Asimov’s Future History Volume 11

by Isaac Asimov

  Daneel said, “But you know, friend Giskard, the fact that a danger to humanity now exists and that it will surely come to fruition if you become the property of Madam Vasilia. That, at least. is not an abstraction.”

  Giskard said, “The danger to which you refer is not something known, but is merely inferred. We cannot build our actions in defiance of the Three Laws on that.”

  Daneel paused, then said in a lower voice, “But you hope that your studies of human history will help you develop the Laws governing human behavior, that you will learn to predict and guide human history – or at lease make a beginning, so that someone someday will learn to predict and guide it. You even call the technique ‘psychohistory.’ In this, are you not dealing with the human tapestry? Are you not trying to work with humanity as a generalized whole, rather than with collections of individual human beings?”

  “Yes, friend Daneel, but it is thus far no more than a hope and I cannot base my actions upon a mere hope, nor can I modify the Three Laws in accordance with it.”

  To that, Daneel did not respond.

  Vasilia said, “Well, robot, all your attempts have come to nothing and yet you stand on your feet. You are strangely stubborn and a robot such as yourself that can denounce the Three Laws and still remain functional is a clear danger to every and any individual human being. For that reason, I believe you should be dismantled without delay. The case is too dangerous to await the slow majesty of the law, especially since you are, after all, a robot and not the human being you attempt to resemble.”

  Daneel said, “Surely, my lady, it is not fitting for you to reach such a decision on your own.”

  “I have reached it nevertheless and if there are legal repercussions hereafter, I shall deal with them.”

  “You will be depriving Lady Gladia of a second robot – and one to which you make no claim.”

  “She and Fastolfe, between them, have deprived me of my robot, Giskard, for more than twenty decades and I do not believe this ever distressed either of them for a moment. It will not now distress me to deprive her. She has dozens of other robots and there are many here at the Institute who will faithfully see to her safety until she can return to her own.”

  Daneel said, “Friend Giskard, if you will wake Lady Gladia, it may be that she may persuade Lady Vasilia –”

  Vasilia, looking at Giskard, frowned and said sharply, “No, Giskard. Let the woman sleep.”

  Giskard, who had stirred at Daneel’s words, subsided.

  Vasilia snapped the finger and thumb of her right hand three times and the door at once opened and four robots filed in. “You were right, Daneel. There are four robots. They will dismantle you and you are ordered not to resist. Thereafter Giskard and I will deal with all remaining matters.”

  She looked over her shoulder at the entering robots. “Close the door behind you. Now, quickly and efficiently, dismantle this robot,” and she pointed at Daneel.

  The robots looked at Daneel and for a few seconds did not move. Vasilia said impatiently, “I’ve told you he is a robot and you must disregard his human appearance. Daneel, tell them you are a robot.”

  “I am a robot,” said Daneel, “and I will not resist.”

  Vasilia stepped to one side and the four robots advanced. Daneel’s arms remained at his side. He turned to look at the sleeping Gladia one last time and then he faced the robots.

  Vasilia smiled and said, “This should be interesting.”

  The robots paused. Vasilia said, “Get on with it.”

  They did not move and Vasilia turned to stare in amazement at Giskard. She did not complete the movement. Her muscles loosened and she crumpled.

  Giskard caught her and seated her with her back against the wall.

  He said in a muffled voice, “I need a few moments and then we will leave.”

  Those moments passed. Vasilia’s eyes remained glazed and unfocused. Her robots remained motionless. Daneel had moved to Gladia in a single stride.

  Giskard looked up and said to Vasilia’s robots, “Guard your lady. Allow no one to enter until she wakes. She will waken peacefully.”

  Even as he spoke, Gladia stirred and Daneel helped her to her feet. She said, wondering, “Who is this woman? Whose robots – How did she –”

  Giskard spoke firmly, but there was a weariness in his voice. “Lady Gladia, later. I will explain. For now, we must hasten.”

  And they left.

  Part V-Earth

  15. The Holy World

  64.

  AMADIRO BIT HIS lower lip and his eyes flicked in the direction of Mandamus, who seemed lost in thought.

  Amadiro said defensively, “She insisted on it. She told me that only she could handle this Giskard, that only she could exert a sufficiently strong influence over him and prevent him from using these mental powers of his.”

  “You never said anything of this to me, Dr. Amadiro.”

  “I wasn’t sure what there was to tell, young man. I wasn’t sure she was correct.”

  “Are you sure now?”

  “Completely. She remembers nothing of what went on –”

  “So that we know nothing of what went on.”

  Amadiro nodded. “Exactly. And she remembers nothing of what she had told me earlier.”

  “And she’s not acting?”

  “I saw to it that she had an emergency electroencephalogram. There have been distinct changes from the earlier records.”

  “Is there a chance she will recover her memory with time?”

  Amadiro shook his head bitterly. “Who can tell? But I doubt it.”

  Mandamus, eyes still downcast and full of thought, said, “Does it matter, then? We can take her account of Giskard as true and we know that he has the power to affect minds. That knowledge is crucial and it is now ours. – In fact, it is well that our roboticist colleague has failed. If Vasilia had gained control of that robot, how long do you suppose it would have been before you, too, would have been under her control – and I, as well, assuming she would think I was worth controlling?”

  Amadiro nodded. “I suppose she might have had something like that in mind. Right now, though, it’s hard to tell what she has in mind. She seems, superficially at least, undamaged except for the specific loss of memory – she apparently remembers everything else – but who knows how this will affect her deeper thought processes and her skill as a roboticist? That Giskard could do this to someone as skilled as she makes him an incredibly dangerous phenomenon.”

  “Does it occur to you, Dr. Amadiro, that the Settlers may be right in their distrust of robots?”

  “It almost does, Mandamus.”

  Mandamus rubbed his hands together. “I assume from your depressed attitude that this whole business was not uncovered before they had time to leave Aurora.”

  “You assume correctly. That Settler captain has the Solarian woman and both of her robots on his ship and is heading toward Earth.”

  “And where does that leave us now?”

  Slowly Amadiro said, “By no means defeated, it seems to me. If we complete our project, we have won – Giskard or no Giskard. And we can complete it. Whatever Giskard can do with and to emotions, he can’t read thoughts. He might be able to tell when a wash of emotion crosses a human mind, or even distinguish one emotion from another, or change one to another, or induce sleep or amnesia – dull-edged things like that. He cannot be sharp, however. He cannot make out actual words or ideas.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  “So said Vasilia.”

  “She may not have known what she was talking about. She did not, after all, manage to control the robot, as she said she was sure of doing. That’s not much of a testimonial to her accuracy of understanding.”

  “Yet I believe her in this. To actually be able to read thoughts would demand so much complexity in the positronic pathway pattern that it is totally unlikely that a child could have inserted it into the robot over twenty decades ago. It is actually far beyond even the pres
ent-day state of the art, Mandamus. Surely you must agree.”

  “I would certainly think it was. And they’re going to Earth?”

  “I’m sure of it.”

  “Would this woman, brought up as she was, actually go to Earth?”

  “She has no choice if Giskard controls her.”

  “And why should Giskard want her to go to Earth? Can he know about our project? You seem to think he doesn’t.”

  “It is possible he doesn’t. His motivation for going to Earth might be nothing more than to place himself and the Solarian woman beyond our reach.”

  “I shouldn’t think he’d fear us if he could handle Vasilia.”

  “A long-range weapon,” said Amadiro icily, “could bring him down. His own abilities must have a limited range. They can be based on nothing other than the electromagnetic field and he must be subject to the inverse square law. So we get out of range as the intensity of his powers weaken, but he will then find that he is not out of range of our weapons.”

  Mandamus frowned and looked uneasy. “You seem to have an un-Spacer liking for violence, Dr. Amadiro. In a case like this, though, I suppose force would be permissible.”

  “A case like this? A robot capable of harming human beings? I should think so. We’ll have to find a pretext for sending a good ship in pursuit. It wouldn’t be wise to explain the actual situation –”

  “No,” said Mandamus emphatically. “Think of how many would wish to have personal control of such a robot.”

  “Which we can’t allow. And which is another reason why I would look upon destruction of the robot as the safer and preferable course of action.”

  “You may be right,” said Mandamus reluctantly, “but I don’t think it wise to count on this destruction only. I must go to Earth – now. The project must be hastened to its conclusion, even if we don’t dot every ‘i’ and cross every ‘t. ‘Once it is done, then it is done. Even a mind-handling robot – under anybody’s control – will not be able to undo the deed. And if it does anything else, that, perhaps, will no longer matter.”

  Amadiro said, “Don’t speak in the singular. I will go as well.”

  “You? Earth is a horrible world. I must go, but why you?”

  “Because I must go, too. I cannot stay here any longer and wonder. You have not waited for this through a long lifetime as I have, Mandamus. You do not have the accounts to settle that I have.”

  65.

  Gladia was in space again and once again Aurora could be made out as a globe. D. G. was busy elsewhere and the entire ship had about it a vague but pervasive air of emergency, as though it were on a battle footing, as though it were being pursued or expected pursuit.

  Gladia shook her head. She could think clearly; she felt well; but when her mind turned back to that time in the Institute, shortly after Amadiro had left her, a curiously pervasive unreality swept over her. There was a gap in time. One moment she had been sitting on the couch, feeling sleepy; the next there were four robots and a woman in the room who had not been there before.

  She had fallen asleep, then, but there was no awareness, no memory, that she had done so. There was a gap of nonexistence.

  Thinking back, she had recognized the woman after the fact. It was Vasilia Aliena – the daughter whom Gladia had replaced in the affections of Han Fastolfe. Gladia had never actually seen Vasilia, though she had viewed her on hyperwave several times. Gladia always thought of her as a distant and inimical other self. There was the vague similarity in appearance that others always commented on but that Gladia herself insisted she did not see – and there was the odd, antithetical connection with Fastolfe.

  Once they were on the ship and she was alone with her robots, she asked the inevitable question. “What was Vasilia Aliena doing in the room and why was I permitted to sleep once she had arrived?”

  Daneel said, “Madam Gladia, I will answer the question, since it is a matter friend Giskard would find difficult to discuss.”

  “Why should he find it difficult, Daneel?”

  “Madam Vasilia arrived in the hope that she might persuade Giskard to enter her service.”

  “Away from me?” said Gladia in sharp indignation. She did not entirely like Giskard, but that made no difference. What was hers was hers. “And you allowed me to sleep while you two handled the matter by yourselves?”

  “We felt, madam, that you needed your sleep badly. Then, too, Madam Vasilia ordered us to allow you to sleep. Finally, it was our opinion that Giskard would not, in any case, join her service. For all these reasons, we did not wake you.”

  Gladia said indignantly, “I should hope that Giskard would not for a moment consider leaving me. It would be illegal both by Auroran law and, more important, by the Three Laws of Robotics. – It would be a good deed to return to Aurora and have her arraigned before the Court of Claims.”

  “That would not be advisable at the moment, my lady.”

  “What was her excuse for wanting Giskard? Did she have one?”

  “When she was a child, Giskard had been assigned to her.”

  “Legally?”

  “No, madam. Dr. Fastolfe merely allowed her the use of it.”

  “Then she had no right to Giskard.”

  “We pointed that out, madam. Apparently, it was a matter of sentimental attachment on the part of Madam Vasilia.”

  Gladia sniffed. “Having survived the loss of Giskard since before I came to Aurora, she might well have continued as she was without going to illegal lengths to deprive me of my property. “– Then, restlessly, “I should have been awakened.”

  Daneel said, “Madam Vasilia had four robots with her. Had you been awake and had there been harsh words between the two of you, there might have been some difficulty in having the robots work out the proper responses.”

  “I’d have directed the proper response, I assure you, Daneel.”

  “No doubt, madam. So might Madam Vasilia and she is one of the cleverest roboticists in the Galaxy.”

  Gladia shifted her attention to Giskard. “And you have nothing to say?”

  “Only that it was better as it was, my lady.”

  Gladia looked thoughtfully into those faintly luminous robotic eyes, so different from Daneel’s all-but-human ones, and it did seem to her that the incident wasn’t very important after all. A small thing. And there were other things with which to be concerned. They were going to Earth.

  Somehow she did not think of Vasilia again.

  66.

  “I am concerned,” said Giskard in his whisper of confidentiality in which sound waves barely trembled the air. The Settler ship was receding smoothly from Aurora and, as yet, there was no pursuit. The activity onboard had settled into routine and, with almost all routines automated, there was quiet and Gladia slept naturally.

  “I am concerned for Lady Gladia, friend Daneel.”

  Daneel understood the characteristics of Giskard’s positronic circuits well enough to need no long explanation. He said, “It was necessary, friend Giskard, to adjust Lady Gladia. Had she questioned longer, she might have elicited the fact of your mental activities and adjustment would then have been more dangerous. Enough harm has already been done because Lady Vasilia discovered the fact. We do not know to whom – and to how many – she may have imparted her knowledge.”

  “Nevertheless,” said Giskard, “I did not wish to make this adjustment. Had Lady Gladia wished to forget, it would have been a simple, no-risk adjustment. She wanted, however, with vigor and anger, to know more of the matter. She regretted not having played a greater role in it. I was forced, therefore, to break binding forces of considerable intensity.”

  Daneel said. “Even that was necessary, friend Giskard.”

  “Yet the possibility of doing harm was by no means insignificant in such a case. If you think of a binding force as a thin, elastic cord – this is a poor analogy, but I can think of no other, for what I sense in a mind has no analog outside the mind – then the ordinary inhibitions I deal
with are so thin and insubstantial that they vanish when I touch them. A strong binding force, on the other hand, snaps and recoils when broken and the recoil may then break other, totally unrelated binding forces or, by whipping and coiling about other such forces, strengthen them enormously. In either case, unintended changes can be brought about in a human being’s emotions and attitudes and that would be almost certain to bring about harm.”

  Daneel said, his voice a little louder, “Is it your impression you harmed Lady Gladia, friend Giskard?”

  “I think not. I was extremely careful. I worked upon the matter during all the time you were talking to her. It was thoughtful of you to bear the brunt of the conversation and to run the risk of being caught between an inconvenient truth and an untruth. But despite all my care, friend Daneel, I took a risk and I am concerned that I was willing to take that risk. It came so close to violating the First Law that it required an extraordinary effort on my part to do it. I am sure that I would not have been able to do it –”

  “Yes, friend Giskard?”

  “Had you not expounded your notion of the Zeroth Law.”

  “You accept it, then?”

  “No, I cannot. Can you? Faced with the possibility of doing harm to an individual human being or of allowing harm to come to one, could you do the harm or allow the harm in the name of abstract humanity? Think!”

  “I am not sure,” said Daneel, voice trembling into all but silence. Then, with an effort, “I might. The mere concept pushes at me – and at you. It helped you decide to take the risk in adjusting Lady Gladia’s mind.”

  “Yes, it did,” agreed Giskard, “and the longer we think of the Zeroth Law, the more it might help push us. Could it do so, I wonder, in more than a marginal way, however? Might it not only help us take slightly larger risks than we might ordinarily?”

  “Yet I am convinced of the validity of the Zeroth Law, friend Giskard.”

  “So might I be if we could define what we mean by ‘humanity.’”