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The reflection seemed to lean forward, as if she were able to come blazing out
of the glass by sheer force of conviction. "Don't you dare talk to me that
way! I do not change my mind for little things and I do not let people tell me
what to do! Not even me. Or you. Or whatever. Listen. Are you going to
listen?"
"Who? Me? Trapped onboard a sunken ship with a monster and my fiance
ex-husband who is slowly going mad? Where am I going? Talk yourself blue in
the face. But I'm looking to see how many simulations he ran."
Daphne called up the information on the simulation runs and frowned. There was
something odd here.
She slowly turned and stared at her reflection.
"Just... what... did ... he ... say?"
"You mean, what did he say to convince me in one try... ?" The mirror image
smiled Daphne's private smile, the one she only used in looking glasses, when
she was very pleased with herself. "Something wonderful! Listen: What is the
one thing we are afraid of?"
"Bacon."
"Besides bacon. And don't say pork hash."
"Pork hash. And... you know."
The image nodded.
Dying.
The image said, "It'll happen eventually anyway, you know. Just like Pa and Ma
always said. The noumenal recording might last a million years, or two, but
eventually everything runs down, decays, runs out of energy. All the heroes
die young. All the color runs out of life. And the only people left are
withered, tired, scared, useless old things, mumbling over memories of brave
adventures in their youth they were always too scared to attempt, bright fires
they were afraid to touch. And those gray leftover people are only playing a
delaying game, playing stay-away with life so they can have more lifetime.
"But life loses. Life always loses. Heroes stop being heroes, and then they
live boringly ever after, and then they die. Entropy wins. Everything ends.
Logic enforces that law. Everywhere where there is time and space, everywhere
where there is cause and effect, that law always wins.
"But" and now an elfish twinkle gleamed like fire in her eye "but what if
someone did not want it to be that way? Someone a little Like Phaethon. A
whole race of Phaethons. An heroic race, a million of them, each as fierce and
free as Phaethon. A race not willing to give in.
Not willing to give up. What if they found a trapdoor out of this dead
universe? A hole? A black hole? A place where the tyranny of time and space
couldn't reach? A realm where laws of logic don't apply?"
Daphne said in dreamy, angry, half-breathlessness, listening, unwilling to
listen: "What what in the world do you mean? You're talking nonsense!"
"All fairy tales are nonsense. That is what makes them beautiful."
"But fairy tales aren't true."
"Not unless you find someone, someone great, great enough to do deeds of
renown, who can make them true for you."
Daphne said, "So the Second Oecumene people shot their brain information into
a black hole to find... what? A wormhole? An escape exit? There is nothing
inside a black hole!"
"Yes, he is," The reflection smiled with pride.
"Escape from where? From reality? From life? There's no other place to go,
outside the universe."
"Listen, sister-me. You know it's true. Even a prison the size of a universe
is still a prison. And it is every prisoner's duty to escape."
At that moment, Daphne saw, clear as crystal in her memory, an image from a
fairy tale.
She saw an heroic man, shining in gold armor, who rode on a winged boat to the
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top of the sky. Surrounded by frost, he raised an ax in bloodstained hands
high overhead, and swung to crack the crystal dome of the sky and see what lay
on the other side. His face was set, and held no hint of fear at all, even
though the world he had left far underfoot was calling out in craven terror.
The image trembled in her heart. She felt as if a dam inside her broke.
Emotion caught her throat. She blinked tears.
Could there be a realm larger than the universe?
Could there be a life larger than entropy? Was there nothing brave enough to
find that realm, that life?
Daphne turned to Phaethon, who sat motionless in front of his reflection in
the mirror.
Daphne said, "Darling, I'm getting edgy. Nothing is beginning to make sense."
Phaethon said coldly, "You're starting to believe it? So am I."
"Does that mean we're wrong?"
"That means we haven't figured out the problem yet. Let's just find out what's [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]