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"Not tonight. There's a nearly full moon. I noticed it last night. No clouds
to speak of, should be fairly bright. You game?"
"Sure. Why not? What else I got to do?"
But being game wasn't the same as facing unpleasant truths. Throughout this
whole thing I'd come to junctions, one after the other. Some had worked out,
others had not, but all of them had affected only me. That made it easier to
take risks. The one that hadn't, getting out of the institute with Angel, was
still as much in Angel's interest as in mine and came under the "pro-tecting
the kid" flag.
Not this. What I decided at this point affected at least three others: Angel,
of course, and Chalmette and Suzy. I was tempted to drive back to Yakima or
north to that town at the other end, find a motel, and leave one of the women
there with Angel, but what would that do? If I couldn't get back, what would I
have done to them? And if there were spies even in little gas stations, how
long would either Suzy or Chalmette re-main free once we left them there?
I could ignore this and run. Assuming I could elude any chasers not a sure
thing but possible what would happen then? My physical body was frozen in a
kind of joke. Bald, frozen at a high level of pregnancy, but not high enough
to solve the problem. I probably wasn't aging physically, either, so if I just
turned my back on things this time, I would be like this indefinitely. That
was not a choice.
Or I could charge in and risk my young child and the only two adults in the
world I could trust.
These were choices?
"Query help system."
"?"
"Are choices of future direction as stated?"
"Substantially correct. There are many millions of fine per-mutations. "
"And if I did walk away from it, just remain as I am, get away? Would things
continue as they are?"
"Too many variables. However, energy link will be broken when central core
moves to next creation plane. At that point programs would become permanent
and dynamic."
"How can something become both permanent and dynamic? Seems like those are
opposites."
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"Not at all. Change is a constant. Loss of connection would leave you without
any power to alter programs but as you are. Fetus could be delivered by
C-section and would then develop normally."
This was something new. Not the C-section business but the idea that things
would still be around, would still exist, if the core, if the master computer
and master Brand Boxes, went on to another virtual universe.
"You mean prior universes are not destroyed once they've been created?"
"Not unless specifically terminated by instruction, no. Never if any core
subjects remain within."
So there was a sort of future here if we walked, although God knew if it would
be much of a life. It wasn't enough to just live; there had to be some reason
to keep living.
"Percentage that going into the reservation this time will gain me anything
except maybe an arrest?"
"Incalculable but probably even. This was the site of a num-ber of previous
major core installations and thus is a weak point. There is a power nexus at
this point."
"What's that mean? "
"Master program can be suspended locally, patched, or by-passed within limits
at a nexus if proper knowledge and access are present."
There wasn't much choice in this. I didn't see any future in dropping out this
time, nor would there be much of a future for my kids. No, it was better in
this case to be in than out.
Darkness proved more of an asset than a liability, something I hadn't
expected. By shifting to wireframe mode and looking out across that bleak
landscape, I was able to see the entire re-gion not as an eerie land of
shadows and shapes but as an al-most equally eerie rendering of
topographically outlined contours. And beyond the shielding low range in the
distance, from about where Rick, as Riki, and I had once stood and watched
Walt and Cynthia and others off-load from a rabbit hole, I could see the
weakness in the overall structural integrity there and at that point a
liquidlike pool, mostly calm at the mo-ment, of that dull green energy that
gave the real power. It was energy that flowed out and through the wireframes,
creating and maintaining them.
More startling, I could feel it tugging on me, or at least on my skull. Not
pain, not a headache, not a pounding, just a gen-tle tug that made me suddenly
aware of the artificial head mount integrated with my skull up there and its
connection to all this.
The source of my own energy thread had not been this pool, although that was
what I'd thought until I saw it. But this close, with this sort of
proximity to that much raw power, even if it was currently dormant in this
spot like one of those big volca-noes in the distance, the pull, the
attraction was so great that I felt things switch. I could feel that energy
thread break and swing out, freed from its prior source, and curve instead
into this shimmering lake of pale green energy.
For a moment the power had left me and things had blanked out, but now that
the other end was clearly inserted into and drawing from this pool, the power
surged through it and into me, stronger than before. This diversion had
created something new, something those who'd sent the head mount and its
strange integration program hadn't figured on.
As a part of the March Hare Network I'd been connected to the equivalent of a
server, but I'd been a workstation, under the server's limits and subject to
its call. Not now. Although not the central computer, source of all the Brand
Boxes and of all reality, this energy permeated the world, perhaps the
universe, and kept the program stable. This weak point, perhaps one of many
around the world, was sort of a bug in the system, a hid-den connector to the
same power source that was in the core. I now had power equal to that of Al or
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Walt or anybody else; what I did not have that they had was a connection to
the knowledge base, the network server and its files. I was like a savage
standing in front of the world's most powerful main-frame, knowing its vast
power but, staring at the keyboard, wishing I knew how to type.
"Query help system."
Silence.
"Query help system!"
There was nothing. I was no longer connected in any way. I was strictly on my
own.
"Let me drive," I told the women.
"But you don't know howl" Chalmette protested.
I gave a soft smile. "I know how to drive a car. Don't worry."
The very limited use of nearly absolute power was the easi-est. I could fry
somebody or do other simple, visceral things as they came up. Approaching the
fence and gate, I simply ig-nored them and the protests from my passengers.
The car passed through the gate. It didn't open it or clear it. nor did the
gate and fence cease to exist. We just went through it like ghosts.
We didn't, however, find ourselves immune from the bumps in the far less than
perfect dirt road. I found the bumps irritat-ing and uncomfortable and got
angry at their presence; the road suddenly smoothed out, a small but now paved
ribbon.
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