Glory Season

without machines, I would have given them the power, too.

That is possibly true. But then, what is a man whom you have equipped with a womb? A womb-man would necessarily take on other traits of woman, and cease being identifiable as male at all. That is not an appealing or practical innovation.

In the end, all of our clever gene designs, and corresponding plans for cultural conditioning, will come to nought if we are smug or rigid. The heritage we give our children, and the myths we leave to sustain them, must work with the tug and press of life, or they will fail. Adaptability has to be enshrined alongside stability, or the ghost of Darwin will surely come back to haunt us, whispering in our ears the penalty of conceit.

We wish our descendants happiness. But over time one criterion alone will judge our efforts.

Survival.

12

Over the following days, Maia and her new friend learned to communicate despite the thick walls separating them. From the first, Maia felt stupid and slow, especially when Renna went back to sending coded, compacted messages designed to be deciphered by the Game of Life board. Maia could not blame her, since the method was more efficient, enabling a full screen to be sent in just a few minutes. Yet it made Maia’s responses seem so clumsy in comparison. One line of text was all she could manage after a day’s work, and sending it left her exhausted, frustrated.

…DON’T … FRET … MAIA…

…I’LL TEACH ANOTHER CODE…

… FOR SIMPLE LETTERS… WORDS…

Gratefully, Maia copied down the system Renna transmitted, one called Morse. She had heard of it, she was sure. Some clans based their commercial ciphers on variants of very ancient systems. Another item that should have been in the Lamatia curriculum, she thought grimly.

O= +++, P= –++–, Q= + +–+

The code seemed simple enough, with each plus sign standing for a long stroke and each dash for a short one. It greatly speeded Maia’s next effort, though she remained awkward, and kept making mistakes.

IF YOU KNOW MORSE WHY USE LIFE CODING ISNT IT HARDER

To this question, Renna answered,

HARDER. SUBTLER. WATCH

And to Maia’s astonishment, the game board proceeded to shake her friend’s letters into coruscating patterns, like a fireworks show on Founders Day.

Maia found even more amazing the next message Renna sent. Though compacted, it was long, taking up thirty-one rows by the time Maia finished laying down a snaking chain of black and white squares. Pressing the launch button set off a wild, hungry “ecology” of mutually devouring pseudo-entities that finally resolved, after many gyrations, into what looked like a picture … a crude sketch of plains and distant mountains, seen through a narrow window. It was recognizably a scene looking out from this very stone tower— not the view from Maia’s window, but similar.

The other prisoner followed this with

LIFE IS UNIVERSAL COMPUTER

CAN DO MORE THAN MORSE

& HARDER TO EAVESDROP

Maia was impressed. Nevertheless she answered

I DID. WHY NOT OTHERS?

Renna’s reply seemed sheepish.

NOT AS CLEVER AS I THOUGHT

The game board next rippled to show a slim face with close-cropped hair, eyes rolled upward in embarrassment, shoulders in the act of shrugging. The caricature made Maia giggle in delight.

Thankfully, she hadn’t damaged the Life set during that first experiment. Over the following days, Renna taught her how to connect the machine directly to the wall circuit, so she could send messages directly, instead of laboriously and dangerously touching wires by hand. Renna still made transmissions at high power every midnight, attempting to use crudely generated radio waves to contact friends somewhere out there, beyond the walls. The rest of the time, they communicated using low currents, to avoid arousing the guards.

Renna was so friendly and welcoming, reinforcing Maia’s sense of a warm, maternal presence. Maia soon felt drawn into telling her story. It all came spilling out. The departure from Lamatia. Leie’s loss. Her encounters with Tizbe and involvement in matters far murkier than any young var should have to deal with, newly fledged from her birth clan. Laying it out so starkly brought home to Maia how unfair it was. She’d done nothing to deserve this chain of catastrophes. All her life, mothers and matriarchs had said virtue and hard work were rewarded. Was this the prize?

Maia apologized for stumbling through the story, especially when emotion overcame her at the sending key. THIS IS HARD FOR ME, she transmitted, trying to keep her hand from trembling. Renna’s reply offered reassurance and understanding, along with some confusion.

AT 16 YOU

OUGHT TO BE HAPPY

SUCH A ROTTEN SHAME