Part 1 (1/2)
Phaze Doubt.
by Piers Anthony.
1 - Lysander
Lysander found his a.s.signed seat in the shuttle as it commenced slow acceleration. The s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p had been a liner, with individual cabins for each pa.s.senger, but the planetary shuttle was cramped in the manner of an atmospheric transport. Well, he was used to tight quarters, after his time in the laboratory.
He hesitated, glancing at the young human woman in the adjacent seat. She was in the process of getting out of her dress by working it up past her legs and b.u.t.tocks. ”Please, excuse me, if it is not an imposition-”
She looked up at him, pausing in her labor. She had short curly black hair and dark brown pupils, in those respects almost matching him. But what was coming into view below didn't match. ”Am I embarra.s.sing you?” she inquired brightly.
”No, I am most interested. Your form strikes me as pulchritudinous.”
She blinked. ”What?”
Evidently he had used the wrong term. ”Of aesthetic outline. Comely. Subject to admiration. Incitive of s.e.xual ambition.”
She smiled. ”Attractive?”
”Yes, thank you. That must be the operative term.”
”You're not from this neighborhood,” she remarked.
”This is a perceptive observation. Indeed I am not. But you-you are a native of the upcoming planet?”
”Yes. In a manner. I'm a serf. We don't wear clothing.”
”Now I understand. I read the handbook. I will be a serf too, to earn what I need to be recognized as an independent individual. But would you be willing to exchange seats? I have little experience of planetfall and would like to gaze out the window.”
”Oh, of course. I've seen it before.” She got up and stepped to the center aisle, her dress remaining halfway up. Lysander took the seat she had occupied. Then she lifted her dress the rest of the way off, over her head, leaving only pink bra and panties. She was a well-endowed female, quite appealing in that limited outfit. She folded the dress carefully and took the outer seat.
”Thank you,” Lysander said. ”May I introduce myself? I am Lysander, from Planet Grenadier. I am a specialist in robot feed back circuitry.”
”Alyc,” she responded. ”That's A-L-Y-C, not ALICE. We serfs have little of our own except our names. I'm a.s.sistant what ever for Citizen Blue. Not in your cla.s.s, I guess.”
”Cla.s.s?”
”I'm not educated like you. I just help with housework and cooking and whatever, as I said. I never got beyond regular schooling.”
He smiled. ”There may be a misunderstanding. I did not have schooling. I am an android.”
She stared at him momentarily, startled. ”You're joking!”
”My humor is limited, as it is in all my kind. My body was generated in the laboratory.”
”But androids are, well, not smart. You don't talk at all like that!”
”Perhaps that is because my brain is fully organic. It was taken from a living creature and implanted in the android body in the manner of a cyborg. I was pre-educated in the laboratory so my only challenge was learning to use the body.”
”That's fascinating!” she said. ”I never heard of an android cyborg!”
”So as you understand, I am not in your cla.s.s, not being a proper man. I have existed in this form only two years.”
She was gazing at him with increasing interest. ”You haven't had social experience on your own world?”
”I am not entirely certain what you mean. I am conversant with the appropriate modes for eating, eliminating, sleeping-”
”Man/woman,” she said. ”Interaction.”
”I have been instructed on the mechanism for copulation.”
Alyc laughed. ”Dating. Dancing. Kissing.”
”The mechanisms for relating the local calendar to current events, or-” He saw by her expression that he was not reflecting her intent. ”I suspect not.”
”Would you like to start with me? I mean, until you get into things in Phaze?”
”Phase? To be in phase, or out of phase?”
She laughed again. ”Phaze. With a z. The magic part of Proton.”
”Magic? I think I must misunderstand.”
”So you don't know about that. Well, I guess they haven't bruited it about, offplanet. You'll see. But what I meant was whether you would like to be my boyfriend, until you find a girl of your intellect?”
”But you are full human!” he protested. ”My indoctrination is specific about the perils of miscegenation. I am obliged to inform any human person of my status as quasi-human.”
She turned earnestly to him. ”I am a serf. And you will be too. We're all equal, on Proton: humans, robots, cyborgs, androids, and aliens. All naked, too; will you be able to handle that?”
He frowned. ”The social-the types interact? I a.s.sumed that the social interaction was confined android to android, and man to woman, in practice.”
”You are a man, Lysander, as I'm sure I can show you. The only forbidden interaction is disobedience to a Citizen. Of course serfs don't normally marry, but they do have relations.h.i.+ps. So-” She looked at him questioningly.
”In that case, yes, I would like to be your social friend. As I remarked, your physique is attractive.”
”Oh, I'm so pleased!” she exclaimed. ”I'm sure it will be very nice, the little time it lasts.”
”These affiliations are of limited duration?”
”With me they are. You see, I like smart men, and I can attract them at first, but they always leave me for smarter women.”
”I apologize in advance for doing that.”
She started to laugh, but changed her mind, remembering that he wasn't much for humor. ”Well, let's make it count.” She leaned over to kiss him.
”Secure belts for landing.” It was the shuttle announcer system, giving warning of higher acceleration. The vessel had been accelerating at just under one gee throughout, backward, its jets toward the planet. In this manner it had reduced the momentum it had started with at the s.h.i.+p. But now it had to make planetfall, and that would require more than one gee.