Phaze Doubt

14 - Duet

The time passed seemingly swiftly, though this bore no relation to the ratio beyond the Pole. Lysander worked hard on the algorithm, using Mischief to make supplementary calculations. It was an irony, he thought, that he finally had complete access to this computer, as he had wanted at the outset, but wasn’t bothering with either games or machine consciousness. Instead he was working out a program that would defeat his purpose in being on this planet (shell). But what a glorious challenge it was!

He could not work all the time; even his Hectare brain could handle only so much at one sitting, and then he had to take time off. The community was eager to entertain him. There were indeed a number of human men and women, and to his eye there was a certain resemblance between some of the women and Tania, their long-gone ancestor. He dated them, and they were barely restrained in their eagerness to get him into a breeding mode, though he told them plainly that he was infertile. “Aye, but mayhap with magic...” one suggested as she seduced him.

He thought about that. Magic did phenomenal things, here. It was responsible for Flach/Nepe and Weva/Beman. (He had grown quite interested in Weva, until she teasingly showed him her other aspect: she too was a male/female composite. That turned him off, as perhaps she intended.) Surely it could make a full man of an android, if properly applied.

“Aye, ‘Sander, it could,” Nepe replied when he asked her. She had grown into a charming young woman, her charms no accident, because of course her amoebic flesh could be shaped to any form she chose. She showed a certain physical interest in him, but he thought of Flach, present as her alternate self, and did not reciprocate. It was obvious that however much those two composites played around, it was each other they were destined for. Whether it would be Flach-Weva or Beman-Nepe wasn’t certain; so far both male versions seemed more interested in relating to the eager young females of the colony than to their opposite numbers, while the females were more reserved. It was an interesting situation.

“If Phaze survives?” he asked.

She smiled teasingly. “Aye.”

And of course there would be little point, if it did not, for he could sire no offspring, fertile or not. This made him think about his position, as perhaps Nepe had intended. The choices were simple. Either he held to his mission, and torpedoed the plan by refusing to release the computed figures, and the worlds of Proton and Phaze perished, along with the Hectare who were here. It was already too late to warn them; in less than a day they would not be able to evacuate. So they were doomed. Or he could cooperate with the enemy, and save the frames, and render the Hectare into subservient status. He would incidentally save himself, too.

But his mission was clear. It was not his place to judge its merit. It was his place to fulfill it without question. His judgment was confined to questions of compromise necessary in order to facilitate his mission, as when he helped Nepe fetch the Hectare seed. That had indeed enabled him to discover the Adepts’ plan, so carefully implemented here by Clef and Tania and Mischief and the elves. Now he had simply to act to complete his mission—and he could do that by inaction.

So he set the matter aside and sought his date for the evening. She was as eagerly obliging as always. But the truth was, with the number of eligibles limited to about six, the matter was becoming a bit dull. He was also tired of walking in the subterranean park, where stalagmites formed a forest of trunks in many colors, and in watching re-reruns of the community’s store of video shows. Life was healthy here, as all things physically necessary to survival were provided, but emotionally stultifying. Many of the natives spent a great deal of time sleeping or gaming, but sleep was not for him, beyond the minimum required for survival, and gaming was now his vocation instead of his avocation.

It was no better for the elves, who on the surface had mined iridium and fashioned it into assorted artifacts. Deprived of their natural way of existence, they reacted in much the fashion of the human beings, sleeping, gaming, socializing, and fighting. Chief Oresmite was at times hard put to it to keep the peace.

There were some human-elf liaisons, not because of any natural affinity, but because of sheer boredom with the limits of their own populations. Lysander had not understood this well at first, but in time the relative unfamiliarity of the elf maidens became appealing, and he found himself dating them too. Such liaisons were officially discouraged, but privately tolerated; they were better than violence.

The whole community existed to support Mischief and the effort to save Phaze. But most of its work had been done before the four newcomers had arrived. Only if there was a cave-in in a tunnel or some other emergency was there actual need for human or elfin action. It was apparent that those who had settled here had made a considerable sacrifice. All longed for the time when they would be freed to live again on the surface—or die.

“The truth be,” an elf lass confided to him once, as she showed him what elves knew about fundamental interaction that human beings did not, “that I care not o’ermuch which it be, just so long as the dullness be done.” That seemed to be a general sentiment. They knew his position, but were not pushing him to save Phaze.

He avoided Echo, and she avoided him. But after a year desperation brought them together. “I told you I wasn’t interested in sex without obligation,” she said. “I have changed my mind.”

“It was better when we were in love,” he said. “If there were another potion, I would take it with you.”

“So would I. But there isn’t. Such potions work only once for a given couple. We would have to do it the hard way.”

“The hard way?”

“By falling in love naturally.”

“You mean that’s possible? I thought—“

“So did I. But others say that though it is harder, after a potion and nulling, it can be accomplished. It has to be worked at. I know you wouldn’t be interested in that.”

“I thought you wouldn’t be interested!” he said.

She gazed at him. “I wasn’t interested in being your mistress. Then. Now it doesn’t matter. Anything’s better than this bore dom.”

“Are the two incompatible?”

“Love and sex? They weren’t before.”

“Let’s consider it a challenge.”

“A challenge,” she agreed.

It turned out to be worth it. They could handle the sex readily enough, for they had had a lot of practice in their original month in love, but the love was slower. After a month there was only a flicker of emotion. After six there was some. After two years; it was significant. After three it was assuming the aspect of a shadow of their former feeling.

“I think we are right for each other after all,” he said. “I” have not been bored since we undertook this challenge.”

“Nor I,” she agreed. “Now I am glad we lost the unnatural love, because we are proving what is real.”

They kissed, quite satisfied. It seemed that love was most valuable when it was a struggle to achieve.

Four years after his arrival, Lysander was able to announce that the algorithmic computations were complete. “The figures, if invoked, will do the job,” he said.

Oresmite’s delight was restrained. “Then we must deal.”

“My position is unchanged.”

“But thou hast had opportunity to consider. Be it a victory for the Hectare an all be destroyed?”

“They would not consider it so.”

“But it be a victory for us, an it be saved.”

“Agreed.”

“So one side can win, and the other can only lose.”

“Yes. But this is logic. My mission is not subject to that.”

“Suppose it were possible at least to save most Hectare and some natives, by warning them now?”

“It isn’t. It would take several days to organize for a disciplined withdrawal, and only one day remained when I came here. Had I known the nature of the ploy sooner, I would have warned the Hectare.”

“Aye. We told thee little, until thou wast here. Yet there be a way.”

“Something you didn’t tell me?”

“Aye. I be thine enemy, remember.”

Lysander laughed. “I had almost forgotten! What is this secret?”

“We can, by special magic, transport some o’ the acceleration to the surface o’ the shell. It would deplete the effect at the Poles, but provide perhaps a week at the cities.”

“They could get away!” Lysander exclaimed.

“Aye.”

“But there’s a catch.”

“Perceptive o’ thee to fathom that.”

“You won’t let it happen.”

“Aye. Why facilitate the benefit o’ mine enemy?”

“And I, lacking your expertise in magic, can not do it without your cooperation.”

“Aye, no more than I can gain thy figures from Mischief.”

“Then what is the point? It changes nothing. I will not save your frames, and you will not save the BEMs. Our positions are consistent.”

“The point be that we have chips to bargain. An the Hectare had a choice, would they not choose to exit Proton?”

“Yes, of course! But you aren’t going to give them that choice.”

“Here be my challenge: play me a game. An thou dost win, I will provide magic to save the Hectare and those they choose to take with them, and thou and Echo. That be a half victory, but better than naught. An I win, thou dost release those figures.”

“But the stakes aren’t even!” Lysander protested, guiltily intrigued. “You aren’t offering victory against victory, but half against whole.”

“True. But our victory be not complete loss for the Hectare or thee. We will treat them fairly, and put thee in charge o’ integrating them into the society. We can use their skills. And we will make a spell to make thou fertile—“

“I’m with Echo. She can’t conceive.”

“An we do the magic, she can. Remember Nepe; she be child o’ machine.”

Lysander considered. It was true: the full victory for the natives would be only half a loss for the Hectare, while the full loss of the natives would be half a Hectare win. The stakes were fair. But did he have the authority to make such a deal?

“Be the Hectare not gamesmen?” Oresmite inquired. “Would they not let the game decide, an the stakes be even?”

“Yes, they would. But I can’t—“

“An the leader be incapacitated, who has authority?”

“The next in command. But—“

“An the leader be away or distracted, and the next in command learns aught that must needs be decided instantly, what then?”

“The next in command must act.”

“Does the authority for this matter then not devolve on thee, the only Hectare to know its nature in time to act?”

“Well, there is Weva—“

“Wouldst have her make the decision?”

“No! She’s on your side!”

“Then methinks it must be thee, unless my logic be in error.”

Lysander realized that the cunning old elf had him. He had been maneuvered into a position where the authority was his; a Hectare court would agree. He might lack the authority simply to decide the fate of the frames, but as a player in a game of decision—a case could be made.

“Agreed. But it must be a fair game.”

“Aye. We shall decide together. Or wouldst prefer to have Mischief decide?”

“No!” Then Lysander had to laugh. “No, we shall come to our own agreement. Only when both are satisfied will it be set.”

“Aye.” Oresmite smiled. “We have time.”

There followed several days of negotiations. Oresmite, being old and small, would not commit to any brute physical contests. Lysander, wary of the elf’s lifetime experience, rejected those that were culturally oriented. Intellectual games like chess or go were tempting, but Lysander wasn’t sure how much the elf might have played these to wile away the time, and Oresmite was nervous about Lysander’s analytic Hectare brain.

“Methinks we require a new game, ne’er before played,” the Chief remarked at last.

“Yes. So that neither experience nor special aptitude is likely to count.”

They brought the others in on it. The challenge: create a new, fair, playable but unplayed game whose outcome could not be certain.

The boredom evaporated as elves and human beings got to work. Proposals were made, analyzed, and rejected.

The key, as it turned out, came from an elf child. He had been listening to the stories of the history of magic before Phaze, when it had existed back on Earth. “Why not Merlin and the Witch?” he asked.

This was an episode recorded by T. H. White in a book titled Sword in the Stone but later excluded from a larger compendium, perhaps because it revealed too much about magic. Merlin had fought the witch by form changing, each trying to assume the form of a creature that could demolish the other. Merlin, sorely pressed, had won by becoming a germ that infected and killed the witch’s monster.

“But I can’t change forms!” Lysander protested.

“Nor can I, neither any elf,” Oresmite replied. “But we can in illusion.”

The illusion chamber was normally used to generate lovely vistas similar to those of the outside world, so as to lessen the claustrophobic restrictions of the caves. But it could be turned to any fancy. A person had only to take his place at one of the focal points and imagine something, and it was animated in the chamber. There were regular puppet shows, the puppets illusory but realistic, because complete living detail wasn’t expected in such creatures. Few could imagine sufficient detail to make an image seem truly realistic.

But if animals could be represented crudely, puppet-fashion, as pieces in a game, then it might be feasible. He could imagine a tiger, chasing the elf’s antelope. Only the elf would then imagine a dragon, and turn on the tiger. Then—

“But we’d just both wind up with the biggest, most ferocious monsters, and it would be a stalemate,” Lysander said. “Or as germs, trying to infect the other. I don’t think it would work as well as it did centuries ago on Earth.”

“Aye,” the Chief agreed. “It were a nice notion, but impractical.”

“Not necessarily,” Beman said. “Appropriately restrictive rules could make a fair game of it.”

“Agreed,” Nepe said. “Scientific rules applied to the magic. To prevent stalemates.”

“Then work it out,” Lysander said, intrigued by the notion of being able to change forms, if only in imagination. It was as close to magic as he could get, on his own. “If we like it, we’ll play it.”

They retired with a committee of elves to work it out. Next day they returned with the proposal for “Animals.” Oresmite and Lysander reviewed it and liked it. They had their game.

The Chief took the key position at one end of the chamber, and Lysander the one at the other end. At the sides sat elves and human beings holding pictures of assorted animals ranging from ladybugs to fire-breathing dragons. The animals were paired, with one of each kind at each side of the chamber. One side represented Lysander’s animals, the other the Chief’s, and they were even.

Each player had an iridium coin. They flipped them together. Lysander’s bounced, flipped, and settled down with the picture of an equine tail showing. The Chief’s coin spun and rolled, finally falling with a donkey’s head in view. The two did not match, which meant the result was odd rather than even, and that meant by prior agreement that Oresmite chose the first animal.

The Chief glanced at his pictures. One glowed, and its figure jumped off the paper to take its place in the chamber beside the pictures. It was a donkey, appropriately.

Lysander looked at his pictures. He focused on the unicorn, and it left its paper and hit the chamber floor running. It charged the donkey, its horn lowering to point forward.

The onus was on him, as predator, to dispatch the prey within one minute, or forfeit the game.

The donkey took off, running fleetly. The illusion expanded to fill in the surrounding terrain: a grassy plain, bordered by mountain ranges to north and south. It was a miniature of the frame of Phaze, with the seas at east and west and the dread Lattice at the center: the network of deep crevices in which demons lived. The animals were bounded by these natural features, and could not go beyond them. But there was plenty of room to maneuver.

The unicorn was faster than the donkey, and its horn was capable of making a lethal thrust. In thirty seconds Lysander had almost closed the gap. The donkey dodged, but so did the unicorn; the imagination that made the creatures go was limited by their natural abilities. The Chief had to act.

He did. The donkey became a tiger, whose paws skidded as it turned to face the unicorn.

Lysander veered aside. The tiger was trouble. True, the unicorn could spear the feline with the horn—but the tiger knew how to avoid horns, and if the first thrust didn’t score, the tiger would pounce and bite. The prey had become the predator.

Now the tiger had one minute to bring down the unicorn, or forfeit. The onus had shifted.

Lysander elected to remain with the unicorn, because there was an advantage in avoiding change. An animal could be used only once; then its sign was taken down, and it was retired. If one side used up all its animals, and the other saved a number, that other side would have a significant advantage in the end game. That player would be able to use a fleet animal to catch the other, then shift to a killer animal for the finale.

The unicorn took off. The tiger leaped after, but already the unicorn was at speed. The tiger put forth its best effort, and gained, but it was evident that it would be unable to close the gap within a minute, if at all. Tigers were good for the short run, but not for the long, while unicorns could run all day if they had to. The Chief had to change forms again, or lose by default. That onus was a deadly thing!

The tiger became a flying dragon. The onus was still on the Chief, because it belonged to the last form change, but the minute started fresh from the moment of that change. Lysander had gained a long-range advantage, because he was on his first animal while the Chief was on his third, but that dragon could finish the game in the short range.

Indeed, in a moment the dragon was looming overhead and orienting its snoot for a fiery blast. He had to change!

He changed to a salamander, and stared up at the dragon. The dragon did a doubletake and popped into a blind eel. The eel fell to the ground and wriggled desperately away. The Chief had been caught by surprise and made an error; he should have continued his attack, because though a magic salamander was immune to fire, it wasn’t immune to teeth. The Chief had confused it with a basilisk, whose stare could kill; the Chief had taken the handiest way to stop the meeting of the eyes by adopting an eyeless form.

Lysander scrambled after the eel, who wasn’t well suited to motion on land. The eel heard the noise and hastily became a hawk, who flew away without looking back.

Lysander had definitely come out ahead in this encounter. The Chief had used two more forms to his one, and still had the onus. And—Lysander had done it on a bluff, for this was neither basilisk nor magic salamander, but an ordinary one, harmless to anything larger than a fly.

As the Chief was about to realize. The hawk was coming back, and it would make short work of the salamander. One snap of its beak—

Lysander burrowed down into the grass, trying to hide. If he could remain clear for another thirty seconds—

The hawk came to the ground, and changed. Lysander couldn’t see the change, but he knew it had occurred, because a bird on land did not make that slithering sound. That was either a lizard, or—

The head of a snake loomed over him. It struck down—as Lysander became a mongoose.

He spun about to face the snake. It was a simple black racer, not venomous to man but deadly enough to a salamander. But the mongoose was able to kill even the most deadly snakes. Lysander had the onus now. He dived in—

The snake became a wolf. The wolf’s jaws snapped at the mongoose—

Lysander became a giant serpent. The serpent’s jaws opened to take in the wolf.

The wolf became a bear. A bear was a lot tougher animal than many supposed; it could handle just about any other animal its size, and anything smaller. It swiped at the serpent’s head.

Lysander became a rhinoceros. He swung his nose-horn viciously at the bear—who became a monstrous roc, a bird capable of catching up a rhino in its talons and carrying it away. Indeed, those talons closed on the rhino’s body, and the great wings spread. In a moment he would be lifted up. He could be carried high and dropped; any fall over five or six feet might kill him.

But he didn’t change. He let the bird haul him into the air. The roc carried him over a nearby rocky region, and let him go.

But as he fell, he became a sparrow. Of course he had nothing to fear from being dropped! Not as long as he could change to another flying form. Now the Chief had used up his largest and second largest flying forms—the roc and the dragon—and would not be able to use them again. Lysander had both those forms in reserve. He was still gaining.

But it would be foolish to let any opportunity pass. He needed to try for the quick victory, lest the Chief catch him first. He remembered seeing chess games where one player had pieces all over the board, but the other had the victory because of the position. Pieces were only part of it.

The sparrow looped and flew in at the roc. The roc’s beak snapped down, but the sparrow was swifter at close quarters, and got by. It came up against the roc’s fur-feathered leg—and became a cobra. By the definition of the game, a poisonous bite affected any other creature, even another of its kind, if it scored well. Lysander opened his mouth and struck at the flesh of the leg.

The roc became a gnat and zipped away; the cobra’s jaws snapped on nothing. And now he was in trouble, for he was in the air and falling.

He became a hawk. The Chief’s hawk had been used before, and it could not return, and there were few other birds that could catch a hawk. But the onus was on Lysander; he had to do the catching, and this was no form for gnat-hunting!

He pondered. The Chief would surely outwait him if he didn’t find a quick way to catch that gnat. A toad could do it—but the gnat would be flying high up, out of reach of a landbound creature. This was a problem!

Then he had it. He became not a dragon, but a dragonfly. Dragonflies hunted smaller insects on the wing, and were strong flyers and efficient predators. He looped around and spied the gnat, who hadn’t gone far. Indeed, a gnat couldn’t get far in a few seconds, compared to a dragonfly.

He revved up his four wings and zoomed in for the kill. But the gnat became a toad in midair, its mouth opening. Lysander realized that though the toad would fall to the ground, it would get the dragonfly first, and win; the fall didn’t matter.

Caught by surprise, he found his mind blank. The toad’s sticky tongue came out, rooted at the front, catapulting toward him. He would be caught before he—

In desperation he became another toad; he couldn’t think of anything else.

The two loads collided in the air, and fell together.

Lysander still had the onus. He had only seconds: should he assume a form to crunch the other toad, or wait for the Chief to change, so the Chief would be committed, and Lysander could immediately counter the form? The latter seemed better.

But the Chief seemed to have the same idea. They continued to fall. What would happen if they both splatted into the ground? They were playing a game of chicken!

Probably if they both persisted, it would be declared a draw, and they would have to play another game. Lysander was ahead in this game; he didn’t want to start another.

That decided him. So what if he went splat immediately after; he should grasp the victory first.

He became a weasel, which was more than enough to dispose of even the illest-tasting toad. He twisted around in the air and snapped at—

The Chief became a hippopotamous—and he was just above the weasel! He would land and squash the weasel flat! He would die himself—but after the weasel. This was the strategy of suicide.

Lysander became a horsefly and zoomed away. Such a change would not have been safe while the toad remained, but no hippo could nab a fly in the air.

And the Chief became a dragonfly, borrowing from Lysander’s prior strategy, and winged swiftly after him. The onus was on the Chief, but he was playing with greater savvy now. Lysander was on the run—or in flight, in this case.

He didn’t want to waste a good predatory form that would be immediately countered; he wanted to force the Chief to use up more of his forms, until he was starved for variety at the end and subject to a power play. He saw water below, and had a notion. He plunged toward it, the dragonfly gaining but not yet in range.

He plunged in, becoming a fish.

The Chief plunged after, becoming a pelican.

Trouble! Lysander became an alligator just as the pelican’s beak closed on the fish. The beak closed instead on the hide of the alligator.

Lysander whipped his toothy snout around to snap up the bird, and the bird became a giant sea serpent whose much larger toothy snout whipped around to snap up the alligator. Lysander was having trouble matching change for change, and couldn’t think of a good rejoinder on the spot, so became an elephant.

The sea serpent stared. An elephant?

But the water was not deep, and the elephant was only halfway submerged. It wrapped its trunk around the head of the serpent, tying its jaws closed, and pushed the head under the water. Drowning was as good as being bitten to death. Lysander had found a good predator form after all.

The serpent became a fish and slid away. Lysander waited, knowing that no fish could hurt him here; the water was too shallow for any really big one. Nothing much could hurt an elephant. But the Chief had the onus, and would have to try.

Then he spied something sliding through the water. It wasn’t a fish, but more like an eel.

Oops—an electric eel! Again by definition, the shock would stun any other creature. Lysander became a frog and leaped out of the water.

So it went, change and counterchange, and the assortment of animals was depleted on both sides. But Lysander’s strategy of forcing the Chief to change more often was pacing off, and it came to the point where Lysander had several top predators left and the Chief was reduced to his next to last form: a sheep. Lysander became a roc and pounced on the sheep, forcing the Chief to take his last form: a mouse.

Lysander became a dragon, and inhaled. He would send a blast of fire that burned out the entire region, the mouse with it.

But the mouse, astonishingly, did not flee. Instead it jumped onto the dragon’s nose and clung there.

Lysander shook his head, trying either to toss the mouse into his mouth, or fling it to the ground where it could be scorched before it fled. Another creature it could hide from, but the fire of the dragon would seek it out regardless. But the mouse refused to be dislodged; it dug its tiny claws into the snout and hung on.

This was a problem Lysander had never anticipated. His forelegs were too short to reach his snout. He tried to whip his tail about to wipe the mouse off, but it only stung his nostrils sharply. He tried to roll and squish the mouse against the ground, but it was in the declivity between eyes and nostrils. He could not dislodge that mouse!

He blew out fire. But his snout was insulated so that its own flesh would not be destroyed by the heat, and that protected the mouse too.

If he changed form again, the mouse would get away; he had no specific mouse-catching forms left, having labored to save the largest predators instead. If he hadn’t used up his weasel—

Maybe he could bounce fire back on his nose. It would hurt his own flesh, but it would fry the mouse, and that was what counted.

He put his nostrils against a rock and blew out fire. It bounced, but to the side. He tried again, and missed again. He needed a rock with a hollow, that would cup and reflect the fire-Suddenly a gong sounded. The minute was up, and he had not destroyed the mouse. Since the onus was his, he lost by default.

The game was over, and Chief Oresmite had won. Lysander had tried his hardest to win, and thought he had the win assured, until that last astonishing ploy. He had been fairly beaten, and now was obliged to give the figures to the enemy. Yet, somehow, he was relieved.

Only later did it occur to him that he had blundered crucially. He had been a roc when the Chief was a sheep; the Chief had become a mouse. Lysander’s blunder had been in changing to the dragon. All he had had to do was maintain roc form and fly away, and the Chief, stuck with the onus, would have lost in one minute.

Flach and Weva stood before Mischief, and lifted their flutes. They played, and Lysander remembered the magic, figurative and literal, of Clef’s music. Flach was good, because of his unicorn heritage, but Weva was better, because of her Hectare heritage. That, of course, was why she had been brought into existence. Only a Hectare mind, trained also in magic, could handle the figures Lysander’s algorithm had produced.

The magic came, much stronger than before, almost tangible. The two set aside their flutes, but the music continued, generated by their minds.

Mischief began to run the figures on a screen. It was a massive array: thousands of numbers jammed together. But Weva’s eyes were on them, and they were being fed through to her mind, and changing the music. No human mind could have done it, but hers could, with the support of her companion.

The world began to change, as the paths for each atom of matter were defined, and the push from the Magic Bomb began. The merged frames would slide around the black hole, nothing changing within them, but everything changing beyond them. Like a cover on a piece of equipment, turning without altering its shape or nature; it was the nature of the universe that was changing instead.

There was a shudder. Dust sifted down. Elves and human beings glanced around alike in alarm. This had the feel of an incipient earthquake, and they were underground.

The shuddering intensified. Cracks appeared in the stone.

“It’s going wrong!” someone cried.

The computer screen went blank. Then the single word ERROR flashed, blinking.

“We kept faith with thee!” an elf cried at Lysander. “Thou didst promise true figures!”

“My figures are true!” Lysander replied. “The error must be somewhere else!”

“Cease playing!” Oresmite rapped, and the music halted. “There be error somewhere, but Lysander has honor; he would not cheat on this.”

“Then he made a mistake!” Flach said.

“I made no mistake,” Lysander said. “Every figure checked. It must be in the translation.”

“Nay, none there,” Weva said. “We play true!”

“If we resume not soon, the detonation of the Magic Bomb will destroy us regardless,” Flach pointed out. “Now be the time; the paths must be set.”

“The time factor!” Echo said. “We’re accelerated, but how does it relate to the rest of the frames?”

“We allow for that,” Weva said. “Our music relates.”

“The Poles!” Lysander said. “Their times are different. Do you allow for that?”

“Yes, o’ course,” she said. “Twelvefold for the East Pole, a hundred and forty-four for the West Pole. I were made there; I would forget my home region not.”

“And the North Pole? The one that’s slower than normal time?”

Weva looked stricken. “Slower! I adjusted for faster!”

“Can you correct for that?”

“Aye. Now.” She lifted her flute again, and Flach quickly joined her.

“Rerun the figures, Mischief!” Lysander said. “The error is being corrected.”

The figures reappeared on the screen.

They resumed playing, and in a moment set aside the flutes and continued. This time there was no shuddering; the magic intensified, and there was a feeling of something colossal shifting, but it was smooth. It was working.

Yet there was in the background an almost imperceptible disharmony, a keening as of something not quite right. The error had caused them to start over, slightly delayed; did that make a difference? If so, it could be cumulative, and...

Lysander did not care to finish that thought. He had been an agent for the other side, but he had made a deal, and now was bound to see it through. He would not care for the irony of having his original side win through default. Not after he had resigned himself to the prospect of living, and of love with Echo.

The eerie trace of wrongness did not fade; it got worse. Lysander knew what was happening: the delay occasioned by the failure to zero in the North Pole correctly had thrown the timing off slightly, and that imbalance was recycling and building. If it expanded logarithmically, as such things could, they could still get dumped, and all would have been for nothing.

Echo was near him. He caught her hand and squeezed it to let her know that whatever happened, he was glad for their association. Then an elf girl caught his free hand, and someone else caught Echo’s free hand. The impulse spread, and soon everyone in the chamber was linked, including Flach and Weva and Chief Oresmite. The music went on, through all their heads and all the frames, translating the figures to reality, carrying them all on the wave of force that was the detonation of the Magic Bomb.

That Bomb had been confined by the slowed time at the North Pole. That had been a bad Pole on which to err!

The linked hands provided comfort, but the wrongness worsened. Lysander felt as if his guts were being removed and convoluted topologically and strung through the electrical conduits of his brain. He didn’t dare vomit, because he didn’t want the contents of his stomach suffusing his brain. He suspected that the others were experiencing similar distortions. If the frames didn’t complete their journey soon—

The music stopped. They were there!

There was a silence. Then the Chief looked around. “We remain alive,” he said. “That means it is successful. But per haps not entirely. We must proceed cautiously.”

“The timing,” Weva said. “I couldn’t quite compensate. I think things are all right, but some detail may have changed.”

The group let go of hands. Lysander brought Echo into him. “Just so long as you are not changed!” he said.

Her eyes were round. “I fear I be. I—“

“Check your body,” he suggested. All around them others were similarly concerned. No one seemed quite certain what had happened, but knew that something fundamental was not the same.

“Well, it be metal and plastic, o’ course, as always. I’ll show thee.” She opened her robe and touched the place where her left breast was latched. “Uh-oh.”

“You look fine!” he said. “I don’t care if your latch is broken.”

“There be no latch.”

“Well, whatever. I have accepted the local way, and you are part of it.”

She closed her robe. “E’en an I be not exactly the creature thou hast known?”

He experienced an unpleasant chill. “Are you trying to say that your emotion has changed? That now the crisis is past, you don’t—“

She put her finger across his lips. “Nay, Lysan! I love thee yet! I would spend my life with thee! But an I be other—“

He swept her in and kissed her. “My emotion didn’t change either. I love you too, and no potion is responsible. But I think we have work to do outside.”

“Aye,” she breathed, seeming relieved.

The others had come to a similar conclusion. They were forging toward an exit.

But when the hatch was opened, a stormy swirl of air rushed in, blowing back the elves.

“Must be a dust storm,” Lysander said.

“But it’s wet!” an elf protested.

So it was. “Then it’s safe to go out there,” Lysander said. “I’ll do it.”

The elves gave way for him, and he scrambled through the tunnel and thrust his body up through a hole. There was a storm raging- all right; warm rain plastered his robe to his body in a moment.

Echo emerged after him. “This be not the heat o’ the South Pole!” she said.

“But it’s warm enough. Drop your robe and come on; we can handle this.”

She did. He took her hand, and forged on, trying to gain a point of perspective.

Then a rift opened in the clouds. The sun shone down, directly south of the Pole.

Lysander froze. South?

Beside him, Echo was similarly amazed. “Be the magic gone?” she asked. “The sunlight bends not?”

Flach and Weva came up behind them. “Now I see what happened,” Weva said. “That imbalance—the shell got twisted! The South Pole is now the West Pole!”

“That’s why the storm,” Flach agreed. “The temperature patterns changed; it has to get resettled.”

“A quarter turn!” Lysander said. “We’re lucky it wasn’t worse.”

“It was worse,” Weva said. “We have changed similarly.”

Lysander looked at her. “No you haven’t.”

She smiled. “You are an idiot, ‘Sander.”

“Is there something I’ve overlooked?”

Echo touched his shoulder. “Aye, because thou be not affected, mayhap, having an alternate self not. Watch me change forms.”

Then she assumed her Phaze-harpy form, and flew a short distance into the air.

Her body was shining metal, and her feathers plastic. “Now do you understand?” she called.

“You’re a robot harpy—a cyborg!” he exclaimed.

“I am Echo.” She descended to the ground, and resumed to human form. “And I be Oche. Now dost recant thy pledge to love me?”

Suddenly the change in language penetrated. Echo had been talking in the Phaze dialect! The cyborg harpy talked in Proton dialect. They had changed!

“But you said you still loved me!” he said, stunned.

“Aye, Lysan. I be Echo’s living aspect, and I love thee as she does. It were always I who loved thee, but I said naught, lest revolt thee. Now I would be with thee, but I will leave thee an thou ask.”

“But if the harpy body is now inanimate—“

“This human form be alive,” she said. “I offer it thee, with my love, an thou desire either.”

Nepe appeared. “Methinks thou be wisest to accept, Lysan,” she said.

He turned his head to look at her. “You are Flach,” he said.

“Aye. But I were always both, as be Weva and Beman. It b( a big adjustment, but we shall do it, as we did mergence be fore.” She—he—smiled impishly. “Methinks those in the cities have big adjustments to make too!”

Weva became Beman. “Yes, I be Weva,” he—she—said “Needs must we all adjust. But it be especially important for thee, Lysan, because thou wills! have to coordinate the integration o’ the Hectare into the new order. The faster we can al come to terms with ourselves, the better off we shall be.”

Lysander turned to Oche. “I always knew you were both,” he said. “I knew the harpy watched everything. I knew she way the brain in your machine, just as you knew a living Hectare was the brain in my laboratory-generated body. What ha? changed is only a detail. I love the whole of you. If you love me—“

“Aye,” she said. Then she stepped into him, and they embraced. “But I think thy body be human now too, Lysan.”

“All the way human? But that would mean—“

“That we can have a family,” she finished.

He realized that his future was likely to be even more busy than his past. But there was no time now to ponder the implications; they had to organize for the reorganization of the frames.

Epilog

They gathered beside the wooden castle of the Brown Demesnes. Tsetse looked out a window and spied them. “Brown—there’s an army outside! But a moment ago it was just open fields!”

“Mayhap it be Franken returning,” Brown said. “His step can shake the ground. He were on errand, returning the Book o’ Magic to the Red Adept.”

“No, I mean there really are people out there,” Tsetse insisted. “And animals, and everything.”

“Methought I felt a conjuration,” Brown said. Because her selves were the same, and Tsetse had only one self, the two of them had not been affected by the exchange of identities. It had taken a while to get used to the quarter turn the compass had taken, making the sun now rise and set at the North and South Poles instead of the East and West ones, but the climate of her region had changed only slightly. She considered herself well off in most respects, now that the alien conquest had been reversed.

But whatever could have caused this sudden gathering? She gazed out, and spied wolves, unicorns, elves, demons, animal heads, BEMs, and of course human folk. It seemed to be some kind of celebration, for the folk were brightly garbed and there appeared to be picnic sheets spread out.

“Needs must we go out and see,” Brown decided, speaking positively though she was perplexed and a bit nervous.

“Maybe I should stay in,” Tsetse said.

Brown came to a decision. “Nay, friend. I love thee and will deny thee not. An thou lovest me, come face the world with me.”

“If you’re sure—“

“I know only that I will live a lie no longer, come what may.” She took the woman by the hand, kissed her, and led her to the front portal.

Outside, the gathering was organized almost like an army, with contingents spread in a large semicircle, and a small group centered, facing the castle entrance. As Brown walked out, the visitors came to attention, silently.

At the head of the assembly was Purple, whether Citizen or Adept she would not know until he spoke—and then she would remain in doubt, because of the reversals. This was another surprise; she had thought him imprisoned again. Just behind him stood the woman Alyc, the one who had dated Lysander but then worked for the enemy. Evidently she had found another companion. Brown stopped before Purple, Tsetse beside her.

Purple spoke. “Thou knowest my life be forfeit, for that I twice betrayed my culture. Thou must believe I bespeak thee truth now. I yield naught to none, except to thee, for that thou didst treat me kindly. Know, Adept, that the specter I held o’er thee were but a phantom; others differ but judge thee not for it, as thou dost not judge them. An thou accept it not from thy friends, accept it from thine enemy: it be no barrier for thee.”

She stared at him. There was only one subject he could be addressing. Had he come to shame her openly, before them all?

Purple stepped forward. He caught Tsetse’s timid hand. “My purpose in sending thee to the Brown Demesnes were malevolent,” he told her. “I sought to blackmail her, that she would serve the Hectare. But it were a lie. None begrudge Brown her way or thee thine. I now renounce any power I had o’er thee, Tsetse, and wish thee well.” He turned to Brown. “Deep do I regret repaying thy kindness with malice, and using a lie to savage thee. Thou didst deserve it not.”

He turned in place and walked away. Alyc followed.

“Wait!” Brown cried. “What did they promise thee, to make thee speak so?”

He paused. “That need concern thee not. Be assured I bespoke thee the truth.”

“It does concern me!” she insisted. “I know thou dost do naught for naught. What—?”

“A clean and painless death,” he said, and resumed his walk-

“Nay!” she cried, hurrying after him. “I wished this not on thee! We made a deal, and I agreed nor to seek harm to thee neither to be silent an I learned o’ harm coming.”

“This be not o’ thy making,” he said gruffly, still walking. “In any event, the deal be off; it were in power only while the Hectare governed. Concern thyself not farther on this matter.”

But she could not let it go. “An they brought thee here for a public execution, I tolerate it not! I forgive thee aught thou intended, and thank thee for bringing me a companion. Thou must not die!”

“I ask this not o’ thee,” Purple said, pausing again. “I came only to spare myself a life confined, under geis. An the truth purchase me that, I be satisfied.”

Brown looked to the side. There was the Blue Adept and the Lady Blue. “Stile! I beg thee, an our friendship mean aught, let not this horror be!”

Stile lifted his hands. “Thou be pardoned, Purple, at Brown’s behest. An thou do no further evil, we spare thee death and confinement, and thy paramour too. Get thee gone from our sight.” He was evidently somewhat disgusted—but only somewhat. He had never been a vengeful man, when there were reasonable alternatives. He turned to the Hectare standing behind him. “Do thou input it to thy net: he to be watched but not molested.”

The BEM extended one small tentacle, its tip tilted up.

Slowly Purple turned. “Lady, thou be more generous to me than I were to thee. I thank thee for what I expected not.” Then he turned again and walked away, and no one challenged him.

No one except Alyc, who tackled him and embraced him. He put an arm around her. He had always had an eye for young women, and she was reputed lo be a most passionate one.

Now Brown saw the Tan Adept, with the vampire Jod’e beside him. Tan had used his power to fascinate the lovely bat woman, who was blameless. Brown opened her mouth.

“And Tan, pardoned,” Blue said before Brown could speak.

The BEM made another note.

“I thank thee, O my lady!” Jod’e exclaimed.

Tan walked away, with Jod’e. Brown had to admit that they did make a decent couple. With a bat wife, Tan would not again betray the interests of Phaze.

Another couple came forward. It was Lysander, who had turned out to be another enemy spy, but who had in the end chosen to help save Phaze, and his companion Echo or Oche. “When you took Tsetse to Hardom to help Purple play his game with the Hectare, I was the one you took, in the guise of Tsetse. I apologize for deceiving you in this manner.”

Brown was amazed. “Thou? A man?” But she realized that it was possible. She had known that the person was larger than Tsetse, and of course she hadn’t verified for gender.

“Yes. The prophecy indicated that my cooperation was required if the planet shell was to be saved. Thus I was integral to Phaze Doubt, and Nepe brought me to help her fetch the key element of the counterploy.”

Phaze Doubt. She realized that that would have been their name for the project to save Phaze. “The key element?”

An attractive young woman of about seventeen stepped up. “I was the one he fetched, in the form of a BEM seed,” she said. “I am known currently as Weva, though with the reversal this is approximate. I want to thank you, Adept, for enabling me to come into existence, and to help save Phaze.”

So this was the new BEM Adept, whose music had indeed saved Phaze! Without her, all would have been lost. “I be glad, now, it happened,” Brown said.

“My companion Flach sends his regrets, and those of the Robot Adept; they are occupied at the moment in conjuring the last snow demons to the western reaches, where it is now suitably cold. I offered to help, but Flach preferred to handle it himself.”

Brown looked at her. “Thou dost disagree?”

Weva smiled wryly. “Not really. I think he has to bid farewell to a certain snow demoness before he can get serious about me.”

Brown laughed. “Methinks I heard about Icy! Believe me, he had his future not with her!”

“True. But I think I will remind him of it several times before I let him settle down to his future with me. Meanwhile, I am glad to meet you, who were instrumental in my genesis. I had no parents, really, but I always thought that someone like you—“ She shrugged. “A foolish notion, of course.”

“A mother figure?” Brown asked, amazed.

“I should not have mentioned it,” Weva said quickly, flushing. “Now I realize that I had no right to cast you as—“

“Nay, girl, I be not affronted!” Brown exclaimed. “Gladly would I have had a child like thee, an it been possible without—“

A tear showed at the girl’s eye. “Then—?”

“May I hug thee, Weva?”

“Oh, yes!” Weva opened her arms and embraced her.

“Thou must visit me,” Brown said. “Thou and thy young—“ She hesitated. “Flach and Nepe be similarly reversed?”

“Yes. We are working it out. For now, we agree that he is male and I female. In time I’m sure the ambiguity will be resolved.”

“Surely it will,” Brown agreed. It occurred to her that there could be another reason that Weva chose to identify with her, Brown. That sexual ambiguity...

Now a unicorn stepped forward. It was Neysa. She assumed ‘her woman form, actually that of Nessie the Moebite emulating hers. “I be last,” she said, “ ‘cause my burden be most onerous.”

“Thou?” Brown asked, astonished. “Thou hast been always my best friend, Neysa!”

“Aye. That be why my pain be most, that I betrayed thee in thine hour o’ need.”

“What? Thou didst ne’er—“

“Nay, I did! When thou didst tell me what I somehow hall ne’er fathomed before, and sought my support.”

“Thou gavest it, Neysa. Thou didst—“

“I said thy shame would not be known. I, who loved outside my species, and had not the courage to confess it, and who condemned my filly when she did have the courage—how could’ I have condemned thee for loving in other manner! I were hypocrite when I hurt thee, Brown, and deep be my thereof.” There had been one tear at Weva’s eye; there was t stream at Neysa’s eyes. “It were not thy shame, O truest friend it were mine.”

Brown opened her mouth to protest, but was frozen. For from the mare radiated the splash of truth. It caused the air to shimmer, and the ground to ripple, and the sky to shift color. crossed the assembled folk, and from them radiated echoing splashes, their ripples crisscrossing. That backwash intersected the spot where Brown and Tsetse stood, and suddenly Brown felt the great current of support from all the gathering. The knew—and they accepted her way, as she accepted theirs.

Brown embraced Neysa. “There be no shame,” she said. Now it was true. The last doubt of Phaze had been resolved.