Isaac Asimov - Caliban

Maybe, Reybon thought, I’ve gotten too good at this to bother with the low-end ones. This one was almost too simple.

“Okay, very good, you tin excuse for a machine,” Reybon said, leaning closer. “Now fire the blaster.”

The robot fired, and its head vaporized. Its body fell to the floor and dropped the weapon. Reybon roared with laughter and kicked the robot’s ruined carcass.

The floor was littered with the components of shattered robots. Reybon went over to a severed hand and kicked it clear across the floor of the abandoned warehouse. He stepped back, turned to his fellow laborers, who were sitting on packing cases in the middle of the room. He took a bow. They cheered wildly. One of them tossed him a bottle of something, and he caught it with the odd, neat, fluid dexterity some drunks have. He yanked the top off, and took a long pull from the bottle.

“Who’s next?” he demanded. “That one was too easy. Who’s gonna get me some stupid hunka metal ’n’ plastic that’s gonna be tougher to crack?”

Santee Timitz got up. “I’ll go,” she said. “Lemme go find one.” She ambled toward the door of the warehouse, moving a bit slowly. “I’ll get you a really good one.” The rest of the group found that absurdly funny for some reason, and laughed louder and harder than ever.

“Hey, hey, Reybon,” Denlo said. “Maybe it’s time we got going, huh? Deputy’s gonna show up sooner or later. Maybe we quit while we’re ahead, huh?”

Reybon walked back to the gang lounging on the packing cases. “Ah, take it easy, Denlo. We’re okay. Santee’ll find us a good one.”

NIGHT had come, and still Caliban walked the streets of the city, watching, thinking, learning. Robots were utterly, totally subservient to humans, that much he was sure of. Whatever a human told a robot to do, that robot did. Why, he could not imagine.

Humans were weaker, slower, in some ways at least far less intelligent and competent than robots. But even if the datastore contained no information on robots, Caliban had at least the resonances in the datastore, the remnant hints left behind by whoever had assembled the datastore and then excised the robot data. Those hints, those resonances, seemed to confirm his impression that robot subservience was irrational. In fact, the whispering mood-voice went further than that, implying, insinuating, that the situation was actually dangerous. Caliban had no way of judging that, or even of knowing if the whispers were real projections from the datastore’s creator, or a malfunction, a failure in his own perception.

Humans. They were the other side of the equation. Many of them seemed to have vast amounts of time for leisure. They lingered in restaurants, relaxed in the parks, read bookfilms in the backseat while the robots drove the cars. Robots had no leisure.

On the very few occasions in which Caliban saw a robot not working, not fetching or carrying or repairing or building, then that robot would be waiting, standing stock-still, staring straight ahead, unwilling—or perhaps unable—to do anything at all unless it was told to do something. How could they not take advantage of spare moments to explore, enjoy, the world of which they were a part? Strange were the ways of the world; Caliban could better understand human behavior than that of his own kind.

But at least his observations did teach him how to act, what to do, if he was to avoid any other unpleasant incidents. Act busy. Do what a human tells you to do. It wasn’t much, but it ought to be enough to keep him safe.

SANTEE was none too steady on her feet, and she half tripped over a bit of trash in the street. But that didn’t matter. Trash in the street was a victory. The sight of trash in a Spacer city that was supposed to be spotlessly clean almost made them seem human. Almost. Maybe it just meant things weren’t in such great shape on this world, but she had known that already. Otherwise, why would the Spacers come to Tonya Welton for help? But littered streets also meant that there were precious few maintenance and street-cleaner robots about. Well, that was all right. Street-cleaners were no real challenge, anyway.

She would just find another kind of robot and bring it back to the warehouse. Something smarter than a street-sweeper. Something more interesting. She stumbled through the empty streets, looking for prospects. That was the trouble with this game, she decided. The only places in town it was safe to play were the untenanted places, where few humans or robots went.

Wait a second. There, up ahead. A big red robot, a stylish-looking make. And no one else around. “Hey, you, robot!” she called. “Stop! Turn around and come toward me.”

Santee grinned eagerly. This one was no half-mindless little street-sweeper. There was obviously money and polish behind this robot. Anyone who spent that kind of money on the frame was bound to have spent even more on the brain. It would be fun messing with this robot’s mind.

The robot seemed a little slow in turning around, as if it had to think about it for a moment. Maybe it wasn’t so smart. No—no, wait a second. What had they told them in those damned orientation classes? Something about the lower-end robots having less discretion to act, and the higher-end ones being able to evaluate various hierarchies of importance to their orders, and something about setting an owner’s order higher in precedence. With a high enough precedence a robot could be forced to ignore all subsequent orders—ah, hell, she couldn’t remember all the details of that crap. But maybe it meant that a dumb robot would turn around faster. The smart ones would have to think about it for a while.

Finally the red robot turned around and started toward her. Good. Every once in a while Santee could understand why the damn Spacers put their kids through classes in how to handle robots. It could get complicated.

Santee stood there, a bit unsteadily, as the big red robot came closer. She had to look up at it when it got close enough. Damn thing had to be a half meter taller than she was.

A twinge of nervous foreboding went through her as she stared up at those glowing blue eyes. “Hey, robot. You,” she said, quite unnecessarily, slurring her words just a bit. “You come wi’ me.” She lifted her hand and moved her forearm in a somewhat jerky come-along gesture and turned around to lead the robot back to the warehouse where her friends waited. Suddenly her mouth was dry, and she felt a line of prickles down her back. Maybe she should let this one go, find another robot. There was something scary about this one.

No, that was stupid. A robot may not harm a human being, or through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. That much she remembered, and never mind how much she had dozed off in the back of the orientation lecture. That the instructors drummed into their heads again and again. It was the key fact about robots. It was what made robot bashing possible. No way they could get hurt.

Santee straightened her back and walked a little taller. There was nothing to fear. She led the way, not altogether steadily, back to the warehouse.

CALIBAN was confused, and troubled, even alarmed as he followed behind the short, oddly dressed woman with slurred speech and a rather wobbly way of walking. Act like the other robots, he told himself again. Do what a human tells you to do.

The plan gave him a simple and obvious guide to action, yes—but it was predicated on everyone else knowing the rules, even if he did not. Further, the plan was predicated on everyone else following those unknown rules as well.

But the moment he stepped into the warehouse, he knew these people were not following any rules at all. There was a strange tension in their postures, a furtiveness in their movements. The hint of viewpoint, of opinion, layered over the objective information in his datastore told him that much and more. The ghostly emotional link whispered to him of danger, of the need for caution.