Free Maximum Ice by Kay Kenyon

preserve had given over to the nuns for their interviews.
    The Hall of Ice Eyes was in darkness, except for the far end, where two of the great electric chandeliers were lit near the sisters. Kellian walked toward her interview, her obo at her side, creaking and mumbling. She tried to summon her wits. Her mother’s hasty advice still rang in her ears.
Be nice, Kellian. Those sisters won’t brook impudence from a twenty-two-year-old misfit, especially if she’s arrogant. Be nice.
    She would try very hard. It was her last chance.
    Slabs of Ice protruded through the gaps in the vaulted room, gaps they called windows in the first age of earth. Nearest the chandeliers the incursions danced with reflected light, lighting up a profusion of tiny surface crystals.
    There were two of the child-stealers waiting for her. Unlike other preserve families, the Bourassas had never given up a child to the sisters. It was a measure of Kellian’s disgrace that they hoped to do so today.
    “Now who?” the older sister said.
    “Kellian Bourassa, Sister,” the assistant said, reading from an activated scroll.
    The nun looked Kellian up and down. Though well over sixty, the woman appeared to have all-porcelain teeth, at least in front. A gnarled hand rested on a cane with an ornate handle. A finger was tapping, tapping…
    “I am Sister Patricia Margaret Logue,” the nun said. “I’d like to speak with you, Kellian. Don’t be nervous, just answer me the best you know how.” Sister paused. “You will say, ‘Yes, Sister.’ ”
    “Yes, Sister.”
    The other nun was young and cross- up the scroll and placed it in the folds of her robe. It was said the nuns carried all manner of tech about themselves, and the scroll reader was an example. They came to the preserves, snapping up the smartest recruits, setting them to the great task of their order: to interface with the computational programs of Ice. Someday, when the nuns programmed Ice to retreat, the preserve would dig through Ice as easy as scraping algae from the paddies.
    “You have a noisy obo, Kellian,” Sister Patricia Margaret said.
    “A noisy machine lets people step out of its way.”
    “Better that it avoid humans than humans it, don’t you think?”
    “No, obo3 is young, so it’s better being free to explore.”
    The assistant seemed displeased with that answer, but received a calming hand wave from her superior.
    Sister Patricia Margaret raised an eyebrow. “I understand the last time it
freely explored
, your obo blew a circuit that jeopardized half the preserve.”
    “Power was only out for twenty minutes, Sister.” And the obo got a priceless lesson it would never forget. But for her, the price had been banishment to the digs. It was a harsh sentence, imposed by the Group of Five themselves. They had long since given up on her, as her experiments failed to yield anything useful. Hypotechnic, they called her, suited for labor, not invention.
    The Group of Five couldn’t see past their potbellies.
    The younger sister didn’t look happy with anything Kellian said. Or perhaps she was just unhappy to be in the preserve, surely not the luxury she was accustomed to. She brought a small lace hankie to her nose now and then, as if the preserve actually smelled bad.
    “Sister?” Kellian spoke to the head nun. “Can my obo go walking? It isn’t often it gets the chance to learn in here.”
    Sister Patricia Margaret waved her hand in permission.
    Kellian looked down at her invention. “Go now, obo3. You can walk about.”
    It left her side, wheezing and scraping. Luckily it turned to the side and didn’t go bumping into the sisters.
    “Thank you, Sister,” Kellian said.
    “You won’t ask questions though, Kellian. I will ask, you will answer.”
    “Yes, Sister.”
    The nun stifled a yawn. “Sister, bring Kellian a chair. She’s tall, and I’m too weary to stand just now.”
    The assistant brought Kellian a chair, leaving it just out of reach.
    Sister