Infoquake by David Louis Edelman Page B

frowned. "Yes, that's right. But I convinced one of my
apprentices to cover for me. At least, I think she said she would cover
for me...." Vigal's eyes searched the ground as if he might find
answers woven into the Aztec patterns on the carpet. Finally, he gave
a self-deprecating shrug. "Well, there's nothing I can do about it now."
Natch noticed the neural programmer's baffled expression and stifled a
smile. It was impossible to get mad at Serr Vigal. He might be hopelessly out of touch, but at least he had a sense of humor about it.
    "Come," said the older man, clapping a virtual hand on Natch's
shoulder. "Let's take a walk in the garden, and I'll give you the last bit
of sentimental nonsense you'll have to endure for the next twelve
months."

    The Proud Eagle's garden was the envy of metropolitan Cape Town.
Gargantuan sunflowers sat alongside lush poppies and forbidding
cacti, all growing in the shadows of redwoods, bonsai and elm. Natch
had been training himself for initiation by trying to identify things
that would not exist without Sheldon Surina's science of bio/logics, and
this improbable congregation of plants was one of them. It was easy to
forget that bio/logics dealt not only with the programming of the
human body, but with other organic structures as well.
    Serr Vigal kept his silence for several minutes. Natch could feel the
hair on the back of his neck standing at attention as his guardian gave
him one of those world-weary stares. The boy put his hands in his
pockets and did his best to ignore it.
    Natch wondered for the millionth time what kind of relationship Vigal had really had with his mother. Had he loved her? Had they
slept together? Would they be bonded companions now if Lora had not
been infected by that epidemic in the orbital colonies? It was a pointless exercise. All Natch ever managed to pry out of Vigal was the
skeletal structure of a life story. Sometimes Natch suspected the neural
programmer was really his father, but Genealogy Sleuth 24.7 concluded that the differences in their DNA made such a relationship
unlikely at best.

    "I hear some of your hivemates are starting their own fiefcorps after
initiation," said Vigal abruptly.
    Natch nodded. "A few of them."
    "Your friend Brone among them, I suppose."
    A flurry of emotions washed through Natch's mind as he considered the visage of his hated rival. The two had spent most of their
childhood warily circling one another like fencers, always testing and
probing for weaknesses. Over the past year, Natch's competition with
Brone had turned into full-scale war. "Krone is not my friend," he said
through gritted teeth.
    Natch's malice passed right over Vigal's head. "What about
Horvil?"
    "He doesn't know."
    "And you? After the hive, after initiation, what then?"
    There was a pause. "I've had ... a few meetings."
    Vigal exhaled softly and pretended to study a hanging grapevine.
"I see."
    Another period of silence followed. Serr Vigal seemed to be marshaling the courage to say something. Meanwhile, Natch could see
through the hothouse windows that the commotion in the hive
building was dying down. Families were giving their sons and daughters one last virtual embrace before cutting their multi connections.
Natch and his fellows would be on their way to initiation in just
eighteen hours.

    "Listen, Natch," said his guardian finally. "I'd like to give you
some advice before you head out to initiation. It's just ... I'm not very
good at this kind of thing. As you know, raising a child wasn't something I planned. It sort of fell in my lap by accident.... And now,
after all this time, I'm not sure how to begin...." Vigal stopped and
collected his thoughts, aware he had not exactly gotten off to an auspicious beginning. "Natch, I have tried to give you the education your
mother would have wanted you to have. She believed her hive did not
adequately prepare her for the world. And now I wonder if the same
thing will prove