John Wright - The Golden Age

This was a mind virus developed by the Red Manorials. Phaethon now knew why Daphne had come here to drown herself. No other mansion could allow one to destroy so thoroughly one's own sense of reality. Even if she were to wake up again, she would still be lost. The living provision specifically prohibited the unrequested removal of that mind virus.

"Why won't you let me save her?"

"If you may do so without violence, proceed. But her life is her own, to live or to destroy howsoever she sees fit."

"Why did she ... do this ... ? Why did she ..." And he could not force the words aloud. Why did she leave me ? Why did she betray me? Why didn't she love me as she should have done?

"You knew the answer at one time and have made yourself forget it. Phaethon has instructed us, at Lakshmi, not to an-

swer that question. Those instructions are still in force."

Phaethon's head had bowed forward till his forehead was resting against the cool glassy surface of the coffin. All he had to do was call Rhadamanthus and order the memory box to open. This horrible uncertainty, this battle with ghosts, would be over. He would suffer the Hortator's exile. But if Daphne, his Daphne, the woman who made his life into a heroic adventure, the woman who gave his life meaning, if she were gone, what use would the rest of his life do him?

Then he straightened up. He must refuse to surrender to despair. He would find a way. His pride was still running high.

"I am involved in a law case which requires that I prove my identity. I intend to subpoena her as a witness. No matter what her right to her privacy, she must answer a lawful subpoena."

"Phaethon may certainly apply for such a subpoena. If it is submitted to us, we will release her. However, we have run two thousand extrapolations of the outcome of such a request before the Curia, and all of them agree that you will not prevail."

"You cannot know that."

"Phaethon may hold to delusive hope if he wishes; we criticize nothing which gives you pleasure, provided the pleasure is true and lasting. But such hope will not last. The determinations of the Curia have been made as predictable as justice and policy permit, so that reasonable men will know to what standard to arrange their conduct. Determining the outcome of Curia decisions therefore is no different from determining the outcome of a game of tic-tac-toe or of chess; it may seem mysterious to Phaethon, but not to us. The Judges will conduct a Noetic examination and will see you intend the subpoena process only to invade the rights of your wife; her testimony will have no bearing whatever on the question of your identity, Helion's inheritance, or any of the other issues in the case."

Phaethon drew a breath and tried again. "I have a communion circuit giving me the right to examine her mental

activities. I ask that you open the channel to allow me to exercise this right; the right cannot be used while she is involved in a far dream ..."

When that argument failed, he tried another. And another and another.

Two hours later, his voice hoarse, Phaethon was standing with his cheek pressed against the glassy surface of the case, overwhelmed with weariness. His hands were clutching the corners of the casket.

"... her living will is not valid because ... it is based on the false premise that I... had done something to shock or offend her ... whether or not she left a provision for reawakening, since she would want to be woken at this point, were she to know I'm here ..."

In the third hour he tried simply begging, screaming, pleading threatening, bargaining, bribing. In the fourth hour he sat mute, unable to move or think. In the fifth hour, he convinced himself that there was a secret password or hidden command that Daphne had not told to Eveningstar, which would unlock the casket and end the dream in which she was trapped. He whispered every word of love or of endearment or apology he could imagine to her cold, still, silent face.

He talked about their past life together; about how they met; he asked her if she remembered their marriage ceremony; if she remembered their first honeymoon in the Antarctic Wintergardens, or their anniversary in the reconstructed version of Third Era Paris, or the time he had accidentally collapsed the pseudo-matter holding up the east wing of their nuptial house in reality, so that it no longer matched the version of their house in Mentality. He asked her about her pet horses, and her latest drama she was writing, and about her hopes for the future.

Then he said: "I'd like to be alone with her."

The image of the woman representing Eveningstar Sopho-tech nodded gravely, and, out of politeness to him, instead of vanishing, she turned and walked away. Every detail was correct; her shoes rang on the marble floor, diminishing as she receded, she cast a shadow when she passed through a pool

of mauve light, and highlights fled across the twilight blue texture of her silk gown.

It was very realistic; a Silver-Gray Sophotech could not have done better. Phaethon waited while she walked so very slowly away, and his impatience clawed and gnawed him.

Impatient, because his pride was still very strong within him, like a wildfire.

And because it only took a moment to enlarge his vision to embrace several different wavelengths and analytic routines. His private thoughtspace, once summoned, seemed to surround him with floating black icons, superimposed upon the real scene around him, with the spiral wheel of stars hovering in the background, beyond his wife's coffin. A gesture accessed the records he carried for biomedical manipulations, and compared it to the analysis he had just completed on the medical nanomachinery suspended in the liquids embracing his wife.

The molecular shapes of her medical nanomachinery were standardized; it would be easy to counteract it, and to affect a disconnect. The black lining of his armor could produce the required assemblers in a moment of heat.

Also in his private thoughtspace was an engineering routine, including a simple subprogram to estimate the strengths of structures. A second glance allowed him to analyze the coffin lid and conclude how many foot-pounds of pressure, applied at what angle, were sufficient to break the surface material without allowing any Shockwave to travel into the interior.

Phaethon shrugged. Gauntlets of golden admantium grew from his sleeves and embraced his hands. He raised his hand triumphantly, made a fist.

No wonder they were all afraid of him. Here was armor that could allow him to walk into the core of a star without harm. What weapon, what threat, what force could stop him, once he was resolved? The Golden Oecumene had witnessed no real crimes in decades; were there any structures still in place to detect or hinder such things?

The fire left his eyes at that point. His anger and pride

evaporated, and his face sagged into expressionless despair. Foolish. He knew how foolish he was being.

He brought his fist down nevertheless. An outside force seized his arm, and made him lay his hand gently on the casket lid, not hurting it.

No, not his arm. The mannequin's arm. He was merely telepresent in whatever mannequin had been sitting in the chair in the receiving room. The invulnerable armor that he seemed to wear existed only in his eyesight, an illusion created by Eveningstar out of politeness to him. Eveningstar had merely turned off the arm when he ordered it to slam downward.

A silver light, shivering with beams of pleasure, shining over his shoulders, and a sense of dread and sorrow, like a wash of pressure, told him that Eveningstar Sophotech had manifested her representative behind him. Her voice, like a glorious symphony, filled his ears. He could feel the words caressing his neck and cheeks. He could feel the tiny pinpricks, like sparks, in their stern firmness. The luster on the coffin lid was sad and fascinating; the shimmer of light on the golden intricacy of his finger joints was a ballet.