only see your faces!'
Chip stared at Karl, and at Dover again. 'Christ and Wei, what are you talking about?' he said. 'The programmers are dead! Uni's—it goes on by itself, it doesn't have—'
Dover was looking past him, smiling. Silence had spread through the room. Chip turned around.
A man in a smiling mask that looked like Wei (Was this really happening?) was coming to him, moving springily in red silk high-collared coveralls. 'Nothing goes on by itself,' he said in a voice that was high-pitched but forceful, his smiling mask-lips moving like real ones. (But was it a mask—the yellow skin shrunken tight over the sharp cheekbones, the glinting slit-eyes, the wisps of white hair on the shining yellow head?) 'You must be 'Chip' with the one green eye,' the man said, smiling and holding out his hand. 'You'll have to tell me what was wrong with the name 'Li' that inspired you to change it.' Laughter lifted around them.
The outstretched hand was normal-colored and youthful. Chip took it (I'm going mad, he thought), and it gripped his hand strongly, squeezed his knucklebones to an instant's pain. 'And you're Karl,' the man said, turning and holding out his hand again. 'Now if you had changed your name I could understand it.' Laughter rose louder. 'Shake it,' the man said, smiling. 'Don't be afraid.' Karl, staring, shook the man's hand. Chip said, 'You're-'
'Wei,' the man said, his slit-eyes twinkling. 'From here up, that is.' He touched his coveralls' high collar. 'From here down,' he said, 'I'm several other members, principally Jesus RE who won the decathlon in 163.' He smiled at them.
'Didn't you ever bounce a ball when you were a child?' he asked. 'Didn't you ever jump rope? 'Marx, Wood, Wei, and Christ; all but Wei were sacrificed.' It's still true, you see. 'Out of the mouths of babes.' Come, sit down, you must be tired. Why couldn't you use the elevators like everyone else? Dover, it's good to have you back. You've done very well, except for that awful business at the '013 bridge.'
They sat in deep and comfortable red chairs, drank pale yellow tart-tasting wine from sparkling glasses, ate sweetly stewed cubes of meat and fish and who-knew-what brought on delicate white plates by young members who smiled at them admiringly—and as they sat and drank and ate, they talked with Wei. With Weil How old was that tight-skinned yellow head, living and talking on its lithe red-coveralled body that reached easily for a cigarette, crossed its legs casually? The last anniversary of his birth had been what—the two-hundred-and-sixth, the two- hundred-and-seventh?
Wei died when he was sixty, twenty-five years after the Unification. Generations before the building of Uni, which was programmed by his 'spiritual heirs.' Who died, of course, at sixty-two. So the Family was taught. And there he sat, drinking, eating, smoking. Men and women stood listening around the group of chairs; he seemed not to notice them. 'The islands have been all those things,' he said. 'At first they were the strongholds of the original incurables; and then, as you put it, 'isolation wards' to which we let later incurables 'escape,' although we weren't so kind as to supply boats in those days.' He smiled and drew on his cigarette. 'Then, however,' he said, 'I found a better use for them, and now they serve as, forgive me, wildlife preserves, where natural leaders can emerge and prove themselves exactly as you have done. Now we supply boats and maps, rather obliquely, and 'shepherds' like Dover who accompany returning members and prevent as much violence as they can. And prevent, of course, the final intended violence, Uni's destruction—although the visitors' display is the usual target, so there's no real danger whatsoever.' Chip said, 'I don't know where I am.' Karl, spearing a cube of meat with a small gold fork, said, 'Asleep in the parkland,' and the men and women nearby laughed.
Wei, smiling, said, 'Yes, it's a disconcerting discovery, I'm sure. The computer that you thought was the Family's changeless and uncontrolled master is in fact the Family's servant, controlled by members like yourselves —enterprising, thoughtful, and concerned. Its goals and procedures change continually, according to the decisions of a High Council and fourteen sub-councils. We enjoy luxuries, as you can see, but we have responsibilities that more than justify them. Tomorrow you'll begin to learn. Now, though'—he leaned forward and pressed his cigarette into an ashtray—'it's very late, thanks to your partiality to tunnels. You'll be shown to your rooms; I hope you find them worth the walk.' He smiled and rose, and they rose with him. He shook Karl's hand—'Congratulations, Karl,' he said—and Chip's. 'And congratulations to you, Chip,' he said. 'We suspected a long time ago that sooner or later you would be coming. We're glad you haven't disappointed us. I'm glad, I mean; it's hard to avoid talking as if Uni has feelings too.' He turned away and people crowded around them, shaking their hands and saying, 'Congratulations, I never thought you'd make it before Unification Day, it's awful isn't it when you come in and everyone's sitting here congratulations you'll get used to things before you congratulations.'
The room was large and pale blue, with a large pale-blue silken bed with many pillows, a large painting of floating water lilies, a table of covered dishes and decanters, dark green armchairs, and a bowl of white and yellow chrysanthemums on a long low cabinet.
'It's beautiful,' Chip said. 'Thank you.'
The girl who had led him to it, an ordinary-looking member of sixteen or so in white paplon, said, 'Sit down and I'll take off your—' She pointed at his feet.
'Shoes,' he said, smiling. 'No. Thanks, sister; I can do it myself.'
'Daughter,' she said.
'Daughter?'
'The programmers are our Fathers and Mothers,' she said.
'Oh,' he said. 'All right. Thanks, daughter. You can go now.'
She looked surprised and hurt. 'I'm supposed to stay and take care of you,' she said. 'Both of us.' She nodded toward a doorway beyond the bed. Light and the sound of running water came from it.
Chip went to it.
A pale-blue bathroom was there, large and gleaming; another young member in white paplon kneeled by a filling tub, stirring her hand in the water. She turned and smiled and said, 'Hello, Father.'
'Hello,' Chip said. He stood with his hand on the jamb and looked back at the first girl—drawing the cover from the bed—and back again at the second girl. She smiled up at him, kneeling. He stood with his hand on the jamb.
'Daughter,' he said.
Chapter 4
He was sitting in BED—had finished his breakfast and was reaching for a cigarette—when a knock at the door sounded. One of the girls went to answer it and Dover came in, smiling and clean and brisk in yellow silk. 'How you doing, brother?' he asked.
'Pretty well,' Chip said, 'pretty well.' The other girl lit his cigarette, took the breakfast tray, and asked him if he wanted more coffee. 'No, thanks,' he said. 'Do you want some coffee?'
'No, thanks,' Dover said. He sat in one of the dark green chairs and leaned back, his elbows on the chair arms, his hands meshed across his middle, his legs outstretched. Smiling at Chip, he said, 'Over the shock?'
'Hate, no,' Chip said.
'It's a long-standing custom,' Dover said. 'You'll enjoy it when the next group comes in.'
'It's cruel, really cruel,' Chip said. 'Wait, you'll be laughing and applauding with everyone else.'
'How often do groups turn up?'
'Sometimes not for years,' Dover said, 'sometimes a month apart. It averages out to one-point-something people a year.'
'And you were in contact with Uni the whole time, you brother-fighter?'
Dover nodded and smiled. 'A telecomp the size of a matchbox,' he said. 'In fact, that's what I kept it in.'
'Bastard,' Chip said.
The girl with the tray had taken it out, and the other girl changed the ashtray on the night table and took her coveralls from a chairback and went into the bathroom. She closed the door. Dover looked after her, then looked at Chip quizzically. 'Nice night?' he asked. 'Mm-hmm,' Chip said. 'I gather they're not treated.'
'Not in all departments, that's for sure,' Dover said. 'I hope you're not sore at me for not dropping a hint somewhere along the way. The rules are ironclad: no help beyond what's asked of you, no suggestions, no nothing; stay on the sidelines as much as you can and try to prevent bloodshed. I shouldn't have even been doing that
