John Wright - The Golden Age

The viral civilization had been well equipped to fight the Eleemosynary defensive reflexes and programs. Phaethon was not surprised. By the nature of a mass-mind, there was no privacy involved in its upper command structures. The father of the original virus could have studied the Eleemosynary techniques on the public channels.

Phaethon could not imagine, at first, why the attack had failed. He was, after all, not very imaginative when he was in this persona, and he was meant to counteract ongoing space emergencies, not analyze mind-war data.

Then he thought to open the options log. And there it was. It had not been the Eleemosynary defensive reflexes that had shut down the virus after all. It had been his suit. His gold

armor.

The connection between the medical box sustaining his body and his brain circuits was routed through the many con-trol interfaces in his suit. When the virus command tried to leave Phaethon's brain and go to the medical box, the golden armor had snapped shut, severing all the connections between Phaethon and the box he was in. No messages could pass in

or out, nor could any energy. No energy of any kind could pass that armor plate: a concentrated thermonuclear blast would not have even scratched him. Phaethon was still alive because the inner lining of the armor was programmed to protect him and sustain his life; it had merely formed medical services similar to what the Eleemosynary public box had been running.

So Phaethon was safe. He still did not know what was going on, but he was safe.

The emergency persona was thorough. As he double-checked the logs, he followed up on an entry that, before, had not seemed pertinent to his personal danger. In the frantic moment when he had been half-blind, stabbed, and falling, he had tried to call for help. The communication log showed that Rhadamanthus Sophotech had answered and was on-line. The log entries showed that the virus had rewritten itself, perhaps into a configuration better adapted for a nonhuman target, and launched along that open line. During the next picosecond, the matching signal from Rhadamanthus was garbled and corrupted. This line had shut down before the suit had cut everything off, as if Rhadamanthus had been damaged.

The emergency persona was not very emotional, but he could recognize that a lack of information, especially during moments of crises, could be dangerous, or even fatal. Now there was no doubt. Atkins had been correct. This was an enemy; it intended murder, and had been stopped by a lucky fluke. Rhadamanthus was in danger, as was everyone using a Rhadamanthus system, his father, his companions, the lieutenants and subalterns, the collateral members; everyone. Even Daphne's relic, the poor, sweet girl who was in love with him.

He would have to protect her. (Phaethon realized that, while his emergency persona might be somewhat unemotional, he had been written with instructions, during disasters, to save women and children first. The emergency persona was not entirely without chivalry.)

The emergency persona puzzled over the parting comments

of the Scaramouche entity. You cannot escape your guilt. Who was this Xenophon?

He realized that to solve that mystery was beyond him. It was not an engineering disaster. It did not involve explosive decompression, pseudo-material field failure, antimatter cascade, or anything else he understood, or that he had reflexes with which to reply.

So Partial-Phaethon opened his diary. "When my full personality comes back on, I may no longer feel this way. I will be tangled and confused with other considerations and emotions. You probably will not recall how simple and clear it all seemed to me at this point in time. I am writing this message to remind you. It is clear. Matters are desperate. People may be killed. Your own personal fortunes are not the primary consideration. I must open the memory casket and learn complete information about what has caused this disaster. Without knowing the cause, I will be helpless to prevent it from happening again. I must do what is right no matter what the cost to myself."

Phaethon, in his emergency persona, looked around the status board and log records one last time. The immediate danger was passed.

Or was it? He opened several wavelengths in the suit and examined his external environment.

He was still floating in the fluid of the Hospice casket. The medical box had been damaged when his helmet had snapped shut; tubes and smart-wires that had been sheared off were still wiggling near his neckpiece. The other casket circuits were intact and seemed uncorrupted by the virus. A high-compression beam from his shoulderboard was able to join and interface with the telephone and telepresentation jacks in the casket wall.

In his mind, he touched the yellow disk with his disembodied glove.

"Rhadamanthus, are you injured?" The familiar voice—he thought of it as the penguin voice-sounded in his ears. "Why, of course not, my dear boy. Why on earth should anything be the matter?"

Phaethon relaxed. The emergency was over after all. He put the emergency persona back to sleep, reentered his normal, slow-time brain, and felt the wash of rage and fear and anxiety rush over him.

"Someone's tried to kill me!"

"In this day and age, dear boy? That's simply not possible!"

"I'm coming home." He opened more communication circuits in his armor, till the telepresentation arrangement was fully engaged. Then he stepped past the Middle Dreaming into the Deep Dreaming, and, in his mind, shoved open the door to Rhadamanthus Mansion, stepping onto the flagstones of the main hall, and looking around wildly.

Rhadamanthus, looking like an overweight butler, stood blinking in surprise. "What in the world is wrong?!"

Phaethon pushed past him and ran through the door and up the stairs. Rhadamanthus, panting, breathless, jogged after him, gasping, "What?! What is it?"

Phaethon paused at the threshold of the memory chamber to catch his breath. It was morning here, and sunlight yellow as gold came slanting from behind him in through windows still cold with dew. Open windows let in a morning chill. The silver and brass fittings of the cabinets to the left and right twinkled like ice. Phaethon saw his breath steaming.

There, on a low shelf near the window, in a pool of sunlight, was the casket.

Even from across the room he could see the words on the lid. Sorrow, great sorrow, and deeds of renown without peer, within me sleep; for truth is here.

Rhadamanthus touched his shoulder. "Phaethon—please tell me what has happened."

Phaethon took a step into the chamber, and looked at Rhadamanthus across his shoulder. The note to himself, written when he was only playing a partial personality, was still ring-

ing in his ears. (It is clear. I must do what is right, no matter what the cost to myself.)

"You have no recollection of having been attacked by a Neptunian virus-entity?" Phaethon asked Rhadamanthus.

"Anticipating your orders, sir, I have called the Constabulary, who have constructed a new type of Sophotech based on historic records, named Harrier. Harrier has conducted several investigations based on available information, but finds no probable cause to continue. I have downloaded a copy of myself to be examined by the Southwest Overmind, who is one of the Ennead; likewise, they have detected no evidence that I have been tampered with. Was I correct in assuming you believe yourself to be under an attack by a violent aggressor?"

"You think I'm suffering pseudomnesia? This is all delusion ... ?"

"That would be the logical implication. Otherwise we have to assume the existence either of a traitor Sophotech among the Earth mind community or of a highly industrialized technical civilization external to our own, aware of us and among us, familiar with our systems, and yet a civilization which, so far, has produced no sign detectable to us that it exists."