Robot Adept

Unfortunately, it was Bane who picked up the small advantage. As they ground into the endgame, Bane was ahead by one point, but his position was stronger than that indicated and, for the huffdraw variant, stronger yet.

Huffdraw was a device that had come into play in the last few centuries, because too many tournaments were being stymied by frequent draws. Planetary championship matches had dragged on interminably, draw after draw, as each player settled for even rather than risking worse for the sake of better. This was hard on the players, and worse for the audience. Chess was in danger of fading as a competitive sport because of it. Huffdraw changed that radically. The term was borrowed from checkers, and the effect was roughly similar, but the execution differed significantly. There were several applications, depending on the type of draw that threatened. But the basic element was the removal of “dead” pieces: those that hadn’t moved in some time. If that failed, then pieces started to be added back in, until there were enough in action to force a decision.

They came to a draw by perpetual check: Mach prevented Bane from winning by checking his king continually, forcing him to protect the king rather than closing in on Mach’s. Bane used his pole to block each check, but Mach simply moved to a new position for check. This repetitive motion caused the board to assume the same configuration for a third time, by definition a draw.

At that point all chessmen of either color that had not moved during the game were to be huffed, or removed from the board as if taken. There were none, so the huff proceeded to those who had been longest without moving, as traced by the Game Computer in Proton, without regard to color. This proceeded until either the position was freed, or it proved to be impossible to free it in this manner. In this case, it was freed—but it left Mach in a weaker position than before.

Play resumed, but he was in trouble. Bane’s small advantage in pieces was looming more formidably. Mach saw a chance to play for another draw—but saw also that the resultant huffing would make him yet more vulnerable. Only if he could achieve a draw whose breakup would benefit him could he afford to take it. He used his pole increasingly, which meant he was moving his other pieces less often, and that made them vulnerable to huffing. If he could only get Bane to neglect his pieces—

But he could not. Bane had evidently drilled in this, and was playing with machinelike conservatism. He made no errors, simply letting his advantage operate.

Mach tried a desperate strategy that he knew was flawed, hoping that Bane’s machine mind would not perceive the flaw. But the effort failed, and Mach’s position became hopeless.

He had to resign. He had lost the game, and the first match.

Chapter 14 Chase

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They played the grid again. This time it did not seem remarkable to Bane that he could match against his other self through the console; the three grueling chess games had made it seem natural. But this time he intended to stay well clear of board games; Mach’s experience in that regard was far greater than his, and it had been mere luck that he had learned chess from his father, Stile, and been able to add that experience to Mach’s stored knowledge and the advice of the Oracle. If he encountered a game in which he was inexperienced, he would not be able to upgrade sufficiently to be competitive. It had been close, as it was.

He had the numbers, so he chose 1. PHYSICAL. That eliminated the major region of danger! He had had a lot of experience with physical games of all types. Mach had too, of course, but Bane now had Mach’s physical body and could match any of his experience by opening the appropriate memory file. He wasn’t sure how they would be able to play a physical game, but the Oracle said it would be arranged. Soon he would discover what the Oracle had in mind.

Mach chose A. NAKED. So it was to be man against man, unadorned. The man in the machine body against the robot in the living body. Bane was ready, if the framework could arrange it. The second grid appeared on the screen:

5. SEPAR 6. INTERAC 7. COMBAT 8. COOPER

E. EARTH F. FIRE G. GAS H. H20

He had the numbers again. He chose 6. INTERACTIVE, becoming more interested in the challenge to the system than in the game itself, for the moment. A separate game would be easy enough: they could race against a common clock, or lift similar weights, or do individual dives for rating on a common scale. But Interactive meant that they had to touch or at least be affected by each other, as with Hide and Seek. How could they do that, physically, across the frames?

Mach chose H. H2O. So it was to be a water sport! Bane had no fear of that; he had swum joyfully since infancy. Were they going to stretch a pool across the frames?