Stepping inside the bathroom, he set the shower control to alternate
tepid and very warm. Instead it chose irresponsibly to alternate icy
and steaming, so that he leaped out with a yell. But the incident
didn't even scratch his mood. As he toweled himself (he didn't like the
air drier and toweling robots made him uneasy) he sang:
We're out in space, they've cut the jet,
There isn't any ceiling, floor, or wall.
Let's dance on air, or better yet--
Hug me, love me, darling, in free-fall!
He came out of the bathroom feeling like an emperor and fully
determined to inspect the world he owned, the world that was any
man's for the asking and a little courage. As he slipped on singlet,
trousers, sockasins and jacket, he explained his feelings to Lucky, who
had cleaned up every bit of his colorful meal.
"You see, it's this way, fellow: I've always been three-quarters dead.
But not any more. I'm through with being scared and stand-offish and
bored. No more filing, dial-watching, and tape-cutting jobs, with some
about-to-be-invented robot breathing down my neck. I'm just going out
and look things over, talk to people, find out what it's all about. I'm
going to have adventures, really live. Some program, eh? And you know
who's responsible for it, fellow? You are."
Lucky seemed fairly to fluoresce in appreciation. He fluffed his
gleaming green fur.
Phil wondered what time it was. His wrist-watch had gone dead
yesterday, the cranky thing, only five months after having the battery
replaced. He stuck his head out the window and looked up the dizzy gray
crack to where the portholes were tiny dots and the slit ended in a
ribbon of blue sky. Only the top floor to the east was yellow with true
sunlight, though the false sunlight from the sodium mirror circling the
earth to make evening light for this city was beginning to show about
eight stories down.
He scooped up Lucky without a thought of leaving him behind or a worry
as to the attention he might attract. But the verdant cat sprang from
his arms and made for the hall door, looking back as if to say, "I'm
right there with you and game for any adventure, too, but I don't need
a nurse."
Side by side they walked to the stairs and down to twenty-eight--the
overworked elevator stopped only at even-numbered floors. And there he
ran into Phoebe Filmer, play robe swishing and apparently headed for
the snack bar on twenty-eight.
"Hello, Miss Filmer," he heard himself say. "I've admired you for a
long time."
"You have?" she said, glancing at him sideways. "How did you know my
name?"
"Just asked the desk robot who the beautiful girl was in 28-303a."
She tittered with a faintly flirtatious contempt. "You don't talk to
the desk robot. You just punch buttons and it won't give out names when
you punch room numbers, unless you have a government key."
"I have a way with robots," Phil explained. "I win their confidence
with small talk."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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