Chapter 6. A Meeting Of Minds
Ariel hated robotics labs. They were always full of bizarre hardware, too much of which looked like torture instruments. They were all, without exception, cold and impersonal and utilitarian in design. Something about them seemed to suck the humanity right out of anyone who entered. Even Derec became just like the robots he worked on when he entered a robotics lab: single-mindedly intent on the task before him. Ariel stayed away from him then, and she tried to stay away from labs all the time.
So, of course, in their search for Dr. Avery, the robots led her directly to the laboratory where he had taken them. The door was still open, and the concave stumps of three examination tables still rose from the floor in the middle of the room. Glittering grains of what looked like coarse sand covered the floor around the remains of the tables, and it took Ariel a moment to realize that they were robot cells. Something was evidently keeping them from rejoining the rest of the city.
She looked around the lab for clues to Avery’s whereabouts, but saw nothing immediately obvious. She didn’t know what she was looking for anyway. He was hardly going to leave a note or a map leading her to wherever he’d gone, now was he? Still, she supposed the robots were right; if they couldn’t find him through Central, then this, the last place where he’d been seen, was the logical place to start looking for him.
She walked over to the workbench at the end of the lab. A light on an arm stuck out from the wall above it, the pool of illumination coinciding with the cleared area amid a clutter of machinery. All the machinery faced the light. It seemed pretty obvious that someone had been working here, then, but whether it had been Avery or Derec, she couldn’t tell.
She should have insisted that Derec come along with her. He’d have been able to make more sense of this jumble of equipment, but no, he was too busy for that. While he sat there in his study playing with some idiotic formula for God only knew what, Avery could be escaping the planet with the seeds for galactic destruction.
A noise in the corridor outside made her turn around. The four robots paused in their examination of the room as well. Lucius stepped silently toward the wall beside the doorway, and the other three moved just as silently to flank him, staying out of view from whomever or whatever was beyond the door. They’d coordinated their motion via comlink, Ariel supposed.
Mandelbrot turned toward her for a moment and raised his finger to his speaker grille, motioning with his other hand for her to move out of sight as well. She nodded and backed over to stand against the wall. She felt silly hiding from a noise, but she felt very much out of her element here; she would humor the robots until she learned who was out there.
She didn’t have to wait long. Avery’s voice was instantly recognizable, even with the false note of enthusiasm in it.
“Well, my dear, fancy meeting you here. What a surprise.”
Ariel supposed he was talking to her, that he somehow knew she was in the lab. She could see no reason to hide, then, but before she could respond, another voice, this one female and less familiar, answered him. “Wendell Avery. The pleasure’s yours, I’m sure.”
She hadn’t expected to find him quite so soon, so Janet hadn’t prepared what she was going to say to him yet. After their initial surprised volley, there was a long silence while they each sized up the other. Janet noted that Wendell’s hair had finally made the transition from gray to white, and that his taste in clothing hadn’t changed a bit since the day she’d left him. He still wore a white ruffled shirt and baggy trousers. Knowing him, they could be the very ones he’d worn on their wedding day.
She considered taking the initiative and lambasting him immediately for his stupidity in disturbing two alien civilizations with his robot cities, but curiosity made her reconsider. If he’d orchestrated this encounter, he must have done it for a reason, and she wanted to know why. She thought she knew, but she wanted to hear him say it. There would be plenty of time to lecture him later, and possibly more ammunition to do it with if she let him have his say first.
“So,” she said. “Now that you’ve lured me here, what do you intend to do?”
Avery manufactured an incredulous expression. “Me? You’re the one who arranged this whole business, disturbing my project with your silly robots at every turn. Well, you’ve got my attention. What do you want?”
The conceited arrogance of the man brought genuine incredulity to Janet’s face. Of course he wouldn’t admit to anything himself; he was a master at shifting the blame. But to imply that Janet had orchestrated what he had so obviously set up himself was too much to believe. “Me arrange to meet you? Don’t make me laugh.”
Avery shook his head. “Come on, Janet, there’s no sense denying it. You set this whole thing up just to smoke me out and you know it, though how you could imagine there could still be anything between us is beyond me.”
“Anything between us? You’re the one fooling yourself, if you think that. I came to get my robots, and to shut down this whole stupid project of yours before you destroy any more civilizations with it. That’s why I’m here.”
Avery could hardly believe his ears. The woman had gone to enormous trouble just to arrange this meeting, and now when she had her chance to speak her mind she stood there vilifying him instead. He supposed he shouldn’t be surprised-she had always backed away at the last minute, always taken the easiest route no matter what the situation-but he had naively assumed that over a decade of independence would have made her a little more-what? Adventurous? Assertive? Competent?
Evidently he’d been wrong about that. She hadn’t changed. She was still the same old Janet: a genius at design but an absolute moron when it came to implementation.
She hadn’t changed a whole lot physically, either. Avery would have been surprised if she had; spacers generally counted their age in centuries. Janet’s hair was still its original blond tint, and her eyes were the same sometimes-green, sometimes-gray he remembered, and she had managed to keep her figure as well. Her style of dress hadn’t changed appreciably either, but her shape-flattering clothing had never been a problem for him.
Looking at her now, he remembered what had brought them together.
But listening to her reminded him of what drove them apart. He began to pay attention to what she was saying.
“I managed to look the other way when you stole my cellular robot idea, but when you used it to build these ugly monstrosities you call cities, and then scattered them around the galaxy without a thought of caution, I decided it was time to put a stop to it. I-”
“ Developed,”Avery said sternly. “I developed the cellular robot and the robot city, from a concept I freely admit was your idea. You were content to experiment forever with it in the laboratory, but I was not. The concept needed to be tested on a larger scale, and I did so. But I did not steal your idea.”
“Semantics, Wendy. Call it development; call it what you want, but a rose by any other name…” She left the phrase unfinished, but went on before he could interrupt. “ And now you’ve gathered all three of my new robots. Are you planning to develop them, too? Ah, you’re blushing. Struck a nerve there, didn’t I? Well, this time I’m not going to let you. This time I’m keeping my idea to myself.”
Avery felt his hands clenching into fists. Unclenching them, he stuffed them into his jacket pockets, but his right hand encountered the welding laser. He withdrew his hand, empty, deeply troubled by the thought that had entered his mind.
He had once been insane. That insanity had nearly led him to kill his own son. He had since been cured, but no one had promised him it would be permanent. Apparently it wasn’t; this momentary urge to burn a neat hole through Janet’s left breast was very probably a symptom of the same insanity creeping back on him again.