Her old clothes had been stripped off and thrown away. When she woke up, she would have to have different garments, of course. In fact, one of the false memories was of throwing the original nightgown away.
Held in one arm was a big fuzzy teddy bear. That had been given her, supposedly several years ago, as a birthday gift. She had, supposedly, asked for it, and, since then, had used it as her No. 2 security blanket. Her No. I was Jack himself.
The suspended bed had been replaced by a conventional one.
It was large enough for Tappy and Jack to romp around on in sexual play. Jack was supposed to have been sleeping with her for the last five years.
The formerly bare room was now filled with many things: furniture, machines that played the music of many planets, though not of Earth, dolls, an ice-cream dispensing machine, a table loaded with cosmetics, which she supposedly used for makeup, and a mirror she could not use as yet, games for blind people, and dozens of other items, some useful, some recreational.
One of the AI had followed Jack to the bedroom entrance. Jack turned to it.
"The Imago?" he said very softly. "Shouldn't it be manifesting itself?"
His heart battered his chest hard. He felt a great fear and awe.
It was as if he would soon be in the presence of the living God.
He did not know if he could endure such an experience. His flesh would become wax and would melt in the terrible light and heat.
He looked at Tappy and thought he saw, for a second, something . . stirring in her, something no human eyes could look upon without being scared.
"Why doesn't it wake her up?" he said softly. His voice trembled.
Part of his fear was the knowledge that she would no longer be the Tappy he had known. She would be a fleshly tool of the Imago.
"What do you mean?" the AI said.
"It ... the Imago ... should awaken her when it awakens."
"I don't know why," the AI said. It added, "There's no guarantee that the woman will have matured. Even though she may think she's seven years older, her body might not. Or her subconscious may not be fooled. Or the Imago may perceive the truth."
"Can you give her a shot of something to make her wake up?"
"It's better to allow her to awake naturally."
At that moment, Tappy turned onto her back.
Jack said, "For God's sake!"
Her nightgown revealed the top half of her breasts. Between them was a bulge the s'ze of a large egg. The tight and dark red skin over it looked as if it were about to burst. Around it at its base was a purplish swelling. A yellowish liquid shone on its surface, and that oozed out even as Jack stared at it.
He strode to her bedside and reluctantly touched the skin on top of the bulge. It was fever-hot. Her forehead felt hot, too, though it was cooler than the bulge.
"The egg the honker inserted!" he said. "It's infected!"
"No. It's just grown," the AI said. It put a finger on the bulge and then on Tappy's forehead. "Notice how much weight she seems to have lost in the last few hours. The egg's grown so fast it's sucked energy from her. The whole process probably involves an enormous expenditure of energy. She should be all right as soon as the process is completed."
"What does this mean for Tappy?"
Despite the Al's reassurance, Jack was certain that she was sick and that she could die from the disease.
"I do not know. It must be part of the Tmago's maturing process.
Or hers. Or both. Or it could have nothing to do with the Imago.
We'll have to wait and observe."
Tappy, though still sleepingr unconscious from the feverjerked. That was followed by a twitching of her hands, which then became motionless. Her eyelids fluttered but did not open. Then a line redder than the rest of the skin appeared on the very top of the bulge. One end was pointed toward her chin; the other, toward her navel.
Then the break gaped like two thin lips. A few seconds later, it extended itself for a half inch on each side of the bulge, revealing something dark greenish below it. Then the line very quickly ran down both sides and disappeared into the purplish fester.
"We have to do something!" Jack cried.
"We can only wait and observe."
The line bisecting the skin gap on the top widened slightly.
The greenish round thing pushed upward a trifle.
The AI, standing by Jack, touched his shoulder.
He looked up and then behind him as the AT gestured to him.
A haze just beyond the entrance was clearino'. It cleared, revealing a female AI. It walked in swiftly and stopped a few feet from Jack before speaking with the usual emotionless tones of the androids.
If it had been human, it would have screamed out the news.
"The Gaol have found us!"
A FLURRY of questions surged through Jack's mind. could they flee again?viously not, or the AI would have done so.
could they fight the Gaol? Same answer. could they talk the Gaol out of it? Unl'kely.
Jack realizeld that their ploy to age Tappy in her fancy, so as to evoke the Imago immediately, no longer mattered. The Imago might be awake, or it might still be asleep; either way, the Gaol had won, because they had closed in too soon. There just hadn't been time!
He sighed. This was the part he hated. "Then do what you have to do," he told the AI.
"And what is that?"
"Destroy us both. So the Imago will be freed to seek another host. It's the only way we can foil the Gaol now."
"We are unable to do that."
Jack was perversely annoyed. "What do you mean, unable? You told me that you would do it, to prevent the Imago from falling into Gaol power. There's very little time left. So do it now, while you can."
The scene was fading or changing. The exotic vegetation he had first seen from the station's window appeared around them. The AI assumed better definition, and became the voluptuous creature he had named Candy. "No.
"No? Why?"
"Because we no longer serve the Imago. We have been taken over by the Gaol and are now agents of the empire."
Jack saw the awful logic of it. Naturally the Gaol knew how to handle the AI. They had nullified those androids at the outset, before physically taking over the station. Maybe they had managed to deceive the All about their approach, so that the AI thought they had more time than they did.
Jack came to a sudden, terrible decision. "Then I"11 do it!" He turned toward Tappy, hoping that he could bring himself to kill her bare-handed. One smash of her head against the floor could do it. Then they could do what they liked to him; he didn't matter.
He saw that she now lay unceremoniously on the floor, between the plants, her book beside her. He took a step.
But Candy moved more swiftly than he thought possible, and intercepted him. Suddenly he had an armful of phenomenal woman , ,ho xygas nevertheless not a woman at all. She closed lier amis around him and lifted him from the floor. He felt her awesome power and Icnew that he was helpless. She might look like a siren, but she was also as deadly as one.
all right!" he gasped. "Put me down. I'm helpless."
She set him down.
"So what happens now?" he asked. He doubted that he would be able to distract her or change the course of the conquering Gaol, but he was casting about for anything that might concelyably make a difference.
"Now we wait for the arrival of the minion of the Gaol."
"Oh, you mean Malva," he said jokingly, remembering the woman who had tempted and threatened him, back on the honkers' planet.