'So if I punch you in the face, you won't feel it?'

'Of course I'll feel it, I'm programmed to be human. You'll hurt me, you might even kill me.'

'It's rubbish,' said Kelly. 'Mad rubbish.'

'Is it?' said Mute. 'Then tell me about your mother.'

'I've heard that line before,' said Kelly.

'Yes,' said Shibboleth. 'I said it.'

Kelly stared. Remington Mute was no longer Mute, he was Shibboleth.

'Sorry,' said Shibboleth. 'I'm just another player in this game. We're all just players and this is just a game.'

'No.' Kelly rubbed at her eyes.

'Yes,' said Remington Mute, for he was Mute once more. 'And you can't tell me about your mother, because you have no memories of her, because none were programmed into you. You only came into existence when you walked into Brentford five days ago, complete with all the skills that had been programmed into you. The Dimac, the computer literacy. Think about it, think about yourself. Think about what you eat. Good grief, woman, no real human being could tuck into all that grub and keep a figure like yours. When you feed you gain energy, you're a very basic system, but you have some special refinements, which is why I still have such great hopes for you.'

'No,' said Kelly. 'This is all madness. I don't believe any of this.'

'It makes you feel very helpless, doesn't it? But then that's life, isn't it? We're all doomed, but some of us are more doomed than others. But sadly, unless something is done and done soon, all of us are doomed and all this, unreal as it is, yet all the life that we have, will cease to be.'

Kelly glared bitterly upon Remington Mute. 'I don't believe anything you say,' she said. 'I don't.'

'So, have you remembered anything about your mother?'

'No,' said Kelly. 'But my eighteenth birthday

'No,' said Remington Mute, shaking his old head once more. 'You only thought you remembered that because Shibboleth mentioned it to you. You can't really remember anything about it, can you?'

Kelly slowly shook her golden head. 'No,' she said. 'I can't.'

'Well,' said Mute. 'It is neither here nor there. Time is running out anyway. The system is crashing. Everything is falling to pieces. My lovely new town Mute Corp Keynes, my finest simulation. It started to fall apart almost as soon as it was built. The virus destroyed it. go mango is a virus all right. It started as a fun game, aiming purely to entertain, but inside the great Trojan there lurks a deadly, voracious virus. It's eating its way right through the system, putting people off-line. In a way, those who think it's The Rapture are right. But people are not really going off to Heaven, they're simply going off-line. Such a shame. We really could have all been immortal if I'd just had a little more time to iron out the glitches.'

Kelly's bitter glare remained upon Remington Mute. 'So,' she said, with braveness in her voice. 'I am not a real human being. I'm just a computer simulation.'

'There are no human beings any more,' said Mute.

'So what is my purpose? Or is there no purpose? Are we all just players inside a sophisticated game you invented to serve some purpose for the military? And where is this computer system? And if the world ended in a nuclear holocaust, what powers it?'

'It isn't on Earth,' said Remington Mute. 'It's in orbit, part of the American Star Wars system, solar-powered, nanorobotechnic. It has a million years of life left in it. And so would we too. Immortality, Kelly, for all of us. If we could purge the system of the virus that is destroying it.'

'How?' Kelly asked, 'Say I believed any of this.'

'Which means that you do. You could destroy it. It is why you were created.'

'And you created me?'

'Lots of little yous. Lots of little anti-virus programs. All with particular skills. But you're the very best of them. You're the pick of the crop. The golden woman. If anybody can put everything back online, it's you.'

'So I'm an anti-virus,' said Kelly, her hand now in her hair and toying with it feverishly.

'I don't like that habit,' said Remington Mute. 'I never programmed that into you. I hope you're not going off-line too.'

'I'm very much online,' said Kelly. 'And I'm very much alive. And I want to stay alive. If I am what you say I am and all of this is unreal, then ultimately what does it matter to me? It's the only "life" I've ever known and I'll be content with it. But I don't want it to stop.'

'Of course you don't,' said Mute. 'Which is why I'm offering you immortality. All you have to do is debug the system, destroy the virus, then we all live for ever, or at least until the sun goes supernova and there is no Earth with its satellites any more.'

Kelly's hand left her hair. 'Just a couple of questions,' she said. 'Firstly, you say that you created this system for the military, so is the real Remington Mute dead?'

'Dead,' said Mute. 'I am his downloaded file, I have become service-provider, my program is to rebuild and extend the parameters of the simulation.'

'To create simulated life?'

'If you like. That is what I do. And each individual system is unique. They couldn't be more real.'

'It's almost a Godlike role,' said Kelly.

'Yes,' said Mute, chuckling. 'I suppose it is.'

'Oh come on,' said Kelly. 'There's no suppose about it. You are the builder and creator. You are to all intents and purposes the God of this simulated world.'

'Yes,' said Mute, chuckling further.

'And this rogue program, this go mango virus, that could be seen as the Devil, couldn't it?'

'Yes,' said Mute. 'It could.'

'And yet,' said Kelly. 'Within this simulated system, which you say could last for a million years if the Devil was cast out, you have grown old. How do you account for that? Surely you should be forever young.'

Mute shrugged. 'Fair wear and tear,' he said.

Kelly shook her head. 'I don't think so,' said she.

Mute cast a rheumy eye in her direction.

'What is on your mind?' he asked.

Kelly raised an eyebrow. 'Surely you know,' she said. 'Surely you know everything I think. You created me.'

'You're an independent program, you are capable of making independent decisions based on incoming data. It's called Data Reaction. I invented it.'

'And you are… what are you really, Mr Mute?'

'I'm everything that I've told you. And I have explained it all to you as best I can. I know it's a hideous thing for you to find out. And you are coping with it all remarkably well. But then I knew you would, that's the way I built you. You're a real prize, Kelly, and you are going to succeed where others failed. I just know you will.'

'Oh yes,' said Kelly. 'I will, have no doubt of that.'

'So I can rely on you? You will use your skills to destroy the virus?'

'Absolutely,' said Kelly. 'You can count on it.'

Remington Mute smiled gummily. 'I knew it,' he said. 'I knew that you were the one.'

'Oh yes. I am the one.' Kelly rose to her feet. She smiled down upon Remington Mute. 'It's very impressive,' she said. 'All of it. Not crude at all. Sophisticated, very sophisticated. But then it would be, wouldn't it? Computers can do wonderful things, if people choose to do wonderful things with them. But most people only ever grasp the basics, go through the motions, never use all the options. Play a few games. They never really use the tools.

'Now if it were the other way round, if computers were in control. That would be different, it wouldn't be crude, it would be precise. Everything would be done for a specific purpose, no mucking about, no trial and error, precise, mathematical. Everything with a specific purpose.'

'You're so right,' said Remington Mute.

'There wouldn't be any grey areas,' said Kelly. 'No loose ends, no bits that couldn't be precisely explained.'