Dark brown eyes looked back at him. The girl - woman; she must be in her twenties - smiled at Wili as she acknowledged his move. She leaned forward, and raised an input/output band to her temple. Soft black hair spilled across that hand.
Almost ten minutes passed. Some of the spectators began drifting off. Wili just sat and tried to pretend he was not looking at the girl. She was just over one meter fifty, scarcely taller than he. And she was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. He could sit this close to her and not have to say anything, not have to make conversation.... Wili rather wished the game might last forever.
When she finally moved, it was another pawn push. Very strange, very risky. She was definitely a soft player: In the last three days, Wili had played more chess than in the last three months. Almost all of it had been against assisted players. Some were mere servants to their machines. You could trust them never to make a simple mistake, and to take advantage of any you made. Playing them was like fighting a bull, impossible if you attack head on, easy once you identify the weak points. Other players, like Jeremy, were soft, more fallible, but full of intricate surprises. Jeremy said his program interacted with his own creativity. He claimed it made him better than either machine or human alone. Wili would only agree that it was better than being the slave of a processor.
This Della Lu, her play was as soft as her skin. Her last move was full of risk and - he saw now - full of potential. A machine alone could never have proposed it.
Rosas and Jeremy drifted into view behind her. Rosas was not entered in the tournament. Jeremy and his Red Arrow special were doing well, but he had a bye on this round. Jeremy caught his eye; they wanted him outside. Wili felt a flash of irritation.
Finally he decided on the best attack. His knight came out from the third rank, brazen ahead of the pawns. He pushed the clock; several minutes passed. The girl reached for her king... and turned it over! She stood, extended her hand across the table to Wili. "A nice game. Thank you very much." She spoke in English, with a faint Bay Area twang.
Wili tried to cover his surprise. She had lost, he was sure of that. But for her to see it this early.... She must be almost as clever as he. Wili held her cool hand a moment, then remembered to shake it. He stood and gargled something unintelligible, but it was too late. The spectators closed in with their congratulations. Wili found himself shaking hands all around, and some of those hands were jeweled, belonged to Jonque aristocrats. This was, he was told, the first time in five years an unaided player had made it to the final rounds. Some thought he had a chance of winning it all, and how long had it been since a plain human had been North American champion?
By the time he was out of his circle of admirers, Della Lu had retired in graceful defeat. Anyway, Miguel Rosas and Jeremy Sergeivich were waiting to grab him. "A good win," Mike said, setting his arm across the boy's shoulder. "I'll bet you'd like to get some fresh air after all that concentration."
Wili agreed ungraciously and allowed himself to be guided out. At least they managed to avoid the two Peace reporters who were covering the event.
The Fonda la Jolla pavilions were built over one of the most beautiful beaches in Aztlÿn. Across the bay, two thousand meters away, gray-green vineyards topped the tan-and-orange cliffs. Wili could follow those cliffs and the surf north and north till they vanished in the haze somewhere near Los Angeles.
They started up the lawn toward the resort's restaurant. Beyond it were the ruins of old La Jolla: There was more stonework than in Pasadena. It was dry and pale, without the hidden life of the Basin. No wonder the Jonque lords had chosen La Jolla for their resort. The place was far from both slums and estates. The lords could meet here in truce, their rivalries ignored. Wili wondered what the Authority had done to persuade them to allow the tournament here, though it was possible that the popularity of the game alone explained it.
"I found Paul's friends, Wili," said Rosas.
"Huh?" He came back to their real problems with an unpleasant lurch. "When do we go?"
"This evening. After your next game. You've got to lose it."
"What? Why?"
"Look," Mike spoke intensely, "we're risking a lot for you. Give us an excuse to drop this project and we will."
Wili bit his lip. Jeremy followed in silence, and Wili realized that Rosas was right for once. Both of them had put their freedom, maybe even their lives, on the line for him - or was it really for Paul? No matter. Next to bobble research, bioscience was the blackest crime in the Authority's book. And they were mixing in it to get him cured.
Rosas took Wili's silence for the acquiescence it was. "Okay. I said you'll have to lose the next one. Make a big scene about it, something that will give us the excuse to get you outside and away from everyone else." He gave the boy a sidelong chance. "You won't find it too hard to do that, will you?"
"Where is... it... anyway?" asked Jeremy.
But Rosas just shook his head, and once inside the restaurant there was no chance for further conversation.
Roberto Richardson, the tournament roster said. That was his next opponent, the one he must lose to. This is going to be even harder than I thought. Wili watched his fat opponent walk across the pavilion toward the game table. Richardson was the most obnoxious of Jonque types, the Anglo. And worse, the pattern of his jacket showed he was from the estates above Pasadena. There were very few Anglos in the nobility of Aztlÿn. Richardson was as pale as Jeremy Sergeivich, and Wili shuddered to think of the compensating nastiness the man must contain. He probably had the worst-treated labor gangs in Pasadena. His type always took it out on the serfs, trying to convince his peers that he was just as much a lord as they.
Most Jonques kept only a single bodyguard in the pavilion. Richardson was surrounded by four.
The big man smiled down at Wili as he put his equipment on the table and attached a scalp connector. He extended a fat white hand, and Wili shook it. "I am told you are a former countryman of mine, from Pasadena, no less." He used the formal "you."
Wili nodded. There was nothing but good fellowship on the other's face, as though their social differences were some historical oddity. "But now I live in Middle California."
"Ah, yes. Well, you could scarcely have developed your talents in Los Angeles, could you, son?" He sat down, and the clock was started. Appropriately, Richardson had white.
The game went fast at first, but Wili felt badgered by the other's chatter. The Jonque was all quite friendly, asking him if he liked Middle California, saying how nice it must be to get away from his "disadvantaged condition" in the Basin. Under other circumstances, Wili would have told the Jonque off - there was probably no danger doing so in the truce area. But Rosas had told him to let the game go at least an hour before making an argument.
It was ten moves into the game before Wili realized how far astray his anger was taking him. He looked at Richardson's queen-side opening and saw that the advantage of position was firmly in his fat opponent's hands. The conversation had not distracted Richardson in the least.
Wili looked over his opponent's shoulder at the pale ocean. On the horizon, undisturbed and far away, an Authority tanker moved slowly north. Nearer, two Aztlÿn sail freighters headed the other way. He concentrated on their silent, peaceful motion till Richardson's comments were reduced to unintelligible mumbling. Then he looked down at the board and put all his concentration into recovery.
Richardson's talk continued for several moments, then faded away completely. The pale aristocrat eyed Wili with a faintly nonplussed expression but did not become angry. Wili did not notice. For him, the only evidence of his opponent was in the moves of the game. Even when Mike and Jeremy came in, even when his previous opponent, Delia Lu, stopped by the table, Wili did not notice.