John Wright - The Golden Transcendence

"But I learned, back then, that there was no such thing as right or wrong, not that anyone could agree upon; or if there was, it did not make a damn bit of difference, if someone did not have the might or wit or luck to make right things go right. My uncle Kassad told me. Right and wrong come from the mouth of a weapon."

The weapon Atkins carried spoke, and it said, "Sir? Permission to speak frankly?"

"Granted."

"If your uncle had been right to say that might makes right, then the mere fact that his enemy was stronger, by his own theory, makes him wrong. Is this what the Marshal-General believes? That there is no reason for duty, honor, obedience? No reason to live a life such as that which the Marshal-General has led?"

Atkins frowned.

After what was a short time, but which seemed very long to him, he softly said, "Very well. Belay that last order. Stand down."

And he returned the dagger, asleep, to its sheath.

Phaethon, with a gesture, banished the image off the mirror, and commanding one of his crew mannequins, said, "Drake, please go see Marshal Atkins, give him my compliments, and escort him off my ship before he commits any mischief."

Daphne was gazing at Phaethon in mingled speech-lessness, impatience, amusement, and outrage. She demanded, "Were you actually going to sit here on your lump and just watch him sabotage your ship? What if you had guessed wrong about him?!"

"A good engineer always has a backup plan."

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning that I would not care to cross swords with Marshal Atkins on any field of combat, land, space, sea, dream, or air, except here. Any other place, he would have such weapons and such advantages that anyone would be helpless. Except here. Aboard my ship, I'm in my element. I built this place. I control what happens here. That's why he did not know I was spying on him."

"And what would you have done?"

He smiled expansively. "The stealth remotes are a fascinating piece of technology. Each one has an artificial molecule in its inertial navigation system, completely shielded from the outside, which registers movement by electron shell displacement in the surface atoms. The shielding normally protects it from tampering. Because, normally, there is no ghost-particle array system in place to teleport electrons through the base vacuum directly into the heart of the little machines and disable them."

"You figured out how to control the ghost-particle array?"

"Not entirely. There are circuits I cannot trace till they activate. But the machine is on my ship, and it is a machine, and, well, it is on my ship, so I suppose it is just a matter of time."

Daphne smiled, sharing his emotion, and delighted to see him so happy. She pointed at the now-blank mirror that had been focused on Atkins. "You really like him, don't you?"

Phaethon looked a little surprised. She knew he did not have many friends in the Golden Oecumene, and few men he admired. He said, "Yes. Actually I like him a great deal. I'm not sure why. We're opposites. I am a builder and he is a destroyer."

"Not opposites. Two sides of the same coin. And you both wear spiffy armor."

He laughed out loud. Then he said, "My system checks are almost done. Helion has returned to his tower, and has generated a low-pressure area in the plasma below us, a whirlpool to carry us down toward the core, and he is pulling most of the energy in this magnetic hemisphere to run the force lines parallel to our line of motion, in order to minimize resistance." Two mirrors to his left and right lit up. The one on the left showed an X-ray picture of the plasma below, with . a vast swirl of darkness and relative coolness yawning beneath them, a slowly turning red-lit well of inconceivable fire.

The mirror on the right displayed an upper image. Here, like a tiny arrowhead of gold, hung the Phoenix Exultant beneath the slender bridge of the Solar Array lateral dock. Down from space loomed a titanic pillar of flame, directly above the black well, and centered on the Phoenix. This column stretched far into space, and majestically curved to the east. It was a prominence, with one foot atop the sunspot beneath the Phoenix, the other atop the sunspot's magnetic sister to the east. This prominence was created by plasma trapped in the magnetic field lines Helion had torn from the sun's huge aura and pointed down vertically here.

The sunspot below was larger than the surface area of most planets; the prominence held up an arch beneath which giant planets could have passed with room to spare. The mirror also carried a sound of sinister hissing; this was a representation of the noise of the wash of particles descending through the vertical tornado of the prominence, and ringing against the invulnerable hull.

"So," said Phaethon. "We are almost ready to cast off. See? We are just waiting for the currents creating the tornado below us to build up more energy. Shall we celebrate the launch?"

She blinked. "Did you say 'celebrate' ... ?" "Of course! It is the Night of Lords! Transcendence Eve! A time of high exploits and splendor. What shall we have . .. ?" He signaled for his servants. "Champagne ... ?"

Daphne said, "Do you think that is appropriate? We might be about to die!"

"Better to die in style, then, isn't it?" She looked at him, and narrowed her emerald eyes. "I know what it is. You're free. After three hundred years of building and dreaming and working and doing, this ship is finally ready to fly. Oh, I know that over the last day or so, she's been flying. But she was not owned by you, then, not really. And it was Atkins at the controls, not you. And you had Hortators to worry about, or missing memories, or someone trying to stop you. Well, no one is trying to stop you now, are they?"

"If you don't count the unthinkably evil and super-intelligent war machine sent out from a dead civilization for incomprehensible reasons, which I am about to descend into hell in an unarmed and completely open ship to go confront, exposing the woman I love and my whole civilization to horrid danger, why, except for that, no, I'm fine! Who would care to stop me?"

"Don't you think we should be more gloomy? I mean, considering the circumstances? The heroes in my stories always make grim and noble speeches, saluting wan sunsets with bloody swords, or blowing last defiant trumpet blasts from empty battlements when they are going off to die."

He held up his delicate glass to toast her, and the light sparkled mirthfully along the dancing bubbles in the wine. "But I am not the hero here, my dear. Ao Aoen, just before my Hortator trial, told me that. I am the villain. And I think I am going to prevail against this Nothing Machine. That hope and confidence delights me; nor do I believe that fate is more cruel to those who fret than she is to those who laugh. And so I laugh. Comic-opera villains always vaunt and gloat, do they not?"

And she laughed too, to see him in such good spirits on the brink of such deep danger. Daphne said, "Well, if you are the villain, lover, who is the hero?"

"You mean heroine. Yes. Who else? Born in ugly poverty among the primitivists, tempted by wild hedonisms in her youth, sultry Red Manorials and mysterious Warlocks; then for a moment, married, and yes, happily, to a handsome (if I may say so) prince: but then! Cruelty! Evil fairies! She wakes to discover it is all a dream. That she is no more than a doll and plaything of an evil witch, who has stolen her prince and name and life! The witch kills herself and the prince goes into exile. Who is brave and fair enough to save him? Who else but Daphne? Our heroine risks everything to save her man, embraces exile and poverty, survives being anywhere near a gun-happy Atkins, finds him, turns him back from being a toad, and voila! He gets his ship back and he, at least, lives happily ever after. I, of course, am still hoping you will share that life and happiness: but I do not seem to recall you actually answered my proposal, did you?" "Yes."