America 2040 - Golden World Part 25

"I see people?"

"If you see them, you will die."

Paul Warden sat in the waiting room of the ship's sick bay. He had forgotten to remove his service cap.

He was a bit dusty, for he'd just returned from a trading route, which had taken him to the rugged foothills of the Snowy Mountains. He'd been told by one of Mandy Miller's staff that Dr. Miller was with Sage Bryson and would speak with him as soon as she was finished. In the meantime, he'd pulled a portable reader into his lap and was idly punching up possible t.i.tles and not seeing them.

He put the reader back on the table, rose, and began to pace. The corridor door opened, and Evangeline Burr, in white shorts and a middy blouse that showed her tanned midriff, smiled kindly at him.

"Hi. I heard you had just gotten back."

"Hi, Vange," Paul said, remembering his hat and removing it, running his hand through his hair, which was still somewhat damp from his long ride in the hot late summer sun. "Do you know what happened?"

"I believe it was some sort of mental breakdown." Evangeline said.

"How is she? Have you seen her or anything?"

"No. She's been under sedation." She sat down, watched him pace for a moment. "Is it your intention to wear out the carpet, Paul?"

He gave her his lopsided grin, then sat down.

"Did you have an interesting trip?" she asked.

"Not bad. There's some pretty spectacular country out there beyond the badlands, and the closer you get to the Snowy Mountains, the more impressive they are. It rained on us a couple of times. I didn't know how much I'd missed rain."

"Yes," she said. She started to make a comment on the weather but held her tongue. Paul looked too worried for small talk. Evangeline had changed in the past months. She had started playing tennis with some of the young married people. She no longer felt uncomfortable with her womanly curves, and she found herself thinking about Paul a lot. She remembered with great pleasure those beautiful nights under Omega's two moons when a group of them would be sitting around Paul's campfire and eating hot dogs. She wasn't sure she was in love, but she knew that she always took great pleasure from being around Paul, and she admired him greatly. On the other hand, her friendship with Sage Bryson had begun to cool for two reasons: First, Sage no longer seemed to have time for her, and second, Evangeline did not approve of Sage's cold, often rude treatment of a man who obviously adored her.

She was trying to think of something comforting to say, when Mandy Miller, in white reading gla.s.ses pushed up into her dark hair, came into the waiting room. Paul leaped to his feet.

"How is she?" he asked.

"Well," Mandy said, "she's had a good rest. We kept her sedated until an hour or so ago."

"That doesn't tell me anything, Mandy," Paul said, with his little grin.

"Paul," Mandy said, looking grim, "there is nothing physically wrong with her. But she's a very disturbed woman. When she first came out of sedation, she seemed to think that she was back in New York, and that she was about ten years old."

Paul's face went white.

"Dr. Allano is with her now," Mandy said. "He's the best we have."

"Is it a nervous breakdown?" Paul asked.

"It's too early to speculate," Mandy answered. "From what she said to Captain Rodrick, and from what we've been able to get from her in the last couple of hours, I'd say that her problem has very deep roots, and that she has in the past been quite successful in compensating." She shrugged. "She was so successful in compensating for her, uh, problems that she fooled the selection board. Sometimes, when things are buried that deeply, when they do at last come out-"

"Bad, huh?" Paul asked.

"We just don't know yet," Mandy said. "Dr. Allano will have to work with her, to make a complete evaluation. I'm sure you're aware that we have fine tools to work with mental disturbances. Given time, now that she's come face to face with her... uh, problems, we'll be able to help her."

"Would it be a good idea for us to see her?" Evangeline asked.

"Not right now," Mandy said. "I'll keep you posted. She's going to need friends, and she's fortunate to have two like you."

Paul and Evangeline walked slowly down the corridor away from the sick bay.

"Why?" Paul asked, after a long silence.

"Paul, she's never opened up to me, but I think something traumatic must have happened to her very early." "I'd like to be able to go back in time and-" Paul didn't finish.

"I know how you feel," she said.

Evangeline was feeling something that bothered her. Sage had never given Paul the least encouragement, but he was just the sort who would, ever faithful, ever hopeful, become the tragic figure, waiting for Sage to be cured of her psychosis. And she, Evangeline, had decided thatshe wanted him. She hadn't made much progress. Now that Sage was ill, would she take advantage of Sage's absence from the field of compet.i.tion? In a way that was dishonorable, but, d.a.m.n it, it wasn't right for a man like Paul to martyr himself for a love that had never existed.

Camped beside a clear mountain stream in a narrow, wooded valley, the admiral's eyes gazed into a dying camp-fire. He'd been sitting beside the fire all night, keeping it going with fallen limbs he'd gathered in plenty. He was looking inward, however, not at the glowing embers. He knew he was not unlike the humans. If anything, his brain, his mind-for there was more to him than his computer-was superior to the fleshy human brain. It could store more information. He had been exposed to, had more ready access to, more knowledge than any person alive.

He suspected that his emotions, his personality, all those little traits that gave him individuality had, in one way or the other, come from Grace. When he and Grace worked together, their thought processes were astound-ingly similar. His opinions on almost any abstract subject mirrored Grace's.

Grace had fallen in love with Max Rosen.

He had fallen in love with Sage Bryson.

Was he, then, nothing more than an electronic copy of Grace Monroe? But he'd fallen in love with a sick human, whose fleshy computer was malfunctioning.

So robot, he thought,you can win affection only from a human whose mind is confused. Second-cla.s.s stuff! You're not even on the same rating list. True, you could kill an even dozen of them before the first human began to react. True, you have more knowledge in your man-sized brain than an even dozen of them. True, you are immune to physical pain. True, you are an animated pile of nuts and bolts, symbolically speaking, just as Sage said you were.

Why, then, he wondered, were the patterns in the glowing embers so fascinating, the happy sound of the stream so pleasing, the Omega sunrise so spectacular?

But why, in your newfound emotion, does it seem so unimportant that what Sage Bryson felt for you was not the romantic love you've read so much about of late? Why is there no pain? Why is there only a sincere pity for the woman? What is your destiny, robot? What is your function?

The admiral, examining himself, talked aloud. "I was constructed to be a mobile, military, decision-making computer. My intended function was to direct fire, to position other robots for the most effective attack or defense, to kill humans in the form of enemy soldiers, or to destroy the robots of the enemy."

Protection of the humans was his primary function now, with his lightning-swift mind on call to aid anyscientist with a problem that could be approached by computer.

And was that all?

Did some of the humans really enjoy his company, or were they merely being kind? A fish jumped in the stream, and he thought of his promise to let Clay know about possible fishing places. What about young Clay Girard? He seemed to be genuinely friendly. Clay was one of the several humans in whose company the admiral himself almost forgot that he was a robot. Stoner McRae was his friend. Of that he was sure.

He could say the same about any number of people. Like Tina. He'd been foolish enough to think that the young girl had fallen in love with him, when all the time she'd just been fond of him. When he had been damaged, her tears and her "nursing" of him had not indicated love, but human concern.

Concern. Yes, that was what he felt for Sage. Concern, and some genuine shame for his own stupidity.

And yet he would lay down his electronic life for Sage. Or for Clay, or Cindy, or Grace, or-for any of them. What was that if not a form of love? Yes, the protective instinct was programmed into him, but did that make it less?

He rose in the light of the early sun and walked upstream until, at the head of the valley, the stream foamed whitely down a hundred-foot waterfall. His eyes were attracted by the reddish tint of a layer of the exposed cliffs. The admiral climbed up, using superhuman strength and agility to do some rock climbing that would have made the most accomplished human mountaineer blanch. He examined the reddish layer from close up, broke off some samples, and made his way back to the camp. He used the communicator in the crawler, asking for Stoner.

"McRae here," Stoner said.

For a moment the admiral was mute. He'd started to say, "This is the admiral." He suddenly realized that he felt a bit uncomfortable about that t.i.tle now.The admiral, with a capital T.

"Stoner," he said, "I'm in the Renfro Mountains, and I feel fairly sure that I've found a deposit of low-grade bauxite. "

"Hey, great!" Stoner came back. "I don't need to tell you to record the map coordinates, I'm sure."

"I have them here," the admiral said, reading them off. "I thought perhaps you might like to fly up while I'm here."

"I'd sure like to," Stoner said. "But I've got to go out to the badlands."

"Would you please pa.s.s the word to Clay and Cindy that the streams here are full of trout?"

"I don't dare," Stoner said. "They've been after me for weeks to let them get up into the Renfros. If they know there are fish up there, I'll hear no end of it."

"All right, sir," the admiral said.

"Come to think of it, Admiral, " Stoner said, "how long do you plan to stay up there?"

"I'll come back in time for the wedding, sir."

"If you wouldn't mind company, I can drop Clay and Cindy off in a couple of hours, and then they cancome in with you on the crawler."

"I'd enjoy their company, sir," the admiral said. There was no doubt in his mind that the cool, crisp mountain air, the beautiful stream, and the sleek, fighting fish would give Cindy and Clay much pleasure.

That, in turn, would givehim pleasure. Sharing their enthusiasm would also be a great pleasure for him.

"So," he said, feeling better, "enough deep thoughts and self-doubts, robot. " Some unforeseen quirk in the functioning of his brain made it possible for him to feel an emotion of gladness. He would guard and protect Clay and Cindy. He would enjoy. What more could he ask?

Jumper and Cat were the first out of the scout as it settled on hydrojets in a small clearing near the stream. Jumper licked the admiral's hand and barked a greeting, while Cat climbed to his shoulder and nestled there, glowing blue with pleasure. Then Clay and Cindy leaped out, all youthful energy and laughter. They shouted thanks to Stoner and their pilot, Jack Purdy, who piled bundles of camping gear and light fishing tackle on the ground. When the scout took off, the day blended into pleasant images: Jumper and Cat cavorting at the camp, Clay catching a large fish on the second cast and, for the humans and the dog, a lunch of fresh trout filets. Then exploration of the beautiful little valley, sunset, a glowing fire. Clay and Cindy growing sleepy, Jumper curled nose to tail near the fire, Cat on the admiral's shoulder-with an extension plugged into the admiral's chest computer as the admiral fed into Cat's smaller, less complex facilities basic information on the appearance of minerals and metals in nature. Cat could scale rocks and cliffs where not even the admiral could go, and while Clay and Cindy fished the next day, the two robots would do a survey of the exposed cliffs around the valley.

The admiral, with no vain pride and no feeling of superiority, did not envy the human need for sleep. He filled his nights with a form of introspection, choosing a subject at random from his doubly packed memory cells and examining it to the fullest extent of his reasoning powers. Sometimes the nights were not long enough. And as he sat back and examined the events of the previous few days, he believed he had truly made peace between his mechanical and emotional selves.

While Clay and Cindy slept soundly beside a camp-fire in the Renfro Mountains, Rocky Miller sat in a conference room aboard theSpirit of America with his growing group of conspirators, for they had, indeed, advanced to that status now.

Rocky was a little annoyed because Clive Baxter had been holding the floor for over ten minutes with a series of niggling little complaints. Baxter talked about Eden's summer heat as if it were just two degrees cooler than an old-fashioned Baptist h.e.l.l. He bemoaned the lack of rainfall. He called the captain a fool for settling the colony in a semiarid wasteland. He complained about the taste of the bread being made with Amando Kwait's new harvest of wheat. Not once did he touch on anything important, such as the basic human right to make one's own decisions, to fashion one's own life-style, to be in charge of one's own fate.

There were times when Rocky was tempted to tell Clive and his malcontented followers that they were overgrown children. But he always managed to keep his cool, because he needed the malcontents.

Without them he would be unable to prove two things to himself and all of them, especially Duncan Rodrick: that Rocky Miller was a competent leader and was overdue for a command, a world of his own. There was plenty of room for it on Omega, even on the continent of Columbia. With some very basic equipment, which the Hamilton colony wouldn't even miss, a settlement much more pleasant and much more productive could be established in the southern areas of mild climate, sensible rainfall, and plentiful natural foodstuffs. He would be able to handle the grumblers once they had broken away fromRodrick's rule; they'd be helpless without him. He might have to take a hard-nosed approach at first, letting them know who was boss, but it could and would be done.

The other thing he had to prove was that his wife really loved him and not Duncan Rodrick. In spite of Rodrick's upcoming marriage to Jackie Garvey and Mandy's a.s.surance that what she'd felt for Rodrick was merely a momentary attraction, there had been a change in Mandy, and in Rocky s mind the final proof of her love for him would come when she climbed into a crawler with him to build a new settlement in the south. Rocky snorted. He wondered if Rodrick knew that Jackie had been a cozy armful forhim for the previous few weeks.

"I say we tell Rodrick that we've had enough," someone was saying, Baxter's monologue having ended.

"I'm sick of this place, just as Dr. Baxter is. I say let's give Rodrick an ultimatum."

"Before we get too excited," Baxter said, "has the list of necessary equipment and supplies been compiled?"

The list had been ready for weeks. A plan of operation to gather the needed equipment and other items had been approved, the plan being mostly Rocky's work.

"Let's go over it once again," Baxter suggested.

"There's no need for that," Rocky said. "It's time we did something besides talking."

"What would you suggest, Commander?" Baxter asked icily.

"I suggest we set a date," Rocky said.

There was a stir of nervousness in the room. There were fewer than a hundred people there, but Rocky knew that that group influenced others. He estimated that he would be able to pull over three hundred people out of Hamilton.

"Setting a date might be premature," said one of Baxter's supporters. "There are too many things to be decided."

"The only thing to be decided," Rocky said, "is if we're serious, or if we just meet here to voice a few petty gripes."

"What about electricity?" a woman asked.

"We've known from the beginning that we're going to have to rough it for a little while," Rocky answered.

"We have only one doctor."

"We will have no air transport."

Mandy Miller's staff had been a tough challenge. And Rocky's cautious approaches to individual scout pilots had been met with blank stares, or worse. Mandy had, it seemed to Rocky, done one h.e.l.l of a job indoctrinating her staff with loyalty to Duncan Rodrick, and the scouts were pure Service, who would consider any attempt to go against the captain's orders as mutiny. "You've all heard the plan a dozen times," Rocky said, standing to take the floor. "Now do you want freedom and a choice of where you're going to make your permanent homes, or do you want to wait until Rodrickchooses , at some undefined time in the distant future, to have elections?"

There was a murmur of talk, and three or four of them tried to take the floor, but Rocky waved them down.

"We have two choices," he said. "To forget it and make the best of it here, or to present Rodrick with a fait accompli and then negotiate for our share of the facilities. No, we will not have electricity at first. We will be without the laboratories left aboard theSpirit of America for a while. We will be cut off from the production facilities that are already built. We will have no metals. But there are reasonable people who are not on our side, and once were settled in the south, we'll be able to trade food with them-the good fruit that is always in short supply here, all the things that the south will produce so easily, for the things we need. We'll have all the resources of the equatorial jungles at our fingertips. And the reasonable people here in Hamilton will insist that the two separate colonies cooperate."

"It's too soon," Baxter declared. "Rodrick is still, in effect, a military dictator. Even if the others had goodwill for us,he would punish us by cutting us off. Two things are vital for the success of the new settlement-petroleum and electricity. Rodrick controls both. And he's going to continue to control all vital supplies until he has enough fuel to take the ship back to Earth."

"TheSpirit of America will never lift off Omega," Rocky said.

"I'm inclined to agree," Baxter replied. "But I think we can be sure that there will be another ship from Earth here within a very few years. If we make Rodrick our enemy, we could be considered mutineers.

When other people from Earth come out here and the colony grows, we'll be just a little splinter group and we'll have to come crawling back to take our punishment and beg forgiveness."

"The time for us to make our move is now," Rocky said. "There will never be a better time than during the captain's wedding. The entire colony will be celebrating the great event." He put heavy sarcasm on those last words. "We will be able to take our share of the crawlers, a couple of plastic-making machines, all the things we need and are ent.i.tled to, and be well on our way south before he realizes we're gone."

"And if he sends the robots after us?" a woman asked.

"Now really, can you see even Rodrick turning Mopro's weapons against us?" Rocky asked.

"No, he wouldn't do that," someone said.

"Either we make our move," Rocky said, "or we settle down to become good citizens of Rodrick's Eden. I'd like a vote on it."