The Fountains of Youth - Brian Stableford [87]
I felt that it was all wrongheaded, of course, but I could see that there was enough truth in it to dispel the notion that it was madness, or nonsense, or an incoherent argument unworthy of a serious reply. Unfortunately, I had no adequately eloquent reply ready. I tried, of course, but I floundered inelegantly, and Nyxson cut me to ribbons.
FORTY-FIVE
I realized once my humiliation was complete that I should never have left myself in the position of needing to reply to Hellward Nyxson at all. I should have done everything in my power to force my opponent into that ignominious position—but the relatively evenhanded exchange of spite in which I had participated with Emmanuelle Standress had lulled me into a false sense of security.
I understood, once the fiasco was over, that Nyxson had been carefully hoarding the moment of his first personal appearance, waiting for the right moment to spring himself on the world. I was unlucky to have been elected as the sounding board off which his manifesto speech would be bounced, but the choice made good tactical sense from his point of view. A professional caster would never have given him so much rope; he needed a debate with an opponent who was set up to be swept aside, at least in the eyes of EdEnt’s consumers.
I had set out on the treacherous path of TV celebrity in order to assert that my work had been misunderstood, not realizing that no one in the world except me gave a damn about whether it had or hadn’t. My inept pursuit of my own agenda was never going to make the slightest difference in opposition to Hellward Nyxson’s showmanship. From his point of view, of course, my only function in life was to make him look more eloquent. Unfortunately, I could not help but oblige.
I was a mere stepping-stone, and the author of the Thanaticist Manifesto stepped on me good and hard.
The only consolation I could take from my brief encounter with Hellward Nyxson was that the whole thing had been mere show business. I told myself that Axel was right: that Thanaticism really was a thing of the moment, a TV-powered fad that would attract far more attention than it deserved for a little while and then fade away. I reminded myself that I, by contrast, was a patient historian, not yet halfway through a work that would take another century to complete.
One day, as even Nyxson had pointed out, I would have the job of fitting the brief history of Thanaticism into my entire history of death—and when I came to do so, I would have the final word. In the meantime, all I could do was to lick my wounds.
“You can’t possibly blame yourself,” Axel assured me. “It wouldn’t have mattered what you’d said in that stupid debate.” Jodocus, Eve, and Minna all concurred, although Camilla gave the distinct impression that she thought it was my fault that Nyxson had had such an easy ride.
Even Keir was soothing, after his own fashion. “Madness has its own momentum,” he said. “You couldn’t have stopped it even if you had outflanked him. The EdEnt people could have stamped on it, but they’re just the PR arm of Fossilized Hardinism. Demand management requires that there always has to be something new on the surface, although the system itself must remain absolutely rigid. Nothing will change until we can redeem Gaea from the curse of private ownership.”
“Are you sure the Rad Libs aren’t just one more faddish media phenomenon?” I asked him, churlishly. “They get their fair share of EdEnt spacetime.”
“I’m sure,” he said, confidently. “We’re the revolution that’s waiting to happen. We can afford to play the long game.”
I almost wished that Keir was right, and that I too was a Gaean at heart, prepared to play the long game and casually able to write off every individual human death as one small step in the direction of Mama’s liberation.
Hellward Nyxson was not allowed to rest on his