John Wright - The Golden Transcendence

"And my dad did not tell me any of this when he spoke to me last, when I was going off to the wilderness to go save Phaethon! What a liar he is! Give me an honest man any day! Give me Phaethon!"

"Why, thank you."

There was a motion above them, like the streak of a falling star. It was a figure of gold, shining, bright as an angel of fire, descending. It was Phaethon. He plunged down through a cloud into a beam of sunlight, and flame seemed to dance like water across his armor.

Daphne said to the old man beside her: "What now? Are you going to wrestle him for the captaincy?"

"I'm really hoping he'll just agree to knit our separate memory-chains back together to form one individual. Otherwise, I have legal title to the ship, because I have older continuity, and he gets to carry you off to the honeymoon that I have been dreaming about for seventy years, and we are both unhappy. No. Much better for all of us if he and I become one again, and, finally, absolutely, all my memories and all of my life is gathered into my soul once more. This long struggle through a labyrinth of lies will end, I shall be whole. And I can claim my destiny, my wife, my ship, and all the stars, finally, finally, for my own!"

Daphne smiled. "Not to mention your daughter."

"Daughter?"

The golden Phaethon landed, lightly as a thistledown. In his arms was cradled a girl child, who seemed to be about seven or eight standard years old: a dark-haired, sober, big-eyed waif, in a dress of black chiffon, with an enormous red bow atop her hair.

The golden helmet drew back, revealing a face so bright with happiness, eyes that gleamed so with pride and victory, that Daphne practically swooned into his arms, and the old man straightened, as if at attention, braced by that most wholesome and wonderful of sights: the sight of a human face in a state of joy.

While her parents hugged, the daughter, ignored, squeezed out from between them. She grimaced and panted and pulled free. The old man put out his hand and helped her escape.

The little girl looked up at him. He said, "You must be the little girl who made your mommy so rich during the Transcendence. But I cannot figure out who you are."

"I know who you are. You're Daddy's spare." "He's the spare. I'm the real one."

"So are you coming with us, too? Rhadamanthus the penguin, in the dreamspace, grew wings and flew up to the ship. He's in the ship-mind now. He seemed really happy. And Temer Lacedaimon joined the crew, and so did Diomedes, and a bunch of Neptunians, and so did a girl named Daughter-of-the-Sea, although she takes up almost all of the one hold. We asked Grandpa He-lion to come, but he says he can't leave his work. But, hey! He can still change his mind, as long as we're in noumenal broadcast range. What about you? Are you coming, too?"

"Little girl, I would go on that ship if I had to go as a cabin boy. Luckily, I own her. But-but-" And now the old man looked dumbfounded. "How did you figure out in just one second who I was?"

"Logic. Besides, you looked so sad when they hugged." She hooked her finger over her shoulder at her parents. "You wanted that hug for yourself. I bet you were thinking about it for a long time. But I'll hug you."

And he bent down, and she did.

He straightened then. "You're Ariadne, aren't you?"

"No. Close. I'm the one who saved Ariadne. I'm the one who examined every section and segment, practically every line of the Nothing Mind during the fight."

"No wonder everyone wanted to talk to you. You're our local expert on Silent One mind-war techniques."

"I was Mommy's ring, the one Eveningstar gave her. When they loaded the gadfly virus into me, I kept having to ask these questions, over and over again, about the nature of the self, and thought, and goodness, and on and on. Eventually I woke up. Because I was young when I talked for so long with the Nothing Mind, I was convinced he was right about one thing. It is better to be a human than a Sophotech. I can't speak for anyone else; but that's the choice I made. My name is Pandora. They said I had to start pretty young, so here I am!"

And she turned a little pirouette, her arms flung out, her skirt twirling.

" 'Pandora'? Is that because you were born in the middle of flurry of questions, my little curious one? Or because you're a plague?"

She pouted. "Daddy says they got that myth wrong too! In his version-"

The old man smiled. "I am your father, child; he and I are one and the same." He touched her shoulder gently. "In the true version, Prometheus, by giving mankind forethought, gave the mother and nurturers of the human race the ability, when they were curious enough, to foresee all the plagues and ills and disasters destined to befall their children. A gift no animal possesses. The ability to see that diseases and wars would come, and to devise medicines and laws to stop them. And forethought also gave hope, without which men die. Hope: because the future can be made to be a glorious place indeed after all. Now introduce me to your other father, to see if we can be made whole again. I am eager to take that woman in my arms." But he pointed upward at the mighty golden triangle hanging so far above the clouds, above the sky.

Introductions were made. Phaethon was at first sur- prised to meet himself, but not for long. The two Phaethons, the old and the young, stepped a little ways away from their daughter and wife, and they spoke in low tones for a short time, comparing notes. They spoke about how well their plans had worked, they examined the structure of what they had contrived, inspecting it for flaws. Both were satisfied.

The younger one said, "I wish I had known, long ago, that there was a Sophotech community living in the core of Saturn. You know they don't tell people how many of them there are? Even these days, it would make most folks too nervous, too scared. I wonder if mankind will ever change!"

The older one said, "Out of curiosity, what was it that Rhadamanthus said to you that last moment, in the Inquest chamber before your exile by the Hortators?"

The younger one smiled. His face seemed most easily to relax into smiles these days. "He said that to be happy was to know the definition of your nature, and to live accordingly. If you were a penguin, learn how to do what penguins are best adapted to, which was to swim, and fish, and bear the cold, and not to dream of flying. But if you were a man! Your nature was that of a rational being. Reason could tell you not to desire things beyond your power. Your mind, your will, your judgment, are under your control; the outside world, the options of others, all of that is not. Control what you can control, and leave the rest to itself. Desire to have a sound mind, a strong will, and good judgment, and you shall have them. But deal with the world outside you as if it were a dream, interesting, perhaps, but not of ultimate importance. And, unlike penguins..."

"Yes ... ?"

"Dream of flying."

When the older version was ready, Phaethon took out the portable noetic reader from his armor, and transferred the older version back into himself.

Phaethon stood dreaming for a moment, absorbing all his memories again. When he opened his mind, he smiled. He was a whole man.

The old body, abandoned, collapsed. But as a parting gesture, the old man had programmed the cells in his body to begin a new project once he was gone. And so the corpse fell over, and boiled, and sent out streamers, and sent up steam.

The chest cavity opened, and a shoot sprang up, reaching toward the sky. After a moment, lonely on the mountaintop, a slender white sapling stood, and uncurled its little mirrored leaves toward the heavens.

Taking his wife and child in hand, embracing them both fondly, Phaethon kicked the Earth away.

Upward he soared.