Out of Phaze

Again there was an aspect of insincerity in the man. What would happen to Mach when he returned to this body and this frame? Surely the Citizen would not just let him return to the Experimental Project. Still, the Citizen could not make them exchange again if they didn’t want to, so there did not seem to be a serious risk. “I think I’ll wait awhile.”

“You bargain for something? Do not try the Citizen’s patience.”

“Bane, if the Citizen will help you return—“ Agape said.

Still it was too pat. Bane remembered how his father Stile dealt with Adverse Adepts whose power paralleled his own. Once those Adepts had tried to kill him, and had killed his other self. There was always a tension in the air when one of those encountered Stile now, and Bane visualized them as dragons who longed to attack, but were restrained by the knowledge that Stile was stronger and had allies who were dangerous to dragons. Yet the words were always courteous; the enmity was muted. One thing was sure: Stile never trusted an Adverse Adept. Bane did not trust this anonymous Citizen either.

“I be not bargaining,” he said. “I just want to deal not.”

“If you do not, as you put it, deal, you will be unlikely to return at all.”

“Bane—“ Agape said urgently.

Foreman glanced at her. “What is this amoeba to you?”

“My friend!” Bane snapped. “Sneer not at her!”

“Your friend,” Foreman said thoughtfully. “Then she can be included. Whatever you want for her, she will have.”

“Her freedom!”

“Of course. Show us how you communicate with Phaze.”

“Bane, you do not know how bad the enmity of a Citizen is,” Agape said, distressed. “Before I came to Proton, I knew that no serf must ever oppose any Citizen. It can be immediate expulsion from the planet, or even—“

“Finish your sentence,” Foreman told her mildly. Bane realized that this was a kind of threat.

“Death,” Agape whispered.

Foreman returned his attention to Bane. “The Citizen has been gentle with you because he knows you are not conversant with our culture. The alien speaks truly. Don’t push your luck.”

Bane felt little but contempt for the Citizen and his minion. But it did seem best to temporize. “Maybe—a game,” he said.

“What?”

“Do not folk settle things here by playing games? Let me play a game with the Citizen, and if I win, Agape and I go free immediately, and if he wins I’ll show him how I make contact with Phaze.”

The serf seemed to swell up. “You offer such a deal to the Citizen? No serf has the temerity!”

“I be not a serf,” Bane said. “I be an apprentice Adept.”

“Here you are a serf—and you are in danger of becoming less even than that. I strongly suggest that you reconsider, before—“

A voice cut in, emerging from a grille on the desk. “I will make that wager.”

Foreman’s face froze. “Sir.”

“Conduct our guests to the Game Annex.”

“Yes, sir.” The foreman stood with alacrity. “Follow me.” He walked quickly from the room.

“Citizens like to gamble,” Agape whispered. “It is notorious throughout the galaxy! But I never imagined—“

“I trust this not,” Bane muttered.

“Trust is not a factor when dealing with a Citizen!” she said. “They give the orders, the serfs obey them.”

They arrived at a pedestal similar to the one Bane had played on before, with the female robot. “Wait here,” Foreman said tersely.

In a moment a stout clothed man walked up from the other side. This was obviously the Citizen. His apparel was white, and he wore a ring set with a huge purple amethyst.

“Purple!” Bane exclaimed.

“Say Sir to the Citizen!” Foreman snapped.

But the Citizen hoisted a restraining hand. “You know me from somewhere, apprentice Adept?”

“Aye,” Bane agreed. “Thou art the Purple Adept.”

The Citizen smiled. “So you really are from Phaze! And my other self retains his position there.”

“Aye,” Bane agreed warily. Purple was one of the Adverse Adepts, a dragon lurking. Now Bane was quite sure that this man was not to be trusted. But he did have power, whether as Adept or Citizen, and had to be handled carefully.

“So it seems we have a wager,” the Citizen said, smiling coldly. “One game to settle the issue. I win, I get your secret; you win, you go free.”

“Aye,” Bane agreed, not quite sure of himself. He might have contempt for the idiosyncrasies of the society of Proton, but the power of Adepts he understood and feared. He had in effect challenged a dragon barehanded, and he was apt to rue it.

“Then play, apprentice,” the Citizen said, touching his side of the pedestal.

Bane looked at the grid. The numbers, letters and words were there by the squares.

“But this is wrong!” Agape said. “Both are lighted!”

So they were. Which was he to choose from?

“This is not your ordinary entertainment-type game,” the Citizen said. “In this one, you choose all your parameters, and I choose mine.”

Agape fidgeted beside him. Bane knew she was bothered by this, but he was prepared to play one version of the Game or another. He touched PHYSICAL and NAKED, 1A. He felt most comfortable with that.

“But the Citizen isn’t limited to that!” Agape reminded him.