The Golden Age

by John C. Wright

Phaethon had been irked by the exchange with Helion. He had always promised himself he would redact the unrecorded conversation, so that his memories of his graduation and rite of passage would be a memory of gold, a perfect day, untarnished by Helion’s sarcasm and doubts. Didn’t he have a right, if that was the way he wanted to remember it?

  But, somehow, Phaethon had never gotten around to redacting the memory, and, eventually realized he would not and should not. The irritation had been real, part of the event, part of him, and part of his life. Falsifying the event would have made the event false, and part of him false.

  So he kept the memory. He had not even stored it in archive, but kept it in his head.

  4.

  With his arm still buried up to his elbow in the two-dimensional screen of the self-consideration circuit, Phaethon took his hand off of the index box. He had seen the memory that had made him hesitate. It was a warning from his past; Helion had told him not to trust the Sophotechs, that the machine intelligences would not protect his life from fear and sorrow. Instead, Helion had urged him to trust the Hortators, the guardians of the conscience of society.

  Phaethon could see the pale light indicating his desire for Helion’s help dim and ebb away. But the Sophotechs would help him. Hadn’t Monomarchos solved a seemingly impossible problem? Any problem could be solved, as long as the problem solver were intelligent enough.

  As for trusting the Hortators, they were the ones who had somehow gotten Phaethon to butcher his own memory. To forget his drowned wife. They would be no help; if anything, they were his rivals.

  Should he go in person to the place where his wife’s body was kept? Phaethon could see the red line indicating his fear levels, rising and rising, forming what psychometric analysts called a catastrophe bubble. In a moment, fear would make him do something unwise, such as telepresenting himself to where his wife lay, when he knew he should go in person. How to head off this growing fear?

  Phaethon, leaning into the surface, plunged in his arm up to his shoulder, so that he could reach the deep-structure connections feeding into his emotion/action core. He turned his pride reading up to the maximum recommended level.

  Suddenly he was invincible. Was he not Phaethon? The mere fact that he inspired such fear in the Hortators was a sign of his power, power enough to sweep aside any obstacles that might dare to confront him. He had spun worlds and moons into new orbits; he had done miracles before this; to save his wife from the cobwebs of delusion could not be so impossible a task!

  With great satisfaction he saw his fear levels deflate. But the emotion grid now showed another catastrophe bubble beginning to form, this one a response to mounting impatience. The same high pride that disdained all thought of fear would not allow him to wait the hours or days it would take to ship his physical body to the Eveningstar Sophotech Housing where, no doubt, Daphne Prime was resting. Besides, to rent a vehicle would require him to draw money from Helion’s account, and give Helion plenty of warning, and perhaps time to interfere.

  Whereas, on the other hand, the very reason why the manorial movement had gotten started in the first place was that telepresentation was quicker and less expensive than lugging a physical body around everywhere.

  A gesture at the communication icon was sufficient to make a connection. A moment later he woke up in another scene.

  15

  THE COFFIN

  Phaethon found himself in a chair of pale wood, ornamented with scrollwork, next to a small table holding a lily vase, a pomander, and a figment-case made of brass. A rug of white and pigeon-blue was underfoot. Before him, embraced by two funeral urns, was a doorway leading to a hall of dark green marble.

  This hall was filled with shadows, striped with bands of pale, soft light, so details were not clear. But he had the impression there were large square stones, perhaps columns, to the right of the hall, reaching high to the cathedral ceiling.

  Mauve-tinted sunlight streaming in through tall stained-glassed windows to his left fell across his face, producing a sensation of velvet warmth and melancholy pleasure. When he stood, he could feel the muted sunlight slide across his cheek like a caress.

  He stood, surprised to find himself represented as wearing his armor of black and gold-admantium. His helmet and gauntlets were retracted, so that his face and hands were exposed. The texture of the air as he breathed produced a gentle and powerful delight, like wine, in his mouth, nose and lungs. The simple objects his eye fell upon, the chair, the white lilies, the dark marble luster of the hall beyond the door, all these things seemed charged with a wonder and sad beauty he could not name.

  The touch of the chair arms on his palms as he leaned forward to stand, the hint of fragrance from the lilies, sent a mild thrill of ecstasy through him, but the pleasure was fragile, and transitory. As he stood, in the distance, he heard or thought he heard the trembling, low echoes of a gong, which almost brought tears to his eyes, so plaintive and mournful was the note. Like a tingle on his skin (another transitory pleasure) he felt the sound wave ripple over him.

  Phaethon was not unfamiliar with this style of dreamscape; it was typical of the Red Manorial group (to which Daphne had once belonged) to exaggerate the sensual sensations. Red protocols allowed the introduction of new sense impressions (such as, for example, an ability to feel the texture of sunlight, or of gong notes) that had no counterpart in reality.

  He was not sure if he was in Surface Dreaming, in which case all the objects around him had real-world counterparts, or if he was partway into the Middle Dreaming, which allowed the thought-environment to project additional information into his memory. Silver-Gray and White sense-filters were normally tuned to exclude anything other than information from being inserted through Middle Dreaming channels; but the Reds allowed emotions, conclusions, and states of mind to be altered by information fields attached to sense-objects, like a type of psychic aura, as if hints and colors of childhood memories were being stirred deep within him, reminders of other lives, perhaps, or of forgotten dreams.

  The gong had summoned something. Phaethon could feel a Presence, a pressure on the wine-sweet gloom of the air, a thrill in his nerves that sent his heart beating in his throat. In the distance, down the hall, hovering above its reflection in the dark green marble floor, came a figure of silver, bright within the gloom.

  She was something like a butterfly, or an angel, a shape of subtle lacy lights. Like a queen she came foreword, with solemn music trembling in the floor before her as she came. Her face was grave and remote, solemn, sweet and sad, with ancient wisdom deep within her eyes. On her brow was bound a pale star.

  Phaethon stepped forward, one hand before his face to guard his eyes. It was not that the light was bright, it was that it was so beautiful and holy that the sight was sending shivers of pleasure through him, as if each silver ray were a sword. He crossed the threshold, and heard his golden boots chime on the marble, a lovely sound. As he turned his head away from that too-beautiful light, he saw that the columns to the right embraced a mausoleum.

  Here were a dozen caskets of dark crystal, half-upright, projecting from the far wall, like cocoons of living diamond set in marble housings. All but one of the surface of the caskets were polarized against him; all but one were velvet-black; but one was clear, the color of pellucid arctic water. Inside was Daphne. A single ray of light touched her face and shoulders; the rest of her body was obscured by gloom and filmy cloud trapped in the casket surface.

  The Presence approached; silver light caressed Phaethon even through his armor; a sense of awe and mystery and sorrow beat inside his body like a second heart. The emotion was more than he could tolerate; he sank to one knee, his hands still before his face, tears streaming. The kneecap of his armor chimed against the stone, a ghost of sound.

  He called out: “I am Phaethon, scion of Helion, of the House of Rhadamanth. I am come to demand the restoration of my wife. Deny me at your peril! I would speak with Eveningstar.”

  The presence spoke i
n a voice like a harp: “Eveningstar is before you. We know who you are. Weep, Phaethon, for your wishes shall not prevail.”

  A stab of melancholy lanced his heart at those words; he knew their certainty and truth.

  Or did he? “You are manipulating my nervous system. Stop at once. I am of the Silver-Gray; politeness demands that you abide by my protocols.”

  In the time it took for his heartbeat to slow, and for him to wipe his tears and rise to his feet, the chamber around him faded in vividness. There was still a marble floor, and gloomy caskets of diamond, tall pillars, and muted sunlight; but the textures no longer trembled with melancholy, the sunlight could only be seen, not felt, and the angelic form dwindled, became a woman dressed in silk evening gown the hue of deep twilight. A long train curved behind her in many satiny folds, and looped into her left hand. She still wore a coronet, and this crown bore a star sapphire on her brow, which was one of the heraldic symbols of the Eveningstar Sophotech.

  But the rest of the scene remained the same. Daphne was indeed here, locked in a coffin of spun diamond, asleep, a look of peace on her face.

  The Sophotech image said in a soft voice: “Forgive any impoliteness; since you project yourself here from an Eleemosynary public basic-casket, and do not have Rhadamanthus with you, there was no one to translate our dreamscape to your format. We are not required to reorganize to your preference. Nonetheless, we do so out of a sense of charity and good fellowship; the expense, while small for us, is more than you can bear. You have troubles enough to endure.”

  Phaethon was not listening. He stepped over to that casket, and stood with his hand on the glassy surface. There, two inches below his hand, was the quiet face of his wife. He had seen that face so often, with so many moods and thoughts and emotions of her features. It seemed strange and impossible to see her so still. It was only two inches, a few microns of diamond, an inch and a half of transparent nanomedical medium. Two inches.

  “Wake her,” said Phaethon. He was looking a Daphne’s profile, at the way her lashes almost brushed her cheeks. He concentrated on the curve of her cheek, the delicacy of her nose, the sensitive fineness of her lips. Her skin was pale as a porcelain doll’s; her hair a black cloud, floating in the liquid substance trapping her.

  “Phaethon knows we cannot do so.”

  He spoke without turning. “Is there a hidden command or contingency for waking her? She would have asked for you to wake her up if she knew I were here. She would have thought to put such a command in place before she did this to herself. I know she would have.”

  “There is no such command.”

  Phaethon turned toward the queenly figure representing Eveningstar. “Wake her up for only a moment, so I can tell her I am here. If she wishes later to drown herself again and redact the memory, she may; but I must be given a chance to speak with her … .”

  “There is no provision in her living will for any such a waking, long or short.”

  “Generate an extrapolation from her memories and consult that for orders … .”

  “We had done so since the moment Phaethon appeared here; our extrapolated version of Daphne is crimson with rage and grief; her only instruction is to deliver a curse upon you for your treason, your betrayal of your marriage vows, your selfishness. We consider this to be an accurate representation of what Daphne Prime would say were she to wake. Would Phaethon care to hear the entire text of the message?”

  Phaethon gritted his teeth. If he wanted to hear a copy of his wife, he could have stayed with the Daphne doll, or downloaded his own dreams from his marriage album’s memory.

  Besides, he had argued violently with his wife on many occasions in real life—she never would come with him when he went to the Outer Solar System on long-term engineering projects. To hear a mere ghost or reconstruction berating him in her voice, copying her words, while he stood above her coffin, would have destroyed him. “I do not care to hear the text, thank you … but you must tell me if there is an explanation for this—for what she has done to herself. What is the reason for this—this horrible—for—” Phaethon found he could not speak.

  “Our sorrow is great. Phaethon has foolishly agreed, at Lakshmi, on Venus, where our parent system rests, not to be told this reason.”

  “Did she leave a message for me? She must have left a note. Everyone leaves a note.”

  “There is no note. A copy of her living will and all instructions are available for your examination.” The figure seemed to produce a parchment, which she handed to Phaethon. When his fingers touched it, a circuit in the Middle Dreaming put the text of Daphne’s final instructions into his memory.

  It was an accountancy program, and details about the disposition of her property while she slept. There was nothing about him; nothing about any provision, under any circumstances, which would allow him to wake her again. No one was listed as agent or attorney, aside from her own thought-properties in the Red Eveningstar. If there were words to wake his wife, only his wife knew them.

  Many dreamers kept open a channel, so that outside messages, even if translated to fit into the background and story line of the dream universe, could somehow filter into the dream. He saw no evidence of any such provision here.

  It was not clear from the document what program she was running. But the document held mention of a transitional end-program Daphne Prime had inflicted on herself: were she ever to wake again, a virus in her thoughts would continue to have her believe that reality was false, an hallucination or deception, and that the dreamworld was a higher or inner reality, whose certainty could never be questioned. The same sensations in brain chemistry that produced the sensation of distance, disbelief, and unreality one had, upon waking, of dream-memories, would be applied to any thoughts or memories she had about the real world.

  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 answer 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.