Unicorn Point

“Are you going to choose. Uncle?” Nepe asked.  Mach glanced at his grid. As always, it showed the four major categories across the top: 1. PHYSICAL 2. MENTAL 3. CHANCE 4. ARTS, and four types down the left side: A.  NAKED B. TOOL C. MACHINE D. ANIMALS. He had the letters. Quickly he touched A. NAKED. Here in Proton the word had no social significance, as all serf’s were naked; it simply meant that no tools, machines or animals would be used. He felt this was the safest course for a game with a child, because it eliminated most of the most complicated ones.

Immediately the new grid formed: 2A. NAKED MENTAL. He had not needed to worry about inappropriate tools; her choice of MENTAL had negated most of that. Across the top were 5. SOCIAL 6. POWER 7. MATH 8. HUMOR, and down the side were E. INFORMATION F. MEMORY G.  RIDDLE H. MANIPULATION. He had the numbers this time, so selected 8. HUMOR.

She had chosen as quickly as he, and the third grid appeared: HUMRUS MANPLASHUN. Good enough; he should not get into much trouble there. The point of this Game was to satisfy Nepe, not to win or lose.  Then he glanced back at the grid heading, startled, but the title had already faded. Had he imagined Nepe’s language there? How could that happen to a robot? He looked at the child, but she had assumed a mask of complete innocence.  They set up the final grid, filling in improbable choices relating to illogic and jokes. Nepe’s choices evinced a proclivity for naughtiness that would have distressed her mother; apparently the child felt free to express herself more openly in the company of her uncle.

They played the grid, and the final choice of games was made: STRUCTURED LYING.

Mach shook his head. “Your mother—”

“Isn’t playing,” the child said quickly.  True. So Nepe had her way, and could now tell lies with impunity. This variant, as structured, required that each make a statement, while the other challenged any lie. If a lie was accepted as valid, or a true statement challenged as a lie, a point was scored by the originator. If the statement was called correctly, the point went to the challenger. The trick was to cause the opponent to challenge some seemingly outrageous but actually accurate statement. A lead of two points decided the game.

Mach made the first statement. He was not very good at lying, because it was foreign to both his training and his robotic programming; a good lie required imagination of the quality only a living brain could achieve. Fortunately his opponent was a child, and a childish example would suffice. He presented one of the classic ancient riddles.

“I know of a chamber filled with gold. The gold is wrapped in a silken shroud, and set in a transparent liquid, which is sealed in a container that has no doors or windows or openings at all. Yet—“

 “An egg,” Nepe said, not waiting for him to finish. “So it is true.”

“You’ve heard it before,” Mach said, chagrined to be thus readily bested.

“No, I guessed. I figured you’d start with something pretty elmentry.”

Elementary: indeed he had. Still, Nepe did not strike him as even minimally retarded. She had made a swift and accurate connection, after correctly analyzing his strategy. She showed potential for master gamesmanship.  Now it was her turn. “The man rode on the horse, and yet he walked beside it,” she said.

Mach pondered that. Surely it was a trick statement, appearing impossible, just as his riddle of the egg was supposed to be. But what was the rationale that made it true? Either the man was on the horse, or he walked beside it. Unless there were two selves in the two frames, Phaze and Proton, with one self riding and the other walking. But that would require alternate selves of me horse, too, and mat made four creatures in all. The Game Computer was unlikely to allow so farfetched an interpretation; structured humor had to be narrowly defined.

One man, one horse: how could it be? Mach was somehow sure it could be, but his robotic logic did not fathom it.  “That’s a lie,” he said.

Nepe smiled, as he had known she would. “Yeti is the name of the dog,” she said. “That one’s as old as your egg.”

Mach groaned, seeing it. Not “yet he” but “Yeti,” sounding the same when spoken. An interpretation that was valid in humor, if not elsewhere. He had indeed blown it.

“So did I win, huh?” she inquired joyfully.

“You won,” he agreed.

“Gee—my first and last,” she said with a mixed smile. “Thank you. Uncle.”

Her last victory? He doubted it! He wished Flach had her ready wit.