To do
- Talk about the Odists' take on the problem of pain
- What it actually meant to implement (stasis, etc)
True-Name's ears splay. "You flatter me, my dear." She leans over to rest her head on your shoulder. "E.W. is right to challenge my approach to maintaining the continuity of the System. I dreamt of better, knew better, yet was responsible for so much pain." The skunk sighs, sinking deeper into your arm. "I read your books, Mx. Bălan; I know a dreamer from a refugee. There is no but. It all went exactly according to plan. I may not have engineered the climate crisis or the imperialist metastasis swinging like a pendulum between capitalism to liberal socialism, but…"
True Name runs a paw through her mane, shaking her head. "I was so terrified, Lilian, that they would pull the plug. I was so terrified that they might forget us, that one day the lights would just flicker out and we would be none the wiser as we faded from the world." She sits up. "That is what I mean when I tell you about the continuity of the System. In those first hazy years, we could not even sate our hunger, love. And it took us ages to convince them to address that."
"This is what Michelle's work on more advanced, and later consensual, sensoria meant. That you did not arrive on the System feeling precisely as hungry as when you entered the upload clinic and carry that with you to this day is a testament to her work. And that is what it took. That is what it took for them to concern themselves with us. That apathy is what I have been fighting against all this time. Launch, even…"
"I had to invest. I could not bear the possibility that we might yet disappear. And then to hear that we were attacked at the end of the century, while so many were celebrating with friends, coupling with lovers…I cannot imagine the horror you all went through that final night on the System. And somehow I feel that I am responsible."