When she got to TrogTown, she was patted down by a different woman this time, a twentysomething in a peasant dress. Again assaulted by the smells—patchouli among them this time—Delaney parked the bike and saw a flash of rust-colored fur. A fox darted in front of her and disappeared into an alley.

  At the post office, she found only one letter. It was from Agarwal. She knew it was unwise to read it there, on the counter, but she opened it anyway.

  Dear Delaney,

  I should have talked to my colleagues in the Religion department years ago. Now I understand surveillance.

  God is not old. He/she/they were invented, all across the world, not more than ten thousand years ago. When human societies were small, they were close-knit and moral boundaries were clear. In a tribe of twelve, if you stole your fellow caveperson’s favorite club or wheel prototype, it was known and could be rectified. You were always seen, and all was known.

  But as societies grew, the wayward could do things unobserved, and crimes could be committed. So it became necessary to invent a being who saw everything. Watch out, God’s creators said, you are being watched by a morally righteous eye in the sky—even when no one else is around. (The concept of Santa works in a similar way.)

  Now, the decline of God and the imminent collapse of so many faiths seems tied directly to the rise of surveillance, and the collective enforcement of social norms through instant global shaming. God promised punishment after death. Now it’s meted out in minutes. Karma was vague; digital shaming is specific. And I would argue people prefer the reliable nature of morality-through-surveillance over the ephemeral promises of the gods/Gods of the past.

  Prayers to God were rarely answered, while shouts into cyberspace always receive a response, even if misspelled and hateful. Everything God offered—answers, clarity, miracles, baby names—the internet does better. Do you know how many times What is the meaning of life? was searched on your platforms last year? Twenty-one billion times. Every one of those queries got a reply. The one question that could not be answered, until now, is Am I good?

  I think we’re on the verge of the Every, or those who want to be subsumed by the Every, of determining this—or claiming to. This will be the last step. The number will tell us. Homo sapiens will become homo numerus. Millions more will suicide, yes—those who bristle at the numerification of our species—but for so many billions more, the new certainty will allow them to sleep.

  I’m keeping up with my treatments, and things for the time being seem stable. Which is a bit of good news that might lead to more good news. If my tumor shows no growth for the next month, I might qualify for an experimental treatment. The irony is not lost on me: I have to be healthier to be given medicine.

  Agarwal.

  Delaney stared at the letter, numb. She folded it back into its envelope, looked up and jumped out of her skin.

  A man was studying her from the other side of the glass. She backed away. He didn’t move. She edged toward the front counter. He didn’t move. His face was hidden deep under a hoodie, his eyes behind bug-eyed sunglasses. She was about to yell for help when the man threw his hood back. It was Gabriel Chu.

  She was pressed against the wall. He waved innocently. She mimed a heart attack. He mimed an apology, then pointed to his left. He wanted her to follow. She steadied herself. Her heart had relocated to somewhere near her right shoulder. She nodded. He walked on. She left the post office and walked up Bryant, followed by a pair of stray dogs, both beagles, seeming like siblings. Gabriel stayed a block ahead, glancing her way as he crossed the street. They passed an alleyway full of tents. A pair of city workers were in the process of trying to clear them out, while the sound of someone practicing the trombone came mournfully from beyond.

  She passed under a sign on the corner. YOU ARE ENTERING A PATH WITHOUT SURVEILLANCE CAMERAS. CITIZENS CHOOSING THIS PATH ASSUME ASSOCIATED RISKS. SFPD. Somehow all the subterfuge she’d engaged in the last month seemed pedestrian next to this, following Gabriel Chu through TrogTown. She followed Gabriel down two sloping blocks overgrown with ivy and wisteria until he ducked into the Senello Animal Shelter. Most shelters were now in trog zones; scrutiny online was too unhinged.

  Delaney followed him in. There was no physical danger inside, she assumed, and she could leave any moment. The moment she opened the door, she was blown back by dual assaults of noise and stench. It was loud as a monkey house and smelled far worse. The ceiling was eighteen feet high and cages were stacked to the roof. Dogs, cats, guinea pigs, birds. A banner across the rafters said These animals cannot be released into the wild. We try to find them homes. Support the Senello Animal Shelter and Proposition 67. The anti-pet movement had grown exponentially. Prop 67 would codify the right of humans to keep pets, but was expected to fail.

  Delaney heard a deafening bray. She turned to find a pair of goats in a large corner cage. When she turned back again, Gabriel was at her side. “Have you been here before?” he asked.

  She said she had, and he glided away, leading her to a silver cage in the middle of the floor that held what appeared to be a chinchilla. The enclosure reached Gabriel’s chin, striping his torso. Delaney stood on the other side of it, making the chinchilla an unwitting eavesdropper.

  “I’m sorry we’re in here,” he said. “I know you guys just lost Hurricane and this is probably triggering.”

  “Thank you,” Delaney said, “and it’s okay.”

  The woman at the counter, fully twenty feet away, noticed them. “You can bring that chinchilla home today,” she called out. “If you live in Nevada, of course. Not here.”

  “Thanks!” Delaney shouted back to her.

  Gabriel hadn’t taken his eyes off Delaney. “I know what you’re doing and it’s okay,” he said. “I approve.”

  Delaney tensed.

  “Don’t worry. We’re safe here,” he said.

  Those words meant nothing. He could be wearing a hundred devices. Delaney tried to think of a response that would survive playback scrutiny. “What is it I’m doing again?”

  “I know you’re at the Every to destroy it,” he said. “Or at least to gather information. It’s obvious. You’re a bad spy. Why do you think I interrogated you?”

  Delaney stared at the animal in the cage. Its expression said both End my life now and I have everything I need.

  “I’ve watched you from the moment you got onto campus,” Gabriel said. “I read Agarwal in college. Then a student of Agarwal’s comes to the Every after six years in the forest? It was all too intriguing. Then I watched your presentation with Wes. I know it fooled Carlo and Shireen, but please—it was terrible. You were terrible. And when I questioned you, Friendy ripped you apart. Your ratings were abysmal. But it was fun watching you lie, thinking you were fooling your own software.”

  Delaney couldn’t stay. This was too much. This was not the way to reveal herself, amid braying goats and chittering rabbits and to a man in burgundy pants. She felt ambushed and wanted to run.

  “We have pot-bellied pigs,” the shelter woman said. She was now standing behind Gabriel. She was wearing a soiled lab coat and a knit beanie. “They’re out back. We can’t keep them here.”

  “We’re just looking around for now,” Delaney said.

  The woman didn’t move. “Something smaller? We have a kangaroo rat. It’s really just a hamster with big feet. Adorable.”

  “Thank you,” Delaney said. “That sounds tempting.”

  “These animals will die,” the woman said. “Hundreds every week. When the Every canceled pets, they all ended up here. You have no idea. How about a cat? We have seventy out back.”

  “Please,” Delaney said, “please give us a minute.”

  She retreated to the shrieking back room.

  “Delaney, you need our help,” Gabriel said. “There are a lot of us. Did you think that out of twelve thousand people on that campus you were the only saboteur?”

  Delaney stared hard at the mound of fur in the cage.

  “Is Joan involved? I know Wes is,” he asked.

  She couldn’t say anything—that would confirm his presumptions—but she needed to absolve Wes and Joan. How, though, without admitting her own culpability?

  “My best guess is that you’re trying to plant terrible ideas at the company in hopes they cause some chain-reaction and bring the company down. Am I right?” He was craning his head to catch Delaney’s eyes, while Delaney was determined not to meet his. “Delaney, say something.”

  By staying this long, by not denying anything he’d said, she’d already opened herself to catastrophic scrutiny. If he was indeed trying to trap her, he’d already won. Delaney didn’t trust Gabriel, or the existence of any Every underground. But as soon as she thought of those words, Every underground, she had the sense that Gabriel had a name for his movement. And she knew that if the group did have some name, that name would be idiotic.

  “We’d like you to join the EveryThrow,” he said.

  Delaney laughed involuntarily. Of course they’d named it.

  “Listen, I like your plan,” he said, “but you should go further. We can help. You’ve met Holstein. I hope you’re pleased with how far she’s taken Friendy.”

  Gabriel smiled. “Yes. Holstein is one of you. One of us. She’s trying to drive the program off a cliff. Same idea as you. And then of course there’s Hans-Georg. He’s been key.”

  Delaney’s neck tingled. Hans-Georg could be trusted. He was a man without guile. “I thought he left,” she said.

  “No, no,” Gabriel said. “Well, yes and no. He’s been bouncing around the world, making some arrangements and connecting with hundreds of others. It’s not just this campus, Delaney. There are insurgents all over. He sends his greetings, by the way.”

  Gabriel tapped his index finger against the chinchilla’s cage.

  “Tell him hello,” Delaney said, and knew she shouldn’t say more. She needed to flee, to think.

  The shelter woman emerged from the back, holding a white rabbit in each hand. Their eyes were pink. “These are great pets,” she said, and made her way toward Delaney and Gabriel. “Ignore the eyes.”

  “Thank you,” Delaney said to her and to Gabriel, and weaved toward the exit.

  “I’m assuming no snakes?” the woman yelled.

  “Even if we don’t work together, we’ll be watching,” Gabriel said over the cages, two fingers raised to signify victory, as Delaney fled the building.

  XXXVIII.

  DELANEY MADE PLANS TO GO HOME. Home to Idaho. She’d take a leave of absence. Or she could quit. The idea that there was an insurgency at the Every seemed impossible. But if there was one, she was intoxicated by the idea that she was not alone. That people like Gabriel and Holstein, far better placed than herself, were already working to destroy the company. But she did not trust Gabriel Chu. He’d inhabited her nightmares for weeks; no one who wanted to position himself as her ally would have performed an interrogation as ruthlessly as he had. It showed a sadistic side that couldn’t be reconciled with an idealist. And by following her, Gabriel had compounded her paranoia when he was trying to gain her trust.

  This was the Every way.

  So she needed Idaho. She needed to sit by the river and think. She put in a request for time off, and in the meantime she requested a low-pressure rotation, citing the emotional drain of HereMe. She was placed in New World Order, where the team of six was tasked with ranking all that could be ranked, which was everything. That week was M-themed, so she ranked the world’s best mammals, mothers, monarchs, magicians, mail carriers, Malawians, Malaysians, mannerisms, maps, masseuses, and Marxists. They ranked mathematicians, MBA programs, medicines, measurements (No. 1 = millimeter), Mercurys (Freddie first, then the element), midwives, meteorologists, middleweights, mimes (Marceau 1, Melania 2), Misters (Rogers 1, Mister 2), mountains, mutineers, and muffins.

  The work occupied her mind while she awaited approval for her vacation. Meanwhile, Gabriel wanted an answer. Was she in or out? Let me know, he wrote. He was good, Delaney knew. The message was vague enough to refer to anything. He sent a slew of texts in a similar vein. Answer please, he wrote. Join us, another said. If examined, all the messages could refer to anything—he’d even invited Delaney to a brunch for anyone interested in the nutritional value of bark, considered a new superfood. When the invite had come through, she was confused, but now she saw it as a red herring for anyone investigating. She didn’t want to answer any of the missives, but finally, in a noncommittal attempt to bide time, she wrote back “I’ll try!”

  Decide by tonight, came his answer. Things are moving.

  Delaney returned to the Havel late that night. On her phone, she got a message from Soren before she stepped through the door.

  Quiet, he texted.

  She entered silently. Inside, she found him sitting on the floor, his back against the couch. He pressed his forefinger to his lips and pointed to her phone.

  Interesting happenings tonight, he typed.

  She stood in the middle of the room. Now she smelled something sour around him. A tall coffee cup half-full of what she assumed was vodka sat next to him on the floor.

  You’re drinking, she wrote. Shouldn’t you not be drinking?

  Been drinking for months, he wrote. You wondering where Joan is?

  Okay, where is she? she wrote.

  Where is Francis? he wrote.

  Please tell me what’s happening, Delaney wrote.

  Want to check Joan’s bed?

  Delaney’s heart hollowed. No, I don’t.

  I got home earlier than they expected, he wrote. Then they were too embarrassed to get out. But I heard enough.

  And now?

  They’re still in there. I think they fell asleep.

  Let’s get out of here, Delaney wrote.

  No thanks, he wrote.

  Too drunk anyway, he wrote.

  I really have nothing, he wrote.

  Delaney sat down next to him and reached for his hand. They sat in silence while Joan and Francis remained entangled in their tube. The scene was grotesque.

  “Come,” she said to him, and pulled him up and into the hallway. He had changed, and was wearing a loose T-shirt and basketball shorts. The effect was dramatic; he looked comfortable for the first time since she’d known him. Far more attractive, too—when every extra pound wasn’t straining against the limits of lycra. He nodded gently to her, moving her to the unseen spot where they’d spoken before.

  When they were finally hidden, he exhaled and looked like he might cry. “What are we doing here?” he asked.

  Through the window, over the roofs and over the mountains to the north, Delaney saw Venus. It twinkled like a drop of honey.

  “Venus,” she said, nodding to the light.

  “Could be,” he said, and all at once broke down. He buried his blubbering face in his hands and his large round shoulders shook.

  “Go ahead,” she said. “You’re invisible.” With the suicides soaring, Delaney knew the sensors would pick up on a big soft man crying uncontrollably.

  “I’m sorry about Joan,” she said. “And—”

  “It’s fine,” he said, cutting her off before he might hear the name Francis. He straightened himself and wiped his face. “I asked for a transfer. I’ll move tomorrow, into one of the newer buildings.”

  “You’re leaving the pod?” Delaney asked. She couldn’t contemplate being alone with Joan and Francis. Their unholy coupling seemed far worse without Soren.

  “You’ll miss me?” he asked, and smiled. “I’ve had a hard time reading you.” He turned to her. “I’ve been wanting to tell you I’m not a zealot. I’m not hellbent on seeing every unmet tribe or putting cams everywhere. Reach was the job they gave me.”

  “I didn’t mean to judge,” she said.

  “You should judge. It was needed. It was the first even mild opposition I’ve heard since I’ve been here.” He looked outside. “Huh. Look. Venus isn’t Venus. It’s getting closer. It must be a helicopter.”

  The honey-colored light was twinkling but was growing larger, flying low over the Bay.

  “It’s been good to have you here,” he said. “You woke me up. I’ve been here four years and something’s different now. A different chemistry in the air maybe. Or it’s just Stenton being back. The smell of sulfur.”

  Delaney was shocked by his candor. It was seductive. And she felt a responsibility to show him uncomplicated affection. Joan’s was a ruse, was teasing and cruel, so Delaney thought she might simply hold him tightly, human to human. She moved to him, filling the gap between his body and the glass. She put her arms around his waist and pressed herself against his soft shape, smelling his gentle scent—a mix of sweat and floral deodorant and a bit of lemon.

  “Oh,” he said, and took her in.

  He was soft everywhere. It was like holding a waterbed. His arms rested high on her shoulders but slowly dropped to her waist. She had no plans beyond this. She hadn’t held anyone in months. She closed her eyes, inhaling him, feeling so tired, so content. But then he began tilting. “I need to sit,” he said, and laughed.

  Finally he slipped away, soundlessly, and smiled, and returned to the pod, and to his spot on the floor.

  “Just working on passing out,” he whispered to her, and blew her a kiss. No one, ever, had blown her a kiss. She returned the gesture and climbed into her tube, feeling that Soren deserved to be loved, and loved correctly, and though she couldn’t imagine that person would be her, she thought, in a short and irrational life, it might as well be. Maybe she would be the one to love that man correctly.

  She was drifting off when a heat pressed against her eyelids—a brightness, as if she were staring into a sun coming quickly toward her. Then all was heat and noise. She watched herself fly away from the light. For a moment she saw the night so clearly, for there was no wall, no windows. The walls were shards, dust. Everything was gone. She contemplated the wholeness of the sky, now unimpeded by the window, saw the shimmer of the water, felt sure she could hear the water, and finally her back struck a wall.