Faust: “I assume you’re testing every leader before you pick a side. The interesting question is what order we fall in, in Mycroft’s estimation of our importance. They’ll have taken you to MASON first most likely, and Ancelet. Oh, I see you haven’t seen Ancelet yet?” I had not spotted the flinch or blink or lack thereof that let Faust guess this. “Fascinating. Mycroft, has Ancelet becoming a Humanist lowered them that much in your hierarchy of masters? Or… ah, I see, Ancelet is… never mind.”

Achilles: “What?”

Faust: “When I say never mind, I mean it.”

Achilles: “Do you have a sense of how and when the war will start?”

Faust: “All the others asked you that question, didn’t they? And now you’re asking me? No, I don’t know. I thought the Odessa mess might start it, or this Mitsubishi strike, but it might start when the Senate meets on Monday, or when the Cousins have their election, or when the Saneer-Weeksbooth trial starts, or when it ends, or if Spain refuses to let Europe make them an Emperor, or if someone says something stupid about Sniper in an interview, or if Mycroft here wanders outside and gets killed by an angry mob and MASON finally cracks. It could be anything. Normally I love suspense, but not this kind.”

Achilles: “What do you intend in all this, Faust?”

Faust: “In that particular sentence, the war, the prewar, or life in general?”

Achilles: “The war. Will you insist on vengeance for what O.S. has done against Gordian?”

Faust: “Vengeance isn’t useful. Participating in a political coalition, should one arise to address how to proceed, may be useful, depending. I take as yet no stand.”

Achilles: “Not even on set-sets?”

Faust: “Oh, one must take whatever opportunities one can regarding set-sets. That’s not even a question. Not to hurt the set-sets themselves, of course, they’re just clockwork tombstones testifying to past infanticide, no, it’s the abominable fools that make them that must be stopped. If convenient. If inconvenient, it can be postponed. The number of children unmade by set-set training is not large compared to the number who might be killed in riots if the issue is badly handled.”

Achilles: “Tell me, Faust, isn’t what your sister has done to Ganymede and Danaë and all her creatures brainwashing, just as much as making a set-set?”

Faust: “Yes. It’s a complex yes, but, in a nutshell, yes.”

Achilles: “Then I want to hear from you why a set-set is so much worse.”