Whose Body Is It, Anyway?             by: Brandy Dewinter

 

Chapter 2 - Testing

Before we could say anything more, the screen on the communicator panel came to life to show Professor Inchbod. His expression betrayed disappointment for just an instant before becoming professionally neutral again.

"Commander Xora, how is your adaptation coming?"

"Well, I hardly have a standard for comparison, but it seems to be fine."

"Yes, well," the professor seemed to hesitate, as though he were trying to decide whether to say something. Then he continued, but I had the impression that he had decided not to say whatever had been on his mind. "Please report to Testing Room 3."

"Yes, sir, um, sorry, yes, Professor," I replied, putting on my uniform again.

I forgot that Titania could hear my thoughts as I mused, *I wonder what that was all about.*

"By this time, Tryx had already returned to a normal human appearance," Titania explained. "He is disappointed that you still look like a commoner pairing."

"Oh, well, can you do something about that?" I asked. "And how do you know so much about Tryx and, um, Bee?"

"I will certainly be doing something about your appearance," Titania promised. Or was it a threat? Then she continued, "When you shook hands with Command Tryx as we were leaving, I communicated with Bee through the physical contact."

*Ah, that flicker of blackness,* I thought, forgetting once again that Titania was listening.

"Precisely," she confirmed, a hint of smugness feeding on my surprised twitch.

Even as I finished dressing, my featureless black skin seemed to shimmer into invisibility. It was only on a second glance that I realized it wasn’t truly my face I was seeing, or at least, not the face I had seen before this pairing. It was similar, but the texture of my skin was finer, flawlessly smooth. And my hair was thicker, almost too long for male uniform standards. I waited for the color to fade from midnight black to my nondescript brown, but this hair retained the dark shine that had so recently covered my entire body.

"Why, thank you, Titania," I said, pleased with both improvements.

"We are just beginning," Titania replied, but while her voice retained the imperiousness that dominated her tone, the petulance had given way to satisfaction.

I finished dressing and we left the room. As we walked to the testing area, I felt a stiff constriction around my midsection.

*What are you doing now?* I asked.

"Continuing to work on your appearance," Titania replied. "You will need a lot of work."

By the time they got to the testing area, my waist had been compressed so tightly that I couldn’t breathe without exaggerated heaving in my shoulders.

"Stop that," Titania commanded. "I will supply you with sufficient oxygen. Just hold yourself proudly, as befits my host."

There was a stiffening in my shoulders as they were pulled back into an erect, military posture. My habitual slouch was banished along with the, um, excess around my middle. As we reached the testing area, I caught a glimpse of myself in a polished metal panel. It looked artificial, the erect posture at odds with my round face and flabby arms. Still, it showed more, oh, discipline I guess, than I had showed before; definitely an improvement.

I pushed another raucous buzzer and was granted admittance to a standard medical examination room. The attendant looked up from his computer and said, "Can I help you?"

"I’m Commander Xora. I was told to report here."

"Um, there must be some mistake," the technician claimed. "I was told Commander Xora was the host for a new symbiont pairing."

I just nodded. The technician waited for me to explain further, but what could I say? I certainly didn’t know what was going on.

After a moment, the technician machine-gunned some keystokes into his computer and hit the enter key. He looked at me again, then shrugged.

"Well, if you say so, we might as well get started. This first test . . ." turned out to be meaningless, I realized. Whatever the tech was looking for, Titania provided regardless of what my real body might have indicated. Or maybe that was wrong. Now, Titania was part of this body. Whatever. It was confusing, to say the least. In the middle of the testing, Professor Inchbod appeared.

As soon as the professor saw me, he said, "So, your adaptation IS going to be a high order one."

"If you say so," I agreed, noncommittally.

"So far, only you and Commander Tryx present a normal human appearance. Well, in the case of Commander Tryx, it’s hardly normal, but at least human. The other pairings all retain the smooth black integument," explained Inchbod.

"Ah, well, as you can see, I have returned to normal, at least in that regard."

"Yes, quite," the professor said, distracted by the results of the tests he was reviewing.

"I didn’t think you were in quite so good a shape as this," he said after a moment.

"Indeed?" I said. A smug sense of pride once again intruded into my thoughts from Titania.

"Yes, your heartbeat is quite low even during exercise, and your respiration is steady. I would have expected you to be panting quite heavily by now."

*Right,* I thought. *Like I could.*

*Stop whining,* Titania commanded.

"Very well," Inchbod declared, making a decision, "with one final test, we will assume you have full physical integration. Through that airlock is a hostile environment. Enter it, proceed to the far door, and exit. If you can do that without ill effect, you’ll be excused from all further tests. At least, physical ones."

"What sort of environment?"

"Not immediately lethal, if that’s what you’re wondering," replied Inchbod. "However, if you cannot adapt to it, you will find it difficult to make it even as far as the other door. The robo-attendants will protect you from any real harm, though."

*Great,* I grumped, but to myself. Then I "spoke" to my partner.

*I hope you’re up to this.*

*It will be fine,* Titania promised. We proceeded to the airlock door with apparent confidence, cycling through the first chamber as quickly as the mechanism would permit.

On the far side, the first sensation was heat. Blistering heat that would make touching any exposed metal an immediate cause for injury. That sensation faded rapidly as my, um, our skin turned a shiny, reflective silver. My uniform actually began to smolder as we walked toward the far door.

I realized I had hardly been breathing for some time now, apparently absorbing oxygen and rejecting carbon dioxide directly through my, uh, our skin. *Damn, this is just to confusing. It is ‘my skin’ our ‘our skin’ or ‘me’ or ‘we’ or what?*

*That is up to you. In symbiosis, those distinctions are meaningless,* Titania lectured. Like I didn’t know that already, at least at an intellectual level. But my instincts certainly hadn’t caught up with my change, yet.

Somewhere in the course of those thoughts, they must have started a second trial, but I didn’t even realize it until Titania informed me.

"They’re flooding the air with a powerful soporific. Don’t worry, though, I’m filtering it."

The final challenge appeared literally right beneath my feet. I stepped into a thin pool of liquid without apparent problem, but when both feet were in the pool and I tried to take another step, my boot was welded to the floor.

*Cute,* I snorted. *Ultima-glue.*

*What?* This time it was Titania who was confused.

*Ultima-glue. It bonds to nearly anything, and is very powerful.

They’re going to owe us a new pair of boots.*

I reached down to undo the fastenings on my boots, a task made not one bit easier by the damn constriction around my belly. When I finally had them loose, I asked Titania, *Can you keep us free of the glue, or do I need to try and jump over the rest of the pool?*

Put your bare hand down close to the pool, but don’t touch it, she directed.

I did as I was told, something I was afraid was going to become much too common. A tiny tendril of blackness extruded from our silver coating and seemed to taste of the glue like a butterfly’s delicate tongue.

*This, I can handle,* she said after a moment. *Make sure your uniform pants don’t touch the liquid, but I can keep it from bonding to your bare feet.*

I carefully stepped out of my boot, pulled off my sock, and put my bare foot down in the middle of the slick pool. As promised, I was able to withdraw it without hindrance. That gave me the confidence to step out again and I went through the gyrations necessary to get my other foot out of boot and sock and stand in the pool on both feet. Careful now only of a sense of slickness, I moved steadily toward the far door. Maybe my success with the glue was all the proof that was needed, because Titania let me perceive that the heat in the room immediately began to slacken once I showed that last challenge wouldn’t stop me. She whispered in my ear that the sleeping gas was also diminishing and by the time we reached the far door I was back to a normal (well, somewhat improved) appearance.

"Very good, Commander," Inchbod’s voice sounded over a speaker in the test chamber. I’ll approve your request for a new pair of boots, of course. Congratulations. I’ll also inform Admiral Jones that you have passed all my tests. You can expect a call from him in the morning."

"Thank you, Professor," I replied. *And thank you, Titania.*

As we made our barefoot way back to my quarters, Titania asked me a question with no apparent relevance to the particular moment, though much relevance to our overall situation. "Do you know the difference between a symbiosis and parasitism?"

*Yes,* I answered silently. *In a symbiosis, both organisms benefit.*

"Quite," Titania agreed. "Our symbiosis occurs both at the individual level, as with you and me, and at the cultural level. Why do you suppose your people found my race, and not the other way around?"

*I guess I hadn’t given it much thought.*

Titania answered her own question before I dredged up any reasonable response. "We are so good at adapting to our environment that we never developed the skills to adapt our environment to ourselves. We are not tool users. By joining our race to yours, we gain access to your tools."

*Ah, of course. I should have seen that.*

By this time we had reached my quarters. I took off the ruined uniform and moved to the replicator to order another.

Titania interrupted me, "Wait a minute. I have a better idea."

The lifted eyebrow that signified my curiosity was somewhat incongruous given my apparent isolation, but it worked. Titania continued.

"You know that I am capable of forming clothing, given the appropriate chemical supplies," she stated.

"Uh, no, I didn’t know that," I disagreed, but of course I was not really arguing.

"Indeed I am," she confirmed. "If you will ingest the following materials, I can give you clothes that will meet any need. At least, anything where the sheer volume of material is reasonable."

The list she gave me seemed daunting to say the least. Any one of several of the compounds were surely fatal in quantities much less than those specified.

"No offense, Titania, but I think we’ll just stick with ordinary clothes for now," I said, punching for a conventional uniform.

Before I had entered the entire command string, my arm was pulled back to my side by an irresistible force. Simultaneously my legs seemed to fuse together in a solid, tapering cone of hard, black plastic. In seconds I was entombed in shining blackness, even my mouth filled to painful dimensions with some sort of stiff mass.

"You WILL do as I say," Titania snarl boomed in my ears.

*I don’t think so,* I disagreed, trying to remain calm. *It has been obvious for some time that you can kill me. On the other hand, you don’t seem to be able to force me to move, only stop me from moving.

Well, I can choose not to do what you want just as easily.*

"Easily?" Titania repeated my comment. "I think not!"

The pressure about my waist that had already seemed impossibly strict began to rise, accompanied by an equally-crushing compression of my entire body. I would have screamed if I could, but my lungs had no air to fuel the sound even if the wad in my mouth would have permitted it. Just as I was sure my bones would be crushed from the pressure, it eased off as though it had never existed.

"Now, will you order what I want?" she asked with haughty confidence.

*No,* I denied her, though if they’d have had the freedom to do it, my knees would have been shaking. *I expect you can eventually break my will, but you haven’t done it yet. Partner.*

The accusation inherent in my last word struck deep at wherever Titania’s emotions formed. The rigid black cocoon constraining me melted away into a normal human appearance.

"I’m sorry, Commander. You are right. I have made a commitment to this team and I will honor that commitment."

With that, I canceled the order that was partially entered and replaced it with the items Titania had desired.

"What? But you said you wouldn’t do that, and I agreed," she exclaimed, new and genuine confusion in her voice.

"Exactly. Once you agreed that we are a team, I knew you would use these for our combined benefit and not just yours. I will not have you as a parasite, but I will welcome you as a partner."

The items appeared in the replicator window and I gathered them up, grimacing again at the witch’s brew I was about to imbibe. Once again, Titania stopped me before I completed the task I intended.

"Wait," she requested, and this time her tone made it clear that it truly was a request. "We need to talk."

Another incongruously arched eyebrow from me and she continued. "I told you that the symbiont called Bee is my brother, of sorts, didn’t I?" My thought confirmed her claim and she continued, "Well, it would be at least as valid to say that he is my rival. He volunteered to be the first of the nobility to pair with a human, when many thought you were incapable of high-order communication. It would be a most dull and boring existence to watch in lonely isolation, trying to keep your human half out of trouble. Yet Bee agreed to give it a try, then succeeded beyond our wildest hopes. Now, I need to do something to succeed as well, to gain recognition for us to rival that given to Tryx."

"A worthy goal, I should think," I agreed.

"Not really," Titania admitted. "His sense of self can be satisfied by merely helping Tryx, fulfilling her wishes about her physical body. I need more than that. You can call me selfish if you will, but I know it to be part of me."

I gave a sort of mental nod and asked, "So, what can I do to help?"

"Help? Me? After what I did to you?" Titania asked in surprise.

"Look, Titania, I am committed to this pairing, too. Both physically, since I have no clue how to separate us and don’t want to try, but also emotionally. I want our pairing to be successful. I have enough pride to want a little recognition as well. I’ve never been blessed with an athlete’s body and had other physical problems, too. With your help, maybe I can overcome some of them."

Some sense of pride returned to Titania’s voice as she declared, "Well, I can certainly help with those."

My response to this promise was to reach once again for the chemicals Titania had requested. This time there was no interference and I quickly swallowed each one.

"Now what?" I asked, still more than a little worried about what I had just done.

"I think you should just lie down and get some rest. You won’t really need physical rest anymore, I can easily remove any fatigue poisons from your system, but it will be easier on you if you are unconscious while I do what needs to be done. It will also provide an opportunity for the psychic cleansing you call dreams."

I nodded and moved to my bunk, still apparently nude though actually in a skin-tight covering that made my body essentially sexless. I wondered if I’d ever again have an opportunity to use that particular tool again. If I’d have known what was coming, that would have been the least of my concerns.

 

(continued in part 3)

 

 

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© 1999 by Brandy Dewinter. All Rights Reserved. These documents (including, without limitation, all articles, text, images, logos, compilation design) may printed for personal use only. No portion of these documents may be stored electronically, distributed electronically, or otherwise made available without express written consent of the copyright holder.