"Clever, eh?" said Chan Shui, smiling at him, then lifting the wide-bodied chair from the grid with one hand. Its perfectly transparent shape glimmered wetly in the overhead light. "Here," he said, handing it to Kim.
Like most of the furniture in the Above, it weighed nothing. Or almost nothing. Yet it felt solid, unbreakable.
Kim handed the chair back, then looked at the spiderish machine with new respect. Jets of air from the segmented arms had directed the fine, liquid threads of ice as they shot out from the base of the machine, but the air had only defined the shape.
He looked at Chan Shui, surprised that he didn't understand—that he had so readily accepted their explanation for why the machines hummed. They did not hum to stop their operators forgetting they were switched on; the vibration of the machine had a function. It set up standing waves—like the tone of a bell or a plucked string, but perfect, unadulterated. The uncongealed ice rode those waves, forming a skin, like the surface of a soap bubble, but a million times stronger because it was formed of thousands of tiny corrugations—the meniscae formed by those standing waves.
Kim saw the beauty of it at once. Saw how East and West had come together here. The Han had known about standing waves since the fifth century B.C.: had understood and utilized the laws of resonance. He had seen an example of one of their "spouting bowls" which, when its handles were rubbed, had formed a perfect standing wave—a shimmering, perfect hollow cone of water that rose a full half ch'i above the bowl's bronze rim. The machine, however—its cybernetics, its programing, even its basic engineering—were products of Western science. The Han had abandoned those paths millennia before the West had found and followed them.
Kim looked around; watching as forms shimmered into life in the air on every side. Tables, cupboards, benches, and chairs. It was like magic. Boys moved between the machines, gathering up the objects and stacking them on the slow-moving collection trays which moved along the gangways, hung on cables from the overhead tracks. At the far end, beyond the door where Kim had entered, was the paint shop. There the furniture was finished— the permapaint bonded to the ice—before it was packed for dispatch.
At ten they took a break. The refectory was off to their right, with a cloakroom leading off from it. There were toilets there and showers. Chan Shui showed Kim around, then took him back to one of the tables and brought him ch'a and a soypork roll.
"I see theyVe sent us a dwarf this time!"
There was a loud guffaw of laughter. Kim turned, surprised, and found himself looking up into the face of a beefy, thickset youth with cropped brown hair and a flat nose. A Hung Moo, his pale, unhealthy skin heavily pitted. He stared down at Kim belligerently, the mean stupidity of his expression balanced by the malevolence in his eyes.
Chan Shui, beside Kim, leaned forward nonchalantly, unimpressed by the newcomer's demeanor.
"Get lost, Janko. Go and play your addle-brained games on someone else and leave us alone."
Janko sniffed disdainfully. He turned to the group of boys who had gathered behind him and smiled, then turned back, looking at Kim again, ignoring Chan Shui.
"What's your name, rat's ass?"
Chan Shui touched Kim's arm. "Ignore him, Kim. He'll only trouble you if you let him." He looked up at the other boy. "Se h nei jen, eh, Janko?" Stern in appearance, weak inside. It was a traditional Han rebuttal to a bully.
Kim looked down, trying not to smile. But Janko leaned forward threateningly. "None of your chink shit, Chan. You think you're fucking clever, don't you? Well, you'll get yours one day, I promise."
Chan Shui laughed and pointed to the camera over the counter. "Best be careful, Janko. Uncle Nung might be watching. And you'd be in deep shit then, wouldn't you?"
Janko glared at him, infuriated, then looked down at Kim. "Fucking little rat's ass!"
There was a ripple of laughter from behind him, then Janko was gone.
Kim watched the youth slope away, then turned back to Chan Shui. "Is he always like that?"
"Most of the time." Chan Shui sipped his ch'a, thoughtful a moment, then he looked across at Kim again and smiled. "But don't let it get to you. I'll see he doesn't worry you."
BERDICHEV SAT back in Director Andersen's chair and surveyed the room. "Things are well, I hope?"
"Very well, Excellency," Andersen answered with a bow, knowing that Berdichev was referring to the boy, and that he had no interest whatsoever in his own well-being.
"Good. Can I see the boy?"
Andersen kept his head lowered. "I am afraid not, Shih Berdichev. Not at the moment, anyway. He began socialization this morning. However, he will be back by one bell, if you'd care to wait."
Berdichev was silent a moment, clearly put out by this devel-
opment. "Don't you feel that might be slightly premature, Director?" He looked across and met Andersen's eyes chal-
lengingly.
Andersen swallowed. He had decided to say nothing of the incident with the boy Matyas. It would only worry Berdichev unduly. "Kim is a special case, as you know. He requires different handling. Normally we wouldn't dream of sending a boy out so young, but we felt there would be too much of an imbalance were we to let his intellectual development outstrip his social development too greatly."
He waited tensely. After a while Berdichev nodded. "I see. And youVe taken special precautions to see he'll be properly looked after?"
Andersen bowed. "I have seen to matters personally, Shih Berdichev. Kim is in the hands of one of my most trusted men,
Supervisor Nung. He has my personal instructions to take good care of the boy."
"Good. Now tell me, is there anything I should know?" Andersen stared back at Berdichev, wondering for a moment if it was possible he might know something. Then he relaxed.
"There is one thing, Excellency. Something you might find very interesting."
Berdichev lifted his chin slightly. "Something to do with the boy, I hope."
Andersen nodded hastily. "Yes. Of course. It's something he produced in his free time. A file. Or rather, a whole series of files."
Berdichev's slight movement forward revealed his interest.
"What kind of file?"
Andersen smiled and turned. On cue his secretary appeared and handed him the folder. He had added the subfiles since T'ai Cho had brought the matter to his attention, and the stack of paper was now almost twice the size it had been. He turned back to Berdichev, then crossed the room and deposited the folder on the desk in front of him before withdrawing with a bow.
"The Aristotle file," Berdichev read aloud, lifting the first few sheets from the stack. "Being the true history of western science." He laughed. "Says who?"
Andersen echoed his laughter. "It is amusing, I agree. But fascinating too. His ability to fuse ideas and extrapolate. The sheer breadth of his vision—"
Berdichev silenced him with a curt gesture of his hand, then turned the page, reading. After a moment he looked up. "Would you bring me some ch'a, Director?"
Andersen was about to turn and instruct his secretary, when Berdichev interrupted him. "I'd prefer it if you did it yourself, Director. It would give me a few moments to digest this mate-rial."
Andersen bowed deeply. "Whatever you say, Excellency."
Berdichev waited until the man had gone, then sat back, removing his glasses and wiping them on the old-fashioned cotton handkerchief he kept for that purpose in the pocket of his satin jacket. Then he picked up the sheet he had been reading and looked at it again. There was no doubt about it. This was it. The real thing. What he had been unearthing fragments of for the last fifteen or twenty years. Here it was—complete!
He felt like laughing, or whooping for joy, but knew hidden cameras were watching his every movement, so he feigned disinterested boredom. He flicked through, as if only casually interested, but behind the mask of his face he could feel the excitement course through him, like fire in his blood.