counselor, like, and help kids."
The Amazing Robotron turned into a pinball machine again, an unreadable andmotionless block. Silent for so long I thought he was gone, dead as a sardineinside his tin can. Then, he twitched both of his arms, like he was shivering.Then his robot-voice came out of the grille on his face. "I think that you wouldbe a ve-ry good coun-sel-or, Chet."
"Yeh?" I said. It was the first time that The Amazing Robotron had told me hethought I'd be good at anything. Hell, it was the first time he'd expressed_any_ opinion about anything I'd said.
"Yes, Chet. Be-ing a coun-sel-or is a ve-ry good way to help your-selfun-der-stand what we have done to you by put-ting you in the Cen-ter."
I couldn't speak. My Mom, before she fell silent, had often spoken about howunfair it was for me to be stuck here, because of something that she or myfather had done. But my father never seemed to notice me, and the teachers onthe vid made a point of not mentioning the bat-house -- like someone trying hardnot to notice a stutter or a wart, and you _knew_ that the best you could hopefor from them was pity.
"Be-ing a coun-sel-or is ve-ry hard, Chet. But coun-sel-ors sometimes get aspec-ial re-ward. Some-times, we get to help. Do you re-ally want to do this?"
"Yeh. Yes. I mean, it sounds good. You get to travel, right?"
The Amazing Robotron's idiot-lights rippled, something I came to recognize as achuckle, later. "Yes. Tra-vel is part of the job. I sug-gest that you start byex-am-in-ing your friends. See if you can fi-gure out why they do what they do."
I've used this trick on my kids. What do I know about their psychology? But youget one, you convince it to explain the rest to you. It helps. Counselors arealways from another world -- by the time the first generation raised in abat-house has grown old enough, there aren't any bats' children left to counselon their homeworld.
#
I take room-service, pizza and beer in an ice-bucket: pretentious, but betterthan sharing a dining-room with the menagerie. Am I becoming a racist?
No, no. I just need to focus on things human, during this vacation.
The food is disappointing. It's been years since I lay awake at night, craving aslice and a brew and a normal gravity and a life away from the bats.Nevertheless, the craving remained, buried, and resurfaced when I went over theroom-service menu. By the time the dumbwaiter in my room chimed, I waspractically drooling.
But by the time I take my second bite, it's just pizza and a brew.
I wonder if I will ever get to sleep, but when the time comes, my eyes close andif I dream, I don't remember it.
I get up and dress and send up for eggs and real Atlantic salmon and brown toastand a pitcher of coffee, then find myself unable to eat any of it. I make asandwich out of it and wrap it in napkins and stuff it into my day-pack alongwith a water-bottle and some sun-block.
It's a long walk up to the bat-house, but I should make it by nightfall.
#
Chet was up at 6h the next morning. His mom was already up, but she never sleptthat he could tell. She was clattering around the kitchen in her housecoat,emptying the cupboards and then re-stacking their contents for the thousandthtime. She shot him a look of something between fear and affection as he pulledon his shorts and a t-shirt, and he found himself hugging her waist. For asecond, it felt like she softened into his embrace, like she was going to saysomething, like it was normal, and then she picked up a plate and rubbed it witha towel and put it back into the cupboard.
Chet left without saying a word.
The bat-house breathed around him, a million farts and snores and whisperedwords. A lift was available almost before he took his finger off the summonbutton. "125," he said.
Chet walked to the door of the guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla and startedto knock, then put his hands down and sank down into a squat, with his backagainst it.
He must have dozed, because the next thing he knew, he was tipping overbackwards into the apt, and the guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla was standingover him, concerned.
"Are you all right, son?"
Chet stood, dusted himself off and looked at the floor. "Sorry, I didn't want todisturb you. . ."
"But you wanted to come back and see more. Marvelous! I applaud your curiosity,young sir. I have just taken the waters -- perhaps you would like to try?" Hegestured at the ocean.
"You mean, swim in it?"
"If you like. Myself, I find a snorkel and mask far superior. My set is up onthe rim, you're welcome to them, but I would ask you to chew a stick of thisbefore you get in." He tossed Chet a pack of gum. "It's an invention of my own-- chew a stick of that, and you can_not_ transmit any nasty bugs in your salivafor forty-eight hours. I hold a patent for it, of course, but my agents reportthat it has been met with crashing indifference in the Great Beyond."
Chet had been swimming before, in the urinary communal pools on the tenth andfifteenth levels, horsing around naked with his mates. Nudity was not a big dealfor the kids of the bat-house -- the kind of adult who you wouldn't trust insuch circumstances didn't end up in bat-houses -- the bugouts had a differentplace for them.
"Go on, lad, give it a try. It's simply marvelous, I tell you!"
Unsteadily, Chet climbed the spiral stairs leading up to the tank, clutching thehandrail, chewing the gum, which fizzed and sparked in his mouth. At the top,there was a small platform. Self-consciously, he stripped, then pulled on themask and snorkel that hung from a peg.
"Tighten the straps, boy!" the guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla shouted, fromfar, far below. "If water gets into the mask, just push at the top and blow outthrough your nose!"
Chet awkwardly lowered himself into the water. It was warm -- blood temperature-- and salty, and it fizzled a little on his skin, as though it, too, wereelectric.
He kept one hand on the snorkel, afraid that it would tip and fill with water,and then, slowly, slowly, relaxed on his belly, mask in the water, arms by hisside.
My god! It was like I was flying! It was like all the dreams I'd ever had, offlying, of hovering over an alien world, of my consciousness taking flight frommy body and sailing through the galaxy.
My hands were by my sides, out of view of the mask, and my legs were behind me.I couldn't see any of my body. My view stretched 8m down, an impossible,dizzying height. A narrow, elegant angelfish swam directly beneath me, andtickled my belly with one of its fins as it passed under.
I smiled, a huge grin, and it broke the seal on my mask, filling it with water.Calmly, as though I'd been doing it all my life, I pressed the top of my mask tomy forehead and blew out through my nose. My mask cleared of water.
I floated.
The only sound was my breathing, and distant, metallic _pink!_s from the ocean'sdepths. A school of iridescent purple fish swam past me, and I lazily kicked outafter them, following them to the edge of the coral reef that climbed the farwall of the ocean. When I reached it, I was overwhelmed by its complexity,millions upon millions of tiny little suckers depending from weird branches andmisshapen brains and stone roses.
I held my breath.
And I heard nothing. Not a sound, for the first time in all the time I had beenin the bat-house -- no distant shouts and mutters. I was alone, in a vast,personal silence, in a private ocean. My pulse beat under my skin. Tiny fishwriggled in the coral, tearing at the green fuzz that grew over it.
Slowly, I turned around and around. The ocean-wall that faced into the apt wassilvered on this side, reflecting back my little pale body to me. My headpounded, and I finally inhaled, and the sound of my breathing, harsh through thesnorkel, rang in my ears.
I spent an age in the water, holding my breath, chasing the fish, disembodied, aconsciousness on tour on an alien world.
The guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla brought me back. He waited on the rim ofthe tank until I swam near enough for him to touch, then he tapped me on theshoulder. I stuck my head up, and he said, "Time to get out, boy, I need to usethe ocean."
Reluctantly, I climbed out. He handed
me a towel.
I felt like I was still flying, atop the staircase on the ocean's edge. I feltlike I could trip slowly down the stairs, never quite touching them. I pulled onmy clothes, and they felt odd to me.
Carefully, forcing myself to grip the railing, I descended. The guy who thoughthe was Nicola Tesla stood at my side, not speaking, allowing me my reverie.
My hair was drying out, and starting to raise skywards, and the guy who thoughthe was Nicola Tesla went over to his apparatus and flipped a giant knife switch.The ocean stirred, a puff of sand rose from its bottom, and then, the coral onthe ocean's edge _moved_.
It squirmed and danced and writhed, startling the fish away from it, sheddinglayers of algae in a green cloud.
"It's my latest idea. I've found the electromagnetic frequencies that thevarious coral resonate on, and by using those as a carrier wave, I can