“You're right, Jacob. I should talk to Derec.”
She placed her hand on Jacob's neck and softly traced the muscles as though she were stroking a pet. His concern touched her. It was she he was concerned about. It is difficult for a young woman to ignore such concern when it comes from a warm-skinned being as handsome as Jacob. He was a dear, like a big brother.
That thought confused her. When had she stopped thinking of Jacob as a robot? Her regard for him was sisterly, was it not? It couldn't be anything more than that, surely. In spite of the way Derec ignored her in his interest with the wild one, SilverSide.
Perhaps her own impetuous experiment was getting out of hand. Since Derec had arrived on Oyster World, he had not seemed the dear thing she had dreamed about so intensely.
And Jacob's concern was pleasing, and the feel of his muscular neck was certainly stimulating.
With that wild thought she jerked her hand away, jumped up, walked into the apartment, and threw open the door to the bedroom where Derec had gone immediately after lunch and where Jacob said they were keeping SilverSide.
Derec had removed the rope, and SilverSide was sitting on the floor between twin beds. He was leaning back against the wall and had balled in that curious way the aliens had of reducing their surface area. That decreased his height by half.
Derec was sitting on the far bed and had to look up to peer into the robot's red-rimmed eyes.
Ariel sat down on the other bed. Jacob had followed her. He stayed near the door, standing with his back against the wall.
“I have explained the crisis he has caused in our relations with the Ceremyons,” Derec said, “and SilverSide is willing to try to straighten things out. He does not wish to offend the beings he is trying to emulate and serve.”
“They might likely destroy him before he gets the chance to do any serving,” Ariel said. “They were quite disturbed.”
“That is the chance I must take, Ariel,” SilverSide said, “but I do not think that is likely.”
The title Miss was stressed by its absence in SilverSide's remark. He had clearly imprinted on the aliens in thought as well as in form.
“Still, you had best shout at them from a distance,” Ariel said. “Out of flamethrowing range.”
“Communication by radio accomplishes the same thing,” SilverSide said, “without the danger you suggest.”
“One must first understand their radiospeech,” Ariel said. “The modulation is pure ultrasonic gibberish. “
“I have been working on that ever since we arrived. It is not different from the ultrasound they used to converse privately during your meeting with them. That meeting provided the clues I needed to understand the radio transmissions I had picked up the evening of our arrival. I am now modestly fluent in the language.
“So fluent that I suspect you will find several representatives of their species awaiting us outside and probably well within flamethrowing range.”
Derec jumped up from the bed and ran from the bedroom to the French window that opened onto the balcony. Ariel followed him. He started to go out but stopped. There were two aliens perched on the balcony rail, clearly visible through the sheer curtains in spite of the permanent dusk created by the dome. They were silhouetted against the white building across the street like two huge black crows. There were probably more at street level.
Derec and Ariel went back to the bedroom.
“You have been talking to them!” Derec said quietly but with emphasis.
“Yes,” SilverSide said. “I have already opened my own negotiations.”
“And who have you been talking to?” Derec asked.
“The leader called Sarco.”
“And what do they want?”
“My release. I told them I was being held prisoner.”
“Hardly. You could have broken the ropes any time you wanted to, either before or after we got here.”
“Perhaps, but I didn't want to risk damaging my wings. To make myself aerodynamic I've had to sacrifice my original strength and ruggedness to the stamina and lightness needed for extended flight, which unavoidably entails a certain fragility.
“But now I must go talk to Master Sarco.”
“Tell them the truth,” Ariel said. “Explain our sincerity and our lack of knowledge of this last transformation of yours.”
“I must always tell the truth. I cannot do otherwise,” SilverSide said.
“But you do sometimes omit things,” Derec said. “Try to tell everything that is relevant to our situation.”
“My first concern must be for my new masters, but I do not easily forget those like LifeCrier and Wolruf who have been kind to me. Roping and binding, however, can hardly be described as kind.”
“Think of Wolruf, then,” Derec said. “And the many kindnesses I have shown you before this last incident.”
“I must go and confer with Sarco,” SilverSide said as he rolled to his feet, still balled. Then he partially straightened, still bent sideways, and sidled through the bedroom door.
Chapter 19. The Laws Of Humanics
Circling far above normal charge altitude, Synapo watched the silver alien and his escort of Ceremyons-all less than half his size-as they headed toward The Cliff of Time, far below, toward the gathering Sarco had called to hear the words of the alien.
Sarco was already waiting on the pinnacle of The Cliff of Time. Synapo had seen him arrive a quarter-hour before, not long after that final radio transmission that had set up the gathering.
Synapo balled, and as he dropped, he feathered an exposed edge of a wing so that it set him in rotation and in motion toward the Cliff of Time as though he were rolling down a ramp.
His progress toward the Cliff of Time matched the progress of the small escort of Ceremyons who had the silver alien in their midst, so that Synapo and they arrived at the gathering almost simultaneously.
Synapo took up his perch on the adjacent lower crag, the position Sarco had occupied during that earlier gathering. His Cerebron elite were already aligned on the table rock below.
The alien who called himself SilverSide stood in front of the center of the line of Myostrians below Sarco. The Myostrian leader wasted no time. He began the interrogation of the alien as soon as Synapo settled onto his perch.
“Who are you and what is your purpose in contacting us?” Sarco asked.
“I am a robot, and I am here to serve you,” SilverSide replied.
In spite of himself, Synapo was impressed. The silver alien had mastered the Ceremyon tongue and now mouthed it with only a slight accent.
“You are a servant, like the servants who built the city we have nullified?” Sarco said.
“Yes, only somewhat more versatile,” the alien replied.
“Were you created this morning, at the time of our meeting with the aliens?”
“No. I was created on another planet. That was merely a transformation this morning.”
“To what end?”
“To follow as best I can the laws that I am governed by, the laws of the beings who created me.”
“And what is the nature of those laws?” Sarco asked.
“I may not injure a human being,” SilverSide replied, “or through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
“I must obey the orders given me by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
“And I must protect my own existence, as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.”
“Those are the same laws that govern the servants who built the city,” Sarco said.
“Yes,” SilverSide said. “We are all robots, or so I am told.”
“And these human beings,” Sarco said, “you consider them your creators and the ones you must serve?”
“Yes.”
“Then why do you seek to serve us?”
“The laws and my programming do not make clear what human beings are. Clearly, only beings more intelligent than I could have created me. I seek to know and understand all such beings. Until I met your species, Ariel and Derec were the most intelligent beings I had found-with the possible exception of Wolruf.”