Permutation City

by Greg Egan

Around three o’clock, she gave up pondering the question and managed to force herself to sleep. She dreamed that she was still awake, distraught at the news of her mother’s illness – and then, realizing that she was only dreaming, cursed herself angrily because this proof of her love was nothing but an illusion.

An ex-psychiatric patient was planning to spend thirty million dollars of other people’s money to “prove” his own sanity – and lead the clones of his followers into a cybernetic paradise which would last for about twenty seconds. Taking a cut seemed just a tiny bit like doing the catering for the Jonestown massacre.