Filus Olvidatum sat at his chair, and pressed the ‘on' button of his computer. While pretending to change his heavy and mud-speckled boots for a more comfortable and cleaner pair of shoes, he secretly listened to the computer booting up. This was one of the few opportunities you got to actually listen to Them speaking, to THEIR real language: Beep..Buzz..Burr...Click click click and so on-it was completely indecipherable, of course, but fascinating nonetheless. But by now, Filus had put on his office shoes and it was not a good idea to spend too much time with your ear stuck against the computer. It might make the Imposters suspicious.

Next came the exchange of conversational tokens that is such a part of the start of the working day. Filus wondered if it had always been this way, or if the Imposters had started the custom for reasons unknown. Either way, compliance with the custom was essential.

"Hello Filus! You've put your shoes on," a colleague said, who like many Imposters, had a habit of stating the obvious, thereby revealing their fundamental inability to master human communication. The Imposters were impressive pieces of genetic and biomechanical engineering, and physically at least, indistinguishable from real humans, but their programming was rather basic, and their conversational routines lacked imagination and were generally incapable of originality.

"Yes, I've put my shoes on now," Filus replied, imitating the Imposter's odd grin, but unable to fathom why this should be something to grin about. However, Imposters often smiled. Humans-it had been realised early on-had a weakness for people who smiled, so a good way to spot an Imposter was to look for someone who smiled at inappropriate moments, or someone who smiled too much.

Filus remember the old adage that when in Rome, you should do as the Romans, and when you're surrounded by Imposters studying every move you make, you had to do as they did. Those who don't are locked up, and have their brains turned to jelly with psychoactive drugs and electro-convulsive ‘therapy'. The Imposters knew he wasn't one of them, of course, but they didn't know that he knew what they were. It was imperative to maintain this illusion. Imperative.

"It's raining again, eh?" the Imposter continued, pointing out the window in order to clarify where the weather could be found. Imposters always identified referents-this mechanical need to clarify things was another giveaway that what you were not talking to was not truly human.

"Yes, I believe cats and dogs are forecast for the afternoon," Filus replied, but was greeted by a look of incomprehension. Filus quickly realised his mistake, an idiomatic reference and an attempt at humour were not appropriate with Imposters, and went on to explain himself.

"I mean the rain is going to get even heavier later...Damn weather,"

"Yes, awful weather."

Filus stared at his computer Screen in order to try and cut the conversation short. He found that if you stared at the Screen for long enough, people would eventually leave you alone. You had to remember to turn the screen on though, as staring at a blank screen didn't to have the same effect at all and would attract unwanted attention. Perhaps is was the Imposter's way to maximize the amount of time you spent looking at the Screen, maximizing the amount of faceflie time for Them, ensuring the Dictionary was ready as soon as possible.

Filus looked at the Screen and tried to keep his face as neutral as possible. They would be watching him now; They were always watching through the Screens. It was their preferred medium of observation. They Imposters had video relays, of course, there was the CCTV network too, and TV, of course, but it was the computer Screens they were really interested in. They allowed for close-up scrutiny of facial expressions, and more importantly, they were interactive. It was to propagate this interactivity that They had created the Imposter Supremo, Bill Gates, to spead Windows Spyware into offices all over the globe.

It was the perfect medium of observation. TV is a passive phenomenon. They could learn nothing from watching couch potatoes stare zombie-like at soap operas, but computers and an army of Imposters allowed for Stimulus-Response methods of behavioural research. Responses were continually being analysed, categorised and processed and going into improving the Dictionary.

Darwin, in the Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, had discerned about a hundred money expressions; some were universal and some were learned, and many were also present and had the same meaning when displayed by humans. However, humans are more complex, and They were not interested in emotions alone, They wanted to be able to recognize thoughts as well, and that's what They needed the Screens and the Imposters for.

By surrounding chosen humans with Imposters-Filus estimated that 85% of his current social network was made up of Imposters-and using these Imposters to as conduits for carefully chosen input in the form of e-mails, They could measure facial responses while reading the e-mail, and the textual output that came from answering the e-mail, and in so doing, bring the Dictionary nearer to completion.

Each of the Dictionaries, Filus had recently realised, corresponded to an edition of Windows-the earliest was Windows 95, and this was when Filus had started to notice how many of his friends in school were changing their behaviour patterns, and when his suspicions first became aroused.

The second Great Dictionary, Windows 98, and the spread of the Screens into daily life, meant a marked improvement in the Dictionary of Human Thought. Moreover, the Imposters had become more and more numerous, and even started to outnumber humans in many First World economies, especially America, as was demonstrated by the election of Bush, a talentless prototype Imposter with a faulty speech program. The Vista program, as its name suggested, meant that They were near to be being able to see into the Human ‘soul', that we were near to being categoried. ‘What will come after that?' Filus asked himself, remembering to keep a neutral face pointed at the Screen. He knew what They were doing, and he knew how They were doing it.

What he did not know was why.