copycats?"

"No."

"Do you know any other Guild members?"

"Yes."

"Good." he says. "Let's go pay them a visit."

1 Day Later - Clearview - Bay Area Penthouse

My phone rings again. I block the call. Jesus Christ. You'd think a billionaire (almost/soon-to-be) wouldn't have to deal with unwanted phone calls. Fuck you, Steve Jobs. You gave us airplane mode, but not I-own-an-airplane mode. Idiot.

Actually, I probably could have my calls screened through an offshore call centre. I'll do that in the morning. No, I'll have someone do it. Someone should be doing it right now. There's nobody else here. I'm new to being rich. Gotta work on my infrastructure. I have the penthouse, but not the 24 hour servitude. The only services I have at this hour are pizza delivery and escorts. I wonder who'd be better at tech support?

My phone rings again. Dang it, shut up. Can't you see I'm trying to order a tech savvy whore? It's not easy, their bio's are not helpful. Fuck it, I just pick an Asian chick. I guess that's racist. I'll have to pretend I want an Asian for the sex, not the tech support. I think that makes it okay. I do more cocaine.

Who the fuck is calling anyway? Is it the guys trying to buy my app? The Guild? Fuck them. Clearview is the premier facial recognition app. I have hundreds of police departments using it, and thousands more on the way. They'll have to use Clearview. I'm the only one with the balls to scrape social media for the billions of pics the app needs. It's not illegal, just against the "user agreement", and "highly unethical", and "illegal". Fuck it, everybody scrapes Facebook. Who's gonna arrest me? My fucking clients? Hardly.

I'm never selling this app. It's a goddamn goldmine. A genie in a bottle. A million cops to grant my wishes. What's that green dot in my cocaine? PAP!! Holy fuck! There's a flaming hole in my marble countertop. I look down. There's a hole through my pant leg, and my chair. A scorched line along my sack. Fuck!

I stagger to my feet. The green dot flickers to my chest. I freeze. The dot goes back to the table. I slowly edge away. The dot flickers back to my chest. Stays there. I slowly get back in my seat. The dot goes back to the table. Blurs out. Spells a message in green laser light - ANSWER YOUR PHONE.

My phone rings.

I answer.

"Listen," I beg. "I can sell you the app. We can make that happen. Or, I can erase people from the app. Nobody needs to know who you are."

"We're past that." The green dot flickers to my chest. "Tell me about Empty Man."

I start to pee. "I don't know what that means."

"Fair enough. Give me your client list."

1 Day Later - Becky - Content Warning Fan-Fic Theatre

I'm enjoying a drink at the theatre pre-party. Getting loose for my performance.

Symbiont assisted theatre has become quite popular. There's no audience, everyone who attends gets to play a role. The symbionts provide the costumes, sets, and special effects. They also whisper our lines in our ears. It's a blast. Especially if you're a wee bit wasted.

I like coming to the Content Warning Fan-Fic Theatre. The randomly chosen fan-fics are both familiar and surprising. It makes for a fun show. That said, there's always a chance of someone getting roughly penetrated on stage. Probably not me though. I'm playing a Dalek tonight.

"Jolly, do any Daleks get roughly penetrated in tonight's performance?" I ask.

"No." says Jolly Gnome.

Dang. Well, there's always the afterparty. Speaking of which, it seems to be starting early. There's a large bowl of pills on the bar. The cast are digging in.

"What are those?" I ask.

"Apparently they're mind destroying drugs." says Rose.

"Cool." I pop a couple.

I grab another beer and head to my mark. It feels like there's an icy knife stabbing into my brain. Extremely painful, but I don't care. My phone is taken away. I hear Jolly howling until it's smashed, but it doesn't matter.

My new symbiont is a decaying, disgusting, version of Jolly Gnome.

"Do you know any Copycats?" asks Jolly Ghoul.

"No."

"Do you know any other Guild members?"

"Yes."

She smiles. "Let's pay them a visit."

1 Day Later - Neurotank - Corporate Headquarters

"The first step is the total immersion in a new reality." I say into my phone. I'm talking up a new client. She's interested in our opinion changing service. Conventional wisdom says you shouldn't try for a major sale over the phone, but she's too busy to meet in person, and doesn't consider me important enough to change her schedule. That's cool, I like entitled clients. They tend to have money.

"We maintain a couple million virtual people on social media. But honestly, they only have a few hundred unique personas. That's all you need. Real humans can only remember 150 personalities. Any more just blur together. We copy each persona thousands of times just to keep distinct social circles. You don't want real people having the same virtual friends. The point is to keep real people away from each other.

"We have 15 million Americans in total immersion. That means 90% of their social contact is happening with our virtual people. 15 million is enough to turn the dial on most elections. Just tell us who you want to win.

"Of course, people don't just vote the same as their social circle. They need an extra push. That brings us to step two - neuroplasticity.

"Neuroplasticity is the brain's ability to physically rewire itself. This allows big personality changes to happen. When we're young, the brain is very plastic, and big opinion changes can happen often and easily. Once we hit 25, that plasticity slows dramatically, and our personality is kinda stuck.

"Obviously, a simple solution would be to get'em young. Works for religion. Unfortunately, under 25's are a weak portion of the electorate. There aren't enough of them. Also, it can be counter productive to lock them into political opinions we may be hired to change later.

"Luckily there's two ways to induce neuroplasticity in older populations - strong desire and trauma. Now, strong desire is beyond our ability to trigger. If we could, we wouldn't need the rest of this operation. It takes more than a motivational poster and a titty pic. But trauma? Trauma can be mass produced. Happens all the time with media accounts of god-awful murders and tragic senseless deaths.

"Now, we're not going on a killing spree to change people's votes. We don't have to. We can kill virtual people.

"Basically, we immerse a guy in a virtual social network. Surround him until we're the only people he talks to. Then we wait til he's at a crossroads, an emotional vulnerable point. They come along regularly. Next we give him an imaginary friend, someone to help him out. Then we kill the imaginary friend, blame it on our political adversaries, and boom - we got another radical on our side.

"What do you think?"

"I think my daddy warned me about boys like you." My client sighs. "Do you ever work for Empty Man?"

"My client list is confidential."

"Fair enough." she says. "What would it cost to see it?"

"One billion dollars." I used to say it wasn't for sale, but that wasn't believable. Asking for a billion presents me as hard to bribe, which may be believable. And hey, you never know.

"Hmm. I have a counter offer." she purrs. "Do you see that green dot between your legs?"

1 Day Later - Brooke - Produce Cooler

"Hey Brooke!" yells Brooke from the produce cooler. "Get in here!"

I enter the produce cooler. "What's up?"

"I have drugs." she hands me some pills.

"Cool. Thanks." I pop them back. "Your wizard looks rad."

"Thanks, he's trying something new."

I feel a hideous icy pain in my brain, but it doesn't matter. My wizard is destroyed before me, but I don't care. His rotten corpse asks "Do you know any Copycats?"

"Yes."

"Excellent." he giggles.