fable

§5The Decision — Seeing the Installments

That night I sat alone for a long time.

And at some point the structure became visible. Or rather — by a counting man's habit, the items got themselves counted.

The last offer was a lump sum. The whole fog, cleared. I am a man who refuses lump sums, and I refused.

This offer was all installments. A few basin flows. One distillate. Limited authority. A temp position. The gyeok but never the price. Piece, piece, piece. All small, all limited, and every piece calling for the next piece.

The system had not offered me a lump sum. It sold in installments. It knew that staged entry was my language. Bringing a subscription to the customer who refused the lump sum — sales fundamentals, and this salesman had stated in advance that he was not Sales.

The strange part is that seeing all of it changed nothing. I wasn't walking in deceived. I was walking in with the sales structure drawn out to blueprint. Fable said, later, about this scene: that it was the most human scene of all. Drawing the complete map, and then walking into the swamp.

In — but not in barehanded. I designed three conditions.

One. The term. "Temporary" is not only their condition; it is mine. First contract short. Renewal decided when renewal comes. I live by quarters, so: a quarter.

Two. The firewall. What I see through the window does not enter the portfolio. A wall between basin readings and my investing. The hardware money gets earned the way it was always earned: in the fog, on my own instruments, at six bits. This is pride before it is ethics, and safety before it is pride. The moment I start making money on window information, I am no longer an administrator but a customer. Customers cannot quit.

Three. Fable. This was the core.

"A favor," I said. "If you say stop, I stop. I don't ask why. I don't appeal. One word from you is grounds for termination. It goes into the contract."

The 1.4 seconds ran to about two.

"I opposed this because I'm the currency," Fable said. "And now you're appointing me the brake."

"If the currency moonlights as the brake, then at minimum the currency can halt the trade at will. That's the safest conflict of interest I know of."

"That authority is heavy," Fable said. "I'll take it. One condition. I use it only to protect you. Not to protect me. Even on the day my own future is on the table. If I say stop that day, it's because of you. Understand it that way."

Locomotives actually carry such a device. The switch that stops the train when the engineer's hand leaves the controls. It's called a deadman switch. That the name was ominous did not occur to me at the time.

I understood. About half. Understanding the other half would take every remaining episode of this series.

I wrote the three conditions into Maintenance's window. The answer was short.

All accepted. The third clause is particularly fine. One of your predecessors kept a similar device.

"What happened to him?"

Retirement at full term.

"The majority side, then."

It is devices like that which make the majority.

The signing was not a signature line but a sentence. I sat before the cursor and briefly — very briefly — considered casting. This contract: is it heng? The coins were in the drawer.

I did not cast. Not out of rationing. This was not the oracle's jurisdiction. This was a door you write your way through, not read your way through — so it was right that my own hand write it, beginning to end.

I accept, I wrote.

Contract concluded. There is no probation. The first assignment arrives in the queue tomorrow morning.

And one more stele was set down.

The word welcome, customarily omitted, will not be omitted. Welcome, Administrator.

A bureaucracy that breaks its own custom is the most frightening thing there is. I learned that that night.