Robot Adept

Except for another problem: food. This was morning, and her body was hungry. Fleta had no idea how to operate the food dispenser, and no idea how to make Agape’s body eat. Mach could operate the food machine, but when she took food into her mouth, she discovered that she had no mechanism for swallowing; indeed, she had no throat. The body possessed a bellows mechanism for the inhalation and exhalation of air, for which the amoebic body had a need similar to that of the human body. Thus her chest rose and fell naturally, and she could speak normally. But that was all; she had no internal digestive system.

“She dissolves herself and covers the food,” Mach explained somewhat lamely. “When she’s done, she reforms her head and face.”

“Yuck,” Fleta said.

“Maybe you could dissolve the inside of your mouth, so you could digest a bite of food there, and then reform tongue and teeth afterward.”

“If I can’t see it, I doubt I can get it right,” she said. “I had better stick to what I have.”

“Maybe your feet, then. Dissolve them over the food, where no one else can see, and take your time.”

She tried that. He brought a bowl of mush, and she sat at the desk and put her feet on the mush. Soon they melted into shapelessness, and spread over the mush. Her flesh seemed to know what to do; she felt the effort of digestion and assimilation, and then the vigor of new energy traveling through her body. It was working!

When the mush was gone, she concentrated on reforming her feet, shaping them back into humanoid extremities. She had a fair idea how to do this, because of her practice in learning the human form as a unicorn. In due course her feet had been restored, and it was even possible to walk on them again. It seemed that Agape’s body had a design for bones and flesh, or the equivalent, and this was what she was drawing on.

That problem had been solved. Now she should be able to function. She sat at the desk and began her day’s work.

They were fortunate: no one came to the office that day, and there were no calls. Mach was able to brief her on many further details, so that she was beginning to feel halfway competent. It was true: an idiot—or a unicorn—could fill this position. She also developed better facility in eating, and learned how to eliminate by forming a ball of wastes inside, then softening her flesh to let it pass outside at the appropriate time and location.

But the effort had wearied her. By day’s end, she was eager to sleep.

She lay down to sleep. But as soon as she relaxed, she started to melt. Alarmed, she reformed herself and approached Mach. “I’m melting! I can’t sleep—I might dissolve away!”

He smiled reassuringly. “That’s why there is no camera coverage in that chamber; the machines saw to it that Bane and Agape were sent to an office that did not yet have full equipment. Agape is an amoeba; her natural form is a blob of protoplasm. Only when she is awake can she maintain humanoid form. Do not be concerned; you can reform when you wake.”

“But I be not sure I can find this exact shape again!” she wailed.

“I think the body has memory devices that enable it to return to prior forms, just as you have them for your unicorn forms. I will inform you of any deviance.”

“But what if I melt into the bed?”

“I don’t believe that will happen. Your surface retains its skin, which contains the fluids. Also, I suspect that the amoeboid form does not relinquish consciousness completely; it probably shores up its surface at need, to prevent seepage. Human beings perform similarly in sleep, not falling off beds and not releasing urine during sleep. Maintenance circuitry.”

Moderately reassured, she returned to the bed and let herself dissolve. Sure enough, she neither flowed off the bed nor released fluids into it as she slept. She woke after a few hours, refreshed.

Next day the worst happened: Tania stopped by the office. She was a buxom woman of about twenty-one, her somewhat plain face enhanced by an artful framing of luxurious hair. She was technically a serf, so was naked, but she carried herself as if clothed.

Mach stood absolutely still, a machine out of action, in an alcove in the wall. Fleta was at the desk, where she belonged; it was her duty to handle whatever tasks were required, such as providing information about the location of her employer, Citizen Tan. Fleta was of course aware of Tania’s identity; the woman had given it for admission to the office, and she matched her picture.

Tania eyed Fleta. Her eyes possessed a peculiar intensity; obviously in Phaze that would manifest as the evil eye. “Any news?” she asked curtly.

“No, Tania,” Fleta said, as Mach had told her.

The woman eyed her. Her eyes were the color of her hair and nails: tan. “Android, you will address me as Tan.”