It was peaceful
enough. But Nona wasn't there.

"We'll get you out of the tank," promised Jordan. "When she comes
back, we'll rig up a place where there's no gravity. And we'll
continue cold treatment."

"I can wait," said Anti. "On this world I'm normal."

Docchi stared forlornly about. The one thing he wanted to see wasn't
there.

"If you're worrying about Nona," advised Anti, "don't. The guards were
pretty rough with the women, but plastissue doesn't feel pain. They
didn't find her."

"How do you know?"

"Listen," said Anti. The ground shivered with the power of the
gravital units. "As long as they're running, how can you doubt?"

"If I could be sure--"

"You can start now," Jordan said. "First, though, you'd better get up
and turn around."

Docchi scrambled to his feet. She was coming toward him.

She showed no sign of strain. Except for a slight smudge on her
wonderfully smooth and scar-less cheek, she might just have stepped
out of a beauty cubicle. Without question, she was the most beautiful
woman in the world. This world, of course, though she could have done
well on any world--if she could have communicated with people as well
as with machines.

"Where were you hiding?" Docchi asked, expecting no answer.

She smiled. He wondered, with a feeling of helplessness, if machines
could sense and appreciate her lovely smile, or whether they could
somehow smile themselves.

"I wish I could take you in my arms," he said bitterly.

"It's not as silly as you think," said Anti, watching from the surface
of the tank. "You don't have any arms, but she has two. You can talk
and hear, but she can't. Between you, you're a complete couple."

"Except that she would never get the idea," he answered unhappily.

Jordan, rocking on his hands, looked up quizzically. "I must be
something like her. They used to call me a born mechanic; just put a
wrench in my hand and I can do anything with a piece of machinery.
It's as if I sense what the machine wants done to it. Not to the
extent that Nona can understand, naturally. You might say it's
reversed, that she's the one who can hear while I have to lip-read."

"You never just gabble," Docchi prompted. "You have something in
mind."

Jordan hesitated. "I don't know if it's stupid or what. I was thinking
of a kind of sign language with machines. You know, start with the
simple ones, like clocks and such, and see what they mean to her.
Since they'd be basic machines, s