The Circle

to get them all. How
     to save them all? This has been the work of missionaries for millennia.” He was slurring,
     but took another long swallow from his drink. “You and yours at the Circle”—and here
     he drew a circle in the air, horizontally, and Mae thought of a halo—“you’re gonna
     save all the souls. You’re gonna get everyone in one place, you’re gonna teach them
     all the same things. There can be one morality, one set of rules. Imagine!” And here
     he slammed his open palm upon the iron table, rattling his glass. “Now all humans
     will have the eyes of God. You know this passage? ‘All things are naked and opened
     unto the eyes of God.’ Something like that. You know your Bible?” Seeing the blank
     looks on the faces of Mae and Francis, he scoffed and took a long pull from his drink.
     “Now we’re all God. Every one of us will soon be able to see, and cast judgment upon,
     every other. We’ll see what He sees. We’ll articulate His judgment. We’ll channel
     His wrath and deliver His forgiveness. On a constant and global level. All religion
     has been waiting for this, when every human is a direct and immediate messenger of
     God’s will. Do you see what I’m saying?” Mae looked at Francis, who was having little
     success holding back a laugh. He burst first, and she followed, and they cackled,
     trying to apologize to him, holding their hands up, begging his forgiveness. But he
     was having none of it. He stepped away from the table, then swirled back to get his
     drink, and, now complete, he rambled crookedly down the waterfront.
    Mae awoke next to Francis. It was seven a.m. They’d passed out in her dorm room shortly
     after two. She checked her phone, finding 322 new messages. As she was holding it,
     her eyes bleary, it rang. The caller ID was blocked, and she knew it could only be
     Kalden. She let it go to voicemail. He called a dozen more times throughout the morning.
     He called while Francis got up, kissed her, and returned to his own room. He called
     while she was in the shower, while she was dressing. She brushed her hair, adjusted
     her bracelets, and lifted the lens over her head, and he called again. She ignored
     the call and opened her messages.
    There was an array of congratulatory threads, from inside and outside the Circle,
     the most intriguing of which was spurred by Bailey himself, who alerted Mae that Circle
     developers had begun to act on her ideas already. They’d been working through the
     night, in a fever of inspiration, and within a week hoped to prototype a version of
     Mae’s notions, to be used first in the Circle, polished there and later rolled out
     for use in any nation where Circle membership was strong enough to make it practical.
    We’re calling it Demoxie
, Bailey zinged.
It’s democracy with
your
voice, and
your
moxie. And it’s coming soon
.
    That morning Mae was invited to the developers’ pod, where she found twenty or so
     exhausted but inspired engineers and designers, who apparently already had a beta
     version of Demoxie ready. When Mae entered, cheers erupted, the lights dimmed, and
     a single light shone on a woman with long black hair and a face of barely contained
     joy.
    “Hello Mae, hello Mae’s watchers,” she said, bowing briefly. “My name is Sharma, and
     I’m so glad, and so honored, to be with you today. Today we’ll be demonstrating the
     very earliest form of Demoxie. Normally we wouldn’t move so quickly, and so, well,
     transparently, but given the Circle’s fervent belief in Demoxie, and our confidence
     that it will be adopted quickly and globally, we couldn’t see any reason to delay.”
    The wallscreen came to life. The word
Demoxie
appeared, rendered in a spirited font and set inside a blue-and-white striped flag.
    “The goal is to make sure that everyone who works at the Circle can weigh in on issues
     that affect their lives—mostly on campus, but in the larger world, too. So throughout
     any given day, when the Circle needs to take the company’s temperature on any given
     issue, Circlers will get a pop-up notice, and they’ll be asked to answer the question
     or questions. The expected turnaround will be speedy, and will be essential. And because
     we care so much about everyone’s input, your other messaging systems will freeze temporarily
     until you answer. Let me show you.”
    On the screen, below the Demoxie logo, the question
Should we have more veggie options at