Prodigy

Chapter 3. Circuit Breaker

Now that he was walking down the same streets he had ridden the scooter through earlier, Derec took advantage of the slower pace to try to deduce how much the city had changed in the interim. Complicating the deductions was the fact that his previous speed hadn't been very accommodating. He'd had only glimpses before, and he wasn't sure if he was remembering half of them correctly.

But after he'd made allowances for the flaws in his survey, he was convinced that entire buildings had been replaced by new ones in an assortment of geometric designs that, for all their variety, nonetheless possessed a cookie-cutter sameness. In some places, whole blocks had been transformed. However, the streets remained roughly consistent with previous directions, despite the addition of many twisted, almost gnarled turns.

The farther he went from Lucius's building, the more unexpected diversions there were, in the forms of metalworks, fenced run-off canals, bridges, and power stations. Derec felt fortunate that his talents included a fairly strong sense of direction; otherwise, he would always be forced to rely on robots for navigational purposes. There was nothing wrong with that-robots had an excellent sense of direction-but he couldn't always assume a robot would be around when his survival depended on it.

But wherever he was, he could always see the distant shards of light shining from Lucius's building. They stabbed up from the surrounding darkness like ethereal swords rising up from a pit, swords that cut deep into the cloud banks high in the sky. The clouds twisted and rolled, covering new sections of sky, as if the light were stirring an inner fire.

The group with Derec-Ariel, Mandelbrot, Wolruf, and Lucius-walked in silence, as they had been doing for some time. Derec suspected that all of them, even Mandelbrot, required a few minutes lost in their own thoughts to digest what they had seen tonight.

Derec wished it weren't so difficult to remember so much of his knowledge of galactic histories and customs. Not only had he lost his personal history, but he had forgotten the methods he used to recall things. He'd lost his entire mental filing system, and had to be immersed in doing something, such as fixing a robot, before it came back to him.

He did not like this state of affairs because he did not like to think that he and Ariel-both of whom were mentally handicapped at the moment-were the only ones who had ever encountered robots that were capable of searching, creative thought. He wondered if originality in humans was the result of logical thinking as much as transcendent inspiration.

Besides, who was to say that robots didn't possess subconscious minds of their own, minds capable of generating their own brands of inspiration, neither superior nor inferior to those of humankind but merely separate? After all, humans themselves hadn't been aware of the existence of the subconscious mind until it had been defined by primitive scientists and doctors, before the era of colonization. Had anyone ever bothered to make similar explorations into the mental depths of robots? It frightened Derec to think that he had the potentially awesome responsibility of witnessing the robots during-and possibly midwifing them through-their mental birth pains. He hardly felt qualified.

But then again, I'm not the type to miss an opportunity, either,he thought. Creative robots might be able to make the conceptual breakthrough I need to have them find a cure for Ariel's ailment.

Her disease was the reason for her exile from Aurora, whose population dreaded diseases of all sorts.They had managed to rid themselves of most illnesses, but whatever it was that Ariel had contracted, it was beyond the grasp of Auroran medical science. The doctors there had been able neither to diagnose nor cure what ailed her. The diagnostic robots here were completely stymied. And Derec himself had made exactly zilch headway. Perhaps a team of creative robots-whose inspirational talents leaned toward the sciences rather than the arts-could succeed where he had failed.

But first Derec had to understand as much as he could about what was happening now-to Lucius, to Harry and the others, and even to the ebony. He had long since formulated his line of questioning, but he had decided to wait because he was reluctant to break the spell of silence that had fallen among the members of the group.

Besides, Derec saw it was no use trying to pull Ariel into a conversation. She walked with her shoulders slumped and her hands behind her back. Her expression was pensive, her eyebrows narrowed. Derec knew from bitter experience that it did no good to engage her when she was this way. She rarely cared to have her depressed moods interrupted, rationalizing the unhealthy tendency by claiming the moods belonged to her and she preferred to enjoy them while she had them.

Well, she'll come out of her shell when she's ready,he thought. I just hope this current episode of introversion isn't the result of her disease.

Of course, it was always possible that she wanted a little bit of attention and was reacting badly to the fact she wasn't likely to get it. He had just decided to risk taking a few unkind words from her, in the hope of pleasantly surprising her, when Lucius surprised him by taking the initiative and breaking the silence.

"Were you pleased with my creation?" the robot asked. "Forgive me if I seem to be overstepping the boundaries of politeness, but I'm naturally interested in your human reaction."

"Yes, absolutely, I'm pleased. It's unquestionably one of the most spectacular buildings I can recall ever having seen." An easy enough compliment, because he could recall so little-just jumbled images of Aurora, and what he had seen since awakening with amnesia. "The question is: were you satisfied?"

"The building seems adequate for a first effort. Already its logical shortcomings seem all too obvious to me."

"But not to others, your circuits will be warmed to know."

"Yes, you are quite correct. They are," he replied. "And they are warmed, too, by the fact that I have found some strange sense of purpose resolved in seeing the final product. Now my mind is free to formulate my next design. Already it seems inappropriate to dwell overmuch on past accomplishments."

"I found that by looking on your building, I personally experienced what I have always assumed humans to mean by the thrill of discovery," said Mandelbrot, with a measured evenness in his words that he had never used while speaking to Derec. "Indeed, my positronic pathways concentrated easily on it."

"Then I am gratified," said Lucius.

"So am I," said Derec. "I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say I felt almost privileged to be viewing the structure."

"Then I am doubly gratified," said Lucius.

"In fact, I would go so far as to say that never before in human history has a robot produced such a composition."

"Never before-?" said Lucius. "Surely I would have thought that elsewhere-" The robot shook its head, as if to assimilate the ramifications of the notion. The effect was disconcerting, and for an eerie moment Lucius reminded Derec of what a human might act like if he had a nervous tic.

"I' d like to know what prodded you to think in terms of art in the first place," Derec said.

Lucius responded by suddenly standing perfectly still and staring blankly straight ahead. Everybody, including Ariel, stopped walking. Something seemed terribly, terribly wrong.

Derec felt an awful wrenching in his gut. Not since he had awoken alone and amnesic in the lifepod had he felt such dread.

For Lucius's words definitely indicated he had assumed he was merely the first robot in Robot City to produce art. It was hardly unreasonable on the face of it to assume that elsewhere, among the Spacer societies, other robots routinely conceived art and labored to make it reality.

Robots are not programmed to take initiatives, especially those whose consequences are as yet unknown. They routinely rationalize anything, and freely expound upon the logic justifying every deed. And Derec felt certain Lucius's immobile stance was the outward sign of what was happening in its brain, where its circuits were grappling with the inescapable fact that it had taken an unacceptable initiative, but were incapable of justifying it rigorously.

As a consequence, Lucius's brain was in danger of overloading. It would die the robotic death of positronic drift, an irreparable psychic burnout-thanks to an inherent inability of its programming to resolve apparent contradictions.

Derec had to think fast. The body could be fixed up after the disaster happened, of course, but the worthless brain would have to be chucked into the recycler. The special circumstances that had brought about Lucius's capacities for intuitive leaps might never again be duplicated.

An angle! I need an angle to get inside Lucius's mind!Derec thought. But what?

"Lucius, listen to me very carefully," he said through tense lips. "Your mind is in danger. I want you to stop thinking about certain things. I know there are questions in your mind. It is essential to your survival that you deliberately close down the logic circuits preoccupied with them. Understand? Quickly! Remember-you're doing this for a reason. You're doing this because of the Third Law, which dictates that you must protect yourself at all times. Understand?"

At first, while Derec spoke, Lucius did nothing. Derec doubted his words were getting through the positronic haze. But then Lucius perked up and, hesitantly, looked around. It had regained a tenuous control of its faculties, but was clearly still in danger.

"My thanks, sir. Your words have pleasantly rearranged my mental meanderings, for the nonce. I am most grateful. It is difficult to serve humanity when you are totally incapacitated. But I do not understand. I feel so strange. Is this what humans mean by whirlwind thoughts?"

"Don't even think about your physical efficiency," said Derec anxiously. "In fact, I want you to direct your integrals only to those precise subjects I suggest."

"Sir, I must respectfully point out that that is impossible," replied Lucius.

“Perhaps I can impart some information to him that will assist you, master:' said Mandelbrot.

Derec nodded approval, and Mandelbrot then said to Lucius, "Permit me to introduce myself, comrade. My name is Mandelbrot, and I am a robot. But not a robot like you. You were built in a factory here in Robot City, but Master Derec personally built me. He constructed me from used parts he was given access to by an alien creature holding him prisoner against his will. Master Derec may not know the particulars of his past life, but he is certainly a superior roboticist. He can help you reason out of your dilemma. "

“Right now reasoning is-is so difficult." Lucius was slipping fast, down into a dreamstream of his own making. His sensor glow progressively dimmed, and unusual, cantankerous noises emanated from inside his body.

"All right, Lucius," Derec said, "I want you to think back very carefully. I want you to remember everything you can about what happened to you, oh, a few hours before you first conceived of the building. I want you to slowly, carefully tell me exactly the truth. Don't worry about any apparent discrepancies. If something appearing dangerous to you comes up, we'll take care of it before we go on. Just remember one thing, okay?"

Lucius did nothing.

"Okay?" Derec repeated more insistently.

Lucius nodded.

"Excellent. Just remember that, as a general rule, the contradictions of the moment are eventually erased in the cool light of sublime reflection. Can you remember that?"

Lucius did not answer, did not move.

"Answer me!" Frustrated, he tapped the shell of the robot's temple-the sound reverberated from the buildings.

Finally, Lucius nodded. "I understand," it said simply.

"A suggestion, master?" inquired Mandelbrot.

"Anything-just be quick about it!"

"Lucius's problems stem from its belief that, by programming its building into the city, it has failed to adhere to the Three Laws, and hence has strayed from the path. Its conversation with the ebony back in the square may have contributed to the positronic imbalances, but mere words would have no effect if Lucius had not already been subliminally alert to the possibility."

"This is a suggestion?" exclaimed Derec impatiently. "What's the point?"

"Forgive me, but a robot can understand the paradoxes in the behavioral applications of the Three Laws more fully than any human-but until now only humans have made intuitive leaps of the imagination. Now I must ask you, Master Derec, so you may ask Lucius: why is that?"

Derec turned to Lucius, rose to his tiptoes, and spoke directly into the robot's auditory sensors. "Listen to me, Lucius. I want you to think back-and tell me of the time when you believe you became different from the others."

"Different?"

"This is no time for equivocation, Lucius-tell me! Why are you different?"

After a protracted pause-during which Derec heard his heart beating hard and his temples throbbing furiously-Lucius began to speak as if hypnotized. "It was during the period when you and the one called Ariel had first arrived in the city. The central computer had already responded defensively to the death of the man with your identical appearance."

"My double, yes," said Derec tersely, folding his arms. "Go on."

"Erroneously concluding that the city was under attack by mysterious, unknown, and perhaps invisible adversaries, the computer promptly shifted into high gear and began redrafting the city at an unprecedented rate, approving the modifications it had suggested to itself before external factors such as need and compatibility were adequately integrated into the sketches. The rate of revision quickly became suicidal. Resources were strained to the utmost. The weather patterns were stirred to the boiling points. The city was destroying itself to save itself."

"I seem to remember most of this," said Derec.

"Forgive me if I am declaring the obvious, but I think it shall prove germane." Lucius's tones betrayed no electronic agitation at Derec's impatience. On this score, at least, the robot had no doubt it was following orders. "Though I admit I have sought no empirical evidence to either prove or disprove it, I think it is safe to say that every robot in the city was so intent upon keeping up with short-term directives that no one realized a crisis was happening."

"And what do you think would have happened if some robots had?"

"They might have deduced that their short-term directives were actually counterproductive, so far as the Third Law was concerned, and they might have attempted to communicate to central in an effort to countermand its orders."

"Central wasn't talking, anyway," said Derec impatiently. "It would have been a dead end! What makes you think they would have disregarded central when they did decide it was on the fritz?"

"Because that is precisely what I did, following the logical actions dictated by my deductions."

"I assume you attempted communication several times?”

"And each time the interplay indicated the channels were opened only one way. Central could talk to me, but I could not talk to central. This struck my curiosity integrals as significant, but, lacking further information, I had not the means to determine the deeper meaning of the issue. "

"So what did you do then? Did you obey your short-term directives?"

"No. I had already determined that they were counterproductive, so I had no choice but to try to discern, through whatever means available, a logical, constructive direction warranted by the circumstances. I wandered the streets, watching them metamorphose, studying their changes, attempting to discern the overall pattern that I suspected lay hidden beneath the shifting ones."

"Did you notice any other robots doing the same thing-just wandering around?"

"No. Other robots I saw were simply going about their assigned activities, automatically performing their routines regardless of the supranormal rate of change. It was not complimentary to think so, but I viewed them, on one level at least, as mindless beings, who went about doing as they were told without ever stopping to consider the long-term consequences of their actions. The entire situation was unacceptable, but what could I do? I could only conclude that all my opinions were just that-opinions. And mine were not inherently better than theirs."

"Is that when you thought of it-when you conceived of your building?"

"If you will remember, there was a series of torrential downpours at the time. The robots gradually shifted the bulk of their activities to stemming the environmental tides, but remained incapable of perceiving the root of the disaster. The significance of how this turn of events commented on the superficial way we accepted our customs could not escape me, and the blind acceptance seemed contrary, in some ways, to my programmed purpose of being."

"And exactly what was the comment?" Derec asked.

"Just then I could not be certain; there seemed to be no concrete train of logic setting the proper precedent. "

"Please go on-you're doing well. So far I've seen no violation of the Laws. You've got nothing to worry about-You only think you do!"

"I decided that I had derived as much empirical evidence of the city, as seen from the sidewalks, as would be useful. I needed to see the sky and rainfall clearly, unobstructed by the buildings, much as a human in an analogous situation might want to."

Derec shrugged. "Go on."

"Once the idea came to me, I acted immediately. So intent was Ion my goal that I neglected to appreciate what my sensors otherwise perceived quite clearly: the city streets beneath me had begun to undergo a kind of trembling that disguised any vibrations the rain and the wind might be causing. I felt the trembling through my legs; the sensation shimmered up my torso. And as I walked to the nearest skyscraper, the vibrations tingled in my fingertips.

"Once I was inside, I realized my mind remained inordinately fixated on the thunderheads above. Their shades of black and gray swirled more vividly in my mind than when I had directly perceived them earlier; so intent was Ion holding onto the image that when the first floor quaked without warning and nearly sent me tumbling against the wall, my only thought was to reach the lift without delay." There Lucius paused, and reached out to grab Derec's shoulder.

Derec flinched instinctively, but when Mandelbrot made a motion as if to deflect Lucius's hand, Derec stopped him with a gesture. Robots did not normally touch humans, but Derec sensed Lucius had need for tactile sensation, if for no other reason to reassure itself that its problems were isolated in its mind.

Lucius held Derec's shoulder just too hard for comfort, but the human tried not to wince. If he did, Mandelbrot would quickly decide that further inaction on his part would conceivably cause Derec too great a harm, and Derec did not want to risk Mandelbrot's interference at this stage of the game.

"I fear that was my first true transgression. The quaking of the building put into my head the notion of everything I had learned in my brief life about how humans sustain themselves through eating."

"Huh?" Derec said.

"Meaning now that I was inside the building when its general behavior was indicating a change was about to occur, I had some notion about how a living creature swallowed by a human must feel once it has reached its destination."

Derec felt his own stomach go queasy. "Lucius, that's barbaric! Nobody does that anymore-at least not that I know of."

"Oh. Perhaps my information is suspect, then. It is so difficult to tell fact from fiction when you're trying to understand humans.”

“Yes, I can certainly appreciate that," said Derec, thinking of Ariel for an instant before resolving to keep his thoughts on the matter at hand. "Continue. You realized your existence was in danger, then, because of how the building was acting."

"Yes. It was either changing or being reabsorbed into the street. The Third Law dictated I should exit immediately. Indeed, I should have had no choice in the matter. But, strangely, I did not go. The urge to do so, in fact, was easily suppressed. Because for those brief moments it was more important to me to see the clouds unobstructed by the civilization that had spawned me than it was to ensure my continued survival. I was acting in a manner completely contrary to the path dictated by the Third Law, and yet I functioned normally, at least on the surface of things. It is only now… now…now…"

Lucius repeated the last word as if its mind had been caught in an intractable loop.

"Nonsense!" snapped Derec. "If your actions did place you in physical danger-which I gather is the general direction we're headed for-how were you to know for certain? Sure, it might have looked that way, but you had a mission, a deed to accomplish. You had factors to weigh. You had other things on your mind."

"Sti-ill-still dar waz dangzzer…”

"And a likelihood, I take it, that you would come through all right if you kept your wits about you. Obviously! Come on, Lucius, it's got to be obvious, else you wouldn't be here right now. Come on, the time to fizzle out was then, certainly not now. Live and learn, remember? Just like an artist!"

Lucius swayed like a drunken man but fixed its optics firmly on Derec. It was difficult to tell if it was getting better because its metal face was incapable of exhibiting the slightest emotion or feeling, and because the dim level of the lights in the optics lingered. But already its voice sounded firmer as it said, "We are trained to recognize probability. We deal constantly with probability. We are used to accessing it in a split centad and acting accordingly. And the probability was most unpromising."

"But what counts most is what happened-not what didn't happen. The rest you're just going to have to chalk up to experience, Lucius."

Lucius released Derec's shoulder. And just in time, Derec thought, rubbing it gently.

"Yes-I have had experience lately, have I not?" said Lucius in a tone whose very evenness made Derec catch his breath. "Are you implying that when it comes time to gain a little bit of experience in the galaxy, there may be occasions when avoiding risk might conceivably cause one more harm than taking it?"

"Ultimately, yes, I suppose," said Derec, nodding for emphasis even though he really didn't care to commit himself to that point. "In this case an omission of experience might have stunted your mental development in a certain direction-which you could define as harm of a sort. Wouldn't you say so, Mandelbrot? Lie if you have to."

"Pardon me, master, but you know I cannot lie. Was that an attempt at humor?"

"Thanks, Mandelbrot. What happened next, Lucius?”

“Despite the unsound nature of the building, I rushed to the lift and activated it. It occurred to me, just for an instant, that if the controls had shifted, then I would have no choice but to exit with the utmost dispatch. But the controls showed no evidence of a transmutation about to take effect, and so I not-quite-reasoned that the safeguards of the city itself would give me time enough to accomplish my goal and then get out. I could not have been more wrong. I must have experienced something akin to human shock, when the full impact of my miscalculation struck me.

"For when the lift had taken me approximately halfway up, the building itself ruptured. Its foundations dissolved, its walls merged into a chaotic stream that first swept me up and then remorselessly carried me down toward the surface. All I could sense was an ebb tide of meta-cells, yielding to the contours of my body yet not permitting me the slightest freedom of movement."

"Wait a second," said Derec. "Are you trying to tell me that in the history of this city, however brief, no robot has ever happened to be submerged, even accidentally, in a building as it changes or merges back into the city?"

"Naturally not, sir. There are many interior indications whenever a building is about to change, and our adherence to the Third Law prevents us from staying past the point where even accidental harm is a realistic possibility. Inaddition, the city would normally cease to act if a robot happened to remain inside because he had been rendered immobile through an accident. But I had neglected to foresee the implications of the special circumstances the city was dealing with at the time-the belief that it was under attack, the frantic restructuring, the raging environmental disaster… "

Forget it-you're a robot, not a seer. You couldn't have guessed just how badly the city's program was crashing. So what happened once you were submerged? What thoughts went through your mind?"

"Clear ones-the most logical ones I had ever had. Strangely, I felt no sense of time whatsoever. Reason indicated that I had only been submerged for a few decads, but for all practical intents and purposes my mind was flowing at a rate strongly emphasizing the subjectivity of the concept of time. Every moment I spent in the ebb stretched out for an eternity. And within those eternities, there stretched out an infinity of moments. I realized that for much of my brief existence I had lived in a state of dream-death, living, working, doing all the things I had been programmed to do, but holding back the realization of possibilities ignored. Now, I had no idea what to do about that, but I resolved to explore the appropriate possibilities, whatever they came to be.

"There came a moment when my sensors indicated I was no longer moving. I had become stationary, but the ebb was moving past me, running over me as though I had been strapped to a rock in turbulent rapids. The weight on my body gradually diminished, and I realized I was being held fast by the surface of the streets beneath the sinking building.

"And I was left lying on the surface as the final streams of meta-cells trickled over me, leaving my body fresh and cleansed. I, who had been immersed in a building, had an individualized idea of the sort of building Robot City should contain, the design and structure of which was imminent in my own experience."

"Didn't this strike you as being unusual?" asked Derec.

"No. In fact, it was logical. It was so logical that it made perfect sense to me. I had a purpose and I was going to achieve it. Beyond that, I had no interest in determining why I had it, because that did not appear to be important. I notice, however, from observing the behavior of my comrades, that I am not the only one striving to express something inside me. The ambition seems to be spreading."

"Like a plague," said Derec.

"Strangely, now the stars and clouds that had once fascinated me held no interest. All I cared about was fashioning, with the tools and instruments available tome, my idea into a reality. "

"You did not think that others would perhaps object?" asked Derec.

"It did not occur to consider the opinions of others at all. There was too much of an inner crackling in my transistors for me to be seized by distractions. My circuits had flashes of uncontrollable activity, and they made unexpected connections between thoughts I had once believed were entirely unrelated. These continuous flashes of realization came unbidden, at what seemed to be an ever-accelerating rate. I perceived still more buildings hidden in the flux, and all I had to do to find them was reach down into the pseudo-genetic data banks to shape them."

A hundred notions bloomed in Derec's mind. He had once believed that he understood robots, that he knew how they thought because he knew how their bodies and minds were put together. He believed he could take apart and reassemble the average model in half a day while blindfolded, and probably make a few improvements in the process. In fact, he bragged about it often to Ariel, not that she ever believed him.

Nevertheless, before this moment he had always imagined that an untraversable gulf lay between him and the robots. There was nothing about his mind, he had always assumed, that in the end bore much resemblance to their minds. Derec was a creature of flesh, composed of cells following complex patterns ordained by DNA-codes. Flesh and cells that had grown either in a womb or in an incubator (he wouldn't know which until he regained his memory). Flesh and cells that would one day be no more. Of these facts his subconscious was always aware.

While robots-while this robot was made of interchangeable parts. A robot's positronic potentials were naturally capable of endowing it with subtle personality traits, and they had always been able to take some initiative within the Three Laws. But even those initiatives were fairly dependable, predictable in hindsight because generally one robot thought like another.

However, it was rapidly becoming undeniable that, on this planet at least, the robotic mind resembled the human mind in that it was an adaptive response to selective pressures. From that point on, the possibilities were endless.

So Lucius was, in its own way, like the first fish that had crawled from the water onto the ground. Its positronic potentials had adapted to life in Robot City by taking definite evolutionary steps. And other robots weren't very far behind.

"Master? Are you well?" inquired Mandelbrot gently.

"Yes, I'm fine. It's just taking an effort to assimilate all this," Derec replied in a distracted tone, looking about for Ariel. He wanted to hear what she thought of what he had learned, but she was nowhere to be seen. Neither was Wolruf. They had both slipped away while he had been preoccupied. "Uh-and how are you, Lucius?"

"I'm well-functioning at peak capacity," said Lucius evenly. "Evidently merely talking things through has helped me."

"There's much more I'd like to ask you-about your building and how you went about it. I'm especially interested in how you dealt with the central computer and managed to alter some of the pseudo-genetic codes."

"Certainly, master, my mind and methods are at your disposal. But any reasonable explanation would take several hours. "

"That's quite all right. I've made an appointment with another robot in the morning, but I should finish with him in a few hours. Then I'd like to interview you."

"You don't wish to examine me?"

"No, I'm afraid taking you apart-even for a quick looksee-would cause you harm. I don't want you to change."

Lucius bowed slightly. "I suspected as much, but the confirmation is appreciated. "

"I would like to know one thing, though. Does your building have a name?"

"Why, yes. You're the first to ask. Its name is 'Circuit Breaker.' "

"An interesting name," said Mandelbrot. "May I ask what it means?"

"You may ask," replied Lucius. But that was all it said.

"Mandelbrot, I want you to do me a favor," said Derec.

"Certainly."

"Find Ariel and keep an eye on her. Don't let her find out you're around. Obviously, she wishes to be alone, but she obviously can't be in her condition."

"It has already been taken care of. I saw a ten percent probability of a First Law situation coming up but was sufficiently cognizant of her wishes to realize that privacy was her goal. So I signaled Wolruf to keep a watch on her. "

Derec nodded. "Good." He felt vaguely ashamed that he hadn't been on top of the situation earlier. Perhaps he was a little too self-involved for his own good. But he already felt better that Mandelbrot had automatically watched out for her interests, in a manner protecting both her body and her sense of self-identity. It seemed that for a robot to serve man most efficiently, it had to be something of a psychologist as well. Or at least a student of human nature.

Lucius asked, "And how did my building affect you, sir?"

"Oh, I enjoyed it," said Derec absent-mindedly, his thoughts still on Ariel.

"Is that all?" said Lucius.

Derec hid his smile with his hand. "You must remember, this is the first time you've ever created something that approaches the concept of art. Tonight was the first time your fellows had ever experienced the power of art. We humans have been surrounded by it and influenced by it all our lives, from the first gardens we see, to the first holo-landscape reproductions, to the first holodramas, everything we see that's created by or influenced by the hand of man.

"But you robots are articulate and intelligent from the first moment you've been switched on. And this is the first time, to my knowledge, that one has created something in the more profound sense of the word. Had I conceived a similar project, I doubt if I could have done as well."

"Your talents may lie in other areas," said Lucius.

"Well, yes-I'm good at math and programming. Those are arts, too, though normally those not actively involved with them think of them as arcane crafts. But the moment of inspiration is similar, and they say the level of creativity is somewhat the same."

"That is not what I meant, and I suspect you know it," said Lucius pointedly. "If I am to grasp the true nature of human creativity, then it stands to reason that my fellow robots and I would profit by seeing you create art. "

"But, Lucius, I don't even know if I am creative in the sense you are."

"Another sense, then," Lucius suggested.

"Hmmm. I'll think on it, but right now I've got other things on my mind."

"As you wish. But it is perhaps unnecessary to add that our study of the Laws of Humanics would benefit greatly from any creation you'd attempt."

"If you say so," replied Derec absently, looking up at the clouds reflecting the colors of Circuit Breaker and seeing only the outline of Ariel's face looking down on him.