It was a gamble at best. The curtain might not be close enough, and if it was within range he might not be able to spot it from the tank, and if he did spot it he still might not be able to will himself through it while riding in the tank. Yet one thing he was not going to do was stop and get out, under the guns of the other tanks!
It was no gamble at all to remain here idle. He would inevitably fall to Satan’s forces. He had to try for the curtain!
He crashed on out of Heaven, through the interim chambers, and on into the barrens of Proton. The enemy tanks were on the other side of the dome, where he had entered. That was a break for him. Stile headed toward the region where the curtain should be. With just a little further luck—
The enemy tanks reacted as one, cruising around the dome on either side and spreading out to form a broad line. Now they were getting him into their sights—and the dome was not going to be in the line of fire much longer. No good luck for him here!
Stile threw his tank from side to side as the firing commenced, making a difficult target. Machines were accurate shooters when the target was stationary or in steady motion, but when velocity was erratic and non-laser weapons were being employed, as now seemed to be the case, it was necessary to anticipate the strategy of the prey. Otherwise the time it took the shell to travel would put it behind the target-tank. Since Stile was humanly unpredictable, the shots were missing. But he could not afford to flaunt him-self before them for long; inevitably a shell would score, at least disabling his machine. Then he would become a stationary target: a sitting quack, as it was described in Game-parlance.
In Phaze, he thought with fleeting humor, he had to watch out for spells. Here it was shells.
But his meandering had another purpose: to locate the curtain. It was here somewhere, but there were such poor reference points on the bare sand that he could not place it precisely. The curtain could curve about, and it shimmered so faintly that it was invisible from any distance, even for those like himself who were able to perceive it at all. He would probably come upon it so swiftly that he would pass it before realizing; then he would have to turn and try to cross from the other side while the enemy tanks had full seconds to orient.
A shell exploded in the sand beside him. The concussion shoved Stile’s tank violently to the side. Something flew from it, visible in his screen. A section of armor? No. If was Sheen.
Then Stile saw the curtain, angling across his path just ahead. He must have been traveling beside it, not quite intersecting it. He could veer right and pass through it now—
Not without Sheen! Yet he could not halt; that would be instant, fiery death. Already his pace slackened, the enemy tanks were closing the gap; their aim would become correspondingly more accurate. He had to get across—or perish.
Sheen had asked to be junked cleanly. Was this the occasion? Should he, after all, allow her to. . . ?
Stile set the controls to automatic, opened the hatch, and climbed out. The tank was moving at about 50 kilometers per hour now. Stile leaped off the side, sprinting desperately forward in midair. His feet touched the ground, and
Still weren’t fast enough. He made a forward roll, eyes and mouth tightly closed, curling his body into a ball. The sand was soft, here, though his velocity was such that it felt hard; he rotated many times before coming out of it, bruised but whole. Oh, that sand was hot! The enemy tanks, for the moment, were still chasing his empty tank. Stile charged back to find Sheen, who lay sprawled where she had fallen. She looked intact; perhaps the shock of the explosion had only jogged a wire loose, interrupting her power.
Stile picked her up and carried her toward the nearest intersection of the curtain. But she was heavy, being made of metals and plastic; it was a considerable burden in the shifting sand, and his bare feet were hurting from the heat. Stile was soon panting as he staggered on. His empty tank exploded. Chance and firepower had brought it down.
Now the enemy tanks slowed their pursuit, turning to return to their normal perimeter. And of course they be-came aware of Stile, lumbering along with his burden. Cannon swiveled to bear on him. But there was the curtain, just ahead.
Stile summoned his reserves and leaped. Phazel he thought, willing himself through. A tank fired; the shell whistled; the sand behind Stile erupted. Then the faint tingle of the curtain was on him. Stile fell to the ground, and it was green turf. Sheen was wrenched from his grasp and rolled through the grass and leaves and landed arms and legs akimbo.
One foot was burning. Stile realized that it remained on the other side of the curtain, where the smoke and heat of the shell-blast touched it. Hastily he drew it through. It was not burned, merely uncomfortable.
Now he went to Sheen. She was disheveled and battered, her fine torso abraded. One breast had been torn off, and about a third of her hair had been pulled out. It seemed, too, that the right side of her body had been crushed, and metal showed through a compound fracture of her right arm. There was a great deal more wrong with her than a loose wire!
He did not love her, he reminded himself. She was only a machine, her consciousness artificial. Without her power pack and feedback circuitry she was no more than junk. But his logic was overwhelmed by a surge of emotion. “I do love you, Sheen, in my fashion!” he whispered. “I shall have you repaired—“ Have her repaired? This was Phaze, the frame of magic. He was the Blue Adept. He could restore her himself! Or could he? He was not a healing Adept, and had never been able to affect the vital functions of a living creature. Well, he had healed Neysa after her visit to Hell, and his alternate self had done healing. So maybe he just needed practice. The Lady Blue had the healing touch, while Stile’s magic was generally more physical, however. And in no event could he restore the dead to life. Yet Sheen had never been alive. Why couldn’t he fix her physical circuitry, repair her breaks and losses? She should be within the ambience of his talent, after all! Quickly he fashioned spot spells: “Robot Sheen, body clean,” he sang, wishing he had his harmonica or the Platinum Flute along. But he had never anticipated returning to Phaze like this! In future he would keep those instruments with him at all times.
Sheen’s torso became unblemished. It was working! “Bones of steel, mend and heal.” And her fracture knitted itself together while her torso sprang out to original configuration, with even the missing breast replaced. “Face be fair; restore the hair,” and all that damage was undone. Now for the big one. “Broken circuits mend; consciousness lend.” Once again he was bothered by the crudity of the verse. But it served his purpose. Sheen was whole, now.
Except that she still lay there, lovely as any naked woman could be. She showed no sign of animation. How had he failed?
Maybe the lack of a musical instrument had depleted the force of his magic. Stile conjured a simple guitar and used it to strum up greater power, then tried other spells. He covered everything he could think of, but nothing worked.
At last, succumbing to reaction from his own narrow escape and grief-stricken at her apparent demise, he threw himself on her body and kissed her unresponsive lips. “Oh Sheen—I’m sorry!”
If he had expected his kiss to bring her magically to life, he was disappointed. She remained defunct. After a moment Stile sat up. His face was wet, a signal of his emotion. “I can’t accept this,” he said. “There has to be something.”
Then it came to him: Sheen was a sophisticated machine, mechanical and electronic, a creature of advanced science and technology—and such things were not operative in the fantasy frame. Sheen could be in perfect condition—he could not say “health”—yet be inoperative here. Only her body could cross the curtain, not her functioning. The answer was to get her back to her own frame. He had business there anyway. This excursion into Phaze was merely a device to save his own life.