This Day All Gods Die by Stephen R. Donaldson Page A

sharper. More like Morn's? His intensity gave him focus; seemed to give him authority.
    "Vector," he commanded, "let's turn him over."
    "What?" Vector asked uncomprehendingly.
    In silence Angus echoed, What?
    "Turn him over," Davies insisted. "Put him on his stomach."
    Hands jerked along Angus' sides. He couldn't tell how many there were. After a moment the restraints fell away, releasing him into zero g.
    "Mikka," Davies went on at once, "set the systems to open up his back."
    "Why?" she demanded. Vector may have been swayed by Davies' passion; but she was tougher.
    Don't ask stupid questions! Angus shouted uselessly. Just do it!
    "So we can pull his datacore," Davies retorted. "He said the stasis commands are hardwired. Taking out the chip freezes the whole system. Maybe if we unplug his datacore and then put it back, the computer will reset itself."
    Aping Mikka, he growled, "What the hell do you think we have to lose?"
    Shit! Abrupt amazement shot through Angus' trapped mind. It might work. It might—
    This time he hadn't been ordered into paralysis. His programming had imposed it on him because he'd gone down one of its logic trees too far to recover. Under the circumstances, anything which forced or enabled his computer to re-evaluate his condition might set him loose.
    He landed on his face, felt the restraints close again.
    "No good," Mikka reported. "The computer wants a code. Sickbay won't do it without the right code."
    Davies didn't hesitate. "Then get me a first-aid kit. I'll cut him open myself." Muttering, he added, "It's not like I haven't done this before."
    Only a few seconds passed before Angus felt a sharp line run along the skin between his shoulder blades. It should have hurt; but he was too far removed from it for pain. It might as well have belonged to some other reality.
    All this was familiar. Alone with Warden Dios, he'd sprawled under the light like a sacrifice while the UMCP director had worked on his back: cut him open; swabbed away the blood; unplugged his old datacore; set a new one into the socket. Dios hadn't stopped talking the whole time.
    If Min knew why I'm doing this, she'd turn against me herself.
    We call the process "welding.' When a man or woman is made a cyborg voluntarily, that's "wedding." "Welding" is involuntary.
    In essence, you're no longer a human being. You're a machina infernalis—
    an infernal device. We've deprived you of choice—
    and responsibility.
    Davies swore steadily under his breath while he did the same things for different reasons. Back then Angus had been able to recognize the change when his datacore was taken out: he'd felt a void as deep as the gap between the stars crouching just beyond the window which linked him to his computer; poised to consume him—
    But now he recognized only the tug
    which plucked at his back when Davies pulled the chip. Nothing shifted.
    He already belonged to the void. Its power over him could not be made worse.
    Yet he knew that wasn't true. Trapped and suffocating in the crib in his EVA suit, he'd launched a singularity grenade against Free Lunch. And then he'd fired his portable matter cannon; fired it accurately despite the chaos of the swarm and the instability of cold ignition. He'd created that singularity by his own skill and cunning, no matter who hurt him, or why.
    Morn had set him free to fight for himself.
    And then he'd been brought back from the edge of his personal black hole. He wasn't alone here: other people had saved him. They could have left him to die, damn right, that's what he would have done himself, get rid of the butcher the rapist the illegal who looked like a toad and stank like a pig while they had the chance, no one would ever know the difference. Gone and good riddance.
    The people around him hadn't done that. They'd retrieved him from the fringes of his doom. And now they were trying to do the same thing again in another way.
    Beyond question the power of the void could be made worse. Davies, Vector,