Till Death Makes a Monk-Fish Out of Me
by Mike Sousa (2002)
Genres: Science Fiction

Dr. Taylor's looking worried. Dr. Kurner's looking exhausted. Zak is grinning with glee. Today is the big day, and you're about to try out the crowning experiment of your life, and in AtlantisLab's chequered history. It's just a shame that it's not going to work. And you're unlikely to stay alive through the consequences. TILL DEATH... and then some.

action: %
response: "After you, Professor," Zak says, holding open the door. "Think - if this works you'll be standing on the surface in no time!"

"Yes, Zak, I know."

The floor is a tangle of cables running from the bank of heavy machinery to the man-sized glass cylinder in the corner; it's like a blender plugged into a car-battery in a giant's world. The whole arrangement looks suspiciously haphazard.

Dr. Kurner is already here, looking like he only just got out of bed.

The others enter behind you. "All set, Professor?" asks Zak, clapping you on the back. Taking your arm he helps you into the glass tube.
You don't need help, but this is a Momentous Occasion.
action: Winnable
response: This game is in a perpetual winnable state.
action: Review
response: (Review mode - time does not pass)

Cables feed away from the base of the glass to the bank of machinery outside, around which the scientists huddle and confer. Inside is your own little fish-tank; there's a grille to put your feet on, and some machinery at the top, and the Emergency Door Release Switch just about where your left hand is. They're all looking at you expectantly, perhaps waiting for a final speech before the glass slides shut...
action: You say
response: What do you want to say?
action: You talk
response: "Friends! This is a momentous day! I have prepared just a few words to be said on this occasion, if you will bear with me. There is a saying in my country: he who eats of the plum tree must wonder why he ..."

The glass door slides quickly shut. Your view of the scientists is somewhat obscured by a note, taped to the inside.
action: You examine the note
response: (first taking the note)
"Well, Professor. I suspect that from now on you will not prove a problem in my life any more. Your machine is under my control. Shall we say: if you are reading this, you are already dead."

"FIVE," booms the automated countdown voice.
action: You pull the release switch
response: You tug the release. Nothing results but a grating noise. It's broken!

"Hey - do you suppose it should be sparking like that?" Zak pipes up. The others tut and mutter.

"THREE." Power begins to build.
action: You look at Kurner
response: A sour man, five years your senior, but lower than you in rank. You vaguely remember him from college but don't think you ever spoke. Otherwise - he was down here when you arrived.

"And then there's quite a bit of smoke too, isn't there?"

"TWO." The cables on the floor wriggle like a squid.
action: You pull the cables
response: The cables aren't important.

"Maybe we should open it up and take a look?"

Dr. Kurner's attention is taken briefly by a school of fish passing by the window. No dedication, that man.

"ONE." The coils at the top of the cylinder make a searing noise.
action: Scream
response: Your words are muffled by the glass; which steams up as you shout. You could probably write in the condensation with a fingertip, though.

"Anyone got a screwdriver?" A few pat their pockets, and shrug.

"ZER-OH!" The machine blasts a spurt of searing white light, as though your head has come off. The scientists outside barely seem to notice as they hunt around for a coin to use in the screw-head. Just as everything fades fuzzily to black, you see Kurner stumble himself; then the world slides away...

Consciousness projection. They'd not said it couldn't be done, but they had said it was pretty unlikely. They'd not said you were mad, but they had said you were a little unusual, especially in your taste for sushi. But you knew, if anyone down in AtlantisLab needs anything, it's a holiday on the surface. Preferably a holiday as a twenty-two-year-old beach dweller.

Which is where you should be right now. It feels colder than Hawaii should this time of year. You have a slight headache. It's dark - so you open your eyes.
action: Scream
response: Your words are muffled by the glass; which steams up as you shout. You could probably write in the condensation with a fingertip, though.

Outside all the scientists gather around the machinery, intent; tapping gauges and nodding seriously. All except Dr. Kurner, that is, who stands off to one side, leaning heavily on a counter, staring at you.

"FOUR." There's a slight snigger sound just at the end; you remember laughing when you recorded that last week.
action: You write in the condensation
response: When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, write "in".
action: You write xyzzy
response: When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, write "xyzzy".
action: You look around
response: In a drawer, sitting up
You are sitting up in a long metal drawer, halfway up a large wall
of metal drawers. Most of the others are closed; yours is open. Below - about ten feet or so - is the floor of an unfamiliar room, with a door at the far end. The main features seem to be metal: metal ceiling, metal walls, metal piping along one side. Coupled with the dim lighting, this is definitely not Waikiki Beach, by any stretch of the imagination.

Your foot is itching.
action: You examine the foot
response: Tied tightly around your big toe is a tag. It reads "John Doe." Well, at least you know what name you should answer to.
action: You remove the tag
response: The toe tag is firmly attached.
action: About you
response: Well, you seem to be naked. This isn't your body either. So everything's gone to plan; except this doesn't look a lot like Hawaii.

Tied around your toe is a tag.
action: You get up
response: You stand up.
action: You examine the drawers
response: Your drawer is empty bar you, without even a sheet, and is labelled "John Doe" at the front. Looking around the others you see they're all labelled too - there's Jeremy Doe off to one side; Jack Doe a few
action: Inventory
response: levels up, and the lowest down you can read is Ms. Jenny Doe; who's about halfway to the ground. The surrounding drawers are all closed.

You have nothing, absolutely nothing. And you're cold as a consequence.
action: You open the drawer
response: Your drawer is already open.
action: Go outside
response: The ground is too far to jump!
action: You open the drawers
response: One at a time, please.
action: You open Jenny
response: It's too far below for you to reach the handle.
action: You open jeremy
response: You slide open Jeremy's drawer. He's inside, asleep. He seems to have a peg-leg.
action: You examinpeg-leg
response: The peg-leg is a tapering pole the length of one leg - more like a strut, really, or half a flamingo.
action: You get the leg
response: Taken.
action: You examine Jeremy
response: Jeremy is a large round-faced man, almost tubby, almost jovial in fact; apart from the missing leg which adds a sinister touch to the proceedings. He is naked, and asleep, and looks very comfortable somehow.
action: You open Jack
response: You stand up, and can easily reach Jack's drawer to slide it open.
Jack is inside, but he appears to be asleep.
action: You examine Jack
response: You can only really make out his feet from down here, but they're very still, so he must be fast asleep.
action: You wake jack
response: Don't wake him. He looks like he's sleeping real deeply.
action: You open Jenny
response: (with the peg-leg)
Hooking the drawer with Jeremy's leg, you slide it open. Poor old Jenny rolls into view. She looks positively knackered.
action: You look at Jenny
response: Jenny is a red-head, and a good-looking one too. If you weren't both naked, and lying in cold metal drawers halfway up a wall, you'd consider asking her out; just to irritate your wife.
action: You get in Jenny's drawer
response: The peg is far too cumbersome for this manoeuvre, so you first give it back to good old Jeremy next door.

It's a fair way down - so first you get a solid grip on the edge of your pallet, and then very gradually you slide off it. There's a moment of flailing before one toe meets her drawer. Slight kick in the ribs - you freeze - but she hasn't noticed. Lucky. Next foot, you can't see where it's going - oops, that felt like her head; you feel certain her eyes must open any second, you'll hear a complaint... no, no, somehow you get away with it. The next time you put it down it's more or less onto a clear space - bar some hair.

You let go of your drawer, now firmly astride Jenny's, and rub your hands. There's a deep shadowed groove in either palm from holding up your weight.
action: You examine Jenny
response: Jenny is a red-head, and a good-looking one too.
action: You examine the floor
response: It lies beneath you.
action: Kiss Jenny
response: She'd no doubt appreciate it, of course, given that she's probably quite lonely here. But you refrain, on grounds of hygiene.
action: Down
response: You make the final fall to the ground.

This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall.
action: You examine the hatch
response: The hatch is about three foot square and flush with the floor. Just by it is a circular recess in the wall.
action: You examine the compartments
response: The names read: Kathleen, Victoria, Charlotte and Rosalind.
action: You look at the recess
response: It's roughly ten centimeters wide and deep, and is barely a meter off the floor.
action: You open kathleen
response: You slide open the compartment. Inside is a trolley on which lies what is clearly a corpse. A transparent sheet covers face down to ankles, like it was wrapped in cling-film. Only the feet protrude - no tag. A little horrified, you slam the compartment closed.
action: Open Victoria
response: You quickly slide it open and shut -- same story as the other compartment.
action: You open Rosalind
response: Inside the compartment is an empty trolley.
action: You look at the trolley
response: The trolley is inside the compartment.
action: You take the trolley
response: You can't reach it from here.

You can't reach it from here.
action: You enter Rosalind
response: You enter Rosalind's compartment.

A metal box, seven foot by four foot by five, arranged such that you could lie down spread-eagled but stoop when you stand. The west wall is missing. In the middle of the floor is a low flat trolley.
action: You enter Rosalind
response: You're already in the compartment.
action: Go west
response: This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall.
action: You look at the trolley
response: Six feet long, three feet wide, it is essentially a tray on wheels.
The only additions are a rubber bumper at one end and a flat metal rectangle at the other. This is like the registration plate of a car, only blank.
action: You look at the bumper
response: You push the trolley west.

This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall.

An arc of thick rubber, designed for shock absorbance.
action: You look at the rectangle
response: It is just smooth metal.
action: You get on the trolley
response: You lie on the trolley. It's cold.
action: Look around
response: Bottom of ramp, on the trolley
This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall. In the middle of the floor is a low flat trolley.
action: You get off
response: (the trolley)
You get off the trolley.

This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall. In the middle of the floor is a low flat trolley.
action: Go north
response: This is a small stage, facing the stalls below down a ramp to the south, with the royal boxes on the wall above, reserved it seems for the Doe family. You could take your bow, lit by the spotlight-glow through the window, or slip offstage through the door just beside it. Just left of the door is a small device.
action: Bow
response: Anything for a little credit.
action: You examine the window
response: Across the glass in arcing letters is emblazoned: "YRAUTROM" (though the R's are a little strange). Which is - you're quite sure - a place in Jordan; and not a place in Hawaii.

It is bright in the corridor beyond, which smarts your eyes a little.
action: You look at the device
response: ** ERROR - Reset Required **

are printed on the tiny display. Near the display is a button.
action: You examine the device
response: are printed on the tiny display. Near the display is a button.

At the bottom of the ramp, a robot appears through the hatch.
action: You go south
response: This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall. In the middle of the floor is a low flat trolley.

The robot positions its hexagonal tube by the trolley base with a muffled clang. It then powers away up the ramp, pushing the trolley ahead of it.
action: You get on the trolley
response: It's too far away.

At the top of the ramp, the robot does something to make the door open, and slips through, pushing the trolley in front of it. Then the door slams shut.
action: You enter door
response: The door is sealed shut.
action: You look at your surroundings
response: This is a small stage, facing the stalls below down a ramp to the south, with the royal boxes on the wall above, reserved it seems for the Doe family. You could take your bow, lit by the spotlight-glow through the window, or slip offstage through the door just beside it. Just left of the door is a small device.

At the bottom of the ramp, a robot appears through the hatch.
action: You examine the door
response: It is locked, it seems. By the side, at shoulder height, is a black glass palm-scanner. Three feet below is a circular recess and to the left is a small device.

The robot - whose name appears to be Kathleen - rumbles up the ramp.
action: You examine the robot
response: This Hansome is Kathleen. It is shaped like a square coffee-table resting on one side. The two legs - or rather, arms - at the top each boast a shining disc, like eyes; though only one is a camera lens and the other is a stubby protrusion like a hockey puck. The two bottom prongs are run with caterpillar tracks. Slung between them is brown hexagonal tube.

The robot inserts its hockey puck into the circular recess and opens the door long enough for it to power through. Then the door slams shut.
action: Go south
response: This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall.
action: Open Victoria
response: You quickly slide it open and shut -- same story as the other compartment.
action: You wait
response: Time passes...

The hatch slides open long enough to spit out an orange robot.
action: You get on robot
response: There's no surface to clamber on.

The robot - whose name appears to be Victoria - rumbles up the ramp.
action: You get on robot
response: There's no surface to clamber on.

At the top of the ramp, the robot does something to make the door open, and slips through. Then the door slams shut.
action: You go to the east
response: You enter Rosalind's compartment.

A metal box, seven foot by four foot by five, arranged such that you could lie down spread-eagled but stoop when you stand. The west wall is missing.
action: You go north
response: This is a small stage, facing the stalls below down a ramp to the south, with the royal boxes on the wall above, reserved it seems for the Doe family. You could take your bow, lit by the spotlight-glow through the window, or slip offstage through the door just beside it. Just left of the door is a small device.

Through the hatch appears first a trolley, then a robot shepherd. In a deft volley of whirrs and flicks, it opens the Charlotte compartment with its extending arm and shoves the trolley inside, moving forward itself. The trolley bounces off the one already inside the compartment and comes to a rest in the room, behind the robot. The compartment door swings shut.
action: Go south
response: This is a thin room then, between the wall of square drawers like a tiling and another side of sheer metal, east and west respectively.
The floor is split-level; from where you stand a ramp leads up and northward, and light from a window there tumbles back down.

The drawers stop about five feet from ground-level; below are four compartments.

There is a smooth hatch set into the south wall. In the middle of the floor is a low flat trolley.

The robot - whose name appears to be Charlotte - rumbles up the ramp.
action: You get on the trolley
response: You clamber on.

The robot inserts its hockey puck into the circular recess and opens the door long enough for it to power through. Then the door slams shut.
action: You wait
response: Time passes...
action: You examine the compartments
response: The names read: Kathleen, Victoria, Charlotte and Rosalind.

The hatch open long enough to spit out Kathleen, again.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

Kathleen positions its hexagonal tube by the trolley base with a muffled clang. It then powers away up the ramp, taking you with it.

Top of ramp, on the trolley
This is a small stage, facing the stalls below down a ramp to the south, with the royal boxes on the wall above, reserved it seems for the Doe family. Above you is a circular recess which is attached to a door. Just left of the door is a small device.
action: Sing
response: What do you want to sing to?
action: You examine Kathleen
response: This Hansome is Kathleen. It is shaped like a square coffee-table resting on one side. The two legs - or rather, arms - at the top each boast a shining disc, like eyes; though only one is a camera lens and the other is a stubby protrusion like a hockey puck. The two bottom prongs are run with caterpillar tracks. Slung between them is brown hexagonal tube.

The robot extends its hockey puck to an absurd length, reaching over the trolley in front, to clip into the recess by the door. The entrance slides open, and it passes through, taking you with it.

Once in the corridor outside, you leap from the trolley before it, and the robot, power away.

The corridor curves southeast to southwest, smooth metal walls low
and merging over your head. Portholes splatter the north side like bullet-holes. A neon striplight runs the length of the corridor, lighting round the bends on either hand, but right now your eyes are elsewhere - drawn to the window of the room you have just left.
action: You look at the window
response: Here it is light, and there it is dark, and the glass acts as a mirror over which your haggard face looms. Only it is not your face. It is the face of Dr. Kurner. A moment of staring is not enough, and you stare some more. His nose is your nose, his eyes, wet and squinting, are your eyes, they move as you look over them. You feel the tightness of his skin around your mouth and cheekbones. And worse: his face is framed, like an advert for a circus clown, by an arcing title in large letters:

Dead! Ridiculous! You're not dead! You're standing upright. Indeed, you're breathing! Aren't you? There - you blow a long breath onto the glass, and a pool of condensation smokes it over. Alive. You're alive. And the sooner you can get back to your machine and get yourself back into your own skin, the better.

The robot pushes the trolley through the hatch in the southwest wall and disappears.
action: You look at the portholes
response: Through the portholes swim a variety of underwater fish, lit in the half-glow leaking from this dome.

The condensation on the window evaporates away.
action: You go west
response: The robot's hatch is closed.

The condensation on the window evaporates away.
action: You go to the east
response: The airlock is closed. And it doesn't look in good repair, either.

Through the door appears Victoria.
action: You go north
response: You can't go that way.

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: You look at the airlock
response: The airlock is circular, and damaged, with loose wiring hanging from the frame. Set in the centre is the access mechanism, above is a small square spyhole. The sight beyond it is not good - you can make out twisted metal, bent panels and wiring dripping from the ceiling like thick seaweed. It appears not to have been breached, though, as there is no water. Something moves about within: something large and orange.
action: You examine the mechanism
response: The mechanism is a large button marked ACCESS MECHANISM. Its functions are probably impaired by the sparking wiring hanging from the doorframe.
action: You examine the wiring
response: Two wires, crudely torn. They spark occasionally - and are quite possibly live!
action: You connect the wiring
response: Of course! If you electrocute yourself - if you die - then your consciousness will flip back to your original body! It's bound to, after all! And then your problem is solved! ... Though you'll still have to help Dr. Kurner, somehow, wherever he is. Excellent idea.

You steel your courage, raise your hand... and have a moment of doubt. Are you sure you want to do this?
action: Yes
response: You close your eyes, and close your hand around the two ends of the wires. There is a terrible sparking as electricity leaps between them, flowing blue lightning between your fingers, along your skin, down your palm!

However, due to Dr. Kurner's plastic prosthetic wrist replacement, it doesn't get much further than that. Your hand comes away, a little blackened.

The airlock door slides open.

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: Yes
response: It's good that you're feeling so positive.
action: You look at the hand
response: Your hand is the colour of your wife's baked potatoes.
action: You go east
response: You slip through the airlock, into a mangle of metal.

This was the eastern quadrant of the dome, but something has fallen away and it is now a mangle of sheets of metal, intersecting skew-like. About halfway along, the roof is so low to the floor as to admit a mere few centimeters of space between. Wiring hangs from the neon light, but only the first segment is still lit. Where the corridor is most crumpled, one of the panels underfoot is loose, rippling out from the floor. A large orange robot is whirring back and forth here. It is Rosalind.

You hear the rumbling sound of another robot in the corridor.
action: You look at the panel
response: One of the panels of flooring at the southern end of this area has stuck up from the floor, like the bone protruding from a broken leg; like a wafer in an ice-cream.

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.

Rosalind edges forward once more, away from the airlock.
action: You look under the panel
response: There's nothing under the panel.

The robot moves on down the corridor, until it hits the fallen roof.
action: You examine Rosalind
response: She has not survived the impact, either. Poor thing - you wonder how long she has been trapped here, whirring forward along the corridor until she can go no further, then back until caught in the pinched walls by the airlock.

Rosalind whirrs slowly across the corridor.
action: You get the panel
response: The panel is heavy, and one end is stuck in a pinch of metal, but this acts neatly as a hinge. You prop it with a clang against the wall.

Beyond is a dark hole in the flooring. Who knows how far a drop it might be, how long one might tumble before finally crunching to certain death on the floor?

The robot reaches the airlock, but cannot quite fit through the gap.
action: You enter the hole
response: You cross yourself once. This is it - a long jump - air whipped from your mouth - certain death on a solid flooring, who knows how far down. You can see nothing in there, it is black. Will they ever find this body? Who can say? You close your eyes and leap into the dark.

And land, an instant later, in a waist-deep hole.

You are waist-high in a hole in the floor, in the middle of a
corridor of mangled metal walls.

You hear Rosalind's trudging footsteps.
action: Go downward
response: The only exit is up.

You hear Rosalind's trudging footsteps.
action: Search hole
response: You find nothing of interest.

You hear Rosalind's trudging footsteps. With a loud rumble, the robot looms over your head, filling your vision the way a cloud can blot out the sun. You cower, raising your arms instinctively over your eyes, as Rosalind pitches forward into the hole...

But it seems the centre of those robots is just a sheet of orange paper, as it rips easily when it hits your head. A crash-smash later, you are standing in the debris of shattered robot, half filling the pit.
action: You examine the robot
response: Rosalind is in at least twelve parts, most bright orange, a few black, with wires spilling from several fissures. The debris is four inches deep.
action: You search debris
response: Amongst the orange parts you find the robot's hockey-puck arm, which you take.
action: You look at the arm
response: It's a two-inch long black cylinder, as wide as your prosthetic wrist. One end is marked with concentric ridges - that's the end that fits the hatch-locks. It must be telescopic, somehow, but you can't see a mechanism.
action: Pray
response: You pray and feel a bit better.
action: Up
response: You scramble out of the hole.

This was the eastern quadrant of the dome, but something has fallen away and it is now a mangle of sheets of metal, intersecting skew-like. About halfway along, the roof is so low to the floor as to admit a mere few centimeters of space between. Wiring hangs from the neon light, but only the first segment is still lit. The loose panel is propped against the wall, revealing a promising, deep hole into the bowels of the dome.
action: You examine the wiring
response: The wiring is dark and dead, like the hair of a drowned mermaid.
action: You pull it
response: The wires slip through your hands.

You hear the rumbling sound of another robot in the corridor.
action: You look around
response: This was the eastern quadrant of the dome, but something has fallen away and it is now a mangle of sheets of metal, intersecting skew-like. About halfway along, the roof is so low to the floor as to admit a mere few centimeters of space between. Wiring hangs from the neon light, but only the first segment is still lit. The loose panel is propped against the wall, revealing a promising, deep hole into the bowels of the dome.

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.
action: You go east
response: The only exit is west.
action: You go to the west
response: The corridor curves southeast to southwest, smooth metal walls low
and merging over your head. Portholes splatter the north side like bullet-holes. A neon striplight runs the length of the corridor, light leaking round the bends until it is cut on the west side by a robot-hatch, and on the east by an airlock door, which is open.

To the south is the door back to the mortuary, a black glass panel by its side.
action: You go west
response: The robot's hatch is closed.
action: You open hatch
response: The hatchway will not open, will not budge and will not slide either.

Through the door appears Victoria.
action: You put the arm in the recess
response: The hatch slides open for a brief moment, then slams shut. You put the arm in once more, and this time, slip through.

The western side of the dome, and an area not designed for human personnel. Robot hatches stand secure at the north and southern ends, the latter a little dented, perhaps in the same explosion that damaged the east side. Portholes peer out in the dark, their ring broken by a passage to the west, opposite an open archway to the east.

The norhern hatch flips open and out pops Victoria. She slowly lumbers southward, disappearing through the southern hatch.
action: Go north
response: The hatch is shut.
action: You put the arm in the recess
response: Which recess do you mean, the dented recess, or the circular recess?
action: You put the arm in circular recess
response: The hatch opens; you dart through.

The corridor curves southeast to southwest, smooth metal walls low
and merging over your head. Portholes splatter the north side like bullet-holes. A neon striplight runs the length of the corridor, light leaking round the bends until it is cut on the west side by a robot-hatch, and on the east by an airlock door, which is open.

To the south is the door back to the mortuary, a black glass panel by its side.
action: You put arm in recess
response: The hatch opens; you dart through.

The western side of the dome, and an area not designed for human personnel. Robot hatches stand secure at the north and southern ends, the latter a little dented, perhaps in the same explosion that damaged the east side. Portholes peer out in the dark, their ring broken by a passage to the west, opposite an open archway to the east.
action: You put the arm in the dented recess
response: There is a dull click. It seems not to want to work. There could be a hundred finicky mechanical reasons why.
action: Go west
response: This is just a short vestibule, from the airlock to the west to the main corridor back east. The airlock door is sealed, but looking through its panel, you can see a long corridor, leading off into the distance. This must be the umbilical to the rest of the lab.

You spot a robot trudging along the curving corridor, disappearing through the southern hatch.
action: You examine airlock
response: The door is sealed shut. You can make out the opening mechanism - on this door it's near the top, out of reach for stumpy Dr. Kurner and probably your old self too. Set into the centre of the door is a viewing panel.
action: You examine the mechanism
response: Nothing fancy, just a large button that you'd need to jab. You just can't reach it, that's all.
action: You go east
response: Without something to poke that catch with - a broom handle, or something - there's no way through that airlock. Hopefully you can find something, though; as that's the way back to the lab.

The western side of the dome, and an area not designed for human personnel. Robot hatches stand secure at the north and southern ends, the latter a little dented, perhaps in the same explosion that damaged the east side. Portholes peer out in the dark, their ring broken by a passage to the west, opposite an open archway to the east.

Kathleen slips through the northern hatch and moments later exits to the south.
action: Go south
response: That hatch is sealed to you, and likely to remain so.
action: Go north
response: The hatch is shut.
action: You put the arm in circular recess
response: The hatch opens; you dart through.

The corridor curves southeast to southwest, smooth metal walls low
and merging over your head. Portholes splatter the north side like bullet-holes. A neon striplight runs the length of the corridor, light leaking round the bends until it is cut on the west side by a robot-hatch, and on the east by an airlock door, which is open.

To the south is the door back to the mortuary, a black glass panel by its side.
action: Go south
response: The door is closed and locked.

Through the door appears Victoria.
action: You look at the door
response: It is locked, it seems. By the side, at shoulder height, is a black glass palm-scanner.

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: You look at the scanner
response: Flat black glass, a panel that uses all manner of fancy beams to read over your palm-print and check you are who you think you are. Unfortunately, it's not clever enough to realise you now think you are someone that you actually aren't. Or you think you are someone who you're not, but really are. Or something like that. Anyway, it's a pig-ignorant machine.
action: You touch the scanner
response: It bleeps red, displaying "PATTERN NOT IN DATABANK".
action: You look at your surroundings
response: The corridor curves southeast to southwest, smooth metal walls low
and merging over your head. Portholes splatter the north side like bullet-holes. A neon striplight runs the length of the corridor, light leaking round the bends until it is cut on the west side by a robot-hatch, and on the east by an airlock door, which is open.

To the south is the door back to the mortuary, a black glass panel by its side.
action: You examine the panel
response: Flat black glass, a panel that uses all manner of fancy beams to read over your palm-print and check you are who you think you are.

Through the door appears Charlotte.
action: You look at the arm
response: It's a two-inch long black cylinder, as wide as your prosthetic wrist. One end is marked with concentric ridges - that's the end that fits the hatch-locks. It must be telescopic, somehow, but you can't see a mechanism.

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: You pull the arm
response: You waggle and flip the cylinder, but it refuses to extend to its full length.
action: You look at the arm
response: It's a two-inch long black cylinder, as wide as your prosthetic wrist. One end is marked with concentric ridges - that's the end that fits the hatch-locks. It must be telescopic, somehow, but you can't see a mechanism.
action: You wear arm
response: You can't wear the robot arm.

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: You remove the hand
response: Your hand is firmly attached to you.
action: You wait a while
response: Time passes...

Through the door appears Victoria.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: You wait
response: Time passes...

Through the door appears Charlotte.

Time passes...

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.

Time passes...
action: You go east
response: You slip through the airlock, into a mangle of metal.

This was the eastern quadrant of the dome, but something has fallen away and it is now a mangle of sheets of metal, intersecting skew-like. About halfway along, the roof is so low to the floor as to admit a mere few centimeters of space between. Wiring hangs from the neon light, but only the first segment is still lit. The loose panel is propped against the wall, revealing a promising, deep hole into the bowels of the dome.
action: You go to the east
response: The only exit is west.

You hear the rumbling sound of another robot in the corridor.
action: Go downward
response: You leap into the dark and land, an instant later, in a waist-deep hole.

You are waist-high in a hole in the floor, in the middle of a
corridor of mangled metal walls. It's filled with the mangled rubble of robot parts, all a lurid orange.
action: You go to the south
response: The only exit is up.
action: You examine the hole
response: You are waist-high in a hole in the floor, in the middle of a corridor of mangled metal walls. It's filled with the mangled rubble of robot parts, all a lurid orange.
action: Go up
response: You scramble out of the hole.

This was the eastern quadrant of the dome, but something has fallen away and it is now a mangle of sheets of metal, intersecting skew-like. About halfway along, the roof is so low to the floor as to admit a mere few centimeters of space between. Wiring hangs from the neon light, but only the first segment is still lit. The loose panel is propped against the wall, revealing a promising, deep hole into the bowels of the dome.
action: Go west
response: The corridor curves southeast to southwest, smooth metal walls low
and merging over your head. Portholes splatter the north side like bullet-holes. A neon striplight runs the length of the corridor, light leaking round the bends until it is cut on the west side by a robot-hatch, and on the east by an airlock door, which is open.

To the south is the door back to the mortuary, a black glass panel by its side.

Through the door appears Victoria.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: Go south
response: The door is closed and locked.
action: You put arm in recess
response: The hatch opens; you dart through.

The western side of the dome, and an area not designed for human personnel. Robot hatches stand secure at the north and southern ends, the latter a little dented, perhaps in the same explosion that damaged the east side. Portholes peer out in the dark, their ring broken by a passage to the west, opposite an open archway to the east.
action: You go to the east
response: This appears to be the hub of the Hansome's world. Along one wall
runs a large computer bank, over which soft lights play in colours tailored for electric eyes. The far corner of the room contains a large glass cylinder that disappears through the ceiling; it is open at the bottom, where a coffin waits. The centre of the floor is taken up by a circular hatch marked "Waste Disposal". The juxtaposition is quite unpleasant, and if too much so, you could leave back west.
action: You examine the coffin
response: The coffin is a smart black number of regular height. It is unmarked, open, and waiting with a depressing certitude.

From the corridor, you hear the sound of the robot hatch opening and closing.
action: You look at the computer
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard, and a flat black palm scanner. However, your gaze is taken by one larger switch, marked with beautiful portent: PERSONAL DETONATION DISPENSEMENT.
action: You check what you're carrying
response: You have a robot arm.
action: You examine Switch
response: That switch should dole out swifter death than cyanide.
action: You switch Switch
response: It's already open.

I don't know how to switch the switch.

From the corridor, you hear the sound of the robot hatch opening and closing.
action: You look in the coffin
response: The coffin is empty.
action: You examine the cylinder
response: It's glass, and stretches upwards. During a funeral, the base seals, it fills with water and coffins are flushed out to be found and buried on land. You'd seen it before on the designs for this place, but never realised they'd been so heartless as to actually build the thing.
action: You get in the coffin
response: You made that mistake when you joined AtlantisLab. You're not doing it again.
action: You enter the cylinder
response: The coffin is in the way.
action: You move the coffin
response: You can't move the coffin.

The familiar swish-snap sound of the robot hatch gets your attention.
action: You pull Switch
response: You tug the switch. It sticks halfway, and a message appears on the screen: DISPENSEMENT SET. PROCEED VIA PERSONAL SETTING.
action: You examine the hatch
response: Ah, the eco-friendly waste system. A hatch, with a short tunnel, another hatch, and then the sea. Waste goes into through one door and is ejected into the water. Simple, effective, and self-cleaning. The waste disposal hatch is closed, and there is no immediately obvious control to change that.
action: You examine computer
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard, and a flat black palm scanner. The switch for the PDD is stuck half-way down. The screen is flashing something about setting a PERSONAL.
action: You touch the scanner
response: Of course, it probably won't be happy with your print. But you put your palm on the glass anyway.

The computer heaves and splats. You barely notice a squat oblong fire out from its base, because of a searing pain that shoots across your palm. You pull back your hand, to find you have been branded!
action: You look at the palm
response: Your palm contains a brand. Beneath it is inscribed "Press for detonation."

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.
action: Press brand
response: Your finger hovers over the contact. Eyes to palm, eyes to bomb. You can't help feeling it's a slightly extreme way to go. But you press the button anyway.

"!ERROR - PERSONAL WITHIN BLAST RADIUS!" screams a siren from just above your wrist.
action: You enter the coffin
response: You made that mistake when you joined AtlantisLab. You're not doing it again.
action: You examine brand
response: The brand is a small black button - a tattoo just left of your lifeline. Beneath it is inscribed "Press for detonation."
action: You look at the computer
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard, and a flat black palm scanner, slightly stained with your blood. The switch for the PDD is stuck half-way down. The screen is blank.

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.
action: You examine the blood
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard, and a flat black palm scanner, slightly stained with your blood. The switch for the PDD is stuck half-way down. The screen is blank.

You didn't think Dr. Kurner had any left.
action: Describe the surroundings
response: This appears to be the hub of the Hansome's world. Along one wall
runs a large computer bank, over which soft lights play in colours tailored for electric eyes. The far corner of the room contains a large glass cylinder that disappears through the ceiling; it is open at the bottom, where a coffin waits. The centre of the floor is taken up by a circular hatch marked "Waste Disposal". The juxtaposition is quite unpleasant, and if too much so, you could leave back west.

Sitting in the middle of the floor is a black oblong, with a single red light on top which blinks intermittently.
action: You examine oblong
response: Of course, "black oblong" is a marketing euphemism. It means "container capable of violent explosive self-destruction" or "Bomb".

It's small, black, and judging by the way it slid across the floor, very heavy. There is a single red light on top which blinks intermittently.
action: You take bomb
response: It's small, but it's heavy, and flat on the flat floor so you can't get your fingers underneath. (That's not helped, of course, by the fact you can barely bend your left palm thanks to the brand.)

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.
action: You examine the hatch
response: Ah, the eco-friendly waste system. A hatch, with a short tunnel, another hatch, and then the sea. Waste goes into through one door and is ejected into the water. Simple, effective, and self-cleaning. The waste disposal hatch is closed, and there is no immediately obvious control to change that.
action: Go west
response: The western side of the dome, and an area not designed for human personnel. Robot hatches stand secure at the north and southern ends, the latter a little dented, perhaps in the same explosion that damaged the east side. Portholes peer out in the dark, their ring broken by a passage to the west, opposite an open archway to the east.
action: Go south
response: That hatch is sealed to you, and likely to remain so.
action: You go west
response: This is just a short vestibule, from the airlock to the west to the main corridor back east. The airlock door is sealed, but you recall that a long corridor leads off into the distance.
action: Go east
response: The western side of the dome, and an area not designed for human personnel. Robot hatches stand secure at the north and southern ends, the latter a little dented, perhaps in the same explosion that damaged the east side. Portholes peer out in the dark, their ring broken by a passage to the west, opposite an open archway to the east.

The norhern hatch flips open and out pops Kathleen. She slowly lumbers southward, disappearing through the southern hatch.
action: You look at what you're carrying with you
response: You have a robot arm.

Your left palm has been branded with a button.

You hear the rumbling sound of another robot in the corridor.
action: You look at the door
response: It is locked, it seems. By the side, at shoulder height, is a black glass palm-scanner.
action: You toucthe palm-scanner
response: It bleeps red, displaying "PATTERN NOT IN DATABANK".

Through the door appears Victoria.
action: Go south
response: The door is closed and locked.

The robot opens the hatch and rumbles through.
action: You look at the portholes
response: Through the portholes swim a variety of underwater fish, lit in the half-glow leaking from this dome.
action: You break the cylinder
response: You'll have to tell me how to do that.

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.
action: You examine computer
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard, and a flat black palm scanner, slightly stained with your blood. The switch for the PDD is stuck half-way down. The screen is blank.
action: You examine the recess
response: Much like the others you've seen. Around the circumference are marked small lines.
action: You put the arm in the recess
response: You clip the robot arm into the circular recess. The screen lights up with a list of names.
action: You examine the screen
response: The list on the screen reads:
DOE, JACK
DOE, JENNY
DOE, JEREMY
DOE, JOSEPHINE
DOE, JULIA
DOE, JOHN

Jack's name is currently blinking.

The familiar swish-snap sound of the robot hatch gets your attention.
action: You look at the computer
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard from which protrudes a broken robot arm and a flat black palm scanner, slightly stained with your blood. The switch for the PDD is stuck half-way down. The screen is displaying a list of names. One - "JACK" - is flashing.

The red light on the black oblong winks.
action: You put the arm in recess
response: The robot arm is already in the recess!
action: You look at the recess
response: The arm protrudes from the recess like a broken spur from a wrecked ship. Around the circumference are marked small lines.
action: You pull arm
response: You unclip the arm from the recess. The screen flashes: "PROCESSING... PROCESSING... READY", then falls dark.
action: You check your inventory
response: You have a robot arm.

Your left palm has been branded with a button.
action: You press the button
response: You press the small black button.

"!ERROR - PERSONAL WITHIN BLAST RADIUS!" screams a siren from just above your wrist.
action: You examine the screen
response: The list on the screen reads:
DOE, JENNY
DOE, JEREMY
DOE, JOSEPHINE
DOE, JULIA
DOE, JOHN

Jenny's name is currently blinking.
action: Look around
response: This appears to be the hub of the Hansome's world. Along one wall
runs a large computer bank, over which soft lights play in colours tailored for electric eyes. The far corner of the room contains a large glass cylinder that disappears through the ceiling; it is open at the bottom, where a coffin waits. The centre of the floor is taken up by a circular hatch marked "Waste Disposal". The juxtaposition is quite unpleasant, and if too much so, you could leave back west.

Sitting in the middle of the floor is a black oblong, with a single red light on top which blinks intermittently.

You hear the familiar snap of the robot hatch echo in the corridor.
You turn and spot Kathleen, connected to trolley, trudging along the corridor.
action: You put the arm in recess
response: You unclip the arm from the recess. The screen flashes: "PROCESSING... PROCESSING... SYSTEM BUSY", then falls dark.

Kathleen enters the room, pushing a trolley in front of it. On the trolley lies Jack Doe.

You clip the robot arm into the circular recess. The screen lights up with a list of names.

The robot pushes the trolley over to the coffin, performs an ingenious twist, and the body slides in.
action: You pull Switch
response: It doesn't budge.

The robot flips the coffin shut. The glass cylinder seals, and in a great spiral of water rather too much like a submarine toilet, the coffin is ejected outwards and upwards. You can't help noticing its panel was never engraved. An empty coffin slides into place, by some mechanism too fast for your watery eyes to follow.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

Kathleen turns tail and leaves the room, pushing its empty trolley before it.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

From the corridor outside you hear the swish-snap of the robot hatch.
action: You wait for a while
response: Time passes...

The red light on the black oblong winks.
action: You examine computer
response: The computer has one main screen, a circular recess to serve as a monodigital keyboard from which protrudes a broken robot arm and a flat black palm scanner, slightly stained with your blood. The switch for the PDD is stuck half-way down. The screen is displaying a list of names. One - "JENNY" - is flashing.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

The familiar swish-snap sound of the robot hatch gets your attention.
action: You wait
response: Time passes...

Time passes...

Time passes...

You hear the familiar snap of the robot hatch echo in the corridor.
You turn and spot Kathleen, connected to trolley, trudging along the corridor.

Time passes...

Kathleen enters the room, pushing a trolley in front of it. On the trolley lies Jenny Doe.
action: You wait awhile
response: Time passes...

The robot transfers the body to the coffin.
action: You wait for a while
response: Time passes...

The robot flips the coffin shut, and it is ejected, presumably into the sea above.
action: You wait for a while
response: Time passes...

Kathleen turns tail and leaves the room, pushing its empty trolley before it.

You hear a great rumbling under the floor.
action: You listen
response: You can hear the low hum emanating from the computer bank.
action: You put the arm in recess
response: You clip the robot arm into the circular recess. The screen lights up with a list of names.

From the corridor, you hear the sound of the robot hatch opening and closing.
action: You examine the screen
response: The list on the screen reads:
DOE, JEREMY
DOE, JOSEPHINE
DOE, JULIA
DOE, JOHN

Jeremy's name is currently blinking.
action: You turn the arm
response: You turn the arm one notch, and the name JOHN in the list begins to blink.

The familiar swish-snap sound of the robot hatch gets your attention.
action: You take the arm
response: You unclip the arm from the recess. The screen flashes: "PROCESSING... PROCESSING... READY", then falls dark.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

You hear the familiar snap of the robot hatch echo in the corridor.
You turn and spot Victoria, connected to trolley, trudging along the corridor.
action: Wait
response: Time passes...

Victoria enters the room, pushing a trolley in front of it, on which lies Jeremy and Jeremy's peg-leg. It is heading for the coffin, but there is a sudden loud grumbling from under the floor and the robot stops dead. Before you spot the connection between the trolley's position and the waste-disposal hatch, the trolley has been tipped up by a neat shudder of Victoria's lower limbs and Jeremy has slid down in the compartment in the floor. The coffin remains empty, and appears not to have noticed that's its snack has been thrown away by the waiter.

The robot motors quietly out of the room westward, leaving the trolley behind, lolling flat on the floor once more. The waste-disposal hatch slides shut. Or, well, almost shut. Jeremy's peg-leg protrudes, obstructing the closing of the cover.
action: You get the leg
response: The hatch has gripped it obliquely, and it's trapped on something inside the compartment (an armpit, perhaps).
action: You open hatch
response: You pull at the hatch, but don't have quite enough strength to move it with your hands. Jeremy's peg-leg slides a bit toward you.
action: You get the leg
response: You lever open the hatch with the peg-leg, which finally comes free in your hands.

Inside, your eyes are met by an appalling sight. Jeremy is crumpled in the bottom of the compartment, whose lower door is not sealed, but rather filled by a thick green sludge, which oozes between his splayed limbs.

And as you look down, the sludge looks up. You leap back.
action: You examine the sludge
response: You lean back toward the hole.

There is a surge of movement from inside the hatch, and then an eruption of cobalt goop as a tentacle surges out. It feels at the air, back and forth like the foil of a fencer, swiping toward your face.
You recoil, stumble, fall back flat upon the trolley. The suckers, blood-tipped already, follow the sound, soon hovering mere inches from your face.
action: You use the computer
response: Trolley-very-fast-squid-flood, remember?

Behind you the tentacle is still coming. It's almost upon you. The flood door is now half-way to the floor.

In a final surge, you crash toward the flood door, and sweep through just before it rams home. There is a colossal thud from behind as the squid hammers into it. But it holds. The trolley rockets calmly into a wall, and you are thrown painfully, rolling further down the corridor where it bends to the north, head spinning with legs. It is a while before you take in your surroundings once more.

You're in the main module, and that means you know your way around
with your eyes shut. With your eyes open you can also comment on the decor; and note that it improves substantially to the east where the General has his office, to the west it probably disimproves (Kurner's hole is over there) and north leads toward the centre of the dome which means one thing - toward the room with your machine.

Back south is a long corridor.
action: You go to the west
response: The corridor continues around the curve of the base to the
northwest, to the rooms of the various scientists. This one is of interest though, perhaps - it is the door to Kurner's room - chosen by lottery, it is the nearest to all the machinery and so the loudest to be in.

The door itself is quite a sight if you like hybridised tech - Kurner being the paranoiac he is has fitted it with a Russian retinal scanner, a thumb-reader and a voice tag detector.
action: You unlock door
response: There's a pretty formidable array of locks on the thing!
action: You put the hand on the reader
response: The door chimes happily.
action: You look in the scanner
response: The door pings happily.
action: You examine the microphone
response: Just a microphone to read in a code-word. Known to be temperamental most people don't trust these to anything you actually want to be able to get into. Kurner himself always has problems because he insists on whispering his password. Eventually he'll just yell "SCARECROW" and pretend it was a curse at the door's failures.
action: Go west
response: The corridor continues northwest and Kurner's room is directly north. The intersection lies east.
action: You go north
response: Ironic, really, that if he'd just had a keyhole you'd never have broken in.

Dr. Kurner's Office
- is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.

From the floor one fragment of paper catches your eye. It reads: "If you are reading this, then, by Jove, it's all up with you!"
action: You look at the paper
response: There are about a hundred scraps of paper littered around. You pick one at random to read:

"If you are reading this, death is imminent!!!"
action: You examine paper
response: "By the time you read this, my dear friend, death is your only alibi!!!"
action: You examine paper
response: "If you are reading this, you are quite simply doomed!"
action: You look at the paper
response: "When you wrap your head round this, your doom approaches!!"
action: You look at the books
response: 80% are "Physics for Beginners", 18% are "Biochemistry for Beginners" and 1 book is a biography of Judy Garland.
action: You examine computer
response: "Type password:"
action: You read the biography
response: No, don't. You really don't want to know what Kurner's hidden behind that appalling dust-jacket.
action: You search the books
response: You've read most before. And they're mostly trash.
action: You search the bed
response: You find books...
action: You look under bed
response: The morass of paper continues that way. Perhaps in the darkness it is growing more slowly.
action: You get the biography
response: No - someone might see you with it.
action: Search paper
response: "If you are reading this, death is your only alibi!"
action: You look around
response: Dr. Kurner's Office
- is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
action: You look at the desk
response: The desk is cleared but for the computer, the screen and keyboard built into the surface. There is also a drawer, with a small metal lock.
action: You examine computer
response: It's locked.

"Type password:"
action: You look at the keyboard
response: Standard.
action: You examine the clothing
response: It's all about your (current) size.
action: Search clothing
response: You hunt around, hoping to find a drawer key. But it's likely to be small, and, well, you don't find it.
action: You go west
response: (Opening the bathroom door)
Bathroom
Standard cubby-hole bathroom really. A sink, toilet, and a greasy mirror reflecting the steam-stained beige walls in all their smudged glory. The door - should you tire of such an atmospheric locale - is back east.
action: Flush toilet
response: You flush the toilet.
action: You examine the mirror
response: Kurner's harassed and ugly mush looks back at you. You can't help noticing he looks a little pale - but then everyone here does, it's lack of sunlight. Once again you curse your machine for not having put you sea-side.
action: You examine the walls
response: The beige walls compliment the room nicely. No, really...
action: Break mirror
response: You'll have to tell me how to do that.

The condensation on the mirror evaporates away.
action: You breathe on the mirror
response: You breathe on the mirror and a pool of condensation forms. Your previous message "xyzzy" is now visible on the mirror.
action: You examine the mirror
response: Kurner's harassed and ugly mush looks back at you. You can't help noticing he looks a little pale - but then everyone here does, it's lack of sunlight. Once again you curse your machine for not having put you sea-side. You can make out "xyzzy" scribbled in big chunky fat-child finger-writing in the condensation.

The condensation on the mirror evaporates away.
action: Go east
response: Dr. Kurner's Office
- is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
action: Go south
response: The corridor continues around the curve of the base to the
northwest, to the rooms of the various scientists. This one is of interest though, perhaps - it is the door to Kurner's room - chosen by lottery, it is the nearest to all the machinery and so the loudest to be in.

The door itself is quite a sight if you like hybridised tech - Kurner being the paranoiac he is has fitted it with a Russian retinal scanner, a thumb-reader and a voice tag detector.
action: You go east
response: You're in the main module, and that means you know your way around
with your eyes shut. With your eyes open you can also comment on the decor; and note that it improves substantially to the east where the General has his office, to the west it probably disimproves (Kurner's hole is over there) and north leads toward the centre of the dome which means one thing - toward the room with your machine.

Back south is a long corridor.
action: Go east
response: A familiar waiting room - when you first joined AtlantisLab you'd be here every month as you worked your way up the security clearances. Ironic, in a way, that you were only two chevrons from finding out what all that electro-plasma and virus engineering was for when you'd mooted your Project and been booted into a whole new department. Just goes to show, it seems, that even the most dedicated people need a holiday, and the General himself was no doubt very much looking forward to stepping inside your machine and spending a fortnight on a beach in someone else's head.

Of course he, like all the others, and yourself, was expecting it to work.
action: Go east
response: The General's door is closed.
action: You open the door
response: It's locked, very heavily, with many a large key.
action: You go north
response: You walk along a fairly long stretch of corridor, until it opens out.

gods of pressure - this room, unlike the cramped corridors and tight bunkrooms, is a wide cathedral-like dome, held up by one fat pillar in the centre of the floor. A smooth ramp snakes around it on a gentle incline up to the higher levels - no stairs here, the robots not being that adept - and on a normal day the floor around would be crowded with scientists, like worshippers at a standing stone. However today - for some reason, it seems - is not a normal day. Where is everyone?

Corridors leave the space in all directions - Kurner's room is down the passage further south.
action: Go east
response: There's nothing of great interest there. Besides, you don't really want to bump into anyone, you look terrible.
action: Up
response: You climb the great spiral of the ramp, round and round until you're sure the ground is screwing in and you're not going anywhere...

You know you're in favour when your personal lab is put on the first level of the building. It's behind that door to the south, the one only you have the key to. Except, of course, you haven't got it, because you're inside the room. Or you might be. Anyway, the door seems to still be open, which is handy.

A loose panel hangs from the doorframe - it seems it's incurred some damage since you were last here.

The ramp which leads back down to the main room is north.

There's a screwdriver lying on the floor.

A lab coat is crumpled in the corner. You're shivering, and quickly put it on.
action: You examine the handle
response: The yellow plastic handle is charred, and a little deformed.
action: You examine the panel
response: The panel is about two inches by four, and hangs from one screw revealing the wiring inside. Which, now you look, is certainly not how is should be.
action: You look at the wiring
response: There are two wires running under the panel, down to the keyhole. They have been ripped up from their sockets, the ends bared; presumably they were then twisted together to make the door unlock.

Whoever did this has since tried to repair the damage - the first wire is jammed back into their socket. But with one wire connected the other would have been sparking with a lot of electricity. It's strangely dead, now. Perhaps the fuse was blown by a surge.

More importantly though, someone has hotwired your door whilst you've been away.
action: Review
response: (Review mode - time does not pass)

You know you're in favour when your personal lab is put on the first level of the building. It's behind that door to the south, the one only you have the key to. Except, of course, you haven't got it, because you're inside the room. Or you might be. Anyway, the door seems to still be open, which is handy.

A loose panel hangs from the doorframe - it seems it's incurred some damage since you were last here.

The ramp which leads back down to the main room is north.
action: Go south
response: You enter your lab.

The room is much as you left it; a porthole above a bank of heavy machinery. The glass cylinder stands in one corner, aloof and empty.

You can't help noticing with something verging on a nervous tick above one eye that a terminal case has had its lock smashed open.
action: You examine terminal
response: The terminal lock has been broken, shattered off, with a few dents in the metal left behind. These dents are about a half-centimeter long, and thin, like the blade of a screwdriver.
action: You look in it
response: (opening the case first)
Inside the case is all the familiar circuitry and wiring - and then one addition to the family. A black plastic box sits on the base of the terminal, with a multi-strand wire coming out of the side, its connections soldered onto the circuit boards. You recognise the manufacture. It's exactly like the modules Dr. Kurner was building for you, it's his characteristic habit of hiding all his work inside moulded boxes so no-one can see it and criticise.

But what's it doing here? You last checked over the machine last night, it wasn't here then. In the morning - well, Kurner was already here, wasn't he? So whatever happened to your machine - whatever you're doing in this non-sunshine state - it's his doing. And you're not going to be able to get back to your own body with this machine unless you find out what he's done.
action: You get the box
response: The box is firmly soldered into the machine. You'd need proper tools if you were going to remove it. Probably easier, then, to get it open and rewire it inside.
action: You examine the cylinder
response: The cylinder is all rigged up and ready from the experiment, the door open.
action: Examine box
response: The box gives no clues, it's a smooth firm black. They'll be a catch on it, somewhere, that's how Kurner designs these things, but quite where - well. You could hunt for several hours or you could go and find a design plan and work it out. That'd tell you what it was for, too.
action: You enter the cylinder
response: You step inside the cylinder.

Cables feed away from the base of the cylinder. Inside, there's the grille for your feet, and the Emergency Door Release Switch.
action: You examine Switch
response: The Emergency Release Switch - provided in the terrible off-chance that the door release cover might fail, or be sabotaged, or any such.
action: Leave
response: You step out of the cylinder.

The room is much as you left it; a porthole above a bank of heavy machinery. The glass cylinder stands in one corner, aloof and empty.

One terminal case is violently unlocked.
action: You go north
response: You know you're in favour when your personal lab is put on the first level of the building. It's behind that door to the south, the one only you have the key to. Except, of course, you haven't got it, because you're inside the room. Or you might be. Anyway, the door seems to still be open, which is handy.

A loose panel hangs from the doorframe - it seems it's incurred some damage since you were last here.

The ramp which leads back down to the main room is north.
action: Go downward
response: You make your way down the ramp...

gods of pressure - this room, unlike the cramped corridors and tight bunkrooms, is a wide cathedral-like dome, held up by one fat pillar in the centre of the floor. A smooth ramp snakes around it on a gentle incline up to the higher levels - no stairs here, the robots not being that adept - and on a normal day the floor around would be crowded with scientists, like worshippers at a standing stone. However today - for some reason, it seems - is not a normal day. Where is everyone?

Corridors leave the space in all directions - Kurner's room is down the passage further south.
action: You go south
response: You walk back down the corridor.

You're in the main module, and that means you know your way around
with your eyes shut. With your eyes open you can also comment on the decor; and note that it improves substantially to the east where the General has his office, to the west it probably disimproves (Kurner's hole is over there) and north leads toward the centre of the dome which means one thing - toward the room with your machine.

Back south is a long corridor.
action: You go to the west
response: The corridor continues around the curve of the base to the
northwest, to the rooms of the various scientists. This one is of interest though, perhaps - it is the door to Kurner's room - chosen by lottery, it is the nearest to all the machinery and so the loudest to be in.

The door itself is quite a sight if you like hybridised tech - Kurner being the paranoiac he is has fitted it with a Russian retinal scanner, a thumb-reader and a voice tag detector.
action: Go north
response: Dr. Kurner's Office
- is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
action: You examine computer
response: "Type password:"
action: Search desk
response: A glint catches your eye, but it turns out to be the silver button on a particularly hideous shiny-purple shirt. You toss it aside.
action: You search floor
response: Books, clothes, papers -- a mess, really.
action: Review
response: (Review mode - time does not pass)

Dr. Kurner's Office
- is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
action: You look at the drawer
response: It's locked.
action: You check what you're carrying
response: You have a lab coat (being worn) and a screwdriver.

Your left palm has been branded with a button.
action: You go west
response: Standard cubby-hole bathroom really. A sink, toilet, and a greasy mirror reflecting the steam-stained beige walls in all their smudged glory. The door - should you tire of such an atmospheric locale - is back east.
action: You examine the toilet
response: You can learn about those things yourself.
action: You breathe on the porthole
response: You breathe on the portholes and a pool of condensation forms.
action: You examine the portholes
response: Through the portholes swim a variety of underwater fish.
action: Go east
response: You can exit Kurner's room by going south. The bathroom is west.
action: You type nothing
response: When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, type "nothing".
action: Go east
response: The door to the General's office itself is to the east. This room isn't really a room, it's more just an expansion of the corridor westwards, with the walls hung with deep curtains and a couple of leather sofas stuck in the middle of the floorspace. In one corner there used to stand a potted plant, but as budget cuts meant saving on electricity it quickly died in the glow of forty-watt bulbs.

In place of the plant is a Stat machine.
action: You examine the curtains
response: They're deep blue, like the sea, and hung to cover the otherwise utilitarian walls.
action: You look behind the curtains
response: Behind the curtains is propped what you assume are a few cleaning tools - a floor waxer and a metal rod with a plate on the end.
action: You get the metal detector
response: Taken.
action: You get the waxer
response: It's far to heavy.
action: You examine the machine
response: A panel for your hand, and then once read it'll tell you on a need-to-know basis all you need to know. By one side is a notice listing all the current clearances: "1 - General Huffing. 2 - Dr. Kurner, Prof. Taylor". 3 is your old group, and contains most of the established members of the team. Zak still loiters in a class by himself, no. 12, mainly due to his mother being Ukrainian and the General being somewhat old-school.
action: You touch panel
response: Clearance 2: CONFIRMED
*Plasma virus-injection complete
*Virus tests on rodent subjects complete
*Results show 250% growth - see Dr. Taylor for details.
WARNING - CONTAINER LOSS REPORTED

Container loss! Well, that would explain why Taylor had that "car keys down the gutter" expression all last week.

The screen falls dark as you remove your hand.
action: You examine the detector
response: It's called a "Cosmetic" apparently, in another one of those horribly garbled nicknames that are currently all the range. (Anyone for a Coocla? Or a game of Bammon?)  It has a switch on one side, a four-foot handle pole and a rounded plate at the base.
action: You wave it
response: You could take someone's eye out with that! (If their eye was about a foot wide).
action: You turn it on
response: Bleep!
action: You point it at the clothes
response: Nothing.
action: You point it at the books
response: Bleep!

Hunting more thoroughly leads you to locate a small key under the dust jacket of a hideous looking volume.

You find nothing else.
action: You unlock the drawer with the key
response: Unlocked.
action: You open the drawer
response: Opened.

In the drawer you see a pill-bottle and a notepad.
action: You look athe pill-bottle
response: It's labelled in gibberish: "TAXI MALLO BALUO:" and so forth.
action: You open the bottle
response: Of course! An overdose on strange medicines! That'd take you out faster than it did your aunt! (Who was rushed to hospital, revived, but then died of food-poisoning from a bunch of grapes).

You open the bottle, to reveal a large number of pink tablets.
action: You eat the tablets
response: You swallow a fistful, noting they are cherry flavoured. Then you wait.

One.

Two.

Zmigra.

Chank.

Zis qua! Lil betite monkrane follo! Ze chafi lighan mucho blanchos, y ca merhaba ftang flivaro-toaster. Milcha! San omb-bomba ze anse le tabbycat-rrr.

>ANSE TABBYCAT-RRR

La ranja se: "ProtoFrench lessons. Dosage: one tablet last five minutes. Try to avoid taking more than twenty a day. Do not take with alcohol or whilst in control of aircraft or heavy equipment. Do not feed to children. Do not use as fertiliser, or vitamin supplement. Do not sue the manufacturer for misunderstandings."

The shock of comprehension lasts well after the severe nausea and stomach cramp has passed, and you come around, feeling well. The drug - a ProtoFrench class, presumably imported from Europe itself - has slackened its grip on the language centres of your brain leaving you with just a mild dyslexia when you look around.
action: You look at the notepad
response: "He is there. He was there. He will be there. He has been there. He might well be there. He shall be there. The password is dog. The password was dog. The password will be dog. The password has been..."

And so on.
action: You look at the computer
response: It's unreadable.

You feel a slight shadow pass across your eyes as your brain is repaired to Native Tongue once more.
action: You go west
response: Standard cubby-hole bathroom really. A sink, toilet, and a greasy mirror reflecting the steam-stained beige walls in all their smudged glory. The door - should you tire of such an atmospheric locale - is back east.
action: You write the dog
response: When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, write "dog".
action: You examine the mirror
response: Kurner's harassed and ugly mush looks back at you. You can't help noticing he looks a little pale - but then everyone here does, it's lack of sunlight. Once again you curse your machine for not having put you sea-side. You can make out "dog" scribbled in big chunky fat-child finger-writing in the condensation.

The condensation on the mirror evaporates away.
action: You eat the pill
response: You swallow a pill, and wait a second until the pain in your brain indicates effect.
action: You wait for a while
response: Time passes...

The brain-pain subsides.

Time passes...

Time passes...

Time passes...
action: You examine the mirror
response: Kurner's harassed and ugly mush looks back at you. You can't help noticing he looks a little pale - but then everyone here does, it's lack of sunlight. Once again you curse your machine for not having put you sea-side.
action: You breathe on mirror
response: You breathe on the mirror and a pool of condensation forms. The word "CHYNE" is now visible on the mirror.
action: Go east
response: Dr. Kurner's Office
- is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
action: You examine the screen
response: It's changed to white, just plain white. There should be a selection of program buttons - and a logout - which you'd touch to activate the applications. (The "mouse" went out of fashion as soon as people were willing to have fine enough electrodes implanted in their index fingers). But there's nothing visible here.
action: You touch the screen
response: You jab the screen randomly and eventually hit the logout button at the bottom left of the screen, which you spot by the way it blinks blue before returning the screen to

"Enter password:"

It must have been white-on-white.
action: Type chyne
response: When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, type "chyne".
action: You touch top left
response: The screen changes.
action: You examine the screen
response: On the screen is a collection of Dr. Kurner's documents - mostly uninteresting; work reports, one is apparently the first draft of a novel called "Vengeance is my Sister". There is one open already - and it catches your eye.

It is the design for a black-box module with a multistrand wire feed that looks not a whole lot unlike the one plugged into your beloved upstairs. You skim over the opening mechanism and make a note of it, before ploughing into the circuits themselves.

Quickly the patterns form. The search processes have been altered - no longer the first-mind-in-set-location pattern you'd programmed, but rather a nearest-to-base scan. And the criteria - you'd demanded a certain age, fitness, and suntan level for your subject. Kurner's level is set for ... good grief...

That explains it then. That box must have been in place this morning, when you stepped into the machine. It's set up to find the nearest dead body it can and transfer. Thinking back - didn't Kurner collapse when the machine fired? Maybe he had a heart attack or something, then machine transferred you in.

Only one thing to do then. Get back to the machine, and reprogram that box to get you back.
action: You touch the screen
response: Nothing else happens.
action: You touch bottom left
response: "Enter password:"
action: You touch the top right
response: Nothing happens.
action: You go to the east
response: You're in the main module, and that means you know your way around
with your eyes shut. With your eyes open you can also comment on the decor; and note that it improves substantially to the east where the General has his office, to the west it probably disimproves (Kurner's hole is over there) and north leads toward the centre of the dome which means one thing - toward the room with your machine.

Back south is a long corridor.

Joe the janitor saunters in from the east corridor. "Well, there it is!" he exclaims. "I've been looking for that." He removes the Cosmetic from your hand with a frown of reproach. "I know you scientists are the bigwigs here, but I wish you'd ask first."

"Say, Dr. Kurner, are you ill?" He smiles. "I guess you're nervous about the Big Day. I'll let you get on." With that - and with the metal detector - he whistles his way off westwards.

Big Day?
action: Up
response: You climb the great spiral of the ramp, round and round until you're sure the ground is screwing in and you're not going anywhere...

You know you're in favour when your personal lab is put on the first level of the building. It's behind that door to the south, the one only you have the key to. Except, of course, you haven't got it, because you're inside the room. Or you might be. Anyway, the door seems to still be open, which is handy.

A loose panel hangs from the doorframe - it seems it's incurred some damage since you were last here.

The ramp which leads back down to the main room is north.
action: You go south
response: You enter your lab.

The room is much as you left it; a porthole above a bank of heavy machinery. The glass cylinder stands in one corner, aloof and empty.

One terminal case is violently unlocked.
action: Examine box
response: You kneel down by the terminal case and begin to feel for the various catches which control the opening mechanism. There's one - the next - you feel one side start to pivot round, which is a good sign.

Suddenly there is a noise from the door. You stand up sharply, wheel around.

"Oh, hi there, Dr. Kurner!" exclaims Zak cheerily, from the doorway.
He has a screwdriver held between his teeth and is working on something in the doorframe. "Something went wrong with the door; I'm just refusing it. Be with you in a second."
action: You tell Zak about yourself
response: "Hold on a sec Doc -- almost done here," says Zak.
action: You open the box
response: You freeze as Zak shouts "Morning, Professor!" And sure enough, through the door enters yourself, looking spritely, excited, well. You stagger back in shock against the machine, in front of the damaged terminal case. There is a moment of eye-contact, but the Professor - you - don't seem to react.

The others on the project enter the room and start to fiddle with the machinery. As the Professor pauses to gaze in proud awe at his construction, Zak winks your way and whispers "Good thing I got that door fixed, eh?"

"All set, Professor?" Zak takes his arm - your arm is supporting your weight against the terminal due to the weakness entering your body as suddenly it all comes become clear. "Nearest-search". Any physicist knows "near" isn't just a three-dimensional concept.

"FIVE". "FOUR".

"Hey - do you suppose it should be sparking like that?" Zak pipes up.

It is sparking, too, but you're not thinking about that, you're desperately trying to work out what happens next.

"And then there's quite a bit of smoke too, isn't there?"

Dr. Kurner's box wasn't well programmed enough to cope with this - with an empty mind-sack next to a host containing its mind. Not only that but the machine is still performing it's primary search too, just secondary to Kurner's implanted approach.

"Maybe we should open it up and take a look?"

And to cap it all - you've just seen a cable at the top of the machine which is plugged into completely the wrong socket.

A school of fish swims past the window.

"Anyone got a screwdriver?" A few pat their pockets, and shrug.

"ZERO."

Your eyes flip open, to a flash of your face in glass. Then the air sears once more. Bug in my program, you think. What happens now?

No other way to put it. Our myriad eyes see it a hundred different ways; a million little angles on the same rocks below, the same lights distant and near. It all spins sickly, too much information, too much speed, every bit of changing direction constantly. We are swimming, around in and about each other.

A snuttlenose swims by.

The school flicks about and swims northeast.

From way above trickles light. To the south is the dome.
action: About yourself
response: We are multiple, all seeing. We see ourself and the world at once, it is all placed out. We are fish.
action: Frolic
response: We don't understand.

The school flicks about and swims southward.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
action: You go to the south
response: In a pulse we move south.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.

Jagged rocks blade from the sand here.
action: You look at the rocks
response: They are rugged and ripped, protruding like spines through the sand.

An allamander passes us in eerie silence.

The school flicks about and swims westward.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
action: You go south
response: The dome blocks us swimming.

A squid passes us in eerie silence.
action: Examine dome
response: The dome is a huge bulge of copper on the seabed. We do not understand it, it is just rock, shape of land, movement of speed of water. A metal corridor snakes out of it eastward toward a smaller dome, with a glass chimney at its top. It is the mortuary block and near it blackness moves.

Floating through the blue comes a finn.
action: You go east
response: The school trails eastward.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue. We are near a window in a large metal dome just to the south.

Floating through the blue comes an angel.
action: You look at the angel
response: The angel swims out of reach -- and not to our disappointment.

The school flicks about and swims northwest.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
action: Go south
response: We fin south.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue. We are near a window in a large metal dome just to the south.

A cuttlesprout swims by.

With a snap one of our school is gone. Suddenly we can't remember our father's face.
action: You look at the window
response: We see our reflection.

A calarta swims by.

The school flicks about and swims in many directions before joining us again.

The dome is south. We are in blue.
action: Go east
response: We fin east.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.

This is ridiculous. We can't spend our life as a shoal of fish. We need to get back, and fast.
action: Examine dome
response: The dome is a huge bulge of copper on the seabed. We do not understand it, it is just rock, shape of land, movement of speed of water. A metal corridor snakes out of it eastward toward a smaller dome, with a glass chimney at its top. It is the mortuary block and near it blackness moves.

The school flicks about and swims westward.

From way above trickles light. To the south is the dome.
action: Go east
response: The school trails eastward.

The dome is south. We are in blue.
action: You go east
response: We swim east.

The dome is south. We are in blue.
action: Go upwards
response: We are up and down as well. We are a school, and wide, and shape changing always.

The school flicks about and swims northward.

The dome is south. We are in blue.
action: You examine the chimney
response: The Mortuary dome is broken, some walls have collapsed under a great dark weight we cannot see clearly, with moving eyes and confusion.

An angel passes us in eerie silence.
action: You look at weight
response: It is blackness over the mortuary.

A shrake swims by.

The school is fished, we are piece-eaten. Strangely our name has gone missing.

There are a good few hundred in this school. It will take forever to be eaten by other fish.

The school flicks about and swims northwest.

To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
action: You eat yourself
response: We are too many.
action: You eat the weight
response: We try but we just don't know how.

An octopus swims by.
action: You go south
response: We swim south.

From way above trickles light. To the south is the dome. We are above a long corridor of metal leading toward the mortuary.

A calarta swims by.
action: Go east
response: We fin over the dome of mortuary, where the metal turns black with a heaving darkness.

Our motion sets a rustle in the water like the waving of seaweed and some of the shoal tries to leave in a panic. The darkness below is moving. It's coming nearer. It's rushing from the seabed in a motion like the unfolding of the earth. It is a giant, wrapping hand, that our kaleidoscope eyes see from all sides and form into a huge rounded trunk in our mind. The whole object encompasses us until a mouth is doing the same. The rest try to swim away, finning back madly over the corridor toward the dome. The shadow follows, boiling out of the sand, revealing its shadow full. Sweeps over the corridor, more of us are lost. We try to out-shake it. We fail. Flitter, flurry, fade, in blackness.

Eyes open. You feel somewhat dizzy. You can't remember how to tie a tie, you note, which at least means one got away.

The glass door has slid open. Outside, the room is empty bar for smoking machinery and Dr. Kurner's body, slumped out on the floor.

Somewhere, an alarm is blaring.
action: About yourself
response: You are yourself, once more.
action: You look
response: Cables feed away from the base of the cylinder. Inside, there's the grille for your feet, and the Emergency Door Release Switch.
action: Leave
response: You step out of the cylinder. From here you can see the screen in the corner of the room, which shows a giant multi-tentacled creature growing from over the mortuary dome, coming closer.

Your machine is in one corner, forgotten. Dr. Kurner slumps on the floor, quite dead, almost forgotten too.

The alarm is blaring. A voice over the intercom shrieks "What are we going to do? General? WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?"
action: You examine screen
response: The squid is coming closer, ever closer. In a matter of minutes it will crush the lab.