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"At least a rotten egg used to be an egg," agreed Escrima, wrinkling his nose. "That powdered stuff, maybe it came out of a vat in some chemical plant. About all it's good for, is you can use it to kill bugs, if you got bugs."

"Kill bugs?" Phule's brow wrinkled. "How do you kill bugs with powdered eggs? I didn't think even bugs would eat the stuff."

"No," said Escrima, a sly grin now on his face. "The way you kill bugs, you take a whole big box of the crap and drop it right on top of the bug. Kills him real good, you bet."

Phule laughed. "I promise, Escrima, you get the best ingredients," he said. "If you ever get anything that isn't good enough for you to feed the troops, feed it to me first."

"What?" said Escrima, mortally offended. "You want me to feed you trash?"

Phule nodded. "Yes, absolutely," he said. "That way I know when we're being cheated, and I'll get mad enough to do something about it. You know I'm behind you all the way, Escrima. Look here: On this new assignment, if you want something, let me know and I'll figure out a way to get it. If I have to put a fleet of private transports on the job, I'll get it. But believe me, we should be able to use the local stuff, too. Just wait and see."

Escrima nodded. "If you tell me that, I believe you. All right, then, Captain. We got a deal."

"Good," said Phule. "Now, I told you I'd get you the best equipment available. I've got a new field kitchen ordered-a prototype, designed to allow you to prepare anything you could do in a five-star restaurant under field conditions. We're going to give it a test here on Landoor before we get out somewhere where we can't get it replaced. It arrives day after tomorrow, if everything goes right. I want you to give it a full test and let me know anything it needs to meet your specifications. OK?"

"Yes, sir!" said Escrima. Like half the men in the legion, he loved the chance to play with new toys. Now he was going to get his hands on a brand-new one. It would keep him busy for a while, Phule knew, figuring out ways to get the most out of it. The results would be well worth the effort.

"All right, so I was wrong," said Lola, not sounding in the least contrite. She turned off the hotel room's built-in computer screen, which had been displaying Do-It-Yourself Turing Test, by Minsky & Hofstadter Enterprises. "We've gone and stolen the damned robot dupe instead of kidnapping Willard Phule. Now what?"

They'd realized something wasn't right almost as soon as they'd dissolved the goo gun bonds they'd used to capture their prey. The captive's response to the situation had been thoroughly inappropriate, unless one assumed that a total idiot had been running a Legion company and a major Casino Hotel-not only running them, but running them successfully. Their suspicions aroused, they'd called up the Turing test, and the robot had failed it miserably.

Ernie shook his head, miserably. "We've blown it, for sure," he said. "The bosses send us here to snatch a guy and all we get's a stupid bot. They're gonna wale on our butts for this."

Lola paced back and forth in short steps, thinking furiously. "I think it's time we stopped thinking about the bosses and start looking after ourselves," she said. "We can still make something out of this if we don't panic."

"Panic?" said Ernie, his voice squeaking. "You ever seen what the bosses do to guys who stiff 'em?"

"That's the ones they catch," said Lola. She stopped and pointed at Ernie, and continued, "If we play our cards right, who says they're going to catch us? Especially if we can get Phule to pay to get his robot back. These things can't be cheap. It ought to be worth enough to him to give us enough of a nest egg to run off and hide someplace safe."

"Yeah, I guess the boys gotta be worth somethin' to him," Ernie said, scratching his head. "I wonder what he'll pay to get it back."

"We need to know the going price for an Andromatic dupe, for starters," said Lola. She flopped onto the bed and stared at the ceiling a moment before continuing, "I guess. he'll pay that much just to avoid waiting for the factory to turn out a new one for him. This thing's gotta be a custom model-nobody else would want one that looked like him."

"Yeah, I guess we can get replacement value, whatever that is," said Ernie. He looked once more at the replica of Phule sitting, with an expression of seeming unconcern, cross-legged in a chair by the window. It might have been waiting for a dinner date.

Or, more likely, looking for a chance to escape. But the two kidnappers weren't betting that their captive would remain docile. The robot's left leg was shackled to the heavy chair, and even with its superhuman strength, it wouldn't make much progress dragging such an awkward impediment. Still, if it managed to escape the building, it was a good bet that it would find its way back to the Fat Chance, and that shortly thereafter, the two botnappers would be in the hands of unsympathetic security guards, learning firsthand about the penal system of Lorelei Station.

"One thing hasn't changed," said Lola. "We have to get off-station with this thing as quick as we can. The heat's going to be turned way up. We've still got a chance to turn a profit. The bot's worth something. Let's get someplace where we can cash it in."

Ernie looked her in the eye for a long moment, then shrugged. "OK, you're running the game," he said. "But first things first. What do we do to keep the Fat Chance security from beating down our door?"

She stood and moved quickly to the computer terminal she'd signed off from only a few minutes before. "Like I said, we have to get off-station-and take the bot with us-pronto. Tell you what; you go to the public 'puters in the lobby and do some research on the going price of these robots. Meanwhile, I'll see if I can get us a berth on something headed out-and right now, I'm not particular about destinations. Don't take too long, OK? 'Cause I'm grabbing the first thing I can find, even if we have to leave without our luggage to make it. Got it?"

"Got it," said Ernie. He walked over and patted the robot on the head. "You just rest, of boy, you're gonna be our ticket to Rich Man's Row before it's all over." The robot, still gagged, said nothing.

"Be careful, it might grab you," said Lola, wrinkling her brow.

"Nah, the Asimov circuits won't let it," said Ernie. "Be back in a bit."

"Make it half a bit," said Lola, but Ernie was already out the door. She turned to the terminal and began searching for a ship headed out-out to anywhere.

"Andromatic stands behind its product without reservation, Captain Jester," said the customer service representative with an audible sniff. A name badge, which read Stanton, was visible on his chest. "However, if you will examine your purchase agreement, you will see that customer negligence is excluded. It appears that the android's automatic theft alarms have been turned off by you or your agents."

"The factory default settings on the theft alarms prevented us from using the android as intended," said Phule. "With my initial order, I specified that the robot had to be able to mingle freely with customers in the casino. It was your factory-recommended installation consultant that suggested disabling the alarms in that environment so they wouldn't go off every time some unfamiliar person got too close."

"I am afraid that your consultant-who, I should point out, is an independent contractor and not one of our employees-has given you bad advice," said Stanton. "That is not an authorized modification. If you had read the documentation-"

Phule cut him off. "I did read the documentation," he said. "So did a couple of pretty talented engineers. We all agreed that it was nearly useless. Just for starters, the index is completely inaccurate, and the illustrations look as if they were drawn by somebody who'd never laid eyes on the product."

"Of course," said the customer service rep with an insulted expression, "you can't expect the standard manual to cover all the custom features you ordered. Why, we'd have to write a new manual for every order we filled."