Out of Phaze

10. Adept

The castle of the Brown Demesnes was impressive, being fashioned of brownstone rather than the wood he had thought, with a brown forest and the river turning muddy brown. Even the grass was brown. There could be no doubt of the identity of its owner. Two great brown wooden golems guarded the heavy brown wooden door. But Fleta approached it without trepidation. "Bane came often here," she said. "And I too, carrying him, when we were young and he used not his magic to travel. Brown was I think about ten years old when I was foaled and now she be close to thirty, but she it was who versed me in the human tongue and in the ways of thy kind. She did babysit Bane, too. She be the best of Adepts."

That seemed to be a sufficient recommendation. They stepped up to the golems. Mach had nullified the invisibility spell, realizing that however convenient it had been to travel without being seen, they couldn't approach a friendly Adept in that condition. "Tell thy mistress that Fleta and a friend come calling," Fleta said to them.

One golem turned ponderously and stomped inside, while the other maintained watch. Soon the first returned. "Come!" it boomed. Mach wondered how a creature that did not breathe could boom, but realized that magic could account for it.

They followed it inside. The paneling inside was brown, but in varying shades, so that it was not oppressive. They came to the central hall, where a handsome brown-haired woman stood. She wore a brown gown and brown gloves and slippers, and her hair was tied back by a brown ribbon. This was of course the Brown Adept. Mach had rather expected her to be brown-skinned; she was well tanned, but that was the extent of it. Maybe the first person to hold this office had been literally brown.

"Fleta, it has been many months!" the woman said. "And Bane-"

"He be not Bane, Brown," Fleta said. "He be Bane's other self, from Proton-frame."

Brown's brown eyes studied Mach. "Aye, now I perceive the difference! But I thought there was no communication between the frames anymore."

"Only in our case, sir," Mach said.

"Dost call me 'sir'?" she said, amused.

Mach was abashed. "In my frame, only Citizens wear clothes. I-"

She laughed. "I remember the Citizens! Stile and Blue fought them, and in the end I helped. Call me Brown; if thou art not the son of Stile, thou'rt the son of Blue."

"The son of Blue," Mach agreed. "I am called Mach, and I am a robot."

"A rovot be very like a golem," Fleta put in quickly.

"Only now I'm in Bane's body, and he's in mine. We need to switch back, but don't know how. So we were going to go to the Blue Demesnes, but demons and goblins prevented us, so we looped around and came here."

"So that be why the monsters stir!" Brown exclaimed. "They be in pursuit of thee!"

"That's the story," Mach agreed. "We don't know why. We're hoping you will help us."

"Of course I will help," Brown agreed. "I will send a golem bird to the Blue Demesnes, and thy problem shall be resolved. Meanwhile, the two of you be welcome here; the golems will protect you from the goblins."

"O, thank thee!" Fleta said, going and hugging Brown.

The Brown Adept snapped her fingers, and a brown bird flew in to perch on her wrist. It looked authentic, but evidently it was a golem; this was an impressive evidence of the woman's skill. "Go tell the Blue Adept to contact Brown," the Adept told it. "The matter be important."

The bird flew away. "It can speak?" Mach asked.

"Nay," Brown said, smiling. "It understands only where to go, but Blue will know I sent it not frivolously. We should hear from him in two hours."

They had an excellent meal, and Brown provided better clothing for Mach; his homemade apparel was quite ragged. Brown was an easy woman to know; it was evident that she had a high regard for Stile and Stile's son, and she was quite interested in what Mach had to tell of Proton.

"But now that I have met Fleta," Mach said in passing, "I am not as certain I really want to return to Proton. If she can't go with me-"

Fleta tried to caution him, but Brown was on it immediately. "So thy relationship with the mare be more than convenience?"

"Nay," Fleta said.

"Yes," Mach said. "I think I love her."

"But that cannot be, in Phaze," Fleta said. "Thy kind and mine do not love."

"And thee," Brown said, fixing her gaze on Fleta. "Thou dost not love him?"

Fleta's lip trembled in the way it had. "I know it be forbidden."

"But thou dost love him."

"Aye," Fleta whispered.

"Then why dost thou help him to return to his frame?"

"Because he and me can never be, and his world be there."

"I am not sure of that," Mach said. "But if I stayed here, Bane would be trapped there, and I know that's not right."

"So it be hopeless as well as forbidden," Brown said. "I think I cannot help the two of you in that."

"No one can help," Fleta said, turning on Mach a look of such misery that he leaped from his chair and went to hold her.

At this point there was an interruption. A globe of mist appeared above the table. It formed into a shape of a man's head. "So the apprentice and the animal are getting friendly," the head remarked.

"What dost thou do here, Translucent?" Brown demanded angrily.

"Our agents have discovered that the young man be not what he appears to be," Translucent said. "This be not the apprentice Adept, but his other self from Proton.

"So I have already ascertained," Brown snapped. "Be it for this thy minions persecute this couple?"

"Persecute? Hardly. This young man represents the only known contact with the other frame in a score years. We have long regretted lack of contact with those of Proton, and would have this lad relay messages there for us. For this purpose we sought him, and are prepared to reward him handsomely."

"By sending demons and harpies and goblins after him?" Fleta demanded hotly. "Some reward!"

"Watch thy tongue, animal, lest thou lose it," Translucent said to her.

"Don't call her animal!" Mach flared.

The foggy head surveyed him, then nodded. "So it really be like that." It smiled. "I apologize, unicorn, if aught I spoke of thee seemed amiss."

"Just call off thy minions," Fleta said, taken aback.

"Indeed, they be gone already," Translucent said. His gaze returned to Mach. "What be thy price to carry messages?"

"Price?"

"Gold? Servants? A palace? My associates and I can be generous when pleased."

"Thy associates and thee be no credit to the frame of Phaze!" Brown snapped. "Get thee hence from my Demesnes!"

"In a moment, woodworker." Again the misty gaze fixed disconcertingly on Mach. "An thou not be ready at this time to make a commitment, call me when thou dost wish. Take a cup of water and dash it to the ground and speak my name, and I shall respond. I think thou willst in due course perceive the merit in mine offer." And at last the head faded out.

"Disgusting intrusion!" Brown muttered. "We try to keep things civil with the Adverse Adepts, and Translucent be not the worst o' them, but even he can try my patience."

"You mentioned that you helped fight the Citizens, in the old days," Mach said. "Is this tied in with that?"

"Aye." Brown smiled reminiscently. "I was but a child then, and new at my post, for my predecessor had recently died. Stile, new as the Blue Adept, came here and wreaked havoc in my Demesnes, and I was angry; but when I came to know him, I helped him, and for a time I had charge of the Book of Magic, and in the end I did betray him for his own good by reversing the frame he went to."

"So you were the one who brought Blue to Proton, and Stile to Phaze!" Mach exclaimed.

"Aye. Then I turned the Book of Magic over to Trool the Troll, and he became the Red Adept. Since then Stile has guided the affairs of Phaze in a beneficial direction, curtailing the evil powers of the opposing Adepts, who naturally hate him. E'er they sought to balk him, and to diminish the freedoms of the animals and Little Folk, but e'er he was alert, and Red provided powerful new spells when needed, and Phaze has prospered despite the loss of magical power."

"Loss of magic? It seems effective enough to me!"

"That be because thou saw it not in the old days. When the frames separated, half the Phazite, the rock of magic, was passed o'er to Proton, to make up for the Protonite lost by mining there. That balanced the frames so they would not destroy each other, and then they separated so that no one could cross thereafter. But the power of magic was diminished, and I think the power of economics diminished in Proton too, because there could be no more unlimited mining."

"It was," Mach agreed. "Proton remains well off, because Protonite now commands a much higher price, but only a small fraction of the prior total is exported. My father has worked to make the operation of the society more efficient, so that we can maintain as good a lifestyle as before; the self-willed machines have been helping. But the old-guard Contrary Citizens have adamantly opposed him; they want to get rich by multiplying the output of Protonite."

"Stile encouraged the association of the species," Brown continued. "Thus it was that Bane was named after wolf-bane, the charm the werewolves use for strength, and had as playmates the young of the unicorns, werewolves, vampires and even on occasion some of the Little Folk or the trolls."

"I learned about Fleta," Mach said, smiling at her. "But how far does this association go? Fleta seems to feel that any permanent liaison between us is forbidden."

Brown spread her hands. "Camaraderie be one thing; marriage be another. The species be concerned about the purity of their lines, and some have ancient enmities. So this be an uneasy association at best. Stile himself was close to Neysa, but he married his own kind. So even if thou didst not have to return to thine own frame, I think there would be no approval in this frame for what thou might desire."

"She speaks truth," Fleta murmured.

"Not as I see it!" Mach said. "I grew up in a society in which robots like myself mixed with other types of creature, and no limits to their association were imposed. My father is human, my mother a robot. Is there greater distinction between me and a unicorn than between me and a human being?"

Brown shook her head. "In Phaze thou wouldst be called a golem, an thou didst have thine own body. Even so was Sheen considered, when she visited this frame. I personally believe that golems should have greater rights, but I am biased by the nature of my magic. Phaze be not ready for mixing of species in any but the most innocent sense, and not ready for self-willed golems at all. An thou didst take Fleta to Proton with thee, there the situation might differ."

Mach sighed. "I think I do not want to return to Proton alone, but I cannot take her with me."

"I knew always our love was forbidden," Fleta said. "The more fool I for yielding to it."

"This experience has been a kind of dream for me," he said. "But I too knew I could not live forever in a dream. Once I discover how to exchange back, I will have to return his body to Bane."

Soon they had another call. A man walked in from the kitchen, carrying a tray full of desserts: chocolate ice cream. Mach glanced at him casually, then did a doubletake. "Father!"

Brown laughed. "Stile, thou idiot! Thou didst not have to masquerade as a servant!"

For it was indeed Stile, the Adept. He looked exactly like Citizen Blue, except that his clothing was of Phaze instead of Proton. He was small, shorter than any of the others in the room, but fit, in his middle forties.

"I didn't know quite what to expect," Stile said, setting down the desserts. "So I thought I'd come quietly." He sounded exactly like Blue, too.

"So thou didst animate one of my golems!" Brown said.

"It was already animate. I merely gave it my semblance."

"Sit down, have some ice cream," Brown said mischievously. Mach had to smile, knowing that an ordinary golem could not eat.

"Not my flavor," Stile demurred.

Brown snapped her fingers. Another golem responded. "Fetch some blue ice cream," she ordered.

The golem returned in a moment with blueberry ice cream, setting it before Stile. He took his spoon and began to eat.

Fleta's mouth dropped open. Then Brown caught on. "Thou dost fashion the illusion of eating, to go with the illusion of life for the golem."

Stile smiled. "It gets harder to deceive thee, Brown. Why didst thou send thy messenger?"

"This be not thy son, Bane, but his other self from Proton, Mach," Brown said. "He needs to know how to return to Proton."

Now Stile did a doubletake. He stared at Bane. Then he glanced at Brown. "May I?"

"Feel free," she replied.

Stile sang something under his breath. There seemed to be a play of force around Mach, but nothing else happened.

"So it be true," Stile breathed. "Contact between the frames, after twenty years!"

Brown relaxed. Evidently she had retained a certain skepticism about Mach's claim, despite her friendly treatment of him. But it seemed that Stile's magic had verified it.

"Fleta brought me here," Mach said. "We were pursued by agents of Adverse Adepts."

Stile nodded. "So that was why it came not to mine attention! They used no magic. Methought thou wast merely having a private fling with thine old companion, and I knew my son could handle the like of goblins."

"I managed to work a little magic, but it was clumsy, especially at first," Mach said. "Without Fleta, I would have been captured."

"I brought him here because I thought they would not be blocking off this castle as they were the Blue Demesnes," Fleta said. "But I could not tell him how to return to Proton."

"How didst thou come to this frame?" Stile inquired of Mach.

"I willed it-and suddenly it happened."

"But thou couldst not will thyself back?"

Mach shook his head. "It didn't seem to work that way."

Stile considered. "Where did it happen?"

"In a glade near the swamp."

Stile looked at Fleta. "What glade?"

Fleta gave a more accurate geographic description, and added that Bane had gone there several times before the exchange was made.

"Then Bane was trying for this?"

"Yes," Mach said.

"Thy position in Proton-how did it relate to thy point of arrival in Phaze?"

"Why, they were the same," Mach said.

"Then thy body occupied the same spot his did-one in each frame."

"Yes, I think so."

"That must be the key! To overlap the position, then will the exchange. Mayhap he facilitated it with a spell."

Mach sat amazed. Of course that was the key, suddenly so obvious! To overlap, so there was no physical motion required. And when he had walked away from that spot, the overlap no longer occurred, so they couldn't change back.

"I did it!" he exclaimed ruefully. "I left the spot, trapping him there without even realizing!"

"Then perhaps he is trying to locate thee, again," Stile said. "Does he have a mechanism for that?"

"I don't know," Mach said. "But I think so, because he knew where to be, while I did not realize that location mattered. But if so, it may not work in Proton."

"He would have used another spell," Stile agreed. "Or perhaps the two of you are attuned to each other. If thou dost try to tune in on him-"

"I never thought of that!" Mach exclaimed, feeling quite stupid. He sat still and concentrated, thinking of Bane. Where are you, my other self?

He felt the faintest of stirrings, as though he had reached something far distant. But he couldn't be sure.

"Try it again, periodically," Stile suggested. "I think this be a thing no other can do for thee." He leaned forward. "But in the meantime, there be things we must grasp. This be contact between the frames, when we thought it impossible. A psychic rapport between the two of you-mayhap a unique one. I see now why the Adepts be after thee; they knew before I did, and seek contact with Proton."

"Yes," Mach agreed. "They want me to carry messages, and have offered me anything I want."

Stile nodded. "We all be starved for news! But thou-if thou be the son of mine other self, who is thy mother?"

"Sheen."

"Sheen be the best and loveliest of women, but she also be a robot. Do robots bear babies now?"

"No. I am a robot too." Quickly Mach explained.

"Yet thou dost resemble Bane, physically?"

"Precisely, as far as I can tell."

"And thou dost have a soul, for now it be here."

"And his is in my robot body," Mach agreed.

"I suspected that a machine could have a soul when I knew Sheen," Stile said, and his eyes looked far beyond the chamber. "Now it seems we have the proof." He shrugged. "Tell thy mother I remember her, and be glad for her fortune in marrying Blue." Then he left, and only the golem remained, brown and wooden, the melting ice cream untouched before it.

"He seemed not much interested in thee!" Fleta said indignantly.

Mach smiled. "He was interested. He is like my father; only a small fraction of the thought and emotion in him leaks out. I'm glad to have met him, and I shall carry back his message."

"Methinks Stile was a bit too restrained," Brown remarked. "He will be watching thee, Mach."

"I know it." Mach looked at Fleta. "I think our time together is limited, now that I have the key to my return."

"Aye," she agreed faintly.

"I will provide you with a suite here, until the time," Brown said.

It was a nice suite. "She understands," Fleta whispered.

"She understands," Mach agreed. "She may have had some forbidden love of her own."

For the first time, they spent a night in human quarters, without fear of pursuit or discovery, and it was sheer delight. They made love with the desperation born of the knowledge of coming separation.

"But surely I need not stay always in Proton," Mach murmured. "If I could come here once, I could come here again, at least for a visit, to see you."

"Aye," she breathed with sudden hope.

"If Bane agreed. I don't know how he would feel-"

"Bane be a good man. He would do it."

They lay in silence for a time. Then he asked: "You told the Brown Adept that you love me."

"I had no right," she said.

"Surely it has happened before! With animals being able to assume human form, and sharing human intelligence-has no unicorn, or werewolf, or vampire ever before loved a human being?"

"Oh, aye," she said. "But it be discouraged for aught but play."

"Play-as in bed? But not serious, as in love?"

"Aye. Love be special."

"Surely it is! And until I occupied this human body, I think play was all I ever experienced. But now I believe I love you, Fleta, and I don't see how that can be wrong. I know what you are, and if you love me too-"

She shook her head. "Mach, mayhap there be secret love twixt our kinds on occasion, but ne'er open. Sometimes a human man will take a werebitch as a concubine, and she would do it not if she loved him not. Sometimes an animal be so fetching, like Suchevane the vampiress, that she could take a human man."

"Who?"

"Suchevane. She be the loveliest of her kind. Methinks Bane played a game with her, too." She grimaced. "But thou dost have no need to meet her," she concluded firmly.

"So animals and human beings never marry."

"Nor speak the three," she agreed.

"The three? Three whats?"

"When thy kind - and sometimes other kinds - bespeak true love, the one will address the other three times, and then there be no doubt."

"Three times? You mean if I said 'I love you' three times, then you would believe me?"

"Thee," she said. "But say it not, Mach."

"Thee? But I don't talk that way."

"Aye. Thou art not of Phaze."

"Thee - three times?"

"Say it not!" she repeated. "This be ne'er offhand!"

"I don't understand."

"Aye," she murmured, and kissed him.

In the morning they joined Brown for breakfast, then went out for a walk around the Demesnes. Mach paused to concentrate on his other self - and felt Bane much more definitely than before. "He's closer!" he said. "He must be tuning in on me, making his way here."

"Aye," she said, her lip trembling.

He kissed her. "I will return!"

"I will wait for thee."

They were coming into a pleasant flowery garden, whose blooms were all shades of brown. "I'm getting to like the color," Mach remarked.

"These be grown on the best fertilizer there be," Fleta said.

"Oh? What's that?"

"Unicorn manure."

He laughed, thinking it a joke. But she was serious. "When my dam, Neysa, met Brown, and Brown helped Stile, the unicorns agreed to provide her fertilizer for her garden, and so it has been e'er since."

That reminded him of her nature. She had not assumed her natural form since their arrival at the Brown Demesnes. "Fleta, before we part, would you-"

She glanced askance at him.

"Would you play me a tune? I think your music is lovely."

"But to do that-"

"What is wrong with your natural form?"

She hesitated. It was obvious that she preferred to relate to him in the human fashion. Then she shrugged, and became herself, with her glossy black coat and golden socks. She played a melody on her horn, and then a two-part tune, the pan-pipes playing counterpoint. How she could do that he was not sure; he assumed that magic assisted it. Perhaps the high notes were played at the narrow tip of the horn, and the low ones at the broader base. But the music was as pretty as he could imagine. He would always remember her for this, for her sound as much as for her appearance.

She finished, and changed back to girl form. "Thou dost value me only for my melody," she teased him.

"I would value you just as much if-" Mach looked around, seeking a suitable metaphor for the occasion. They were near a pleasant pool, at whose brown-mud border fat frogs squatted. "If your horn sounded like the croaking of frogs."

She laughed, but there was an angry croak from the nearest frog, who evidently had overheard. In a moment all the frogs had the message, and were glaring at him.

"Methinks thou didst misspeak thyself," Fleta said,

suppressing a merry chortle in the way she had, at bosom-level.

Mach was abashed. It had never occurred to him that the frogs would understand. "I—"

"Croak!" the largest frog said witheringly. Then it turned about, facing the other frogs. They settled themselves in a ring around the pool, at the water's edge. Then they croaked.

Some had low croaks, and some had high croaks, while most were in the middle ranges. They croaked in sequence—and suddenly a melody emerged, each croak a note. More than that: it was the same melody Fleta had just played on her horn, in both its parts. The frogs were duplicating it in all its detail, and in this mode it had another kind of beauty, as great in its fashion as the original had been.

The frogs completed it, and were silent. They waited.

Mach knew he was on the spot. In his ignorance he had affronted the frogs, without cause. He owed them an apology.

He faced Fleta. "In fact, your horn does sound like the croaking of frogs," he said loudly. "Beautiful!"

Fleta smiled. "I thank thee for that compliment."

The frogs considered that. Then the leader jumped into the pond. After that the others followed. In a moment the mud was clear.

"I think they have forgiven thee," Fleta murmured. Then she embraced him and kissed him, in the midst of her laughter.

She changed back to 'corn form and played a new melody. This time Mach joined her, singing counterpoint. And from the pond the croaking resumed, providing a melodic background. It was as though an entire orchestra were performing.

There was a rumble. The ground shook. Fleta stopped playing, alarmed.

The pond abruptly drained away, its water disappearing into the ground beneath. The frogs scrambled desperately to escape. The mud bubbled and slid into the deepening hole.

The flower garden caved in around them. Fleta blew a startled note, bracing her four feet. Mach, realizing that something was seriously amiss, leaped for her, scrambling to her back as his footing gave way. "Get out of here!" he cried.

She leaped-but the entire garden collapsed under her hooves, dropping them down into a forming sinkhole. Fleta kept her feet, but slid to the bottom.

Now smoke showed, issuing from forming vents. "It's a caldera!" Mach cried, jumping off her back. "Change to bird form and fly out, Fleta!"

But she did not; she would not leave him in this danger.

The ground shook again, and the volume of smoke increased, obscuring everything. It seemed to form a globe about them, closing in.

"Magic!" Mach cried. "I'll try a spell!"

But in this pressure of the moment, he could think of neither rhyme nor melody. Fleta blew a note, trying to help him, but then the smoke closed in, chokingly, and they were helpless.

In a moment, it cleared-but they were no longer in the garden. They were in a chamber hewn from rock-and great ugly creatures surrounded them. The creatures pounced, grasping Mach by the arms, one of them clapping a rough and dirty hand over his mouth. Others flung themselves on Fleta, shoving her against the wall while one grasped her horn.

"Welcome, apprentice!" a man said, entering the chamber. "I am the Purple Adept, and these trolls be under my sway. As thou mayst know, I reside in the Purple Mountains, and I possess the magic of the movements of the earth. Now I want thy cooperation, apprentice, and I want thy word on that now."

At a signal from Purple, the troll removed his hand from Mach's mouth. Mach spat out gravel. "I'll give you no such word, criminal!"

"Now I know thou canst not do magic without thy mouth, and my minion will clap his hand back o'er it the moment thou dost try to sing a spell. So thou canst not escape by thy magic."

"But I won't help you, either!" Mach said.

"But an thee give me not thy word, it will go grievously with thy steed here."

"She's not my steed!" Mach exclaimed.

"Aye, she be thy concubine. I saw as much when the two of you trespassed across my Demesnes. Now I ask thee, apprentice: how much music will that mare play, without her horn?"

Fleta renewed her struggles, but the mass of trolls overwhelmed her. She could neither escape nor change form, while her horn was held.

What would happen to a unicorn whose horn was amputated? Mach didn't know, but the very fact that the evil Adept expected him to be cowed by this threat served the purpose. He had no faith in any good will by this man, and he couldn't risk harm to Fleta.

"I will carry a message to Proton," he said dully. "Release Fleta."

"Release her? Nay, she will remain with us-unharmed pending thy cooperation." The Purple Adept made another signal, and the trolls heaved and shoved the resisting unicorn from the chamber. "She will reside in an enchanted cell that be proof from her escape in any form. An thou cooperate fully, she will be well enough treated otherwise."

Mach felt a private rage such as he had never experienced when he had been a robot, but he knew he had to control it. He just could not risk harm to Fleta! "What is your message?"

"The first one will be to mine other self, Citizen Purple, just to let him know that contact has been reestablished. He will know what to do, and what message to return."

The first one. When would this brute ever give over? Not as long as he had control of Fleta!

But perhaps there was a way out. Mach suppressed that thought, not wanting any hint of it to show here. "I have to overlap the spot my other self occupies," he said. "I can't do that if you don't let me move about."

"Thou shalt move about-in my presence," Purple said. "And be thou advised, apprentice, that thy magic may be apt against ordinary folk, but cannot compare with mine own. An thou try something against me, not only will I balk it, I will let my minions at the animal's horn. Trolls hate 'corns; only the restraint I impose prevents them from making her scream."

There will be a reckoning, Mach thought, then quelled his outrage.

He tuned in on Bane-and his other self was very close now. Apparently Bane had been able to follow him here. So it would happen soon-and then he would see whether his wild notion would work.

He experimented, discovering that he could tell the direction from which his other self was coming. He faced that way, ready to walk toward Bane-but he was in a tunnel underground, and the rock wall cut him off.

So he walked along the tunnel, angling toward the other self, while the Purple Adept paced him. "As I understand this," Purple said, "thou art from Proton and have little power of magic. When thou dost exchange back, Bane will be here, and he has power. But thou must remember that any hostile magic practiced here will cost the horn of the animal, and perhaps more thereafter. So thou wouldst be best advised to deliver the message, and bring the return message-and to advise thine other self of the wisdom of this procedure. He may not care for the animal as thou dost, and will leave her to her fate otherwise."

"Understood," Mach said tightly. He kept walking.

The awareness of his other self grew steadily stronger. Mach realized that the two would overlap very soon. He resolved to accomplish the exchange without giving any outward sign. That was part of his wild plan.

The tunnel curved, allowing him to proceed directly toward his target-and suddenly it happened. Overlap! But Mach did not stop walking, and in a moment the contact slipped; he had not grasped the opportunity when it had come.

Then he felt his other self approaching from behind. Wait, it thought.

I cannot, Mach thought back, as the other paced him for a moment. I am in enemy power.

So am I! the other returned.

Mach quailed. His wild hope had been dashed. He had wanted to get help through Proton, arranging some counter pressure there that would nullify the hold Purple had oh him. If he could have made the exchange without Purple knowing, and arrange the counter-action, and exchanged back-

He kept walking, and the other phased in again, this time maintaining it. Fleta is hostage; I am helpless.

Agape be hostage here.

Quickly they compared situations-and realized that they had a chance after all. Satisfied, they made the exchange.