The bat-house breathed around him, a million farts and snores and whispered words. A lift was available almost before he took his finger off the summon button. "125," he said.
Chet walked to the door of the guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla and started to knock, then put his hands down and sank down into a squat, with his back against it.
He must have dozed, because the next thing he knew, he was tipping over backwards into the apt, and the guy who thought he was Nicola Tesla was standing over him, concerned.
"Are you all right, son?"
Chet stood, dusted himself off and looked at the floor. "Sorry, I didn't want to disturb you. . ."
"But you wanted to come back and see more. Marvelous! I applaud your curiosity, young sir. I have just taken the waters — perhaps you would like to try?" He gestured at the ocean.
"You mean, swim in it?"
"If you like. Myself, I find a snorkel and mask far superior. My set is up on the rim, you're welcome to them, but I would ask you to chew a stick of this before you get in." He tossed Chet a pack of gum. "It's an invention of my own — chew a stick of that, and you can_not_ transmit any nasty bugs in your saliva for forty-eight hours. I hold a patent for it, of course, but my agents report that it has been met with crashing indifference in the Great Beyond."
Chet had been swimming before, in the urinary communal pools on the tenth and fifteenth levels, horsing around naked with his mates. Nudity was not a big deal for the kids of the bat-house — the kind of adult who you wouldn't trust in such circumstances didn't end up in bat-houses — the bugouts had a different place for them.
"Go on, lad, give it a try. It's simply marvelous, I tell you!"