Offline, by Graham Attenborough

She was taken from her cell by two guards in their google uniforms. At the end of a long white corridor, still flanked by her guards, she was greeted by a smiling young woman who looked up briefly from a glowing tablet as she was brought in to a gleaming office.

'Please sit', said the man sat behind a Habitat table, adorned with a magnificent digitalised flowering plant.

She sat, the one piece, paper suit they had given her to wear, crackling as she did so. 'What is your username?' The man asked.

She said nothing.

'Your google account? Amazon? What is your smart phone number?'

'I don't have a mobile' she said, 'or a username; a blog; a Facebook page; or a google account. In fact, I don't even have a fucking computer - okay!'

They all looked at her as though she'd just said that she butchered babies for a living.

The man turned to his screen, tapped on it a couple of times and turned it towards her. Immediately she recognised herself walking along a fairly busy street. She saw that as other people walked along, the giant billboard screens flashed up their usernames and quickly directed them to their next shopping destination. A hint of a smile danced across her lips as she saw how the screens went blank as she passed them, unable to identify all her consumer wants and needs.

'As a matter of fact' he said, 'no, it's not okay. Do you even have a bank account?'

'No' she said, 'I do not have a bank account. I don't want a bloody bank account and I have a democratic right not to have one if I chose.'  The man laughed.

'Oh, democracy. That old chestnut. Didn't you know? We have no need of democracy in the age of google because we have no need of governance. We are all free and equal under google. The world has moved on my dear. You see, you and your kind are still living in the bad old days, that's why you insist on calling yourselves neo Luddites and Latter-day Diggers, they tried to halt progress too didn't they, and of course, they failed. I suggest you read about them sometime, on Wikipedia, that is - when you're back on line. And you will be back on line, reconnected to the net, because that, is the only rule passed down by google, in its - all-consuming wisdom.  As I say' he went on, 'we are all free to choose under google but our choices must be made on line. That is the rule. Everything we will ever need is to be found on the worldwide web and you must be a part of the great google family. Otherwise, well, you are nothing, nothing but a shadow, a waste of digits, an affront to consumerism. Someone like you is a non unit. You might as well be dead.'

'Are you actually saying' she said, 'that our only purpose is to shop! To buy stuff on line?'

'Of course', he said, 'what other purpose could we possibly have'?

She looked at the man aghast. She longed to go home, to her dogs, to her books and her vegetable garden. She didn't need google to be fulfilled. She only needed her freedom, her friends, love.

She said: 'you can't force me. You can give me an iPad and a username but I just won't log on. I don't want you, I don't need you.'

The man sat back in his chair and laced his fingers into a steeple.

He said: 'Nonsense, we all need google. Google is us and we are google. You see my dear, if you were on line and keeping abreast of google events, you would know that the latest google nanotechnology means that we can now connect you to the web intravenously. You should consider yourself privileged, you shall be one of the first units on earth to, not merely be connected but to actually be a living part of google itself. There shall be no logging off, even as your physical body sleeps, you shall live and breath within the net, being updated instantaneously. I'm envious I can tell you. Just imagine, you will be as one with google, and, gradually, as this marvellous, google-given technology is rolled out, more and more of us will join you, our minds and bodies sharing forever the power and the glory of the one great google!'

Realising there was no escape from this madness, she began to panic. She stood up and tried to run but the two google guards grabbed her by the arms and held her fast.

'They will take you down to the technicians now' said the man kindly, 'we shall meet again my dear, on line.' He stood to attention, tapped his chest with his right hand before stretching his arm out before him.

'Google be praised' he said, and the others responded.

'Praise be to Google!'

Her legs gave way beneath her.