In the depths of Sanctity is the name of every man and woman who has ever lived in all of human history. Those for whom no written history could be found have been extrapolated by the humming machines back to the edge of the time when there was no mankind. There are men and women in the machines with names no historic person ever knew, names in languages that were spoken at the dawn of time. Never mind that no one alive can speak the language of Homo habilis; the machines know what it was and the names of those who spoke it. Adam, just down from the trees, is on the list, and Eve, scratching her butt with a splay-thumbed hand. Their genotypes are there as well, designed by the machines and assigned appropriate DNA sequences. Every person ever alive is there, in Sanctity/Unity/Immortality.
And all of it, every machine, every entry, every sample, all of it is guarded. There are guards everywhere, watching, noticing, reporting. Watching for those who may not conform to the ideal of S/U/I. Watching for acolytes who fall apart into gibbering madness. Watching for Moldies, members of that sect that has wearied of troublesome life and desires only the end, the ultimate destruction of Sanctity, of Terra, of a hundred worlds, of life itself—the end of all those men and women on the eternal list.
Every day, in each of a thousand chapels, parts of the list are read by the machines, read aloud, dawn to dusk, dusk to dawn. When the list has been read in its entirety, the machines start over. The mosquito whine of the reading has no end as it rehearses all of humanity from father Adam to little Dom, over and over again.
As it goes on Rillibee sits staring at the elder, half listening to the names put forward by the acolyte, lifting the mechanism back to his ear as the machine recitation goes on. “Violet Wilberforce. Nick En Ching. Herbard Guston.” Everyone else who has ever lived, but not Rillibee Chime. He has never heard his name in that mechanical voice. Perhaps he will not be enrolled until he has completed his twelve years and gone. The earpieces are thick with dust. It has been a long time since anyone has come there to listen, a long time since anyone has cared about the litany.
In a little while he will pick up the cleric-all and report for duty to Room 409, level three minus. In a moment. For now, he will sit here very quietly, choking down his loneliness as he saysRillibee Chimeto himself, carefully listening to the sound of it, words spoken aloud in a human voice in this empty hell where no one speaks his name.
As Rigo Yrarier stepped out of the conveyance pod in the reception area deep underground, he was not entirely surprised to find his skin crawling with superstitious revulsion. He hadn’t wanted to come here. Uncle Carlos had sent a message begging him to come. Uncle Carlos, the family scandal. Carlos, a skeleton in the confessional, as it were. Apostate Uncle Carlos, long ago lapsed from the Old Catholic religion of his birth and now Hierarch of all this …this.Rigo looked around himself trying to define this.This hive. This unholy ant’s nest. Outside the glass room in which he stood, identically suited and powdered figures scurried like so many anonymous insects.
Rigo had not wanted to come, not even on a mission of mercy, which is what Uncle Carlos had called it in his message. Missions of mercy were Marjorie’s business, not Rigo’s, and he was not even sympathetic with hers. Useless, all of it. One could not save people who were too stupid to save themselves, and the same thing applied to Sanctity, so far as Rigo was concerned. Then, surprisingly, Father Sandoval had urged Rigo to answer the plea. No doubt Father had reasons of his own. He would probably want a report; he would want to know all about Sanctity, what it looked like, what went on there. Old Catholic clergy were allowed to take tours of Sanctity about as often as Old Catholic clergy allowed the devil to assist at mass.