Free Asimov's Science Fiction: March 2014 by Penny Publications Page A

Sturm. "And skip the special effects."
    "When in the course of human events," Silk said, "it becomes necessary for one
people
to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another..."
    "Okay," said Botão.
    "... and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
    The four others—Remeny, Sturm, Botão, and Toybox—scanned each other and then turned on Silk. They had agreed to close all private channels and keep their avatars emotionally transparent, so the air filled with blips of confusion and disapproval.
    "Laws of Nature?" said Toybox. "What the hell is that about?"
    "Maybe relativity." Sturm's scorn blip started at (.3) and climbed.
    "They didn't even have relativity back then."
    "They did, they were just too stupid to realize it."
    "Mankind? What about the other 52 percent?" Botão was laughing now. "And who is nature's god?"
    "Exactly," said Sturm. "I call bullshit. Crusty oldschool bullshit."
    Remeny kept quiet; she focused on Silk, who was waiting for them to calm down.
    "Agreed," he said. "But it will mean something to the old people because Thomas Jefferson wrote this stuff."
    "Who's he and so what?" said Toybox.
    "Jefferson as in Jefferson County," said Remeny. "As in where we live."
    "I live in softtime." At (.9+), Toybox's rage was nearly unreadable—but then he was always shouting. "That's where I live."
    Silk waved a hand in front of his face, as if the blip was a bad smell. "History is important to reality snobs," he said. "This gets their attention."
    Remeny noticed that he was keeping his temper in check. She was definitely interested in Silk; poise was something she looked for in a boyfriend.
    "So will making their lights flicker," said Toybox. This was why he had flunked one coop already. "Crashing their flix."
    "We're not talking about anything like that," said Botão. "We're students, not terrorists."
    "Speak for yourself." Sturm spread his hands and between them appeared an old-school clock. "Revolutions don't play by the rules." Its face showed two minutes to midnight.
    Remeny couldn't believe Sturm, of all people, aligning himself with terrorists. She agreed with Botão; she didn't really care about the revolution. All she wanted was to get a grade for her senior cooperative, graduate, and never log on to the Jefferson County Educational Oversight Service again. The problem was that a third of her grade for coop was for contribution to the team's cooperative culture. The senior coop was supposed to demonstrate to the EOS that students had the social skills to succeed in softtime by coming together anonymously to plan and execute a project that had hardtime outcomes.
    Of course, anonymity wasn't easy in a county like Jefferson. Students spent hours in soft and hardtime trying to figure out who was who. Botão, for example, was one of the refugees from Brazil and probably lived in Tugatown. Remeny had first met her two years ago in the EOS playgrounds, mostly ForSquare and Sanctuary. Now Botão was Sturm's friend too—maybe even his girlfriend. Toybox defied the rules of anonymnity by dressing his avatar in clothes that pointed to hardtime identity. Everyone knew that he was the Jason Day whose body was stashed in bin 334 of the Komfort Kare body stack on Route 127 in Pineville. Unfortunately for him, no one cared. Bad luck to have him on the team—if he was going to be such a shithead, they might all flunk. Good luck, though, to get Silk—whoever he was. The avatar was new to the senior class, but Silk didn't act new. She thought maybe he was a duplicate of some rich kid they already knew. It cost to be in two places at once and considering how crush his domain was, Remeny guessed Silk had serious money. Probably lived in that gated community at the lake. She wondered