Part 25 (1/2)

”I see people?”

”If you see them, you will die.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

He gave her his lopsided grin, then sat down.

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

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

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

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

”How is she?” he asked.

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

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

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

Paul's face went white.

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

”Is it a nervous breakdown?” Paul asked.

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

”Bad, huh?” Paul asked.

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

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

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

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

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

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

”I know how you feel,” she said.

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

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

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

Grace had fallen in love with Max Rosen.

He had fallen in love with Sage Bryson.

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

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

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

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

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

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

And was that all?

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

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

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

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

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

”McRae here,” Stoner said.