"Rajnar Vajra - Passing the Arboli Test" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vajra Rajnar)

the food. We do _not_ play by usual rules! Here is the game: find the sphere
without touching or moving any cup, directly or indirectly."
"Well ... I've got a one-in-three chance of guessing right."
"You must not guess. You must _know_. This self leaves you to the
test." Then the Arboli was gone before I could ask any thing more.
I looked carefully at the cups. They weren't perfectly identical. Small
variations would've helped me immensely if I'd been able to observe more
carefully. Damn.
I couldn't touch the cups, but maybe I wouldn't have to. I noticed a
small lamp resting on a nearby cupboard. I unplugged the thing and re-plugged
it near the table. I turned the lamp on, held it hear the cups and tried to
spot a gumball-shaped silhouette inside of them.
No good. The material was too opaque.
I seriously considered cheating, but wasn't naive enough to believe
that I was unobserved -- not to mention that camera.
What had Water-Holder first said about the Test in general? Something
about "Mind and body." And "drink twice." That statement made me realize I was
thirsty. I looked around the kitchen, poking into a few cupboards until I
found a glass. I went to the sink and got some water.
Water. If the cups were really made of paper, if I soaked them, they
might sag until I could spot the ball. No. I'd been instructed not to touch
the cups, even indirectly.
With a drill, I could drill through the table from underneath. Now
_there_ was a practical idea. Practically imbecilic.
The water had a bitter taste and foul smell. At my home in Sunnyvale, I
filter my tap water into pure, clean H^2O and I'd forgotten how bad the stuff
can taste at this end of the Bay Area.
If I lifted one end of the table -- no, that would also be moving cups.
Ditto for shaking the table. Was the problem insolvable? What were my other
options?




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 Could I use sound somehow? Maybe, if I were a bat or a porpoise. How
about opening a window and hoping some breeze would blow the damn cups over?
Hell, that would also be moving the things indirectly....
Unconsciously, I brought the glass back to my lips, but the smell
reminded me the stuff wasn't fit to drink.
And that was it. So stupidly simple, I'd almost missed it.
"Your time for solving the puzzle has expired." Water-Holder, or a
twin, had reentered the room. "Are you prepared to identify the proper cup?"
"I am."
"Proceed."
I moved over to the table, put my nose near the cups, and said, "this
one."
From close range, bubblegum scent was wafting nicely though the porous
paper.
"Superb. You have now passed our Test. Please follow this self."