The hunger was getting bad. THX felt a constant, burning ache in his middle. His legs were getting fluttery. And he was seeing things.
Off in the corner of his eye, strange lights nickered at him. When he turned to look directly at them, the lights disappeared.
Does hunger cause hallucinations? he wondered.
Then the voice of OMM came to him from out of the nowhere: “Blessings on you. Even here, in the realm of confessed and condemned felons, I am with you. Do not try to evade your fate. Rest. Surrender your will to the necessities of reality. I will provide. Rest and sleep. Sleep.”
The taped voice was supposed to be hypnotic, but hot anger kept THX going.
“You let this happen to me,” he shouted into the nothingness. “I was your faithful follower and you led me into this. You let them do this to me. And to her.”
OMM’s taped voice serenely ignored his words. “Even here, in the realm… Rest… Surrender… Rest and sleep.”
When he finally did sleep, his dreams were filled with OMM’s voice, but now it was a fierce demanding voice telling him:
“Thou hast sinned greatly and must suffer for it. The masses will not rest until you have payed for your sins.”
And he saw himself back at his job in the assembly bay, standing on aching rubbery legs, hands trembling as he worked the remote manipulators. But inside the assembly area, on the other side of the leaded window, there was not a robot. LUH lay there, her body open and shining metal organs gleaming in the overhead lights. And THX saw that he wasn’t assembling her, he was taking her apart.
He awoke screaming.
At his feet were four brown food cubes. His scream choked off as he stared at them. He reached out and touched them. They were real.
“Even here, I provide,” said OMM’s lofty voice.
Why? he wondered as he slowly picked up one of the cubes. Why feed a condemned man, a man they’re going to kill?
The answer came easily. “Because they want my body to be in good health when they kill me. They want my organs.”
The food was at his lips when he told himself that truth. Far off in the distance, he saw the blinking lights again. This tune they remained even when he stared right at them. Blinking red and blue lights, going on and off in sequence, like a signal.
His stomach was wrenching, his mouth dry and caked. He held the food cubes before his face, a brown gritty lump that contained nourishment without taste.
No, he told himself. Starve yourself. Let your body shrivel and die. Don’t give them what they want.
But his body answered, “If they can bring you food, they can make you eat it. Don’t be a fool. Eat now, or they’ll make you eat later. They’re not going to let a valuable collection of organs destroy its usefulness to them.”
Be strong, he said. Don’t give in to them. Even if they can overpower you, don’t go along with them. Fight!
But it was a losing argument. He held the food cube in his shaking hands for a few moments longer, then took a bite of it, then wolfed down all four of them.
The blinking signal lights disappeared.
Slowly, his stomach rumbling with unaccustomed fullness, he got to his feet and resumed walking.
No voices now, no lights. But far off in the distance he saw something—a dark blob that grew and took shape, a human shape, a man, approaching him.
THX quickened his pace. The man was heading straight for him, tall and purposeful. Then THX saw that it was a chrome robot.
But not a police robot. The same size and model, but this one wore the pastel green uniform of Mercicontrol.
THX stopped as the robot came up to him.
“Don’t you think you’ve gone far enough?” asked a human voice from the robot’s mouth grill.
“No. I want to get out.”
“There is no way for you. Why don’t you let me lead you back to your compound?” The robot extended one gloved hand.
THX backed away. “I’m going to find a way out. I’m not going to stay here and wait for you to kill me.”
“Kill you?”
“Consume me… it’s the same thing.”
If a robot could look confused, this one would have.
“Who are you? Identify yourself.”
THX glared at the robot’s impassive face and said nothing.
“Wait… wait…” the human voice said. “I have your picture file… you’re a felon. How did you get into the hospital area?”
“Hospital area?”
“You’re trespassing. Felon 1138, prefix THX. You belong back in the prison area. You’re trespassing!”
THX laughed. “Then arrest me.”
“Don’t move. I’m calling the police. They’ll pick you up and return you to your proper area.”
Still laughing, THX started to walk past the robot.
“I said don’t move! You’re not allowed here…”
Shaking his head, THX answered, “You’re crazy—why should I wait here for the police?”
The robot started walking with him. “Very well, I’ll just have to keep you in sight until the police arrive. You can’t get away, you know.”
Shrugging, THX asked, “This is a hospital area? Where are the patients?”
“Can’t you see…” the voice hesitated. “Oh, of course not, the food conditioning. Well, the patients are here. Most of them in cryosleepers, in stasis.”
“What?”
“Never mind. Two police robots are heading toward us. They’ll have you in custody in a few minutes.”
THX looked around. In every direction, nothing but white nothingness.
“Don’t be alarmed,” the robot said. “The police won’t hurt you if you don’t resist.”
“No, they’ll just take me out one time to be consumed.”
The voice from the robot said, “Well, if it’s any consolation, that’s what happens to everybody here.”
Puzzled, THX said, “You told me this was a hospital.”
“Yes,” the voice explained pleasantly, “we take in the people who are incurably ill and put them into cryogenic stasis. If we can cure them, we do. If we decide they can’t be cured, then we consume them for their organs. Sooner or later, everyone who comes here is consumed. It’s economically efficient.”
The police robots came into view. THX said, “Everybody is consumed.”
“Yes,” the Mercicontrol robot said. “So don’t feel bad about it. We all have to go sooner or later.”
“Thanks,” said THX as the police robots came up and silently stood before him.
They walked him in an amazingly short time back to a point where he could just barely make out a dark fleck in the middle of the white nothingness.
One of the police robots pointed to it. “That is your area. Go to it and stay there until sent for. This is your final warning.”
THX felt an urge to spit at them, but he did nothing. The robots stood there and watched as he walked toward the modules.
After a long time walking he could make out the flat bed modules and the standing, gesticulating people. One of them—the boy, perhaps—climbed up on a bed and began waving to him.
THX walked steadily. Their voices began drifting toward him:
“I can just barely see him…”
“He’s free! Can’t you see, he’s free!”
“No. I think he’s coming back.”
“I don’t see anything… I can’t see him at all. I think he’s been destroyed.”
“I can see him. He’s coming back. There.”
Finally he was close enough for even old PTO to see him. “Fool!” the old man called out “Completely reckless behavior. I’m not responsible.”