TREVIZE seemed lost in thought during dinner, and Bliss concentrated on the food.
Pelorat, the only one who seemed anxious to speak, pointed out that if the world they were on was Aurora and if it was the first settled world, it ought to be fairly close to Earth.
"It might pay to scour the immediate stellar neighborhood," he said. "It would only mean sifting through a few hundred stars at most."
Trevize muttered that hit-and-miss was a last resort and he wanted as much information about Earth as possible before attempting to approach it even if he found it. He said no more and Pelorat, clearly squelched, dwindled into silence as well.
After the meal, as Trevize continued to volunteer nothing, Pelorat said tentatively, "Are we to be staying here, Golan?"
"Overnight, anyway," said Trevize. "I need to do a bit more thinking."
"Is it safe?"
"Unless there's something worse than dogs about," said Trevize, "we're quite safe here in the ship."
Pelorat said, "How long would it take to lift off, if there is something worse than dogs about?"
Trevize said, "The computer is on launch alert. I think we can manage to take off in between two and three minutes. And it will warn us quite effectively if anything unexpected takes place, so I suggest we all get some sleep. Tomorrow morning, I'll come to a decision as to the next move."
Easy to say, thought Trevize, as he found himself staring at the darkness. He was curled up, partly dressed, on the floor of the computer room. It was quite uncomfortable, but he was sure that his bed would be no more conducive to sleep at this time and here at least he could take action at once if the computer sounded an alarm.
Then he heard footsteps and automatically sat up, hitting his head against the edge of the desk-not hard enough to do damage, but hard enough to make rubbing and grimacing a necessity.
"Janov?" he said in a muffled voice, eyes tearing.
"No. It's Bliss."
Trevize reached over the edge of the table with one hand to make at least semicontact with the computer, and a soft light showed Bliss in a light pink wraparound.
Trevize said, "What is it?"
"I looked in your bedroom and you weren't there. There was no mistaking your neuronic activity, however, and I followed it. You were clearly awake so I walked in."
"Yes, but what is it you want?"
She sat down against the wall, knees up, and cradled her chin against them. She said, "Don't be concerned. I have no designs on what's left of your virginity."
"I don't imagine you do," said Trevize sardonically. "Why aren't you asleep? You need it more than we do."
"Believe me," she said in a low, heartfelt tone, "that episode with the dogs was very draining."
"I believe that."
"But I had to talk to you when Pel was sleeping."
"About what?"
Bliss said, "When he told you about the robot, you said that that changes everything. What did you mean?"
Trevize said, "Don't you see that for yourself? We have three sets of coordinates; three Forbidden Worlds. I want to visit all three to learn as much as possible about Earth before trying to reach it."
He edged a bit closer so that he could speak lower still, then drew away sharply. He said, "Look, I don't want Janov coming in here looking for us. I don't know what he'd think."
"It's not likely. He's sleeping and I've encouraged that just a bit. If he stirs, I'll know. -Go on. You want to visit all three. What's changed?"
"It wasn't part of my plan to waste time on any world needlessly. If this world, Aurora, had been without human occupation for twenty thousand years, then it is doubtful that any information of value has survived. I don't want to spend weeks or months scrabbling uselessly about the planetary surface, fighting off dogs and cats and bulls or whatever else may have become wild and dangerous, just on the hope of finding a scrap of reference material amid the dust, rust, and decay. It may be that on one or both of the other Forbidden Worlds there may be human beings and intact libraries. So it was my intention to leave this world at once. We'd be out in space now, if I had done so, sleeping in perfect security."
"But?"
"But if there are robots still functioning on this world, they may have important information that we could use. They would be safer to deal with than human beings would be, since, from what I've heard, they must follow orders and can't harm human beings."
"So you've changed your plan and now you're going to spend time on this world searching for robots."
"I don't want to, Bliss. It seems to me that robots can't last twenty thousand years without maintenance. Yet since you've seen one with a spark of activity still, it's clear I can't rely on my commonsense guesses about robots. I mustn't lead out of ignorance. Robots may be more enduring than I imagine, or they may have a certain capacity for self-maintenance."
Bliss said, "Listen to me, Trevize, and please keep this confidential."
"Confidential?" said Trevize, raising his voice in surprise. "From whom?"
"Sh! From Pel, of course. Look, you don't have to change your plans. You were right the first time. There are no functioning robots on this world. I detect nothing."
"You detected that one, and one is as good as-"
"I did not detect that one. It was nonfunctioning; long nonfunctioning."
"You said-"
"I know what I said. Pel thought he saw motion and heard sound. Pel is a romantic. He's spent his working life gathering data, but that is a difficult way of making one's mark in the scholarly world. He would dearly love to make an important discovery of his own. His finding of the word 'Aurora' was legitimate and made him happier than you can imagine. He wanted desperately to find more."
Trevize said, "Are you telling me he wanted to make a discovery so badly he convinced himself he had come upon a functioning robot when he hadn't?"
"What he came upon was a lump of rust containing no more consciousness than the rock against which it rested."
"But you supported his story."
"I could not bring myself to rob him of his discovery. He means so much to me.
Trevize stared at her for a full minute; then he said, "Do you mind explaining why he means so much to you? I want to know. I really want to know. To you he must seem an elderly man with nothing romantic about him. He's an Isolate, and you despise Isolates. You're young and beautiful and there must 61 other parts of Gaia that have the bodies of vigorous and handsome young am. With them you can have a physical relationship that can resonate through Gaia and bring peaks of ecstasy. So what do you an in Janov?"
Bliss looked at Trevize solemnly. "Don't you love him?"
Trevize shrugged and said, "I'm fond of him. I suppose you could say, in a nonsexual way, that I love him."
"You haven't known him very long, Trevize. Why do you love him, in that nonsexual way of yours?"
Trevize found himself smiling without being aware of it. "He's such an odd fellow. I honestly think that never in his life has he given a single thought to himself. He was ordered to go along with me, and he went. No objection. He wanted me to go to Trantor, but when I said I wanted to go to Gaia, he never argued. And now he's come along with me in this search for Earth, though he must know it's dangerous. I feel perfectly confident that if he had to sacrifice his life for me-or for anyone-he would, and without repining."
"Would you give your life for him, Trevize?"
"I might, if I didn't have time to think. If I did have time to think, I would hesitate and I might funk it. I'm not as good as he is. And because of that, I have this terrible urge to protect and keep him good. I don't want the Galaxy to teach him not to be good. Do you understand? And I have to protect him from you particularly. I can't bear the thought of you tossing him aside when whatever nonsense amuses you now is done with."
"Yes, I thought you'd think something like that. Don't you suppose I see in Pel what you see in him-and even more so, since I can contact his mind directly? Do I act as though I want to hurt him? Would I support his fantasy of having seen a functioning robot, if it weren't that I couldn't bear to hurt him? Trevize, I am used to what you would call goodness, for every part of Gaia is ready to be sacrificed for the whole. We know and understand no other course of action. But we give up nothing in so doing, for each part is the whole, though I don't expect you to understand that. Pel is something different."
Bliss was no longer looking at Trevize. It was as though she were talking to herself. "He is an Isolate. He is not selfless because he is a part of a greater whole. He is selfless because he is selfless. Do you understand me? He has all to lose and nothing to gain, and yet he is what he is. He shames me for being what I am without fear of loss, when he is what he is without hope of gain."
She looked up at Trevize again now, very solemnly. "Do you know how much more I understand about him than you possibly can? And do you think I would harm him in any way?"
Trevize said, "Bliss, earlier today, you said, 'Come, let us be friends,' and all I replied was, 'If you wish.' That was grudging of me, for I was thinking of what you might do to Janov. It is my turn, now. Come, Bliss, let us be friends. You can keep on pointing out the advantage of Galaxia and I may keep on refusing to accept your arguments, but even so, and despite that, let us be friends." And he held out his hand.
"Of course, Trevize," she said, and their hands gripped each other strongly.
TREVIZE grinned quietly to himself. It was an internal grin, for the line of his mouth didn't budge.
When he had worked with the computer to find the star (if any) of the first set of co-ordinates, both Pelorat and Bliss had watched intently and had asked questions. Now they stayed in their room and slept or, at any rate, relaxed, and left the job entirely to Trevize.
In a way, it was flattering, for it seemed to Trevize that by now they had simply accepted the fact that Trevize knew what he was doing and required no supervision or encouragement. For that matter, Trevize had gained enough experience from the first episode to rely more thoroughly on the computer and to feel that it needed, if not none, then at least less supervision.
Another star-luminous and unrecorded on the Galactic map-showed up. This second star was more luminous than the star about which Aurora circled, and that made it all the more significant that the star was unrecorded in the computer.
Trevize marveled at the peculiarities of ancient tradition. Whole centuries might be telescoped or dropped out of consciousness altogether. Entire civilizations might be banished into forgetfulness. Yet out of the midst of these centuries, snatched from those civilizations, might be one or two factual items that would be remembered undistorted-such as these co-ordinates.
He had remarked on this to Pelorat some time before, and Pelorat had at once told him that it was precisely this that made the study of myths and legends so rewarding. "The trick is," Pelorat had said, "to work out or decide which particular components of a legend represent accurate underlying truth. That isn't easy and different mythologists are likely to pick different components, depending, usually, on which happen to suit their particular interpretations."
In any case, the star was right where Deniador's co-ordinates, corrected for time, said it would be. Trevize was prepared, at this moment, to wager a considerable sum that the third star would be in place as well. And if it was, Trevize was prepared to suspect that the legend was further correct in stating that there were fifty Forbidden Worlds altogether (despite the suspiciously even number) and to wonder where the other forty-seven might be.
A habitable world, Forbidden World, was found circling the star-and by this time its presence didn't cause even a ripple of surprise in Trevize's bosom. He had been absolutely sure it would be there. He set the Far Star into a slow orbit about it.
The cloud layer was sparse enough to allow a reasonable view of the surface from space. The world was a watery one, as almost all habitable worlds were. There was an unbroken tropical ocean and two unbroken polar oceans.
In one set of middle latitudes, there was a more or less serpentine continent encircling the world with bays on either side producing an occasional narrow isthmus. In the other set of middle latitudes, the land surface was broken into three large parts and each of the three were thicker north-south than the opposite continent was.
Trevize wished he knew enough climatology to be able to predict, from what he saw, what the temperatures and seasons might be like. For a moment, he toyed with the idea of having the computer work on the problem. The trouble was that climate was not the point at issue.
Much more important was that, once again, the computer detected no radiation that might be of technological origin. What his telescope told him was that the planet was not moth-eaten and that there were no signs of desert. The land moved backward in various shades of green, but there were no signs of urban areas on the dayside, no lights on the nightside.
Was this another planet filled with every kind of life but human?
He rapped at the door of the other bedroom.
"Bliss?" he called out in a loud whisper, and rapped again.
There was a rustling, and Bliss's voice said, "Yes?"
"Could you come out here? I need your help-"
"If you wait just a bit, I'll make myself a bit presentable."
When she finally appeared, she looked as presentable as Trevize had ever seen her. He felt a twinge of annoyance at having been made to wait, however, for it made little difference to him what she looked like. But they were friends now, and he suppressed the annoyance.
She said with a smile and in a perfectly pleasant tone, "What can I do for you, Trevize?"
Trevize waved at the viewscreen. "As you can see, we're passing over the surface of what looks like a perfectly healthy world with a quite solid vegetation cover over its land area. No lights at night, however, and no technological radiation. Please listen and tell me if there's any animal life. There was one point at which I thought I could see herds of grazing animals, but I wasn't sure. It might be a case of seeing what one desperately wants to see."
Bliss "listened." At least, a curiously intent look came across her face. She said, "Oh yes-rich in animal life."
"Mammalian?"
"Must be."
"Human?"
Now she seemed to concentrate harder. A full minute passed, and then another, and finally she relaxed. "I can't quite tell. Every once in a while it seemed to me that I detected a whiff of intelligence sufficiently intense to be considered human. But it was so feeble and so occasional that perhaps I, too, was only sensing what I desperately wanted to sense. You see-"
She paused in thought, and Trevize nudged her with a "Well?"
She said, "The thing is I seem to detect something else. It is not something I'm familiar with, but I don't see how it can be anything but-"
Her face tightened again as she began to "listen" with still greater intensity.
"Well?" said Trevize again.
She relaxed. "I don't see how it can be anything but robots."
"Robots!"
"Yes, and if I detect them, surely I ought to be able to detect human beings, too. But I don't."
"Robots!" said Trevize again, frowning.
"Yes," said Bliss, "and I should judge, in great numbers."
PELORAT also said "Robots!" in almost exactly Trevize's tone when he was told of them. Then he smiled slightly. "You were right, Golan, and I was wrong to doubt you."
"I don't remember your doubting me, Janov."
"Oh well, old man, I didn't think I ought to express it. I just thought, in my heart, that it was a mistake to leave Aurora while there was a chance we might interview some surviving robot. But then it's clear you knew there would be a richer supply of robots here."
"Not at all, Janov. I didn't know. I merely chanced it. Bliss tells me their mental fields seem to imply they are fully functioning, and it seems to me they can't very well be fully functioning without human beings about for care and maintenance. However, she can't spot anything human so we're still looking.»
Pelorat studied the viewscreen thoughtfully. "It seems to be all forest, doesn't it?"
"Mostly forest. But there are clear patches that may be grasslands. The thing is that I see no cities, or any lights at night, or anything but thermal radiation at any time."
"So no human beings after all?"
"I wonder. Bliss is in the galley trying to concentrate. I've set up an arbitrary prime meridian for the planet which means that it's divided into latitude and longitude in the computer. Bliss has a little device which she presses whenever she encounters what seems an unusual concentration of robotic mental activity-I suppose you can't say 'neuronic activity' in connection with robots-or any whiff of human thought. The device is linked to the computer, which thus gets a fix on all the latitudes and longitudes, and we'll let it make the choice among them and pick a good place for landing."
Pelorat looked uneasy. "Is it wise to leave the matter of choice to the computer?"
"Why not, Janov? It's a very competent computer. Besides, when you have no basis on which to make a choice yourself, where's the harm in at least considering the computer's choice?"
Pelorat brightened up. "There's something to that, Golan. Some of the oldest legends include tales of people making choices by tossing cubes to the ground."
"Oh? What does that accomplish?"
"Each face of the cube has some decision on it-yes-no-perhaps-postpone-and so on. Whichever face happens to come upward on landing would be taken as bearing the advice to be followed. Or they would set a ball rolling about a slotted disc with different decisions scattered among the slots. The decision written on the slot in which the ball ends is to be taken. Some mythologists think such activities represented games of chance rather than lotteries, but the two are much the same thing in my opinion."
"In a way," said Trevize, "we're playing a game of chance in choosing our place of landing."
Bliss emerged from the galley in time to hear the last comment. She said, "No game of chance. I pressed several 'maybes' and then one sure-fire 'yes,' and it's to the 'yes' that we'll be going."
"What made it a 'yes'?" asked Trevize.
"I caught a whiff of human thought. Definite. Unmistakable."
IT HAD been raining, for the grass was wet. Overhead, the clouds were scudding by and showing signs of breaking up.
The Far Star had come to a gentle rest near a small grove of trees. (In case of wild dogs, Trevize thought, only partly in jest.) All about was what looked like pasture land, and coming down from the greater height at which a better and wider view had been possible, Trevize had seen what looked like orchards and grain fields-and this time, an unmistakable view of grazing animals.
There were no structures, however. Nothing artificial, except that the regularity of the trees in the orchard and the sharp boundaries that separated fields were themselves as artificial as a microwave-receiving power station would have been.
Could that level of artificiality have been produced by robots, however? Without human beings?
Quietly, Trevize was putting on his holsters. This time, he knew that both weapons were in working order and that both were fully charged. For a moment, he caught Bliss's eye and paused.
She said, "Go ahead. I don't think you'll have any use for them, but I thought as much once before, didn't I?"
Trevize said, "Would you like to be armed, Janov?"
Pelorat shuddered. "No, thank you. Between you and your physical defense, and Bliss and her mental defense, I feel in no danger at all. I suppose it is cowardly of me to hide in your protective shadows, but I can't feel proper shame when I'm too busy feeling grateful that I needn't be in a position of possibly having to use force."
Trevize said, "I understand. Just don't go anywhere alone. If Bliss and I separate, you stay with one of us and don't dash off somewhere under the spur of a private curiosity."
"You needn't worry, Trevize," said Bliss. "I'll see to that."
Trevize stepped out of the ship first. The wind was brisk and just a trifle cool in the aftermath of the rain, but Trevize found that welcome. It had probably been uncomfortably warm and humid before the rain.
He took in his breath with surprise. The smell of the planet was delightful. Every planet had its own odor, he knew, an odor always strange and usually distasteful-perhaps only because it was strange. Might not strange be pleasant as well? Or was this the accident of catching the planet just after the rain at a particular season of the year. Whichever it was-
"Come on," he called. "It's quite pleasant out here."
Pelorat emerged and said, "Pleasant is definitely the word for it. Do you suppose it always smells like this?"
"It doesn't matter. Within the hour, we'll be accustomed to the aroma, and our nasal receptors will be sufficiently saturated, for us to smell nothing."
"Pity," said Pelorat.
"The grass is wet," said Bliss, with a shade of disapproval.
"Why not? After all, it rains on Gaia, too!" said Trevize, and as he said that a shaft of yellow sunlight reached them momentarily through a small break in the clouds. There would soon be more of it.
"Yes," said Bliss, "but we know when and we're prepared for it."
"Too bad," said Trevize; "you lose the thrill of the unexpected."
Bliss said, "You're right. I'll try not to be provincial."
Pelorat looked about and said, in a disappointed tone, "There seems to be nothing about."
"Only seems to be," said Bliss. "They're approaching from beyond that rise." She looked toward Trevize. "Do you think we ought to go to meet them?"
Trevize shook his head. "No. We've come to meet them across many parsecs. Let them walk the rest of the way. We'll wait for them here."
Only Bliss could sense the approach until, from the direction of her pointing finger, a figure appeared over the brow of the rise. Then a second, and a third.
"I believe that is all at the moment," said Bliss.
Trevize watched curiously. Though he had never seen robots, there was not a particle of doubt in him that that was what they were. They had the schematic and impressionistic shape of human beings and yet were not obviously metallic in appearance. The robotic surface was dull and gave the illusion of softness, as though it were covered in plush.
But how did he know the softness was an illusion? Trevize felt a sudden desire to feel those figures who were approaching so stolidly. If it were true that this was a Forbidden World and that spaceships never approached it-and surely that must be so since the sun was not included in the Galactic map-then the Far Star and the people it carried must represent something the robots had never experienced. Yet they were reacting with steady certainty, as though they were working their way through a routine exercise.
Trevize said, in a low voice, "Here we may have information we can get nowhere else in the Galaxy. We could ask them for the location of Earth with reference to this world, and if they know, they will tell us. Who knows how long these things have functioned and endured? They may answer out of personal memory. Think of that."
"On the other hand," said Bliss, "they may be recently manufactured and may know nothing."
"Or," said Pelorat, "they may know, but may refuse to tell us."
Trevize said, "I suspect they can't refuse unless they've been ordered not to tell us, and why should such orders be issued when surely no one on this planet could have expected our coming?"
At a distance of about three meters, the robots stopped. They said nothing and made no further movement.
Trevize, his hand on his blaster, said to Bliss, without taking his eyes from the robot, "Can you tell whether they are hostile?"
"You'll have to allow for the fact that I have no experience whatsoever with their mental workings, Trevize, but I don't detect anything that seems hostile."
Trevize took his right hand away from the butt of the weapon, but kept it near. He raised his left hand, palm toward the robots, in what he hoped would be recognized as a gesture of peace and said, speaking slowly, "I greet you. We come to this world as friends."
The central robot of the three ducked his head in a kind of abortive bow that might also have been taken as a gesture of peace by an optimist, and replied.
Trevize's jaw dropped in astonishment. In a world of Galactic communication, one did not think of failure in so fundamental a need. However, the robot did not speak in Galactic Standard or anything approaching it. In fact, Trevize could not understand a word.
PELORAT'S surprise was as great as that of Trevize, but there was an obvious element of pleasure in it, too.
"Isn't that strange?" he said.
Trevize turned to him and said, with more than a touch of asperity in his voice, "It's not strange. It's gibberish."
Pelorat said, "Not gibberish at all. It's Galactic, but very archaic. I catch a few words. I could probably understand it easily if it were written down. It's the pronunciation that's the real puzzle."
"Well, what did it say?"
"I think it told you it didn't understand what you said."
Bliss said, "I can't tell what it said, but what I sense is puzzlement, which fits. That is, if I can trust my analysis of robotic emotion-or if there is such a thing as robotic emotion."
Speaking very slowly, and with difficulty, Pelorat said something, and the three robots ducked their head in unison.
"What was that?" said Trevize.
Pelorat said, "I said I couldn't speak well, but I would try. I asked for a little time. Dear me, old chap, this is fearfully interesting."
"Fearfully disappointing," muttered Trevize.
"You see," said Pelorat, "every habitable planet in the Galaxy manages to work out its own variety of Galactic so that there are a million dialects that are sometimes barely intercomprehensible, but they're all pulled together by the development of Galactic Standard. Assuming this world to have been isolated for twenty thousand years, the language would ordinarily drift so far from that of the rest of the Galaxy as to be an entirely different language. That it isn't may be because the world has a social system that depends upon robots which can only understand the language as spoken in the fashion in which they were programmed. Rather than keep reprogramming, the language remained static and we now have what is to us merely a very archaic form of Galactic."
"There's an example," said Trevize, "of how a robotized society can be held static and made, to turn degenerate."
"But, my dear fellow," protested Pelorat, "keeping a language relatively unchanged is not necessarily a sign of degeneration. There are advantages to it. Documents preserved for centuries and millennia retain their meaning and give greater longevity and authority to historical records. In the rest of the Galaxy, the language of Imperial edicts of the time of Hari Seldon already begins to sound quaint."
"And do you know this archaic Galactic?"
"Not to say know, Golan. It's just that in studying ancient myths and legends I've picked up the trick of it. The vocabulary is not entirely different, but it is inflected differently, and there are idiomatic expressions we don't use any longer and, as I have said, the pronunciation is totally changed. I can act as interpreter, but not as a very good one."
Trevize heaved a tremulous sigh. "A small stroke of good fortune is better than none. Carry on, Janov."
Pelorat turned to the robots, waited a moment, then looked back at Trevize. "What am I supposed to say?"
"Let's go all the way. Ask them where Earth is."
Pelorat said the words one at a time, with exaggerated gestures of his hands.
The robots looked at each other and made a few sounds. The middle one then spoke to Pelorat, who replied while moving his hands apart as though he were stretching a length of rubber. The robot responded by spacing his words as carefully as Pelorat had.
Pelorat said to Trevize, "I'm not sure I'm getting across what I mean by 'Earth.' I suspect they think I'm referring to some region on their planet and they say they don't know of any such region."
"Do they use the name of this planet, Janov?"
"The closest I can come to what I think they are using as the name is 'Solaria.' "
"Have you ever heard of it in your legends?"
"No-any more than I had ever heard of Aurora."
"Well, ask them if there is any place named Earth in the sky-among the stars. Point upward."
Again an exchange, and finally Pelorat turned and said, "All I can get from them, Golan, is that there are no places in the sky."
Bliss said, "Ask those robots how old they are; or rather, how long they have been functioning."
"I don't know how to say 'functioning,"' said Pelorat, shaking his head. In fact, I'm not sure if I can say 'how old.' I'm not a very good interpreter."
"Do the best you can, Pel dear," said Bliss.
And after several exchanges, Pelorat said, "They've been functioning for twenty-six years."
"Twenty-six years," muttered Trevize in disgust. "They're hardly older than you are, Bliss."
Bliss said, with sudden pride, "It so happens-"
"I know. You're Gaia, which is thousands of years old. -In any case, these robots cannot talk about Earth from personal experience, and their memorybanks clearly do not include anything not necessary to their functioning. So they know nothing about astronomy."
Pelorat said, "There may be other robots somewhere on the planet that are primordial, perhaps."
"I doubt it," said Trevize, "but ask them, if you can find the words for it, Janov."
This time there was quite a long conversation and Pelorat eventually broke it off with a flushed face and a clear air of frustration.
"Golan," he said, "I don't understand part of what they're trying to say, but I gather that the older robots are used for manual labor and don't know anything. If this robot were a human, I'd say he spoke of the older robots with contempt. These three are house robots, they say, and are not allowed to grow old before being replaced. They're the ones who really know things-their words, not mine."
"They don't know much," growled Trevize. "At least of the things we want to know."
"I now regret," said Pelorat, "that we left Aurora so hurriedly. If we had found a robot survivor there, and we surely would have, since the very first one I encountered still had a spark of life left in it, they would know of Earth through personal memory."
"Provided their memories were intact, Janov," said Trevize. "We can always go back there and, if we have to, dog packs or not, we will. But if these robots are only a couple of decades old, there must be those who manufacture them, and the manufacturers must be human, I should think." He turned to Bliss. "Are you sure you sensed-"
But she raised a hand to stop him and there was a strained and intent look on her face. "Coming now," she said, in a low voice.
Trevize turned his face toward the rise and there, first appearing from behind it, and then striding toward them, was the unmistakable figure of a human being. His complexion was pale and his hair light and long, standing out slightly from the sides of his head. His face was grave but quite young in appearance. His bare arms and legs were not particularly muscled.
The robots stepped aside for him, and he advanced till he stood in their midst.
He then spoke in a clear, pleasant voice and his words, although used archaically, were in Galactic Standard, and easily understood.
"Greetings, wanderers from space," he said. "What would you with my robots?"
TREVIZE did not cover himself with glory. He said foolishly, "You speak Galactic?"
The Solarian said, with a grim smile, "And why not, since I am not mute?"
"But these?" Trevize gestured toward the robots.
"These are robots. They speak our language, as I do. But I am Solarian and hear the hyperspatial communications of the worlds beyond so that I have learned your way of speaking, as have my predecessors. My predecessors have left descriptions of the language, but I constantly hear new words and expressions that change with the years, as though you Settlers can settle worlds, but not words. How is it you are surprised at my understanding of your language?"
"I should not have been," said Trevize. "I apologize. It was just that speaking to the robots, I had not thought to hear Galactic on this world."
He studied the Solarian. He was wearing a thin white robe, draped loosely over his shoulder, with large openings for his arms. It was open in front, exposing a bare chest and loincloth below. Except for a pair of light sandals, he wore nothing else.
It occurred to Trevize that he could not tell whether the Solarian was male or female. The breasts were male certainly but the chest was hairless and the thin loincloth showed no bulge of any kind.
He turned to Bliss and said in a low voice, "This might still be a robot, but very like a human being in-"
Bliss said, her lips hardly moving, "The mind is that of a human being, not a robot."
The Solarian said, "Yet you have not answered my original question. I shall excuse the failure and put it down to your surprise. I now ask again and you must not fail a second time. What would you with my robots?"
Trevize said, "We are travelers who seek information to reach our destination. We asked your robots for information that would help us, but they lacked the knowledge."
"What is the information you seek? Perhaps I can help you."
"We seek the location of Earth. Could you tell us that?"
The Solarian's eyebrows lifted. "I would have thought that your first object of curiosity would have been myself. I will supply that information although you have not asked for it. I am Sarton Bander and you stand upon the Bander estate, which stretches as far as your eye can see in every direction and far beyond. I cannot say that you are welcome here, for in coming here, you have violated a trust. You are the first Settlers to touch down upon Solaria in many thousands of years and, as it turns out, you have come here merely to inquire as to the best way of reaching another world. In the old days, Settlers, you and your ship would have been destroyed on sight."
"That would be a barbaric way of treating people who mean no harm and offer none," said Trevize cautiously.
"I agree, but when members of an expanding society set foot upon an inoffensive and static one, that mere touch is filled with potential harm. While we feared that harm, we were ready to destroy those who came at the instant of their coming. Since we no longer have reason to fear, we are, as you see, ready to talk."
Trevize said*, "I appreciate the information you have offered us so freely, and yet you failed to answer the question I did ask. I will repeat it. Could you tell us the location of the planet Earth?"
"By Earth, I take it you mean the world on which the human species, and the various species of plants and animals"-his hand moved gracefully about as though to indicate all the surroundings about them-"originated."
"Yes, I do, sir."
A queer look of repugnance flitted over the Solarian's face. He said, "Please address me simply as Bander, if you must use a form of address. Do not address me by any word that includes a sign of gender. I am neither male nor female. I am whole."
Trevize nodded (he had been right). "As you wish, Bander. What, then, is the location of Earth, the world of origin of all of us?"
Bander said, "I do not know. Nor do I wish to know. If I did know, or if I could find out, it would do you no good, for Earth no longer exists as a world. **Ah," he went on, stretching out his arms. "The sun feels good. I am not often on the surface, and never when the sun does not show itself. My robots were sent to greet you while the sun was yet hiding behind the clouds. I followed only when the clouds cleared."
"Why is it that Earth no longer exists as a world?" said Trevize insistently, steeling himself for the tale of radioactivity once again.
Bander, however, ignored the question or, rather, put it to one side carelessly. "The story is too long," he said. "You told me that you came with no intent of harm."
"That is correct."
"Why then did you come armed?"
"That is merely a precaution. I did not know what I might meet."
"It doesn't matter. Your little weapons represent no danger to me. Yet I am curious. I have, of course, heard much of your arms, and of your curiously barbaric history that seems to depend so entirely upon arms. Even so, I have never actually seen a weapon. May I see yours?"
Trevize took a step backward. "I'm afraid not, Bander."
Bander seemed amused. "I asked only out of politeness. I need not have asked at all."
It held out its hand and from Trevize's right holster, there emerged his blaster, while from his left holster, there rose up his neuronic whip. Trevize snatched at his weapons but felt his arms held back as though by stiffly elastic bonds. Both Pelorat and Bliss started forward and it was clear that they were held as well.
Bander said, "Don't bother trying to interfere. You cannot." The weapons flew to its hands and it looked them over carefully. "This one," it said, indicating the blaster, "seems to be a microwave beamer that produces heat, thus exploding any fluid-containing body. The other is more subtle, and, I must confess, I do not see at a glance what it is intended to do. However, since you mean no harm and offer no harm, you don't need arms. I can, and I do, bleed the energy content of the units of each weapon. That leaves them harmless unless you use one or the other as a club, and they would be clumsy indeed if used for that purpose."
The Solarian released the weapons and again they drifted through the air, this time back toward Trevize. Each settled neatly into its holster.
Trevize, feeling himself released, pulled out his blaster, but there was no need to use it. The contact hung loosely, and the energy unit had clearly been totally drained. That was precisely the case with the neuronic whip as well.
He looked up at Bander, who said, smiling, "You are quite helpless, Outworlder. I can as easily, if I so desired, destroy your ship and, of course, you."
TREVIZE felt frozen. Trying to breathe normally, he turned to look at Bliss. She was standing with her arm protectively about Pelorat's waist, and, to all appearances, was quite calm. She smiled slightly and, even more slightly, nodded her head.
Trevize turned back to Bander. Having interpreted Bliss's actions as signifying confidence, and hoping with dreadful earnestness that he was correct, he said grimly, "How did you do that, Bander?"
Bander smiled, obviously in high good humor. "Tell me, little Outworlders, do you believe in sorcery? In magic?"
"No, we do not, little Solarian," snapped Trevize.
Bliss tugged at Trevize's sleeve and whispered, "Don't irritate him. He's dangerous."
"I can see he is," said Trevize, keeping his voice low with difficulty. "You do something, then."
Her voice barely heard, Bliss said, "Not yet. He will be less dangerous if he feels secure."
Bander paid no attention to the brief whispering among the Outworlders. It moved away from them uncaringly, the robots separating to let it pass.
Then it looked back and crooked a finger languidly. "Come. Follow me. All three of you. I will tell you a story that may not interest you, but that interests me." It continued to walk forward leisurely.
Trevize remained in place for a while, uncertain as to the best course of action. Bliss walked forward, however, and the pressure of her arm led Pelorat forward as well. Eventually, Trevize moved; the alternative was to be left standing alone with the robots.
Bliss said lightly, "If Bander will be so kind as to tell the story that may not interest us-"
Bander turned and looked intently at Bliss as though he were truly aware of her for the first time. "You are the feminine half-human," he said, "aren't you? The lesser half?"
"The smaller half, Bander. Yes."
"These other two are masculine half-humans, then?"
"So they are."
"Have you had your child yet, feminine?"
"My name, Bander, is Bliss. I have not yet had a child. This is Trevize. This is Pel."
"And which of these two masculines is to assist you when it is your time? Or will it be both? Or neither?"
"Pel will assist me, Bander."
Bander turned his attention to Pelorat. "You have white hair, I see."
Pelorat said, "I have."
"Was it always that color?"
"No, Bander, it became so with age."
"And how old are you?"
"I am fifty-two years old, Bander," Pelorat said, then added hastily, "That's Galactic Standard Years."
Bander continued to walk (toward the distant mansion, Trevize assumed), but more slowly. It said, "I don't know how long a Galactic Standard Year is, but it can't be very different from our year. And how old will you be when you die, Pel?"
"I can't say. I may live thirty more years."
"Eighty-two years, then. Short-lived, and divided in halves. Unbelievable, and yet my distant ancestors were like you and lived on Earth. But some of them left Earth to establish new worlds around other stars, wonderful worlds, well organized, and many."
Trevize said loudly, "Not many. Fifty."
Bander turned a lofty eye on Trevize. There seemed less humor in it now. "Trevize. That's your name."
"Golan Trevize in full. I say there were fifty Spacer worlds. Our worlds number in the millions."
"Do you know, then, the story that I wish to tell you?" said Bander softly.
"If the story is that there were once fifty Spacer worlds, we know it."
"We count not in numbers only, little half-human," said Bander. "We count the quality, too. There were fifty, but such a fifty that not all your millions could make up one of them. And Solaria was the fiftieth and, therefore, the best. Solaria was as far beyond the other Spacer worlds, as they were beyond Earth.
"We of Solaria alone learned how life was to be lived. We did not herd and flock like animals, as they did on Earth, as they did on other worlds, as they did even on the other Spacer worlds. We lived each alone, with robots to help us, viewing each other electronically as often as we wished, but coming within natural sight of one another only rarely. It is many years since I have gazed at human beings as I now gaze at you but, then, you are only half-humans and your presence, therefore, does not limit my freedom any more than a cow would limit it, or a robot.
"Yet we were once half-human, too. No matter how we perfected our freedom; no matter how we developed as solitary masters over countless robots; the freedom was never absolute. In order to produce young there had to be two individuals in co-operation. It was possible, of course, to contribute sperm cells and egg cells, to have the fertilization process and the consequent embryonic growth take place artificially in automated fashion. It was possible for the infant to live adequately under robotic care. It could all be done, but the half-humans would not give up the pleasure that went with biological impregnation. Perverse emotional attachments would develop in consequence and freedom vanished. Do you see that that had to be changed?"
Trevize said, "No, Bander, because we do not measure freedom by your standards."
"That is because you do not know what freedom is. You have never lived but in swarms, and you know no way of life but to be constantly forced, in even the smallest things, to bend your wills to those of others or, which is equally vile, to spend your days struggling to force others to bend their wills to yours. Where is any possible freedom there? Freedom is nothing if it is not to live as you wish! Exactly as you wish!
"Then came the time when the Earthpeople began to swarm outward once more, when their clinging crowds again swirled through space. The other Spacers, who did not flock as the Earthpeople did, but who flocked nevertheless, if to a lesser degree, tried to compete.
"We Solarians did not. We foresaw inevitable failure in swarming. We moved underground and broke off all contact with the rest of the Galaxy. We were determined to remain ourselves at all costs. We developed suitable robots and weapons to protect our apparently empty surface, and they did the job admirably. Ships came and were destroyed, and stopped coming. The planet was considered deserted, and was forgotten, as we hoped it would be.
"And meanwhile, underground, we worked to solve our problems. We adjusted our genes gingerly, delicately. We had failures, but some successes, and we capitalized on the successes. It took us many centuries, but we finally became whole human beings, incorporating both the masculine and feminine principles in one body, supplying our own complete pleasure at will, and producing, when we wished, fertilized eggs for development under skilled robotic care."
"Hermaphrodites," said Pelorat.
"Is that what it is called in your language?" asked Bander indifferently. "I have never heard the word."
"Hermaphroditism stops evolution dead in its tracks," said Trevize. "Each child is the genetic duplicate of its hermaphroditic parent."
"Come," said Bander, "you treat evolution as a hit-and-miss affair. We can design our children if we wish. We can change and adjust the genes and, on occasion, we do. But we are almost at my dwelling. Let us enter. It grows late in the day. The sun already fails to give its warmth adequately and we will be more comfortable indoors."
They passed through a door that had no locks of any kind but that opened as they approached and closed behind them as they passed through. There were no windows, but as they entered a cavernous room, the walls glowed to luminous life and brightened. The floor seemed bare, but was soft and springy to the touch. In each of the four corners of the room, a robot stood motionless.
"That wall," said Bander, pointing to the wall opposite the door-a wall that seemed no different in any way from the other three-is my visionscreen. The world opens before me through that screen but it in no way limits my freedom for I cannot be compelled to use it."
Trevize said, "Nor can you compel another to use his if you wish to see him through that screen and he does not."
"Compel?" said Bander haughtily. "Let another do as it pleases, if it is but content that I do as I please. Please note that we do not use gendered pronouns in referring to each other."
There was one chair in the room, facing the vision-screen, and Bander sat down in it.
Trevize looked about, as though expecting additional chairs to spring from the floor. "May we sit, too?" he said.
"If you wish," said Bander.
Bliss, smiling, sat down on the floor. Pelorat sat down beside her. Trevize stubbornly continued to stand.
Bliss said, "Tell me, Bander, how many human beings live on this planet?"
"Say Solarians, half-human Bliss. The phrase 'human being' is contaminated by the fact that half-humans call themselves that. We might call ourselves whole-humans, but that is clumsy. Solarian is the proper term."
"How many Solarians, then, live on this planet?"
"I am not certain. We do not count ourselves. Perhaps twelve hundred."
"Only twelve hundred on the entire world?"
"Fully twelve hundred. You count in numbers again, while we count in quality. Nor do you understand freedom. If one other Solarian exists to dispute my absolute mastery over any part of my land, over any robot or living thing or object, my freedom is limited. Since other Solarians exist, the limitation on freedom must be removed as far as possible by separating them all to the point where contact is virtually nonexistent. Solaria will hold twelve hundred Solarians under conditions approaching the ideal. Add more, and liberty will be palpably limited so that the result will be unendurable."
"That means each child must be counted and must balance deaths," said Pelorat suddenly.
"Certainly. That must be true of any world with a stable population-even yours, perhaps."
"And since there are probably few deaths, there must therefore be few children."
"Indeed."
Pelorat nodded his head and was silent.
Trevize said, "What I want to know is how you made my weapons fly through the air. You haven't explained that."
"I offered you sorcery or magic as an explanation. Do you refuse to accept that?"
"Of course I refuse. What do you take me for?"
"Will you, then, believe in the conservation of energy, and in the necessary increase of entropy?"
"That I do. Nor can I believe that even in twenty thousand years you have changed these laws, or modified them a micrometer."
"Nor have we, half-person. But now consider. Outdoors, there is sunlight." There was its oddly graceful gesture, as though marking out sunlight all about. "And there is shade. It is warmer in the sunlight than in the shade, and heat flows spontaneously from the sunlit area into the shaded area."
"You tell me what I know," said Trevize.
"But perhaps you know it so well that you no longer think about it. And at night, Solaria's surface is warmer than the objects beyond its atmosphere, so that heat flows spontaneously from the planetary surface into outer space."
"I know that, too."
"And day or night, the planetary interior is warmer than the planetary surface. Heat therefore flows spontaneously from the interior to the surface. I imagine you know that, too."
"And what of all that, Bander?"
"The flow of heat from hotter to colder, which must take place by the second law of thermodynamics, can be used to do work."
"In theory, yes, but sunlight is dilute, the heat of the planetary surface is even more dilute, and the rate at which heat escapes from the interior makes that the most dilute of all. The amount of heat-flow that can be harnessed would probably not be enough to lift a pebble."
"It depends on the device you use for the purpose," said Bander. "Our own tool was developed over a period of thousands of years and it is nothing less than a portion of our brain."
Bander lifted the hair on either side of its head, exposing that portion of its skull behind its ears. It turned its head this way and that, and behind each ear was a bulge the size and shape of the blunt end of a hen's egg.
"That portion of my brain, and its absence in you, is what makes the difference between a Solarian and you."
TREVIZE glanced now and then at Bliss's face, which seemed entirely concentrated on Bander. Trevize had grown quite certain he knew what was going on.
Bander, despite its paean to freedom, found this unique opportunity irresistible. There was no way it could speak to robots on a basis of intellectual equality, and certainly not to animals. To speak to its fellow-Solarians would be, to it, unpleasant, and what communication there must be would be forced, and never spontaneous.
As for Trevize, Bliss, and Pelorat, they might be half-human to Bander, and it might regard them as no more an infringement on its liberty than a robot or a goat would be-but they were its intellectual equals (or near equals) and the chance to speak to them was a unique luxury it had never experienced before.
No wonder, Trevize thought, it was indulging itself in this way. And Bliss (Trevize was doubly sure) was encouraging this, just pushing Bander's mind ever so gently in order to urge it to do what it very much wanted to do in any case.
Bliss, presumably, was working on the supposition that if Bander spoke enough, it might tell them something useful concerning Earth. That made sense to Trevize, so that even if he had not been truly curious about the subject under discussion, he would nevertheless have endeavored to continue the conversation.
"What do those brain-lobes do?" Trevize asked.
Bander said, "They are transducers. They are activated by the flow of heat and they convert the heat-flow into mechanical energy."
"I cannot believe that. The flow of heat is insufficient."
"Little half-human, you do not think. If there were many Solarians crowded together, each trying to make use of the flow of heat, then, yes, the supply would be insufficient. I, however, have over forty thousand square kilometers that are mine, mine alone. I can collect heat-flow from any quantity of those square kilometers with no one to dispute me, so the quantity is sufficient. Do you see?"
"Is it that simple to collect heat-flow over a wide area? The mere act of concentration takes a great deal of energy."
"Perhaps, but I am not aware of it. My transducer-lobes are constantly concentrating heat-flow so that as work is needed, work is done. When I drew your weapons into the air, a particular volume of the sunlit atmosphere lost some of its excess heat to a volume of the shaded area, so that I was using solar energy for the purpose. Instead of using mechanical or electronic devices to bring that about, however, I used a neuronic device." It touched one of the transducer-lobes gently. "It does it quickly, efficiently, constantly-and effortlessly."
"Unbelievable," muttered Pelorat.
"Not at all unbelievable," said Bander. "Consider the delicacy of the eye and ear, and how they can turn small quantities of photons and air vibrations into information. That would seem unbelievable if you had never come across it before. The transducer-lobes are no more unbelievable, and would not be so to you, were they not unfamiliar."
Trevize said, "What do you do with these constantly operating transducerlobes?"
"We run our world," said Bander. "Every robot on this vast estate obtains its energy from me; or, rather, from natural heat-flow. Whether a robot is adjusting a contact, or felling a tree, the energy is derived from mental transduction-my mental transduction."
"And if you are asleep?"
"The process of transduction continues waking or sleeping, little half-human," said Bander. "Do you cease breathing when you sleep? Does your heart stop beating? At night, my robots continue working at the cost of cooling Solaria's interior a bit. The change is immeasurably small on a global scale and there are only twelve hundred of us, so that all the energy we use does not appreciably shorten our sun's life or drain the world's internal heat."
"Has it occurred to you that you might use it as a weapon?"
Bander stared at Trevize as though he were something peculiarly incomprehensible. "I suppose by that," he said, "you mean that Solaria might confront other worlds with energy weapons based on transduction? Why should we? Even if we could beat their energy weapons based on other principles-which is anything but certain-what would we gain? The control of other worlds? What do we want with other worlds when we have an ideal world of our own? Do we want to establish our domination over half-humans and use them in forced labor? We have our robots that are far better than half-humans for the purpose. We have everything. We want nothing-except to be left to ourselves. See here-I'll tell you another story."
"Go ahead," said Trevize.
"Twenty thousand years ago when the half-creatures of Earth began to swarm into space and we ourselves withdrew underground, the other Spacer worlds were determined to oppose the new Earth-settlers. So they struck at Earth."
"At Earth," said Trevize, trying to hide his satisfaction over the fact that the subject had come up at last.
"Yes, at the center. A sensible move, in a way. If you wish to kill a person, you strike not at a finger or a heel, but at the heart. And our fellow-Spacers, not too far removed from human beings themselves in passions, managed to set Earth's surface radioactively aflame, so that the world became largely uninhabitable."
"Ah, that's what happened," said Pelorat, clenching a fist and moving it rapidly, as though nailing down a thesis. "I knew it could not be a natural phenomenon. How was it done?"
"I don't know how it was done," said Bander indifferently, "and in any case it did the Spacers no good. That is the point of the story. The Settlers continued to swarm and the Spacers-died out. They had tried to compete, and vanished. We Solarians retired and refused to compete, and so we are still here."
"And so are the Settlers," said Trevize grimly.
"Yes, but not forever. Swarmers must fight, must compete, and eventually must die. That may take tens of thousands of years, but we can wait. And when it happens, we Solarians, whole, solitary, liberated, will have the Galaxy to ourselves. We can then use, or not use, any world we wish to in addition to our own."
"But this matter of Earth," said Pelorat, snapping his fingers impatiently. "Is what you tell us legend or history?"
"How does one tell the difference, half-Pelorat?" said Bander. "All history is legend, more or less."
"But what do your records say? May I see the records on the subject, Bander? Please understand that this matter of myths, legends, and primeval history is my field. I am a scholar dealing with such matters and particularly with those matters as related to Earth."
"I merely repeat what I have heard," said Bander. "There are no records on the subject. Our records deal entirely with Solarian affairs and other worlds are mentioned in them only insofar as they impinge upon us."
"Surely, Earth has impinged on you," said Pelorat.
"That may be, but, if so, it was long, long ago, and Earth, of all worlds, was most repulsive to us. If we had any records of Earth, t am sure they were destroyed out of sheer revulsion."
Trevize gritted his teeth in chagrin. "By yourselves?" he asked.
Bander turned its attention to Trevize. "There is no one else to destroy them."
Pelorat would not let go of the matter. "What else have you heard concerning Earth?"
Bander thought. It said, "When I was young, I heard a tale from a robot about an Earthman who once visited Solaria; about a Solarian woman who left with him and became an important figure in the Galaxy. That, however, was, in my opinion, an invented tale."
Pelorat bit at his lip. "Are you sure?"
"How can I be sure of anything in such matters?" said Bander. "Still, it passes the bounds of belief that an Earthman would dare come to Solaria, or that Solaria would allow the intrusion. It is even less likely that a Solarian woman-we were half-humans then, but even so-should voluntarily leave this world. But come, let me show you my home."
"Your home?" said Bliss, looking about. "Are we not in your home?"
"Not at all," said Bander. "This is an anteroom. It is a viewing room. In it I see my fellow-Solarians when I must. Their images appear on that wall, or three-dimensionally in the space before the wall. This room is a public assembly, therefore, and not part of my home. Come with me,"
It walked on ahead, without turning to see if it were followed, but the four robots left their corners, and Trevize knew that if he and his companions did not follow spontaneously, the robots would gently coerce them into doing so.
The other two got to their feet and Trevize whispered lightly to Bliss, "Have you been keeping it talking?"
Bliss pressed his hand, and nodded. "Just the same, I wish I knew what its intentions were," she added, with a note of uneasiness in her voice.
THEY followed Bander. The robots remained at a polite distance, but their presence was a constantly felt threat.
They were moving through a corridor, and Trevize mumbled low-spiritedly, "There's nothing helpful about Earth on this planet. I'm sure of it. Just another variation on the radioactivity theme." He shrugged. "We'll have to go on to the third set of co-ordinates."
A door opened before them, revealing a small room. Bander said, "Come, half-humans, I want to show you how we live."
Trevize whispered, "It gets infantile pleasure out of display. I'd love to knock it down."
"Don't try to compete in childishness," said Bliss.
Bander ushered all three into the room. One of the robots followed as well. Bander gestured the other robots away and entered itself. The door closed behind it.
"It's an elevator," said Pelorat, with a pleased air of discovery.
"So it is," said Bander. "Once we went underground, we never truly emerged. Nor would we want to, though I find it pleasant to feel the sunlight on occasion. I dislike clouds or night in the open, however. That gives one the sensation of being underground without truly being underground, if you know what I mean. That is cognitive dissonance, after a fashion, and I find it very unpleasant."
"Earth built underground," said Pelorat. "The Caves of Steel, they called their cities. And Trantor built underground, too, even more extensively, in the old Imperial days. And Comporellon builds underground right now. It is a common tendency, when you come to think of it."
"Half-humans swarming underground and we living underground in isolated splendor are two widely different things," said Bander.
Trevize said, "On Terminus, dwelling places are on the surface."
"And exposed to the weather," said Bander. "Very primitive."
The elevator, after the initial feeling of lower gravity that had given away its nature to Pelorat, gave no sensation of motion whatsoever. Trevize was wondering how far down it would penetrate, when there was a brief feeling of higher gravity and the door opened.
Before them was a large and elaborately furnished room. It was dimly lit, though the source of the light was not apparent. It almost seemed as though the air itself were faintly luminous.
Bander pointed its finger and where it pointed the light grew a bit more intense. It pointed it elsewhere and the same thing happened. It placed its left hand on a stubby rod to one side of the doorway and, with its right hand, made an expansive circular gesture so that the whole room lit up as though it were in sunlight, but with no sensation of heat.
Trevize grimaced and said, half-aloud, "The man's a charlatan."
Bander said sharply. "Not 'the man,' but 'the Solarian.' I'm not sure what the word 'charlatan' means, but if I catch the tone of voice, it is opprobrious."
Trevize said, "It means one who is not genuine, who arranges effects to make what is done seem more impressive than it really is."
Bander said, "I admit that I love the dramatic, but what I have shown you is not an effect. It is real."
It tapped the rod on which its left hand was resting. "This heat-conducting rod extends several kilometers downward, and there are similar rods in many convenient places throughout my estate. I know there are similar rods on other estates. These rods increase the rate at which heat leaves Solaria's lower regions for the surface and eases its conversion into work. I do not need the gestures of the hand to produce the light, but it does lend an air of drama or, perhaps, as you point out, a slight touch of the not-genuine, I enjoy that sort of thing."
Bliss said, "Do you have much opportunity to experience the pleasure of such little dramatic touches?"
"No," said Bander, shaking its head. "My robots are not impressed with such things. Nor would my fellow-Solarians be. This unusual chance of meeting half-humans and displaying for them is most-amusing."
Pelorat said, "The light in this room shone dimly when we entered. Does it shine dimly at all times?"
"Yes, a small drain of power-like keeping the robots working. My entire estate is always running, and those parts of it not engaged in active labor are idling."
"And you supply the power constantly for all this vast estate?"
"The sun and the planet's core supply the power. I am merely the conduit. Nor is all the estate productive. I keep most of it as wilderness and well stocked with a variety of animal life; first, because that protects my boundaries, and second, because I find esthetic value in it. In fact, my fields and factories are small. They need only supply my own needs, plus some specialties to exchange for those of others. I have robots, for instance, that can manufacture and install the heat-conducting rods at need. Many Solarians depend upon me for that."
"And your home?" asked Trevize. "How large is that?"
It must have been the right question to ask, for Bander beamed. "Very large. One of the largest on the planet, I believe. It goes on for kilometers in every direction. I have as many robots caring for my home underground, as I have in all the thousands of square kilometers of surface."
"You don't live in all of it, surely," said Pelorat.
"It might conceivably be that there are chambers I have never entered, but what of that?" said Bander. "The robots keep every room clean, well ventilated, and in order. But come, step out here."
They emerged through a door that was not the one through which they had entered and found themselves in another corridor. Before them was a little topless ground-car that ran on tracks.
Bander motioned them into it, and one by one they clambered aboard. There was not quite room for all four, plus the robot, but Pelorat and Bliss squeezed together tightly to allow room for Trevize. Bander sat in the front with an air of easy comfort, the robot at its side, and the car moved along with no sign of overt manipulation of controls other than Bander's smooth hand motions now and then.
"This is a car-shaped robot, actually," said Bander, with an air of negligent indifference.
They progressed at a stately pace, very smoothly past doors that opened as they approached, and closed as they receded. The decorations in each were of widely different kinds as though robots had been ordered to devise combinations at random.
Ahead of them the corridor was gloomy, and behind them as well. At whatever point they actually found themselves, however, they were in the equivalent of cool sunlight. The rooms, too, would light as the doors opened. And each time, Bander moved its hand slowly and gracefully.
There seemed no end to the journey. Now and then they found themselves curving in a way that made it plain that the underground mansion spread out in two dimensions. (No, three, thought Trevize, at one point, as they moved steadily down a shallow declivity.)
Wherever they went, there were robots, by the dozens-scores-hundreds-engaged in unhurried work whose nature Trevize could not easily divine. They passed the open door of one large room in which rows of robots were bent quietly over desks.
Pelorat asked, "What are they doing, Bander?"
"Bookkeeping," said Bander. "Keeping statistical records, financial accounts, and all sorts of things that, I am very glad to say, I don't have to bother with. This isn't just an idle estate. About a quarter of its growing area is given over to orchards. An additional tenth are grain fields, but it's the orchards that are really my pride. We grow the best fruit in the world and grow them in the largest number of varieties, too. A Bander peach is the peach on Solaria. Hardly anyone else even bothers to grow peaches. We have twenty-seven varieties of apples and-and so on. The robots could give you full information."
"What do you do with all the fruit?" asked Trevize. "You can't eat it all yourself."
"I wouldn't dream of it. I'm only moderately fond of fruit. It's traded to the other estates."
"Traded for what?"
"Mineral material mostly. I have no mines worth mentioning on my estates. Then, too, I trade for whatever is required to maintain a healthy ecological balance. I have a very large variety of plant and animal life on the estate."
"The robots take care of all that, I suppose," said Trevize.
"They do. And very well, too."
"All for one Solarian."
"All for the estate and its ecological standards. I happen to be the only Solarian who visits the various parts of the estate-when I choose-but that is part of my absolute freedom."
Pelorat said, "I suppose the others-the other Solarians-also maintain a local ecological balance and have marshlands, perhaps, or mountainous areas or seafront estates."
Bander said, "I suppose so. Such things occupy us in the conferences that world affairs sometimes make necessary."
"How often do you have to get together?" asked Trevize. (They were going through a rather narrow passageway, quite long, and with no rooms on either side. Trevize guessed that it might have been built through an area that did not easily allow anything wider to be constructed, so that it served as a connecting link between two wings that could each spread out more widely.
"Too often. It's a rare month when I don't have to pass some time in conference with one of the committees I am a member of. Still, although I may not have mountains or marshlands on my estate, my orchards, my fishponds, and my botanical gardens are the best in the world."
Pelorat said, "But, my dear fellow-I mean, Bander-I would assume you have never left your estate and visited those of others-"
"Certainly not, " said Bander, with an air of outrage.
"I said I assumed that," said Pelorat mildly. "But in that case, how can you be certain that yours are best, never having investigated, or even seen the others?"
"Because," said Bander, "I can tell from the demand for my products in interestate trade."
Trevize said, "What about manufacturing?"
Bander said, "There are estates where they manufacture tools and machinery. As I said, on my estate we make the heat-conducting rods, but those are rather simple."
"And robots?"
"Robots are manufactured here and there. Throughout history, Solaria has led all the Galaxy in the cleverness and subtlety of robot design."
"Today also, I imagine," said Trevize, carefully having the intonation make the remark a statement and not a question.
Bander said, "Today? With whom is there to compete today? Only Solaria makes robots nowadays. Your worlds do not, if I interpret what I hear on the hyperwave correctly."
"But the other Spacer worlds?"
"I told you. They no longer exist."
"At all?"
"I don't think there is a Spacer alive anywhere but on Solaria."
"Then is there no one who knows the location of Earth?"
"Why would anyone want to know the location of Earth?"
Pelorat broke in, "I want to know. It's my field of study."
"Then," said Bander, "you will have to study something else. I know nothing about the location of Earth, nor have I heard of anyone who ever did, nor do I care a sliver of robot-metal about the matter."
The car came to a halt, and, for a moment, Trevize thought that Bander was offended. The halt was a smooth one, however, and Bander, getting out of the car, looked its usual amused self as it motioned the others to get out also.
The lighting in the room they entered was subdued, even after Bander had brightened it with a gesture. It opened into a side corridor, on both sides of which were smaller rooms. In each one of the smaller rooms was one or two ornate vases, sometimes flanked by objects that might have been film projectors.
"What is all this, Bander?" asked Trevize.
Bander said, "The ancestral death chambers, Trevize."
PELORAT looked about with interest. "I suppose you have the ashes of your ancestors interred here?"
"If you mean by 'interred,' " said Bander, "buried in the ground, you are not quite right. We may be underground, but this is my mansion, and the ashes are in it, as we are right now. In our own language we say that the ashes are 'inhoused.' " It hesitated, then said, " 'House' is an archaic word for 'mansion.' "
Trevize looked about him perfunctorily. "And these are all your ancestors? How many?"
"Nearly a hundred," said Bander, making no effort to hide the pride in its voice. "Ninety-four, to be exact. Of course, the earliest are not true Solarians-not in the present sense of the word. They were half-people, masculine and feminine. Such half-ancestors were placed in adjoining urns by their immediate descendants. I don't go into those rooms, of course. It's rather 'shamiferous.' At least, that's the Solarian word for it; but I don't know your Galactic equivalent. You may not have one."
"And the films?" asked Bliss. "I take it those are film projectors?"
"Diaries," said Bander, "the history of their lives. Scenes of themselves in their favorite parts of the estate. It means they do not die in every sense. Part of them remains, and it is part of my freedom that I can join them whenever I choose; I can watch this bit of film or that, as I please."
"But not into the-shamiferous ones."
Bander's eyes slithered away. "No," it admitted, "but then we all have that as part of the ancestry. It is a common wretchedness."
"Common? Then other Solarians also have these death chambers?" asked Trevize.
"Oh yes, we all do, but mine is the best, the most elaborate, the most perfectly preserved."
Trevize said, "Do you have your own death chamber already prepared?"
"Certainly. It is completely constructed and appointed. That was done as my first duty when I inherited the estate. And when I am laid to ash-to be poetic-my successor will go about the construction of its own as its first duty."
"And do you have a successor?"
"I will have when the time comes. There is as yet ample scope for life. When I must leave, there will be an adult successor, ripe enough to enjoy the estate, and well lobed for power-transduction."
"It will be your offspring, I imagine."
"Oh yes."
"But what if," said Trevize, "something untoward takes place? I presume accidents and misfortunes take place even on Solaria. What happens if a Solarian is laid to ash prematurely and it has no successor to take its place, or at least not one who is ripe enough to enjoy the estate?"
"That rarely happens. In my line of ancestors, that happened only once. When it does, however, one need only remember that there are other successors waiting for other estates. Some of those are old enough to inherit, and yet have parents who are young enough to produce a second descendant and to live on till that second descendant is ripe enough for the succession. One of these old/young successors, as they are called, would be assigned to the succession of my estate."
"Who does the assigning?"
"We have a ruling board that has this as one of its few functions-the assignment of a successor in case of premature aching**. It is all done by holovision, of course."
Pelorat said, "but see here, if Solarians never see each other, how would anyone know that some Solarian somewhere has unexpectedly-or expectedly, for that matter-been laid to ash."
Bander said, "When one of us is laid to ash, all power at the estate ceases. If no successor takes over at once, the abnormal situation is eventually noticed and corrective measures are taken. I assure you that our social system works smoothly."
Trevize said, "Would it be possible to view some of these films you have here?"
Bander froze. Then it said, "It is only your ignorance that excuses you. What you have said is crude and obscene."
"I apologize for that," said Trevize. "I do not wish to intrude on you, but we've already explained that we are very interested in obtaining information on Earth. It occurs to me that the earliest films you have would date back to a time before Earth was radioactive. Earth might therefore be mentioned. There might be details given about it. We certainly do not wish to intrude on your privacy, but would there be any way in which you yourself could explore those films, or have a robot do so, perhaps, and then allow any relevant information to be passed on to us? Of course, if you can respect our motives and understand that we will try our best to respect your feelings in return, you might allow us to do the viewing ourselves."
Bander said frigidly, "I imagine you have no way of knowing that you are becoming more and more offensive. However, we can end all this at once, for I can tell you that there are no films accompanying my early half-human ancestors."
"None?" Trevize's disappointment was heart-felt.
"They existed once. But even you can imagine what might have been on them. Two half-humans showing interest in each other or, even," Hander cleared its throat, and said, with an effort, "interacting. Naturally, all half-human films were destroyed many generations ago."**
"What about the records of other Solarians?"
"All destroyed."
"Can you be sure?"
"It would be mad not to destroy them."
"It might be that some Solarians were mad, or sentimental, or forgetful. We presume you will not object to directing us to neighboring estates."
Bander looked at Trevize in surprise. "Do you suppose others will be as tolerant of you as I have been?"
"Why not, Bander?"
"You'll find they won't be."
"It's a chance we'll have to take."
"No, Trevize. No, any of you. Listen to me."
There were robots in the background, and Bander was frowning.
"What is it, Bander?" said Trevize, suddenly uneasy.
Bander said, "I have enjoyed speaking to all of you, and observing you in all your-strangeness. It was a unique experience, which I have been delighted with, but I cannot record it in my diary, nor memorialize it in film."
"Why not?"
"My speaking to you; my listening to you; my bringing you into my mansion; my bringing you here into the ancestral death chambers; are shameful acts."
"We are not Solarians. We matter to you as little as these robots do, do we not?"
"I excuse the matter to myself in that way. It may not serve as an excuse to others."
"What do you care? You have absolute liberty to do as you choose, don't you?"
"Even as we are, freedom is not truly absolute. If I were the only Solarian on the planet, I could do even shameful things in absolute freedom. But there are other Solarians on the planet, and, because of that, ideal freedom, though approached, is not actually reached. There are twelve hundred Solarians on the planet who would despise me if they knew what I had done."
"There is no reason they need know about it."
"That is true. I have been aware of that since you've arrived. I've been aware of it all this time that I've been amusing myself with you. The others must not find out."
Pelorat said, "If that means you fear complications as a result of our visits to other estates in search of information about Earth, why, naturally, we will mention nothing of having visited you first. That is clearly understood."
Bander shook its head. "I have taken enough chances. I will not speak of this, of course. My robots will not speak of this, and will even be instructed not to remember it. Your ship will be taken underground and explored for what information it can give us-"
"Wait," said Trevize, "how long do you suppose we can wait here while you inspect our ship? That is impossible."
"Not at all impossible, for you will have nothing to say about it. I am sorry. I would like to speak to you longer and to discuss many other things with you, but you see the matter grows more dangerous."
"No, it does not," said Trevize emphatically.
"Yes, it does, little half-human. I'm afraid the time has come when I must do what my ancestors would have done at once. I must kill you, all three."
TREVIZE turned his head at once to look at Bliss. Her face was expressionless, but taut, and her eyes were fixed on Bander with an intensity that made her seem oblivious:to all else.
Pelorat's eyes were wide, disbelieving.
Trevize, not knowing what Bliss would-or could-do, struggled to fight down an overwhelming sense of loss (not so much at the thought of dying, as of dying without knowing where Earth was, without knowing why he had chosen Gaia as humanity's future). He had to play for time.
He said, striving to keep his voice steady, and his words clear, "You have shown yourself a courteous and gentle Solarian, Bander. You have not grown angry at our intrusion into your world. You have been kind enough to show us over your estate and mansion, and you have answered our questions. It would suit your character better to allow us to leave now. No one need ever know we were on this world and we would have no cause to return. We arrived in all innocence, seeking merely information."
"What you say is so," said Bander lightly, "and, so far, I have given you life. Your lives were forfeit the instant you entered our atmosphere. What I might have done-and should have done-on making close contact with you, would be to have killed you at once. I should then have ordered the appropriate robot to dissect your bodies for what information on Outworlders that might yield me.
"I have not done that. I have pampered my own curiosity and given in to my own easygoing nature, but it is enough. I can do it no longer. I have, in fact, already compromised the safety of Solaria, for if, through some weakness, I were to let myself be persuaded to let you go, others of your kind would surely follow, however much you might promise that they would not.
"There is, however, at least this. Your death will be painless. I will merely heat your brains mildly and drive them into inactivation. You will experience no pain. Life will merely cease. Eventually, when dissection and study are over, I will convert you to ashes in an intense flash of heat and all will be over."
Trevize said, "If we must die, then I cannot argue against a quick painless death, but why must we die at all, having given no offense?"
"Your arrival was an offense."
"Not on any rational ground, since we could not know it was an offense.”
“Society defines what constitutes an offense. To you, it may seem irrational and arbitrary, but to us it is not, and this is our world on which we have the full right to say that in this and that, you have done wrong and deserve to die.”
Bander smiled as though it were merely making pleasant conversation and went on, "Nor have you any right to complain on the ground of your own superior virtue. You have a blaster which uses a beam of microwaves to induce intense killing heat. It does what I intend to do, but does it, I am sure, much more crudely and painfully. You would have no hesitation in using it on me right now, had I not drained its energy, and if I were to be so foolish as to allow you the freedom of movement that would enable you to remove the weapon from its holster."
Trevize said despairingly, afraid even to glance again at Bliss, lest Bander's attention be diverted to her, "I ask you, as an act of mercy, not to do this."
Bandar said, turning suddenly grim, "I must first be merciful to myself and to my world, and to do that, you must die."
He raised his hand and instantly darkness descended upon Trevize.
For a moment, Trevize felt the darkness choking him and thought wildly, Is this death?
And as though his thoughts had given rise to an echo, he heard a whispered, "Is this death?" It was Pelorat's voice.
Trevize tried to whisper, and found he could. "Why ask?" he said, with a sense of vast relief. "The mere fact that you can ask shows it is not death."
"Mere are old legends that there is life after death."
"Nonsense," muttered Trevize. "Bliss? Are you here, Bliss?"
There was no answer to that.
Again Pelorat echoed, "Bliss? Bliss? What happened, Golan?"
Trevize said, "Bender must be dead. He would, in that case, be unable to supply the power for his estate. The lights would go out."
"But how could? You mean Bliss did it?"
"I suppose so. I hope she did not come to harm in the process." He was on his hands and knees crawling about in the total darkness of the underground (if one did not count the occasional subvisible flashing of a radioactive atom breaking down in the walls).
Then his hand came on something warm and soft. He felt along it and recognized a leg, which he seized. It was clearly too small to be Bander's. "Bliss?"
The leg kicked out, forcing Trevize to let go.
He said, "Bliss? Say something!"
"I am alive," came Bliss's voice, curiously distorted.
Trevize said, "But are you well?"
"No." And, with that, light returned to their surroundings-weakly. The walls gleamed faintly, brightening and dimming erratically.
Bander lay crumpled in a shadowy heap. At its side, holding its head, was Bliss.
She looked up at Trevize and Pelorat. "The Solarian is dead," she said, and her cheeks glistened with tears in the weak light.
Trevize was dumbfounded. "Why are you crying?"
"Should I not cry at having killed a living thing of thought and intelligence? That was not my intention."
Trevize leaned down to help her to her feet, but she pushed him away.
Pelorat knelt in his turn, saying softly, "Please, Bliss, even you can't bring it back to life. Tell us what happened."
She allowed herself to be pulled upward and said dully, "Gaia can do what Bander could do. Gaia can make use of the unevenly distributed energy of the Universe and translate it into chosen work by mental power alone."
"I knew that," said Trevize, attempting to be soothing without quite knowing how to go about it. "I remember well our meeting in space when you-or Gaia, rather-held our spaceship captive. I thought of that when Bander held me captive after it had taken my weapons. It held you captive, too, but I was confident you could have broken free if you had wished."
"No. I would have failed if I had tried. When your ship was in my/our/Gaia's grip," she said sadly, "I and Gaia were truly one. Now there is a hyperspatial separation that limits my/our/Gaia's efficiency. Besides, Gaia does what it does by the sheer power of massed brains. Even so, all those brains together lack the transducer-lobes this one Solarian has. We cannot make use of energy as delicately, as efficiently, as tirelessly as he could. You see that I cannot make the lights gleam more brightly, and I don't know how long I can make them gleam at all before tiring. Bander could supply the power for an entire vast estate, even when it was sleeping."
"But you stopped it," said Trevize.
"Because it didn't suspect my powers," said Bliss, "and because I did nothing that would give it evidence of them. It was therefore without suspicion of me and gave me none of its attention. It concentrated entirely on you, Trevize, because it was you who bore the weapons-again, how well it has served that you armed yourself-and I had to wait my chance to stop Hander with one quick and unexpected blow. When it was on the point of killing us, when its whole mind was concentrated on that, and on you, I was able to strike."
"And it worked beautifully."
"How can you say something so cruel, Trevize? It was only my intention to stop it. I merely wished to block its use of its transducer. In the moment of surprise when it tried to blast us and found it could not, but found, instead, that the very illumination about us was fading into darkness, I would tighten my grip and send it into a prolonged normal sleep and release the transducer. The power would then remain on, and we could get out of this mansion, into our ship, and leave the planet. I hoped to so arrange things that, when Bander finally woke, it would have forgotten all that had happened from the instant of its sighting us. Gaia has no desire to kill in order to accomplish what can be brought about without killing."
"What went wrong, Bliss?" said Pelorat softly.
"I had never encountered any such thing as those transducer-lobes and I lacked any time to work with them and learn about them. I merely struck out forcefully with my blocking maneuver and, apparently, it didn't work correctly. It was not the entry of energy into the lobes that was blocked, but the exit of that energy. Energy is always pouring into those lobes at a reckless rate but, ordinarily, the brain safeguards itself by pouring out that energy just as quickly. Once I blocked the exit, however, energy piled up within the lobes at once and, in a tiny fraction of a second, the temperature had risen to the point where the brain protein inactivated explosively and it was dead. The lights went out and I removed my block immediately, but, of course, it was too late."
"I don't see that you could have done anything other than that which you did, dear," said Pelorat.
"Of what comfort is that, considering that I have killed."
"Bander was on the point of killing us," said Trevize.
"That was cause for stopping it, not for killing it."
Trevize hesitated. He did not wish to show the impatience he felt for he was unwilling to offend or further upset Bliss, who was, after all, their only defense against a supremely hostile world.
He said, "Bliss, it is time to look beyond Bander's death. Because it is dead, all power on the estate is blanked out. This will be noticed, sooner or later, probably sooner, by other Solarians. They will be forced to investigate. I don't think you will be able to hold off the perhaps combined attack of several. And, as you have admitted yourself, you won't be able to supply for very long the limited power you are managing to supply now. It is important, therefore, that we get back to the surface, and to our ship, without delay."
"But, Golan," said Pelorat, "how do we do that? We came for many kilometers along a winding path. I imagine it's quite a maze down here and, for myself, I haven't the faintest idea of where to go to reach the surface. I've always had a poor sense of direction."
Trevize, looking about, realized that Pelorat was correct. He said, "I imagine there are many openings to the surface, and we needn't find the one we entered."
"But we don't know where any of the openings are. How do we find them?"
Trevize turned again to Bliss. "Can you detect anything. mentally, that will help us find our way out?"
Bliss said, "The robots on this estate are all inactive. I can detect a thin whisper of subintelligent life straight up, but all that tells us is that the surface is straight up, which we know."
"Well, then," said Trevize, "we'll just have to look for some opening."
"Hit-and-miss," said Pelorat, appalled. "We'll never succeed."
"We might, Janov," said Trevize. "If we search, there will be a chance, however small. The alternative is simply to stay here, and if we do that then we will never succeed. Come, a small chance is better than none."
"Wait," said Bliss. "I do sense something."
"What?" said Trevize.
"A mind."
"Intelligence?"
"Yes, but limited, I think. What reaches me most clearly, though, is something else."
"What?" said Trevize, again fighting impatience.
"Fright! Intolerable fright!" said Bliss, in a whisper.
TREVIZE looked about ruefully. He knew where they had entered but he had no illusion on the score of being able to retrace the path by which they had come. He had, after all, paid little attention to the turnings and windings. Who would have thought they'd be in the position of having to retrace the route alone and without help, and with only a flickering, dim light to be guided by?
He said, "Do you think you can activate the car, Bliss?"
Bliss said, "I'm sure I could, Trevize, but that doesn't mean I can run it."
Pelorat said, "I think that Bander ran it mentally. I didn't see it touch anything when it was moving."
Bliss said gently, "Yes, it did it mentally, Pel, but how, mentally? You might as well say that it did it by using the controls. Certainly, but if I don't know the details of using the controls, that doesn't help, does it?"
"You might try," said Trevize.
"If I try, I'll have to put my whole mind to it, and if I do that, then I doubt that I'll be able to keep the lights on. The car will do us no good in the dark even if I learn how to control it."
"Then we must wander about on foot, I suppose?"
"I'm afraid so."
Trevize peered at the thick and gloomy darkness that lay beyond the dim light in their immediate neighborhood. He saw nothing, heard nothing.
He said, "Bliss, do you still sense this frightened mind?"
"Yes, I do."
"Can you tell where it is? Can you guide us to it?"
"The mental sense is a straight line. It is not refracted sensibly by ordinary matter, so I can tell it is coming from that direction."
She pointed to a spot on the dusky wall, and said, "But we can't walk through the wall to it. The best we can do is follow the corridors and try to find our way in whatever direction will keep the sensation growing stronger. In short, we will have to play the game of hot-and-cold."
"Then let's start right now."
Pelorat hung back. "Wait, Golan; are we sure we want to find this thing, whatever it is? If it is frightened, it may be that we will have reason to be frightened, too."
Trevize shook his head impatiently. "We have no choice, Janov. It's a mind, frightened or not, and it may be willing to-or may be made to-direct us to the surface."
"And do we just leave Bander lying here?" said Pelorat uneasily.
Trevize took his elbow. "Come, Janov. We have no choice in that, either. Eventually some Solarian will reactivate the place, and a robot will find Bander and take care of it-I hope not before we are safely away."
He allowed Bliss to lead the way. The light was always strongest in her immediate neighborhood and she paused at each doorway, at each fork in the corridor, trying to sense the direction from which the fright came. Sometimes she would walk through a door, or move around a curve, then come back and try an alternate path, while Trevize watched helplessly.
Each time Bliss came to a decision and moved firmly in a particular direction, the light came on ahead of her. Trevize noticed that it seemed a bit brighter now-either because his eyes were adapting to the dimness, or because Bliss was learning how to handle the transduction more efficiently. At one point, when she passed one of the metal rods that were inserted into the ground, she put her hand on it and the lights brightened noticeably. She nodded her head as though she were pleased with herself.
Nothing looked in the least familiar; it seemed certain they were wandering through portions of the rambling underground mansion they had not passed through on the way in.
Trevize kept looking for corridors that led upward sharply, and he varied that by studying the ceilings for any sign of a trapdoor. Nothing of the sort appeared, and the frightened mind remained their only chance of getting out.
They walked through silence, except for the sound of their own steps; through darkness, except for the light in their immediate vicinity; through death, except for their own lives. Occasionally, they made out the shadowy bulk of a robot, sitting or standing in the dusk, with no motion. Once they saw a robot lying on its side, with legs and arms in queer frozen positions. It had been caught off-balance, Trevize thought, at the moment when power had been turned off, and it had fallen. Bander, either alive or dead, could not affect the force of gravity. Perhaps all over the vast Bander estate, robots were standing and lying inactive and it would be that that would quickly be noted at the borders.
Or perhaps not, he thought suddenly. Solarians would know when one of their number would be dying of old age and physical decay. The world would be alerted and ready. Bander, however, had died suddenly, without possible foreknowledge, in the prime of its existence. Who would know? Who would expect? Who would be watching for inactivation?
But no (and Trevize thrust back optimism and consolation as dangerous lures into overconfidence). The Solarians would note the cessation of all activity on the Bander estate and take action at once. They all had too great an interest in the succession to estates to leave death to itself.
Pelorat murmured unhappily, "Ventilation has stopped. A place like this, underground, must be ventilated, and Bander supplied the power. Now it has stopped."
"It doesn't matter, Janov," said Trevize. "We've got enough air down in this empty underground place to last us for years."
"It's close just the same. It's psychologically bad."
"Please, Janov, don't get claustrophobic. Bliss, are we any closer?"
"Much, Trevize," she replied. "The sensation is stronger and I am clearer as to its location."
She was stepping forward more surely, hesitating less at points of choice of direction.
"There! There!" she said. "I can sense it intensely."
Trevize said dryly, "Even I can hear it now."
All three stopped and, automatically, held their breaths. They could hear a soft moaning, interspersed with gasping sobs.
They walked into a large room and, as the lights went on, they saw that, unlike all those they had hitherto seen, it was rich and colorful in furnishings.
In the center of the room was a robot, stooping slightly, its arms stretched out in what seemed an almost affectionate gesture and, of course, it was absolutely motionless.
Behind the robot was a flutter of garments. A round frightened eye edged to one side of it, and there was still the sound of a brokenhearted sobbing.
Trevize darted around the robot and, from the other side, a small figure shot out, shrieking. It stumbled, fell to the ground, and lay there, covering its eyes, kicking its legs in all directions, as though to ward off some threat from whatever angle it might approach, and shrieking, shrieking-Bliss said, quite unnecessarily, "It's a child!"
TREVIZE drew back, puzzled. What was a child doing here? Bander had been so proud of its absolute solitude, so insistent upon it.
Pelorat, less apt to fall back on iron reasoning in the face of an obscure event, seized upon the solution at once, and said, "I suppose this is the successor."
"Bander's child," said Bliss, agreeing, "but too young, I think, to be a successor. The Solarians will have to find one elsewhere."
She was gazing at the child, not in a fixed glare, but in a soft, mesmerizing way, and slowly the noise the child was making lessened. It opened its eyes and looked at Bliss in return. Its outcry was reduced to an occasional soft whimper.
Bliss made sounds of her own, now, soothing ones, broken words that made little sense in themselves but were meant only to reinforce the calming effect of her thoughts. It was as though she were mentally fingering the child's unfamiliar mind and seeking to even out its disheveled emotions.
Slowly, never taking its eyes off Bliss, the child got to its feet, stood there swaying a moment, then made a dash for the silent, frozen robot. It threw its arms about the sturdy robotic leg as though avid for the security of its touch.
Trevize said, "I suppose that the robot is its-nursemaid-or caretaker. I suppose a Solarian can't care for another Solarian, not even a parent for a child."
Pelorat said, "And I suppose the child is hermaphroditic."
"It would have to be," said Trevize.
Bliss, still entirely preoccupied with the child, was approaching it slowly, hands held half upward, palms toward herself, as though emphasizing that there was no intention of seizing the small creature. The child was now silent, watching the approach, and holding on the more tightly to the robot.
Bliss said, "There, child-warm, child-soft, warm, comfortable, safe, child-safe-safe."
She stopped and, without looking round, said in a low voice, "Pel, speak to it in its language. Tell it we're robots come to take care of it because the power failed."
"Robots!" said Pelorat, shocked.
"We must be presented as robots. It's not afraid of robots. And it's never seen a human being, maybe can't even conceive of them."
Pelorat said, "I don't know if I can think of the right expression. I don't know the archaic word for 'robot.' "
"Say 'robot,' then, Pel. If that doesn't work, say 'iron thing.' Say whatever you can."
Slowly, word by word, Pelorat spoke archaically. The child looked at him, frowning intensely, as though trying to understand.
Trevize said, "You might as well ask it how to get out, while you're at it."
Bliss said, "No. Not yet. Confidence first, then information."
The child, looking now at Pelorat, slowly released its hold on the robot and spoke in a high-pitched musical voice.
Pelorat said anxiously, "It's speaking too quickly for me."
Bliss said, "Ask it to repeat more slowly. I'm doing my best to calm it and remove its fears."
Pelorat, listening again to the child, said, "I think it's asking what made Jemby stop. Jemby must be the robot."
"Check and make sure, Pel."
Pelorat spoke, then listened, and said, "Yes, Jemby is the robot. The child calls itself Fallom."
"Good!" Bliss smiled at the child, a luminous, happy smile, pointed to it, and said, "Fallom. Good Fallom. Brave Fallom." She placed a hand on her chest and said, "Bliss."
The child smiled. It looked very attractive when it smiled. "Bliss," it said, hissing the "s" a bit imperfectly.
Trevize said, "Bliss, if you can activate the robot, Jemby, it might be able to tell us what we want to know. Pelorat can speak to it as easily as to the child."
"No," said Bliss. "That would be wrong. The robot's first duty is to protect the child. If it is activated and instantly becomes aware of us, aware of strange human beings, it may as instantly attack us. No strange human beings belong here. If I am then forced to inactivate it, it can give us no information, and the child, faced with a second inactivation of the only parent it knows-Well, I just won't do it."
"But we were told," said Pelorat mildly, "that robots can't harm human beings."
"So we were," said Bliss, "but we were not told what kind of robots these Solarians have designed. And even if this robot were designed to do no harm, it would have to make a choice between its child, or the nearest thing to a child it can have, and three objects whom it might not even recognize as human beings, merely as illegal intruders. Naturally, it would choose the child and attack us."
She turned to the child again. "Fallow," she said, "Bliss." She pointed, "Pel-Trev."
"Pel. Trev," said the child obediently.
She came closer to the child, her hands reaching toward it slowly. It watched her, then took a step backward.
"Calm, Fallom," said Bliss. "Good, Fallom. Touch, Fallom. Nice, Fallom."
It took a step toward her, and Bliss sighed. "Good, Fallom."
She touched Fallom's bare arm, for it wore, as its parent had, only a long robe, open in front, and with a loincloth beneath. The touch was gentle. She removed her arm, waited, and made contact again, stroking softly.
The child's eyes half-closed under the strong, calming effect of Bliss's mind.
Bliss's hands moved up slowly, softly, scarcely touching, to the child's shoulders, its neck, its ears, then under its long brown hair to a point just above and behind its ears.
Her hands dropped away then, and she said, "The transducer-lobes are still small. The cranial bone hasn't developed yet. There's just a tough layer of skin there, which will eventually expand outward and be fenced in with bone after the lobes have fully grown. Which means it can't, at the present time, control the estate or even activate its own personal robot. Ask it how old it is, Pel."
Pelorat said, after an exchange, "It's fourteen years old, if I understand it rightly."
Trevize said, "It looks more like eleven."
Bliss said, "The length of the years used on this world may not correspond closely to Standard Galactic Years. Besides, Spacers are supposed to have extended lifetimes and, if the Solarians are like the other Spacers in this, they may also have extended developmental periods. We can't go by years, after all."
Trevize said, with an impatient click of his tongue, "Enough anthropology. We must get to the surface and since we are dealing with a child, we may be wasting our time uselessly. It may not know the route to the surface. It may not ever have been on the surface."
Bliss said, "Pel!"
Pelorat knew what she meant and there followed the longest conversation he had yet had with Fallom.
Finally, he said, "The child knows what the sun is. It says it's seen it. I think it's seen trees. It didn't act as though it were sure what the word meant-or at least what the word I used meant-"
"Yes, Janov," said Trevize, "but do get to the point."
"I told Fallow that if it could get us out to the surface, that might make it possible for us to activate the robot. Actually, I said we would activate the robot. Do you suppose we might?"
Trevize said, "We'll worry about that later. Did it say it would guide us?"
"Yes. I thought the child would be more anxious to do it, you see, if I made that promise. I suppose we're running the risk of disappointing it-"
"Come," said Trevize, "let's get started. All this will be academic if we are caught underground."
Pelorat said something to the child, who began to walk, then stopped and looked back at Bliss.
Bliss held out her hand and the two then walked hand in hand.
"I'm the new robot," she said, smiling slightly.
"It seems reasonably happy over that," said Trevize.
Fallom skipped along and, briefly, Trevize wondered if it were happy simply because Bliss had labored to make it so, or if, added to that, there was the excitement of visiting the surface and of having three new robots, or whether it was excitement at the thought of having its Jemby foster-parent back. Not that it mattered-as long as the child led them.
There seemed no hesitation in the child's progress. It turned without pause whenever there was a choice of paths. Did it really know where it was going, or was it all simply a matter of a child's indifference? Was it simply playing a game with no clear end in sight?
But Trevize was aware, from the slight burden on his progress, that he was moving uphill, and the child, bouncing self-importantly forward, was pointing ahead and chattering.
Trevize looked at Pelorat, who cleared his throat and said, "I think what it's saying is 'doorway.' "
"I hope your thought is correct," said Trevize.
The child broke away from Bliss, and was running now. It pointed to a portion of the flooring that seemed darker than the sections immediately neighboring it. The child stepped on it, jumping up and down a few times, and then turned with a clear expression of dismay, and spoke with shrill volubility.
Bliss said, with a grimace, "I'll have to supply the power. This is wearing me out."
Her face reddened a bit and the lights dimmed, but a door opened just ahead of Fallom, who laughed in soprano delight.
The child ran out the door and the two men followed. Bliss came last, and looked back as the lights just inside darkened and the door closed. She then paused to catch her breath, looking rather worn out.
"Well," said Pelorat, "we're out. Where's the ship?"
All of them stood bathed in the still luminous twilight.
Trevize muttered, "It seems to me that it was in that direction."
"It seems so to me, too," said Bliss. "Let's walk," and she held out her hand to Fallom.
There was no sound except those produced by the wind and by the motions and calls of living animals. At one point they passed a robot standing motionless near the base of a tree, holding some object of uncertain purpose.
Pelorat took a step toward it out of apparent curiosity, but Trevize said, "Not our business, Janov. Move on."
They passed another robot, at a greater distance, who had tumbled.
Trevize said, "There are robots littered over many kilometers in all directions, I suppose." And then, triumphantly, "Ah, there's the ship."
They hastened their steps now, then stopped suddenly. Fallow raised its voice in an excited squeak.
On the ground near the ship was what appeared to be an air-vessel of primitive design, with a rotor that looked energy-wasteful, and fragile besides. Standing next to the air-vessel, and between the little party of Outworlders and their ship, stood four human figures.
"Too late," said Trevize. "We wasted too much time. Now what?"
Pelorat said wonderingly, "Four Solarians? It can't be. Surely they wouldn't come into physical contact like that. Do you suppose those are holoimages?"
"They are thoroughly material," said Bliss. "I'm sure of that. They're not Solarians either. There's no mistaking the minds. They're robots."
"WELL, THEN," said Trevize wearily, "onward!" He resumed his walk toward the ship at a calm pace and the others followed.
Pelorat said, rather breathlessly, "What do you intend to do?"
"If they're robots, they've got to obey orders."
The robots were awaiting them, and Trevize watched them narrowly as they came closer.
Yes, they must be robots. Their faces, which looked as though they were made of skin underlain with flesh, were curiously expressionless. They were dressed in uniforms that exposed no square centimeter of skin outside the face. Even the hands were covered by thin, opaque gloves.
Trevize gestured casually, in a fashion that was unquestionably a brusque request that they step aside.
The robots did not move.
In a low voice, Trevize said to Pelorat, "put it into words, Janov. Be firm."
Pelorat cleared his throat and, putting an unaccustomed baritone into his voice, spoke slowly, gesturing them aside much as Trevize had done. At that, one of the robots, who was perhaps a shade taller than the rest, said something in a cold and incisive voice.
Pelorat turned to Trevize. "I think he said we were Outworlders."
"Tell him we are human beings and must be obeyed."
The robot spoke then, in peculiar but understandable Galactic. "I understand you, Outworlder. I speak Galactic. We are Guardian Robots."
"Then you have heard me say that we are human beings and that you must therefore obey us."
"We are programmed to obey Rulers only, Outworlder. You are not Rulers and not Solarian. Ruler Bander has not responded to the normal moment of Contact and we have come to investigate at close quarters. It is our duty to do so. We find a spaceship not of Solarian manufacture, several Outworlders present, and all Bander robots inactivated. Where is Ruler Bander?"
Trevize shook his head and said slowly and distinctly, "We know nothing of what you say. Our ship's computer is not working well. We found ourselves near this strange planet against our intentions. We landed to find our location. We found all robots inactivated. We know nothing of what might have happened."
"That is not a credible account. If all robots on the estate are inactivated and all power is off, Ruler Bander must be dead. It is not logical to suppose that by coincidence it died just as you landed. There must be some sort of causal connection."
Trevize said, with no set purpose but to confuse the issue and to indicate his own foreigner's lack of understanding and, therefore, his innocence, "But the power is not off. You and the others are active."
The robot said, "We are Guardian Robots. We do not belong to any Ruler. We belong to all the world. We are not Ruler-controlled but are nuclearpowered. I ask again, where is Ruler Bander?"
Trevize looked about him. Pelorat appeared anxious; Bliss was tight-lipped but calm. Fallom was trembling, but Bliss's hand touched the child's shoulder and it stiffened somewhat and lost facial expression. (Was Bliss sedating it?)
The robot said, "Once again, and for the last time, where is Ruler Bander?"
"I do not know," said Trevize grimly.
The robot nodded and two of his companions left quickly. The robot said, "My fellow Guardians will search the mansion. Meanwhile, you will be held for questioning. Hand me those objects you wear at your side."
Trevize took a step backward. "They are harmless."
"Do not move again. I do not question their nature, whether harmful or harmless. I ask for them."
"No."
The robot took a quick step forward, and his arm flashed out too quickly for Trevize to realize what was happening. The robot's hand was on his shoulder; the grip tightened and pushed downward. Trevize went to his knees.
The robot said, "Those objects." It held out its other hand.
"No," gasped Trevize.
Bliss lunged forward, pulled the blaster out of its holster before Trevize, clamped in the robot's grip, could do anything to prevent her, and held it out toward the robot. "Here, Guardian," she said, "and if you'll give me a moment-here's the other. Now release my companion."
The robot, holding both weapons, stepped back, and Trevize rose slowly to his feet, rubbing his left shoulder vigorously, face wincing with pain.
(Fallow whimpered softly, and Pelorat picked it up in distraction, and held it tightly.)
Bliss said to Trevize, in a furious whisper, "Why are you fighting him? He can kill you with two fingers."
Trevize groaned and said, between gritted teeth, "Why don't you handle him.
"I'm trying to. It takes time. His mind is tight, intensely programmed, and leaves no handle. I must study it. You play for time."
"Don't study his mind. Just destroy it," said Trevize, almost soundlessly.
Bliss looked quickly toward the robot. It was studying the weapons intently, while the one other robot that still remained with it watched the Outworlders. Neither seemed interested in the whispering that was going on between Trevize and Bliss.
Bliss said, "No. No destruction. We killed one dog and hurt another on the first world. You know what happened on this world." (Another quick glance at the Guardian Robots.) "Gaia does not needlessly butcher life or intelligence. I need time to work it out peacefully."
She stepped back and stared at the robot fixedly.
The robot said, "These are weapons."
"No," said Trevize.
"Yes," said Bliss, "but they are no longer useful. They are drained of energy."
"is that indeed so? Why should you carry weapons that are drained of energy? Perhaps they are not drained." The robot held one of the weapons in its fist and placed its thumb accurately. "Is this the way it is activated?"
"Yes," said Bliss; "if you tighten the pressure, it would be activated, if it contained energy-but it does not."
"Is that certain?" The robot pointed the weapon at Trevize. "Do you still say that if I activate it now, it will not work?"
"It will not work," said Bliss.
Trevize was frozen in place and unable to articulate. He had tested the blaster after Hander had drained it and it was totally dead, but the robot was holding the neuronic whip. Trevize had not tested that.
If the whip contained even a small residue of energy, there would be enough for a stimulation of the pain nerves, and what Trevize would feel would make the grip of the robot's hand seem to have been a pat of affection.
When he had been at the Naval Academy, Trevize had been forced to take a mild neuronic whipblow, as all cadets had had to. That was just to know what it was like. Trevize felt no need to know anything more.
The robot activated the weapon and, for a moment, Trevize stiffened painfully-and then slowly relaxed. The whip, too, was thoroughly drained.
The robot stared at Trevize and then tossed both weapons to one side. "How do these come to be drained of energy?" it demanded. "If they are of no use, why do you carry them?"
Trevize said, "I am accustomed to the weight and carry them even when drained."
The robot said, "That does not make sense. You are all under custody. You will be held for further questioning, and, if the Rulers so decide, you will then be inactivated. How does one open this ship? We must search it."
"It will do you no good," said Trevize. "You won't understand it."
"If not I, the Rulers will understand."
"They will not understand, either."
"Then you will explain so that they will understand."
"I will not."
"Then you will be inactivated."
"My inactivation will give you no explanation, and I think I will be inactivated even if I explain."
Bliss muttered, "Keep it up. I'm beginning to unravel the workings of its brain."
The robot ignored Bliss. (Did she see to that? thought Trevize, and hoped savagely that she had.)
Keeping its attention firmly on Trevize, the robot said, "If you make difficulties, then we will partially inactivate you. We will damage you and you will then tell us what we want to know."
Suddenly, Pelorat called out in a half-strangled cry. "Wait, you cannot do this. Guardian, you cannot do this."
"I am under detailed instructions," said the robot quietly. "I can do this. Of course, I shall do as little damage as is consistent with obtaining information."
"But you cannot. Not at all. I am an Outworlder, and so are these two companions of mine. But this child," and Pelorat looked at Fallom, whom he was still carrying, "is a Solarian. It will tell you what to do and you must obey it."
Fallom looked at Pelorat with eyes that were open, but seemed empty.
Bliss shook her head, sharply, but Pelorat looked at her without any sign of understanding.
The robot's eyes rested briefly on Fallom. It said, "The child is of no importance. It does not have transducer-lobes."
"It does not yet have fully developed transducer-lobes," said Pelorat, panting, "but it will have them in time. It is a Solarian child."
"It is a child, but without fully developed transducer-lobes it is not a Solarian. I am not compelled to follow its orders or to keep it from harm."
"But it is the offspring of Ruler Bander."
"Is it? How do you come to know that?"
Pelorat stuttered, as he sometimes did when overearnest. "Wh-what other child would be on this estate?"
"How do you know there aren't a dozen?"
"Have you seen any others?"
"It is I who will ask the questions."
At this moment, the robot's attention shifted as the second robot touched its arm. The two robots who had been sent to the mansion were returning at a rapid run that, nevertheless, had a certain irregularity to it.
There was silence till they arrived and then one of them spoke in the Solarian language-at which all four of the robots seemed to lose their elasticity. For a moment, they appeared to wither, almost to deflate.
Pelorat said, "They've found Bander," before Trevize could wave him silent.
The robot turned slowly and said, in a voice that slurred the syllables, "Ruler Bander is dead. By the remark you have just made, you show us you were aware of the fact. How did that come to be?"
"How can I know?" said Trevize defiantly.
"You knew it was dead. You knew it was there to be found. How could you know that, unless you had been there-unless it was you that had ended the life?" The robot's enunciation was already improving. It had endured and was absorbing the shock.
Then Trevize said, "How could we have killed Bander? With its transducer-lobes it could have destroyed us in a moment."
"How do you know what, or what not, transducer-lobes could do?"
"You mentioned the transducer-lobes just now."
"I did no more than mention them. I did not describe their properties or abilities."
"The knowledge came to us in a dream."
"That is not a credible answer."
Trevize said, "To suppose that we have caused the death of Bander is not credible, either."
Pelorat added, "And in any case, if Ruler Bander is dead, then Ruler Fallom now controls this estate. Here the Ruler is, and it is it whom you must obey."
"I have already explained," said the robot, "that an offspring with undeveloped transducer-lobes is not a Solarian. It cannot be a Successor, therefore, Another Successor, of the appropriate age, will be flown in as soon as we report this sad news."
"What of Ruler Fallom?"
"There is no Ruler Fallom. There is only a child and we have an excess of children. It will be destroyed."
Bliss said forcefully, "You dare not. It is a child!"
"It is not I," said the robot, "who will necessarily do the act and it is certainly not I who will make the decision. That is for the consensus of the Rulers. In times of child-excess, however, I know well what the decision will in."**
"No. I say no."
"It will be painless. But another ship is coming. It is important that we go into what was the Bander mansion and set up a holovision Council that will supply a Successor and decide on what to do with you. Give me the child."
Bliss snatched the semicomatose figure of Fallom from Pelorat. Holding it tightly and trying to balance its weight on her shoulder, she said, "Do not touch this child."
Once again, the robot's arm shot out swiftly and it stepped forward, reaching for Fallom. Bliss moved quickly to one side, beginning her motion well before the robot had begun its own. The robot continued to move forward, however, as though Bliss were still standing before it. Curving stiffly downward, with the forward tips of its feet as the pivot, it went down on its face. The other three stood motionless, eyes unfocused.
Bliss was sobbing, partly with rage. "I almost had the proper method of control, and it wouldn't give me the time. I had no choice but to strike and now all four are inactivated. Let's get on the ship before the other ship lands. I am too ill to face additional robots, now."