Robot Adept

Then she stalled.

Mach agonized as she pondered, while Sharp tried one thing after another. Sharp would find the key, if she didn’t do something!

Then Mach reminded himself that her objective was not to win, but to play like a unicorn. That she was accomplishing!

Then she evidently reread the options at the bottom of the screen. She touched AUTHORS: DESCRIPTION.

TYPE DESCRIPTION, the screen printed, and displayed a keyboard.

She went at it hunt and peck: AUTHORS ENDING IN (TH).

Stroke of genius! In a moment she had WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. The letters checked, and she had a number of new ones—and she hadn’t had to draw from her memory a name Fleta would not have known. Now her cryptogram looked like this:

M I L T O F!—T H O U—S H O U L D ‘S T

1 2 3 4 5 6!—4 7 5 8—9 7 5 8 3 0 ‘9 4

_ E—L I _ I F _—A T—T H I S—H O U R:

(11)(12)-32(13)26(14)-(15)4-4729-758(16):

E F _ L A F D—H A T H—F E E D—0 _—T H E E!

(12)6(14)3(15)60-7(15)47-6(12)(12)0-5(17)-47(12)(12)!

W I L L I A M—W O R D S W O R T H

(18)2332(15)1--(18)5(16)09(18)5(16)47

She pondered, then filled in B above (11) for BE. Then she put N over (17), making ON.

FEED ON THEE? Mach doubted it, and so, evidently, did Fleta. (He knew it wasn’t her, but she was playing the role so well, he kept slipping.) She pondered, then in another fit of brilliance reversed F and N, making it NEED OF THEE! She corrected her bad F’s elsewhere, and now the quotation was almost complete:

MILTON! THOU SHOULD’ST BE LI-IN- AT THIS HOUR: EN-LAND HATH NEED OF THEE! WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

Sharp, meanwhile was starting to get on track; he had asked for the AUTHORS list, and after a tedious search from A to W had spotted Wordsworth. Had he chanced to start from the other end of the list, he would have been there much faster. He had no trouble with MILTON, but couldn’t make sense of THOU and THEE.

Fleta filled in LIVING, and suddenly, to her surprise, she had won. She had no notion what kind of creature ENGLAND was, but that wasn’t necessary. What a perfect portrayal of the unicorn!

Then it occurred to Mach that Agape probably didn’t know England either; it was not part of her heritage. Neither was Wordsworth, or Milton. She might have proven herself to be Fleta—by being herself.

Next day she was up against a young serf woman of about her own apparent age. Agape got the letters, so chose C. MACHINE. The other woman chose 3. CHANCE. They wound up with the game of number bracketing. This required three players, but the Game Computer simply generated random numbers for the third person.

The object was to choose a number from 1 to 100 that was between the two numbers chosen by the others, or, if two numbers matched, to be the odd one out, the one that didn’t match. It was a very simple game, but a nervous one nevertheless. Obviously the best strategy was to go for the center, because the fringes were losers—but every player had the same notion. Thus it might be better to choose one near the edge, and let the other two jam up in the center, perhaps duplicating their numbers and yielding the victory. But every player would reason that way, too. What was the better strategy?

But it wasn’t Mach’s decision to make. He did not like games of chance, as was the case with most competent players; chance was the refuge of incompetence. At least there was no problem about unicorn strategy here; the game was too simple.

Agape chose 1, and the other player chose 50. The random number was 22, making it the winner. Therefore they played again.

This time Agape chose the other player’s prior number, 50, while the other took 75. The random number was 63. Again they had no decision.

The third time Agape went for 75, taking her opponent’s last number again. The other, gambling that she would do just this, took 74, bracketing her toward the edge. But the random number was 90, and Agape won. It was of course sheer luck—but the other woman had elected to win or lose by chance, and had paid the price, when she might have won by skill.

Agape had now won the sixth round, and would compete next in the seventh—one of only sixteen survivors in the Tourney. Mach was amazed: how far would this go? Suppose—just suppose—that her luck continued? Four more victories would make her the winner of the Tourney, and she would become the first unicorn Citizen. What then?

Her Round Seven match was against another Citizen; not one of the Contraries, just a game buff who enjoyed the challenge and the privilege of dashing the hopes of serfs. He was a healthy man in his forties who was the most dangerous of players: the kind who truly understood the Game. He would make no mistakes and would have no mercy. Mach, watching from his chamber, felt the dread of likely loss; Agape was about to be put out of the Tourney.

She got the letters and chose TOOL, following her set strategy. He chose PHYSICAL, craving the greatest immediacy. In the subgrid she chose COOPERATIVE, while he went again for immediacy and challenge; FIRE, or variable surface.