58 pages • 1-hour read
There Is No Antimemetics Division
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Part 2, Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, graphic violence, substance use, self-harm, and illness.
Part 2: “Escapee”
Part 2, Chapter 4 Summary: “Your Last First Day”
U-3125 destroys the facility’s upper levels and either controls or kills many of the Wyeleigh operatives. Quinn arms herself with a disintegration beam and descends into the lower levels. U-3125 has already compromised Quinn’s mind, erasing her memories of her work at the Division. She mistakenly thinks it’s her first day on the job, though her instincts tell her otherwise. At some point, she remembers using a Class Y mnestic drug to make herself immune to U-3125’s memory-erasing powers. The drug continues to take effect, restoring more of her memories and boosting her perception. She hurts her hand to help her focus on the memory of her plan against U-3125, which she manages to remember.
As Quinn exits the elevator and goes to execute her plan, U-3125 begins to taunt her self-assurance. She finds a large airlock and enters it, telling U-3125 that she plans to use the idea that the Organization represents to defeat it. The text reveals that Quinn plans to create an amplifier for that idea. She theorizes that Ed Hix faked his death so that he could begin working on the amplifier in secret. Quinn’s arrival will ensure the completion and deployment of the amplifier.
On the other side of the airlock, Quinn expects to meet Hix, but the lab is empty. Instead, she finds a large memory bomb, designed to erase all memories of the Antimemetics Division throughout all of reality. The device will contain U-3125’s spread by preventing the rest of the Organization and the world from becoming aware of its existence. However, the device won’t kill U-3125. Knowing that she’ll likely have significant brain damage once the Class Y mnestic wears off, Quinn resigns herself to her fate.
Outside the lab, Lee’s possessed body opens the airlock and finds Quinn unconscious. He uses the disintegration ray to destroy the airlock, allowing U-3125 to enter. As they prepare to invade Quinn’s mind, the bomb detonates, erasing all memories of their existence.
Part 2, Chapter 5 Summary: “Quinn’s God”
The novel presents the file for U-2200. U-2200 is a monolith inhabited by an abstract entity that calls itself Gua. This Unknown feeds on the memory of people’s bike-riding skills, making it virtually harmless in its impact on the Organization’s staff.
The monolith was recovered from Johor, Malaysia, and was stored in the British Museum for several decades until the Organization acquired it. The Unknown itself claims to be thousands of years old, given that human civilization has reinvented the bicycle several times throughout history. This allowed it to feed before the invention of the modern incarnation of the bicycle in the 19th century. The Organization is skeptical of this claim.
The file contains the transcript of an interview that Quinn conducted with U-2200. U-2200 can tell that Quinn is stressed, so it suggests that she take a vacation. Quinn declines, saying she has no time for a vacation. U-2200 then offers to acquire recreational drugs for her, which Quinn dismisses because of its absurdity. U-2200 suggests drinking alcohol. Quinn admits that she keeps champagne at home, but that it’s for a special occasion she can’t recall. She worries about the possibility of a large-scale threat arising. U-2200 assures her that it will overcome that threat for her and then urges her to open up to her husband. Quinn doesn’t want to because he doesn’t have clearance, but she reconsiders the advice.
Part 2, Chapter 6 Summary: “Ojai”
James Bess is an operative in the Organization’s Memetics Division. He’s in Ojai on assignment to investigate a cult code-named “Green.” This cult is housed in a one-story home, which Bess enters through the already-open front door. He hears someone talking and discovers a man livestreaming instructions to the Internet. The man is code-named “Red.”
Red attacks Bess, who deflects and fights Red. Bess informs him that the Organization will use his livestreaming channels to inoculate everyone who has been exposed to his viral ideas. However, they need Red to deliver the inoculation code into the livestream to ensure its effectiveness. Bess’s discussion with Red suggests that an Unknown has taken over an innocent man’s body, using him as the conduit to influence people to join its cult. He uses an optic device to talk to the man and promises to save him from the parasitic Unknown. The device leaves the man fully incapacitated.
Bess examines Red’s room and begins executing the Organization’s inoculation plan on Red’s computer. Less than an hour later, Red starts to regain consciousness and asks Bess what happened to his partner. Bess believes that he came alone, but becomes skeptical because Red’s question aligns with the Organization’s protocol. Bess checks outside the room for other people, giving the Unknown time to repossess Red’s body and blast Bess with a lethal idea complex. Unable to retreat, Bess realizes that the human Red has willingly submitted to the Unknown Red’s power.
Bess tries to reach for his gun, but because his mind doesn’t possess any knowledge of Red’s antimemetic clouding effects, he stops perceiving the gun and therefore can’t use it. Red uses Bess’s mind to access intelligence on the Memetics Division, which he plans to attack next. Bess appeals to the human Red to help them contain the Unknown before it turns against him. Red declines and systematically erases all memories of the Memetics Division’s existence.
Part 2, Chapters 4-6 Analysis
In the last three chapters of Part 2, the narrative reaches a turning point in U-3125’s favor, as Quinn initiates the cycle of death and rebirth that Hilton revealed in Part 1. The novel frames the initiation of this cycle as an unexpected outcome, as Quinn enters the hidden lab believing that she’ll meet Hix and complete the amplifier device to defeat U-3125. Quinn’s expectation signals her optimism that humanity can break out of the systemic pattern that allows a dangerous idea like U-3125 to persist. Her decision to take the Class Y mnestic, knowing that it will lead to irreversible brain damage, underscores her sense of hope as she again sacrifices herself for the sake of her mission. Before entering the airlock, she even tells U-3125 her intention to kill it with a “better idea,” signaling her confidence in the plan she believes Hix set up for her. When she discovers that this isn’t the case, it shakes her confidence, leaving her with no other option but to detonate the bomb for humanity’s sake. Quinn’s confidence in her efforts becomes her hubris, thematically underscoring The Human Cost of War.
The contrast between the bomb and the amplifier reveals a juxtaposition between two ways of solving the problem that U-3125 poses. The former is a weapon whose damaging effects involve the eradication of memory. Its long-term impact becomes clear in Part 2, Chapter 6, when James Bess fails to resist Red’s attack because he knows nothing of antimemetics. The amplifier, on the other hand, is a resonant rather than destructive instrument. Its function is to increase the strength of the idea that the Organization embodies to overpower the destructive idea that U-3125 represents. Symbolically, the novel suggests that humanity can most effectively confront a dangerous idea by internalizing and embodying the better idea that counters it. Eradicating the memories that surround a harmful idea will only allow that idea to eventually resurge. The creation and embodiment of better ideas is a position that instead leans toward the theme of Knowledge as a Form of Hope, embracing the power of knowledge as superior to redaction or censorship.
Part 2, Chapter 5 functions as a coda for Quinn’s character, implying that she’s unlikely to have survived both the detonation of the memory bomb and her brain illness. Quinn’s seeking advice from a benign Unknown who consumes bike-riding skills underscores her humanity. The characterization of U-2200 plays on the common idea that certain procedural tasks, like riding a bike, are difficult for the human mind to forget. By suggesting that U-2200 disproves this notion and has witnessed humanity reinventing the bicycle several times throughout history, the novel points to the rebirth cycle that the Organization is expected to undergo in the wake of its destruction. The survivors of the attack on UO Wyeleigh may have forgotten all concepts related to antimemetic science, but this doesn’t mean that they’ve lost all traces of the instinctive or procedural knowledge that allowed them to discharge their functions. Within this chapter, qntm hints at who might survive, considering the deaths of many operatives during the attack, including Quinn herself. When U-2200 references Adam, it reminds readers that Adam is still alive. Though the bomb may have affected his ability to recall anything about antimemetics, he retains the instinctive knowledge relating to his relationship with Marie. This hints that the narrative thrust of the novel’s final section will center on how he uses that knowledge to fulfill her plan and resolve the threat that U-3125 represents.
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