“You! Help my robot with those packages and follow me to my aircar.”
Caliban turned around in some surprise. There was a heavyset man behind him, followed by a personal robot, coming out of the store. The robot was carrying a huge stack of packages, piled so high it could not see over them.
“Come on, come on. The damn store’s robots are all out on deliveries, and damned if I’m going to play seeing-eye guide to a robot.”
Caliban did not move. He had learned last night, the hard way, the danger in blindly obeying orders, and the danger in associating with humans.
“What’s the matter with you?” the man snapped. “You under superseding orders already, waiting for your master, he tell you not to help anyone or some damn thing?”
“No,” Caliban said.
“Then help my robot. That’s a direct order!”
But Caliban knew now there was no safety in playing along, mimicking other robots. Suppose this man ordered him into his aircar and flew him to some unknown place, someplace off the map in his datastore? Suppose this man was collecting robots for the thrill of destroying them, just as the woman had been the night before?
Caliban wanted no part of it. Best to get away from this man, get away and find a place to hide from all the humans.
He turned his back on the man and walked away.
“Hey! Come back here!”
But the lessons of the night before were burned deeply into Caliban’s brain. He determinedly ignored the man and walked on. Suddenly there was a hand around his arm. The man was grabbing at him, trying to restrain him. Caliban pulled himself free. The man reached out to grab him again, but Caliban sidestepped him. At last he decided to run. There was much he did not understand, but he knew he did not want to be in this place any longer than necessary.
Without a backwards glance, Caliban stepped into the street, lengthened his stride into a smooth, steady run, and took off down the avenue.
CENTOR Pallichan watched in astonishment as the big red robot ran away. Pallichan was utterly flabbergasted and more than a little unnerved. The robot had refused a direct order, and shaken loose from Centor’s grip in the bargain! That was tantamount to violent behavior, violence against a human being, and refusal of orders to boot. With trembling fingers, not even entirely sure what he was doing, Pallichan pulled his pocketphone out, flipped it open, and punched in the police emergency code.
He put the little phone to his ear. There was a half moment’s silence, and then the robot operator came on. “Sheriff’s Department Emergency Line. Please state the nature of your difficulty.” It was a smooth, calm, perfectly modulated voice. It soothed Pallichan’s agitated mind, helped him think clearly, as no doubt it was meant to do.
“I wish to report a major robot malfunction. A robot, a big metallic-red robot, has just refused my direct order, and then shook me off when I took him by the arm. He ran away.”
“I see. Now establishing lock on your present location. Sir, what direction was he moving when he ran away?”
“Ah, oh, let’s see.” Pallichan had to think for a moment and get his bearings. He forced himself to think clearly, struggling to keep from getting flustered. “North,” he said at last. “Due north from here, heading up Aurora Boulevard.”
“That would be in the direction of Government Tower?” the deferential robot voice asked.
Pallichan looked up the avenue and saw the tower. “Yes, yes, that’s right.” The dispatch robot must have consulted a map system and located an obvious landmark Pallichan could use to confirm position and direction. Damned clever of the police to have the robots verify things that way.
“Thank you for your report, sir. A top-priority rapid-response aircar is now being dispatched to investigate. Good day to you.”
The line went dead, and Centor Pallichan snapped his phone shut. He dropped it back in his pocket with a proud feeling of civic-mindedness. He led his robot, still patiently carrying his packages, back toward his aircar and managed to get everything packed away without help from any other robots.
Some minutes later, when his robot had taken the controls and lifted toward home, it dawned on him to wonder why the police had been so willing to listen to him. Why had they believed something as mad as a report of a rogue robot? Why hadn’t the dispatcher tried to confirm what should have sounded like a completely lunatic report?
It was, he realized with a chill of fear, almost as if the dispatch robot had been waiting for a rogue-robot call. Pallichan did not even wish to consider the implications of that thought. No, no, far better to force the entire thing from his mind. A quiet life for him. Dealing with the police was distasteful enough.
“INCOMING priority!” The words were out of Senior Deputy Meldor’s mouth almost before he was aware that the alert light had come on. That was what training could do for you, he told himself. It let you act, and act properly, before you were even quite sure what was happening. He scanned the text of the incoming message, allowing Junior Deputy Lusser to keep her full attention on flying the car, picking out the data she would need to get them to the target. No need to distract her with needless details at the precise moment she was called upon to do some intricate flying.
“What is it, Tansaw?” Mirta Lusser demanded.
“Rogue-robot call, subject reported proceeding northward on Aurora from the intersection of Aurora and Solaria.” Meldor checked his vectors and location. “Come to heading 045,” he said.
But the aircar was already banking, veering toward the northeast. She had worked it out in her head. Lusser was a good pilot, Meldor decided, one who always knew where she was over the city and how to get anywhere else. “Damn it, Meldor, a rogue robot? Does this mean the damn rumors are real? ”
“Unless the cops aren’t the only ones hearing the rumors,” Meldor said grimly. “If the civilians have heard the same scuttlebutt we have, some of them might get plenty jumpy, and I wouldn’t blame them. People are going to start seeing things.”
“Wonderful,” Mirta said. “That’s not going to make our job any easier. Hang on, over target location in ten seconds.”
CENTOR Pallichan could not quite believe what had happened. He had seen—and talked with—a mad robot. At least, he had convinced himself that was what had happened. Not altogether subconsciously, he was already mentally reworking the encounter for purposes of relating it to his friends, enhancing his own perspicacity and cleverness just a trifle. Easy to do now that it was all over. The moment itself had contained little actual excitement. It was the aftermath, the call to the police, that put a tingle of excitement and danger in his spine. Perhaps there were people to whom the experience of calling the police would seem to be no great adventure, but it was the closest to bold action Pallichan had ever come, and he felt no guilt in savoring the moment.
But it was time to get back to normal, he decided, a bit primly. Yes, Pallichan decided, it was time to let his robot fly him home, time to slide into the calm, natural order of things. Already he was envisioning the smooth, quiet ritual of the midday meal, always just the same food, served just the same way, at just the same time. His robots knew how much he valued order and regularity, and no doubt his pilot robot had already signaled to his household staff, advising of the upset to the master’s day. No doubt they would see to it that the remainder of his day was even more orderly than usual, in recompense for what he had just been through.
Still, he considered, there was no harm in having a good story to tell. Centor’s brush with a Mad Robot! He could imagine the buzz of excitement that would send through the circle of his acquaintanceship. Within a few seconds, he was lost to the outside world, his imagination back at work cheerfully inflating the danger and drama of his encounter with the robot—and his own courage in dealing with it. It was a rather soothing mental exercise, and he found he was beginning to feel settled down again. He found himself wondering what the sequel to the event would be, what would happen to the robot in question.