"Hey," he shouted, "where is everyone?"

"There is no one here," the voice said, "but me."

"All right," said Sherwood. "Where do I go to find you?"

"You have found me," said the Ship. "You are standing in me."

"You mean...."

"I told you," said the Ship. "I said I was the Ship. That is what I am."

"But no one...."

"You do not understand," said the Ship. "There is no need of anyone. I am myself. I am intelligent. I am part machine, part human. Rather, perhaps, at one time I was. I have thought, in recent years, the two of us have merged so we're neither human nor machine, but something new entirely."

"You're kidding me," said Sherwood, beginning to get frightened. "There can't be such a thing."

"Consider," said the Ship, "a certain human who had worked for years to build me and who, as he finished me, found death was closing in...."

"Let me out!" yelled Sherwood. "Let me out of here! I don't want to be rescued. I don't want...."

"I'm afraid, Mr. Sherwood, it is rather late for that. We're already out in space."

"Out in space! We can't be! It isn't possible!"

"Of course it is," the Ship told him. "You expected thrust. There was no thrust. We simply lifted."

"No ship," insisted Sherwood, "can get off a planet...."

"You're thinking, Mr. Sherwood, of the ships built by human hands. Not of a living ship. Not of an intelligent machine. Not of what becomes possible with the merging of a man and a machine."

"You mean you built yourself?"

"Of course not. Not to start with. I was built by human hands to start with. But I've redesigned myself and rebuilt myself, not once, but many times. I knew my capabilities. I knew my dreams and wishes. I made myself the kind of thing I was capable of being—not the halfway, 

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