by Isaac Asimov
There seemed to be enough good parts to make about one and a half robots. One of the robots was headless, and the mounting circle on the neck was twisted and deformed. That told Derec something about the circumstances under which the robots had been acquired.
More important at the moment, it meant there was only one positronic brain. But there was no guarantee that it was functional. The upper torso of the other robot was torn open at the chest as though by some sort of projectile weapon, and the right shoulder area was rippled as though it had been seared by intense heat. Not only did that hold out little hope for the key components located in the torso, but it also virtually guaranteed that the brain’s powerdown had been anything but orderly.
But at least there was something to work with, and an outside chance, at least, of success. Derec stepped back from the lockers and turned to look up at Aranimas.
“So what do you have in the way of an engineering lab around here?” he asked with a breeziness that was more show than real. “I’m ready to get to work.”
Aranimas nodded gravely. “I will give you that opportunity.”
Answering Derec’s query about a place to work meant going deeper into the confusing maze of the raider ship. Unlike when he had been inside the asteroid, Derec found it impossible to retain any sense of direction. There were too many turns, too short sight lines, and too few absolute references. Once he lost track of where he was in relation to the command center, it was over.
Despite being lost, Derec was still collecting useful information with every step. He learned that different parts of the ship had slightly different atmospheres, and the storage corridors acted as interlocks between them. In one section, something in the air made Derec feel as though a furry ball were caught in his throat. In another, yellowish tears ran from Aranimas’s eyes. Only the caninoid seemed at home in all the atmospheres.
The ship was not only a maze, but a zoo as well, featuring at least four species. Derec saw five of Aranimas’s kin, all of high rank to judge by the activities Derec saw them engaged in. Curiously, the caninoid seemed to be the only one of his kind aboard.
Most numerous were the gaunt-faced Narwe, several of whom had been recruited by Aranimas to carry the robot parts. The Narwe were short bald-headed bipeds with gnarled skull ridges like false horns, which made them look fierce and formidable. But it was clearly only protective coloring, for Aranimas and the caninoid alike cuffed and bullied the Narwe without fear.
The fourth species was the most interesting and the most elusive. Inside the compartment where Aranimas’s eyes began to tear, Derec caught a glimpse of a strange five-limbed wall-clinging creature not unlike a giant sea star. It retreated as they approached, and was gone from sight by the time they reached the spot.
Fascinated as Derec was by the parade of alien biologies, he was also concerned about having so casual a contact with them. He knew that his own body was host to a rich biotic community: bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites. He did not know just how different the aliens were from him. He hoped they were wildly different. The more similar their fundamental structure was to his, the greater the risk that his symbiotes could endanger them or theirs endanger him.
He could only hope that Aranimas had either taken precautions or determined that no precautions were necessary. He based that hope on the fact that the raiders had evidently had some previous contact with humans. The scavenged robots and the aliens’ command of Standard proved that.
But that was another mystery for his lengthening list. Derec was positive that human beings had never crossed paths with even one intelligent alien life form, much less with four of them. To understand interplanetary politics, he had to know history and economics, but not xenobiology.
Did the raiders’ presence mean that he was far out on the fringes of human space? Or had knowledge of the contacts been made a state secret, meant only for those with a need to know? Were the raiders pirates, prospectors, or pioneers? Had they perhaps come looking for the same thing the robots had been looking for? And having found it, were they carrying him toward their home, or his?
They were questions with serious consequences. Tensions were high enough between Earth and the Spacers without any random factors to jumble the picture. An attack of the sort Derec had already witnessed, directed against one of the many human worlds with no planetary defense net, could bring on war.
Which brought Derec back to the silver artifact. If it was as important as the robots’ search for it implied, if it was powerful enough or important enough for the raiders to come after it, then it was too important and too powerful to be left in the raiders’ hands. As much as he hated to be thinking about anyone’s problems but his own, Derec had an obligation to try to reclaim it for humanity.
Mercifully, the lab was located in a section with a normal atmosphere, though the air was a bit warm and dry. While Aranimas settled into a chair and supervised the Narwe’s arrangement of the robot parts on the open areas of the floor, Derec browsed the workbench and wall racks with the caninoid at his elbow to answer questions. By the time he finished, the Narwe were gone.
“Explain each step as you perform it,” Aranimas said, crossing his arms as though settling in.
“Do you intend to sit there and watch?”
“I intend to learn what you know.”
“Then I hope you’re a patient sort,” Derec said.
“According to your story, it took you only a short time to convert an article of clothing into an escape propulsion system,” Aranimas said. “This should require even less time, since you only need to turn a robot into a robot.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Derec said, throwing his hands in the air. “I’m not sure I’m going to be able to do it at all, much less in an hour or two.”
“Explain the problem,” Aranimas said.
Derec bit back a laugh. In the hopes of loosening the noose Aranimas had around his neck, Derec had been rehearsing complaints that the equipment in the lab was ill suited, too crude, anything to lower Aranimas’s expectations.
But his dismay was real, not manufactured. He had prepared himself for instruments designed for nonhuman hands, to having to have one of the raiders at his elbow coaching him. But he had not been prepared to do without what he thought of as the basics.
“The problem is you don’t have the right tools,” Derec said. “I need a diagnostic bench, an etcher, micromanipulators — There’s nothing in here that would even pass for a chip mask or circuit tracer —”
Even as he spoke, he realized that he should not have been surprised. Aranimas would not be so curious about robots, would not need to have Derec repair them, if the culture which he represented were capable of making them. The fact that the raiders employed gunners instead of autotargeting systems should have tipped him off that their computer technology was deficient.
Aranimas stood. “Such tools as are available will be brought to you. Describe what you need to Rrullf” — Aranimas’s shortened version of the caninoid’s name was almost pronounceable —” and she will bring them to you or take you to them.”
She? Derec cast a surprised glance at the caninoid. Interesting.
“Thank you,” he said to Aranimas, and started to turn away. As he did, a thousand bees settled between his shoulder blades and began to sting him wildly. Gasping, his knees buckling, he grabbed for the edge of the workbench to keep from collapsing on the floor. He did not need to see to know that Aranimas had the stylus trained at the middle of his back.
“Do not make the mistake of trying to deceive me,” Aranimas said coldly as the pain held Derec firmly in its grip. “I may be ignorant of your art, but I am not foolish.”
“I — I —”
“Save your words of apology,” Aranimas said as the bees flew away. “Show me results.”
Doubled over the workbench, Derec turned his head in time to see Aranimas return the stylus to whatever hidden pocket was reserved for it. Clearing the phlegm from his throat, he nod
ded weakly. “Right, boss.”
When Aranimas was gone, the caninoid’s face twisted into its macabre grin. “’Urr lucky Aranimas wants robots so bad. Otherwise I guess ‘u be dead now.”
“Thanks for the cheery thought,” Derec said. “What exactly does he want them for?”
“Can’t ‘u figure? Aranimas wants to replace Narwe with robots. Aranimas iss sick of Narwe crying scenes.”
“Do the Narwe know what he has in mind?”
“Narwe been on best behavior since the boss told them,” the caninoid said cheerfully. “What ‘u need to work?”
But Derec had been thinking about something else. The caninoid was treating him in a way that could only be called friendly, and was the best prospect for an ally aboard the raider ship besides. If they were going to be working together, it was time for Derec to stop thinking of the alien as it. Or even she.
“First things first. I can’t say your name even as well as Aranimas does —”
“Thass pretty low standard.”
“— but I have to call you something. Can you live with Wolruf?”
“Iss not my name, but I know who ‘u mean when ‘u say it.”
“That’s all I wanted. Wolruf, I’ve got some fine print to read. What can you find me to read it with?”
“I get ‘u something,” she promised.
The magnifying scanner that Wolruf came up with was an inspection instrument of some sort. It had a display screen rather than an eyepiece, a fixed focus, and a tiny field of view. But the incident lighting at the aperture highlighted perfectly the fine grooves of the serial number engraving, making up for all the other shortcomings.
With Wolruf peering over his shoulder, Derec scanned the fifteen lines of data. “Do you read Standard, too?”
“No,” Wolruf said. “Tell ‘u a secret — I learn Standard so I not ‘ave to lissen to Aranimas mangle my language.”
Derec laughed, and the sound startled Wolruf. “What I’m looking at is one of the robot’s identification gratings. It’ll tell me several things that will help me fix the damage the manufacturer, the model, the date of initialization, any customization parameters,” he said breezily.
He went on like that awhile longer, loading his explanation with as many technical terms as he could in the hopes of appearing to be open and cooperative while actually explaining nothing. He did not mention that if the robot were from Earth, the grating would also tell who owned it, or that the three cryptic lines of symbols at the bottom of the screen were the programming access codes and the initialization sequence, the keys that would allow him to do more than merely repair the robot, but to alter its programming.
“What does it say?”
“This one is a Ferrier Model EG,” Derec said, scanning. “Customized for valet service.” And personal defense, he added silently. A bodyguard robot. “Initialization date, Standard Year ’83 —”
Then he scanned a few words ahead and was struck dumb.
“What is it?” Wolruf asked. “Is something wrong?”
“No,” Derec managed to say. “The robot was registered on Aurora.”
“That iss one of ‘urr worlds?”
“Yes.”
“Iss that important?”
“No,” Derec said. “Let’s look at the other one.” But it was important, and his hands were trembling as he took the scanner in them and rose from his seat. He remembered Aurora. He remembered the World of the Dawn. Not the things that everyone knew — that it was the first Spacer world and long the preeminent one, that it was home to the highly regarded Institute of Robotics from which most advances in robotic science had emerged.
No, like a ray of light sneaking past the black curtain, Derec remembered Aurora as a place he had been: glimpses of a spaceport, a parklike city, a pastoral countryside. He was connected with it in some way, some way strong enough that the word alone had the power to break through the wall separating him from his past.
At last, he knew something about himself. He had been to Aurora. It was not much of a biography, but it was a beginning.
Chapter 9
ALLY
WITHOUT A DIAGNOSTIC board or even a computer at his disposal, Derec had no choice but to activate the robot and rely on its own self-diagnostic capabilities. But before he could get even that far, he had a jigsaw puzzle to assemble.
The headless robot was an EX series, but the differences did not affect the parts Derec needed to borrow to make the EG whole. The active systems — as opposed to the merely structural — of any mass-produced robot were modular and standardized. It would not have been possible to produce them economically any other way. So the kidney-sized microfusion powerpack of the EX was a plug-compatible replacement for the damaged one inside the EG.
But the powerpack’s mounting cradle, which contained the interface for the primary power bus, had also been damaged by the fight which had downed the robot. Regrettably, the cradle had not been designed for field replacement, and it seemed to be attached to every other component inside the EG’s torso — and not by convenient micromagnetic fields. The manufacturer had settled for the less costly alternative of sonic welds.
Lacking the proper tools, swapping the cradles was a challenge. He practiced on the damaged cradle inside the EG, then used his hard-won expertise to transfer the undamaged one into the vacancy. That alone took more than two hours. But when he was done, it took less than two minutes to swap powerpacks.
Unfortunately, that did not end the matter. In all Ferrier models, the basic data library used by the robot was contained in removable memory cubes placed in a compartment just behind its “collarbone.” The robot’s extensive positronic memory was reserved completely for the business of learning from experience.
From the manufacturer’s standpoint, that arrangement meant that the positronic brains did not have to be specialized according to the robot’s function. From the owner’s viewpoint, it meant that their investment was protected against obsolescence or changing needs.
But from Derec’s perspective, it meant trouble. The headless robot had five cube slots, four of them occupied. For the EG, the numbers were seven and five. But the two empty slots and three of the occupied ones had been caught in the same blast that had damaged the power cradle.
There was no repairing them and no replacing them. But what was worse was that Derec was bound to use one of the two functional slots for the standard Systems cube, without which the robot would know nothing about its own structure and operation. He had five cubes packed full of data and logic routines, and he could only use one of them at a time. Eventually he settled on the Mathematics cube, concealing the Personal Defense cube for possible use at some future time.
Derec’s inventory of visible damage to the robot included severed cables that would render the right arm paralyzed and a frozen gimbal on one of the dual gyroscopes. But with power and the working library restored, there was only one truly critical part left to see to: the positronic brain.
In appearance, the brain was a three-pound lump of platinum-iridium. In function, it was the repository for the fundamental positromotive potentials governing the robot’s activity, for the temporary potentials which represented thought and decision, and for the pathways which represented learning.
What Derec was hoping was that the fundamental pathways had not been randomized, as could happen if the brain had been exposed to hard radiation. There was no hope for the robot’s experience base. The backup microcell, used to refresh the pathways while the robot was being serviced, had long since been exhausted and the pathways had long ago decayed. The robot would remember nothing of its previous service. But if the brain was undamaged, it should function normally when reinitiated.
Just like me —
Given the equipment available, the only way to test the condition of the positronic brain was to activate the robot and test it. For obvious reasons, that was dangerous. At one point in the history of robotics, robots had been designed to shut down when the
y detected any internal error conditions. But several hundred years of progress in robotics design had produced a different philosophy built around fault-tolerance and self-maintenance. He could not be sure what would happen.
By the time he was ready to find out, Wolruf had either grown bored or was obliged to go tend to some other duty. That was a fortunate turn, since when the robot was activated, it would be facing a situation that no robot had ever faced before. It would have to decide whether Aranimas and Wolruf were “human” enough that it was required to protect them and obey their orders.
Since robots were as a rule literal-minded to a fault, it should not have been a problem. Aranimas was clearly an alien, despite his superficially humanoid appearance. Wolruf was even more so.
Those who manufactured robots did not ordinarily limit the definition of a human being, but left it as broad as possible. A power plant worker in a max suit did not look human, but a robot would obey its order. Robots were not, could not be, completely literal. They did not judge merely on appearance. A three-year-old child was human, yet a robot would frequently decline its orders.
It was possible that the programming which permitted those distinctions would find some fundamental identity between the aliens and Derec. If there was any way of preventing that, Derec was determined to do so. Because of the First Law, the robot could not be used against him. But if the robot could be persuaded that the aliens were not entitled to protection under the First Law, he might be able to use the robot against Aranimas.
With some trepidation, Derec pressed the power reset. A moment later, all of the robot’s joints except those in the damaged arm stiffened. Its eyes lit up with a red glow that pulsed rhythmically.
“Alpha alpha epsilon rho,” Derec said, repeating the sequence of Greek letters which had appeared on the ID grating. “Sigma tau sigma.”
