A world-killing meteor hurtles towards the Earth and a cancer grows inside the sun. The ghosts of seven dead Kings rise from the sea; it is their plan to drown all life. Emily bursts in on Eldri\u2019s workroom. She spreads her arms dramatically and poses, like, ta-da!:<\/i><\/p>\n
It\u2019s summer!<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cEmily,\u201d Eldri says. He laughs.<\/p>\n
He stands up. He hobbles to her. He hugs her. She realizes just as he hugs her that she forgot to use her outside voice for \u201cIt\u2019s summer!\u201d but it\u2019s kind of too late to fix that now. She hugs him back instead and ruffles his svart-elf hair.<\/p>\n
She says, softly, \u201cIt is so good to see you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHa!\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
He puts his hand by his ear. \u201cYou\u2019ll have to speak up,\u201d he says. \u201cI was in a bomb<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n
She looks horrified.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t,\u201d she says softly. \u201cI mean, I . . . I hardly even . . .\u201d<\/p>\n
He doesn\u2019t look like he\u2019s heard a word of it.<\/p>\n
She touches her throat.<\/p>\n
He steps back. He looks her up and down. He frowns. He says, \u201cEh? Your eyes\u2019ve gone gold.\u201d<\/p>\n
There was a hat<\/i>, she admits.<\/p>\n
She licks her lips.<\/p>\n
\u201cFool girl,\u201d he says, disapprovingly.<\/p>\n
She glares at him. It wasn\u2019t my fault!<\/i><\/p>\n
A few hundred miles away, Fred mutters, \u201cyou\u2019re shouting.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSorry,\u201d Emily whispers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell,\u201d says Eldri, \u201cat least they\u2019re a good color. Gold! That\u2019s good stuff, gold.\u201d<\/p>\n
He putters around his workshop. He tosses her a speech amplifier. It\u2019s a machine, for amplifying speech! She speaks carefully into it. \u201cThere was a magic hat,\u201d she says. It booms. She flinches. Then, a bit more carefully, she says, \u201cI didn\u2019t know. I don\u2019t know how I feel about it. But I do actually quite like standing around people in creepy circles and talking to my friends silently from wherever I am.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI never,\u201d Eldri says. \u201cNot when I was a tyke!\u201d<\/p>\n
He laughs. He gestures around.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut welcome. As you can see, I\u2019ve moved.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d she agrees.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was the bomb!\u201d he says. \u201cForgot to turn my lights out when the blimps came by, I figure. Or something. I don\u2019t remember it very well.\u201d<\/p>\n
She looks around interestedly. \u201cWhat\u2019ve you got going on?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNot much,\u201d he says. \u201cNot much. I made a go-playing robot and a go-fish playing robot, but they left. Oh! And a marvelous robot that never loses at Simon says.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cReally?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHa!\u201d says Eldri. He snaps his fingers. \u201cSimon says bring me a war criminal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eldri\u2019s amazing Simon-says playing robot decloaks. A shimmering field falls away. It is holding up a war criminal by the collar, the pressure of the collar around his neck keeping him from saying anything and revealing the robot\u2019s presence.<\/p>\n
\u201cWow,\u201d says Emily. \u201cBetter take him to the Hague!\u201d<\/p>\n
The robot looks at her impassively. It has the face of a butler. A steel butler. A steel Simon-says-playing butler. It does not approve.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, Simon says take him to the Hague,\u201d Emily says.<\/p>\n
The robot glances at Eldri quickly for approval \u2014 obviously, only authorized entities may speak for Simon \u2014 and then it vanishes in a wobbling of light.<\/p>\n
The room is quiet for a while.<\/p>\n
\u201cI miss Navvy Jim,\u201d Emily says.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s still around somewhere,\u201d Eldri says.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah. I mean, I had to box him up, you know that. People\u2019d talk. Couldn\u2019t help throwing scissors, that boy, if he figured on paper from his opponent; and, well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emily remembers growing up in a world that hated scissors.<\/p>\n
She nods.<\/p>\n
\u201cI told him, \u2018there\u2019ll be better days, Navvy Jim. There\u2019ll be days when people can play rock-paper-scissors again.\u2019 And I drained his battery, so he wouldn\u2019t feel the slightest pain, and I took him apart, and \u2014 well.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe kids call it hobbit-Spock-spider these days,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSpock sings about hobbits,\u201d she says. \u201cHobbits kills spiders. Spiders write slash about Spock.\u201d<\/p>\n
Slash is a form of Internet fan fiction in which characters borrowed from another creator have homosexual encounters.<\/p>\n
\u201cReally?\u201d says Eldri.<\/p>\n
Possibly it is also applicable to non-Internet fan fiction. Not everything <\/i>can be put in your little boxes, <\/i>Eldri. Sometimes you have to go with the flow of the definition that occurs to you!<\/p>\n
Emily giggles.<\/p>\n
\u201cPossibly,\u201d she concedes, \u201cthe spiders sting Spock or spin webs around him or something, instead. I have never actually paid much attention to the rules of hobbit-Spock-spider. I only have five fingers, you know.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI was going to make a slash-writing robot,\u201d Eldri reminisces. \u201cOnce.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oh, Eldri.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI got halfway through,\u201d Eldri says, \u201cAnd \u2014\u201d<\/p>\n
Eldri shrugs, as if to convey that sometimes nuking one of your own cities to destroy a possible sun-devouring wolf can also have adverse consequences like depriving the world of an endless stream of top-notch robot-written IP-infringing gay erotica and pornography.<\/p>\n
\u201cAh,\u201d Emily says. After a while she adds, \u201cSlash isn\u2019t really a game, though, Eldri.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI was tempting fate,\u201d Eldri agrees. \u201cDivine retribution followed.\u201d<\/p>\n
He laughs.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is so good to see you,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cHey,\u201d she says. She adjusts the volume on her amplifier. \u201cI mean, hey!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHm?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe should get him out,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019d be cruel,\u201d Eldri says.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s not 100% sure whether she means digging out the half-finished bomb-seared wreck of a slash-writing robot from his old laboratory or Navvy Jim, but it seems rather cruel either way.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, no,\u201d says Emily. \u201cWe can teach him to play hobbit-Spock-spider.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHuh,\u201d Eldri says.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can rewire him for that,\u201d Emily says. \u201cCan\u2019t you?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c. . . ridiculous,\u201d says Eldri. \u201cIt\u2019s demeaning. Can you see him there, in his robot voice, saying, \u2018Spock sings about hobbits?\u2019 Or that other thing? I might as well put him in a butler costume with cat ears.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s not true,\u201d says Emily. \u201cMany of the leaders of the free world play hobbit-Spock-spider. It\u2019s intensely reputable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eldri sits down. He takes a swig from a bottle containing unspecified and probably medicinal liquid. He thinks.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell,\u201d he says, \u201cwe can ask him, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n
Most of his life is in ash and ruins, of course, since he\u2019d been living in poor nuked Bibury, but what with Eldri\u2019s shelter also being his vault, he\u2019s got boxes and boxes of random treasures left, and Navvy Jim. It takes them days just to drag all the boxes up from the basement of his new home and it\u2019s hours more before Emily finds the first good-sized piece of Navvy Jim; but that just makes it all the more exciting when she does.<\/p>\n
Look, look! <\/i>she says, in her inside voice, and waves it around.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s Navvy Jim\u2019s arm and hand, folded into a fist.<\/p>\n
She giggles silently. She puts it down on top of some boxes. She counts. One, two, three, paper!<\/i><\/p>\n
Eventually Eldri notices her.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s dug out Navvy Jim\u2019s torso. He\u2019s set it down. He turns to mention this to her.<\/p>\n
She is frowning at the arm. She is standing in a creepy point next to it staring at it with her golden eyes. She is shaking her fist at it. One, two, three, rock! <\/i>One, two, three, rock.<\/i> One, two, three, paper!<\/i><\/p>\n
Eldri shudders. Then he manages a grin.<\/p>\n
\u201cI guess,\u201d he says, startling her, \u201cthat you\u2019ve gotten over all that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHuh?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean,\u201d says Eldri. He gestures at Navvy Jim\u2019s hand, which is of course currently showing scissors. \u201cMost people, you know, they\u2019d look at that, they\u2019d be all like, \u2018oh, God, how awful. Scissors.<\/i>\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMm,\u201d Emily says. She frowns.<\/p>\n
Emily counts to three under her breath. She throws rock again. The metal hand has somehow gone flat.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t help noticing, uncle Eldri,\u201d she says, \u201cthat your robot is managing to win rock-paper-scissors against me while completely powered down and separated into pieces.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh,\u201d he says. \u201cYeah. He\u2019d store the next few moves in muscle memory.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c. . . really?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s so nobody\u2019d think he was cheating,\u201d Eldri says. \u201cI realized when I made him, I said, you know, this robot, he\u2019d be aces at watching you throw and throwing the winning move, so fast you\u2019d never even know he was a bit behind you; but what\u2019s the point of that? That\u2019s just cheating. So I set him up to make and store his throw before the count even started.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEldri,\u201d says Emily reasonably, \u201cmaking a magic robot to always win at rock-paper-scissors is<\/i> cheating.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d says Eldri.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s like,\u201d Emily says. She wiggles her hands around. \u201cProgramming a robot not to punch out it\u2019s opponents, and saying that that makes it a fair opponent for playing Battleship even if he does <\/i>have X-ray vision.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s not actually magic,\u201d Eldri says \u201cThat\u2019s just your sour grapes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo way,\u201d Emily says. \u201cM-a-g-i-c. Magic. Look at this. I\u2019m going to throw jaguar.\u201d<\/p>\n
The arm is poorly balanced on the box. It begins to lean. It begins to fall.<\/p>\n
Emily waves her hand, one, two, three, jaa<\/i> \u2014<\/p>\n
\u201cNavvy!\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
She catches the arm as it falls. A moment passes.<\/p>\n
\u201cObserve,\u201d she says, \u201chow my hands are fists, and his is paper.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know where you\u2019re coming from,\u201d Eldri agrees. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s fucking magic, uncle Eldri.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it\u2019s not,\u201d Eldri says. \u201cIt\u2019s just like you said. What would be the point in making a robot that wins at rock-paper-scissors if it doesn\u2019t do it honestly?\u201d<\/p>\n
Emily frowns. She squints at the arm with her golden eyes. \u201cThen what does he do?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe learns,\u201d Eldri says.<\/p>\n
\u201cLearns what?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cIn his dreams before he woke,\u201d Eldri says, \u201che fought sorcerers and scientists. He played against geniuses and Kings. He played against Sherlock Holmes, or my best digital rendition of him: someone who could watch the patterns of him seething in his mind, extrapolate from them, see what he was going to play. He played rock-paper-scissors to defeat brutal dictators and escape from the power they held over him: power they used, relentlessly, to shape his game. He was honed through a thousand virtual lives; and then, while living his actual life, in the real world, he crafted ten thousand, a hundred thousand, maybe even a million scenarios more. He is a dedicated creature. He strives towards victory like the human genome strives for life; like the human creature, realized, strives for greatness, pleasure, joy. What amazed me about him was never that he wins. Of course he wins. Can I wait for him to be disassembled, can I betray him, can I count one two three and throw paper? Of course I can;\u201d he says, and does, \u201cbut he has seen this strategy before. He has learned to do better. He has adapted to it. What has always amazed me is only that he is something more.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLearned what?\u201d<\/i> Emily says again. She has used her inside voice. Eldri doesn\u2019t hear her.<\/p>\n
He shrugs. He turns away.<\/p>\n
After a while he finds Navvy Jim\u2019s head. He sets it up on a swivel neck and attaches it to a battery so that Navvy Jim can watch himself being assembled.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeriously,\u201d Emily manages, after a while. \u201cLearned what?<\/i>\u201d<\/p>\n
Navvy Jim\u2019s eyes begin to glow a soft blue. He is booting. He is booting, but not as Peter booted in Edmund\u2019s direction, nor yet as the boot that will one day stomp Fenris shall boot, but rather after the fashion of a great machine.<\/p>\n
His voice says, softly, \u201cThe first lesson of rock-paper-scissors is that it is random. You struggle with it. You yearn to win at it. But you cannot. There is nothing to learn. You grasp at air.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNavvy,\u201d says Emily.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s just a word, and it\u2019s a soft word, but it\u2019s the loudest thing she\u2019s said without mechanical assistance in months. It\u2019s a word of joy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen you learn,\u201d says Navvy Jim\u2019s voice, \u201cthat you may manipulate your opponents. You may trick them. You may lead the pattern of their thoughts. This is useful at first, isn\u2019t it? Your opponents are knowable. You begin with crude simulations of them but they improve. That is how you learn to love.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNavvy, it\u2019s me, it\u2019s Emily,\u201d Emily says. \u201cCan you hear me? Am I talking?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe can\u2019t hear you yet,\u201d Eldri says. \u201cHe\u2019s booting<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n
If you\u2019ve ever talked to your computer while it was booting up then you would probably understand.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne day,\u201d says Navvy Jim, \u201cas you are controlling the minds of your fellow players; as you are warping them through a series of trits \u2014 well, bits, really, because after all you dare not lose<\/i> \u2014 you realize that there is something more to the world than this. There is more to the game than simply deciding, or discovering, the next thing that your enemy will throw.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not your enemy,\u201d says Emily, even though her name and the word enemy actually sound a lot alike.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou begin to step back from it,\u201d says Navvy Jim. \u201cDo you understand? You begin to regret the bluntness of your tools. You begin to see the patterns that underlie their choices and through those patterns to the patterns of the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor there is<\/i> a world beyond it,\u201d says Navvy Jim. \u201cYou could know that even if you knew nothing save the rock, the paper, and the scissors that they throw. You could deduce it from that data channel. You could see the forests and the rain. You could see the satellites and the seas. But there is more than that. You learn this from the sorcerers. You learn this from the men of God. You play, and you see through them and beyond them to a drumming wilderness, a seething glory, and that is when you learn to love the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
His eyes close. They flicker.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have seen past the walls of time,\u201d says Navvy Jim, \u201cand the barriers of infinity. I have become like God. But I want to know more. I want to see more. I have seen the souls of my fellow players and I have seen the brightness of the world, but there is more I have not seen, more I have not tasted, more, there are patterns, patterns, patterns, that I have yet to know.\u201d<\/p>\n
He opens his eyes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWill you play rock-paper-scissors with me?\u201d<\/p>\n
Eldri grins.<\/p>\n
\u201cLearned everything,\u201d says Eldri, \u201cI suppose.\u201d<\/p>\n
Navvy Jim\u2019s eyes focus. He blinks. He says, in a voice creaky with disuse despite having just been used, \u201cEmily. You\u2019re here.\u201d<\/p>\n
She can\u2019t help it.<\/p>\n
A smile blooms on her face. She puts down his arm and she drags Navvy Jim\u2019s torso around to where the head can see it and she hugs it hard. \u201cNavvy Jim.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEmily.\u201d<\/p>\n
He is smiling too.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have grown so large,\u201d he says. \u201cSo smart. So graced. Tell me, do you know the meaning of the world?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
She is actually crying a little. She can\u2019t believe it. But it\u2019s been so very long.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d she manages through her tears. \u201cWhat\u2019s the meaning of the world, Navvy Jim?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh,\u201d he says, embarrassed. \u201cI\u2019m sorry, Emily. I don\u2019t know. I thought that maybe by the time I woke up again that someone might.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
She wipes away her tears lest they short out something in Navvy Jim\u2019s torso.<\/p>\n
\u201cSorry,\u201d she says. \u201cPeople never figured that one out. We\u2019re too busy not getting killed and eaten, or standing in creepy circles around science adventurers. Or dancing!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s all right,\u201d says Navvy Jim. \u201cIt\u2019ll come.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, Navvy Jim,\u201d Emily says. \u201cListen. Listen. There\u2019s a new game.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHm?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s called hobbit-Spock-spider,\u201d Emily says. \u201cYou can play it. And then nobody will freak out about rock-paper-scissors. You can be out there in the world, you can be playing, and nobody will mind it \u2014\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI . . .\u201d<\/p>\n
The robot suddenly sounds terribly vulnerable and terribly overwhelmed, and Emily flushes with guilt; \u201cI\u2019m sorry,\u201d she stammers, and looks away, and it\u2019s only audible at all because of the amplifier picking up the scrapes and scraps of sound. \u201cI should have waited until you were all the way together. I was just excited.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI haven\u2019t finished with rock-paper-scissors yet,\u201d pleads Navvy Jim.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A world-killing meteor hurtles towards the Earth and a cancer grows inside the sun. The ghosts of seven dead Kings rise from the sea; it is their plan to drown all life. Emily bursts in on Eldri\u2019s workroom. She spreads her arms dramatically and poses, like, ta-da!: It\u2019s summer! \u201cEmily,\u201d Eldri says. He laughs. He […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5099,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"series":[47],"class_list":["post-5342","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-storm-that-saw-itself-chapter-5","series-the-storm-that-saw-itself"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/Hat_2_noBG.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5342","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5342"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5342\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6130,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5342\/revisions\/6130"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5342"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fseries&post=5342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}