"No, why?"
"There's another robox-R coming down on this station," he said.
As he watched, the thing lost the tape track, relocated it.
"There can't be! Nothing at all shows on my board."
The thing stopped across the sensor ring from Flattery. An auger extension jerked away from its side, reached toward the foam-plugged hole, withdrew.
"Who's controlling that thing?" Flattery demanded.
"Not from here," Prudence said. "And I can see both Tim and John. They're not controlling it."
"You still getting drain on the computer?" Flattery whispered.
"Yes."
"Is the... Ox active?" Flattery asked.
"Only the original circuits," Bickel said. "Through the AAT bypass. The new doubled units haven't been connected."
"There can't be another robox in that area," Prudence insisted. "We haven't put any of the damn things on automatic. There's nothing showing on my board. The remotes would take a day and a half at least to -"
"It's right in front of me," Flattery said.
He watched it, fascinated. A tool arm extended with an empty sensor socket, reached toward the foam-plugged hole, retreated. A claw arm came up next. It probed the foam, drew back with a swiftness that startled Flattery.
"What's it doing?" Prudence asked.
"I'm not sure. It seems to be looking over the damage. Its vid-eyes are turned toward the hole. It acts like it can't decide which tool to use."
"What can't decide?" That was Timberlake, his voice faint over the Com-central relay from the shop.
"Try fixing the sensor yourself," Bickel said.
Flattery swallowed in a dry throat. He lifted a feeler with a guide eye from the tool pouch on his own robox, probed into the foam plug looking for the leads from the conduit.
Instantly, a whiplike extension shot out of the other robox, trapped his arm, jerked it away. The pain in his arm where the thing had clamped on it was sharp and shocking. He dropped the tool, yelled.
"What's wrong?" Prudence demanded.
The whiplike extension slowly unwound, released his arm.
"The thing grabbed me," Flattery said. His voice was shaky with pain and surprise. "It used its circuit probe... grabbed my arm."
"It won't let you make the repair?" That was Bickel, his voice coming in loud over the helmet system, indicating he'd plugged into the command circuit from the shop.
"Doesn't look like it," Flattery said. And he wondered: Why doesn't one of us say what this thing has to be? Why're we avoiding the obvious?
With an abrupt sense of purpose, the other robox reached out a claw arm, lifted the replacement sensor from Flattery's left hand, matched sensor and socket. Another claw arm recovered the feeler guide, fitted it to the connections of its own circuit probe.
"What's it doing now?" Bickel asked.
"Making the repair itself," Flattery said.
The feeler came out of the hole pulling the leads.
"John, what's showing on your meters?" Prudence asked.
"A slight pulse from the servo banks," Bickel answered. "Very faint. It's like the cycling echo of a test pulse. Are you still showing current drain in there? I don't have it here."
"Drain from the mains into the computer. You should be registering it."
"Negative," Bickel said.
"It just fitted the new socket and sensor into the hole," Flattery said.
"It brought the correct spare parts?" Bickel asked.
"It took the sensor I brought," Flattery said.
"It just took it from you?" Prudence asked.
"That's right."
"Prue, that test pulse is stronger," Bickel said. "Are you sure nothing on your board is doing it?"
She scanned her console. "Nothing."
"Job's finished," Flattery said. "What's the big board show, Prue?"
"Sensor in service," she said. "I can see you... and it."
"Try touching that new sensor, Raj," Bickel said.
"The thing damn near took my arm out the last time I tried that," Flattery objected.
"Use a tool," Bickel said. "Something long. You've got a telescoping radiation probe there."
Flattery looked into his robox unit, removed the telescoping probe. He extended it to its limit, reached toward the sensor, touched it.
The whip-arm flashed out of the other robox. There came a jolting shock and Flattery stared wide-eyed at the stump of the probe in his hand. The severed end drifted upward along the tube, tumbling from the force of the blow.
"Keee-rist!" That was Timberlake, proving they had the shop's screen switched to this circuit and were watching.
Flattery swallowed, spoke in a muffled voice: "If that'd been my arm..."