Piers Anthony - Juxtaposition

“One moment,” the male Citizen said. “That’s her, isn’t it? I want to question her.”

“That would be involving her in the panel’s deliberation,” the female Citizen said. “I doubt that’s legitimate.”

“The judges may seek any source of information they wish,” the Computer said. “Except the author of the piece in question.”

“Female robot—how do you feel about this poem?” the male Citizen called.

Sheen stopped and faced him. “Sir, I prefer not to answer, if I am to be considered an interested party.”

“Answer!” he directed, with supreme indifference to her feelings.

“You may answer,” the Computer said. “You have not volunteered your influence; you have been summoned by this panel as a material witness. We are trying to deter mine whether there is substance to the hypothesis that the poem in question represents your viewpoint.”

Sheen’s mouth finned. Her human mannerisms had be come so facile that in no physical way was her machine nature evident. She was a beautiful woman, naked of body and perhaps of mind. “Then you shall have my viewpoint, sir. If the poem concerns me, it is not intended as a compliment. It is intended as an attack on the man I love, using me as an involuntary weapon. I am a machine—but I think that even were I alive, I would not care so cynically to hurt a living person in this fashion. This poem is crueler than anything the man I love might do. I am sure his own poem is not of this nature.”

The Citizen nodded. “That’s some machine,” he murmured.

The female Citizen considered, pursing her lips. Her opals flashed. “I am left with a choice. Either this poem is not directed at, shall we say, real people, in which case it is not remarkable—or it is so directed, in which case its brilliance is nullified by its cruelty. In either case, I cannot respect it. I rate it twenty-five.” That was disaster for Rue. It made her average score 34. The other panelists could reconsider their votes if they wished, but seemed content to let them stand. Rue’s poem had a cumulative score of 77’. Stile had a fair chance to beat that, thanks to Sheen. All he needed was forty points.

Now the judges considered Stile’s effort for content. “This poem is more serious and obscure than the other,” the Computer said. “Some may not be aware that there exists an alternate frame of reality of this planet within which other laws of physics govern. The author is able to enter that frame, where he is a person of power and has an elegant wife. Several of the first six lines evidently refer to that frame. There was a female wolf who sacrificed her life for her duty, and a magical encounter between a creature of ice and another of fire. The future in that frame can occasionally be foreseen by magical means, and it contains extraordinary mischief, part of which is the conflict of love loyalties. Two lines refer to the Tourney now being concluded, which will lead to Citizenship for one of these serfs. Thus the first portion of the poem is relevant to the larger situation here and must be accorded credit. The second portion appears to be an advisory essay. The Angel Gabriel is destined mythologically to blow his trumpet on Judgment Day for living persons—and that call is the one no one can evade or cheat. This poem extends this concept to creatures both fanciful and repulsive. It concludes that these people and creatures must accept the inevitable with civility, and reminds us that, according to the legend of the other frame, the powerful flute—perhaps an alternate designation of Gabriel’s horn—has already announced it self by shaking the earth, in the form of the tremors recently experienced here. Allowing for a considerable figurative element, I find this poem serious and valid. The tremors were actually caused by the collapse of over worked Protonite mines in the southern range, but this can be taken as a warning: the mineral on which this planet’s power is literally based is not inexhaustible, and we shall suffer an accounting when that mineral is at last depleted. Already we have suffered a not-inconsequential damage to a number of our facilities. I therefore take this poem as a well-conceived and serious warning, and on that basis I rate it forty-eight.”

Stile was amazed and gratified. He had had no hint the Game Computer knew so much about him or the frame of Phaze, or that it could interpret oblique references with such dispatch. Now he realized that everything he had told Sheen, she had relayed to her machine friends. They in turn could have informed the Game Computer, who per haps was one of their number. Certainly it possessed considerable self-will, backed by the phenomenal resources of the Computer memory banks and the experience of analyzing many thousands of Games. So this should not have surprised him at all.

It was the serf woman’s turn to vote. “Is there any cutting at the opponent?” she asked. The other heads indicated that no one perceived any. “I’m not sure about all the business of the other frame; this is the first I’ve heard of it. But I can believe the Protonite won’t last forever, and somehow this serf-Citizen setup must be called to account. So okay, I’ll go with the warning. I rate it forty.” This was better than Stile had hoped from her. She had given the other poem 50, and he had feared she was a man hater.

“Good job,” the male Citizen said. “Forty-five.”

“Just what kind of a person is he in that frame you talk about?” the serf man asked,

“He is what is called an Adept,” the Computer answered. “That means he is a powerful magician.”

“Funny to hear a computer say that,” the man said. “But I sort of go for that fantasy bit, even if it is all a story. Forty-two.”

Stile’s hope was sailing. These were amazingly favorable responses. He was averaging 44. It would take a rating of 25 by the last panelist to bring him down to par with Rue. The lady Citizen seemed too perceptive for that—but she had surprised him before. He felt his hands getting sweaty as he waited for her answer.

“This mischief of love,” she said. “Is this person concerned about the feelings of the lady robot who loves him?”

“He may not answer,” the Computer reminded her. “We must divine that answer from his poem.”

“I wonder whether in fact it is his own personal reckoning he is most concerned with,” she said. “He says they must be civil, because what will be, will be. I am not sure I can accept that answer.”

Stile quailed. This woman had downgraded Rue’s verse for cruelty; was she about to do the same for his?

“Since he has a wife in the other frame, he really does not need a woman of any kind in this frame,” she continued. “It is unfair to keep her in doubt.”

“We may approve or disapprove the poet’s personal life,” the male Citizen said. “But we are here to judge only the merit of the poem. For what it’s worth, I see several indications that he recognizes the possibility of fundamental change. A bitch turns noble, defeat becomes victory, ice merges with flame, serf becomes Citizen, the fate of dragons and roaches is linked. Perhaps he is preparing his philosophy for the recognition that a living creature may merge with a machine. If this is the way fate decrees, he will accept it.”

She nodded. “Yes, the implication is there. The author of this poem, I think, is unlikely to be deliberately cruel. He is in a difficult situation, he is bound, he is civil. It is an example more of us might follow. I rate this work forty four.”

Stile’s knees almost gave way. She had not torpedoed him; his total score would be 82, comfortably ahead of Rue’s total.

“Do any wish to change their votes on either aspect of either poem?” the Computer inquired. “Your votes are not binding until confirmed.”