"Right both times--but you didn't find my absorption capsules. They weren't there. Never are. I have to go directly to the lab to get them. Of course I couldn't expect you to know that." "Then what are you doing here, alive?" he asked, frowning. "The wrong thing should have killed you." "I'm not a true deficient, you know. It's not that my body fails to produce glandular substances. What I lack is food and water and anything that's composed mostly of that will do, providing it's in a form I can assimilate. When you slapped me and held me up I saw someone else's capsule but I knew it would do. That person has trouble with a number of blood sugars and several fluids--not what I require for a complete diet--but it brought me out of the hunger shock." It was not ordinary hunger which had caused her to stumble and be unable to get up; this was acute, a trauma which affected her whole organism. And because it was such a constant threat, unconsciously or not, she had prepared for it. Deficients knew each other better than any other group. They were aware which prescription could in an emergency be substituted for their own. It was unlikely to be used--but that knowledge had paid off for Jeriann. The house ticked on as he sat watching her. That was another peculiarity of the place, aside from the lack of kitchen or any room wherein she could eat. She didn't need it and so it hadn't been built. She didn't feel hunger except negatively; it would be easy to die if she should decide to do so. And so, to reinforce her will to live, a comprehensive schedule had been imposed from above. But the most rigid personal schedule meant nothing without time. Time took the place of hunger, of the need for food, of all the savour in it. There were clocks on the wall, inconspicuous dials or larger ones, integrated in pictures and summed up in designs. There was a huge circular chronograph on the ceiling; hourglasses and sundials were contrived in the motif on the floor--and they all seemed actually to function. And when she slept or whether she didn't, there were arrangements for that too. The house vibrated, ever so softly, but the attuned senses could hear it, feel it, in sickness and in health. "Damn," muttered Jeriann as the vibration momentarily grew louder. She tried to say something to Docchi but her thoughts were confused and she couldn't concentrate. "Don't mind me," she said, smiling ruefully. "I was conditioned to this sort of thing. They seem to think I've got to be ready on the dot." She could see that it wasn't very clear. "There's a clock in my head too. Everybody has one naturally but mine has been trained. Any natural beat will regulate the self alarm, even the pounding of my heart, even if I don't think about it--but the house is more effective. _They_ said I had to have it if I expected to live."