And yet—and yet—if Mandamus now really had some project in mind that would work and would require the robots.
Amadiro had no great fondness for mystical cries of: “It was better so. It was meant to be.” Yet it was only with an effort that he kept himself from thinking this, as the elevator took them down to a spot well below ground level the only place in Aurora that might be similar, in a tiny way, to Earth’s fabled Caves of Steel.
Mandamus stepped out of the elevator at Amadiro’s gesture and found himself in a dim corridor. It was chilly and there was a soft ventilating wind. He shivered slightly. Amadiro joined him. But a single robot followed each.
“Few people come here,” Amadiro said matter-of-factly.
“How far underground are we?” asked Mandamus.
“About fifteen meters. There are a number of levels. It is on this one that the humanoid robots are stored.”
Amadiro stopped a moment, as though in thought, then turned firmly to the left. “This way!”
“No directing signs?”
“As I said, few people come here. Those who do know where they should go to find what they need.”
As he said that, they came to a door that looked solid and formidable in the dim light. On either side stood a robot. They were not humanoid.
Mandamus regarded them critically and said, “These are simple models.”
“Very simple. You wouldn’t expect us to waste anything elaborate on the task of guarding a door.” Amadiro raised his voice, but kept it impassive. “I am Kelden Amadiro.”
The eyes of both robots glowed briefly. They turned outward, away from the door, which opened noiselessly, rising upward.
Amadiro directed the other through and, as he passed the robots, said calmly, “Leave it open and adjust the lighting to personal need.”
Mandamus said, “I don’t suppose just anyone could enter here.”
“Certainly not. Those robots recognize my appearance and voiceprint and require both before opening the door.” Half to himself, he added, “No need for locks or keys or combinations anywhere on the Spacer worlds. The robots guard us faithfully and always.”
“I had sometimes thought,” said Mandamus broodingly, “that if an Auroran were to borrow one of those blasters that Settlers seem to carry with them wherever they go, there would be no locked doors for him. He could destroy robots in an instant, then go wherever he wished, do whatever he wanted.”
Amadiro darted a fiery glance at the other. “But what Spacer would dream of using such weapons on a Spacer world? We live our lives without weapons and without violence. Don’t you understand that that is why I have devoted my life to the defeat and destruction of Earth and its poisoned brood.—Yes, we had violence once, but that was long ago, when the Spacer worlds were first established and we had not yet rid ourselves of the poison of the Earth from which we came, and before we had learned the value of robotic security.
“Aren’t peace and security worth fighting for? Worlds without violence! Worlds in which reason rules! Was it right for us to hand over scores of habitable worlds to short-lived barbarians who, as you say, carry blasters about with them everywhere?”
“And yet,” murmured Mandamus, “are you ready to use violence to destroy Earth?”
“Violence briefly—and for a purpose—is the price we probably will have to pay for putting an end to violence forever.
“I am Spacer enough,” said Mandamus, “to want even that violence minimized.”
They had now entered a large and cavernous room and, as they entered, walls and ceiling came to life with diffuse and unglaring light.
“Well, is this what you want, Dr. Mandamus?” asked Amadiro.
Mandamus looked about, stunned. Finally, he managed to say, “Incredible!”
They stood there, a solid regiment of human beings, with a little more life to them than so many statues might have showed, but with far less life than sleeping human beings would have displayed.
“They’re standing,” muttered Mandamus.
“They take up less room that way. Obviously.”
“But they’ve been standing about fifteen decades. They can’t still be in working order. Surely their joints are frozen, their organs broken down.”
Amadiro shrugged. “Perhaps. Still, if the joints have deteriorated—and that isn’t out of the question, I suppose those can be replaced—if necessary. It would depend on whether there would be reason to do so.”
“There would be reason,” said Mandamus. He looked from head to head. They were staring in slightly different directions and that gave them a somewhat unsettling appearance, as though they were on the point of breaking ranks.
Mandamus said, “Each has an individual appearance and they differ in height, build, and so on.”
“Yes. Does that surprise you? We were planning to have these, along with others we might have built, be the pioneers in the development of new worlds. To have them do so properly, we wanted them to be as human as possible, which meant making them as individual as Aurorans are. Doesn’t that seem sensible to you?”
“Absolutely. I’m glad this is so. I’ve read all I can about the two protohumaniforms that Fastolfe himself built—Daneel Olivaw and Jander Panell. I’ve seen holographs of them and they seemed identical.”
“Yes,” said Amadiro impatiently. “Not only identical, but each virtually a caricature of one’s conception of the ideal Spacer. That was Fastolfe’s romanticism. I’m sure that he would have built a race of interchangeable humanoid robots, with both sexes possessing such ethereal good looks—or what he considered to be that—as to make them completely inhuman. Fastolfe may be a brilliant roboticist, but he is an incredibly stupid man.”
Amadiro shook his head. To have been beaten by such an incredibly stupid man, he thought—and then he thrust the thought away. He had not been beaten by Fastolfe, but by that infernal Earthman. Lost in thought, he did not hear Mandamus’s next question.
“Pardon me,” he said with an edge of irritation.
“I said, ‘Did you design these, Dr. Amadiro?’”
“No, by an odd coincidence—and one that strikes me as possessing a peculiar irony—these were designed by Fastolfe’s daughter Vasilia. She’s as brilliant as he is and much more intelligent—which may be one reason why they never got along.”
“As I have heard the story concerning them—” began Mandamus.
Amadiro waved him into silence. “I have heard the story, too, but it doesn’t matter. It’s enough that she does her work very well and that there is no danger that she will ever find herself in sympathy with someone who, despite the accident that he is her biological father, is—and must remain forever alien and hateful to her. She even calls herself Vasilia Aliena, you know.”
“Yes, I know. Do you have the brain patterns of these humanoid robots on record?”
“Certainly.”
“For each of these?”
“Of course.”
“And can they be made available to me?”
“If there’s a reason for it.”
“There will be,” said Mandwnus funnily. “Since these robots were designed for pioneering activities, may I assume they are equipped to explore a world and deal with primitive conditions?”
“That should be self-evident.”
“That’s perfect—but there may have to be some modifications. Do you suppose that Vasilia Fast—Aliena would be able to help me with that—if necessary? Obviously, she would be best-acquainted with the brain patterns.”