Montrose and De Ulloa fired at each other with their handheld weapons across the space of the mountain saddle separating the two peaks, but the fire and dust cloud thrown up by the Surtur impact obscured the line of sight.

At this point, Ms. Hecatedora Simon, the chief man-breeder of the Simon Families, and a large squad of her riflewomen emerged from certain hidden places they had dug out of the mountainside the evening previous, and they closed in on Montrose, firing. They had supporting fire from robotic tripod-mounted guns under the command of Ms. Maeveen Simon.

The riflewomen were Simon Family octogenarians and centenarians, and so had many decades of practice, and they still had the stamina, eyesight, and health of youth, but their computer targeting would not lock on to Montrose, and his weapon produced a volume of chaff and smoke screen to impede naked-eye, manual aiming.

Montrose discharged his major shot through the body of the space wreckage, penetrating the shielding of the reactor core and exposing the environment to an unsustainable amount of radiation. The riflewomen retreated to where I had crash-landed my craft. This craft had sufficient shielding to protect us.

Later, Simon Family squads equipped with radiation-suppression gear found the body of De Ulloa. He had been trapped on the peak because of the position of the crater and the fires that spread from it: he had been dying of exposure burns, and the damage was already beyond any cure. He took his own life by wedging his pistol between his feet and ordering it to fire at his head. Montrose should have been similarly trapped, but his body was not found. Hecatedora Simon ordered a careful examination made of the surrounding grounds.

Eventually an echolocation probe discovered the hidden entrance to a still-working depthtrain station. This was not only unexpected, but it also did not fit and could not be reconciled with any rational model of the world we knew: the last working depthtrain had failed centuries ago. Without a large-scale ratiotech or Xypotech computer to organize and balance the intricate field strengths in the openwork carbon nanofiber of the wall system of the evacuated tubes, and thus maintain the containment against the immense heat and pressure, no vehicle can pass safely through the magma of the Earth.

I was selected to attempt the train car we found there, and Hecatedora returned to Exarchel with the news that the depthtrain system still functioned. I was able to break the defensive cryptography surrounding the car’s simple engineering brain due to my superior intellect, but once I was under way, the internal power was cut and the depthtrain car, now under external control, was shunted into another tunnel, and, forty-five minutes later, arrived in a large buried vault defended with an excessive number of automatic guns and electric shock fields. I later deduced that this was the fabled Tomb system, often described and never seen.

Two knights in power armor of a most antique design were waiting for me, and I calculated that my hand weapon would prove ineffectual against them; therefore, cleverly, I determined on the ruse of surrender and begging for mercy, since I am aware that unevolved types often make emotional rather than rational decisions in situations of that kind. These knights had breastplates adorned with the Maltese cross, so I knew them to be agents of Menelaus Montrose.

Instead of killing me, they agreed to place me into involuntary hibernation, until such time, if ever, Menelaus Montrose might see fit to review my case and release me. I assume that since I am now thawed, that either one of you is Menelaus Montrose, or that his system has failed, or that he is dead and his coffins have passed into the hands of others, or some combination thereof.

5. Cloud Cover

Did you say the Cetaceans produced the worldwide cloud cover from 3050 to 3150?

No.

Did you say the Cetaceans produced the worldwide cloud cover?

Yes. I made no mention of any dates.

For what purpose?

In order to answer your question.

No, I mean, for what purpose did the Cetaceans raise a worldwide cloud cover?

It was at the behest of the Simon Families and the Delphic Order, who were politically and philosophically opposed to the Consensus Advocacy of the Thucydidean Posthumans, who had malformed a number of their members into transhuman Giants. The Giants were able to maintain world supremacy only through their system of orbital mirrors, which allowed them close reconnaissance of any surface activity, and a solar-energy weapon which, hitherto, no city on the surface could evade or antimissile system deflect.

The Cetaceans were an artificial transhuman race of whales and dolphins in service to Exarchel, who is the emulation of Ximen del Azarchel, chief and prime of the Hermeticists, and who is also the only legitimate and rightful ruler and Master of the World. The Delphic Order worked closely with the Cetaceans to construct subsea thermal absorption, deflection, and venting systems to alter the world climate and return the Earth to the cloud-cover conditions of the late Triassic. Since the Cetaceans had effective control over seven tenths of the Earth surface, the human and posthuman beings occupying only the habitable areas of the remaining three tenths land surface were unaware of the operation and unable to hinder it once they became aware of its artificial origin.

Once the cloud was in place, the orbital mirrors were useless, and even ordinary space rocket launches became dangerous. Both large cities and the energy-concentrations needed for establishing large-scale emulation mainframes were feasible again.

This was the single event spelling the end of the Promethean Advocacy and the triumph of the Delphic Order.

The Delphic Order are the early Witches?

No referent.

When were you born?

2461 Common Era.

This is the exact same year as A.D. 2461?

Yes. But it is more scientific not to make any reference to any events, real or imagined, that may have taken place at the date from which the calendar is reckoned. Our purpose is to abolish all previous intellectual structures and to allow for perfect liberty of thought by erasing all previous record of accomplishments.

Whatever. How did you manage to survive until 3090, when the duel between De Ulloa and Montrose took place?

Your statement is inexcusably imprecise! It was not a duel; it was murder.

How do you figure?

The agreed-upon weapons of the duel were traditional self-propelled chemically powered ammunition. Instead, Montrose fired into the containment sphere, spilling dangerous radioactive material, in effect, using the radiation as a weapon, which is a clear violation of the code governing duels.

Why did the wreckage of the orbital terawatt laser happen to strike the mountain peak just at that point in time?

The Cetaceans used their weather-control system to heat the atmosphere excessively, and it expanded under this heat, so that the ceiling of the stratosphere was above the perigee of the orbital laser. This caused unexpected atmospheric breaking and sudden deorbit.

But why did it happen to strike that mountain peak at that time and place and no other?

After the terawatt laser platform was in the atmosphere, I was able to get close enough to it with a high-performance craft and take over its attitude jets by remote control. Solving the mathematical chaos-function of guiding an irregularly shaped rolling and tumbling mass was difficult but not impossible for one of my great intellectual accomplishments, and I guided the falling craft to its impact site, keeping pace with it in my craft. When I lost control of the attitude jets, I accidentally entered the turbulence of the wake, and the oxygen-burning ramjet choked. There was insufficient glidepath to switch back to rockets, and so I had to make an emergency landing.