She should have figured it out. A robot, machines in her blood, flying hand, but really, who in their right mind would think they had been abducted by aliens? Was she in her right mind? How would she know? If she was living in her imagination, she wouldn’t be feeling so wretched, would she? Sally didn’t know, she’d never been insane before.

She must be stuck in her imagination, aliens with tentacles? Puleeeze!

To humor herself, she might as well ask more questions and see what her imagination could come up with.

“All right then. How did you get from your room to here? Wait! Don’t say you walked, give me a reasonable amount of detail, not too much. And, uh... how do you know stuff, if you were by yourself?”

“I will answer, largely in reverse order. My room has a square floor-plan, with the same area as the room we are currently inhabiting. The ceiling is lower and mimics a sky, with a sun that’s a glow which crosses the sky from one side to the other, then there’s a night. The room is filled with grass and rows of trees, except for the center, which has a sandbox that is ten feet square. In this sandbox is a pillar with a small box at its base. My food pellets and information packets appear in the box once a day. The food pellets, leaves from the trees, and blades of grass contain the extra nutrients I need to build new structures.” At this point, he dug around in a pocket of his pants and pulled out a pellet that was probably his food. He showed it to her and put it back in his pocket.

The boy appeared to be getting better at talking. This time, she’d understood most of what he’d said. She wanted to learn more, but even though she’d only been awake for something like a half hour she was feeling really worn out again.

“I am sorry, this is good to know and all that, but can we take a break and finish later?”

“Yes.”

The boy fetched the IV stand and Sally drank. Once she had enough she started nodding off, and just went with it.

When she woke a while later, the light still seemed to be the same. Was it ever going to be night? She looked around and was a little shocked that moving wasn’t that hard! She tried raising her arms, and found that she could lift them up to her shoulders! For just a little while, but still! She tried to push the wheels on the chair, but the brake was set and she couldn’t deal with that.

Where was the kid? She got a little panicky, then heard something above her. She looked up and there he was, crawling around the ceiling like a fly. And, like a fly, he would stop every so often and lick the ceiling.

That was going to take some getting used to.

He turned his head, looked her direction, then crawled to the back wall. He didn’t stop, just went headfirst down to the floor, did something acrobatic at the bottom to land on his feet, and walked over.

“Are you thirsty? Do you have to pee?”

“Yeah, and no.” It felt good to give the kid the same treatment he gave her. Petty? Yes.

He gave her more to drink. Sally noticed the taste of puke was almost completely gone from her mouth, but she was sure her breath would kill small animals and young children. For some reason, she’d forgotten to pack her toothbrush when she’d been abducted.

She drank and handed the tube to the boy, noting that her arms were getting stronger.

The boy looped the tube on the stand then continued telling his story. “One day I was absorbing an information packet when I found a rabbit in my room. This was odd since there were no entrances or exits; it was a closed environment. The rabbit escaped through a rogue subspace tube. I followed and found the series of atria we are now in.

“When I left, I brought along some of the leaves and blades of grass which I have been planting in the rooms as I traveled. They grow very quickly and I can return to these rooms to stock up as I grow new structures within myself. I also brought the box but so far, only food pellets have been delivered to it.”

Sally was impressed, the kid could have added in tons of detail, but this was a fairly good summary.

“How long have you been here?”

“Approximately two months.”

“It took you two months to travel through, what did you say? Seven rooms?”

“Yes. I had to be careful.”

That was interesting, he had clarified something without her having to ask.

“Are the other rooms like this one?”

“Yes, with minor variants in the detritus and scrub growth.”

“Detritus?”

“Garbage, or discarded material.”

“So, there are others here?”

“I have found no other inhabitants, except for the rabbits, which are not intelligent enough to generate garbage. I do not have enough information to make other conclusions involving the garbage.”

Sally didn’t really know what he meant. Garbage was garbage. The stupidest thing was that she was talking about garbage with a robot.

“Alright, so what do we do now? Wait! Let me say that a better way.” She thought it over. “What plans do you have about what we are going to do in the next few days? Not too much detail, but enough so I can understand what will be happening.” She thought that should be pretty good, at least she wouldn’t have him telling her how many steps he was going to take in what direction.

“We should stay here to allow you to recover. I can keep examining this room to obtain longer duration results to verify earlier observations. When you are able, we can expand our field of operation and investigate further along this series of rooms. From my observations of the building across the way,” he indicated the building that she could see through the windows, “I can see reflections that show the rooms are of a finite number in the direction we will travel.”

Goodness, he could be longwinded.

For once, she didn’t have anything to say. It was a do-able plan.

That was enough of this, for now. As she recovered she could ask the kid some more questions and see what other things she could find out.

Sally thought about what he had told her. It was very strange, but honestly, everything seemed out of her control. She couldn’t move much, had no idea what was going on, and even if she did, what the heck could she do?

Sally mentally kicked herself. Stop moping! She’d just woken up, something would happen. Hopefully, something good. It wasn’t time to sit around doing nothing and feeling sorry for herself! She wasn’t that sort of person.

She rallied.

“Hey! Can you take the brakes off, so I can try rolling around.” The kid was right, it was obvious who she was talking to, he didn’t really need a name. On the other hand, maybe she would call him “Hey”. That was funny.

The boy released the brakes and Sally tried moving the chair. Once she got it rolling on the level floor the chair coasted for quite a distance before stopping. She struggled to turn around and roll back.

Sally snickered to herself as she pushed herself along. Old folks Olympics! After a few back and forths, it wasn’t so funny. Rolling the chair was a lot more work that it should have been. She was panting, sweating, and could barely get the chair to move.

Enough! Time for a break.

Sally turned the chair so she could see the plastic bag of water? drink? Whatever it was, on the IV stand. The ultimate generic fluid for humans. It was impossibly far, a few feet away behind some brush. She looked around for the kid, even checked the ceiling, then stared at the drinking tube. It obstinately stayed out of reach.

“Uh, kid?” she yelled, “Could you get me a drink, please?”

He appeared right beside her. Sally jumped, at least on the inside. How had he gotten there so fast?

He gave her the tube and she drank. When she was done the bag was empty. Oh-oh.

“Hey, what now? The bag’s empty!”

“It will refill in an hour, or so.”

“What? How?”

He showed her one of the boxes connected to the bag by a little plastic tube. She hadn’t really noticed it before and watched as a drop came out of it and fell into the bag. How did that work? Sally was interested, but she was tired. Again.

Another question for later.

“Would you mind helping me to bed, and no I don’t have to pee. Oh, and let me know if you want to wash my gown so I can cover myself with a blanket.” Maybe she was getting the hang of dealing with the boy.

The boy untied her, carried her to the bed, lay her down, and covered her with a blanket. Sally tried to tuck it around her shoulders but she fell asleep mid-tug.