'Believe me, there are things they can do. Most of the other boys say that Natch led that bear right towards them, that he knew what he was doing the whole time.... Now we've got angry parents threatening all kinds of legal action. Natch should count himself lucky that the initiation compound falls under the jurisdiction of our L-PRACG and not one of theirs.' The headmaster combed her stringy gray hair with the fingers on one hand and peered nervously at the pedestrians surging past on the platform. Who knew which of them would turn out to be a disgruntled investor or a muckraking drudge?
'Between you and me,' she continued over Confidential Whisper, 'I think we'll be able to come to some agreement with the parents and make this whole thing go away. We really are doing the best we can. But until we can get everything straightened out, Natch is better off at the hive. There are lunatics making death threats against him, drudges sending multi requests at all hours, politicians calling on him to testify ..
'But no capitalmen.'
'No,' the headmaster replied with distaste. 'No capitalmen or fiefcorp masters or recruiters at all, thankfully.'
Vigal had changed little since Natch had last seen him. He still wore the same impeccable gray goatee and the unostentatious ocher robe that signaled a hopeless lack of fashion. Vigal was a monument against time, like the cabins in the initiation compound-something that stood unchanged through the vicissitudes of the seasons.
He had certainly not lost his gift for understatement. 'Things are not going so well for you, it seems,' said the neural programmer.
Natch sat on his bed and sulked in silence. The hive dorm, which had been unimaginably vast when he was eight, now felt small and constricting.
'Do you want to talk about what happened out there?' prodded Vigal gently.
'No,' said Natch. He had spent the past few days staring at the ceiling, trying to recount those panicked few minutes in the woods, trying to decide what had happened. Had he purposefully led that bear into Brone's path? Or had it just been a gut instinct, a subconscious split-second decision? Could he have yelled out some warning, waved his arms, something? 'I don't want to talk about it. Not while so many things are unsettled.'
'What things?'
'Practical things, now things.' The boy leaned back against the window and traced a finger over the fiefcorp industry pie charts he had put there. 'I'm seventeen, Vigal. I should be looking at apartments and shopping for a bio/logic workbench. Picking out L-PRACGs. But instead, I've got no future, no prospects, nothing. I'm the most hated person in the world right now, and all because ... because ...' He couldn't find the words to finish his sentence, and bashed his fist against the window.
Serr Vigal pursed his lips into a frown. 'Surely it can't be that bad. What about all those recruiters who were hounding you before initiation?'
'Nothing,' Natch sighed bitterly. 'The capitalmen won't even acknowledge my existence. Oh, a few of the fiefcorp masters will talk to me, but their offers are just laughable. People want me to apprentice for them on spec, not even for room and board. Everyone else just prives me out the instant they find out who I am.'
'The whole incident is still in the news, Natch. Maybe you need to give the fiefcorps some time.'
'It won't matter.'
'You know, you can do so many things other than bio/logics. Maybe-'
'No.' Natch pressed his forehead against the window, covering a histogram of fiefcorp share prices. 'It has to be bio/logics. There's nothing else out there for me.'
The neural programmer cleared his throat and began to say something, then stopped. A statement was slowly coalescing in his mind. At one time, Natch would have lacked the patience to listen to what his guardian had to say, but after nine months in the wilderness surrounded by the impetuosity of teenage boys, Serr Vigal's deliberate manner no longer seemed so irritating. 'Do you remember,' Vigal stammered, 'what I told you before initiation about taking an apprenticeship somewhere close by?'
The boy nodded yes.
'Well, it seems I have some space-I mean, there is an openingat my memecorp. Brainstem programming. The pay isn't much. But, well, I just thought ...' He let the sentence waft away.
What a difference nine months can make, Natch thought. Before initiation, his main concern had been finding an appropriate excuse to take an apprenticeship over Vigal's objections. Even after the debacle with Figaro Fi, Natch had never seriously considered taking an apprenticeship with the neural programmer. But after all that had happened with Brone and the Shortest Initiation, did he have any choice?
Vigal smiled. 'I can see the struggle in your face, Natch. You don't want to apprentice with me because you think the work will be dull and unchallenging. Even worse, you're afraid I'm going to lecture you about what happened at initiation. You think I'll try to guilt you into signing up with my memecorp.'
Natch's silence indicated his agreement.
'You also know that one day you will be beyond my tutelage,' continued Vigal. 'Yet you worry that I might try to keep you around by reminding you how I lent a helping hand when nobody else would. Plus-and this may be the most crucial thing-you doubt that you'll be able to find a decent woman in a company like mine to save your life.'
The young outcast tried hard not to crack a smile, but he failed.
Vigal chuckled and rose from his chair. He took a seat on the bed next to the boy and put his hand on Natch's shoulder. A rare and yet not unwelcome moment of physical contact between them. 'You know that life in the memecorps is much different than life in the fiefcorps, don't you?'
Natch nodded. ' Fiefcorps make money,' he quoted slyly. 'Memecorps cost money.'
The neural programmer snorted. 'Well, that's what those fools at Creed Thassel say. Maybe that was true back when Kordez Thassel and Lucco Primo were alive. But today.... Today, I think even a hard-core libertarian would be surprised at how much of our funding comes from the marketplace. If you ask me, every bio/logic programmer could use a grounding in the fundamentals of the memecorp world.'
The two silently watched the undulations in the Primo's histogram for a few minutes. Vigal's hand communicated an unspoken message of comfort and understanding. Natch could briefly see a widening of vistas, a broadening of horizons.
He tried to picture what life in Vigal's memecorp would be like. Heated debates over brainstem engineering techniques, collaborations with faceless co-workers, long hours fine-tuning bio/logic programs. There were worse ways to spend two years of his life. The money would be a pittance compared to the sums he had been discussing with the capitalmen nine months ago. But all the same, he would be working in bio/logics. And once he had proven his ability in the memecorp world, wouldn't the fiefcorps become that much more attainable?
'So what are your terms?' Natch asked.
Vigal couldn't hold back his delight. He named the terms: Room and board in Omaha. A modest stipend, with the promise of a bonus after two years. Access to the run-of-the-mill bio/logic programming equipment.
'And what about ... all the bad publicity?' said Natch.
His guardian shrugged his shoulders dismissively. 'The publicity will pass. You will discover that one of the benefits of working in the memecorp sector is that we are well-protected from that sort of nonsense.'
Natch stood back and let the phantom letters of Vigal's contract replace the histogram on the window. He called up Shyster 95.3c to help him negotiate the details. Within minutes, the two were sitting across the small round table in the corner of the room dickering over minor contractual differences. By the end of the hour, they had worked out an agreement. Natch affirmed it without hesitation.
He was now officially Serr Vigal's apprentice.
After a few moments of relaxed celebration, Vigal once again struck a serious note.
'I know you worry about your future, Natch,' said the neural programmer in a low voice. 'And I am sorry I have always been so preoccupied with all these ... distractions.' He wiggled his fingers up towards the ceiling and let them linger there a moment, as if he could only keep them from drifting into the stratosphere by a colossal act of willpower. 'But-but when you came to me, I promised myself I would always be there for you. And I intend to keep that promise no matter what the future brings.'
Natch ducked his head under the protective helmet of his clasped fingers. Ordinarily, he would have scoffed at Vigal's sentimentality, but he was not in an ordinary frame of mind. 'And what if I have no future?'
His guardian leaned forward and put his hand on his apprentice's arm. 'Of course you have a future. And do
