Songs of Roads and Other Real Things
BSQ 30: Fading Empires, Spring 2025
Sean had just won the Grand Turvy, the most prestigious virtual race of the year. He'd worked toward this for years. Winning meant credits. And candy! Real candy, not the stuff you suck out of a bag.
As Sean exited the race a winner, the lights in his small podment flickered and went dim -- yet another brown-out.
But it would come back -- Happy the AI would take care of them. As long as the water was still coming out of the tap, air still flowing, and food still delivered to his tiny podment, Sean had nothing to worry about.
Happy would take care of everything. Happy always did.
This was it, the Grand Turvy. Only four of Sean's fellow drivers had made it this far.
His head buzzed. The sound of engines rumbled through his bones. Sean felt as juiced with adrenalin as his racer was with high-octane gas. Or would be, in the real.
Virt beat real, anyway. The other drivers were plenty real, bright blue dots over their racers attesting to that.
To his right, Lime, a shiny length of racer, thin to nose, filigree fins flung out like beetle wings to the side.
Beyond Lime, Rhubarb, a red teardrop shape. Past that Mango, an orange blob. Nowhere near aerodynamic. Didn't matter in virt.
To Sean's left, Blueberry, an undecorated oblong with highlights glittering like sun-drenched diamonds.
Driving those racecars were humans, here to win. Like Sean. He grinned.
At the edge of the blacktop, on both sides, risers tight with people. Sean's heads-up said nearly half were real.
READ MOREThe prize credits, though -- a hundred percent real. And could get you real things. A better simochair. An upgraded rig.
Sean heard howls and applause. He could zoom in, if he wanted, and see expressions, flags, fingers. Some were waving his colors. Most were red-dots -- AI NPCs. They those had a subtlety of expression and posture that blue-dots never quite did.
Well, Happy thought faster than Sean did. Happy had studied humanity for a long time, in AI-years.
Sean's own car was yellow-white and a traditional wedge. Yellow, like butter, real butter, which Sean had had once. Or white like the sun, which he saw bright against blue sky in virt all the time.
And if he won, he'd get a candy victory wreath delivered to his front door inbox with a chime. The wreath would be studded with candy, colorful sweet globes and long, sour, striped canes. Not a bag of syrupy slurry to suck at. Solids, which were not something you got every day.
At the bark of gunshot, Sean pressed the accelerator. The five racers shot forward onto straight blacktop, blurring through fields with barns and cows and horses.
One-point-five. Ahead, a blue and silver maglev train howled its horn, the sound rising in pitch as the racers closed the gap, then dropping to a fade as they passed.
Two hundred. Two-point five. Three.
The road roared and everything blurred by -- towns, hills. Just warmup.
He knew these racers. They were the best. All five dropped speed together, hugging the curves and pacing each other like the pros they were.
A gentle curve, a gimme. Another turn, sharper.
At this speed, Sean needed the subtlest of motions, or he'd spin out.
And reactions that required thought were just too slow. Across years of racing, Sean had learned that you never knew enough to make the right decision in time. He'd learned to trust his intuition, which was faster than his reason, and more reliable.
Another straightaway. Three. Three-point five. Four. The road blurred, a shuddering line of grey against blurred scenery.
All at once the road was gone. A drop-out, and no one should be surprised. Once airborne, you faced multidirectional wind, rise, fall, sheer.
All five shot out over the ravine. Far below, rocks and whitewater. Sean powered the rockets in his racer's undercarriage.
On the other side, a dark sharp-edged cliff. Sean palmed his rockets, rose just a little, keeping it tight, light. Too easy to over-correct.
Which Mango did, the racecar impaling itself on a jagged edge, exploding in a deep orange flash, flaming pieces slowly drifting to the ravine below.
One down.
COLLAPSEWhat happens when the bloom falls off the rose and your civilization is in that long, unstoppable slide in senescence? When nothing is going to save it but a revolution before the barbarian hordes come?
Comments are Disabled