John Wright - The Golden Transcendence

"I know all that. The landing craft fell out from port-side docking bay nineteen, about two hours ago. There were big dragon-signs painted on her keel: Just Married, and tin cans on tethers floating aft. Anyway, the lander flew beneath the levitation array. Your husband left the lander there, and just jumped out of the air lock. He swan-dived into the atmosphere. Simply to show off how much re-entry heat his armor can shed, I suppose. Heh, heh! I expect him any minute."

"How do you know this?"

"I was watching it all from my grove. I told the leaves in a certain valley of mine to form a convex mirror, so I could take measurements of the Phoenix Exultant as she approached. Amazing what you can do with primitive tools and a little simple math! I also built a bridge across that little stream in front of your parent's house, out of planed wood and good old-fashioned molecular epoxy. Very refreshing to work with your hands!"

Daphne made the recognition gesture, but nothing happened. "Who the hell are you? The masquerade is over! Why isn't your name on file?"

"Oh, come on!" He looked sarcastically exasperated. "You are the mystery writer. It should be obvious who I am!"

"You are the one who started all this. Woke up Phaethon, I mean, and got him to turn off his sense-filter so that he saw Xenophon stalking after him. Phaethon found out that he had been redacted...." "Yes. Obviously. And ... ?" "You work for the Earthmind! She arranged this whole thing from start to finish so that everything would work out right!"

"Little girl, if you were not in a space-adapted body one hundred times stronger than I am right now, I would turn you over my knee and spank your pert little behind bright red."

"Okay. You don't sound like an Earthmind avatar. Are you Aurelian ... ? You did all this to make your party more dramatic ... ?" "You're guessing."

"You're an agent of the Silent Ones. You woke up Phaethon for Xenophon's sake, to get the Phoenix Exultant out of hock, so your people could grab it."

"Exactly right! And I've come here to surrender, but only if you make mad, passionate love to me, right now!" He threw his arms wide, as if to embrace her, capering from one foot to the other, hair flying wildly. She fended him off with her hand. "Okay, no. Do I get another guess?"

The old man straightened up, and looked at her, a look of calm amusement. He spoke now in a lower octave, and his voice was no longer thin and cracked. "You could use logic and reason, my dear. The answer, I assure you, is quite evident."

"I've got it. You're Jason Sven Ten Shopworthy, risen from the grave to get back at Atkins for shooting you in the head."

"Logic. Anyone who had a recording in any noume-nal circuit would be logged on to some Sophotech, somewhere. The masquerade is over. If I had any Sophotech connections of any kind, even a money account, even a pharmaceutical record at my local rejuvenation clinic, you would know me at a glance. Logically, I must be someone who has never bought or sold anything, never logged on to my library, never sent or received messages, never bought any adjustments from a thought shop. Who am I?"

He pushed his hair away from his brow, and put his hand along his chin, as if to hide his beard from view. "Ignore the wrinkles. Look at me, my dear."

Daphne put her hand up to her mouth, her eyes wide. "Oh, my heavens. You're Phaethon."

"The real Phaethon."

"But... How ... ?"

"A good engineer always has triple redundancy. Seventy years ago, it was clear to me then that the College of Hortators would never allow my great ship to fly. When the Phoenix was not yet complete, she still had enough thought boxes and storage and ecological material aboard to grow a body, and to store a spare copy of my mind in it. I-this body-Phaethon Secundus- came back to Earth in secret, having erased all record from the ship and my other self's memory that I was alive. And I watched Phaethon Prime-my other self- knowing something would try to stop him.

"I did not expect the drama with Daphne Prime drowning herself. But I expected that if it had not been that, it would have been something else. Gannis, or Vafnir. I knew Phaethon would be hauled before the Hortators at some point. And I had guessed correctly that the most politic solution would be to have everyone undergo a global redaction. Everyone would for- get about the problem. That is the way, after all, the people in the Golden Oecumene tend to deal with all their problems.

"My role was to make sure that he did not forget. I his spare memory. I kept the dream alive when everyone else in the Golden Oecumene, except for his enemies, had forgotten about it.

"Once the masquerade started, I could move around more easily, and could even submit gene designs to Aurelian anonymously. I set up a grove of trees designed to show support for igniting Saturn into the third sun. If Phaethon had ever bothered to read his invitations or party program, his interest would have been piqued, and he would have sought me out. Instead, by dumb luck, he just wandered into the grove. "As for Xenophon, I was as fooled as everyone else; I thought he was doing what I was doing, coming to remind Phaethon Prime of his lost dream; or that Diomedes had sent him. When I saw Xenophon coming up the slope, I decided not to reveal myself to Phaethon Prime. Xenophon was still a Neptunian, after all, and connected to the thought systems of the Duma. Anything he knew might find its way into the public record. I had been very careful, for seventy years, not to buy on credit or send messages or even to read a newspaper, or anything which would leave any record of me. I could not even buy food. It was not easy. So I wasn't going to give away my secret to another soul, even one sent (as I thought then) by Diomedes, my good friend. Besides, I guessed correctly that, if I could get Phaethon to turn off his sense-filter, and he saw Xenophon, Xenophon would tell him (within whatever limits the Hortators' ban allowed) that something mysterious was interfering in his life. And knowing Phaethon as I did, I knew he would not let it rest until he solved the mystery. As I recall, it took him exactly one day. Not as I expected! But if he had been killed, I would have picked up and carried on. That's what I was here for. Phaethon Spare."

"How did you live for seventy years without eating?"

"I ate."

"Without buying food?"

"I bartered it from people who grew it in their gardens. You know. I taught fences how to herd sheep, and decontaminated grass, pulled weeds, split rails, fabricated simple thoughtware for lamps and reading helmets, cleaned house-brains of accumulated bitmap junk. I built things and repaired appliances. You know me."

"Where? What people?"

"I thought I had already made that clear. I am Phaethon Spare Stark of the Stark School. I stayed with your parents. I slept in the bed you slept in when you were a little girl. I dreamed of you every night, once I programmed the nightcap. Because your fragrance is still in that bed. Imagine sleeping in a bed, and not in a pool! I slept with my arms around your pillow."

"My parents... why? I thought they hated you... ?"

"I told them about the Phoenix Exultant."

"What?"

"I told them everything. Your parents want to live as men did in days of old. What did they have in those cruel and ancient times? Adventure; exploration; danger; death; victory. They had Hanno and Sir Francis Drake and Magellan and that bungler Columbus; they had Bucky-Boy Cyrano D'Atano and Vanguard Single Exharmony. I told them that the Golden Age, the age of rest and comfort, was ending; and that an age of iron and of fire was coming next. 'We have rested for a long time,' I told them, 'because history had suffered greatly, and mankind deserved a long period of peace, and play, and contemplation. But now a time of action, and of heroes, and of tragedy, was upon us!' And, when they heard, they welcomed me, and joined in my attempt."