The chat

The party menu's chat option, shown to Donut in ch. 15 — 'Using the chat is quite enjoyable to me' — and used in capitals from then on: fifty-two lines across the book from four voices, about half of them hers. Brandon An, the Meadow Lark maintenance man Carl met at the encampment (ch. 22), is the first crawler outside the party heard in it (ch. 37), and the first thing learned about it is its edge — of the party behind the gate, Brandon: 'We couldn't talk using the party chat, not with the ones in there' (ch. 22). Zev opens 'a special chat channel' for interviews (ch. 36), and in ch. 47 Zev uses it to say the viewer feed has 'been acting funky all day'.

219 lines, seven voices. Mordecai, a manager now, is in it from ch. 4 and takes it over — sixty-seven lines, second only to Carl's ninety-one — and Zev's twenty-five are the show's side; the busiest hours are ch. 9 and ch. 20. The rule of the thing is stated: two crawlers can talk 'only after we both initiated the chat handshake, which had to be done in person' (ch. 21), so a fist bump puts Bautista's name on Carl's list (ch. 23); a post to the whole group draws 'Dozens of responses' (ch. 25); Katia is in it by ch. 24; and Donut blocks Quan Ch 'after he called us assholes' — 'You need to rule with an iron paw' (epilogue).

376 lines, fifteen voices: Elle (ch. 10) and Imani (ch. 12) arrive, with Bautista, Donita Grace, Ronaldo Qu and Gwendolyn Duet; densest in ch. 6 and ch. 22. Carl makes it policy — 'I want to get into everybody's chat', so that 'we can create a network where we can all pass information much more easily' (ch. 14) — and reads it at night in place of the Louis L'Amour he traded away (ch. 15). The show reaches in: 'For a small fee, all viewers may now subscribe to your private messages between other crawlers' (ch. 29). On the last night, Gwendolyn Duet: 'Now clear the chat' (ch. 31).

618 lines, twenty-four voices. A group message to bubble 543 finds Gwendolyn Duet, renamed 'Gwen' in the chat interface to save half a screen (ch. 2); 'I knew the chat was public now, but I didn't care' (ch. 5). Samantha, Louis, Firas, Li Jun, Gideon and Chris join, and Chris says he will not use it — 'I take damage if I use the chat feature' (ch. 14) — though he writes in it from the temple (ch. 29); Zev, demoted to social media manager, cannot be messaged 'unless I open the chat' (ch. 12), and Loita's twenty lines are the sponsors' voice. The densest chapters are the command hours, ch. 29 and ch. 34, and a god's arrival leaves the main window 'filled with panicked people' (ch. 28).

684 lines, twenty-one voices: Florin, Li Na, Britney, the Sledge, Bomo and Miriam Dom join, and Samantha, already in it on the fifth floor, writes again from ch. 22. Samantha's fifty-two lines are all capitals, and Donut mutes 'her ability to chat' (ch. 17); the eavesdropping subscription ends, though 'Borant reserves the right to take your conversations and play them during any and all non-live broadcasts' (ch. 8); Miriam Dom calls for help from the forest with Prepotente frozen beside her, unable to 'use the chat' (ch. 43, ch. 47). The masquerade's last hours run on it: ch. 72 and ch. 73 are the book's densest chapters.

867 lines, thirty voices, from the prologue on, where Odette opens a chat window and Uzzi and Mordecai argue in the group chat under a falling timer (ch. 0). Imani's 'Everybody check in' opens the floor (ch. 1); Prepotente, Odette, Osvaldo, Chaco, Eileithyia, Ren, Paz, Armita and Sister Ines join; Katia runs the card list in it (ch. 8) and the deck debate lives there (ch. 28); Louis has blocked Samantha, she says (ch. 26). The Desperado Club night and the broken stairwells are its busiest hours (ch. 32, ch. 61), and its last line goes out under Carl's name from whoever is wearing him: 'If I am unsummoned, Carl will die' (ch. 71).