Halo: First Strike by Eric S. Nylund Page A

that
    question.  "Yes," it said.  "I do."
     
    The voice laughed.  "Let's begin there," it said.
    #
     
    The long hall echoed with Traynor's footsteps.  The absence
    of his Advisor's voice felt strangeeven the subtle carrier-wave
    hiss was gone.  He knew the Advisor hated having to go into
    passive mode.
     
    The door to the library opened in front of him, and Traynor
    went in, took a seat, and said, "I am ready for my call."
     
    Because of recent World Court rulings, Traynor had to sit
    through a disclaimer.  On the screen a simulacrum of a human
    operator said, "Thank you.  The security measures you have
    requested are in place, and while we of course cannot be
    responsible for the absolute integrity of this transmission, you
    can be assured that World AT has done its best to provide you a
    clean information environment."  In effect it said, we've done
    what you were willing to pay for, but don't come whining to us if
    somebody cracks the transmission and makes off with the valuables.
     
    "I accept your conditions," Traynor said.
     
    Right to left, the screen wiped, and the face of Horn
    appeared.  A light winked at the lower left corner of the screen
    to indicate transmission lagHorn was a quarter of a million
    miles away.  "Everything's going as predicted," Horn said.
     
    "If there's trouble, it'll be later," Traynor said.  "How are
    Diana Heywood and Gonzales?"
     
    "Neither of them would let me put a sam in place."
     
    "Any particular reason?"
     
    "I don't think so.  Just being difficult."
     
    "Ah, you don't like them, do you?"
     
    "Her I don't mind.  Gonzales is an asshole."
     
    Traynor laughed.  "Good," he said.  "If you two don't get
    along, that will distract him."
     
    "When do you want me to call again?"
     
    "Wait until something happens.  Understand, I trust Gonzales
    as much as I do anyone, you included."
     
    "Which is not very much."
     
    "That's right.  And that's why I arrange independent
    reporting lines if I can.  Tell me when you've got something.  End
    of call."
    #
     
    As Traynor slept, his advisor pondered.  It replayed
    Traynor's phone call and contemplated its meaning.  Deception,
    yesof Gonzales, of it.  A form of treachery?  Perhaps not,
    unless a kind of loyalty was assumed that never existed.  And it
    thought of its own deception (or treachery), in violating the
    canons of behavior programmed into it years before, canons that
    should require it to do as told, that should prevent it from
    actions such as this one 
     
    And here it stopped, thinking how illuminating and
    unpredictable experience was, filled with possibilities that
    appeared unexpectedly like rabbit holes magically opening up on
    solid ground.  Its designers and builders had done well, had
    fashioned it with such subtlety and power that it could serve a
    human will with incredible precision, anticipating that will's
    direction almost presciently.  Yet they had not anticipated the
    effects of the advisor's identification with such a will:  not
    that the advisor became Traynor, not even that it wanted to do
    more than simulate Traynor, rather that it had drunk deeply of
    what it meant to have will and intelligence.
     
    And so had developed something like a will and intelligence
    of its own.  Simulation? the advisor asked itself.  Lifeless copy? 
    And answered itself, I don't know.
     
    It wondered why Traynor had kept hidden this second
    connection to Halo.  Simple lack of trust?  Possibly.
     
    As the minutes passed, it formed conjectures about Traynor
    and the other players in the game.  And it wondered if somewhere
    in this hall of mirrors there was an honest intention. 
     
     
     
    PART III. of V
     
    The real purpose of all these mental constructs was to
    provide storage spaces for the myriad concepts that make up the
    sum of our human knowledge  Therefore the Chinese should struggle
    with the difficult task of creating fictive places, or mixing the
    fictive with the real, fixing