Larry Niven - The Moon Maze Game

“What do you think it’s about?” She paused. “Let me get someone on Earth familiar with the science behind our security system.”

In five minutes, they were linked to a fiftyish Brit woman with a sleepy expression and a tightly pursed mouth. Dr. Phelps, the name bar announced.

Phelps twisted her pert little mouth. “Well… based upon what you’ve told me, the retinal patterns might not have been analyzed properly.”

“And what does that accomplish?”

Three seconds of delay, then:

“Perhaps,” Phelps said, “one twin pretending to be both?”

“Excuse me?” Kendra said.

Another delay, while the doctor cleared her throat and assumed a professorial tone. “Identical-or monozygotic-twins form when a single fertilized egg splits in two after conception. Because they form from a single zygote, the two individuals will have the same genetic makeup. Their DNA is virtually indistinguishable. However, things like fingerprints and retinal patterns are not an entirely genetic characteristic. Scientists,” she said, “love to use this topic as an example of the old ‘nature versus nurture’ debate. Retinal patterns, along with other physical characteristics, are an example of a phenotype-meaning that it is determined by the interaction of Thomas’-”

“Or Douglas’.”

“-genes and the developmental environment.” It had taken a few seconds for Kendra’s interjection to travel a quarter-million miles to Earth, and for Phelps to realize she had been interrupted. “Yes, Ms. Griffin?”

“You’re saying it’s possible, depending on the sensitivity of our sensors, that one brother could pretend to be another.”

“Why yes. But why?”

A pause. “Well, I can think of one reason,” Kendra said. “So that one brother could be inside the game with no one on the outside realizing it. Dr. Phelps, thank you very much. I’ll be in touch if there is anything else.” She clicked the line off.

“Why?” Foxworthy asked. “Why would they go to all this trouble? We can’t touch anyone in there. If the kidnappers have an escape figured, they can take the twins with them.”

“Yes. So it’s not just about escape. It’s that there is something useful that the other brother can do outside that he can’t do while inside the gaming dome.”

Her assistant began to chord. “I’m putting a tracer on them. Actions and movements of both brothers for the last forty-eight hours.”

“Wristlamps,” Darla said, distributing bracelets with bulbed nodes at the center. “Found an emergency stash of ’em.” Scotty slipped his on, flexed his wrist, and watched the bright beam splash against the wall. Nice. Darla knelt tracing a map in dust on the floor with her fingertip. “All right. We have to go through this dome to reach a hatch where we could get down a piece.”

“And then?”

“Four levels down and we might be able to get straight to the underground pool. That’s where all of this was supposed to end, you know.”

Angelique managed a tired, wan smile. “Not sure you were supposed to tell us that.”

“Xavier can sue me. Come on.”

She tugged at the door. It opened, and they entered a triangular corridor, unadorned with gaming gear. They moved forward into it.

Sharmela seemed to test every footfall. “Doesn’t look like this was a part of the game, does it?”

“No,” Darla said. “But the next bubble is, so there may be some backup power on.”

Angelique touched Scotty’s shoulder, as if trying to siphon off a bit of his pain. “Where did you leave Asako?”

“In her pod. In an airlock. We’ll have to get it later.”

“If there is a later,” Wayne said.

“There’s always a ‘later’-for someone,” Scotty said. “Let’s make sure it’s us.”

The next door opened. The gamers stepped in.

1350 hours

Clusters of mushroom shapes shadowed bubble 60-E. As they watched, lights glowed to life. The air crackled, and suddenly the walls and ceiling seemed to fly back, expand by a factor of three. The bubble expanded into a gigantic cavern, complete with staggered rows of stalagmites, and a hundred varieties of fungus.

Angelique was the first to speak. “Wow,” was all she could manage.

In Heinlein, something new had happened in gaming central as a light popped up on the gaming map.

Wu Lin turned. “Xavier? We have a blip in the fungus farm. Someone has entered.”

He spun heel-toe. “Have we got visual?”

“No. But I’m still trying.”

“Auditory?”

Wu Lin shook her head. “Not yet.”

“But you will continue to try, yes?”

“Yes,” she said.

Scotty walked through the fungus farm slowly, his sense of disoriented wonderment growing with every new step. As he walked, it seemed to spring to life: Little caterpillar critters swarmed at his feet. Miniature mooncalves crawled hither and thither, munching at the fungus and ignoring the humans.

“What the hell?” he said, genuinely confused.

Darla sighed. “More battery backup. The IFGS insisted. Must be on a proximity trigger. It wasn’t alive until we appeared.”

“The world doesn’t exist if we’re not here,” Maud sighed.

“Your solipsism is showing,” Mickey said.

“There you go, spouting your methodological nonsense.”

A mooncalf ran right up to them, squeaked, and ran away again.

“Metaphysical solipsism, not epistemological or method-”

“Oh!” Maud stamped her little foot. “You drive me crazy.”

To Scotty’s surprise, Angelique didn’t just tell Maud to shut the hell up. “What’s the difference?”

“Please,” Maud said. “Don’t get him started.”

“Too late,” Mickey said. “Metaphysical solipsism is a type of idealism. It says that the perceiver is the only real thing… and everyone else is just a part of that self, with no external reality.”

“And in English?” Scotty asked.

“Like she said: Before I turned on the lights, the room wasn’t there.”

“Ah-hah.”

Darla shushed them. “You go on like two chickens fightin’ over half a worm. Squabble later. Help me find the exit hatch.”

“Did they tell you where it is?” Scotty asked.

“I haven’t the slightest clue… but I expect it will make itself known.”

Without warning the air filled with a whirring sound, and an enormous section of ground began to shake. The gamers sprang back, as a mooncow the size of a city bus rose up from the ground, gazing at them with hugely faceted eyes.

There was a mechanism of some kind around its neck, like a gigantic golden pendant. The device clicked and popped at them. Then it made a whining sound, and then a sound that resembled whale song.

“Hello?” Angelique said. “We’re human.”

Scotty frowned. “You’re talking to a machine. Or a hologram, or something.”

She radiated scorn. “It doesn’t know that. Hello?”

“Hello,” the mooncow said in English. “Who are you?”

It paused, and Scotty watched it cock its head as if waiting for outside guidance.

Angelique nudged him. “This is the fail-safe loop. In case of major power or communication outage, there is a small amount of on-site programming to keep things moving forward.”

“Voice recognition?” Sharmela asked.

“Welcome, Earthlings. You are friends of Dr. Cavor?”

Wayne yelped with pleasure. “Yes! We’re friends.”

“That is good. It is good to have friends, and he is a nice human.”

The mooncow emitted a lowing sound, and little calves the size of legless Great Danes wriggled in and out of the mushrooms. The cow’s side fluttered, exposing a row of a thousand teats. Dozens of calves streaked in to suckle.