Short Fiction Fritz Leiber (free e books to read .txt) 📖

A human chess master would have seen a trap like that, but the Machine could not, because Lysmov was maneuvering in an area that did not exist for the Machine’s perfect but limited mind. Of course the Machine changed its tactics after the first three moves of the ten had been played⁠—it could see the checkmate then⁠—but by that time it was too late for it to avert a disastrous loss of material. It was tricky of Lysmov, but completely fair. After this we’ll all be watching for the opportunity to play the same sort of trick on the Machine.

“Lysmov was the first of us to realize fully that we are not playing against a metal monster but against a certain kind of programming. If there are any weaknesses we can spot in that programming, we can win. Very much in the same way that we can again and again defeat a flesh-and-blood player when we discover that he consistently attacks without having an advantage in position or is regularly overcautious about launching a counterattack when he himself is attacked without justification.”

Sandra nodded eagerly. “So from now on your chances of beating the Machine should keep improving, shouldn’t they? I mean as you find out more and more about the programming.”

Doc smiled. “You forget,” he said gently, “that Simon Great can change the programming before each new game. Now I see why he fought so hard for that point.”

“Oh. Say, Doc, what’s this about the Sherevsky end game?”

“You are picking up the language, aren’t you?” he observed. “Sherevsky got a little angry when he discovered that Great had the Machine programmed to analyze steadily on the next move after an adjournment until the game was resumed next morning. Sherevsky questioned whether it was fair for the Machine to ‘think’ all night while its opponent had to get some rest. Vanderhoef decided for the Machine, though Sherevsky may carry the protest to F.I.D.E.

“Bah⁠—I think Great wants us to get heated up over such minor matters, just as he is happy (and oh so obliging!) when we complain about how the Machine blinks or hums or smells. It keeps our minds off the main business of trying to outguess his programming. Incidentally, that is one thing we decided last night⁠—Sherevsky, Willie Angler, Jandorf, Serek, and myself⁠—that we are all going to have to learn to play the Machine without letting it get on our nerves and without asking to be protected from it. As Willie puts it, ‘So suppose it sounds like a boiler factory even⁠—okay, you can think in a boiler factory.’ Myself, I am not so sure of that, but his spirit is right.”

Sandra felt herself perking up as a new article began to shape itself in her mind. She said, “And what about W.B.M. replacing Simon Great?”

Again Doc smiled. “I think, my dear, that you can safely dismiss that as just a rumor. I think that Simon Great has just begun to fight.”

IV

Round Four saw the Machine spring the first of its surprises.

It had finally forced a draw against Sherevsky in the morning session, ending the long second-round game, and now was matched against Votbinnik.

The Machine opened Pawn to King Four, Votbinnik replied Pawn to King Three.

“The French Defense, Binny’s favorite,” Dave muttered and they settled back for the Machine’s customary four-minute wait.

Instead the Machine moved at once and punched its clock.

Sandra, studying Votbinnik through her glasses, decided that the Russian grandmaster looked just a trifle startled. Then he made his move.

Once again the Machine responded instantly.

There was a flurry of comment from the stands and a scurrying-about of officials to shush it. Meanwhile the Machine continued to make its moves at better than rapid-transit speed, although Votbinnik soon began to take rather more time on his.

The upshot was that the Machine made eleven moves before it started to take time to “think” at all.

Sandra clamored so excitedly to Dave for an explanation that she had two officials waving at her angrily.

As soon as he dared, Dave whispered, “Great must have banked on Votbinnik playing the French⁠—almost always does⁠—and fed all the variations of the French into the Machine’s ‘memory’ from M.C.O. and maybe some other books. So long as Votbinnik stuck to a known variation of the French, why, the Machine could play from memory without analyzing at all. Then when a strange move came along⁠—one that wasn’t in its memory⁠—only on the twelfth move yet!⁠—the Machine went back to analyzing, only now it’s taking longer and going deeper because it’s got more time⁠—six minutes a move, about. The only thing I wonder is why Great didn’t have the Machine do it in the first three games. It seems so obvious.”

Sandra ticketed that in her mind as a question for Doc. She slipped off to her room to write her “Don’t Let a Robot Get Your Goat” article (drawing heavily on Doc’s observations) and got back to the stands twenty minutes before the second time-control point. It was becoming a regular routine.

Votbinnik was a knight down⁠—almost certainly busted, Dave explained.

“It got terrifically complicated while you were gone,” he said. “A real Votbinnik position.”

“Only the Machine out-binniked him,” Bill finished.

Judy hummed Beethoven’s “Funeral March for the Death of a Hero.”

Nevertheless Votbinnik did not resign. The Machine sealed a move. Its board blacked out and Vanderhoef, with one of his assistants standing beside him to witness, privately read the move off a small indicator on the console. Tomorrow he would feed the move back into the Machine when play was resumed at the morning session.

Doc sealed a move too although he was two pawns down in his game against Grabo and looked tired to death.

“They don’t give up easily, do they?” Sandra observed to Dave. “They must really love the game. Or do they hate it?”

“When you get to psychology it’s all beyond me,” Dave replied. “Ask me something else.”

Sandra smiled. “Thank you, Dave,” she said. “I will.”

Come the morning session, Votbinnik