D.G. beckoned to his second-in-command. “Oser, I presume you see that object the two robots are carrying?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, have them carry it on board. Have it put in the security room and kept there. The security room is then to be locked and kept locked.” He turned away for a moment, then turned back. “And Oser, as soon as that is done, we will prepare to take off again.”
Oser said, “Captain, shall we keep the robots as well?”
“No. They are too simple in design to be worth much and, under the circumstances, taking them would create undesirable consequences. The device they are carrying is much more valuable than they are.”
Giskard watched the device being slowly and very carefully maneuvered into the ship. He said, “Captain, I am guessing that that is a dangerous object.”
“I’m under that impression, too,” said D.G. “I suspect that the ship would have been destroyed soon after we were.”
“That thing?” said Gladia. “What is it?”
“I can’t be certain, but I believe it is a nuclear intensifier. I’ve seen experimental models on Baleyworld and this looks like a big brother.”
“What is a nuclear intensifier?”
“As the name implies, Lady Gladia, it’s a device that intensifies nuclear fusion.”
“How does it do that?”
D.G. shrugged. “I’m not a physicist, my lady. A stream of W particles is involved and they mediate the weak interaction. That’s all I know about it.”
“What does that do?” asked Gladia.
“Well, suppose the ship has its power supply as it has right now, for instance. There are small numbers of protons, derived from our hydrogen fuel supply, that are ultrahot and fusing to produce power. Additional hydrogen is constantly being heated to produce free protons, which, when hot enough, also fuse to maintain that power. If the stream of W particles from the nuclear intensifier strikes the fusing protons, these fuse more quickly and deliver more heat. That heat produces protons and sets them to fusing more quickly than they should be and their fusion produces still more heat, which intensifies the vicious cycle. In a tiny fraction of a second, enough of the fuel fuses to form a tiny thermonuclear bomb and the entire ship and everything upon it is vaporized.
Gladia looked awed. “Why doesn’t everything ignite? Why doesn’t the whole planet blow up?"
“I don’t suppose there’s danger of that, madam. The protons have to be ultrahot and fusing. Cold protons are so unapt to fuse that even when the tendency is intensified to the full extent of such a device, that still is not enough to allow fusion. At least, that’s what I gathered from a lecture I once attended. And nothing but hydrogen is affected, as far as I know. Even in the case of ultrahot protons, the heat produced does not increase without measure. The temperature cools with distance from the intensifier beam, so that only a limited amount of fusion can be forced. Enough to destroy the ship, of course, but there’s no question of blowing up the hydrogen-rich oceans, for instance, even if part of the ocean were ultraheated—and certainly not if it were cold.”
“But—if the machine gets turned on accidentally in the storage room—”
“I don’t think it can get turned on.” D.G. opened his hand and in it rested a two—centimeter cube of polished metal. “From what little I—know of such things, this is an activator and the nuclear intensifier can do nothing without it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Not entirely, but we’ll just have to chance it, since I must get that thing back to Baleyworld. Now let’s get on board.”
Gladia and her two robots moved up the gangplank and into the ship. D.G. followed and spoke briefly to some of his officers.
He then said to Gladia, his weariness beginning to show, “It will take us a couple of hours to place all our gear on board and be ready for takeoff and every moment increases the danger.”
“Danger?”
“You don’t suppose that fearful woman robot is the only one of its kind that may exist on Solaria, do you? Or that the nuclear intensifier we have captured is the only one of its kind? I suppose it will take time for other humanoid robots and other nuclear intensifiers to be brought to this spot—perhaps considerable time—but we must give them as little as possible. And in the meantime, madam, let us to go your room and conduct some necessary business.”
“What necessary business would that be, Captain?”
“Well,” said D.G., motioning them forward, “in view of the fact that I may have been victimized by treason, I think I will conduct a rather informal court-martial.”
33
D.G. said, after seating himself with an audible groan, “What I really want is a hot shower, a rubdown, a good meal, and a chance to sleep, but that will all have to wait till we’re off the planet. It will have to wait in your case, too, madam. Some things will not wait, however, my question is this. Where were you, Giskard, while the rest of us were faced with considerable danger?”
Giskard said, “Captain, it did not seem to me that if robots alone were left on the planet, they would represent any danger. Moreover, Daneel remained with you.”
Daneel said, “Captain, I agreed, that Giskard would reconnoiter and that I would remain with Madam Gladia and with you.”
“You two agreed, did you?” said D.G. “Was anyone else consulted?”
“No, Captain,” said Giskard.
“If you were certain that the robots were harmless, Giskard, how did you account for the fact that two ships were destroyed?”
“It seemed to me, Captain, that there must remain human beings on the planet, but that they would do their best not to be seen by you. I wanted to know I where they were and what they were doing. I was in search of them, covering the ground as rapidly as I could. I questioned the robots I met.”
“Did you find any human beings?”
“No, Captain.”
“Did you examine the house out of which the overseer emerged?”
“No, Captain, but I was certain there were no human beings within it. I still am.”
“It contained the overseer.”
“Yes, Captain, but the overseer was a robot.”
“A dangerous robot.”
“To my regret, Captain, I did not realize that.”
“You feel regret, do you?”
“It is an expression I choose to describe the effect on my positronic circuits. It is a rough analogy to the term as human beings seem to use it, Captain.”
“How is it you didn’t realize a robot might be dangerous?”
“By the Three Laws of Robotics—”
Gladia interrupted, “Stop this, Captain. Giskard only knows what he is programmed to know. No robot is dangerous to human beings, unless there is a deadly quarrel between human beings and the robot must attempt to stop it. In such a quarrel, Daneel and Giskard would undoubtedly have defended us with as little harm to others as possible.”
“Is that so?” D.G. put two fingers to the bridge of his nose and pinched. “Daneel did defend us. We were fighting robots, not human beings, so he had no problem in deciding whom to defend and to what extent. Yet he showed astonishing lack of success, considering that the Three Laws do not prevent him from doing harm to robots. Giskard remained out of it, returning at the precise moment when it was over. Is it possible that there is a bond of sympathy among robots? Is it possible that robots, when defending human beings against robots, somehow feel what Giskard calls ‘regret’ at having to do so and perhaps fail or absent themselves—”
“No!” exploded Gladia forcefully.