text: [Themes: Science Fiction]
  
  > Go downward
  You make your way down the ramp...
  
  gods of pressure - this room, unlike the cramped corridors and tight bunkrooms, is a wide cathedral-like dome, held up by one fat pillar in the centre of the floor. A smooth ramp snakes around it on a gentle incline up to the higher levels - no stairs here, the robots not being that adept - and on a normal day the floor around would be crowded with scientists, like worshippers at a standing stone. However today - for some reason, it seems - is not a normal day. Where is everyone?
  
  Corridors leave the space in all directions - Kurner's room is down the passage further south.
  
  > go south
  You walk back down the corridor.
  
  You're in the main module, and that means you know your way around
  with your eyes shut. With your eyes open you can also comment on the decor; and note that it improves substantially to the east where the General has his office, to the west it probably disimproves (Kurner's hole is over there) and north leads toward the centre of the dome which means one thing - toward the room with your machine.
  
  Back south is a long corridor.
  
  > go to the west
  The corridor continues around the curve of the base to the
  northwest, to the rooms of the various scientists. This one is of interest though, perhaps - it is the door to Kurner's room - chosen by lottery, it is the nearest to all the machinery and so the loudest to be in.
  
  The door itself is quite a sight if you like hybridised tech - Kurner being the paranoiac he is has fitted it with a Russian retinal scanner, a thumb-reader and a voice tag detector.
  
  > Go north
  Dr. Kurner's Office
  - is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
  utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
  
  > examine computer
  "Type password:"
  
  > Search desk
  A glint catches your eye, but it turns out to be the silver button on a particularly hideous shiny-purple shirt. You toss it aside.
  
  > search floor
  Books, clothes, papers -- a mess, really.
  
  > Review
  (Review mode - time does not pass)
  
  Dr. Kurner's Office
  - is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
  utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
  
  > look at the drawer
  It's locked.
  
  > check what you're carrying
  You have a lab coat (being worn) and a screwdriver.
  
  Your left palm has been branded with a button.
  
  > go west
  Standard cubby-hole bathroom really. A sink, toilet, and a greasy mirror reflecting the steam-stained beige walls in all their smudged glory. The door - should you tire of such an atmospheric locale - is back east.
  
  > examine the toilet
  You can learn about those things yourself.
  
  > breathe on the porthole
  You breathe on the portholes and a pool of condensation forms.
  
  > examine the portholes
  Through the portholes swim a variety of underwater fish.
  
  > Go east
  You can exit Kurner's room by going south. The bathroom is west.
  
  > type nothing
  When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, type "nothing".
  
  > Go east
  The door to the General's office itself is to the east. This room isn't really a room, it's more just an expansion of the corridor westwards, with the walls hung with deep curtains and a couple of leather sofas stuck in the middle of the floorspace. In one corner there used to stand a potted plant, but as budget cuts meant saving on electricity it quickly died in the glow of forty-watt bulbs.
  
  In place of the plant is a Stat machine.
  
  > examine the curtains
  They're deep blue, like the sea, and hung to cover the otherwise utilitarian walls.
  
  > look behind the curtains
  Behind the curtains is propped what you assume are a few cleaning tools - a floor waxer and a metal rod with a plate on the end.
  
  > get the metal detector
  Taken.
  
  > get the waxer
  It's far to heavy.
  
  > examine the machine
  A panel for your hand, and then once read it'll tell you on a need-to-know basis all you need to know. By one side is a notice listing all the current clearances: "1 - General Huffing. 2 - Dr. Kurner, Prof. Taylor". 3 is your old group, and contains most of the established members of the team. Zak still loiters in a class by himself, no. 12, mainly due to his mother being Ukrainian and the General being somewhat old-school.
  
  > touch panel
  Clearance 2: CONFIRMED
  *Plasma virus-injection complete
  *Virus tests on rodent subjects complete
  *Results show 250% growth - see Dr. Taylor for details.
  WARNING - CONTAINER LOSS REPORTED
  
  Container loss! Well, that would explain why Taylor had that "car keys down the gutter" expression all last week.
  
  The screen falls dark as you remove your hand.
  
  > examine the detector
  It's called a "Cosmetic" apparently, in another one of those horribly garbled nicknames that are currently all the range. (Anyone for a Coocla? Or a game of Bammon?)  It has a switch on one side, a four-foot handle pole and a rounded plate at the base.
  
  > wave it
  You could take someone's eye out with that! (If their eye was about a foot wide).
  
  > turn it on
  Bleep!
  
  > point it at the clothes
  Nothing.
  
  > point it at the books
  Bleep!
  
  Hunting more thoroughly leads you to locate a small key under the dust jacket of a hideous looking volume.
  
  You find nothing else.
  
  > unlock the drawer with the key
  Unlocked.
  
  > open the drawer
  Opened.
  
  In the drawer you see a pill-bottle and a notepad.
  
  > look athe pill-bottle
  It's labelled in gibberish: "TAXI MALLO BALUO:" and so forth.
  
  > open the bottle
  Of course! An overdose on strange medicines! That'd take you out faster than it did your aunt! (Who was rushed to hospital, revived, but then died of food-poisoning from a bunch of grapes).
  
  You open the bottle, to reveal a large number of pink tablets.
  
  > eat the tablets
  You swallow a fistful, noting they are cherry flavoured. Then you wait.
  
  One.
  
  Two.
  
  Zmigra.
  
  Chank.
  
  Zis qua! Lil betite monkrane follo! Ze chafi lighan mucho blanchos, y ca merhaba ftang flivaro-toaster. Milcha! San omb-bomba ze anse le tabbycat-rrr.
  
  >ANSE TABBYCAT-RRR
  
  La ranja se: "ProtoFrench lessons. Dosage: one tablet last five minutes. Try to avoid taking more than twenty a day. Do not take with alcohol or whilst in control of aircraft or heavy equipment. Do not feed to children. Do not use as fertiliser, or vitamin supplement. Do not sue the manufacturer for misunderstandings."
  
  The shock of comprehension lasts well after the severe nausea and stomach cramp has passed, and you come around, feeling well. The drug - a ProtoFrench class, presumably imported from Europe itself - has slackened its grip on the language centres of your brain leaving you with just a mild dyslexia when you look around.
  
  > look at the notepad
  "He is there. He was there. He will be there. He has been there. He might well be there. He shall be there. The password is dog. The password was dog. The password will be dog. The password has been..."
  
  And so on.
  
  > look at the computer
  It's unreadable.
  
  You feel a slight shadow pass across your eyes as your brain is repaired to Native Tongue once more.
  
  > go west
  Standard cubby-hole bathroom really. A sink, toilet, and a greasy mirror reflecting the steam-stained beige walls in all their smudged glory. The door - should you tire of such an atmospheric locale - is back east.
  
  > write the dog
  When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, write "dog".
  
  > examine the mirror
  Kurner's harassed and ugly mush looks back at you. You can't help noticing he looks a little pale - but then everyone here does, it's lack of sunlight. Once again you curse your machine for not having put you sea-side. You can make out "dog" scribbled in big chunky fat-child finger-writing in the condensation.
  
  The condensation on the mirror evaporates away.
  
  > eat the pill
  You swallow a pill, and wait a second until the pain in your brain indicates effect.
  
  > wait for a while
  Time passes...
  
  The brain-pain subsides.
  
  Time passes...
  
  Time passes...
  
  Time passes...
  
  > examine the mirror
  Kurner's harassed and ugly mush looks back at you. You can't help noticing he looks a little pale - but then everyone here does, it's lack of sunlight. Once again you curse your machine for not having put you sea-side.
  
  > breathe on mirror
  You breathe on the mirror and a pool of condensation forms. The word "CHYNE" is now visible on the mirror.
  
  > Go east
  Dr. Kurner's Office
  - is also his room, and it's a tip. A bed in one corner looks
  utterly pristine, under forty or fifty large books. The desk, facing onto a ubiquitous porthole, has a computer screen and keyboard set into it but is otherwise empty. The floor is a seaweed-sludge of screwed-up paper and dirty clothing. A door leads out south, and there's a bathroom annex to the west.
  
  > examine the screen
  It's changed to white, just plain white. There should be a selection of program buttons - and a logout - which you'd touch to activate the applications. (The "mouse" went out of fashion as soon as people were willing to have fine enough electrodes implanted in their index fingers). But there's nothing visible here.
  
  > touch the screen
  You jab the screen randomly and eventually hit the logout button at the bottom left of the screen, which you spot by the way it blinks blue before returning the screen to
  
  "Enter password:"
  
  It must have been white-on-white.
  
  > Type chyne
  When typing or writing, you need to surround the target word in quotes; ie, type "chyne".
  
  > touch top left
  The screen changes.
  
  > examine the screen
  On the screen is a collection of Dr. Kurner's documents - mostly uninteresting; work reports, one is apparently the first draft of a novel called "Vengeance is my Sister". There is one open already - and it catches your eye.
  
  It is the design for a black-box module with a multistrand wire feed that looks not a whole lot unlike the one plugged into your beloved upstairs. You skim over the opening mechanism and make a note of it, before ploughing into the circuits themselves.
  
  Quickly the patterns form. The search processes have been altered - no longer the first-mind-in-set-location pattern you'd programmed, but rather a nearest-to-base scan. And the criteria - you'd demanded a certain age, fitness, and suntan level for your subject. Kurner's level is set for ... good grief...
  
  That explains it then. That box must have been in place this morning, when you stepped into the machine. It's set up to find the nearest dead body it can and transfer. Thinking back - didn't Kurner collapse when the machine fired? Maybe he had a heart attack or something, then machine transferred you in.
  
  Only one thing to do then. Get back to the machine, and reprogram that box to get you back.
  
  > touch the screen
  Nothing else happens.
  
  > touch bottom left
  "Enter password:"
  
  > touch the top right
  Nothing happens.
  
  > go to the east
  You're in the main module, and that means you know your way around
  with your eyes shut. With your eyes open you can also comment on the decor; and note that it improves substantially to the east where the General has his office, to the west it probably disimproves (Kurner's hole is over there) and north leads toward the centre of the dome which means one thing - toward the room with your machine.
  
  Back south is a long corridor.
  
  Joe the janitor saunters in from the east corridor. "Well, there it is!" he exclaims. "I've been looking for that." He removes the Cosmetic from your hand with a frown of reproach. "I know you scientists are the bigwigs here, but I wish you'd ask first."
  
  "Say, Dr. Kurner, are you ill?" He smiles. "I guess you're nervous about the Big Day. I'll let you get on." With that - and with the metal detector - he whistles his way off westwards.
  
  Big Day?
  
  > Up
  You climb the great spiral of the ramp, round and round until you're sure the ground is screwing in and you're not going anywhere...
  
  You know you're in favour when your personal lab is put on the first level of the building. It's behind that door to the south, the one only you have the key to. Except, of course, you haven't got it, because you're inside the room. Or you might be. Anyway, the door seems to still be open, which is handy.
  
  A loose panel hangs from the doorframe - it seems it's incurred some damage since you were last here.
  
  The ramp which leads back down to the main room is north.
  
  > go south
  You enter your lab.
  
  The room is much as you left it; a porthole above a bank of heavy machinery. The glass cylinder stands in one corner, aloof and empty.
  
  One terminal case is violently unlocked.
  
  > Examine box
  You kneel down by the terminal case and begin to feel for the various catches which control the opening mechanism. There's one - the next - you feel one side start to pivot round, which is a good sign.
  
  Suddenly there is a noise from the door. You stand up sharply, wheel around.
  
  "Oh, hi there, Dr. Kurner!" exclaims Zak cheerily, from the doorway.
  He has a screwdriver held between his teeth and is working on something in the doorframe. "Something went wrong with the door; I'm just refusing it. Be with you in a second."
  
  > tell Zak about yourself
  "Hold on a sec Doc -- almost done here," says Zak.
  
  > open the box
  You freeze as Zak shouts "Morning, Professor!" And sure enough, through the door enters yourself, looking spritely, excited, well. You stagger back in shock against the machine, in front of the damaged terminal case. There is a moment of eye-contact, but the Professor - you - don't seem to react.
  
  The others on the project enter the room and start to fiddle with the machinery. As the Professor pauses to gaze in proud awe at his construction, Zak winks your way and whispers "Good thing I got that door fixed, eh?"
  
  "All set, Professor?" Zak takes his arm - your arm is supporting your weight against the terminal due to the weakness entering your body as suddenly it all comes become clear. "Nearest-search". Any physicist knows "near" isn't just a three-dimensional concept.
  
  "FIVE". "FOUR".
  
  "Hey - do you suppose it should be sparking like that?" Zak pipes up.
  
  It is sparking, too, but you're not thinking about that, you're desperately trying to work out what happens next.
  
  "And then there's quite a bit of smoke too, isn't there?"
  
  Dr. Kurner's box wasn't well programmed enough to cope with this - with an empty mind-sack next to a host containing its mind. Not only that but the machine is still performing it's primary search too, just secondary to Kurner's implanted approach.
  
  "Maybe we should open it up and take a look?"
  
  And to cap it all - you've just seen a cable at the top of the machine which is plugged into completely the wrong socket.
  
  A school of fish swims past the window.
  
  "Anyone got a screwdriver?" A few pat their pockets, and shrug.
  
  "ZERO."
  
  Your eyes flip open, to a flash of your face in glass. Then the air sears once more. Bug in my program, you think. What happens now?
  
  No other way to put it. Our myriad eyes see it a hundred different ways; a million little angles on the same rocks below, the same lights distant and near. It all spins sickly, too much information, too much speed, every bit of changing direction constantly. We are swimming, around in and about each other.
  
  A snuttlenose swims by.
  
  The school flicks about and swims northeast.
  
  From way above trickles light. To the south is the dome.
  
  > About yourself
  We are multiple, all seeing. We see ourself and the world at once, it is all placed out. We are fish.
  
  > Frolic
  We don't understand.
  
  The school flicks about and swims southward.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
  
  > go to the south
  In a pulse we move south.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
  
  Jagged rocks blade from the sand here.
  
  > look at the rocks
  They are rugged and ripped, protruding like spines through the sand.
  
  An allamander passes us in eerie silence.
  
  The school flicks about and swims westward.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
  
  > go south
  The dome blocks us swimming.
  
  A squid passes us in eerie silence.
  
  > Examine dome
  The dome is a huge bulge of copper on the seabed. We do not understand it, it is just rock, shape of land, movement of speed of water. A metal corridor snakes out of it eastward toward a smaller dome, with a glass chimney at its top. It is the mortuary block and near it blackness moves.
  
  Floating through the blue comes a finn.
  
  > go east
  The school trails eastward.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue. We are near a window in a large metal dome just to the south.
  
  Floating through the blue comes an angel.
  
  > look at the angel
  The angel swims out of reach -- and not to our disappointment.
  
  The school flicks about and swims northwest.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
  
  > Go south
  We fin south.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue. We are near a window in a large metal dome just to the south.
  
  A cuttlesprout swims by.
  
  With a snap one of our school is gone. Suddenly we can't remember our father's face.
  
  > look at the window
  We see our reflection.
  
  A calarta swims by.
  
  The school flicks about and swims in many directions before joining us again.
  
  The dome is south. We are in blue.
  
  > Go east
  We fin east.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
  
  This is ridiculous. We can't spend our life as a shoal of fish. We need to get back, and fast.
  
  > Examine dome
  The dome is a huge bulge of copper on the seabed. We do not understand it, it is just rock, shape of land, movement of speed of water. A metal corridor snakes out of it eastward toward a smaller dome, with a glass chimney at its top. It is the mortuary block and near it blackness moves.
  
  The school flicks about and swims westward.
  
  From way above trickles light. To the south is the dome.
  
  > Go east
  The school trails eastward.
  
  The dome is south. We are in blue.
  
  > go east
  We swim east.
  
  The dome is south. We are in blue.
  
  > Go upwards
  We are up and down as well. We are a school, and wide, and shape changing always.
  
  The school flicks about and swims northward.
  
  The dome is south. We are in blue.
  
  > examine the chimney
  The Mortuary dome is broken, some walls have collapsed under a great dark weight we cannot see clearly, with moving eyes and confusion.
  
  An angel passes us in eerie silence.
  
  > look at weight
  It is blackness over the mortuary.
  
  A shrake swims by.
  
  The school is fished, we are piece-eaten. Strangely our name has gone missing.
  
  There are a good few hundred in this school. It will take forever to be eaten by other fish.
  
  The school flicks about and swims northwest.
  
  To the south is the bulging dome. All around us is the blue.
  
  > eat yourself
  We are too many.
  
  > eat the weight
  We try but we just don't know how.
  
  An octopus swims by.
  
  > go south
  We swim south.
  
  From way above trickles light. To the south is the dome. We are above a long corridor of metal leading toward the mortuary.
  
  A calarta swims by.
  
  > Go east
  We fin over the dome of mortuary, where the metal turns black with a heaving darkness.
  
  Our motion sets a rustle in the water like the waving of seaweed and some of the shoal tries to leave in a panic. The darkness below is moving. It's coming nearer. It's rushing from the seabed in a motion like the unfolding of the earth. It is a giant, wrapping hand, that our kaleidoscope eyes see from all sides and form into a huge rounded trunk in our mind. The whole object encompasses us until a mouth is doing the same. The rest try to swim away, finning back madly over the corridor toward the dome. The shadow follows, boiling out of the sand, revealing its shadow full. Sweeps over the corridor, more of us are lost. We try to out-shake it. We fail. Flitter, flurry, fade, in blackness.
  
  Eyes open. You feel somewhat dizzy. You can't remember how to tie a tie, you note, which at least means one got away.
  
  The glass door has slid open. Outside, the room is empty bar for smoking machinery and Dr. Kurner's body, slumped out on the floor.
  
  Somewhere, an alarm is blaring.
  
  > About yourself
  You are yourself, once more.
  
  > look
  Cables feed away from the base of the cylinder. Inside, there's the grille for your feet, and the Emergency Door Release Switch.
  
  > Leave
  You step out of the cylinder. From here you can see the screen in the corner of the room, which shows a giant multi-tentacled creature growing from over the mortuary dome, coming closer.
  
  Your machine is in one corner, forgotten. Dr. Kurner slumps on the floor, quite dead, almost forgotten too.
  
  The alarm is blaring. A voice over the intercom shrieks "What are we going to do? General? WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?"
  
  > examine screen
  The squid is coming closer, ever closer. In a matter of minutes it will crush the lab.