Asimov’s Future History Volume 7

by Isaac Asimov

  “They help Arriel, but she feelss they are just ass unpredictable ass everr.”

  “I suspect so. And the dancers?”

  “She ssaid to tell ‘u they do not do well. They get old. One died.”

  “Did that upset Ariel badly?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Eve wass concerned. She inssissted on taking it somewhere and burrying it. Ariel ssaid that iss sstrange.”

  “I agree. But Adam and Eve seem full of surprises, don’t they?”

  “Alwayss.”

  “Anything more, Wolruf?”

  “That’ss all she told me to tell ‘u.”

  “Well, thank you. You make a good messenger, Wolruf. I won’t have to shoot you.”

  “Shoot me? You would —?”

  Derec laughed. “No, I wouldn’t shoot you. According to some Earth legend I read about, if a king was dissatisfied with the news a messenger brought, he would order the messenger killed. But, if it were ever true, it was a custom that faded out with civilization.”

  “I am thankful for that.”

  “Stay with us, Wolruf. I’m hungry. We can eat something. I’ve taught Mandelbrot how to program the chemical food processor. He comes up with some awesome concoctions, and I’m sure if you state your preferences, he can devise something to your taste.”

  Derec rose from his chair and led the others out of the room. The food machine was located in a kitchen on the other side of the corridor.

  The human need for food solved Bogie’s problem. He slipped away from his corner and, checking the corridor carefully, went out into it. As he passed the kitchen, he heard Derec talking and the sounds of Mandelbrot operating the processor.

  Growing again the thick legs it used to get around the computer chamber, the Watchful Eye moved out of its haven.

  There were no robots or intruders anywhere near the computer complex at this time, and it wanted to be ready for Bogie when he arrived. It had a plan, and it needed Bogie to make the plan work.

  It was night in Robot City, Bogie’s favorite time, and he noticed that the moonlight slashed off the sides of buildings like a mugger’s sudden attack. As he walked quickly through the streets, he liked to think of descriptive lines like that, lines derived from the voiceovers in many of the old movies he’d viewed. He glanced around for more opportunities to practice such lines. In the night sky, the stars flickered on and off, like the sequins on a party girl’s dress. The tunnel he would use to go down to the computer level — and the Watchful Eye — loomed mysteriously in front of him, like a black hole with a welcome mat in front of it.

  He wondered why his thoughts had taken such an odd turn. Could it just be his fascination with all those movies he’d researched, or was there some reason to be wary of what the Watchful Eye had in store for him?

  The Watchful Eye tracked Bogie on his trip through the intricate maze that was the route to the computer chamber, watching several view-screens so he could gain knowledge of the robot from all angles. The more it could study Bogie before the robot arrived, the easier it would be to duplicate him. Further, it could store images of Bogie’s movements in its own memory banks, so that it could duplicate him with Derec or the others.

  Bogie came through the sliding wall, saying, “You called, boss?”

  “That is correct, Bogie. You are the first robot ever allowed into this sanctum by me. I hope you are honored.”

  “A singular honor, boss. I’ll dine out on this for years. It’ll impress all the dolls. A doll in Washington Heights once got a fox fur out of me.”

  The Watchful Eye hadn’t the slightest idea what Bogie was talking about, but that didn’t matter. It had no more use for Bogie anyway.

  It moved out of its haven, walking on the short, rudimentary legs so adequate for the computer room. Sometimes it had been necessary to get through interstices in the machinery, to stretch itself to an elongated shape and worm its way, grabbing with even shorter legs (and more of them), through an opening. At other times it had needed to puff itself out in order to roll through a chute or tunnel; at those times it retracted its legs. But now it was perched on its conventional limbs, standing in front of Bogie, who had to look down at it.

  “Say, boss, you’re not what I expected.”

  “You did not expect me to be so amorphous?”

  “If you say so. What I mean, I didn’t expect a blob. From the movie of the same name.”

  This robot had gone too far with its research, the Watchful Eye decided. Shutting him off was, in a way, a kindness.

  Using Bogie as a model, supplemented with the images it had already stored, the Watchful Eye began transforming itself. Bogie watched silently as the blob began to grow in height and shrink in width. Soon its legs lengthened and it grew arms. A moment later it was in a clearly humanoid shape. Even quicker came the changes that made it clearly a robot. Last were the delicate shifts in the facial and bodily look that gave it features and characteristics. But it was not until the Watchful Eye had finished its transformation that Bogie recognized it.

  “Hey,” he said, “You’re me now, boss. That’s a nifty trick. How’d you do it?”

  “That is not necessary for you to know, Bogie. I must explain to you now, because I want you to realize, that I will have to disconnect you now.”

  “Disconnect? You mean, rub me out?”

  “That is exactly what I do mean. I need to observe our visitors up close, arid so I am going to pose as you. That means I cannot take the chance of anyone discovering you here and guessing my disguise. Further, you are the only robot to be allowed into my presence, and so you have already seen too much and cannot be allowed even to carry that information in your memory banks. Also, you are no longer of any use to me. So I must disconnect you.”

  “It’s like shooting the messenger, I guess.”

  “I do not understand the reference.”

  Bogie explained what Derec had said about messengers while the Watchful Eye opened the control panel in his back.

  “Boss?”

  “Yes?”

  “When I am activated again, I won’t remember anything? I won’t even have this identity? I’ll be reprogrammed?”

  “If you are activated again, all that would be true.”

  “If?”

  “Your existence is a threat to my safety. I must protect myself, so I must destroy you.”

  “Oh. I understand. Well, boss, I guess it’s goodbye, huh?”

  “There is no need for amenities between us.”

  Just before the Watchful Eye disconnected the final wire, Bogie said, “Well, we’ll always have Paris.”

  After Bogie was shut off, the Watchful Eye, with the precision of a surgeon, broke him up into his components. He carried the parts to a recycling chute, from which they would eventually be collected and taken to a Robot Recycling Facility, where they would be used in the construction of new robots.

  The Watchful Eye continued on down the corridor. It wanted to reach Derec’s quarters before Bogie was missed.

  Chapter 15

  SAVE THE LAST DANCER FOR ME

  ARIEL WAS EXHAUSTED but too jittery to sleep; She had spent the better part of two days working alternately with Avery and the dancers.

  Avery was, as doctors or med-bots might say, responding to treatment. Under Ariel’s relentless questioning, assisted by many queries from Adam (she had briefed him on the types of questions to ask), the doctor had sunk into a depressed but much more rational state. He treated Adam politely, even though Adam had chosen to continue to look like him.

  Sometimes, when Adam asked Avery a question, Ariel got confused. The question would be in Avery’s old, madder voice — abrupt, condescending, sharp-dictioned — but the real Avery would respond in an un-Averylike voice; quieter, kinder, sad. Yet the technique, one never used before in psychiatric circles — a robot interrogator who could become an exact double of the patient — seemed to have good effects. Avery’s responses to Adam tended to dig deeper into the man’s psyche,
brought out more interesting possibilities. His responses to Ariel were more evasive, cloudier. It became her task to follow up on the clues drawn out by Adam. She would zero in on any hint, any opportunity; make any remarks about any revelations; do anything, finally, to make Avery talk.

  In the last two days, Avery had become more relaxed, calmer. Many of the things he said were still outrageous, and he could not get off the subject of wanting to dissect a dancer, but he no longer ranted, and his sarcasm was considerably reduced. He seemed — to Ariel at least — more rational, though hardly sane, and still not very nice.

  Now Avery had concluded that he was better off as a human than he had been when he’d thought of himself as a robot.

  “No real insight there,” Ariel commented. “I should think that would be obvious.”

  “No, no. You do not understand me.” When he was misunderstood, he had a tendency to pat the outside of his right thigh nervously with his right hand. “I still think of robots as the greatest entities of all. The perfect creatures, without emotion or aging; you know that old routine, I suspect?”

  “I do. Schoolbook stuff back on Aurora. But I don’t agree that an invention without a true inner life or without feelings is worth being, no matter how long it exists.”

  “Well, I did. In some ways I still do. I’ve always wanted a life of the mind, not of the emotions. And I’ve wanted to live longer than our natural lifespans.”

  “An Auroran lives so long, I’m surprised you’d even worry. Isn’t the real issue your fear of death?”

  He laughed scoffingly. “More schoolbook stuff, Ariel. If one wants to live forever, you reality-distorters automatically knee-jerk the idea of fear of death.”

  “Hey, I’m young and I fear death.”

  “That attitude is only sensible. We all have it. But I don’t care about death itself. If it comes, I’ll shake its hand and lead it off. No, it’s the chance to watch history, to see what will happen further in science, that’s the reason I want the long life of a robot. I want to see if the Settler worlds will succeed or perish from their own boorish and violent ways. I want to see if Earth can somehow survive its terrible, claustrophobic ways of life, or will decay and be destroyed from the inside, becoming a ghost planet, a worn-out memorial to what humanity once was. I want to see if Spacers —”

  “Don’t get carried away by your own rhetoric, Dr. Avery. I get the message. It’s not fear of death, it’s a need to know the future.”

  “Simplistically stated, but essentially correct. At any rate, I spent so much time with robots and thought so much about them that eventually I wanted to be one, needed to be one. I’d still like to be one. The difference is I no longer believe I am one.”

  She turned the care of Avery back to Adam and took a short walk across the room to confront her other problem. Eve, now restored to her Ariel form, sat beside the desk, merely staring at the dancers, the five who were left. The other nine had all died quietly or, as Avery would have it, “ceased operation.”

  Just looking at the remaining quintet made Ariel sad. She had hoped for great communicative advances when she had started working with the tiny creatures. So little had really been accomplished. The games were cute, and some of their behavior showed a minimal intelligence, but no language had been conveyed, only a few hand signals. The gestures were significant, but not enough for Ariel.

  She had this faint sense that she had failed. And the apparent success of her other project, Avery, somehow did not compensate for her failure with the dancers.

  “Anything new, Eve?” she said as she sat down in her customary chair.

  “Nothing. They merely sit, holding hands like that. They never even look up at us anymore.”

  “Perhaps they think that their gods are punishing them.”

  “I do not understand. Their gods?”

  “Us, Eve.”

  “Would you explain?”

  “Well, we — never mind. Ignore the comment.”

  There was something morbid about Eve’s vigil over the remaining dancers. Each time one died, she insisted on taking it away, presumably to bury it. Ariel had never asked her where she went or exactly how she had performed the ritual. She did not want to know. The thought of Eve in a lonely, dark area, performing death rites for a dancer made Ariel shudder.

  Avery, still demanding that one be handed over to him for study, had fussed over the first four or five deaths. Ariel’s adamant support of Eve had apparently discouraged him. He had been silent on the matter for some time. Once she tried to introduce the subject, but he h’dd dismissed it with a wave of his hand.

  At times Ariel wished the dancers would finish their dying. Then she could return to Derec and help him in restoring the city. He had made some progress lately, managing to convince the computer to make all the lights of the city work again. And some utility robots had been seen picking up street debris. Water no longer tasted brackish, and the food coming out of the processors actually had flavor. But Derec wasn’t satisfied, he said. There were still so many things out of whack, and the essential mystery of why the city had deteriorated in their absence remained.

  Wolruf came into the room. She was returning from stilt another meal with Derec and Mandelbrot. Ariel didn’t blame her for spending more time with them. Since Adam had begun working with Avery, there had been little for Wolruf to do here.

  Coming to the desk, Wolruf glanced down at the dancers. “They look worrse, ‘u think?”

  “Much worse.”

  “What can I do?”

  “Nothing much anyone can do.”

  “Could ‘u just sset them loosse?”

  “Why?”

  “They could die in peace, alone. On my worrld, there iss a custom of dying alone.”

  “Perhaps you’re right. But I think it’s too late for such a compassionate act. They’re too far gone.”

  “Yess, I ssee, I think.”

  When she turned her attention back to the desktop, Ariel saw one of the dancers, a once-chubby, now-emaciated male, break his grip on two of the others and fall backward.

  Eve, now so used to a dancer’s passing, immediately scooped up the corpse and strode out of the room. Ariel, staring after her, said, “And then there were four. Soon, none. It won’t be long now.”

  She glanced over toward Avery. He was now looking at her with some concern in his face. How sane of him, she thought.

  Timestep, in his corner, had seen Bogie leave. Then, a short time later, he witnessed his return. After Bogie had gone back to his corner, Timestep catalogued the oddities. First, if not summoned by Derec or even Mandelbrot, why had Bogie left the corner in the first place? Second, where had he gone? Third, why was his return so secretive? Fourth, an important fourth, what was it that looked so wrong about Bogie?

  Derec reentered the room, followed by Mandelbrot. He was silent, his index finger tapping on his chin thoughtfully. Timestep studied the tap. It was too slow, unrhythmic. He would not have been able to use it for any dancing step he knew. (All the while he stood in his corner he called up from his memory banks the dances he had memorized and visualized how he would do them if his feet were not forbidden to move just now.)

  Across the way, Bogie appeared to lean forward, which seemed odd to Timestep. But then Bogie had left the corner and returned to it on his own, so a simple bending at the waist should not seem so out of the ordinary.

  “Bogie!” Derec called, and Bogie came out of his corner. Did Timestep observe a hesitation before his companion moved?

  “Did you think we’d forgotten you, Bogie?” Derec asked.

  Bogie hesitated before saying, “That you would forget about me would not occur to me, Master Derec.”

  “You seem a little sluggish. And what’s this Master Derec? What happened to ‘kid,’ ‘kiddo,’ ‘pal’?”

  “I felt momentarily respectful, Mast — kiddo.”

  Derec narrowed his eyes as he stared at Bogie. “Are you functional? Should I send you to the Robot Repair
Facility for a diagnostic scan or a tune-up?”

  “That will not be necessary. Pal.”

  For a moment Derec seemed unsure. “That’s okay,” he finally said. “Tell me, Bogie, what do you know about our mysterious controller?”

  “I know nothing of a mysterious controller, sir.”

  “Weren’t you supposed to tell me there was a block on that information, something like that?”

  Again Bogie hesitated. “The nature of the block upon information does not include such a question as the one you asked. Kid.”

  Derec smiled. “Very good. It was a sort of ‘do you still beat your wife’ question, wasn’t it?”

  “I do not have a wife. Kiddo.”

  “It’d be an idea, though. Robot husbands and wives. Robot families. I might work on it when the mess here is cleared up. Would you like a family, Bogie?”

  “I cannot have a family.”

  “Isn’t there a family feeling among robots?”

  “No, sir. Pal.”

  “Okay, okay. You’ll have to forgive me. I’m bone-weary, and my mind isn’t even forming casual conversation effectively. Bogie?”

  “Yes, Master — Pal.”

  “I need Wolruf back here. Go to the medical facility and fetch her.”

  “Fetch?”

  “Bring her back here. In fact, since she just left, you might be able to catch up with her even before she reaches the medical facility. Well, what are you waiting for? Get a move on.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Derec stared at the empty doorway for a long while after Bogie left. He seemed preoccupied. Then he turned suddenly and bellowed: “Timestep!”

  Timestep immediately left his corner and went to Derec. “Yes, Master Derec?”

  “Is something wrong with Bogie? Anything another robot can discern?”

  “I do not know, sir.”

  “Let me put it another way. Was that Bogie who just left here?”

  “I do not know, sir.”

  Derec looked worried. “Well, that’s some progress. You would know for certain if it was, wouldn’t you, Timestep?”