The Circle

finally succumbed and answered her phone, knowing it would be Kalden.
    “Hello?” she said.
    “Mae,” he said, his voice terse, “this is Kalden. Don’t say my name. I’ve rigged it
     so the incoming audio isn’t working.”
    “No.”
    “Mae. Please. This is life or death.”
    Kalden held a power over her that shamed her. It made her feel weak and pliable. In
     every other facet of her life she was in control, but his voice alone disassembled
     her, and opened her to an array of bad decisions. A minute later she was in the stall,
     her audio was off, and her phone rang again.
    “I’m sure someone is tracing this,” she said.
    “No one is. I bought us time.”
    “Kalden, what do you want?”
    “You can’t do this. Your mandatory thing, and the positive reaction it’s gotten—this
     is the last step toward closing the Circle, and that can’t happen.”
    “What are you talking about? This is the whole point. If you’ve been here so long,
     you know more than anyone that that’s been thegoal of the Circle since the beginning. I mean, it’s a circle, stupid. It has to close.
     It has to be complete.”
    “Mae, all along, for me at least, this kind of thing was the fear, not the goal. Once
     it’s mandatory to have an account, and once all government services are channeled
     through the Circle, you’ll have helped create the world’s first tyrannical monopoly.
     Does it seem like a good idea to you that a private company would control the flow
     of all information? That participation, at their beck and call, is mandatory?”
    “You know what Ty said, right?”
    Mae heard a loud sigh. “Maybe. What did he say?”
    “He said the soul of the Circle is democratic. That until everyone has equal access,
     and that access is free, no one is free. It’s on at least a few tiles around campus.”
    “Mae. Fine. The Circle’s good. And whoever invented TruYou is some kind of evil genius.
     But now it has to be reined in. Or broken up.”
    “Why do you care? If you don’t like it, why don’t you leave? I know you’re some spy
     for some other company. Or Williamson. Some loony anarchist politician.”
    “Mae, this is it. You know this affects everyone. When were you last able to meaningfully
     contact your parents? Obviously things are messed up, and you’re in a unique position
     to influence very crucial historical events here. This is it. This is the moment where
     history pivots. Imagine if you could have been there before Hitler became chancellor.
     Before Stalin annexed Eastern Europe. We’re on the verge of having another very hungry,
     very evil empire on our hands, Mae. Do you understand?”
    “Do you know how crazy you sound?”
    “Mae, I know you’re doing that big plankton meeting in a couple days. The one where
     the kids pitch their ideas, hoping the Circle buys them and devours them.”
    “So?”
    “The audience will be big. We need to reach the young, and the plankton pitching is
     when your watchers will be young and vast. It’s perfect. The Wise Men will be there.
     I need you to take that opportunity to warn everyone. I need you to say, ‘Let’s think
     about what closing the Circle means.’ ”
    “You mean completing?”
    “Same thing. What it means for personal liberties, for the freedom to move, do whatever
     one wants to do, to be free.”
    “You’re a lunatic. I can’t believe I—” Mae meant to finish that sentence with “slept
     with you” but now, even the thought of it seemed sick.
    “Mae, no entity should have the power those guys have.”
    “I’m hanging up.”
    “Mae. Think about it. They’ll write songs about you.”
    She hung up.
    By the time she made it to the Great Hall, it was raucous with a few thousand Circlers.
     The rest of the campus had been asked to stay at their workspaces, to demonstrate
     to the world how Demoxie would work across the whole company, with Circlers voting
     from their desks, from their tablets and phones and even retinally. On the screen
     in the Great Room, a vast grid of SeeChange cameras showed Circlers at the ready in
     every corner of every building. Sharma had explained, in one of a series of zings,
     that once the Demoxie questions were sent, eachCircler’s ability to do anything else—any zing, any keystroke—would be suspended until
     they voted.
Democracy is mandatory here!
she said, and added, much to Mae’s delight,
Sharing is caring
. Mae planned to vote on her wrist, and had promised her