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a sardine inside his tin can. Then, he twitched both of his

arms, like he was shivering. Then his robot-voice came out of the grille
on his face. "I think that you would be a ve-ry good coun-sel-or, Chet."
"Yeh?" I said. It was the first time that The Amazing Robotron had told
me he thought I'd be good at anything. Hell, it was the first time he'd
expressed any opinion about anything I'd said.
"Yes, Chet. Be-ing a coun-sel-or is a ve-ry good way to help your-self
un-der-stand what we have done to you by put-ting you in the Cen-ter."
I couldn't speak. My Mom, before she fell silent, had often spoken
about how unfair it was for me to be stuck here, because of something
that she or my father had done. But my father never seemed to notice
me, and the teachers on the vid made a point of not mentioning the
bat-house -- like someone trying hard not to notice a stutter or a wart,
and you knew that the best you could hope for from them was pity.
"Be-ing a coun-sel-or is ve-ry hard, Chet. But coun-sel-ors sometimes
get a spec-ial re-ward. Some-times, we get to help. Do you re-ally want
to do this?"
"Yeh. Yes. I mean, it sounds good. You get to travel, right?"
The Amazing Robotron's idiot-lights rippled, something I came to
recognize as a chuckle, later. "Yes. Tra-vel is part of the job. I sug-gest
that you start by ex-am-in-ing your friends. See if you can fi-gure out
why they do what they do."
I've used this trick on my kids. What do I know about their psychology?
But you get one, you convince it to explain the rest to you. It helps.
Counselors are always from another world -- by the time the first
generation raised in a bat-house has grown old enough, there aren't any
bats' children left to counsel on their homeworld.
#
I take room-service, pizza and beer in an ice-bucket: pretentious, but
better than sharing a dining-room with the menagerie. Am I becoming a

racist?
No, no. I just need to focus on things human, during this vacation.
The food is disappointing. It's been years since I lay awake at night,
craving a slice and a brew and a normal gravity and a life away from
the bats. Nevertheless, the craving remained, buried, and resurfaced
when I went over the room-service menu. By the time the dumbwaiter
in my room chimed, I was practically drooling.
But by the time I take my second bite, it's just pizza and a brew.
I wonder if I will ever get to sleep, but when the time comes, my eyes
close and if I dream, I don't remember it.
I get up and dress and send up for eggs and real Atlantic salmon and
brown toast and a pitcher of coffee, then find myself unable to eat any
of it. I make a sandwich out of it and wrap it in napkins and stuff it into
my day-pack along with a water-bottle and some sun-block.
It's a long walk up to the bat-house, but I should make it by nightfall.
#
Chet was up at 6h the next morning. His mom was already up, but she
never slept that he could tell. She was clattering around the kitchen in
her housecoat, emptying the cupboards and then re-stacking their
contents for the thousandth time. She shot him a look of something
between fear and affection as he pulled on his shorts and a t-shirt, and
he found himself hugging her waist. For a second, it felt like she
softened into his embrace, like she was going to say something, like it
was normal, and then she picked up a plate and rubbed it with a towel
and put it back into the cupboard.
Chet left without saying a word.
The bat-house breathed around him, a million farts and snores and
whispered words. A lift was available almost before he took his finger

off the summon button. "125," he said.
Chet walked to the door of the guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla
and started to knock, then put his hands down and sank down into a
squat, with his back against it.
He must have dozed, because the next thing he knew, he was tipping
over backwards into the apt, and the guy who thought he was Nicola
Tesla was standing over him, concerned.
"Are you all right, son?"
Chet stood, dusted himself off and looked at the floor. "Sorry, I didn't
want to disturb you. . ."
"But you wanted to come back and see more. Marvelous! I applaud
your curiosity, young sir. I have just taken the waters -- perhaps you
would like to try?" He gestured at the ocean.
"You