Diamond Age or a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer

"The Vickys have an elaborate code of morals and conduct. It grew out of the moral squalor of an earlier generation, just as the original Victorians were preceded by the Georgians and the Regency. The old guard believe in that code because they came to it the hard way. They raise their children to believe in that code– but their children believe it for entirely different reasons."

"They believe it," the Constable said, "because they have been indoctrinated to believe it."

"Yes. Some of them never challenge it– they grow up to be smallminded people, who can tell you what they believe but not why they believe it. Others become disillusioned by the hypocrisy of the society and rebel– as did Elizabeth Finkle-McGraw."

"Which path do you intend to take, Nell?" said the Constable, sounding very interested. "Conformity or rebellion?"

"Neither one. Both ways are simple-minded– they are only for people who cannot cope with contradiction and ambiguity."

"Ah! Excellent!" the Constable exclaimed. As punctuation, he slapped the ground with his free hand, sending up a shower of sparks and transmitting a powerful shock through the ground to Nell's feet.

"I suspect that Lord Finkle-McGraw, being an intelligent man, sees through all of the hypocrisy in his society, but upholds its principles anyway, because that is what is best in the long run. And I suspect that he has been worrying about how best to inculcate this stance in young people who cannot understand, as he does, its historical antecedents– which might explain why he has taken an interest in me. The Primer may have been Finkle-McGraw's idea to begin with-a first attempt to go about this systematically."

"The Duke plays his cards close," Constable Moore said, "and so I cannot say whether your suppositions are correct. But I will admit it hangs together nicely."

"Thank you."

"What do you intend to do with yourself, now that you have pieced all of this together? A few more years' education and polishing will place you in a position to take the Oath."

"I am, of course, aware that I have favorable prospects in the Atlantan phyle," Nell said, "but I do not think that it would be fitting for me to take the straight and narrow path. I am going to China now to seek my fortune."

"Well," Constable Moore said, "look out for the Fists." His gaze wandered over his battered and filthy armor and came to rest on the floating helmet. "They are coming now."

The best explorers, like Burton, made every effort to blend in. In this spirit, Nell stopped at a public M.C., doffed her long dress, and compiled a new set of clothes– a navy blue skin-tight coverall emblazoned with SHIT HAPPENS in pulsating orange letters. She swapped her old clothes for a pair of powered skates on the waterfront, and then headed straight for the Causeway. It rose gently into the air for a few miles, and then the Pudong Economic Zone came into view at her feet, and Shanghai beyond that, and she suddenly began to pick up speed and had to cut the skates' power assist. She'd passed over the watershed now. Nell was alone in China.

The Hackworths have a family reunion; Hackworth strikes out on his quest; an unexpected companion.

Atlantis/Seattle was designed small and to the point; the narrow, convoluted straits of Puget Sound, already so full of natural islands, did not leave much room for artificial ones. So they had made it rather long and slender, parallel to the currents and the shipping lanes, and been rather stingy when it came to the parks, meadows, heaths, gentleman farms, and country estates. Much of the Seattle area was still sufficiently rich, civilized, and polite that New Atlantans did not object to living there, and little Victorian mini-claves were scattered about the place, particularly east of the lake, around the misty forest domains of the software khans. Gwen and Fiona had taken a townhouse in one of these areas.