With the aid of his medical kit, Perceveral taped up his side. The robot finished work and came back for further instructions. Shakily, Perceveral ordered him to a distant spring for water. The robot left, showing no further signs of aggression. Perceveral dragged himself to the radio shack.
“You shouldn’t have tried to turn him off,” Haskell said, when he heard what had happened. “He isn’t designed to be turned off. Wasn’t that apparent? For your own safety, don’t try it again.”
“But what’s the reason?”
“Because—as you’ve probably guessed by now—the robot acts as our quality-control over you.”
“I don’t understand,” Perceveral said. “Why do you need a quality-control?”
“Must I go through it all again?” Haskell asked wearily. “You were hired as a minimum-survival explorer. Not average. Not superior. Minimum. ”
“Yes, but—”
“Let me continue. Do you recall how you were during your thirty-four years on Earth? You were continually beset by accident, disease and general misfortune. That is what we wanted on Theta. But you’ve changed, Mr. Perceveral.”
“I’ve certainly tried to change.”
“Of course,” Haskell said. “We expected it. Most of our minimum-survival explorers change. Faced with a new environment and a fresh start, they get a grip on themselves such as they’ve never had before. But it’s not what we’re testing for, so we have to compensate for the change. Colonists, you see, don’t always come to a planet in a spirit of self-improvement And any colony has its careless ones, to say nothing of the aged, the infirm, the feeble-minded, the foolhardy, the inexperienced children, and so forth. Our minimum-survival standards are a guarantee that all of them will have a chance. Now are you beginning to understand?”
“I think so,” Perceveral said.
“That’s why we need a quality-control over you—to keep you from acquiring the average or superior survival qualities which we are not testing for.”
“Therefore the robot,” Perceveral said bleakly.
“Correct. The robot has been programed to act as a check, a final control over your survival tendencies. He reacts to you, Perceveral. As long as you stay within a preselected range of general incompetence, the robot operates at par. But when you improve, become more skillful at survival, less accident-prone, the robot’s behavior deteriorates. He begins to break the things that you should be breaking, to form the wrong decisions you should be forming—”
“That isn’t fair!”
“Perceveral, you seem to feel that we’re running some kind of sanitorium or self-aid program for your benefit. Well, we’re not. We’re interested only in getting the job that we bought and paid for. The job, let me add, which you chose as an alternative to suicide.”
“All right!” Perceveral shouted. “I’m doing the job. But is there any rule that says I can’t dismantle that damned robot?”
“No rule at all,” Haskell said in a quieter voice, “if you can do it. But I earnestly advise you not to try. It’s too dangerous. The robot will not allow himself to be deactivated.”
“That’s for me to decide, not him,” Perceveral said, and signed off.
Spring passed on Theta, and Perceveral learned how to live with his robot. He ordered him to scout a distant mountain range, but the robot refused to leave him. He tried giving him no orders, but the black monster wouldn’t stay idle. If no work was assigned, the robot assigned work to himself, suddenly bursting into action and creating havoc in Perceveral’s field and sheds.
In self-defense, Perceveral gave him the most harmless task he could think of. He ordered the robot to dig a well, hoping he would bury himself in it. But, grimy and triumphant, the robot emerged every evening and entered the cabin, showering dirt into Perceveral’s food, transmitting allergies, and breaking dishes and windows.
Grimly, Perceveral accepted the status quo. The robot now seemed the embodiment of that other, darker side of himself, the inept and accident-prone Perceveral. Watching the robot on his destructive rounds, he felt as though he were watching a misshapen portion of himself, a sickness cast into solid, living form.
He tried to shake free of this fantasy. But more and more the robot came to represent his own destructive urges cut loose from the life impulse and allowed to run rampant.
Perceveral worked, and his neurosis stalked behind him, eternally destructive, yet—in the manner of neuroses—protective of itself. His self-perpetuating malady lived with him, watched him while he ate and stayed close while he slept.
Perceveral did his work and became increasingly competent at it. He took what enjoyment he could from the days, regretted the setting of the sun, and lived through the horror of the nights when the robot stood beside his bed and seemed to wonder if now were the time for a summing-up. And in the morning, still alive, Perceveral tried to think of ways of disposing of his staggering, lurching, destructive neurosis.
But the deadlock remained until a new factor appeared to complicate matters.
It had rained heavily for several days. When the weather cleared, Perceveral walked out to his fields. The robot lumbered behind him, carrying the farming tools.
Suddenly a crack appeared in the moist ground under his feet. It widened, and the whole section he was standing on collapsed. Perceveral leaped for firm ground. He made it to the slope, and the robot pulled him up the rest of the way, almost yanking his arm from his socket.
When he examined the collapsed section of field, he saw that a tunnel had run under it. Digging marks were still visible. One side was blocked by the fall. On the other side the tunnel continued deep into the ground.
Perceveral went back for his beamer and his flashlight. He climbed down one side of the hole and flashed his light into the tunnel. He saw a great furry shape retreat hastily around a bend. It looked like a giant mole.
At last he had met another species of life on Theta.
For the next few days he cautiously probed the tunnels. Several times he glimpsed gray molelike shapes, but they fled from him into a labyrinth of passageways.
He changed his tactics. He went only a few hundred feet into the main tunnel and left a gift of fruit. When he returned the next day, the fruit was gone. In its place were two lumps of lead.
The exchange of gifts continued for a week. Then, one day when Perceveral was bringing more fruit and berries, a giant mole appeared, approaching slowly and with evident nervousness. He motioned at Perceveral’s flashlight, and Perceveral covered the lens so that it wouldn’t hurt the mole’s eyes.
He waited. The mole advanced slowly on two legs, his nose wrinkling, his small wrinkled hands clasped to his chest. He stopped and looked at Perceveral with bulging eyes. Then he bent down and scratched a symbol in the dirt of the passageway.
Perceveral had no idea what the symbol meant. But the act itself implied language, intelligence and a grasp of abstractions. He scratched a symbol beside the mole’s, to imply the same things.
An act of communication between alien races had begun. The robot stood behind Perceveral, his eye cells glowing, watching while the man and the mole searched for something in common.
Contact meant more labor for Perceveral. The fields and gardens still had to be tended, the repairs on equipment made and the robot watched; in his spare time, Perceveral worked hard to learn the moles’ language. And the moles worked equally hard to teach him.
Perceveral and the moles slowly grew to understand each other, to enjoy each other’s company, to become friends. Perceveral learned about their daily lives, their abhorrence of the light, their journeys through the underground caverns, their quest for knowledge and enlightenment. And he taught them what he could about Man.