by Greg Bear
“Even Naderites enjoy their longevity,” Olmy said. “Within the decade, millions will have to give up their bodies and download into city memory…or die. Naderites dislike the idea of living permanently in city memory. They accept artificial life enhancements, but city memory is a kind of Gehenna, a limbo to the orthodox.”
“That sounds a lot like hypocrisy to me,” Lanier said dryly.
“It is, of course,” Korzenowski said. “Committees of partials are being formed in city memory to study the possibility—that’s all the neo-Geshels will call it—of Jarts reoccupying the Way. If they agree with Ser Olmy, they might delay the reopening until an adequate defense is in place—perhaps even a workable offense.”
“My God,” Karen said. “They’d fight the Jart Wars all over again?”
“They are being very optimistic,” Korzenowski observed darkly.
“What if the Jarts are right there, waiting for us?” Lanier asked.
Korzenowski grimaced. “Such a nightmare has occurred to me often the past few days. I have partials in city memory listening to all planning sessions. And I must participate in the defense of the Hexamon, if I am so ordered…”
“How can we defend ourselves?” Karen asked.
“It used to be a secret, very closely held,” Korzenowski said. “But even the deepest secrets can be declassified when the ruling powers think it expedient. We have immensely powerful offensive weapons stored in Thistledown. They were too ungainly for pure defense; useless in the Way fortresses. No military planner gives up weapons that might someday have a use…. So they were kept in the asteroid walls. Ancient, but still effective and deadly.
Ram Kikura covered her nose and mouth with prayerful hands and shook her head. “Star, Fate and Pneuma,” she murmured. “I didn’t know. The people were told—”
“All politicians will lie,” Mirsky observed, “when it is politically expedient. The people demand it of them.”
Lanier’s face had gone pale. “Weapons?”
“Surplus from the last Jart War, stockpiled in Thistledown’s secret chambers,” Olmy elucidated.
“They’ve been there all along? When we first boarded?” Lanier asked.
Olmy and Korzenowski nodded. Ram Kikura watched his reaction with grim irony.
“What if we had found them…?” He did not finish his speculation.
“The Death happened anyway,” Korzenowski said, waving a hand, irritated at being sidetracked. “Even if the Jarts are in the Way, we can at the very least establish a ‘beachhead,’ I believe the strategic term is.”
“Unless they’ve progressed beyond our old technologies,” Ram Kikura said dourly.
“Indeed. At any rate, I have been given a Nexus command to render technical assistance. That I cannot refuse. I’ve had my special research privileges for too long to play the upstart now. Our problem is, how to change the Hexamon’s collective mind…”
“Go around the Nexus,” Ram Kikura said. “Go directly to all citizens, including terrestrials.”
“Without the Earth, a bare majority would agree with the re-opening,” Lanier said. “We’ve done opinion modeling. Or rather, Ser Olmy did.”
“They cut the Earth out because it’s too ignorant?” Karen asked.
“Too provincial and too self-absorbed,” Korzenowski said. “Which, of course, it is…but the procedure is very irregular. The threat of encountering Jarts could be made more evident…. Even the existence of the weapons might be used to convince the mens publica to vote against the advisory. Ser Ram Kikura’s suspicion that the Jarts have advanced beyond us—that could make a useful counter-argument. And before the advisory is made, I think we can attack it through the judiciary on the grounds that no segment of the Hexamon should be disenfranchised.”
Mirsky had taken a seat in one of the conference room chairs. He clasped both hands in front of him, then lifted his arms over his head. “Delicate job,” he said. “No doubt Garry understands how delicate?”
Karen looked at her husband.
Lanier decided to emulate the Russian’s familiarity. “Pavel says the Way must be dismantled.”
“And if it isn’t?” Ram Kikura asked.
“It will be,” Mirsky said. “One way or another. I did not count on such difficulties. Even with a better mind than I now have. If I fail, the consequences will be spectacular….”
“Is that a threat?” Ram Kikura asked.
“No. It is a certainty.”
“How spectacular?”
“I do not know. I did not make the contingency plans. I probably would not understand them in my present form, anyway.”
“Too many questions,” Korzenowski said unhappily. “Ser Mirsky, when your story is made public…how many of our citizens will believe you, and how many will think your appearance here is an Orthodox Naderite trick to keep us locked to Mother Earth?”
“I can be no more convincing than I am now,” the Russian said, releasing his hands and stretching. “Do you not believe me?” He looked around the group, thick eyebrows raised in query.
Karen, who had yet to see his presentation, ventured no opinion. Korzenowski, Olmy and Lanier did not hesitate to express their belief. Ram Kikura reluctantly said she concurred.
“We have to set our strategy,” Lanier said. “Between us, we can devise something worth presenting to the opposing corpreps and senators. They can make their case—Ram Kikura can carry the case to the judiciary. A two-pronged assault.”
“I think I’d better start on Earth,” Ram Kikura said. “There’s a meeting of the Earth Hexamon Council in a few days. We were going to report our conference results there anyway—nobody in the Nexus will be any the wiser if Karen and I leave and attend that meeting. How much of this is officially confidential?”
“All of it,” Korzenowski said. “Until the advisory is made, none of us is supposed to talk.”
“That’s not strictly legal either,” Ram Kikura mused. “The Nexus neo-Geshels have become an eager group, haven’t they? I’m surprised Farren Siliom would go along with them…”
“He’d rather keep his government together than turn everything over to his opponents,” Lanier said.
Ram Kikura picted a complex symbol he could not read. “I’ll steer clear of mentioning the weapons. That could involve me in defense law—and I’m no expert there.”
“Somehow, when I was not in this body, and my mind was immense, I thought all rational people would agree,” Mirsky said, shaking his head. “What a surprise to be human again!”
Lanier smiled thinly. “Back to being thick as a brick, hm?”
“Not thickness,” the Russian said. “Perversity, twisting.”
“Amen,” Karen said, glancing at Ram Kikura. “People are the same all over.”
37
The Way
The ghost of Demetrios hung translucent and unhappy before Rhita. Her face was white with horror; she had expected nothing like this. Now she understood she was beyond the reach of any god or gods; or in the hands of the wrong gods.
The escort told her, “His mind patterns have been stored. His body is also in storage. He is not using his body at this moment; nor are his thoughts moving through his brain. They move through a different medium, where you also were once stored.” He stood beside Rhita, examining her face, gauging her reactions. “Are you in distress?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Do you want the display ended?”
“Yes! Yes!” She backed away, hiding behind her clenched fists, and began to cry hysterically. Demetrios reached out with ghostly arms, beseeching, but could not speak before he vanished.
In the indefinite chamber that was her prison, she squatted on the soft floor and buried her face in her hands. All of her remaining scant supply of courage had fled her. She realized, beneath her horror and hysteria, that at this moment she was completely vulnerable to her captors. They could put her back in a fantasy, in a dream, and she would live there happily without protest, answer
ing their questions, just to be in some place like home, away from this nightmare.
“There is no reason for your fear,” the escort said, stooping beside her. “You would be speaking to your friend, not to an image we have made. He is still thinking. He occupies a pleasant illusion, as you did before you insisted on returning to your body.”
The escort waited patiently, saying nothing more as the paroxysm faded and she regained control of herself. She had no idea how long this took. Time was not her strong point now. “Oresias and the others…are they dead, too?” she asked between her last few sobs and gulps.
“Death has a different meaning for us,” the escort said. “Some are active in illusions; others are inactive, as if in deep sleep. None are dead.”
“Can I speak to any of them, if I want to?” she asked.
“Yes. All are available. Some might take more time to be brought here than others.”
She decided it would be best to try again, although she was not at all sure she could control herself. “Can you make Demetrios seem more real? He frightens me…. He looks like he’s dead. He looks like a ghost.”
The escort seemed to savor the word “ghost,” repeating it several times and smiling. “He can be made to seem as solid as you and I, but that will still be an illusion. Do you want such an illusion?”
“Yes. Yes.”
Demetrios reappeared, more substantial but no less miserable. Rhita got to her feet and approached him, leaning forward, arms stiff by her side, hands clenched into fists. “Who are you?” she asked between gritted teeth. Still, her body shivered.
“Demetrios, mekhanikos and didaskalos of the Mouseion of Alexandreia,” the figure replied. “You are Rhita Vaskayza? Are we dead?” He spoke as a shade might speak, voice slow and quavering. Rhita could not stop her teeth from chattering.
“I d-don’t think so,” she said. “We’ve been captured by demons. No.” She shut her eyes tightly, trying to think how Patrikia would have approached this situation. “I think we’ve—we’ve been captured by people who are not human, but with very advanced…machines.”
Demetrios tried to take a step forward, but seemed to be walking on ice. “I can’t reach you,” he said. “I should be frightened, but I’m not…. Am I the one who’s dead?”
Rhita shook her head. “I don’t know. He says you’re still alive. You’re dreaming.”
“He says? What is he?” Pointing to the escort.
“One of our captors.”
“He looks human.”
“He’s not.”
The escort didn’t seem to think it was necessary to pay attention to the image. He focused on Rhita. This frightened her even more.
“Are the others dead?”
“He says they’re alive.”
“What can we do?”
The escort, eyes still on Rhita, said casually, “Nothing. Escape is not possible. You’re all being treated with respect, and no harm will come to you.”
“Did you hear him?” Rhita asked, jerking her thumb vehemently at the escort. She really wanted to strike him, but knew that would accomplish nothing.
“Yes,” Demetrios said in a thin voice. “We opened the wrong doorway, didn’t we?”
“He says years have passed on Gaia.”
Demetrios looked this way and that, squinting as if through smoke. “It seems only a few hours ago…. Can he take us back to the real Gaia?”
“Can you?” Rhita asked.
“It’s possible,” the escort answered diffidently. “Why would you wish to return? It’s not the same world you once knew.”
Demetrios did not react. Rhita felt sick to her stomach; she had enough of her grandmother’s knowledge and instincts to half-visualize what that meant. These were Jarts; Jarts were rapacious. So Patrikia had been told by the people in the Way.
I may be responsible for the destruction of my home. Her hands rose automatically, like symmetrical claws, to just under her chin. “Demetrios, I am so frightened. These…people don’t seem to care. They just want information.”
“On the contrary,” the escort said. “We’re really quite passionate. We’re very interested in your welfare. Very few people have died since we claimed your planet. A great many of them are in storage now. We waste nothing. We cherish all thoughts. We have scholars, and we save as much as we can.”
“What are you talking about?” Demetrios demanded. His voice was so calm, calm and deep and thin; Rhita remembered what that felt like, to be in the illusion and not feel true fear.
“Do you wish me to address your companion?” the escort asked Rhita.
Dumbfounded, aware there was some protocol here of which she was ignorant, she gave her permission with a nod.
“It is our duty and destiny to study and preserve the universes, to spread our own kind, the best and most efficient of all intelligences, to serve the ends of knowledge. We are not cruel. Cruelty is a word and concept I learn only from your language. It is wasteful to cause pain and to destroy. It is also wasteful to let other intelligences advance to a point where they will slow our growth by resistance. Wherever we go, we gather and store, we preserve, we study; but we do not allow resistance.”
Demetrios absorbed this soberly, with a puzzled expression. He knew next to nothing of Patrikia’s stories; only what she had told him on the grasslands, before the arrival of the Kirghiz horsemen.
“I would like to see my home,” Rhita said resolutely. “I would like Demetrios and Oresias…and Jamal Atta, as well, to accompany me.”
“Only part of your request can be granted. Jamal Atta killed himself before we could capture him. Not enough of his personality has been preserved, I fear, to present a complete image, or to control a rebuilt body.”
“I must go,” Rhita said, sticking to this one demand, unwilling to be distracted by her own mounting horror. If she wept, if she let her hands reach her face, she might lose all control, and she would not shame herself before these monsters. Or before pale Demetrios.
“We will take you there. Do you wish to observe the process, or would you like your journey to be instantaneous?”
Demetrios looked at her pointedly; she wasn’t sure what he wanted her to say, but it was obvious to both of them that she was the important one to their captors. “I want to see everything,” she said.
“It might be confusing. Do you wish for me to accompany you, and explain, or would you like a supplement added to your own psyche, to your memory, to guide you?”
She bowed her head, face almost touching her hands. She did not understand the first alternative, or perhaps she refused to understand it. Can they make me more than what I am? Perhaps she had already been changed. That thought was almost unbearable. “Please,” she said, her voice little more than a harsh whisper. “Come with us. Just take us.”
She had one hope left; that the Jarts were liars.
If they were not, then she might as well be dead, and she would work very hard to die. Somehow, she did not think the Jarts would let her. To their way of thinking, it might be a waste.
38
Thistledown City
Ram Kikura wondered what it would be like, some day, to fall into city memory, never to return; trapped away from life, in a world indistinguishable from life but for all its mutability, its extraordinary privileges. That would make city memory either heaven or hell, albeit a comfortable enough hell…
She had been born in city memory, incarnated much as her son would soon be, and feeling uncertain about city memory now was both premature and foolish. She had at least one more incarnation to go, her life was not hazardous; she might live for millennia before the problem became practical…
But she mulled it over as a natural youth on Earth might mull over death. The youth on Earth, however, would not be allowed to sample the afterlife; she could do so whenever she wished, for as long as she wished, and visiting her “unborn” son was the usual reason.
Her visits seldom lasted more than five minutes, external time;
those five minutes in city memory could extend for months. The last time she had visited, she had accompanied Tapi on a tour of an imaginary and highly embellished Amazon, something he had created as a personal project. The simulation was selected for a permanent place in city memory recreations, something of an honor.
Their time would be more limited on this visit. She was entering Axis Euclid’s city memory remotely, from Thistledown. That reduced both the time and complexity of her experience.
When she accessed Tapi’s personal space, he was involved in “limiting” himself, cutting away unnecessary mental adjuncts to prepare his mentality for birth. By law, no newborn could enter its body requiring implant memory; every incarnate had to design and choose a core mentality that could fit within the limits of a normal human brain.
“It’s painful,” he said ruefully. “So much freedom here. Makes the real world seem harsh and confined!”
“Sometimes it is.”
“Makes me wonder if incarnation is such a privilege…”
She moved through his personal space, looking over what he had already cut away. “Wise choices,” she said. Extraneous subroutines, modified personalities adapted to abstract environments he was unlikely to encounter when he became incarnate, sexual image experimentations probably prompted by fellow unborns…all stored away, to be accessed at some future date should he wish, or permanently discarded.
“There’s a lot of me disappearing,” he complained. Around Olmy, Tapi did not complain; he enthusiastically demonstrated and explicated, but never revealed his doubts. That was reserved for his mother, and she took some pride in seeing this other side.
“Doesn’t look like anything essential,” she commented dryly.
