Walkaway

by Cory Doctorow

“We’ve sat through this movie before.” Kersplebedeb touched his nose in a gesture Etcetera eventually recognized as meaning “on the nose.” “In the nineteenth century, the rich had the same pattern – one kid from each family got the name and the estate, everyone else became a comfortable nonentity, or, if they were very lucky, got married off to someone else’s number one. Then came the colonial era, new worlds to plunder, and whoosh, geometric expansion for two generations, long enough that there was no one alive who could remember a time when the dynasty was a straight line instead of an expanding tree of fortunes.” “What happened?” “They ran out of colonies,” Kersplebedeb said. “What happened when they ran out?” “Oh!” Kersplebedeb took a long drink. Sighed as his adam’s apple worked. “World War One broke out. They turned on each other.”