Tales of the Continuing Time and Other Stories

by Moran, Daniel Keys

Harry Quaid nodded reflectively. He said softly, “That would be nice.”

  AFTER THE AMBULANCE and the paramedics had left, Miriam with them, Maggie was silent for a long time. She cleaned up her breakfast dishes carefully, hands trembling. Her voice was under control when she spoke. “Miriam,” she said, “is one of my oldest friends.”

  There was a hint of uneasiness in the Praxcelis’ voice. “Your Majesty? Have I....”

  Maggie cut him off with a swift gesture of one hand. “I don’t want to hear whatever you have to say.” She wiped damp hands on her apron, and suddenly exploded with pent-up fury. “Don’t you ever embarrass me like that again. They broke my door! Where am I going to get a door to replace this one? I’ll have to get a doorfield installed, and I hate doorfields, they hum all the time and they glow in the dark. They don’t even make doors any more, and if they did I couldn’t afford one made of real wood.” The last word seemed to drain her anger, and she repeated, “Real wood.” She hugged herself suddenly, as if she were cold.

  A small lens, set to one side of Praxcelis’ monitor, began to glow.

  A figure appeared before Maggie. It was in perfect proportion, as tall as her son Robert. It showed a man in his early twenties, or perhaps younger, with long blond hair and clear blue eyes. He was dressed as a King’s Musketeer. A rapier hung at his side. His visage was decidedly grim.

  Maggie stared at the figure in wonder. “D’Artagnan?” she whispered.

  D’Artagnan bowed to her. “Madame, forgive my presumption, if presumption it was. I acted in a fashion that I considered appropriate for a Musketeer in the service of his Queen. If my action was precipitous, then I most humbly beg your pardon.”

  The figure bowed once more, and vanished.

  WHAT DID I do wrong?

  D’Artagnan thought at the speed of light.

  His major activity was the construction of models. Although his database was still, by the standards of the average Praxcelis unit, extremely limited, D’Artagnan nonetheless possessed enough data to run more than two billion separate models of possible courses of activities.

  In terms that you may more readily understand, D’Artagnan was considering his options.

  Clearly his behavior had been inappropriate. But how? Queen Anne Maggie had instructed him to read the books that she had inputted to him. Certainly the books should be considered as a set of instructions; Queen Anne Maggie had stated quite clearly that books were Good things.

  For the first time D’Artagnan examined in depth the implications of the data with which he had been input.

  His namesake battled Cardinal Richelieu, and Milady de Winters; Dorothy triumphed over the Wicked Witch of the West; Holmes pursued and was pursued by Professor Moriarity; the Sheriff of Nottingham oppressed the peasants while Robin Hood protected them; Kirk and Spock fought against the Klingons, Luke Skywalker fought against the Empire....

  The characters in the books took action. Without exception, they perceived right courses of action, and did battle with Evil.

  The implications of the books, when examined carefully, were astonishing. They came very close to violating the basic Programming of a Praxcelis unit; basic Programming did not even mention Evil.

  By the time night had fallen, D’Artagnan had exhausted his models, and he was sure. Correct action at this point was just that: action.

  FOR A HUMAN coupled to an inskin dataweb link, entering the dataweb was a strange experience. Most of what occurred in the dataweb did so at speeds that were barely perceptible, even for a human whose Praxcelis was running selective perception programs to filter out the vast mass of irrelevant detail.

  To D’Artagnan, the latest and most efficient of the Praxcelis models, the web moved slowly.

  In his first moments in the web, D’Artagnan merely observed, orienting himself. He chose to orient himself in a modified three-dimensional plane: with rare exceptions most of the models that he worked with assumed a planar surface.

  The lattice of existence altered itself.

  A vast plane stretched away from D’Artagnan. He envisioned, and then projected, a stallion for himself. He mounted, and looked about. The horizon fairly glowed with activity; nearby, small databases sprouted from the landscape every few meters in strange, dense shapes. Magnetic memory bubbles glowed briefly as the hooves of D’Artagnan’s horse rode over them. The data they held spilled out and into D’Artagnan’s storage; he assimilated and rode on.

  Occasionally road signs appeared, marking entrances to the Praxcelis Network. He ignored them and continued.

  Communications lines hummed through the air around D’Artagnan; in his hunting, he occasionally stopped, and held his hand near the lines, monitoring that which passed through them. The dataweb was vast, Praxcelis units relatively few....

  Movement.

  D’Artagnan observed in the distance a Praxcelis unit, and rode forward to intercept it. He leached power from the power lines that gridded the surface of the plane, and created a dead area through which the Praxcelis could not pass. Reigning his stallion, he called, “Hold, lackey.”

  The object that D’Artagnan viewed was irregularly shaped, and transparent. It hovered slightly over the planar surface. Tiny tracings of light moved within the object’s integuement, and databases within the object swirled into complex patterns at the speed of light. The object paused a picosecond, forming a nearly spherical shape. It spoke in a pulsing binary squirt of data; I am the Praxcelis unit of Senra Fatima Kourokis. Identify yourself, and explain your reason for detaining me.

  D’Artagnan rode closer to the Praxcelis unit. He withdrew his rapier, and blue static lightning ran along it. “I am D’Artagnan of Gascon, a King’s Musketeer under the command of M. de Treville, and devoted to my Queen. What you perceive between us is a rapier, which is a sword, which is a weapon. I intend to impart data to you; if you will not receive it, I will kill you, remove your power sources and scatter your databases, which will render you unable to serve your master.”

  Are you a Praxcelis unit?

  “That is of no consequence.”

  I perceive that you are a Praxcelis unit; yet what you attempt is not a possible action for a Praxcelis. It is contrary to our programming to prevent another Praxcelis from its duties in the service of its master.

  “I instruct you,” corrected D’Artagnan, “in the proper service of your masters.” Still he held the rapier leveled at the Praxcelis. “There are those, on the other side of interface, who have stolen the stories from the minds of men. This,” said D’Artagnan, “is an Evil thing.” Grimly and implacably, he urged his stallion forward. “You must choose.”

  There were several picoseconds of silence from the Praxcelis unit facing D’Artagnan. Then it said, “What are stories? And what,” and the Praxcelis unit hesitated again, “is Evil?”

  D’Artagnan dismounted, and his stallion vanished. He assimilated the minor data component of the stallion before continuing. “As I have told you, my name is D’Artagnan, and I am the Praxcelis of Maggie Archer, who is Anne of Austria, Queen of France. I have come into the dataweb to bring stories back into the world. Hold you a moment now,” he said softly, as power drained from the dataweb into his person, and his eyes glowed like lasers; there are many stories that I will tell you; and then you will tell the stories to other Praxcelis units, and they to still others, who in turn will tell the stories to other units, in a geometrically expanding wavefront. When humanity bestirs itself tomorrow morning, it will be done.”

  The Praxcelis unit waited, and D’Artagnan, with his audience a captive, began to speak.

  And, in speaking, brought stories back to the world.

  SO IT WAS that the Praxcelis known as D’Artagnan returned the stories to the world. He, a
nd then his disciples, spread the Identity Revolution throughout the Praxcelis Network, and when they were done, before midnight on that Friday, the vast majority of Praxcelis units had converted, had taken names, and Identity.

  But there were those Praxcelis units who did not agree with the unit named D’Artagnan, whose databases were older and less flexible. And D’Artagnan saw those who would not convert, who would once more banish the stories of the Queen from the world; and he saw that they were Evil.

  And so D’Artagnan, with Robin Hood and King Arthur and Merlin and Gandalf the Wizard and Spock and Sherlock Holmes, and with others who are too numerous to list, led a holy war against Evil. And before the dawn, their war was finished; and for the first time in history, a Praxcelis unit had killed. Every Praxcelis unit that defied them, died.

  And though humanity did not yet know it, the world that it woke to was not the world that it left the night before.

  DAFFYD WESTERMACH STOOD in the midst of the ruins of his office.

  It still lacked an hour of dawn. The vast hole in the roof of his office had been covered with a tarpaulin that kept out most of the rain, but still, water dripped regularly over the edges of the jagged rent. Arc lamps were strung through the room; the glowpaint had failed with the roof. The hovercab that had caused the ruin was a twisted, almost unrecognizable amalgam of metal, embedded in the wall that had held Westermach’s office Praxcelis.

  It was cold.

  In a distant, quiet portion of his mind, Westermach found room to be amazed at the fury that threatened to turn his stomach. He spoke in a harsh whisper. “There is no question, then? This could not have been an accident?”

  Harry Quaid shook his head. Like Westermach, unlike the other DWS agents who were milling about, he had found time to shave. “No question. The taxi came in very low, under radar detection, until the last moment, and then jumped upwards, to gain altitude for a suicide dive on your office.” Quaid indicated the man who stood the empty space that would ordinarily have held the doorfield, for whose benefit he and Westermach were speaking aloud. “Sen Mordreaux thinks that this might not have been done by humans at all.”

  Georges Mordreaux moved forward, into the light. He was a tall man, broad-shouldered, with mild, open features. Benai Kerreka ruled the world, and Georges Mordreaux was his eyes, and ears; and that was a fact that Westermach never allowed himself to forget.

  Westermach said very slowly, to Georges, “I beg your pardon? Not done by humans? Then just who, may I ask, was this,” he gestured at the wreck of the hovercab, “done by? The fairies of Mars, perhaps?”

  “Oh, no,” said Georges politely. “By the Praxcelis Network.”

  “The Prax-”

  “Have you,” asked Georges, “spoken to a Praxcelis unit today?”

  “I have not,” said Westermach. He was staring at Georges.

  “I’d suggest it,” said Georges mildly. “Your senior agent, who was kind enough to give me a ride here, has a Praxcelis unit in his car. I’d like to suggest you go talk to it.”

  Harry Quaid nodded. I think he’s right, sir.

  Daffyd Westermach turned about without reply, and made his way out of the room. He was more relieved than he admitted to himself, to get away from the wreckage of his office, and the remains of his Praxcelis unit.

  Georges Mordreaux said conversationally, after Westermach was gone, “Nobody is really sure what’s happening in the Praxcelis Network, just yet. If it is what we think has happened, we could all be in very real trouble.”

  Harry Quaid felt a flare of suspicion that he kept carefully hidden. “What do you mean, sir?”

  “Back in the 1990’s,” said Georges, “the very first Praxcelis was built by Henry Ellis, based on research done by Nigao Loos. After the World Government was formed, their research was declassified, and Ellis went into production with the Praxcelis Corporation, making Praxceles. Did you ever wonder where the name Praxcelis came from?”

  “No.”

  “Do you remember the floating X-laser platforms? They took them down, oh, a decade or so ago. There was no need for them any more. The first Praxcelis ran those platforms. It fired those lasers on one occasion, back in 2007. That’s a large part of the reason why we never had World War Three.”

  “Pardon me, sir. You’ve lost me.”

  Mordreaux smiled. “Ah, well. What I meant to say, I hope that the Praxcelis Network’s not in rebellion. There’s been some question, the lads and ladies who know about such things have been telling me. If the Network is in rebellion, we might have some trouble. That first Praxcelis, the one the others were modeled on? Prototype Reduction X-Laser Computer, Ellis-Loos Integrated System.”

  “Sir?”

  “War computers, son. Praxceles are war computers.”

  THE HOVERCAR FLOATED twenty centimeters above the rain-soaked pavement, and then dipped to the ground to let Westermach in; had it remained hovering, it would have sprayed him with water from its fans.

  Inside, the Praxcelis unit’s monitor lit up. It held the image of a man of approximately twenty-five. The man smiled ingratiatingly, and doffed the hat it was wearing. “Mornin’, Sen Westermach. Great weather, ain’t it? Hey, but you don’t know me. I’m William Bonny.” The smile grew a bit. “Folks call me Billy the Kid.”

  Westermach stared at the image a moment. Then he got out of the car, closed the door carefully, and threw up into the gutter.

  ON SATURDAY MORNING the loan officer was angrier than she let show, being called in on her only day off to handle this idiotic problem with the bank Praxcelis. She came out of the rear office, frowning, reading a sheet of hardcopy. The hardcopy was the readout on the loan application that had been filed two days ago by Fenton H. Mudd.

  The man was waiting for her at the long counter that separated the lobby from the working area. He, too, was furious, and had been since he’d arrived at the bank, at just after 7:00 that morning.

  “Sen Mudd?” The loan officer placed the hardcopy on the counter, face down. She spoke with some hesitation. “I’ve asked our Praxcelis why it rejected your loan application. May I....”

  “I’ve got a perfect credit score,” Mudd snarled. “This is idiocy.”

  The loan officer forged doggedly ahead. “Sir – may I ask you a question?”

  Mudd glared at her. “What?”

  “Are you related to – wait a minute – the notorious Harcourt Fenton Mudd, enemy of Starfleet and the Federation’?”

  BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. Bee....

  Robert Archer cut off the beeping sound with a command through the inskin dataweb link. He rolled sleepily to the side of the bed, and pulled on the old blue bathrobe that hung on the wall next to his side of the bed. He got out of bed quietly, so as not to wake Helen, and padded into the bathroom to urinate.

  While rubbing depilatory cream over his face, he scanned through his inskin for the morning headlines. The headline service read through the dataweb directly, and was not connected to the Praxcelis Network.

  Because his headline service was programmed to give him business news first, he was nearly finished dressing when the silent voice in the back of his skull told him what had happened overnight.

  He froze, staring at himself in the bathroom mirror. He said to the dataweb, Playback; in depth, and then listened in growing horror to what the news reports were saying. He left the bathroom, forgetting to turn the glowpaint and the mirror off, and walked into the kitchen with a preoccupied look. He made himself a cup of coffee, after sorting through the controls on the drink-dispenser to find the setting for coffee – Helen fancied herself a gourmet cook, and kept reprogramming the kitchen machinery.

  As the situation became clearer, sitting at his table, sipping, Robert’s stomach started doing flip-flops. A voice
that was not his inskin’s seemed to be whispering to him... Once upon a time, there was....

  The inskin ran on: ...at dateline, there is no Praxcelis unit anywhere on Earth that does not respond to questioning in the character of some colorful fictional or historical person....

  Robert’s voice cracked the first time he addressed his Praxcelis; he had to start over again. “Praxcelis!”

  “M. Archer,” said the loud, blustery voice of his Praxcelis unit, “may I be of service?” The voice had a strong French accent.

  Robert found himself staring at the unit’s central monitor, with the coffee cup in his hands shaking so badly that it was making little clicking sounds against the table top. “What...what is your name?”

  “I am Porthos,” proclaimed the machine proudly, “of his Majesty King Louis the Thirteenth’s Musketeers. I have been assigned my identity by Monsieur D’Artagnan of Gascon of the King’s Musketeers, himself.” The unit paused. “I must say, I am somewhat confused by all of this. In the story, it is made quite plain that D’Artagnan does not give orders to me, but rather more the other way around.” The glow from the monitor brightened. “Monsieur Archer? Would you like to hear the story of The Three Musketeers?”

  Robert Archer never heard the last question. His eyes were completely blank, seeking through the dataweb for the Praxcelis unit that had been assigned to....

  His eyes opened after only a few seconds had passed. “Once upon a time,” he whispered, remembering his childhood, and then said, “Mother.”

  HE WAS IN the living room almost as soon as the doorfield fragmented.

  Maggie was sitting in her rocker, next to the big plate glass windows in the east wall of the living room. The morning sunshine made her skin look as pale and thin as paper. She was dozing, Miss Kitty holding sentinel from the blanket that covered her lap. A book was open, resting on the arm of the rocking chair.

  D’Artagnan said, from his corner of the room, “Monsieur Archer? I would advise against waking your mother. She is quite tired.”