John Wright - The Golden Age

Daphne said, "I think everyone has forgotten whatever your shame is. That's the way these things have to go. You would not have agreed to forget unless everyone else, likewise, put the unpleasantness from their minds. Notice how enraged you were at just the thought that I might be hiding the truth from you. Is there any other way we could all live together, undying, forever, unless everyone could put old conflicts utterly and finally behind us?"

"Define 'everyone.' "

She shrugged. "The more civilized sections of society, of course."

"Meaning, not including Primitivist Schools who do not indulge in brain redactions or any neurotechnology. Not Atkins the soldier, who has to keep his brain free from all contaminants. Not including the Neptunians, who are outcasts and scoundrels. And not including one other fellow I saw at

the ecoperformance. He was dressed like me. Only his helmet was different."

"Who was he?"

"I don't know. He was in masquerade."

"What was his costume?"

"He was disguised as part of the Bellipotent Composition, end of the Fourth Era."

"I know who is behind that. The Bellipotent costume was put together by the Black Mansion School. They're all anarchists and disrupters and shock-artists. They're trying to offend Ao Aoen and the other nonstandard neuroforms."

"And offend me? Their costume equated me with Caine, the character from Byron's play who invents murder, and with the Bellipotent Composition, who reinvented war."

She shook her head. "I cannot guess what it means. No other polite person will get his joke either; we've all forgotten whatever it was. The Hortators should not have let him get near you."

Phaethon's mind leaped to another thought. "Meaning that the Hortators are monitoring my actions. I'm not surprised. But, during the masquerade, with the location and identification circuits disenabled, I got lost in the crowds, and saw things I wasn't supposed to see."

"Well! So there's your explanation. The mystery is solved!" exclaimed Daphne brightly. "Can we talk about something more pleasant now?"

Phaethon nodded, and said, "I think this amnesia must have been inflicted only briefly before the masquerade began. Something the primitivist old man I met said, implied that I should not have been invited. I conclude that I agreed to this amnesia in order to be allowed to come. Also, enough people have retained the memory of my past to smirk and stare and gossip, at least enough to lead me to suspect that something was in the air."

"Is it my imagination, or is this the same topic we were just on?"

"The main problem is how to find someone who knows what I did, and to approach them, preferably in costume, so

that the Hortators won't see and make a fuss. Art displays should be posted on the aesthetic index for stock purchases. If one of us tracks down the old man with the Saturn-trees, the other can find out which Cerebelline was holding the eco-performance at Destiny Lake."

"Darling, you're speaking as if I would help you in this quest. But I won't."

Phaethon leaned back in his chair, staring at her, saying nothing.

She said, "It's nothing but a quest for self-destruction."

"It's a quest for truth."

"Truth! There is no such thing. There are only signals in your brain. Everything: sensations, memory, love, hate, abstract philosophy, gross physical lusts. It's nothing. Strong signals and weak signals. Those signals can be reproduced, recorded, faked. Whatever condition of thought, or pleasure, or belief you wish to achieve by discovering this mystery, could be reproduced in your brain by a proper application of such signals, and there would be no way whatsoever you could discover the difference. Everything would seem as real to you now as all of this." A circle of her hand indicated the scenery around them; the sunlight in the garden, the scent of grass and roses, the shining leaves, the drone of bees, the twittering of larks.

"Except it would not be the truth."

"That thought itself is nothing but another signal," she said sulkily, pouting over her teacup.

"Daphne, you don't really believe that. You would not live the life you lead if you did. You would just go off and drown yourself in some dream drama, never to emerge. Besides, I think I can discover the basics of what happened to me without actually violating the letter of whatever agreement I made."

She put down her teacup so that it smacked against the saucer, slopping tea over the side. But her voice was calm and smooth: "Why pursue this? Why not be content with the life you have?"

"It's too easy to be content. Where's the glory in that? I'd rather do something hard."

"I respectfully disagree. It is quite easy to be a stubborn fool, darling. Look at how many of them there are in the world."

Phaethon spread his hands and smiled slightly. "Well, as long as I can go about being a stubborn fool with a certain amount of grace and intelligence, maybe I can do a good job of it. Don't you see how important this is? How much of my life is missing?"

Daphne tried not to look impatient. "Sweetheart, what standard are you using to measure importance? Length of time? The Bellipotent Composition ruled the Eastern Hemisphere for far longer than you've been alive. And they produced nothing but ninety generations of evil and pain. I would not trade one second of your life for their entire hegemony. So why do you spend even one second of your life on something which can only make you miserable? Darling, listen to me. You have no real mystery, no puzzle worth solving. If those memories were ones you did not want, what does it matter how much time they occupied? Has it never occurred to you that, back when you made this choice, you knew what you were doing?"

"Actually, that's the part which puzzles me the most...." Phaethon thoughtfully sipped his tea.

Daphne leaned forward, her green eyes bright.

"You then must have foreseen this present. You, then, knew that you, now, would suffer the pain of curiosity. You then decided the pain of knowledge was the worse of two evils. Can't you just trust that that decision was correct? Can't you accept anyone's judgment without question? Not even your own? You know now that you back then knew more!"

Phaethon smiled half a smile. "Let me understand your argument. You want me to take on faith that I have always had the strength of character to never to take things on faith. But if I give in to your argument, don't I show, by that example, that such faith is misplaced? My past self might have

been, for all I know, convinced by an argument not unlike this one."

"Very cleverly worded!" she blazed. "You may just be clever enough to talk yourself into exile and disgrace!"

Phaethon gazed, absorbed, at the fire of her eyes, the way her red lips parted as she drew a sharp breath, the flare of her nostrils, the flush in her cheeks. Then she subsided, and lowered her gaze to stare moodily to one side. Phaethon studied the curve of her neck, the perfection of her profile, and the delicate lashes, long and black, which almost brushed her cheeks. What had he done to acquire this vivid and fascinating woman?

What should he do to make certain he did not lose her?

No matter. He could not be other than he was, not and still be Phaethon.

A slight wind came up, tousling Daphne's hair, and she held one hand delicately atop her hat to keep it in place. She was looking upward now at the white tumbled clouds and blue skies. These were the skies of ancient Earth, faithfully reproduced. There was no glimmer of the ring-city above the southern horizon, no blinding speck of Jupiter burning, and the Evening Star would appear in her accustomed place, determined by Venus's old orbit.

She said, "The navicular races are soon to begin, out in Vancouver Bay; Telemoan Quatro is challenging his older self Telemoan Quintcux, and they say he's certain to outdo himself. But Ao Ymmel-Eendu, the Warlock who combined himself out of his own twin brains, comes to challenge them both."