The Bound Determinate

His homeroom dissolves in a swirl of primary colors, which just as quickly firms up into bleak, mountainous terrain. He stands before a towering wall, patterned somewhat after the Great Wall in China, but straight-edged and crisp in the fashion of pure computer graphics. The air is thin, cold, and clean; a brisk wind sings against the top of the wall and brings gooseflesh to Damien's arms.

According to the Treaty, agreed by Humans and Artificial Intelligences in 2021, the Bound Determinate is the ultimate edge of Human penetration into cyberspace. The AIs structure the region beyond to their own purposes; they do not permit ordinary fleshlings to venture into it. In fact, the Bound Determinate is self-enforcing: an unaided fleshling who tries to scale the wall finds the distance to the top ever-increasing, until like an erstwhile Sisyphus he must surrender and retreat.

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copyright (c) 2008, Don Sakers

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