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V-Stephens was being held prisoner in a cube-like room in the psychotic ward. How to escape?

From time to time V-Stephens examined his wristwatch and then turned his attention back to the object crawling up and down the sealed edges of the entrance-lock. ('War Veteran' by Philip K. Dick) The object moved slowly and cautiously. It had been exploring the lock for twenty-nine hours straight; it had traced down the power leads that kept the heavy plate fused in place... During the last hour it had cut its way throught the rexeroid surface to within an inch of the terminals. The crawling, exploring object was V-Stephen's surgeon-hand, a self-contained robot of precision quality usually joined to his right wrist. It wasn't joined there now. He had detached it and sent it up the face of the cube to find a way out. The metal fingers clung precariously to the smooth dull surface, as the cutting-thumb laboriously dug its way in... ('War Veteran' by Philip K. Dick) The forefinger of the surgeon-hand reached the anode terminal and paused questioningly. All four fingers rose erect and waved like insect antennae. One by one they fitted themselves into the cut slot and probed for the nearby cathode lead. Abruptly there was a blinding flash... the hand dropped to the floor, its work done. V-Stephens ...crossed the cube to collect it. With the hand in place and acting as part of his own neuromuscular system again, V-Stephens gingerly grasped the lock...

Technovelgy from War Veteran, by Philip K. Dick. Published by If in 1955 Additional resources -

Philip K. Dick was fascinated by the idea of robotic or technological replacement parts for humans.

the mechanical hand from Buck Rogers, 2430 AD (1929) by Philip Nowlan (w/D. Calkins), microhands from Microhands (Микроруки) (1931) by Boris Zhitkov, iron fingers from The Death's Head Meteor (1931) by Neil R. Jones, robot hands from The Iron World (1937) by Otis Adelbert Kline, waldoes from Waldo (1942) by Robert Heinlein, robotic hand from The Door Into Summer (1956) by Robert Heinlein, interchangeable hands from The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (1965) by Philip K. Dick, surgical hand from Clans of the Alphane Moon (1964) by Philip K. Dick and office hand from The Human Blend (2010) by Alan Dean Foster.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from War Veteran
  More Ideas and Technology by Philip K. Dick
  Tech news articles related to War Veteran
  Tech news articles related to works by Philip K. Dick

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