“Hmmph.” Alvar looked around, feeling most unhappy. perhaps his eyes saw the wide-open spaces of the great cavern, but his mind was aware of every single gram of the millions of kilograms of rock over his head. “I suppose it might help, but I find this place sufficiently disorienting no matter what is projected on your false sky. How can you bear to live underground?”
Tonya gestured grandly about the huge artificial cavern. Brilliant simulated sunlight shone down on a pretty little park. A fountain jetted a stream of water into the air, a breeze tickled her hair. Small, handsomely designed buildings were dotted here and there about the landscape. “We Settlers are quite used to life below ground. And besides, you can hardly argue that this place is some dank, dismal dungeon. These days, we are able to make our underground homes seem quite like the surface, without interfering with the landscape or suffering the inconveniences of bad weather. Your dust storms cannot touch us here. But we have other matters to discuss. Come.”
She led them from the bottom of the elevator shaft to a waiting runcart. She sat down in it and waited for Alvar and Donald to do the same. They did so-Alvar next to her in the front seat, Donald in the back-and the cart took off with no apparent command from Tonya. It drove them through the central cavern and into a broad side tunnel. It stopped outside her outer office.
Alvar resisted the temptation to renew the endless philosophical argument Settlers and Infernals had been having since the day the Settlers arrived. The argument about the cart, and all the other “smart,” nonrobotic, automated hardware the Settlers used. It still seemed suicidally dangerous to trust to automatic devices that did not contain the Three Laws, but the Settlers took a perverse pride in the knowledge that their machines would not prevent people from killing themselves-as if that were a useful design feature. Yes, nonsentient machinery left more scope for human initiative-but what benefit if all that scope gave you was more chances to get squashed like a bug in a crash?
The three of them disembarked and went through the ornately carved glass double doors into the reception area, and then through to Welton’s surprisingly austere office. Most places in Settlertown were comfortable, even downright luxurious-except for the lack of robots-but Welton seemed to like things kept to a minimum. There was not so much as a desk in the room, at least at the moment, though Kresh knew a worktable could be extruded from the wall quickly enough. There was nothing but four chairs in a circle with a low, round table in the center.
It seemed to Alvar that the furniture had been rearranged every time he came in here, in accordance with whatever sort of use to which the room was to be put-working office, meeting room, dinner reception, whatever. A Spacer would have had a room for each function. Perhaps this was a cultural holdover from when the Settlers’ underground cities were more cramped. Or perhaps the mock austerity was a mere affectation on Welton ‘ s part. Kresh noted one addition to the room since the last time he had been here. A very standard robot niche, occupied by Ariel at the moment.
Tonya noticed Kresh looking at Ariel and shrugged irritably. “Well, I had to havesome place for her when she is off duty. She herself suggested the niche, and it seemed as good a place as any. I believe she has herself on standby at the moment. Ariel?”
There was no answer. Kresh raised an eyebrow. “You let your robot go into standby whenever it chooses?”
“Ariel, poor thing, serves no other purpose than to act as window dressing when I go out among the Spacers. It upsets your people no end to see someone without a robot in attendance. It made it almost impossible to do my work. She calms the passersby a bit. Otherwise, she has no other duties, and I let her do what she pleases. If she wishes to be dormant for a while, so be it. But come, we have much to discuss.”
Alvar Kresh was more than a bit unsettled by the arrangement with Ariel. Every robot was ordered into standby once in a while, to conserve power or for maintenance, but he had never heard of a robot going into standby on its own. In standby, how could a robot obey the First and Second Laws? Well, no matter, let Welton make her own arrangements. No doubt she told Ariel to choose her own standby times in such a way that Ariel considered it an order. No matter. It was time for business.
He took a seat, and Tonya Welton took the seat opposite. Donald, as a matter of course, remained standing. But Welton would have none of that. “Donald, sit down,” she said. Donald obeyed and Alvar gritted his teeth, determined not to be annoyed. Tonya Welton knew damn well that it would irritate him to have Donald treated as an equal. She was doing it deliberately.
“Now then,” she said. “Starting with your Ironheads, Sheriff. This is the most serious and violent demonstration they have mounted. Can you give me any assurance that these provocations will end?”
Kresh shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “No,” he said at last. “I don’t see much point in my pretending otherwise. There are literally thousands of years of animosity built up between your people and mine. Our people considered yours to be subhuman for a long time, and I suspect ‘some Settlers have had that opinion of us. I think we are all past that stage now, but the fact remains that we don’t like each other. Prejudices remain. There is also a great deal of resentment over the behavior of the Settlers on Inferno.”
“I cannot see that my people have been overly rude or disrespectful-though I, too, have my uncontrollable hotheads. You picked up a mob of robot bashers just last week. Is it their actions that is causing the resentment? I have done all I could to punish such actions quickly and publicly.”
“Gangs of drunken Settlers wandering the streets of Hades, destroying valuable robots, have not helped your cause,” Kresh said dryly. “However, I am willing to accept the point that you cannot control your people-the devil knows I can’t control mine. I am even prepared to believe that a terraforming project might well require some rough-and-ready sorts to make it work. The sort that might find ordering a robot to commit suicide amusing.” He glared at her, but she displayed no reaction.
“None of the bashing incidents have been good public relations for you,” he went on. “But the root cause of resentment is your very presence, your annoying self -confidence that you can so easily solve the climate problems that have bedeviled us.” He made a gesture with his right hand, indicating all of the vast underground settlement he was in. “The casual way in which you builtthis place was disconcerting. And I might add it seems a very permanent home for ‘a group that does not intend to-ah-settlepermanently.”
Tonya Welton nodded thoughtfully. “I have heard all these points before, and they are good ones. But must we act as if we don’t know what we are doing, just to salve the feelings of the Infernals? We have assembled the finest experts on terraforming from all the leading Settler worlds. They are good, they are skilled, and they brought their equipment. They used it to build their own-temporary-dwelling place. Would you trust the rebuilding of your world to people who were unsure of their skills? Or to people who could not excavate a simple cavern?” Tonya gestured toward Ariel, inert in her niche. “You have seen to it that many of us have robots, to convince us of the worth of your lifestyle. When we go, and leave this place behind as a gift to the city of Hades, we hope that some number of your people will take up residence, and see the advantages ofour way of life.”
“There is little chance of that,” Kresh said, a bit too sharply.
“There is little chance of Settlers taking home robot slaves,” Tonya countered in an equally unpleasant tone.