In theory, any private robots taken for use in the terraforming project remained the property of the original owner. However, ownership didn’t count for much when your former valet was suddenly fifteen thousand kilometers away on the other side of the planet, operating a prairie breeding center. People were not happy. And they wanted robots.
There was more about economics and shortages and so forth that was supposed to explain it all, but it didn’t seem to make a great deal of sense to Toth. After all, if there were a shortage of something, why not just make more of it? And how could there be a shortage of robots in the first place? Why not just build more? The government had all sorts of complicated explanations, all about scarcity of resources and investing productive capacity in the planet’s future, but no one could understand the numbers.
The people were being asked to take it on faith that they had to make sacrifices in the name of a better future--but a lot of people did not have much faith. All they knew, and all they cared about, was that there were not enough robots, and everyday life on Inferno had been thrown into turmoil. Even if, as everyone kept saying, there were a hundred times more robots than people on the planet, there were still too few robots.
The whole rustback phenomenon, the enormous criminal enterprise that went with them, was merely an expression of the fact that people wanted robots, and were willing to do anything--even commit crimes--in order to get them.
The detector at his belt beeped. Toth Resato looked down at the display screen and then lifted his night vision farviewers to his eyes. Yes, there they were. Out on the sea, in an open boat, headed this way. There would be a larger craft out there somewhere, the rest of the cargo of rustbacks aboard it, waiting for the human pilot to shuttle them into shore.
Rustbacks. Outlaw New Law robots, escaping from Purgatory, heading off into the wilderness of Terra Grande to what the Settler economists called “indentured servitude. ” They would work off the price of what it cost to smuggle them out of Purgatory, then work for a wage if and when they paid the debt. Or, that is, they would have done all that if Toth had not been waiting for them.
Toth had sat through the training sessions that were supposed to explain the basis of economic crime, so that the Rangers would be able to deal with it better. He had dozed through most of them, but he remembered the Settler economists and how they had blathered on about supply and demand, how no Spacer world had experienced a labor shortage in thousands of years. How unlimited free labor had in turn eroded the value of raw materials down to nothing. The lecturers had said something about the law of supply and demand. and how with supply of everything essentially infinite, demand--and price--had dropped to zero.
Robots completely overturned any concept of a market economy. The use, and even the concept, of money had evaporated away almost entirely.
But now, suddenly, the robots weren’t there to do things and make things for free. Now there was a shortage of labor, and therefore labor--and materials obtained by labor--had a meaningful value.
For the first time in living memory, everything had a price. The catch was none of the incredibly wealthy Spacers had any money--only possessions. They were more or less forced to trade what they owned to get the products or services that had been essentially free. Inferno had dropped back into a semibarter economy. Toth had followed most of the lecture, if not all, but it was clear to him the people lecturing him were missing the point.
The economists seemed fascinated by their charts and graphs and markets, but they never seemed to understand that people, real people, were hurting.
The capital city of Hades had seemed deserted, dingy, the last time Toth had been there for a visit. Nothing seemed bright or alive there. A fine layer of dust had settled on everything, blown from the deserts.
Without the hordes of cleaning robots bustling about downtown, everything had seemed a little worn, a little threadbare and sad. as if the buildings and streets knew that the desert sands were edging just a trifle closer to town.
With the robots gone, the city--its human population intact--seemed almost a ghost town. That irony was not lost even on Toth, and Toth knew there was not much of the poet in his soul. What could you say about a city that seemed halfdead because the machines had left and the people had stayed?
And the people were desperate. There were plenty of sharp operators ready, willing, and able to take advantage of that desperation. The Settler traders were bad enough, buying up works of art and family heirlooms for a pittance in Settler credits, but at least those were legal transactions.
The rustback trade was not. The whole rustback industry had sprung up as if by magic the moment the Governor made his pronouncement impressing “surplus” robots into the terraforming service. It had grown since, in size and sophistication, until now it was a huge and sophisticated enterprise.
There were the restrictor strip shops on Purgatory, where, for a fee, a pull artist would remove the range restrictors from a New Law robot. There were the brokers, charging horrifying amounts of money or making ruinous barters to the Spacers who needed robots, any robots. There were the smugglers ready to get a boatful of N. L. robots off Purgatory, or else fly an aircar full of them, risking detection by the traffic control nets.
And then there were the New Law robots themselves. They were the real mystery. The humans Toth could understand. After all, they were not much different from other criminals willing to risk harsh punishment for the sake of massive profit. But the New Law robots were a mystery to him.
Were New Law robots really robots in the first place? They only had half a First Law, after all. They were enjoined from harming a human being, but they could, if they chose, stand by and let a human being be killed. One of the primordial protections of Spacer existence was no longer there. How could anyone feel safe around them? New Law robots were not required to obey the orders of a human, either. They were required to “cooperate” with humans. No one seemed to be quite sure what “cooperate” meant to a robot. And what if there were two groups of humans with different ideas? With which would a New Law robot “cooperate”?
Cooperating meant running away, at least to some N. L. s, and Toth could not understand why. A rustback had to work just as hard, if not harder, than a New Law that stayed where it belonged. Some of the New Law robots talked about having at least the hope of being free someday, but what could freedom mean to a robot? And yet, he was here waiting on another boatload of New Law robots, risking their very existence in hope of freedom.
And they were heading his way right now. A boatload of runaway robots. Runaway robots. It was almost a contradiction in terms.
Toth watched in the farviewers as they got closer. He saw the signal light blink from the bow of the boat. Three long blinks, then three shorts.
Toth just happened to know that the man on the boat was named Norlan Fiyle, and that Fiyle was expecting a rather hard-edged woman named Floria Wentle to signal back. Toth had recently made Wentle’s acquaintance, and provided her with a rather more permanent accommodation than she might have preferred. It had taken merely the slightest mention of the Psychic Probe to make her reveal all concerning Fiyle and his plans for the shipment tonight. It seemed there wasn’t much to the idea of honor among thieves.
Toth lifted his own signal light and signaled back--two longs, three shorts, four longs. He watched for a moment and got the proper signal in reply, three more longs and three more shorts.
Toth glanced to his left and then to his right, needlessly and pointlessly checking to make sure his robots were in position. Needless because he knew they were there, and pointless because they were all very well hidden indeed.
The boat was close enough now that there was no need for the farviewers. Toth felt his heart starting to race. Here they came.
Now he could hear the high-pitched humming of the engine over the roar of the surf. He could see the robots sitting, stockstill, in their seats, and one human figure--Fiyle, it had to be Fiyle--standing at the stern, o
perating the controls.
Act like his friend, Toth told himself. Act like you’re the one he’s supposed to meet. Toth raised his arm and waved. Toth knew damned well he was silhouetted against the night sky, and that Fiyle had to be using night-vision gear at least as good as his own, and, no doubt, had a blaster more powerful than the Ranger-issue model Toth had. Toth walked toward the point on the shore the boat was making for, trying to move casually, calmly, in his damn-fool civilian clothes, as if everything were normal and fine.
At least the civvies were bulky enough that it was hard to get an idea of body shape from them. With luck, and in the dark, Fiyle would not notice that Toth was not a woman.
One half of a pair of handcuffs was already locked on to Toth’s wrist, likewise hidden by the bulky clothes. The empty cuff would be around Fiyle’s wrist in short order.
Toth paused, looking for a way down to the rocky shore at the base of the low cliffs. He knelt, turned around so he was facing the cliff, and started to climb down, painfully aware that he had just put his back to Fiyle. He forced himself not to think about it, and concentrated on finding handholds.
It wasn’t much of a climb down to the shoreline. Toth was glad to reach the bottom and turn around.
There was the boat, only a hundred meters away, just about to beach itself on a small patch of sandy shoreline. Toth could see Fiyle in the stern, see that he was watching the shore, not Toth. Even with a night-vision helmet covering half of his face, it was easy to see his anxious expression as he struggled to guide the little craft through the surging waves, thread it around rocks and ledges. Closer, closer.
At last, with a final burst of power from the engine, Fiyle gunned the boat forward on the crest of an incoming wave, surfing the boat to land gently on the shore, not twenty meters from where Toth stood.
It was immediately obvious that the robots in the bow of the boat had been well briefed on what to do upon landing. Three of them jumped out and held the bow. Another then jumped ashore, the end of a rope in its hand. It headed up to the base of the cliff, snubbed the rope around an outcropping of rock, and tied it off. Then the rest of the robots started to disembark in orderly fashion.
Fiyle shut down his engine, peeled off his night-vision helmet, and rubbed his face with both hands. He stretched his arms and flexed his back, working out the kinks. Then, with one graceful motion, he set one hand on the gunwale and jumped over the side of the boat. He landed feetfirst in the surf, showing a sailor’s lack of concern for getting his feet wet.
Toth smiled at him, stepped toward him, and offered the man his hand as Fiyle sloshed through the surf toward dry land. It was not until Fiyle was within less than a meter of Toth that the rustbacker realized something was wrong. Toth stepped forward into the cold surf, took him by the hand--and had the cuff on him before he could react.
Fiyle cried out and yanked his arm back, pulling Toth forward, slamming into him. Both of them toppled over into the water, but Fiyle managed to heave himself over on top of Toth. The rustbacker grabbed the Ranger by the throat and shoved his head down into the frigid water.
Toth opened his eyes underwater, but the dark night and the cloudy seawater rendered him as good as blind. He struggled, clawing at the man’s face with his free right hand. He pulled back on his left hand, with the cuff on it, trying to dislodge Fiyle’s grip on his throat.
Toth tried desperately to lever himself up far enough to get his face above water, to reach the air. He made a fist of his free hand and tried to punch Fiyle in the side of the head. He missed completely and landed a glancing blow on his shoulder. He pulled back his arm to try again.
But then, suddenly, it didn’t matter. Fiyle wasn’t on him anymore, and strong arms were fishing him out of the water. Toth coughed and spluttered as the robot--his robot, a Gerald, a GRD unit, one of his arrest team--carried him to shore. The GRD cradled Toth like a baby, Toth’s arm with the cuff on it dangling out in midair, still connected to Fiyle.
Another GRD was carrying Fiyle, holding him in a tight restraint position.
“Let me down!” Fiyle bellowed. “I order you to let me down!”
The robot was unmoved. “I regret, sir, that both First Law and preexisting orders prevent me from doing so. Please do not attempt to escape, as that might entail injury to yourself or Ranger Toth.”
Toth had to smile to himself, in spite of the beating he had taken. Say what you might about Three Law robots. You couldn’t fault them for being impolite.
Toth had learned a thing or two about Settlers--or at least the sort of Settler who got picked up by the cops. It seemed to Toth that they broke into two groups. On the one hand there was the snarling sort, who denied everything, accused the arresting officer of planting evidence, who threatened and sniveled and sneered. On the other hand, there were some who seemed to regard it all as something of a game, complete with winners and losers. Once he was safely back in Toth’s mobile Ranger Station, locked into its archaic-looking barred cell, where it was plain to see he was caught and there was nothing he could do about it, Norlan Fiyle immediately demonstrated that he was a member of the second category.
By the time the GRD robots handed Fiyle dry clothes through the bars of the cell, all the aggression seemed to have drained out of the man. He was big and burly, in the vigorous health of an active man in his middle years. He was a roundfaced, dark-skinned man, with a thin fringe of snow-white hair. He seemed quite unconcerned by the fact that he was under arrest, or that a trio of rather intimidating GRD robots were standing outside the cell, watching his every move.
Fiyle sat down on the cell’s narrow cot and pulled on the dry prison-issue clothes. “So,” he asked, “how did you nail me?”
Toth was not in a good mood. His head hurt, and he was fairly certain that he was going to have a black eye and a stiff back in the morning. “Let’s just say you trusted the wrong people,” he said, not wanting to give too much away. He sat down at his desk chair, facing the prisoner, and made a show of doing some work. Not that he was in any shape to make a coherent report.
“That so?” Fiyle asked. “I should have known better than to count on Floria Wentle,” he said in a calm, conversational tone as he pulled on a pair of prison slippers. “Hmmph. Not a bad fit,” he said, standing and taking a step or two.
“Glad you like them,” Toth said, a little annoyed that Fiyle had guessed it in one try. “But I didn’t say who it was who gave you away.”
Fiyle looked up at him and smiled. “Oh, it had to be Floria. She talked just a little bit too good a game. I should have known she was the kind to get caught. By the way, can you tell me what happened to my New Laws? Any of them manage to get away?”
“About half of the ones in the boat escaped, “ Toth said. “My robots caught the rest on the beach. We’ll pick up the ones waiting on the ship in the morning.”
“Don’t count on that,” Fiyle said. “Those robots are no fools. Once I don’t make it back to the ship for the second load, they’ll all hightail it. They’ll take over the ship and try for a landing someplace else. ”
“Think so?” Toth said, a trifle defiantly. If Fiyle knew so much, then how had he gotten caught? “They’re just robots. They’ll be sitting out there when we go to get ‘em.”
“If you want to bet on that, you’re on,” Fiyle said. “They’re New Law robots. One of them’s got more initiative than a whole herd of those Three-Law jobs--and believe me, this crowd knows they have a real incentive for getting away. You know what happens to New Law robots caught trying to escape?”
Toth shrugged. “Not really. ” Fiyle gave him an odd look. “For a cop, you don’t have much curiosity. N. L. s caught trying to escape are destroyed. A blaster shot to the head. Once they start running, they damned well know they don’t dare stop. No way back.”
“But they wouldn’t know how to run your ship,” Toth objected.
“They’re smart, and they’d sure as hell have the incentive to learn,” Fiyle said. “If
they decide they can’t handle it, they might even just jump overboard, let themselves sink, and walk to shore on the bottom. I doubt it, though. They weren’t made waterproof, on purpose, to keep ‘em on Purgatory. Besides, even a robot would get disoriented underwater around here. Bad visibility, strong currents, uneven seafloor. But they’re your problem now. ”
Fiyle leaned back on the cot and grinned. “That’s something, anyway,” he said. “ At least now I won’t have a shipload of New Law know-it-alls driving me crazy. Now you have to deal with them. But I am glad at least some of them got away.”
“Why should you care?” Toth asked. Somehow, he was the one ill at ease. Fiyle wasn’t acting like a man caught in the act and looking at a world of trouble.
“Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m in this for the money. But I still like seeing someone getting away once in a while. Even if it is just a bunch of robots. ” Fiyle grinned at Toth and winked, just to lay the sarcasm on a bit thicker.
“I think that’s just about enough lip out of you, Settler,” Toth said.
“And why is that enough?” Fiyle asked, losing nothing of his easy manner.
“Take a look around yourself. You’re in a Spacer jail and I’ve got you dead to rights on a very serious charge.”
“True enough,” Fiyle said. “Or at least true as far as it goes. Because you’re just about to trade up, Ranger Resato.”
“Trade up to what?”
“No, no, trade up for what. We talk about that first. We talk about the deal first. I’m going to give you a name, a name that you are going to love to have, and hate to have. And you are going to give me a ticket home, off this Spacer rathole and back to a decent life. ”
Toth looked carefully at his prisoner. The man was serious--and somehow he knew that Fiyle was not the sort of man who made an offer he could not back up.
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