La Edad De Oro (72 page)

Phaethon did not hesitate. “His goals. I want to achieve the dream they forced me to forget.”

“Gannis! My client is prepared to allow this matter to be postponed for the space of ninety days, but only on two conditions. First, you personally must agree that the debts my client owes your metallurgical effort are forgiven; you are no longer one of his creditors. Second, you must stipulate that your client presently is the relic and not the second of Helion, and does not presently share continuity of memory with the Helion who died at the Solar Array. In return we shall stipulate that my client, Phaethon Prime, is the relic of the Phaethon who agreed to the Lakshmi Agreement. The offer shall only be open for fifteen seconds.”

Gannis said, “What if—”

“Gannis! The Hundred-mind of which you are a member can predict the outcomes of Curia determinations as well as I. You know your case is lost without that postponement. Ten seconds.”

Gannis’s face took on the cold and distant look that a Synnoet communing with his overmind might bear. The real Gannis, the hundredfold mind that oversaw the many separate bodies and partial personalities of the Gannis-group had stepped in to speak directly. “We will agree if your client will sign a confession of judgment to any violation of the Lakshmi Agreement.”

“Agreed. Six seconds.”

“Then we agree.”

Phaethon spoke at the same time: “Wait, Monomarchos! Haven’t you just lost the case for me?”

“Quiet. Your Lordships, I present that I carry a power of attorney for Phaethon Prime Rhadamanth, and that, as such, I hereby deliver his last will and testament, devised by him, and tendered to me to deliver in the event he was declared legally dead. The will names my present client, Phaethon Relic, as heir to his estate, to all property and personality, perquisites, assists and aids; but we expressly do not assume the debts of the deceased Phaethon.”

Gannis shouted “Hold it! Wait!”

The Curia said, “The last will and testament of Phaethon Prime has been duly recorded.”

“Monomarchos!” said Phaethon, “What is going on?!”

The burning cube ignored him: “We further ask this Court to extend recognition of the continuity of marriage from that version to this. I stipulate on behalf of both versions of my clients that both agree.”

“The Court does not view such a requirement as necessary. A stipulation made as part of a negotiation is not recognized as a finding of fact. And now, if there are no further issues or objections, the Court will declare a recess till Helion’s deposition, and adjourn.”

“Wait!” said Gannis. “I have objections! I have a lot of objections!”

The burning cube said: “Phaethon, if you refrain from opening the casket of memory for the space of ninety days, everything your old self desired will come to pass.”

“Explain!”

“As of this moment, sir, I am no longer in your employ or under your orders. I need explain nothing. The case has been settled.”

“Would you be willing just to tell me, one gentleman to another, what—”

“No, sir. I do not wish to spend another second speaking to or listening to you. Except to say this: It is often said we live in a paradise. That is a gross exaggeration. We live in an age of great liberty, beauty, comfort, and wealth. But there are injustices and imperfections with the system which cannot be cured. One injustice is that reckless men, such as yourself, can put the whole society at risk, but that our laws are so jealous of your rights, that no man can use any force to stop you until and unless the danger is manifest. Another injustice is that minds like mine must carry out the strict letter of our duty, even if our duties require us to serve men whom we detest. My duty to you is complete; your victory is assured. It is a duty I relinquish with great pleasure.”

Phaethon’s jaw was clenched; his hands, at his sides, were balled into fists. “Sir, I am sorry if I have displeased you. Since I do not recall the acts of mine which so dismay you, I cannot tell if your gross rudeness to me is justified or not. But, whatever the case, I still thank you for your service to me, if, once I understand it, it turns out to have been of service.”

The silver cube had now cooled, and was growing dim. “I ask the Curia to excuse me from further duties owing to this client. I have received an offer from a temporary overmind composition of Westmind associates to enter their deep meditation to explore fundamental questions of abstract mathematics for the next two hundred years without external distraction. I was forced to leave those important contemplations to return and finish these minor duties here; this time away from that significant work may have crippled the expedition’s ability to succeed. Your Lordships; the case is settled; any other attorney program of ordinary skill can explain to my client the further details and ramifications of these transactions. May I be excused from his service?”

“You are excused for now, but may be recalled to attend the deposition of Helion ninety days hence. And may we say, the brethren of the Curia are most pleased and amused at the skillfulness with which you have resolved this issue.”

“What issue?! Resolved how?” said Phaethon loudly, stepping toward the floating cubes. “Someone owes me an explanation!”

The black cube on the left said: “But there you are mistaken, Phaethon. Our society is built on the paramount value of human freedom, which means that no one owes any debts to any others except those which he voluntarily assumes. Gannis, did you wish to raise any objections at this time?”

Gannis was staring thoughtfully at Phaethon. “If I may reserve my objections, without prejudice, for a later time, I shall do so, Your Lordships. The Court may have been amused by Monomarchos’s little antics, but I am not. He is betting that Helion will not be able to prove his identity when he comes before this court three months hence. Whereas I agreed to these terms only because I am certain Helion Relic shall be indistinguishable from Helion Prime in far less than three months. Whatever happened to him during that last hour of his life, it will have no effect on the ultimate decision of this case. Furthermore, I do not believe Phaethon will have the self-control not to open the memory casket until after that date. He has always been a reckless fellow.”

Phaethon had been rather put out by Monomarchos’s hostility. So it was with a touch of malice that he impersonated Gannis’s tone of voice, and said, “I would like Your Lordships to note that my learned opposition has just expressed the belief that I am one and the same with the original Phaethon.”

The central cube said, “He is not testifying, nor is his opinion dispositive in this case. We are now in recess.”

The cubes ceased to radiate their sense of brooding pressure. Phaethon turned to say some further word to Monomarchos, but the silver cube had turned entirely dark and cold, and was beginning to disintegrate its substance back into the wall.

Phaethon turned to Gannis, but he had already stalked away, the tentacles and tassels from his baroque costume twitching irritably.

He turned to Atkins. “Did you understand what’s going on?”

Atkins spread his hands. “I’m just the bailiff, sir. I’m not supposed to give legal advice. Here, let me turn your armor back on.”

Atkins inserted a probe at the armor’s neckpiece. While he worked, he spoke in an offhand fashion. “But, you know, I thought what happened was pretty obvious. You’re now Phaethon Relic in the eyes of the law. If you open your old memories, you turn into Phaethon Prime, and you’ll inherit all of Helion’s stuff. But then you get kicked out. If you don’t open those memories, you’ll inherit whatever Phaethon Prime would have owned, because you made out your will to yourself just now. If the Gannis from Jupiter cannot prove that Helion Relic is one and the same with Helion Prime, you get everything. If he does prove it, you are in the same position you’re in now, and you lose nothing. So your hotshot lawyer figured out how to get you everything you wanted for no risk; either you win or you break even. Right? And him clearing out all your debts was just an added bonus, icing on the cake. I thought it was pretty slick, actually. All you have to do is follow orders, and keep your memories tucked away for ninety days. So go back to the party, it’s going to go on at least for that long, sit back, and relax. You’ve got it made.”

Phaethon thanked him, and walked back up the stairs with a heavy footstep.

As he reached the top of the stair, he was aware of the feeling of discontent gnawing at him. It just did not seem like a victory.

He slid upward through the rock. There was a crowd of monsters and grotesqueries gathered on the grass outside. When they saw Phaethon, they cheered.

Since Phaethon’s sense-filter was still not turned on, he could not read the placards and hypertext the cheering crowd waved and broadcast. All he could see, at the moment, were faces of ghastly ugliness or lopsided asymmetry grinning at him. Claws waved, hands fluttered, wings, polyps, brachial attachments made a dizzying motion as the creatures leaped and capered.

The foremost, no doubt the leader, was an immense rugose cone. Four wide tentacles sprang from the apex of its body, terminating in pincers, manipulators, or clusters of sense organs, eyeballs or ear trumpets. It made an eye-defeating gesture of complex loops, knotting and unknotting. with all four tentacles at once. “Greetings! O Greetings, adventurous, beauteous, all-destroying Phaethon! We greet you with a thousand million greetings, and express the boundless hope that your terror-inspiring victory of this day will send the leaden and oppressive weight of the Eldest Generation (The Long-Dead Generation, as I like to call them) quaking and shivering into well-deserved oblivions! At last the Wheel of Progress, albeit with much squeaking, has made a millionth-inch turn upon its eternally rusted axle! The Golden Oecumene (The Rusted Oecumene, as I like to call her) has seen the first of many such revolutions: that is our fervid hope!”

Phaethon was not sure what these people intended. At this thought, his golden helmet unfolded from his gorget and covered his face. A tissue of black nanomachinery unfolded like a cloak from his backplate, and he swirled it across his limbs and shoulders as he folded his arms, to make a protective barrier against any microscopic foulnesses these dirty creatures might give off.

“I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure, sir,” said Phaethon. He recognized them as Never-Firsts, from the generation born during and after Orpheus perfected Noumenal Recording, and members of Neomorphic and nonanthropomorphic schools.

A hooting laughter passed through the crowd. The leader flapped his tentacles in comic display. “Hoy! Listen to his stiff-arsed, high-nosed twang! Eh, eh, Phaethon, you are among friends and close companions of the heart! Our goals are your goals! We offer you adoration, endless love! We ask only that you allow our schools to take you on as a mascot and ultimate hero! Come! We prepare a love-feast in your honor.”

To the rear, Phaethon saw an organism shaped like a sloppy pile of internal organs, all mucus and twisted intestines, passing out pleasure-needles to those around him. These needles were tuned to direct pleasure-center stimulation, Phaethon saw by the looks of glassy nirvana that usurped the eyes of the deformities and grotesques. Also, they must have had their sense-filters tuned to reject any evidence of the damage their hedonism did, for he saw the creatures stepping blindly on or over the prone body of a she-monster, stupefied with pleasure.

Phaethon fought down his sense of disgust. Without Rhadamanthus to help control his bodily reactions, the task was not easy. But he told himself these people might know the secret of his past; they said he was their hero. Perhaps they had information he could use.

He said, “I am flattered that you call me so heroic. Surely you can see that all I do now is no more than a natural outgrowth of my past acts?”

The creature flopped its tentacles in a energetic pumping motion. “What is the past but a pile of dead meat, already slick with flies? No, no, it is the future (‘Our’ Future, as I like to call it) to which we turn our eager eyes, bright and glistening with promise!”

But another part of the creature’s body (or perhaps it was a second creature, a parasite) leaned up and presented a rank fungoid tendril toward Phaethon. In the sucker-disks of the tendril was a card.

The creature said, “Here! Lookit! Take! This contains everything you need to know about your past accomplishments, and our assessment of their relative worth.”

Phaethon took the card in his gauntlet. It was blank, meant to load a file directly into his brain from the Middle Dreaming. Should he open an unknown file into himself without Rhadamanthus here to check it first?

On the other hand, who would dare commit a prank on the steps of the courthouse door, with Atkins standing in earshot? And it may have information about his past…

He opened a temporary sense-filter (one not connected through Rhadamanthus) and looked through the Middle Dreaming at the card.

The card was black, empty as the void, and radiated a sensation of painful cold. In strokes of angular ice-white dragon sign, the glyph on the card read “NOTHING.”

The blackness flowed out from the surface of the card toward his face, filled his vision. There was a sensation of pain in his eyes, a whirl of movement, of falling, of giddy motion.

He threw the card from him, shut off his sense-filter, and fell out of the Middle Dreaming. His spinning sense-perceptions returned instantly to normal. The security buffer in his personal thoughtspace showed a virus of the most crude and sophomoric design, one called drunk-rabbit, had tried to enter his brain and turn on his internal neural signals to flood his system with endorphins and intoxicants. Had it been assault? But he had taken the card willingly.

“How dare you attack me?” said Phaethon loudly. “Do you respect neither law nor decency?”

There was laughter at that; some of the lumps of flesh here snickered; other monsters roared with ungainly mirth, opening wide mouths hooked with fangs or black tusks.

The ridged cone twisted, bringing the tentacle from which its many-eyed head-ball drooped down to where the parasite-polyp glistened on the red-blue flesh. He said: “Scary, what are you doing? Phaethon is our lovely friend!”