He felt the tingle as he passed through. He was in the hall, naked, alone. He turned around and faced Neysa, who was faintly visible beyond the curtain. She had shifted back to her natural form. “Bye, friend,” he called, and waved to her.
Then he went resolutely back and walked rapidly down the hall. It was strange being bare again, after getting accustomed to the mores of the other frame.
Soon the hall intersected a main travel route, where many naked serfs walked swiftly toward their places of employment. He merged with them, becoming largely anonymous. He was smaller than all the men and most of the women and some of the children, but he was used to this. He still resented the disparaging glances some serfs cast at him, but reminded himself that a person who made a value judgment of another person solely in consideration of size was in fact advertising his own incompetence to judge. Still, Stile was glad to get out of the public hall and into his private apartment.
His handprint keyed open the door. Stile stepped inside.
A naked man looked up, frowning. For a moment they stared at each other. Then the other stood. “Sheen did not tell me you would return this hour. I shall retire.”
“One moment,” Stile said. He recognized the man as his double: the robot who filled in for him while he was in the magic frame of Phaze. Without this machine, Stile’s absences would become too obvious, and that could make mischief. “I have not encountered you before. Does Sheen treat you well?”
“Sheen ignores me,” the robot said. “Except when others are present. This is proper in the circumstance.”
“Yet you are programmed to resemble me in all things. Don’t you get bored?”
“A machine of my type does not get bored unless so directed.”
“Not even when you are put away in the closet?”
“I am deactivated at such times.”
This bothered Stile, who felt sympathy for all oppressed creatures. “If you ever do feel dissatisfied, please let me know. I’ll put in a word for you with the mistress.”
“Thank you for your courtesy,” the robot said without emotion. “It does not fit my present need. I am a machine. Should I retire now?”
“When is Sheen due back?”
“In four minutes, fifteen seconds from … mark.”
“Yes, retire now. I’ll cover for you.”
The robot, of course, did not assimilate the humor. Robots came in many types and levels, and this one was relatively unsophisticated. It had no consciousness feedback circuits. It walked to the wall, looking completely human; it bothered Stile to realize that this was exactly the way he looked to others, so small and nondescript. The robot opened a panel and stepped into the closet-aperture behind. In a moment it was out of sight and deactivated.
Stile was reminded of the golem that had impersonated him, or rather, impersonated his alternate self the Blue Adept until he, Stile, arrived on the scene to destroy it. What was the difference, really, between a golem and a humanoid robot? One was activated by magic, the other by science. There were more parallels between these two frames than geographical!
Stile sat down at the table the robot had left. A game of cards—solitaire—was laid out. If the robot did not experience boredom, why was it playing cards? Answer: because Stile himself would have done this, if bored, sharpening obscure Game-skills. The robot probably followed Stile’s program of acrobatic exercises, too, though it could hardly benefit from these. It was emulating him, so as to improve verisimilitude—the appearance of authenticity.
He analyzed the situation of the cards, then resumed play. He was deep in it when the door opened and Sheen appeared.
She was beautiful. She was only slightly taller than he, with over-perfect proportions—breasts slightly larger and firmer and more erect than the computer-standard ideal for her size and age; waist a trifle smaller, abdomen flatter, hips and buttocks fuller—and luxuriantly flowing fair hair. The average man wanted a better-than-average woman; in fact he wanted a better-than-ideal woman, his tastes distorted by centuries of commercialized propaganda that claimed that a woman in perfect health and fitness was somehow less than lovely. Stile’s tastes were average—therefore Sheen was far from average.
She reminded him moderately of another girl he had known, years ago: a woman smaller than himself, a female jockey he had thought he loved. Tune had been her name, and from that encounter on he had been addicted to music. Yet Sheen, he knew objectively, was actually a prettier and better woman. She had only one flaw—and he was not inclined to dwell on that at the moment.
Stile rose and went to her, taking her in his arms. “Oh—is someone here?” she asked, surprised.
“No one,” he said, bringing her in for a kiss. “Let’s make love.”
“With a robot? Don’t be silly.” She tried to break free of his embrace, but he only held her more tightly.
“It is best with a robot,” he assured her.
“Oh.” She considered momentarily. “All right.”
Oops. She was going along with it! “All right?” he demanded. “Just how far do you go with robots?”
“My best friends are robots,” she assured him. “Come to the bed.”
Angry now, Stile let her go. But she was laughing. “You amorous idiot!” she exclaimed. “Did you think I didn’t know you?” And she flung her arms about him and kissed him with considerably more passion than before.
“What gave me away?” Stile asked.
“Aside from the differences between man and robot that I, of all people, know?” she inquired mischievously. “Things like body radiation, perspiration, heartbeat, respiration and the nuances of living reactions?”
“Aside from those,” Stile said, feeling foolish. He should have known he couldn’t fool her even a moment.
“Your hands are tanned,” she said.
He looked at them. Sure enough, there was a distinct demarcation where his Phaze-clothing terminated, leaving his hands exposed to the strong rays of the outdoor sun. All living-areas on Proton were domed, with the sunlight filtered to nondestructive intensity, so that only moderate tanning occurred. And of course there were no demarcations on the bodies of people who wore no clothing. Not only did this uneven tanning distinguish him from the robot, it distinguished him from the other serfs of Proton! “I’ll have to start wearing gloves in Phaze!”
“No such heroic measures are necessary,” she assured him. She brought out some tinted hand lotion and worked it into his hands, converting them to untanned color.
“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” Stile said gratefully.
“You’d stay in Phaze the whole time, with that blue lady.”
“No doubt.”
“Well, this is another world,” she informed him. “I had a piece of you before you ever knew she existed. You have a good six hours before the first Game of the Tourney, and I know exactly how to spend it.”
She did, too. She was as amorous as she was lovely, and she existed only to guard and to please him. It was easy to yield to her. More than easy.
Afterward, as they lay on the bed, she inquired: “And how exactly are things in Phaze?”
“I killed the golem who was impersonating me, and gave my friend Kurrelgyre the werewolf advice on how to regain his standing in his pack—”
“I know about that. You returned here for the final pre-Tourney qualifying Game, remember? What did you do on your last trip there?”
“The werewolves and the unicorns helped me to establish my identity as the Blue Adept,” Stile said, grossly simplifying the matter. “I do magic now. But I have to fight the unicorn Herd Stallion to preserve Neysa from breeding for a season.”
“I like Neysa,” Sheen said. “But doesn’t she get jealous of the Lady Blue?”
“No, they are oath-friends now. Neysa knows my destiny lies with my own kind.”
“With the Lady Blue,” Sheen said.
Stile realized he had carelessly hurt Sheen. “She is not of this world, as you pointed out.??
?
“That’s what you think. It’s a different world, but she’s here too. She can’t cross the curtain, can she? So she must have a double on this side.”
Stile suffered a shock of amazement. “That’s right! There must be another self of her living here. My ideal woman, all the time right here in Proton.” Then he caught himself. “An ideal—”
“Oh, never mind,” Sheen said. “We both know I’m not your kind, however much I might wish to be.”
“But why did you tell me—”
“Neysa helped you reach the Lady, didn’t she? Can I do less?”
There was that. Sheen identified with Neysa, and tried to emulate her reactions. “Actually, I can’t afford to go looking for her now—and what would I do if I found her?”
“I’m sure you’d think of something,” Sheen said wryly. “Men usually do.”
Stile smiled. “Contrary to appearances, there is more than one concern on this male mind. I am fated to love the Lady Blue, though she may not be fated to love me—but how can I love two of her? I really have no business with her Proton-alternate.”
“You don’t want to see her?”
“I don’t dare see her.”
“My friends can readily locate her for you.”
“Forget it. It would only complicate my life, and it is already somewhat too complicated for equanimity. How long can I continue functioning in two frames? I feel a bit like a bigamist already, and I’m not even married.”
“You really ought to settle this.”
He turned on her. “Why are you doing this?” But he knew why. He had hurt her, and she was expiating the hurt by exploring it to the limit. There was a certain logic in this; there was always logic in what Sheen did. They both knew he could never truly love Sheen or marry her, any more than he could have loved or married Neysa. Sheen would always love him, but could never be more to him than a temporary mistress and guardian.
“You’re right,” she said, her pursuit abated by his pointed question. “It is best forgotten. I shall store it in the appropriate memory bank.”
“You don’t forget something by remembering it!”
“We have a Tourney to win,” she reminded him, aptly changing the subject in the manner of her sex.
“You understand,” he cautioned her. “I can not reasonably expect to win the Tourney. I’m not at my peak Game capacity, and in a large-scale double-elimination competition like this I can get lost in the crush.”
“And if you lose early, your tenure as a Proton serf ends, and you’ll have to stay in Phaze, and I’ll never see you again,” Sheen said. “You have reason to try. We need to find out who has been trying to kill you here, and you can only pursue an effective investigation if you become a Citizen.”
“There is that,” he agreed. He thought of the anonymous Citizen who had had his knees lasered and gotten him washed out as a jockey. The series of events that action had precipitated had paradoxically enriched his life immeasurably, introducing him to the entire frame of Phaze—yet still an abiding anger smouldered. He had a score to settle with someone—and Sheen was right, it was an incentive to win the Tourney if he possibly could. For the winner would be granted the ultimate prize of Proton: Citizenship. Runners-up would receive extensions of their tenure and the chance to compete again in a subsequent Tourney. So he did have a chance, a good chance because of his Game abilities—but the odds of final victory remained substantially against him.
He wondered, coincidentally, whether the history the Lady Blue had recently related had any bearing. A snow demon had fired a freeze-spell at the Blue Adept, and it had caught the Hinny and damaged her knees. Stile had been lasered in the knees while riding a horse. Was this an example of the parallelism of the two frames? Things did tend to align, one way or another, but sometimes the route was devious.
“One Game at a time,” Sheen said. “If and when you lose, I’ll just have to abide by that. I know you’ll try.”
“I’ll try,” he agreed.
They reported on schedule to the Game Annex. Sheen could not accompany him inside; only Tourney entrants were permitted now. She would go to a Spectator Annex and tune in his game on holo, unless it happened to be one in which a live audience was permitted. She would lend her applause and opinion when feedback opportunity occurred.
There was a line at the entrance. There was hardly ever such a crowd—but the Tourney came just once a year. Six hundred serfs had to report at once, and though the Game facilities were extensive, this was a glut.
When he stepped inside, the Game Computer interviewed him efficiently. “Identity?” a voice inquired from a holographic image of the capital letters GC suspended a meter before him at head height. The computer could make any image and any sound emanate from anywhere, but kept it token. Proton was governed by Citizens, not by machines, and the smart machine maintained that in memory constantly.
“Stile, serf, ladder 35M, Rung 5.” That gave his name, status, age, sex and the fact that he had qualified for the Tourney by holding the fifth rung of the competitive ladder for his bracket: the minimum entry requirement. He could have been first on his ladder had he gone for it earlier; he was actually one of the best players extant. But all that really counted was qualification. All had equal Tourney status.
“Stile 35M-5, assigned number 281 for Round One only,” the voice of the Game Computer said. A decal emerged from a slot. Stile took it and set it against his forehead. Now he was marked, for the purpose of this Round, with the number and name: 281 STILE. “Proceed to the 276–300 sub-annex and encounter your opposite number. Your Game will be announced in due course. Respond immediately or forfeit.”
“Acknowledged,” Stile said. The floating GC faded out and he proceeded to the designated annex. For this Round, a number of waiting rooms and hall alcoves had been converted to rendezvous points. After the first few Rounds many of these would revert to their normal uses, as the number of entrants decreased.
Already the annex was filling. Each person wore the decal on his or her forehead, all numbers in the 276–300 range. Most were naked men and women, some familiar to him. But before Stile could fully orient, a clothed man stepped forward. “Salutation, opposite number,” the man said.
Stile was taken aback. This was a Citizen, fully garbed in tan trousers, white shirt, jacket and shoes. But he did bear the number on his forehead: 281, with no name. Citizens were generally anonymous to serfs. Anonymity was a privilege of status that showed most obviously in the clothing that concealed bodily contours. Serfs had no secrets.
“Sir,” Stile said.
“We are all equal, ad hoc,” the Citizen said. He was handsome and tall, a good decade older than Stile, and as self-assured as all Citizens were. “Come converse in a nook.” He put his hand on Stile’s elbow, guiding him.
“Yes, sir,” Stile agreed numbly. His first match was against a Citizen! Of course he had known that Citizens participated in the Tourney; he just had not thought in terms of playing against one himself. On Proton there were two classes: the Citizens and the serfs. The Haves and the Have-nots. Stile himself was employed by a Citizen, as every serf was; no unemployed serf was permitted on the planet beyond a brief grace period, and no employed serf could remain beyond his twenty-year tenure—with certain very limited exceptions. This was part of what the Tourney was about.
The Citizen guided him to a bench, then sat down beside him. This alleviated his third-of-a-meter advantage in height, but not his immeasurable advantage in status. “I am popularly known as the Rifleman. Possibly you have heard of me.”
Stile suffered a second shock. “The Tourney winner—fifteen years ago! I watched that Game … sir.”
The Rifleman smiled. “Yes, I was a serf like you. I won my Citizenship the hard way. Now the perennial lure of the Game brings me back. You never do get it out of your system! Who are you?”
“Sir, I am—”
“Ah, now I connect! Stile is the designation of one of the top current Games
men! I had not realized your tenure was expiring.”
“It had three years to go, sir. But I had a problem with my employer.”
“Ah, I see. So you had to go for double or nothing. Well, this is a pleasure! I’ve entered other Tourneys since my ascent, but the moment I matched with a serf he would throw it into CHANCE, and two or three of those in succession washed me out early. It is hard to beat a person unless he thinks he can beat you. I’m sure you will give me an excellent game.”
“Yes, sir,” Stile agreed. “I don’t like CHANCE.” He didn’t like having to play a Citizen either, but that could not be said here. Of all the people to encounter this early! A former Tourney winner! No wonder the Rifleman’s opponents in other Tourneys—a Citizen could enter anything he wanted, of course, being immune to the rules governing serfs—had avoided honest contests. CHANCE was at least a 50–50 proposition, instead of a virtually guaranteed loss. It was axiomatic that the poorer players preferred CHANCE, while the better ones disliked it, and the top players wished it would be abolished as a category.
Stile had been twenty years old, already an avid follower of Tourneys, when the Rifleman fought his way up to ultimate victory by shooting six target ducks against his opponent’s three. A highly skilled player, who had of course taken a name reflective of that victory.
But that had been a long time back. The man could be out of practice and out of shape. Unless he had been practicing privately. Yet why should a Citizen bother? He had nothing to win in the Tourney. A Citizen, almost by definition, had everything. Fabulous wealth, power, and prestige. If a Citizen saw an attractive serf-girl, he could hire her and use her and fire her, all within the hour. It would not even occur to her to protest. A Citizen could have a household of humanoid robots, virtually indistinguishable from living people (until one got to know them, which did not take long) to serve his every need. The finest creature comforts of the galaxy were his, and the most exotic entertainments. Small wonder that many Citizens grew indolent and fat!
“I can virtually read your thoughts,” the Citizen said. “And I will answer them. I am not in the shape I was when I won, but I have practiced somewhat and remain reasonably formidable. Of course I lack motive, now; victory will not benefit me, and defeat will not harm me. Yet it would be satisfying to win it again.”