“I understand that,” she said. “And I agree. I love you, but I would not destroy what your father has done for the sake of that love. But what I was referring to—”
“Thou didst make Fleta for Mach.”
“Aye,” she said, with a quirk of a smile.
“And so thou didst protect him from possible discovery when he emulated me, and perhaps protected me also when I emulated him. Even as Fleta did in Phaze. Now I can see how he does love her, and he can see how I do love thee. Can we not consider that it were as it seemed, and no harm done?”
“If you wish.”
“Aye, I wish.” He looked at her. “Agape, an thou couldst have whate’er thou didst wish, what would that be?”
“To be with you in Phaze,” she said without hesitation.
“I have made a deal with the Oracle to merge the frames, an it prove possible. Then mayhap we can be together, each in our own bodies, in either frame. And Mach and Fleta too. Then could she play the Game at will, and thou couldst learn magic. And—”
“We could reproduce,” she concluded.
“Aye. But as that be no certain outcome, must needs we do it now. I did learn how Mach and Fleta could do it in Phaze, and Mach did study how we two could do it here. Dost understand how Mach was Grafted?”
“Yes. He started as an infant-robot, and moved to larger body and capacity in the way a living person would grow, until he reached adult status.”
“I have it from Mach’s memory: we can craft a cyborg with a body like mine and a mind like thine. It be not a perfect solution, but I be not a living man, in this frame. So if thou wouldst be interested—”
“I would,” she said.
“Mach learned that Moebites have learned to fission unevenly, so that one retains identity while the other must immediately merge with another to gain enough mass to survive. If thine merges with the machine, for life support—”
“Yes. I have met the cyborg girls, and they can be quite interesting, if you like that type.”
“Girls,” he repeated. “It had not occurred to me, but robots be female too, and cyborgs. Mach’s mother, Sheen—”
“Yes. We shall have a female child.”
“But an I win, and we must separate—”
“The child of our union will remain,” she said firmly. “She must remain here, where the facilities exist for growing and learning.”
“Aye. But an I return to Phaze—”
“I will remain here, and care for her until she is of age. This can be justified as continued experience in the bisexual mode, that my folk need to know.”
“Must needs we name her.”
“After you—”
“And after thee—”
“BA for Bane, AG for Agape?”
“Baag? Forget it, alien!”
She laughed. “Maybe the last letters, NE—”
“And PE.”
“Nepe,” she said.
“Nepe,” he agreed.
They kissed.
In due course Bane played the grid with Mach, across the curtain, and they settled on a board game called Pole Chess. “I know it as well as Mach does,” he said. “By definition. This be a fun game.”
“I do not know of it,” Agape replied.
“It be Occidental chess, with a piece added, invoked after the first piece be lost on either side. Serious practitioners play it not, but it does have its points.”
He had a month to prepare. The Oracle trained him in the nuances of this specialized variant, but expressed concern. “You now inhabit the mind of a machine. Machines are excellent at storage and manipulation, but are not as creative as living creatures. If error-free playing suffices, the advantage is yours, but if not, it is his.”
“He has been limited all his existence,” Bane pointed out. “Can he now become creative?”
“That remains to be seen. He has strong motivation.”
Bane nodded. Mach’s motivation might well be stronger than his own. Yet he had to make his honest best effort.
“Teach me some aspects of this game that Mach knows not,” he said. “And teach me flawless defense. I like not winning a game as it were by default, but this be the way methinks I should play it.”
“True.”
And while he explored the special wrinkles of the game, Agape ate voraciously to increase her mass so that she could fission, and the lab designed a cyborg unit that would support, not a human brain, but a Moebite entity.
Chapter 13 Pole
There be only so much magic can do, in a game like chess,” Trool said. “Thy powers of perception and thought be now enhanced; thou willst play thy best, and make no direct error. But ultimately the victory must go to the one with the greatest experience and vision. Thou must have practice against excellent players.”
“Who are the best in Phaze?”
“Stile. The Silver Elves. The Eldest Vampire.”
“Damn!” Translucent exclaimed. “He cannot play them!”
Because they were all on the other side. “I thought I was so smart, angling for a variant of chess,” Mach said ruefully. “I only got myself in trouble.”
“There be other players,” Translucent said. “And ye be committed to a variant. Mayhap there be other experts in that variant. Some among our forces.”
Mach brightened. “I can make a spell to locate the finest available player of Pole Chess.”
He did so. In a moment he ascertained that the Silver Elves dominated this variant also, but that there was one outstanding player among the snow demons. His name was Icebeard, and he was a chief of a White Mountain clan. He seldom played in tournaments, because he could not tolerate any warm location, so his skill relative to that of the Silver Elves was not known, but it was suspected that it was equivalent.
“I will go see Icebeard,” Mach said.
“But the demons eat normal folk,” Fleta protested.
“I can protect myself, now,” Mach reminded her. “And you, if you want to come.”
“Methinks I had better,” she said. “They may be thine allies now, but an thou sleep, it be best to have a guard.”
Translucent nodded. “I will acquaint him with thy situation. But trust him not behind thy back. Our alliance be jury-built. Conjure thyself to the base of the mountain range, then climb them afoot, that they may recognize thee.”
Mach conjured himself and Fleta to the base of the White Mountain range. The White Mountains were as massive as the Purple Mountains of the south, but more formidable because they were cold.
“One thing amazes me,” Mach said. “The frames of Proton and Phaze overlap, geographically; every feature of one is mirrored in the other. Yet Proton is a planet, a sphere, while Phaze is a flat surface. How can this be?”
“Methinks the folk o’ the other frame suffer from illusion,” Fleta replied. “They think their world must be a ball, while we know it for what it truly be, a circle.”
He glanced at her, uncertain whether she was serious. “Proton has a north and south pole, while Phaze has an east and west pole. How can those be reconciled?”
“By playing Pole Chess,” she replied.
He considered that. Pun or wisdom? Then he saw her laugh bubbling up from her belly to her bosom. He grabbed her and kissed her before it could reach her mouth. “Silly filly!” he exclaimed.
And found himself kissing the unicorn. She had changed form, leaving only her lips touching his.
He changed to his stallion form, snorting. If she wanted to play it that way—
She became the hummingbird, her slender bill touching his nose. He became another.
She returned to girlform. “Ah, I forget thou be Adept now!” she exclaimed. “My Rovot Adept! Methinks I like thee better as a helpless man!”
“Tough manure, bird brain,” he said with mock gruffness as he joined her in manform. “I accepted you as a unicorn; now you have to accept me as an Adept.”