Unicorn Point

Agape nodded, yielding without liking it. It was hard to see her as an alien creature at a time like this; her reactions were completely human, as were those of her daughter.  Nepe took his hand, and they stepped out of the chamber.  The panel closed behind them.

“Why did you make that scene?” Mach inquired as they walked down the hall.

“I heard something,” the child confided. “Something fun, maybe.”

“The Citizen Tan doesn’t serve ice cream,” he cautioned her.

“Bettem that! But it’s a secret!”

“Oh.” He knew better than to question her further. He might learn the secret, but it would spoil her fun.  He checked his watch. He was early for his appointment with the Adept, by about an hour. Normally he would have retreated to his own suite and used the time to check for accumulated messages, as well as verifying the operation of his body. Bane tried to take care of it, but Bane had been brought up as a living creature, and still tended to assume that minor scratches would heal on their own. Also, Bane spent a lot of time with Agape, and that would be wearing on certain circuits. It was generally best to check those circuits, not with any intent to snoop on his other self, but to ensure that they remained fully operative.  But this time Nepe was with him. The child would not be very patient about an hour of stasis on his part. As a living creature she could not turn off or internalize the same way.  Her closest equivalent was sleeping, and like most children, she would rather die than sleep during daylight hours. Very well; his systems check could wait; certainly it wasn’t urgent.

“It will be a while before I meet with Tan,” he said. “If you would like something to eat first—”

“I want to play a game with you. Uncle,” she said.

“Such as piggy-back riding?”

“No piggy-bank riding! A real game!”

“Oh, you mean a Game!” he said, understanding.

“A Game,” she agreed.

“Some of those games are unsuitable for a person your age.”

“Yes,” she said zestfully.

“But your mother would smite me if I played one of those with you.”

Nepe frowned, acknowledging the truth of this concern.

“But I know the difrence. We’ll play a suitble game.”

“Very well.” He guided her to the Game Annex.  They came to a Game Console. This was set up with screens on either side, for the two players. He fetched a bench for Nepe to stand on, and lifted her up so that she could supervise her screen. “Do you know how to do this?” he asked.

“Natchly,” she said. “Get to your side.” Mach went to his side. He knew that Bane and Agape had increasing concern about the child, who seemed to be a slow learner. She did not seem slow to him, but he realized that he had little proper basis for comparison. She seemed to be fully as alert as and somewhat more expressive than his son Flach.

But that of course was the problem. Flach was not keeping pace with either fully human or unicorn children his age. He spoke more slowly, and lacked interest in academic pursuits, and had mastered only two of the three forms expected of a unicorn. They had hoped he would go beyond the ordinary in both the human and unicorn respects, and for a time it had seemed that he would, but then progress had slowed. That was why Mach had intercepted Stile in Phaze—to no avail, as it turned out, because Stile had refused to acknowledge that the problem existed. Stile liked his grandson, without doubt, and that went far toward mitigating his early objection to the unusual marriages of Mach and Bane, but Mach had not expected that to distort his judgment about the boy’s progress.

Could it be overcompensation on Stile’s part, or advancing age? Technically Flach was the child of Bane, because Bane’s body had generated him; genetics took little note of which mind occupied the body at the time. Thus Mach’s son was Stile’s grandson, and no one debated this, but the question always lingered in the background: was this entirely legitimate? Stile might compensate for that doubt by seeing no evil in the boy. But Mach had too high a regard for the ability and character of the man to be satisfied with this explanation.  Stile was on the other side, and he was clever; his optimism about the boy might be a mere mask, preventing acknowledgment of a developing liability in the assets of his enemy.  But how could Stile profit by such a pose? Mach had become the leading Adept of Phaze, thanks to the input of the Book of Magic, but he never deceived himself that he was the smartest person. He suspected that Stile was playing a game whose nature he hardly understood.