The Early Asimov. Volume 1

Death Sentence

Brand Gorla smiled uncomfortably, “These things exaggerate, you know.”

“No, no, no!” The little man’s albino-pink eyes snapped. “Dorlis was great when no human had ever entered the Vegan System. It was the capital of a Galactic Confederation greater than ours.”

“Well, then, let’s say that it was an ancient capital. I’ll admit that and leave the rest to an archaeologist.”

“Archaeologists are no use. What I’ve discovered needs a specialist in its own field. And you’re on the Board.”

Brand Gorla looked doubtful. He remembered Theor Realo in senior year-a little white misfit of a human who skulked somewhere in the background of his reminiscences. It had been a long time ago, but the albino had been queer. That was easy to remember. And he was still queer.

“I’ll try to help,” Brand said, “if you’ll tell me what you want.”

Theor watched intently, “I want you to place certain facts before the Board. Will you promise that?”

Brand hedged, “Even if I help you along, Theor, I’ll have to remind you that I’m junior member of the Psychological Board. I haven’t much influence.”

“You must do your best. The facts will speak for themselves.” The albino’s hands were trembling.

“Go ahead.” Brand resigned himself. The man was an old school fellow. You couldn’t be too arbitrary about things.

Brand Gorla leaned back and relaxed. The light of Arcturus shone through the ceiling-high windows, diffused and mellowed by the polarizing glass. Even this diluted version of sunlight was too much for the pink eyes of the other, and he shaded his eyes as he spoke.

“I’ve lived on Dorlis twenty-five years, Brand,” he said, “I’ve poked into places no one today knew existed, and I’ve found things. Dorlis was the scientific and cultural capital of a civilization greater than ours. Yes it was, and particularly in psychology.”

“Things in the past always seem greater.” Brand condescended a smile. “There is a theorem to that effect which you’ll find in any elementary text. Freshmen invariably call it the “COD Theorem.” Stands for ‘Good-Old-Days,’ you know. But go on.”

Theor frowned at the digression. He hid the beginning of a sneer, “You can always dismiss an uncomfortable fact by pinning a dowdy label to it. But tell me this. What do you know of Psychological Engineering?”

Brand shrugged, “No such thing. Anyway, not in the strict mathematical sense. All propaganda and advertising is a crude form of hit-and-miss Psych Engineering-and pretty effective sometimes. Maybe that’s what you mean.”

“Not at all. I mean actual experimentation, with masses of people, under controlled conditions, and over a period of years.”

“Such things have been discussed. It’s not feasible in practice. Our social structure couldn’t stand much of it, and we don’t know enough to set up effective controls.”

Theor suppressed excitement, “But the ancients did know enough. And they did set up controls.”

Brand considered phlegmatically, “Startling and interesting, but how do you know?”

“Because I found the documents relating to it.” He paused breathlessly. “An entire planet, Brand. A complete world picked to suit, peopled with beings under strict control from every angle. Studied, and charted, and experimented upon. Don’t you get the picture?”

Brand noted none of the usual stigmata of mental uncontrol. A closer investigation, perhaps

He said evenly, “You must have been misled. It’s thoroughly impossible. You can’t control humans like that. Too many variables.”

“And that’s the point, Brand. They weren’t humans.”

“What?”

“They were robots, positronic robots. A whole world of them, Brand, with nothing to do but live and react and be observed by a set of psychologists that were Teal psychologists.”

“That’s mad!”

“I have proof-because that robot world still exists. The First Confederation went to pieces, but that robot world kept on going. It still exists.”

“And how do you know?”

Theor Realo stood up. “Because I’ve been there these last twenty-five years!”

The Board Master threw his formal red-edged gown aside and reached into a pocket for a long, gnarled and decidedly unofficial cigar.

“Preposterous,” he grunted, “and thoroughly insane.”

“Exactly,” said Brand, “and I can’t spring it on the Board just like that. They wouldn’t listen. I’ve got to get this across to you first, and then, if you can put your authority behind it-”

“Oh, nuts! I never heard anything as-Who is the fellow?”

Brand sighed, “ A crank, I’ll admit that. He was in my class at Arcturus u. and a crack-pot albino even then. Maladjusted as the devil, hipped on ancient history, and just the kind that gets an idea and goes through with it by plain. dumb plugging. He’s poked about in Dorlis for twenty-five years, he says. He’s got the complete records of practically an entire civilization.”

The Board Master puffed furiously. “Yeah, I know. In the telestat serials, the brilliant amateur always uncovers the great things. The free lance. The lone wolf. Nuts! Have you consulted the Department of Archaeology?”

“Certainly. And the result was interesting. No one bothers with Dorlis. This isn’t just ancient history, you see. It’s a matter of fifteen thousand years. It’s practically myth. Reputable archaeologists don’t waste too much time with it. It’s just the thing a book-struck layman with a single-track mind would uncover. After this, of course, if the business turns out right, Dorlis will become an archaeologist’s paradise.”

The Board Master screwed his homely face into an appalling grimace. “It’s very unflattering to the ego. If there’s any truth in all this, the so-called First Confederation must have had a grasp of psychology so far past ours, as to make us out to be blithering imbeciles. Too, they’d have to build positronic robots that would be about seventy-five orders of magnitude above anything we’ve even blueprinted. Galaxy! Think of the mathematics involved.”

“Look, sir, I’ve consulted just about everybody. I wouldn’t bring this thing to you if I weren’t certain that I had every angle checked. I went to Blak just about the first thing, and he’s consultant mathematician to United Robots. He says there’s no limit to these things. Given the time, the money, and the advance in psychology- getthat-robots like that could be built right now.”

“What proof has he?”

“Who, Blak?”

“No, no! Your friend. The albino. You said he had papers.”

“He has. I’ve got them here. He’s got documents-and there’s no denying their antiquity. I’ve had that checked every way from Sunday. I can’t read them, of course. I don’t know if anyone can, except Theor Realo.”

“That’s stacking the deck, isn’t it? We have to take his say-so.”

“Yes, in a way. But he doesn’t claim to be able to decipher more than portions. He says it is related to ancient Centaurian, and I’ve put linguists to work on it. It can be cracked and if his translation isn’t accurate, we’ll know about it.”

“All right. Let’s see it.”

Brand Gorla brought out the plastic-mounted documents. The Board Master tossed them aside and reached for the translation. Smoke billowed as he read.

“Humph,” was his comment. “Further details are on Dorlis, I suppose.”

“Theor claims that there are some hundred to two hundred tons of blueprints altogether, on the brain plan of the positronic robots alone. They’re still there in the original vault. But that’s the least of it. He’s been on the robot world itself. He’s got photocasts, teletype recordings, all sorts of details. They’re not integrated, and obviously the work of a layman who knows next to nothing about psychology. Even so, he’s managed to get enough data to prove pretty conclusively that the world he was on wasn’t…uh…natural.”

“You’ve got that with you, too.”

“All of it. Most of it’s on microfilm, but I’ve brought the projector. Here are your eyepieces.”

An hour later, the Board Master said, “I’ll call a Board Meeting tomorrow and push this through.”

Brand Gorla grinned tightly, “We’ll send a commission to Dorlis?”

“When,” said the Board Master dryly, “and if we can get an appropriation out of the University for such an affair. Leave this material with me for the while, please. I want to study it a little more.”

Theoretically, the Governmental Department of Science and Technology exercises administrative control over all scientific investigation. Actually, however, the pure research groups of the large universities are thoroughly autonomous bodies, and, as a general rule, the Government does not care to dispute that. But a general rule is not necessarily a universal rule.

And so, although the Board Master scowled and fumed and swore, there was no way of refusing Wynne Murry an interview. To give Murry his complete title, he was under secretary in charge of psychology, psychopathy and mental technology. And he was a pretty fair psychologist in his own right.

So the Board Master might glare, but that was all.

Secretary Murry ignored the glare cheerfully. He rubbed his long chin against the grain and said, “It amounts to a case of insufficient information. Shall we put it that way?”

The Board Master said frigidly, “I don’t see what information you want. The government’s say in university appropriations is purely advisory, and in this case, I might say, the advice is unwelcome.”

Murry shrugged, “I have no quarrel with the appropriation. But you’re not going to leave the planet without government permit. That’s where the insufficient information comes in.”

“There is no information other than we’ve given you.”

“But things have leaked out. All this is childish and rather unnecessary secrecy.

The old psychologist flushed. “Secrecy! If you don’t know the academic way of life, I can’t help you. Investigations, especially those of major importance, aren’t, and can’t be, made public, until definite progress has been made. When we get back, we’ll send you copies of whatever papers we publish.”

Murry shook his head, “Uh-uh. Not enough. You’re going to Dorlis, aren’t you?”

“We’ve informed the Department of Science of that.”

“Why?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“Because it’s big, or the Board Master wouldn’t go himself. What’s this about an older civilization and a world of robots?”

“Well, then, you know.”

“Only vague notions we’ve been able to scrabble up. I want the details.”

“There are none that we know now. We won’t know until we’re on Dorlis.”

“Then I’m going with you.”

“What!”

“You see, I want the details, too.”

“Why?”

“Ah,” Murry unfolded his legs and stood up, “now you’re asking the questions. It’s no use, now. I know that the universities aren’t keen on government supervision; and I know that I can expect no willing help from any academic source. But, by Arcturus, I’m going to get help this time, and I don’t care how you fight it. Your expedition is going nowhere, unless I go with you-representing the government. “

Dorlis, as a world, is not impressive. It’s importance to Galactic economy is nil, its position far off the great trade routes, its natives backward and unenlightened, its history obscure. And yet somewhere in the heaps of rubble that clutter an ancient world, there is obscure evidence of an influx of flame and destruction that destroyed the Dorlis of an earlier day-the greater capital of a greater Federation.

And somewhere in that rubble, men of a newer world poked and probed and tried to understand.

The Board Master shook his head and then pushed back his grizzling hair. He hadn’t shaved in a week.

“The trouble is,” he said, “that we have no point of reference. The language can be broken, I suppose, but nothing can be done with the notation.”

“I think a great deal has been done.”

“Stabs in the dark! Guessing games based on the translations of your albino friend. I won’t base any hopes on that.”

Brand said, “Nuts! You spent two years on the Nimian Anomaly, and so far only two months on this, which happens to be a hundred thousand times the job. It’s something else that’s getting you.” He smiled grimly. “It doesn’t take a psychologist to see that the government man is in your hair.”

The Board Master bit the end off a cigar and spat it four feet. He said slowly, “There are three things about the mule-headed idiot that make me sore. First, I don’t like government interference. Second, I don’t like a stranger sniffing about when we’re on top of the biggest thing in the history of psychology. Third, what in the Galaxy does he want? What is he after?”

“I don’t know.”

“What should he be after? Have you thought of it at all?”

“No. Frankly, I don’t care. I’d ignore him if I were you.”

“You would,” said the Board Master violently. “You would! You think the government’s entrance into this affair need only be ignored. I suppose you know that this Murry calls himself a psychologist?”

“I know that.”

“And I suppose you know he’s been displaying a devouring interest in all that we’ve veen doing.”

“That, I should say, would be natural.”

“Oh! And you know further-” His voice dropped with startling suddenness. “All right, Murry’s at the door. Take it easy.”

Wynne Murry grinned a greeting, but the Board Master nodded unsmilingly.

“Well, sir,” said Murry bluffly, “do you know I’ve been on my feet for forty-eight hours? You’ve got something here. Something big.”

“Thank you.”

“No, no. I’m serious. The robot world exists.”

“Did you think it didn’t?”

The secretary shrugged amiably. “One has a certain natural skepticism. What are your future plans?”

“Why do you ask?” The Board Master grunted his words as if they were being squeezed out singly.

“To see if they jibe with my own.”

“And what are your own?”

The secretary smiled. “No, no. You take precedence. How long do you intend staying here?”

“As long as it takes to make a fair beginning on the documents involved.”

“That’s no answer. What do you mean by a fair beginning?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea. Itmight take years.”

“Oh, damnation.”

The Board Master raised his eyebrows and said nothing.

The secretary looked at his nails. “I take it you know the location of this robot world.”

“Naturally. Theor Realo was there. His information up to now has proven very accurate.”

“That’s right. The albino. Well, why not go there?”

“Go there! Impossible!”

“May I ask why?”

“Look,” said the Board Master with restrained impatience, “you’re not here by our invitation, and we’re not asking you to dictate our course of actions, but just to show you that I’m not looking for a fight, I’ll give you a little metaphorical treatment of our case. Suppose we were presented with a huge and complicated machine, composed of principles and materials of which we knew next to nothing. It is so vast we can’t even make out the relationship of the parts, let alone the purpose of the whole. Now, would you advise me to begin attacking the delicate mysterious moving parts of the machine with a detonating ray before I know what it’s all about?”

“I see your point, of course, but you’re becoming a mystic. The metaphor is farfetched.”

“Not at all. These positronic robots were constructed along lines we know nothing of as yet and were intended to follow lines with which we are entirely unacquainted. About the only thing we know is that the robots were put aside in complete isolation, to work out their destiny by themselves. To ruin that isolation would be to ruin the experiment. If we go there in a body, introducing new, unforeseen factors, inducing unintended reactions, everything is ruined. The littlest disturbance-”

“Poppycock! Theor Realo has already gone there.”

The Board Master lost his temper suddenly. “Don’t you suppose I know that? Do you suppose it would ever have happened if that cursed albino hadn’t been an ignorant fanatic without any knowledge of psychology at all? Galaxy knows what the idiot has done in the way of damage.”

There was a silence. The secretary clicked his teeth with a thoughtful fingernail. “I don’t know…I don’t know. But I’ve got to find out. And I can’t wait years.”

He left, and the Board Master turned seethingly to Brand, “ And how are we going to stop him from going to the robot world if he wants to?”

“I don’t see how he can go if we don’t let him. He doesn’t head the expedition.”

“Oh, doesn’t he? That’s what I was about to tell you just before he came in. Ten ships of the fleet have landed on Dorlis since we arrived.”

“What!”

“Just that.”

“But what for?”

“That, my boy, is what I don’t understand, either…

“Mind if I drop in?” said Wynne Murry, pleasantly, and Theor Realo looked up in sudden anxiety from the papers that lay in hopeless disarray on the desk before him.

“Come in. I’ll clear off a seat for you.” The albino hustled the mess off one of the two chairs in a state of twittering nerves.

Murry sat down and swung one long leg over the other. “Are you assigned a job here, too?” He nodded at the desk.

Theor shook his head and smiled feebly. Almost automatically, he brushed the papers together in a heap and turned them face down.

In the months since he had returned to Dorlis with a hundred psychologists of various degrees of renown, he had felt himself pushed farther and farther from the center of things. There was room for him no longer. Except to answer questions on the actual state of things upon the robot world, which he alone had visited, he played no part And even there he detected, or seemed to detect, anger that he should have gone, and not a competent scientist

It was a thing to be resented. Yet, somehow, it had always been like that

“Pardon me?” He had let Murry’s next remark slip.

The secretary repeated, “I say it’s surprising you’re not put to work, then. You made the original discovery, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” the albino brightened. “But it went out of my hands. It got beyond me.”

“You were on the robot world, though.”

“That was a mistake, they tell me. I might have ruined everything.”

Murry grimaced. “What really gets them, I guess, is that you’ve got a lot of first-hand dope that they didn’t Don’t let their fancy titles fool you into thinking you’re a nobody. A layman with common sense is better than a blind specialist You and I-I’m a layman, too, you know-have to stand up for our rights. Here, have a cigarette.”

“I don’t sm-I’ll take one, thank you.” The albino felt himself warming to the long-bodied man opposite. He turned the papers face upward again, and lit up, bravely but uncertainly.

“Twenty-five years.” Theor spoke carefully, skirting around urgent coughs.

“Would you answer a few questions about the world?”

“I suppose so. That’s all they ever ask me about But hadn’t you better ask them? They’ve probably got it all worked out now.” He blew the smoke as far from himself as possible.

Murry said, “Frankly, they haven’t even begun, and I want the information without benefit of confusing psychological translation. First of all, what kind of people-or things-are these robots? You haven’t a photocast of one of them, have you?”

“Well, no. I didn’t like to take ‘casts of them. But they’re not things. They’re people!”

“No? Do they look like-people?”

“Yes-mostly. Outside, anyway. I brought some microscopic studies of the cellular structure that I got hold of. The Board Master has them. They’re different inside, you know, greatly simplified. But you’d never know that. They’re interesting-and nice.”

“Are they simpler than the other life of the planet?”

“Oh, no. It’s a very primitive planet. And…and,” he was interrupted by a spasm of coughing and crushed the cigarette to death as unobtrusively as possible. “They’ve got a protoplasmic base, you know. I don’t think they have the slightest idea they’re robots.”

“No. I don’t suppose they would have. What about their science?”

“I don’t know. I never got a chance to see. And everything was so different. I guess it would take an expert to understand.”

“Did they have machines?”

The albino looked surprised. ‘Well, of course. A good many, of all sorts.”

“Large cities?”

“Yes!”

The secretary’s eyes grew thoughtful. “ And you like them. Why?”

Theor Realo was brought up sharply. “I don’t know. They were just likable. We got along. They didn’t bother me so. It’s nothing I can put my finger on. Maybe it’s because I have it so hard getting along back home, and they weren’t as difficult as real people.”

“They were more friendly?”

“N-no. Can’t say so. They never quite accepted me. I was a stranger, didn’t know their language at first-all that. But”-he looked up with sudden brightness-”I understood them better. I could tell what they were thinking better. I-But I don’t know why.”

“Hm-m-m. Well-another cigarette? No? I’ve got to be walloping the pillow now. It’s getting late. How about a twosome at golf tomorrow? I’ve worked up a little course. It’ll do. Come on out. The exercise will put hair on your chest.”

He grinned and left.

He mumbled one sentence to himself: “It looks like a death sentence”-and whistled thoughtfully as he passed along to his own quarters.

He repeated the phrase to himself when he faced the Board Master the next day, with the sash of office about his waist. He did not sit down.

“Again?” said the Board Master, wearily.

“Again!” assented the secretary. “But real business this time. I may have to take over direction of your expedition.”

“What! Impossible, sir! I will listen to no such proposition.”

“I have my authority.” Wynne Murry presented the metalloid cylinder that snapped open at a flick of the thumb. “I have full powers and full discretion as to their use. It is signed, as you will observe, by the chairman of the Congress of the Federation.”

“So-But why?” The Board Master, by an effort, breathed normally. “Short of arbitrary tyranny, is there a reason?”

“A very good one, sir. All along, we have viewed this expedition from different angles. The Department of Science and Technology views the robot world not from the point of view of a scientific curiosity, but from the standpoint of its interference with the peace of the Federation. I don’t think you’ve ever stopped to consider the danger inherent in this robot world.”

“None that I can see. It is thoroughly isolated and thoroughly harmless.”

“How can you know?”

“From the very nature of the experiment,” shouted the Board Master angrily. “The original planners wanted as nearly a completely closed system as possible. Here they are, just as far off the trade routes as possible, in a thinly populated region of space. The whole idea was to have the robots develop free of interference.”

Murry smiled. “I disagree with you there. Look, the whole trouble with you is that you’re a theoretical man. You look at things the way they ought to be and I, a practical man, look at things as they are. No experiment can be set up and allowed to run indefinitely under its own power. It is taken for granted that somewhere there is at least an observer who watches and modifies as circumstances warrant.”

“Well?” said the Board Master stolidly.

“Well, the observers in this experiment, the original psychologists of Dorlis, passed away with the First Confederation, and for fifteen thousand years the experiment has proceeded by itself. Little errors have added up and become big ones and introduced alien factors which induced still other errors. It’s a geometric progression. And there’s been no one to halt it.”

“Pure hypothesis.”

“Maybe. But you’re interested only in the robot world, and I’ve got to think of the entire Federation.”

“And just what possible danger call the robot world be to the Federation? I don’t know what in Arcturus you’re driving at, man.”

Murry sighed. “I’ll be simple, but don’t blame me if I sound melodramatic. The Federation hasn’t had any internal warfare for centuries. What will happen if we come into contact with these robots?”

“Are you afraid of one world?”

“Could be. What about their science? Robots can do funny things sometimes.”

“What science call they have? They’re not metal-electricity supermen. They’re weak protoplasmic creatures, a poor imitation of actual humanity, built around a positronic brain adjusted to a set of simplified human psychological laws. If the word ‘robot’ is scaring you-”

“No, it isn’t, but I’ve talked to Theor Realo. He’s the only one who’s seen them, you know.”

The Board Master cursed silently and fluently. It came of letting a weak-minded freak of a layman get underfoot where he could babble and do harm.

He said, “We’ve got Realo’s full story, and we’ve evaluated it fully and capably. I assure you, no harm exists in them. The experiment is so thoroughly academic, I wouldn’t spend two days on it if it weren’t for the broad scope of the thing. From what we see, the whole idea was to build up a positronic brain containing modifications of one or two of the fundamental axioms. We haven’t worked out the details, but they must be minor, as it was the first experiment of this nature ever tried, and even the great mythical psychologists of that day had to progress stepwise. Those robots, I tell you, are neither supermen nor beasts. I assure you-as a psychologist.”

“Sorry! I’m a psychologist, too. A little more rule-of-thumb, I’m afraid. That’s all. But even little modifications! Take the general spirit of combativeness. That isn’t the scientific term, but I’ve no patience for that. You know what I mean. We humans used to be combative. But it’s being bred out of us. A stable political and economic system doesn’t encourage the waste energy of combat. It’s not a survival factor. But suppose the robots are combative. Suppose as the result of a wrong turn during the millennia they’ve been unwatched, they’ve become far more combative than ever their first makers intended. They’d be uncomfortable things to be with.”

“And suppose all the stars in the Galaxy became novae at the same time. Let’s really start worrying.”

“And there’s another point.” Murry ignored the other’s heavy sarcasm. “Theor Realo liked those robots. He liked robots better than he likes real people. He felt that he fitted there, and we all know he’s been a bad misfit in his own world.”

“And what,” asked the Board Master, “is the significance of that?”

“You don’t see it?” Wynne Murry lifted his eyebrows. “Theor Realo likes those robots because he is like them, obviously. I’ll guarantee right now that a complete psychic analysis of Theor Realo will show a modification of several fundamental axioms, and the same ones as in the robots.

“And,” the secretary drove on without a pause, “Theor Realo worked for a quarter of a century to prove a point, when all science would have laughed him to death if they had known about it. There’s fanaticism there; good, honest, inhuman perseverance. Those robots are probably like that!”

“You’re advancing no logic. You’re arguing like a maniac, like a moon-struck idiot.”

“I don’t need strict mathematical proof. Reasonable doubt is sufficient. I’ve got to protect the Federation. Look, it is reasonable, you know. The psychologists of Dorlis weren’t as super as all that. They had to advance stepwise, as you yourself pointed out. Their humanoids-let’s not call them robots-were only imitations of human beings and they couldn’t be good ones. Humans possess certain very, very complicated reaction systems-things like social consciousness, and a tendency toward the establishment of ethical systems; and more ordinary things like chivalry, generosity, fair play and so on, that simply can’t possibly be duplicated. I don’t think those humanoids can have them. But they must have perseverance, which practically implies stubbornness and combativeness, if my notion on Theor Realo holds good. Well, if their science is anywhere at all, then I don’t want to have them running loose in the Galaxy, if our numbers are a thousand or million times theirs. And I don’t intend to permit them to do so!”

The Board Master’s face was rigid. “What are your immediate intentions?”

“As yet undecided. But I think I am going to organize a small-scale landing on the planet.”

“Now, wait.” The old psychologist was up and around the desk. He seized the secretary’s elbow. “Are you quite certain you know what you’re doing? The potentialities in this massive experiment are beyond any possible precalculation by you or me. You can’t know what you’re destroying.”

“I know. Do you think I enjoy what I’m doing? This isn’t a hero’s job. I’m enough of a psychologist to want to know what’s going on, but I’ve been sent here to protect the Federation, and to the best of my ability I intend doing it-and a dirty job it is. But I can’t help.

“You can’t have thought it out. What can you know of the insight it will give us into the basic ideas of psychology? This will amount to a fusion of two Galactic systems, that will send us to heights that will make up in knowledge and power a million times the amount of harm the robots could ever do, if they were metal-electricity supermen.”

The secretary shrugged. “Now you’re the one that is playing with faint possibilities.”

“Listen, I’ll make a deal. Blockade them. Isolate them with your ships. Mount guards. But don’t touch them. Give us more time. Give us a chance. You must!”

“I’ve thought of that. But I would have to get Congress to agree to that. It would be expensive, you know.”

The Board Master flung himself into his chair in wild impatience. “What kind of expense are you talking about? Do you realize the nature of the repayment if we succeed?”

Murry considered; then, with a half smile, “What if they develop interstellar travel?”

The Board Master said quickly, “Then I’ll withdraw my objections.”

The secretary rose, “I’ll have it out with Congress.”

Brand Gorla’s face was carefully emotionless as he watched the Board Master’s stooped back. The cheerful pep talks to the available members of the expedition lacked meat, and he listened to them impatiently.

He said, “What are we going to do now?”

The Board Master’s shoulders twitched and he didn’t turn. “I’ve sent for Theor Realo. That little fool left for the Eastern Continent last week~

“Why?”

The older man blazed at the interruption. “How can I understand anything that freak does! Don’t you see that Murry’s right? He’s a psychic abnormality. We had no business leaving him unwatched. If I had ever thought of looking at him twice, I wouldn’t have. He’s coming back now, though, and he’s going to stay back.” His voice fell to a mumble. “Should have been back two hours ago.”

“It’s an impossible position, sir,” said Brand, flatly.

“Think so?”

“Well-Do you think Congress will stand for an indefinite patrol off the robot world? It runs into money, and average Galactic citizens aren’t going to see it as worth the taxes. The psychological equations degenerate into the axioms of common sense. In fact, I don’t see why Murry agreed to consult Congress.”

“Don’t your The Board Master finally faced his junior. “Well, the fool considers himself a psychologist, Galaxy help us, and that’s his weak point. He flatters himself that he doesn’t want to destroy the robot world in his heart, but that it’s the good of the Federation that requires it. And he’ll jump at any reasonable compromise. Congress won’t agree to it indefinitely, you don’t have to point that out to me.” He was talking quietly, patiently. “But I will ask for ten years, two years, six months-as much as I can get. I’ll get something. In that time, we’ll learn new facts about the world. Somehow we’ll strengthen our case and renew the agreement when it expires. We’ll save the project yet.”

There was a short silence and the Board Master added slowly and bitterly, “And that’s where Theor Realo plays a vital part:’

Brand Gorla watched silently, and waited. The Board Master said, “On that one point, Murry saw what we didn’t. Realo is a psychological cripple, and is our real clue to the whole affair. If we study him, we’ll have a rough picture of what the robot is like, distorted of course, since his environment has been a hostile, unfriendly one. But we can make allowance for that, estimate his nature in a-Ahh, I’m tired of the whole subject “

The signal box flashed, and the Board Master sighed. “Well, he’s here. All right, Gorla, sit down, you make me nervous. Let’s take a look at him.”

Theor Realo came through the door like a comet and brought himself to a panting halt in the middle of the floor. He looked from one to the other with weak, peering eyes.

“How did all this happen?”

“All what?” said the Board Master coldly. “Sit down. I want to ask you some questions.”

“No. You first answer me.”

“Sit down!”

Realo sat His eyes were brimming. “They’re going to destroy the robot world.”

“Don’t worry about that”

“But you said they could if the robots discovered interstellar travel. You said so. You fool. Don’t you see-” He was choking.

The Board Master frowned uneasily. ‘Will you calm down and talk sense?”

The albino gritted his teeth and forced the words out. “But they’ll have interstellar travel before long.”

And the two psychologists shot toward the little man.

“What!!”

“Well…well, what do you think?” Realo sprang upward with all the fury of desperation. “Did you think I landed in a desert or in the middle of an ocean and explored a world all by myself? Do you think life is a storybook? I was captured as soon as I landed and taken to a big city. At least, I think it was a big city. It was different from our kind. It had-But I won’t tell you.”

“Never mind the city,” shrieked the Board Master. “You were captured. Go ahead.”

“They studied me. They studied my machine. And then, one night, I left, to tell the Federation. They didn’t know I left. They didn’t want me to leave.” His voice broke. “ And I would have stayed as soon as not, but the Federation had to know.”

“Did you tell them anything about your ship?”

“How could I? I’m no mechanic. I don’t know the theory or construction. But I showed them how to work the controls and let them look at the motors. That’s all.”

Brand Gorla said, to himself mostly, “Then they’ll never get it. That isn’t enough.”

The albino’s voice raised itself in sudden shrieking triumph. “Oh, yes, they will. I know them. They’re machines, you know. They’ll work on that problem. And they’ll work. And they’ll work. And they’ll never quit. And they’ll get it. They got enough out of me. I’ll bet they got enough.”

The Board Master looked long, and turned away-wearily. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Because you took my world away from me. I discovered it-by myself-all by myself. And after I had done all the real work, and invited you in, you threw me out. All you had for me was complaints that I had landed on the world and might have ruined everything by interference. Why should I tell you? Find out for yourselves if you’re so wise, that you could afford to kick me around.”

The Board Master thought bitterly, “Misfit! Inferiority complex! Persecution mania! Nice! It all fits in, now that we’ve bothered to take our eyes off the horizon and see what was under our nose. And now it’s all ruined.”

He said, “All right, Realo, we all lose. Go away.”

Brand Gorla said tightly, “Allover? Really all over?”

The Board Master answered, “Really all over. The original experiment, as such, is over. The distortions created by Realo’s visit will easily be large enough to make the plans we are studying here a dead language. And besides-Murry is right. If they have interstellar travel, they’re dangerous.”

Realo was shouting, “But you’re not going to destroy them. You can’t destroy them. They haven’t hurt anyone.”

There was no answer, and he raved on, “I’m going back. I’ll warn them. They’ll be prepared. I’ll warn them.”

He was backing toward the door, his thin, white hair bristling, his red-rimmed eyes bulging.

The Board Master did not move to stop him when he dashed out.

“Let him go. It was his lifetime. I don’t care any more.”

Theor Realo smashed toward the robot world at an acceleration that was half choking him.

Somewhere ahead was the dustspeck of an isolated world with artificial imitations of humanity struggling along in an experiment that had died. Struggling blindly toward a new goal of interstellar travel that was to be their death sentence.

He was heading toward that world, toward the same city in which he had been “studied” the first time. He remembered it well. Its name was the first words of their language he had learned.

New York!

On July 26, 1943, which was a Monday, I had one of the rare days off I could take during wartime. (It was, after all, my first wedding anniversary.) I was in New York that day, and I visited Campbell just as in the good old days. I discussed with him another story in the “Foundation” series, as well as another in the “positronic robot” series. From then on, I always saw Campbell on the rare days when I was in New York on a weekday, and of course we corresponded regularly.

I was definitely back at writing. Output was low, but during the remaining war years I wrote two positronic robot stories, “Catch That Rabbit” and “Paradoxical Escape,” which appeared in the February 1944 and August 1945 issues of Astounding, respectively. Both were eventually included in I, Robot. (The latter story appears in I,Robot under the title of “Escape.” The word “Paradoxical” had been added by Campbell in one of his few title changes, and I didn’t like it.)

I also wrote no less than four stories of the “Foundation” series during those same years. These were “The Big and the Little,” “The Wedge,” “Dead Hand,” and “The Mule.” All appeared in Astounding, of course, the first three in the August 1944, October 1944, and April 1945 issues, respectively.

“The Mule” set several records for me. It was the longest story I had ever written up to that time-fifty thousand words long. Yet even so, and despite the fact that I had to work on it in small scraps of time left over from job and marriage, I managed to complete it in three and a half months. It was submitted on May 21, 1945, and was accepted on the twenty-ninth. (Indeed, throughout the war I never got a single rejection, or even a delayed acceptance. Nor did I submit to anyone but Campbell.)

What’s more, at the beginning of 1944 Campbell raised his basic rate to one and a half cents a word and some months later to a cent and three quarters. For “The Mule” I received a check at the higher rate, for $875. It was by far the largest check I ever received for a single story. By the end of the war, in fact, I was making half as much money writing in my spare time as I was making at my N.A.E.S. job, even though I had been promoted and was receiving sixty dollars a week by the end of the war.

Then, too, “The Mule” was the first story I ever had published as a serial. It appeared in two parts in the November and December 1945 issues of Astounding.

Of the wartime “Foundation” stories, “The Big and the Little” and “The Wedge” are included in Foundation, while “Dead Hand” and “The Mule,” together, make up all of Foundation and Empire.

During the two years between mid-1943 and mid-1945, I wrote only one story that was neither one of the “Foundation” series nor one of the “Positronic robot” series, and that one was inspired directly by the N.A.E.S. This story was “Blind Alley,” which was written during September and early October of 1944. It was submitted to Campbell on October 10, and accepted on the twentieth.