"But as a person?" Li Yuan shrugged, then pulled his silks about him, as if suddenly cold. "I don't know. I cannot make him out. There is something . . . dark in him. I have tried to like him, but . . ."

Tolonen nodded, understanding. It was how he himself felt-at one and the same time awed and repelled by the boy.

6031? He laughed inwardly at the slip. Why, Ward was a man now ... a young man of twenty-five years, but still he thought of him as a boy, perhaps because Ward still had the body of a child-an effete yet threatening child. He shivered. If the truth were known he thought Ward an ugly, stunted little creature and what his daughter had ever seen in him he couldn't imagine. Clayborn he was, and like all of the Clayborn there was something deeply, intrinsically repugnant about him.

He sat back, then locked his hands together in his lap, gold metallic fingers alternating with pink-white flesh. He had not seen Ward since he'd come back from America-in truth, he had hoped never to see him again. When America had fallen he'd believed the boy was dead-had thought it done with for good and all. But Ward had got out-SimFic had protected their investment and shipped him out on the last flight-and he, hearing the news, had felt a bitter disappointment.

A curse-Ward was a curse on him, an evil spell, always coming between him and his daughter.

He felt the cruiser begin to bank, the engine tone change, and knew they were approaching their destination. Below them lay the great three-hundred-level city, like a giant glacier filling the central European plain, its hivelike sections gleaming whitely in the late morning sunshine. Looking back at Li Yuan he saw he was staring out the window; but his hazel eyes were looking inward, his mind worrying over some problem of State. Tolonen, seeing him thus, felt his own worries dissipate. They were as nothing beside his Master's. To serve his T'ang, that was-had always been-his prime directive, and whatever he felt about Ward, he must let none of it come between him and his duty. To serve ... he nodded, then straightened in his seat, pushing out his chest and placing his hands firmly, decisively, on his knees ... it was the very reason for his existence.

KIM LEANED IN to the screen, tracing the slowly descending line of the graph with his index finger, hisworst fears confirmed.

"There's no doubt, is there?"

Curval, beside him, stared a moment longer then shook his head. "No. These performance figures bear out what we've suspected for a while now. There's a definite memory drain."

"Any guesses as to why?"

Curval glanced at Kim, then shrugged. "No idea. But it's happening. At this rate the whole of the implanted memory core will be gone in . . . three months? Four at the outside."

"And the body's good for sixty, maybe eighty years."

"Bit of a problem, huh?"

The two men laughed.

"So what are we going to do?" Curval asked, smoothing the polished dome of his skull. "Start again?

Redesign from scratch?"

"Li Yuan won't like it."

"But if there's no other option?"

Curval considered. "What if we were to create backups? Make more than a single implant? Maybe it's simply a question of reinforcement. After all, the human brain makes copies of all new memories and distributes them, so maybe that's what's lacking? Maybe we're oversimplifying?"

"Maybe. Then again, maybe we're not being simple enough. I've the feeling that the answer's there, staring us in the face, only it's so obvious-so glaring-that we just can't see it."

Curval laughed. "You think so? If you ask me there's a fault in the materials we've been using."

Kim shook his head.

"Then what? There's got to be an answer. This-" Curval tapped the screen-"this oughtn't to be happening."

"No, but it is. Which means something basic is going wrong-something so integral to the process that we're going to have to take the whole thing apart piece by piece before we can understand what it is."

"That'll take time."

"I know."

"And we haven't got time."

"I know."

"So what are we going to do?"

Kim smiled. "First we're going to see the T'ang and show him what we've got."

THE TESTS WERE OVER. Li Yuan watched them lead the manlike morph away then looked down at his hands.In some ways it was impressive, much more impressive than anything GenSyn had thus far managed to produce. The creature's feats of memory and mathematics were breathtaking and there was no doubting its mental agility. Physically, however, it was disappointing. Oh, it was fit-super fit if the performance figures quoted could be trusted- and its coordination was excellent, moreover its vision and muscular strength had been enhanced; even so, it was not what he had envisaged.

He sighed and looked across at Tolonen. The old man smiled back at him, but he looked tired, as if the whole thing had been too much for him. Seeing that, Li Yuan relented a little. They had all worked hard-Tolonen included-to get this far. And maybe he was simply expecting too much. After all, three years ago there had been nothing-nothing but the rumor that DeVore and Hans Ebert had been working on something like this. That and the "manufactured" brains they had discovered in North America.

He was used to synthetic beings, he had grown up surrounded by them tank-grown creatures, products of GenSyn's bioengineering programs-but this was different. The skin, the eyes, they had been grown in GenSyn's vats-special nutrient reservoirs, feeding the living, self-replacing parts; doing the jobs other cells would normally have carried out-but the rest ... the rest had been built. Beneath the human form that presented itself to the eye was a machine; a machine that however crudely-thought for itself.

He turned, looking to Kim. "There's one thing 1 don't understand, why does it make those lists?"

Kim hesitated glancing at Reiss, then answered him. "It makes lists because its autistic-"

"Autistic?"

"You saw how easily it remembered things. It's like a blotting paper, soaking things up. And once shown it never forgets. But what it lacks is the ability to ascribe a meaning or purpose to things-especially to people and places. It has no structure to its existence, you see. There's a gap there whre it ought to be.

So, to plug that gap it fills its life with lists."

"Ahh . . "

"In humans the problem is rooted in the cerebellum-that's where our sense of 'self is to be found." Kim laughed. "I've heard that the Temple of the Oracle at ancient Delphi had an inscription carved into the stone over the entrance 'Know Thyself,' it read. Unfortunately that isn't even an option for our android friend. The brain structure we've developed for this model is simply too crude, too simple, to allow self-consciousness."

"And nothing can be done about that?"

Kim shrugged. "Possibly. But there are other problems we have to solve first. At present the brain in this model is quite small-like the one the Marshal brought back from America. The reason for that's quite simple. An ounce of nerve tissue uses up far more calories in the process of thinking than an ounce of muscle burns up in exercise. In fact the brain uses up a quarter of the body's energy. We've tried to accomodate this fact by providing extra power to our models. Hence storage packs in the small of its back. But we can only do so much. Being aware is actually very hard work. To make that model more aware we would have to increase its cranial capacity considerably, and-that would mean increasing its body size and weight proportionately. What you'd have, in effect, would be a giant."

Li Yuan leaned back, his disappointment deeper by the moment. "I had hoped we would be able to improve on things somehow."

Kim smiled apologetically. "Maybe we shall. Given time. At first I considered doing something new-of designing something that was completely different from the basic human blueprint-but ultimately I had toconcede that there was nothing wrong with the old model. Tens of millions of years of evolution can't be bucked. The brain is as it is because that's how it has to be."

"I understand. But tell me . . . why did it take so long to recognize us? Even you. It seemed almost not to see you until you spoke to it. I thought its vision had been enhanced."

"It has, but the model is essentially prosopognosic. That is, it can't recognize faces. Not at once, anyway.

Retinas, yes, voices too-from the inflections-but a whole face takes much longer. It has to check a number of different elements-shape of nose, color of eyes, distance between forehead and mouth-against a preprogrammed list of the same elements and tick off each item. It doesn't take long, but there's a definite delay. Like many of its behavioral traits, it's a crude analogy of how a human functions, not a perfect copy."

"I was surprised by how human it looks," Li Yuan confessed. "I was expecting something more . . ."

"Brutal?" Kim shrugged. "I toyed with the idea of making it look very different, of enhancing it even more and making it like some sleek custom-designed machine; but in the end I decided it would be best to work with something that looked as unthreatening-as normal-as possible. After all, if it's simple threat you want, you already have GenSyn's half-men, their Hei. My thinking was that if this project had any purpose, it was to produce something that would fool your enemies. Its very normality is, I feel, its greatest strength."

"Is it safe?"

Kim laughed. "Safe? It's positively docile. In fact, one of the problems we've been having with this model is its passivity. It'll make decisions, but only when it's asked to make decisions. Most of the time it'll just sit there."

"I see. And there's no way to alter that?"

Kim hesitated, then glanced at Reiss, who had remained by the door, looking on.

Li Yuan turned, a faint hope growing in him. "Is there something I should know, Director Reiss?"

Reiss bowed his head. "Chieh Hsia, I ..."

"Just tell me."

Reiss swallowed. "There's a-a second prototype."

Li Yuan raised an eyebrow. "A second prototype?"

"Yes, Chieh Hsia, except-"

"Except we've been having problems with it," Kim said, interrupting him.

Li Yuan turned. "What kind of problems?"

Kim smiled then put out an arm, inviting Li Yuan to accompany him. "I think you'd better see it for yourself."

LI YUAN STOOD BESIDE Kim in the tiny room, staring at the creature sprawled on the narrow bed.

The first prototype had seemed little more than a complex marionette, like the golden bird in the poem Ben had sent him, but this . . . he felt a strange thrill-of fear? excitement?-run up his spine. This wassomething special. He could see that at a glance.

"So what is the problem?"

"Can't you see?"

Li Yuan made to step closer, but Kim touched his arm. "Forgive me, Chieh Hsia, but no closer. It's . . .

erratic."

"Dangerous?"

"It hasn't been, but . . . well, I'd hate to be proved wrong."

"Should we ... ?" Li Yuan gestured to the door.

"No. It'll ignore us if we keep our distance. Usually it . . ."

"Usually it what?" The creature turned its head and stared at them, its eyes dark with intelligence.

Yes, Li Yuan thought, his breath catching in his throat, this was more like what he'd expected!

It turned and slid its legs over the edge of the bed.

"How are you today?"

It ignored Kim's question, staring at Li Yuan as if to place him.

"What do the latest figures show?"

"The same trend."

The creature nodded, then, in a gesture that was peculiarly human, combed its dark hair back from its eyes. "So what will you do?"

"I can reimplant."

"No good. If you do that I lose what I am. All I've been. Already-" it grimaced painfully-"already things are slipping from me."

"Has it a name?" Li Yuan asked.

Kim turned, surprised, as if he'd forgotten the young T'ang was there. "Ravachol ... I called him Ravachol."

"A Slavic name. Interesting. He looks Slavic."

Kim nodded, but already his attention was back with the creature.

"What do you want me to do?"

Ravachol looked away, pained, its every action revealing some deep inner torment. "I ... I don't know.

Some new technique, perhaps? A drug?"

"There are no drugs."

It stared at Kim awhile, then shrugged. "So how long do I have?""Three, maybe four months."

It nodded. Then, smiling suddenly, it leaned toward Kim. "I had another dream."

"A dream? Tell me. Was it the same as before?"

Ravachol hesitated, concentrating, then shook its head. "No ... I don't think so."

Kim spoke to it softly, as if coaxing a child. "So?"

It frowned fiercely, as if struggling to recall the details, then began, its voice faltering. "It began in the light.

A fierce, burning light. It seared me. I was consumed by it, caught up within a great wheel of incandescent light. And . . . and then it focused. I was ... I felt new-made. I stepped out from the center of the light and ... it was as if I was stepping into a airtight cube of glass-of ice-a place of stillness.

Perfect, immaculate stillness." It sat back, its face beatific, and sighed. "I could hear nothing, feel nothing, smell and sense nothing. It was . . . strange. The silence was both within me and without. There was no pulse in me, no beating in my chest. It was like I was dead, and yet I was conscious. I could turn my head and see. But there was nothing to be seen. Even^he light . . . even that had gone. Not that it was dark. It was just . j ."

Ravachol stopped, its muscles locked, its eyes staring at Kim as if it had been switched off.

"And then?"