Whose Body Is It, Anyway?
by Brandy Dewinter
Chapter 2 - Testing
Before we could say anything more, the screen on the communicator
panel came to life to show Professor Inchbod. His expression betrayed
disappointment for just an instant before becoming professionally neutral
again.
"Commander Xora, how is your adaptation coming?"
"Well, I hardly have a standard for comparison, but it seems to be
fine."
"Yes, well," the professor seemed to hesitate, as though he were
trying to decide whether to say something. Then he continued, but I
had the impression that he had decided not to say whatever had been on
his mind. "Please report to Testing Room 3."
"Yes, sir, um, sorry, yes, Professor," I replied, putting on my
uniform again.
I forgot that Titania could hear my thoughts as I mused, *I wonder
what that was all about.*
"By this time, Tryx had already returned to a normal human
appearance," Titania explained. "He is disappointed that you still
look like a commoner pairing."
"Oh, well, can you do something about that?" I asked. "And how
do you know so much about Tryx and, um, Bee?"
"I will certainly be doing something about your appearance," Titania
promised. Or was it a threat? Then she continued, "When you shook hands
with Command Tryx as we were leaving, I communicated with Bee through the
physical contact."
*Ah, that flicker of blackness,* I thought, forgetting once again
that Titania was listening.
"Precisely," she confirmed, a hint of smugness feeding on my
surprised twitch.
Even as I finished dressing, my featureless black skin seemed to
shimmer into invisibility. It was only on a second glance that I realized
it wasn't truly my face I was seeing, or at least, not the face I had seen
before this pairing. It was similar, but the texture of my skin was finer,
flawlessly smooth. And my hair was thicker, almost too long for male
uniform standards. I waited for the color to fade from midnight black to
my nondescript brown, but this hair retained the dark shine that had so
recently covered my entire body.
"Why, thank you, Titania," I said, pleased with both improvements.
"We are just beginning," Titania replied, but while her voice
retained the imperiousness that dominated her tone, the petulance had
given way to satisfaction.
I finished dressing and we left the room. As we walked to the
testing area, I felt a stiff constriction around my midsection.
*What are you doing now?* I asked.
"Continuing to work on your appearance," Titania replied. "You
will need a lot of work."
By the time they got to the testing area, my waist had been
compressed so tightly that I couldn't breathe without exaggerated heaving
in my shoulders.
"Stop that," Titania commanded. "I will supply you with
sufficient oxygen. Just hold yourself proudly, as befits my host."
There was a stiffening in my shoulders as they were pulled back
into an erect, military posture. My habitual slouch was banished along
with the, um, excess around my middle. As we reached the testing area,
I caught a glimpse of myself in a polished metal panel. It looked
artificial, the erect posture at odds with my round face and flabby arms.
Still, it showed more, oh, discipline I guess, than I had showed before;
definitely an improvement.
I pushed another raucous buzzer and was granted admittance to a
standard medical examination room. The attendant looked up from his
computer and said, "Can I help you?"
"I'm Commander Xora. I was told to report here."
"Um, there must be some mistake," the technician claimed. "I was
told Commander Xora was the host for a new symbiont pairing."
I just nodded. The technician waited for me to explain further,
but what could I say? I certainly didn't know what was going on.
After a moment, the technician machine-gunned some keystokes into
his computer and hit the enter key. He looked at me again, then shrugged.
"Well, if you say so, we might as well get started. This first
test . . ." turned out to be meaningless, I realized. Whatever the tech
was looking for, Titania provided regardless of what my real body might
have indicated. Or maybe that was wrong. Now, Titania was part of this
body. Whatever. It was confusing, to say the least. In the middle of
the testing, Professor Inchbod appeared.
As soon as the professor saw me, he said, "So, your adaptation IS
going to be a high order one."
"If you say so," I agreed, noncommittally.
"So far, only you and Commander Tryx present a normal human
appearance. Well, in the case of Commander Tryx, it's hardly normal,
but at least human. The other pairings all retain the smooth black
integument," explained Inchbod.
"Ah, well, as you can see, I have returned to normal, at least in
that regard."
"Yes, quite," the professor said, distracted by the results of the
tests he was reviewing.
"I didn't think you were in quite so good a shape as this," he
said after a moment.
"Indeed?" I said. A smug sense of pride once again intruded into
my thoughts from Titania.
"Yes, your heartbeat is quite low even during exercise, and your
respiration is steady. I would have expected you to be panting quite
heavily by now."
*Right,* I thought. *Like I could.*
*Stop whining,* Titania commanded.
"Very well," Inchbod declared, making a decision, "with one final
test, we will assume you have full physical integration. Through that
airlock is a hostile environment. Enter it, proceed to the far door,
and exit. If you can do that without ill effect, you'll be excused
from all further tests. At least, physical ones."
"What sort of environment?"
"Not immediately lethal, if that's what you're wondering," replied
Inchbod. "However, if you cannot adapt to it, you will find it
difficult to make it even as far as the other door. The robo-
attendants will protect you from any real harm, though."
*Great,* I grumped, but to myself. Then I "spoke" to my partner.
*I hope you're up to this.*
*It will be fine,* Titania promised. We proceeded to the airlock
door with apparent confidence, cycling through the first chamber as
quickly as the mechanism would permit.
On the far side, the first sensation was heat. Blistering heat
that would make touching any exposed metal an immediate cause for injury.
That sensation faded rapidly as my, um, our skin turned a shiny,
reflective silver. My uniform actually began to smolder as we walked
toward the far door.
I realized I had hardly been breathing for some time now, apparently
absorbing oxygen and rejecting carbon dioxide directly through my, uh,
our skin. *Damn, this is just to confusing. It is 'my skin' our 'our
skin' or 'me' or 'we' or what?*
*That is up to you. In symbiosis, those distinctions are
meaningless,* Titania lectured. Like I didn't know that already, at least
at an intellectual level. But my instincts certainly hadn't caught up
with my change, yet.
Somewhere in the course of those thoughts, they must have started a
second trial, but I didn't even realize it until Titania informed me.
"They're flooding the air with a powerful soporific. Don't worry,
though, I'm filtering it."
The final challenge appeared literally right beneath my feet. I
stepped into a thin pool of liquid without apparent problem, but when
both feet were in the pool and I tried to take another step, my boot was
welded to the floor.
*Cute,* I snorted. *Ultima-glue.*
*What?* This time it was Titania who was confused.
*Ultima-glue. It bonds to nearly anything, and is very powerful.
They're going to owe us a new pair of boots.*
I reached down to undo the fastenings on my boots, a task made not
one bit easier by the damn constriction around my belly. When I finally
had them loose, I asked Titania, *Can you keep us free of the glue, or do
I need to try and jump over the rest of the pool?*
*Put your bare hand down close to the pool, but don't touch it,*
she directed.
I did as I was told, something I was afraid was going to become
much too common. A tiny tendril of blackness extruded from our silver
coating and seemed to taste of the glue like a butterfly's delicate
tongue.
*This, I can handle,* she said after a moment. *Make sure your
uniform pants don't touch the liquid, but I can keep it from bonding to
your bare feet.*
I carefully stepped out of my boot, pulled off my sock, and put my
bare foot down in the middle of the slick pool. As promised, I was able
to withdraw it without hindrance. That gave me the confidence to step
out again and I went through the gyrations necessary to get my other foot
out of boot and sock and stand in the pool on both feet. Careful now
only of a sense of slickness, I moved steadily toward the far door. Maybe
my success with the glue was all the proof that was needed, because
Titania let me perceive that the heat in the room immediately began to
slacken once I showed that last challenge wouldn't stop me. She whispered
in my ear that the sleeping gas was also diminishing and by the time we
reached the far door I was back to a normal (well, somewhat improved)
appearance.
"Very good, Commander," Inchbod's voice sounded over a speaker in
the test chamber. I'll approve your request for a new pair of boots,
of course. Congratulations. I'll also inform Admiral Jones that you
have passed all my tests. You can expect a call from him in the morning."
"Thank you, Professor," I replied. *And thank you, Titania.*
As we made our barefoot way back to my quarters, Titania asked
me a question with no apparent relevance to the particular moment,
though much relevance to our overall situation. "Do you know the
difference between a symbiosis and parasitism?"
*Yes,* I answered silently. *In a symbiosis, both organisms benefit.*
"Quite," Titania agreed. "Our symbiosis occurs both at the
individual level, as with you and me, and at the cultural level. Why
do you suppose your people found my race, and not the other way
around?"
*I guess I hadn't given it much thought.*
Titania answered her own question before I dredged up any reasonable
response. "We are so good at adapting to our environment that we never
developed the skills to adapt our environment to ourselves. We are not
tool users. By joining our race to yours, we gain access to your tools."
*Ah, of course. I should have seen that.*
By this time we had reached my quarters. I took off the ruined
uniform and moved to the replicator to order another.
Titania interrupted me, "Wait a minute. I have a better idea."
The lifted eyebrow that signified my curiosity was somewhat
incongruous given my apparent isolation, but it worked. Titania
continued.
"You know that I am capable of forming clothing, given the
appropriate chemical supplies," she stated.
"Uh, no, I didn't know that," I disagreed, but of course I was
not really arguing.
"Indeed I am," she confirmed. "If you will ingest the following
materials, I can give you clothes that will meet any need. At least,
anything where the sheer volume of material is reasonable."
The list she gave me seemed daunting to say the least. Any one
of several of the compounds were surely fatal in quantities much less
than those specified.
"No offense, Titania, but I think we'll just stick with ordinary
clothes for now," I said, punching for a conventional uniform.
Before I had entered the entire command string, my arm was pulled
back to my side by an irresistible force. Simultaneously my legs seemed
to fuse together in a solid, tapering cone of hard, black plastic. In
seconds I was entombed in shining blackness, even my mouth filled to
painful dimensions with some sort of stiff mass.
"You WILL do as I say," Titania snarl boomed in my ears.
*I don't think so,* I disagreed, trying to remain calm. *It has
been obvious for some time that you can kill me. On the other hand, you
don't seem to be able to force me to move, only stop me from moving.
Well, I can choose not to do what you want just as easily.*
"Easily?" Titania repeated my comment. "I think not!"
The pressure about my waist that had already seemed impossibly strict
began to rise, accompanied by an equally-crushing compression of my entire
body. I would have screamed if I could, but my lungs had no air to fuel
the sound even if the wad in my mouth would have permitted it. Just as I
was sure my bones would be crushed from the pressure, it eased off as
though it had never existed.
"Now, will you order what I want?" she asked with haughty confidence.
*No,* I denied her, though if they'd have had the freedom to do it,
my knees would have been shaking. *I expect you can eventually break my
will, but you haven't done it yet. Partner.*
The accusation inherent in my last word struck deep at wherever
Titania's emotions formed. The rigid black cocoon constraining me melted
away into a normal human appearance.
"I'm sorry, Commander. You are right. I have made a commitment
to this team and I will honor that commitment."
With that, I canceled the order that was partially entered and
replaced it with the items Titania had desired.
"What? But you said you wouldn't do that, and I agreed," she
exclaimed, new and genuine confusion in her voice.
"Exactly. Once you agreed that we are a team, I knew you would
use these for our combined benefit and not just yours. I will not
have you as a parasite, but I will welcome you as a partner."
The items appeared in the replicator window and I gathered them
up, grimacing again at the witch's brew I was about to imbibe. Once
again, Titania stopped me before I completed the task I intended.
"Wait," she requested, and this time her tone made it clear that
it truly was a request. "We need to talk."
Another incongruously arched eyebrow from me and she continued.
"I told you that the symbiont called Bee is my brother, of sorts, didn't
I?" My thought confirmed her claim and she continued, "Well, it would be
at least as valid to say that he is my rival. He volunteered to be the
first of the nobility to pair with a human, when many thought you were
incapable of high-order communication. It would be a most dull and boring
existence to watch in lonely isolation, trying to keep your human half
out of trouble. Yet Bee agreed to give it a try, then succeeded beyond
our wildest hopes. Now, I need to do something to succeed as well, to
gain recognition for us to rival that given to Tryx."
"A worthy goal, I should think," I agreed.
"Not really," Titania admitted. "His sense of self can be satisfied
by merely helping Tryx, fulfilling her wishes about her physical body. I
need more than that. You can call me selfish if you will, but I know it
to be part of me."
I gave a sort of mental nod and asked, "So, what can I do to help?"
"Help? Me? After what I did to you?" Titania asked in surprise.
"Look, Titania, I am committed to this pairing, too. Both
physically, since I have no clue how to separate us and don't want to
try, but also emotionally. I want our pairing to be successful. I
have enough pride to want a little recognition as well. I've never
been blessed with an athlete's body and had other physical problems,
too. With your help, maybe I can overcome some of them."
Some sense of pride returned to Titania's voice as she declared,
"Well, I can certainly help with those."
My response to this promise was to reach once again for the chemicals
Titania had requested. This time there was no interference and I quickly
swallowed each one.
"Now what?" I asked, still more than a little worried about what I
had just done.
"I think you should just lie down and get some rest. You won't
really need physical rest anymore, I can easily remove any fatigue poisons
from your system, but it will be easier on you if you are unconscious
while I do what needs to be done. It will also provide an opportunity
for the psychic cleansing you call dreams."
I nodded and moved to my bunk, still apparently nude though actually
in a skin-tight covering that made my body essentially sexless. I wondered
if I'd ever again have an opportunity to use that particular tool again.
If I'd have known what was coming, that would have been the least of my
concerns.
(
geocities.com/b_dewinter/xtories) (
geocities.com/b_dewinter)