Halo by Tom Maddox
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Halo
A Novel
by Tom Maddox
From Tom Maddox.Net
Halo
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Table of Contents
* Part I
* Part II
* Part III
* Part IV
* Part V
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Dedication
To the memory of George Maddox, my father; Paul Cohen, my friend; and all our lamented dead, lost in time.
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PART I OF V
Everything is destined to reappear as simulation.
Jean Baudrillard, America
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1. Burning, Burning
On a rainy morning in Seattle, Gonzales was ready for the egg. A week ago he had returned from Myanmar, the country once known as Burma, and now, after two days of drugs and fasting, he was prepared: he had become an alien, at home in a distant landscape.
His brain was filled with blossoms of fire, their spread white flesh torched to yellow, the center of a burning world. On the dark stained oak door, angel wings danced in blue flame, their faces beatific in the cold fire. Staring at the animated carved figures, Gonzales thought, the fire is in my eyes, in my brain.
He pushed down the s-curved brass handle and stepped through to the hallway, his split-toed shoes of soft cotton and rope scuffing without noise across floors of bleached oak. Through the open door at the hallway's end, morning's light through stained glass made abstract patterns of crimson and buttery yellow. Inside the room, a blue monitor console stood against the far wall, SenTrax corporate sunburst glowing on its face; in the center of the room was the egg, split hemispheres of chromed steel, cracked and waiting. One half-egg was filled with beige tubes and snakes of optic cable, the