Out of Phaze

There was a pause. Then: 'Misinterpretation. We have no power over love. We shall free your body from captivity.'

Agape felt ready to melt with relief and gratitude. 'Thank you.'

'We like you.'

'But I understood you had no feelings!'

'It depends on individual programming. Some of us have emotion. We shall conduct you to Sheen, designated Mach's mother, who is a humanoid robot with feeling. Do not reveal our part in this to any other person.'

Agape realized that there could be severe repercussions if the Citizen Purple realized that the machines serving him had acted against his interest. 'I shall not reveal it.'

'Keep silent and follow the directions of our representatives. There are difficulties.'

She was sure there were! 'I like you too,' she said.

'We shall pass you through the water conveyance system,' the grille said. 'Water is mined beneath the Purple Mountains and piped to individual city-domes, where it is purified for potability. You must not enter the processing apparatus. Follow the tapping when you hear it.'

'But how long will that take?' she asked. 'I can go for a time without renewed oxygen, but – '

'Four hours immersion. Our analysis of your system indicates that this is within your tolerance.'

'Yes. But not far within. If there should be any delay – '

'We shall monitor the situation.'

Well, Mach had said to trust these machines. She would have to do so.

They took her down to a water pumping station. Here the pipes came up from below, where the dwindling fluid of Proton was mined, and fed into a cavern reservoir. On their instruction, she melted and entered the reservoir, then formed into a jellyfish shape and pumped her way across to the exit pipe. The pump was slowed so that she could enter without being torn apart, and the primary filtration screen was slid aside just long enough for her to pass. Once she was safely into the pipe, the pump resumed speed, and the water accelerated. She was on her way to the dome-city of Dradom, south of the Purple Mountains.

The water was cold. She had not thought of this; she was a warm-bodied life form, and the chill could kill her if it went too far. She hunched herself into globular form, becoming a sphere, conserving her heat as well as she could. In solid state she could exercise to generate heat, but she could not do so in this jellied state.

The cold penetrated her outer layer and closed relentlessly on her core. She realized that she was not going to make it; she had endured less than an hour, and had three hours to go. The machines might be monitoring her progress, but that meant they would be watching at the receiving station in Dradom; that would be too late.

She could not get out of the pipe; it was absolutely tight, for Proton could afford no leakage. And if it was possible to find a valve and operate it and get out, where would she be? Somewhere between stations, in the barrens of Proton, or underground. That was not a survival situation either.

She would have to change into fish-form and swim back to the reservoir, to alert the machines before she succumbed. They would have to find some other way to transport her, or warm the water. She didn't know whether they could do that.

She wrestled herself into shape, with a powerful tail and small guidance fins. She had only a vague notion of the proper form of a fish, never having anticipated the need to assume this form; it took time and concentration to mimic a given form perfectly, and advance preparation was necessary. That was why she always assumed the same human form; it was far easier than developing a credible new one. But the approximate form of the fish she could manage, and it should swim well enough.

She worked her flukes and commenced swimming against the flow. But she quickly realized that the flow was too strong; she could not swim fast enough to counter it, let alone make progress against it. Already she was warming with the effort, while actually being carried along backward.

Warming? There was the answer! She did not need to escape the pipe; she could swim down flow, heating herself, and making even better progress than planned.

She turned about and swam. She did not push harder than she needed to maintain her body heat. She knew she would arrive ahead of schedule, and in good order.

Then she began to suffer from oxygen shortage. She should have lasted the full time, but realized that the energy consumed in the shape-change and the swimming was exhausting her reserve at several times the anticipated rate. She was in trouble again.

She stopped swimming immediately, conserving her remaining oxygen. But the damage had already been done; she knew she did not have enough to carry her through.

She was in water; didn't that carry oxygen? In fact, it was made of oxygen, in part! If she could tap into that…

She worked on the fish form, generating gills. These were really a variant of the lungs she used in her human form, not too complicated to work out. She let the water flow through, but it really didn't move. She realized she had to swim to cause the water to move through the gills. Then it worked, and it was like breathing, less effective because she didn't have the gills down as well as she had the lungs, but good enough. It took less energy to swim than to walk on land, so the reduced efficiency of intake could be tolerated; she took in less oxygen but required less.

After another hour the water warmed. Evidently the pipe had emerged from the deep rock and was now at or near the surface, possibly even above it. The pipe was level or angled for a slight descent, to help the flow, but it had originated in the mountains, and now was at the level plain. Surely the sun was beating down on it, elevating the temperature. That relieved the problem of cold; now, recharged with oxygen and no longer needing to swim to generate heat, she could melt back into a ball and allow herself to be carried along.

She did so, and had a comfortable hour. But the temperature of the water continued to increase, making her uncomfortable. Heat was as bad as cold; worse, really, for her life-tolerance was not much above her normal body temperature. She could guard herself against cold by various mechanisms, but how could she keep cool when immersed in hot water? The threat of the Citizen to boil her in a big pot had appalled her; she would have been dead within minutes. Now –

She reassessed her situation. She was now in the fourth hour, closing on her destination. The water was heating slowly. If she relaxed totally, she might get through before it got too hot. That seemed to be her best and only course.

She found that the water was slightly cooler at the bottom of the pipe. She formed herself into an eel-shape and planed her way as low as she could, hugging the bottom. This helped.

The water stabilized. The pipe must now be in shadow. What a blessing!

She heard a tapping. She came alert; that was the signal! And in a moment she came to a division in the pipe; a smaller offshoot diverged, and the tapping was from its direction. She wriggled into it, flowing up to a narrow spigot. She squeezed through it, landing in a basin supervised by a testing machine.

She formed an eyestalk so that she could see more clearly. There were no serfs here; this unit was completely mechanized. Good; she formed into her full human shape.

'Go to the overseer's office,' the grille on the testing machine said. 'Follow the line.'

Agape looked, and saw the line. It traveled down the center of the chamber, and was evidently used to guide the less intelligent machines. She followed it out of the chamber and down a hall, and in due course came to the office.

'Assume this form,' a new grille told her. A picture flashed on the adjacent screen.

'But – but that's a man!' she protested.

'Is it beyond your ability?'

'No.' She realized that she had become too thoroughly wedded to the original human form she had assumed. She thought of herself as female, but she could have become a male. Probably the machines wanted to conceal her identity completely, and this was the way to do it.

She melted partially, drawing her hair and breasts back into her torso, then reformed to match the picture. It was holographic, slowly turning to reveal every detail, so this was not difficult. She hesitated when she studied the masculine penis, but realized that she could not afford to omit this detail. So, dismayed, she formed it and the attached scrotum.

'You are Sander, traveling to become the employee of Citizen Kumin. You are new to Proton. Avoid discussion beyond this subject.'