Piers Anthony - Phaze Doubt

Flach walked on, watching for anyone watching him. None seemed to be, but he didn’t trust that. He would wait. He turned the body back to Nepe, who was best at Proton matters.

What would Lysander think, when he found himself back under the harpy’s tree? Nepe wondered. He had just been betrayed by two girlfriends; would he be suspicious of the third? For that was what Echo would be. They had chosen Jod’e for him, but the Tan Adept had gotten her. They had to write her off, as Mach put it. They had feared they would have to write Lysander off too, but somehow he had escaped. The word was that he had banged against the door panel, and it had opened. Tan must have been furious at that malfunction at that critical time! But maybe the prophecy had known that Lysander would squeak through.

But it was more likely that he had simply drawn on his enemy knowledge to make that door open, seemingly by accident. That confirmed that Tan didn’t know Lysander’s nature. Interesting: the Hectare didn’t trust Tan either! They were merely using him, and when he was of no further use to them, they would dispose of him.

But Lysander was dangerous. If it weren’t for the prophecy, they would never have brought him in. would never have brought him in. Suppose he wasn’t the one? Then they were probably lost already, because the prophecy didn’t say there would be one, only that only such a person, alien to the culture and opposed to it, could save it. There might be no such person, or they might have the wrong one, or they might have the right one and he would choose not to save them. It seemed exceedingly chancy.

Chancy—yet their only hope. So she had rescued Lysander, the enemy agent, and Echo would be his woman. Echo didn’t know the truth; she was likely to have a severe disappointment coming up. But if that happened, they would all be lost. If it didn’t, he would save them, and their gamble would have paid off. So Echo would do her best to make Lysander happy, exactly as Jod’e would have, so that when it came to the point of decision, he would be more likely to choose for Phaze instead of for the Hectare.

Meanwhile, she had to check in with others. Satisfied that she was not observed, she ducked into a service niche. “Nepe,” she murmured. “Admit.”

A panel slid aside. She climbed into the rear service area, and the panel closed behind her. The self-willed machines were maintaining a low profile, hoping to escape the notice of the Hectare, but they cooperated with Nepe. That was part of her situation; she had lived among them for years, and her father was one of them, and her grandmother. They trusted her, though her actual flesh was alien.

“Mach,” she said, stepping into a baggage transport cart.

The cart began to move. Nepe focused on her body, changing it slowly from human boy to machine. Flach could change in an instant, but he had to use a different spell each time, so he didn’t waste it. Nepe was slower, but she could do the same form a thousand times if she had to. So she did most of the changing, when it wasn’t an emergency.

She was ready by the time the cart brought her to her father. Actually he was Flach’s father, but it was all complicated, and both Mach and Bane were really fathers to both Flach and Nepe now, since the mergence, and maybe before. She rolled out on small wheels, a spot bag handler.

She rolled up to the larger machine. Mach was in humanoid form, unloading suitcases from a baggage compartment near the airport. Without hesitation he dumped a bag on her, then picked up two suitcases and strode away down the hall. She followed, heeling like a trained canine. The conquest of the planet was fresh, but care was being taken not to disrupt the tourist trade. Many tourists, in fact, didn’t realize that a hostile occupation was in progress. They would not be bothered as long as they didn’t interfere.

“Mission accomplished,” she reported on the machine frequency. Communication of many types and many levels was required to run the complicated society of Proton, and this had not changed with the advent of magic. Anyone in authority could listen in on the machine frequency, but there was little point to it, and there were thousands of exchanges of information going on simultaneously throughout the city. Each machine had limited range, to allow the use of the same frequencies without much interference.

“Tsetse is being assigned to Brown,” Mach replied. “Investigate.”

Nepe detoured into a side hall and rolled up to a disposal unit. Her bag was a dummy. She had the unit take it in, and then herself.

Soon she was connected to the command network. Troubot— status of Tsetse, she sent.

In a moment a message came back: Order just in. Guidebot to take her to Brown Demesnes.

By whose order?

Citizen Purple.

The renegade Citizen! That meant that some sort of mischief was afoot. Yet what would Purple’s interest be in the Brown Adept? She was harmless to the Hectare, now that she was under house arrest.

Could this relate to Grandam Neysa’s odd behavior, when she had hustled Flach from that wooden castle? Well, maybe Nepe could satisfy her curiosity while performing her investigation.

Assign me.

Done. Reach this location ASAP. City coordinates followed.

Nepe disconnected and got moving. Troubot would do anything for her, even if it weren’t business. As she caught a machine transport and zoomed to the address, she reflected briefly on that.

Troubot was a machine she had associated with for years. She considered him male, and he considered her female. He was in love with her. That might have seemed ludicrous to anyone offplanet, but it was feasible on Proton, where the self-willed machines could have feelings. But in Phaze, Troubot became Sirelmoba, the pretty little bitch who was Flach’s Promised. There, the sexes were reversed. But for years it had been assumed that alternate selves had to be of the same sex, and almost always they were. Why was it different here?

She had pondered this before, many times, but could come to only one conclusion: the sexes did match, either male to male or female to female. The only exceptions were when one of the selves was neutral. Troubot was neutral, because a machine had no inherent sex. Troubot thought of himself as male, so he was male, but there was nothing else to substantiate it. Nepe’s father Mach (technically, Bane in Mach’s body) thought of himself as male, so he was male. Her Grandmother Sheen thought of herself as female, and indeed she looked and acted female. But all were in essence neuter machines. All could be set up with other bodies and other programming and be of opposite sex. So there really wasn’t a change of sex, just a change of perception.

Nepe herself, like her mother Agape, was also neutral in essence. Her living component was Moebite, whose species was sexless, but assumed sexual identities when visiting other planets, in deference to the prevailing standard. So she, like the machines, simply assumed a sex, and remained with it because she preferred it. So when she became Flach it wasn’t any true sex change, only an apparent one. He was male and she was neuter, technically.

Yet it certainly felt different!

She reached the location. A gray-eyed, silvery-haired serf woman of about thirty sat in a shipment station. The hair was no sign of decline; it had been permanently tinted. She was an extremely pretty woman despite being past the flush of youth. This was Tsetse, formerly Tania’s obliging receptionist, then Citizen Purple’s mistress. Beautiful, complaisant, and not unduly smart: she had been ideal for her positions.

Nepe had known Tsetse for five years, and privately liked her. The woman was fundamentally innocent, amenable to whatever was required of her. But since she was now Purple’s serf, if no longer his mistress (he knew her age), she was not to be trusted. It was important that Tsetse never suspect Nepe’s identity.