Destination: Void

"It just fitted the new socket and sensor into the hole," Flattery said.

"It brought the correct spare parts?" Bickel asked.

"It took the sensor I brought," Flattery said.

"It just took it from you?" Prudence asked.

"That's right."

"Prue, that test pulse is stronger," Bickel said. "Are you sure nothing on your board is doing it?"

She sca

"Job's finished," Flattery said. "What's the big board show, Prue?"

"Sensor in service," she said. "I can see you... and it."

"Try touching that new sensor, Raj," Bickel said.

"The thing damn near took my arm out the last time I tried that," Flattery objected.

"Use a tool," Bickel said. "Something long. You've got a telescoping radiation probe there."

Flattery looked into his robox unit, removed the telescoping probe. He extended it to its limit, reached toward the sensor, touched it.

The whip-arm flashed out of the other robox. There came a jolting shock and Flattery stared wide-eyed at the stump of the probe in his hand. The severed end drifted upward along the tube, tumbling from the force of the blow.

"Keee-rist!" That was Timberlake, proving they had the shop's screen switched to this circuit and were watching.

Flattery swallowed, spoke in a muffled voice: "If that'd been my arm..."

He stared at the other robox. It sat there, quiescent, its vid-eyes pointed toward him.

We're playing with fire, Flattery thought. We don't know what's guiding that robox. It could be a repair program we've accidentally activated. It could be something the Tin Egg's designers built into the ship.

"You'd better get out of there, Raj," Prudence said.

"No, wait!" Bickel said. "Raj, don't move. You hear me?"

"I hear you," Flattery said. He stared at the robox, realizing the thing could cut him in half with one blow from that whipping circuit probe.

The sound of distant activity came through the helmet phones to Flattery.

"I should have the full computer showing here," Bickel said, "but I can't find that damn robox anywhere on my board. There's not even pulse resonance in any of the loops to hint at the source of control."

"I can't stay out here forever," Flattery whispered.

"What's showing on the meters, Prue?" Bickel asked.

"Still getting computer drain... and that pulse."

"Raj has been outside the shields for sixteen minutes," Timberlake said. "Prue, what's the radiation tolerance level for his area?"

She crossed the comparison lines against the time gauge on her main board scope, read the difference. "He should be back inside the shield lock within thirty-eight minutes."

Movement up the tube caught Flattery's attention. The end of the radiation probe. It had reached the top of its energy curve, was begi

That minimal activity, that watchfulness, filled Flattery with greater dread than if the robox had attacked the length of tool and torn it apart. There was a sense of waiting about the thing - of waiting and gathering information.

"Raj." It was Bickel's voice.

"Yes?"

"Is there any information in the computer - even a hint - that you might destroy it?"

Did he send me out here to trap me into answering that question? Flattery asked himself. But the fear in Bickel's voice ruled out that suggestion.

"Why?" Flattery asked.

Bickel cleared his throat, told about the programmed violence against the cow embryo and the destructive experiment. "It was programmed to fill in the blanks in its information, Raj, and I put no limiting factor on that. The violence proves it'll stop at nothing to maintain its own integrity. If you pose any threat at all..."

"You're saying it's conscious?" Prue asked.

"Not the way we're conscious," Bickel said. "Like an animal - aware... and with at least one drive we can recognize: self-preservation."

"Raj, answer the question," Prudence said.

She knows the answer, Flattery thought. He could hear the awareness in her voice. Why doesn't she answer it for me?

"The computer may well have such information in it," Flattery said. And he thought: I'm trapped! I must get back to quarters, destroy this thing... it's already out of hand. But if I move, it'll kill me.

He stared at the robox. There was the thing that gave the computer mobility - the thousands of special-function utility robox units throughout the ship - even the one under his hands - if it were shifted to automatic and keyed for program control... and if a consciousness directed it. These were what gave the Ox-cum-computer its gonads and ovaries - these and the computer-linked tools.

"Would... it react with violence if Raj tried to move?" Prudence asked.

Silence.

"What about it, Bick?" Timberlake asked.

"Very likely," Bickel said. "You saw the violence it used when he tried to touch that sensor."

"What would you do if someone poked a finger in your eye?" Timberlake asked.

"It's approaching me," Flattery said, and he felt a flicker of pride at how calm his voice sounded.

"Stay put," Bickel said. "Tim! Take a cutting torch and -"

"I'm on my way," Timberlake said.

"Raj... I think your only hope's to play dead... remain absolutely still," Bickel said.

A sensor tip was in front of Flattery's eyes now and he found himself staring for a second into a baleful red and yellow glow. The tip retracted, and the robox backed off half a meter, clearing the repair unit by a hair.

"Let go of your own robox," Bickel whispered.

Flattery saw his own knuckles white with the force of their grip on the robox control bar. He relaxed the hand.

"Gravity will set you drifting presently back down the tube," Bickel whispered. "Just let it happen. Stay limp."

The motion was barely perceptible at first.

"The locks are part of the central system." That was Prue's voice. "What if they don't..."

She didn't finish the question, but it was obvious she, too, remembered how the rogue sphincter lock had crushed the life out of Anderson.

Now, Flattery could see he definitely was drifting back. The two robox units receded up the tube. And that sensor tip remained pointed at him.

The first lock passed his eyes. It had opened!

But the lock's transparent leaves remained open after his passage and that ambulant robox was following, hesitantly at first, then faster.

The AAT klaxon blared in Flattery's helmet, transmitted through the open net from Com-central.

"Oh, Jesus!" That was Prudence.

"Was the transceiver open?" That was Bickel.

"The message is already into the system," Prudence said. "We left it on automatic."

"Tim, where are you?" Bickel asked.

"At the hub lock," Timberlake said.

"Take the message, Prue," Bickel said. "Visio."

Relays clicked as she shunted the AAT to Com-central. Presently, she said: "Short and sweet. Hempstead tells us to cease ignoring communications. We are ordered to turn back and make no mistake about it. Odd choice of words: 'This is an arbitrary turn-back command.'"

"He knows what he can do with his arbitrary turn-back command," Bickel said.

At the sound of Prudence's voice, Flattery had gone cold. The chill of ice water gripped his chest. "Arbitrary turn-back command." It was the coded order he had both dreaded and almost longed for - the "kill-ship" command.