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On the surface of Venus, Charles' long grey fingers of his right hand slowly tilled the soil outside of his dwellingplace, as he held the seeds of corn in his left hand ready to be planted. For the first time in months he was able to clear his head of all the antics going on on Earth, in the Machine, in the Resistance, in the Comittee of Nobles behind the Lincoln, and in the rest of UA and the other FWWs he frequented - for just a few moments his mind was clear.

He wasn't too surprised, but was a bit sad to gaze up toward the horizon and feel the sudden jolt of telepathic recognition from and with every other Venusian simultaniously. Many of them messaged both to him directly and amongst each other exclusive of him but within his ability to percieve. The overall sense, as far as his existence and "hello" was concerned and recieved, was that they felt there was something wrong with him... that he was too close to the humans and spent too much time in plugged in to the Black Web. The inner workings and dynamics of Charles' politics, and his mystical experiences of New Ancient Land, were alien to them, and they had no interest in continuing the telepathic link with him, fearing they too would become contaminated.

"You're just not ready yet, my fellow freaks," Charles said aloud, in english, openly defiant - and returned the entirety of his conscious focus to the planting of the seeds in his hand. As his focus was shifting away from the other Venusians to the soil and the inward contemplation, he could sense some of the Venusians smiling at his words.

********

Corporation G7*9-23 stood tall and proud, somewhere toward the southern edge of New World Center.

Invisible, Reynolds continued to whisper into Drone Seventeen’s ear:

“The vests and belts will be picked up by a human called Blue Bird Simon, then store new settings and destination and continue with the old.”

Then he sprayed his canister into its mind and sat for a while on the simulated carpet beside the Manager-god.

The Manager-god here wasn’t very original. She was a very serious looking woman with a grey skirt and jacket. She stood with her arms folded looking out at the drones, one by one. The drones weren’t so easy to recognize or distinguish as the Manager-god, mainly just a collective blur of movement.

Reynolds stood up, turned to face the Manger-god’s ear, and whispered:

“I am a pawn.”

Thinking this was her own thought, the Manger-god wrinkled her forehead, confused. “Number thirty six, research, priority one. What is a pawn? Report.”

Reynolds walked up to number fifty seven, whom he knew was truly Evin Ridge, a former Red Bird who was being kept “on ice” for some reason. What Reynolds didn’t know what that Evin was actually the fifth next of kin of King Mao the forty second of Cheju Do, and an ex-lover of Lucy’s.

Reynolds whispered into the ear of the Drone formerly called, and who would never again be called, Evin:

“I’m doing this wrong, Manager-god said yesterday new plans for mask, and sword blade and handle,” and sprayed his mind with the detailed program, “and she said rewrite destination Montauk Point Harbor dock twelve, sixteen hundred to be picked up by a human, Blue Bird Simon, at thirteen hundred hours, then store new settings and destination and continue with the old.”

“A Pawn is a piece of an ancient game called chess. It is of the lowest value. It may move forward one square at a time or two squares in the first move, capture other pieces only on a one-space diagonal forward move, and be promoted to any piece other than a king upon reaching the eighth rank, or it is person or an entity used to further the purposes of another.“ number thirty six said out loud. Reynolds looked over his shoulder at the Manager-god, grinning at her extreemly confused facial еxprеssiоn.

“Why would I think such a thing?” the Manager-god thought to herself as she surveyed the Drones again. Her shoulders squared on the space near Reynolds and her eyes became very focused. “Number Fifty Seven, why did you change one of your routeens? …Report, Now!”

“It just took me some time to put your orders into affect from yesterday,” said the Drone, terrified at having shirked his duties.

“Why did your adrenal glands just release, what are you hiding??”

“I’m… I’m lying to you my Lady! The delay was my own fault, I should have made the changes sooner!” He said, weeping.

The Manager-god pointed a small object at the Drone and pushed a button, causing him a very sharp sensation of electricution. He yelped like a dog, then instantly spent all of his accumulated credits from the previous minute and a half on a numbing sensation and some pleasant uplifting music, for his ears alone, and returned to his duties.

She checked his monitor and saw the blue masks being sewn and swords being forged and packaged by many robotic tentacles, which she would never fathom were actually on the other side of a big round world. However, as Reynolds already knew, this Manager-god was colorblind.

“I forgot about the changes. I must not let the voices know I’m forgetting things or they will terminate me,” she thought to herself.

Reynolds looked at the Manager-god’s еxprеssiоn, sighed, whispered to himself, “Hypocrites… all of us.”

“Don’t let it happen again, Drone!” she snapped abruptly at Evin, then returned her gaze to the others, trying to forget what had just transpired. She paused for a few seconds looking at number seventeen, but decided not to investigate.

Reynolds chuckled a bit, “ahhh… so predictable. Well, there you have it, Blythe. Your new uniforms,”

Then Reynolds disappeared from that place.

********

"Just tell me what needs to be done. I feel compelled to point out that if you exert yourself like this you'll delay your recovery and you won't be any good to anyone..."

"Alright!" Blythe said as she threw down the screwdriver and dropped a small metal contraption onto the floor, then picked it up and replaced it on the table while wiping the sweat off her forehead. She looked over at young Baggit with a chilling focus and more than a hint of resentment. On his face she noticed the affect of her word, action and facial еxprеssiоn, so she closed her eyes for a second and opened them, managed a hint of a smile and a brief nod before staggering into her cot.

"Get a pen and write this down, tell Simon we need more fuel, and more meat... and have him bring some nitric acid... and baking soda and an eye dropper. Let me know when he gets here and I'll tell you where to go from there, and would you let Charles know I got his message and tell him... the injury was minor."

"Right away."

"And get me some Asprin! Thanks..." The young boy in the rebel uniform left her cell. She sealed the door and picked up a wire that was dangling beside her bed. She noted the way her face looked in the reflection of the metal tip at the end... the rhythm of her breathing and the beating of the viens of her right hand as she held the plug.

"God how I hate this shit." She said aloud, reffering to her life in the old subways. Behind her hand was a blue mask with a filter build in around the mouthpiece, and a small upward pointed red sword embroidered into the forehead. "What does it mean... Charles...?" She managed a whisper, then quickly shoved the metal plug into the back of her neck, and fell into total relaxation on her bed.

She sat in a large blue swivling chair behind a desk. In front of her on the wall was a map of NWC, a perfect three dimentional replica based on this-instant satalite survalence.

"Map. How many drones are there in New World Center?"

A synthesised voice replied "There are fifteen million six hundred and twenty five thousand drones in New World Center."

"Map. How many Rebels are there in New World Center?"

"Unknown."

"Good," Blythe said and nodded wearily, yawning. "Map. How many drones are there in the World?"

"There are twenty seven billion four hundred and sixty five million ten thousand four hundred and two drones in the world."

Blythe's eyes became focused, and she put her forehead on her desk. "and two? ...Map. Who was the last drone to be added to the Machine?"

"A Rebel who called himself Blue Bird Simon. He was on route from somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean toward New World Center, and was arrested by Sergeant Reynolds, MSD-President of G6*12-32 Guilford Point Metropolis, and added to the staff of G6*12-32 today at 4:32am Standard Time."

Blythe checked her watch in time to see it change from 4:34am to 4:35am, then put her hand to her mouth and rose from her desk. She walked towards the sliding glass doors which opened for her as she steped through them. On the other side was the tiled porch with a few modifications, including a waist-heigh stone railing which she leaned on to gaze out at the sounds and smells and sight of 180 degrees of the ocean at night.

She leaned her elbows on the rail, stifled the urge to vomit, and shook her head from side to side, forcing the tears not to come. Instead she lifted her head and closed her eyes tight, and let out a scream that would have reduced her voice to whispering for a week had it been done in her actual body, in her cell in the old subways just under New World Center.

Charles sat in the form of young George Gordon in his 20th century black suit in a chair hovering a few feet above four square meters of tile.

To his right was a small table with a coaster on it. On the coaster was a coffee mug which contained the taste, texture, and temperature of a cup of coffee with cream, sugar, cinnamin, and nutmeg. In his research he had come to find the answer to that age-old question about the drones and the fish-lady, and had decided to go into competition with Billy for the best Coffee House in Underground America.

Billy was a bit secretive as to his true identity, but in the grid he appeared as a young gentleman with dark skin and a long cherry-wood pipe, usually wearing skin-tight latex or leather or anything black and shiny. He would occasionally serve coffee and act as DJ in his Coffee House on Hendricks Avenue and 5th.

Charles and Billy, while they would soon be competitors, knew each other quite well. Well, they ought to: they're the same person.

This time, though, Charles was creating something a little different. In a plot gratiously dontated by the Lincoln to improve local morale and enhance aesthetic and diversity in the grid, under Charles' direction, he activated the familiar Ocean presetting.

In his command post, atop his hovering square, he sipped his coffee and said "Let there be mountains arising from the waters!"

And there were...

"hmm... no, no, thin ones... almost like cones, but not quite... 30 of them..."

And there were...

"goood, good, good. Now... erase everything in this grid heigher than 50 meters, except for me of course, and everything here on this square with me...

"Now... let the flat tops of these mountains be coated with... marble," and they were, "No... Malechite... Increase Malechite luminosity by fifteen percent... Good! and let there be... uh... pyramids at the centers of each of them with a diameter that allows for a minimum of two meters of floor space before the drop off, made of... sandstone bricks... good, uh... smaller bricks."

And there were...

"Okay... now... let a flag wave on top of each pyramid... not the usual flag... a white flag. Blowing in the wind..."

"Let there be three portals on each wall of every pyramid, and let one on each be open to one other pyramid such that they all be connected, and let the remaining 330 of them lead to the 330 most popular public areas in the UA Grid at any given moment, with the option for the customer to command the door to his own apartment or to a destinating of his own choosing, which is either public or where he is invited."

And it was so...

"Now place the same tables and chairs as there are at Billys throughout all the floorspace. And if someone jumps off of the edge, let them hover or fly. Make the sky change according to the time of day, with stars in desert visibility at night, and the color saturation of the sky... and the ocean... and of everything here except the people who come and go, exaggerate it by ... a hundred fifty percent..."

The synthetic voice replied back to him "I'm sorry to interupt you, sir."

"Then don't interrupt! I'm on a roll here!"

"It's Blythe, sir. An urgent message that you are invited into her aparment as soon as you are able, and that she will be waiting."

"Then I will go right now."

Instantly the square was all that remained, and the Ocean. Charles was standing, and there was a cement railing behind Blythe, who stood before him in uniform. He was a bit started to see the same uniform he had seen in the real word on Jobe so many years before.

"It's good to see you, Blythe," He notice not the slightest hint of a smile on her face, "are you okay?"

Blythe shook her head from side to side, "How do I begin... VSD training?"

********

"You have already seen the first five palaces of New Ancient Land, that is far more preparation than you need, in addition to already knowing the ins and outs of dronelife as a second nature. We shall have to test you to be sure you will not succumb to the trance, though, and you'll need to subtly communicate with the drone just as the man in yellow did with you..."

"...that was...?"

"Yes. I will teach you how to travel there without being seen and we will go see this person. This is the ultimate sacrifice, you know that... it could take years, you may never return... but it makes my heart sing to hear anyone volunteering to be a VSD... We will begin whenever you're ready."

"I am ready."

********

Though incomplete, the untitled Coffee House in the sea became very popular in the following weeks of Charles' absense...

********

Baggit met Billy the day after Blythe plugged in for Simon and Simon went with Charles to New Ancient Land as a sortof experimental conspiracy between Blythe and Charles to try it out as a deprogramming process. So, Simon was the first person to move directly from the drone-trance to initiation into Palace One, so Charles and Blythe were quite interested to see what the results were.

Anyhow, Baggit, while barely 13 in reality, made himself look about 25 and quite militant, in full rebel uniform with a shaved head - an older, more musular version of his actual physical appearance. He came to Billys knowing it was where Charles and Blythe first met, (well, sortof) and went around introducing himself as the Blue Bird Sergaent Baggit, assistant to Commander Saint Blythe of New World Center Subways. This earned him a lot of dirty looks as no one wanted to hear the rebels reffering to themselves in the same terminology as used by the Red Birds and Servant-Cousins.

Billy, looking even more effeminate than usual, with his skin-tight shiny black unknown material body-suit and long cherry-wood pipe sat down at the table with him.

"Nice to meet you, Baggit, I've heard a lot about you."

"Then it seems I'm at a disadvantage."

"Ah, forgive me, I'm Billy. Like the sign," Billy pointed his pipe toward the backward pink neon sign intended to be read from the other side of the glass.

"Oh I see. Well, it's nice to meet you Billy. You probably already know I'm the assistant to..."

"Yes I know."

So just incase you're having trouble following... There's a 13 year old who has been charged to be responsible for Blythe's body in the subways for as long as she's plugged in as VSD for Simon - and there's a 45 year old half human half grey alien on Venus named Charles who is leading Simon through the Palaces of New Ancient Land.

Charles has quite a while, though, as step one for Simon is the 24 hours of breathing, so Charles decided to go meet Baggit whom Blythe had reffered to the Lincoln and whom Richard, another noble, had oriented through the Lincoln.

So when these two meet, the 13 year old is a large muscular self-proclaimed "Sergaent" in uniform, and Charles is the thin effeminate dark-skinned "Billy," owner of a Coffee House on Henricks and 5th in Underground America.