There was no way for him to know. No doubt, somewhere in this city, there were means of learning. But the risks of being seen were too great. No. He would not leave this hiding place until it was to leave this city behind him. Once outside, he would deal with the problem of learning the strange and secret Laws that governed the world, and that everyone but Caliban knew.
That all decided, there only remained the question of how best to leave without being detected or destroyed.
And that was a question that would require some fair amount of thought.
HE was starving to death. Food—delicious, nourishing food—was there, on the table in front of him. His throat burned with thirst as it had never burned before. But there was no robot there to cut the meat, lift the bites to his mouth, pop them into his mouth. There was no robot to wrap its hands around his mouth and jaw, work them to make him chew and swallow. He could lift his hand, feed himself but no, death was better. Death was the ultimate, the absolute insurance that he need never move again, never again pollute his mind with gross and distasteful thoughts about movements, about his body or its disgusting needs.
Yes. Death. Death. Dea—
Alvar Kresh opened his eyes. It was morning. The light was coming in. The sweat was pouring off his body.
The world was real. The ceiling was there, directly over his head, decorated with a subdued abstract design, swirls of color that did not mean a thing. Its meaninglessness was almost comforting, in a way. It seemed to Alvar that there had been entirely too much meaning in his life over the last few days. And that dream, that nightmare, was the limit.
Moving cautiously, he sat up in bed and swung his feet around to the floor, doing everything with slightly exaggerated care. It didn’t take long to find the caution was justified; his body was a mass of tender bruises and stiff muscles.
He sat there for a moment, habit telling him to wait for Donald to come—but then he remembered. This was the morning he started to do things for himself. For a moment he considered the rather tempting idea of rescinding the order. After all, it had been a tough night, and he was not in the best of condition.
But no. For no doubt there would be another excuse tomorrow, and another one the day after that. If he waited until conditions were ideal before he started taking charge of himself, he might as well go back to his dream and live the life of Gidi.
The thought of that was enough to get him up and moving. Determinedly thrusting all thoughts of Gidi from his mind, he stood, a bit stiffly, and made his way to the refresher. He was pleasantly surprised to discover that he remembered where all the controls were. He luxuriated under the needle shower, letting the strong hot jets of water work the kinks and soreness out of his muscles. He found that he was able to manage in the refresher without any great difficulty—though he did have some trouble getting the needle shower to shut off once he was done, and the drying cycle was a bit hotter than he might have preferred. But those were minor problems, and no doubt he could solve them with a bit of experimentation. Feeling far more confident, and with nearly all of the stiffness out of his muscles, he strode out into his bedroom—
And was suddenly confronted with the realization that he had no idea where any of his clothes were. He began rummaging in the dressers, digging through his closets, fumbling with unfamiliar latches on the doors and drawers. Even when he had assembled all the bits of clothing, the struggle was far from over. The fastenings on half his clothes seemed to have been positioned with no concern at all for the ability of the wearer to reach them. He had to go back and dig out more clothes, this time with more of an eye for utility than fashion. It was a good half hour before he was anything remotely like dressed for polite society, and even then something or other seemed to be binding a bit across his midriff, as if it were fastened too tightly. Perhaps he ought to strip down and start over. No, never mind. Dressing had taken too long already, and he could live with it for now. Tomorrow he would do better. This morning he had washed and dressed himself, and that was the main thing.
He stepped out into the upper hall of his house, proud of his accomplishment, and only vaguely aware that he had left his bedroom and refresher an absolute shambles. He did not even notice himself dismiss the thought by telling himself the household robots would tidy it all up.
Donald was waiting for him, holding a notepack out to him. “Good morning, sir,” he said. “I thought it might be wise if you looked at the overnight reports immediately. There have been several significant developments. I believe you will want to know about them right away.”
“Why wasn’t I wakened if the developments were so important?”
“As you will recall, sir, you gave specific orders that you did not wish to be attended to until this morning.”
Kresh opened his mouth to protest, to argue, but then he stopped himself. Hell and damnation, he had given that order. No doubt Donald would have burst in if the news had been life-or-death, but even so.
Something else occurred to him. He normally relied on Donald to wake him. But with Donald ordered not to disturb him… He checked the wall clock and cursed. He had overslept by a full two hours. He felt a flash of temper, but then he realized there was no one to be mad at but himself, and that would not get him far. He sighed and gave it up. Maybe getting a decent night’s sleep for once was far from the worst idea. But it was dawning on him that this idea of taking care of himself was more complicated than he had thought.
He allowed Donald to lead him to the breakfast table, and read over the report in the notepack as he ate.
The short form of the overnight and early morning developments was perfectly straightforward: All hell was breaking loose. It seemed that all the things he had wanted to keep quiet were in the news this morning. Depressingly enough, Alvar realized, Donald had been right: There had been no real reason for the robot to wake him up. After all, there was nothing the Sheriff could do about it all.
Sometimes, it seemed to Kresh, it was as if events themselves took on a power, a logic, of their own. Seemingly unrelated events would converge, fall in on themselves to form a critical mass. And it was happening now.
After all, there was no shortage of sources for rumor and news. Robot-bashing Settlers who could tell tales of a robot that threw a man across a warehouse and set the place on fire; Centor Pallichan, the passerby who called the cops after Caliban refused his order; the now widespread reports of the attack on Fredda Leving; the much-witnessed incident at Limbo Depot, where a bright red robot had smashed its way through a plate-glass window with deputies in hot pursuit, shooting as they went; the undeniable fact that the Settlers were involved in New Law robots; and to top it all off, the riot at Leving’s lecture.
Sometime during the night and the morning after Fredda Leving’s speech on the New Law robots, the city’s rumor mill struck that critical mass. The stories that had been drifting around the city suddenly seemed to coalesce, to form around each other and give each other new strength. Almost, it seemed, by instinct, reporters sensed that it was the moment to start digging. News reports, accurate and otherwise, were allover the media.
Alvar Kresh sighed and tossed the notepack to one side. The server robot took away his fruit cup, which was the first that Alvar knew he had even eaten it. The robot placed an omelette in front of him, and he resolved to eat it with more attention.
It was a resolution that did not last long. His mind was too busy, working over all the events of the last few days and what was likely to happen next.