Clifford Simak - Project Pope

Just how many ships the robots had used to transport themselves and their equipment to End of Nothing, or how they had originally acquired the ships, also was not written out in black and white. The best estimate she could arrive at was that there had been no more than three. Several trips to and from Earth had been made, the later trips to bring in materials that could not be accommodated on the first flight, with the last trip bringing in the humans whose descendants still lived upon the planet. Eventually the ships had been broken up for the metal and other materials that could be salvaged. Once again, it was not clear when this had been done, but it made sense, Jill told herself, that it had not been until the thought-driven ships (if they really were thought-driven) had been built.

The robots had done much more, at first glance, than it would have seemed could have been done in a thousand years — that is, until one considered that robots need take off no time to rest or sleep. They could work around the clock, if need be, for weeks and months, perhaps for years, on end. They were never tired or sleepy. They were never ill. They felt no need of recreation or of entertainment, and she found herself wondering, bemusedly, what a robot might do for recreation or for entertainment. They did not have to take time out to eat; they never paused for breath.

And the remodeling of robots, the designing of new robots (a new generation or generations of robots) was simpler, too, when one thought about it, than would be the mutation and evolution of biologic forms. The genetic shufflings that must take place to bring about appreciable modifications in biological systems would require an enormous amount of time. Natural biological evolution required the death and birth of many generations to pass the gene mutations on and to allow the long, slow process of adaptation. But in a robot society all that would be required to bring about desired changes and new capability would be the redesigning of new forms and mechanisms and the engineering that it would take to translate the blueprints into being.

Behind her a footstep sounded, and at the sound she turned around. It was Asa with her sandwiches and the glass of milk.

He put them down, carefully, in front of her and stepped softly to one side.

'And now, he asked, 'what would you have me do?

'For the moment, she said, 'nothing at all. Take a rest. Sit down and talk wit-h me.

'I need no rest, he said. 'I have no need to sit.

'It's not against your rules, is it?

'Well, not against the rules.

'Even cardinals sit, she said. 'When His Eminence, Theodosius, comes to visit me, he often sits and talks.

'If you wish, said Asa, perching himself upon the stool the cardinal used on his visits.

She picked up a sandwich and took a bite. It was roast beef and tasted good. She picked up the glass of milk.

'Asa, she said, 'tell me about yourself. Were you forged on Earth?

'Not on Earth, milady.

'Then here?

'Yes, here. I am a third-generation robot.

'I see. And how many generations might there be?

'There is no way of telling. It depends on how you count. Some say five, others seven.

'That many?

'That many. There may be even more.

'Have you ever been to some of the places the Listeners have found?

'Twice, milady. I have made two trips.

'Ever outside of time and space?

'On one of them, he said. 'One of the two, I was outside of time and space.

'Could you tell me what it was like?

'No, I cannot. There is no way to tell. It's another place. Not like here at all.

Once again Tennyson was in the place of equations and of diagrams, and this time some of them could be vaguely recognized.

One, he was convinced, was Ecuyer. The diagram somehow had the look of Ecuyer and the equations that were associated with it, in some manner which he could not comprehend, spelled out Ecuyer. Maybe the color, he thought, for Ecuyer's diagram and equations were gray and rose, but why gray and rose should be Ecuyer, he could not imagine. Certainly, he thought, color should have little to do with it — rather it would be the shape of the diagrams and the components of the equations that should determine what they were. Tennyson fought mentally, sweating and gasping, clawing at his intellect, to factor out the equations, but that was impossible because he did not know the conventions and the signs.

Deliberately he backed away from Ecuyer, or what he thought must be Eçuyer. Deliberately, but fighting every step that backed him away. View it all from another angle, he told himself, achieve a perspective from a distance, look away for a while to wipe it from your mind in the hope that when looking back at it again something — either something in the diagram or the equations — will jump out at you.

For he must know, he told himself; it was vital that he know if this was Ecuyer.

The place was hazy and there was a quaver in the air. If only something, just one thing, would be still, he thought — if he could get one good look at something. The trouble was that while it never actually changed, it always seemed on the verge of change. That was it — uncertainty.

Having looked away, he now looked back, swiveling his head quickly in the hope he might catch the diagrams and equations by surprise.

Ecuyer was gone. The gray and rose were gone. In its place was a purple and gold; another diagram and a new set of equations.

Seeing them, he froze. His terror rose to choke him and he screamed.

'Mary! Mary! Mary!

He struggled to climb out of wherever he was, although there was nothing he could climb and someone had seized him to prevent his climbing.

'No! No! No! he shouted, and someone was whispering to him.

'There, there, there… the someone said, and soft hands were upon him and when he opened his eyes he found himself in darkness — which was strange, for he had not known his eyes were

closed.

The voice said, 'No, Hubert, it's all right. He was having a nightmare.

'Jill? Tennyson asked weakly.

'Yes. It's all right now. I'm with you. You're back again.

He was in bed, he saw, with Jill bending over him and Hubert hovering in the lighted doorway.

'I worked late, said Jill, 'and I thought you might be asleep, but I knocked anyway and Hubert let me in. I wanted to see you. I had so much to tell you.

'I was in the equation world, he told her. 'I was dreaming it again. Ecuyer was there and he was gray and rose and when I looked away for a moment…

'You were screaming at Mary. Was Mary there? The Heaven Mary?

He nodded, struggling to sit up, still befuddled with the dream. 'She was purple and gold, he said. 'And it was horrible.

It was the first time he'd returned since he'd finally walked away from the boat ten — no, it must have been twelve — years ago, and it still was there, where he'd remembered it, lying in a small, grassy valley between two ranges of steep hills. Brambles had grown up around it, but not so thickly or so high as to obscure it. Apparently nothing else had found it, for it lay exactly as he remembered it, and he wondered how he could have found it so easily, walking straight through the tangled foothills to the place he knew it was.

— Whisperer, are you here? he asked.

Knowing that he was, but he had to ask.

— Yes, Decker. Of course I'm here. So is the Old One of the Woods. He's been following us for days.

— What does he want?

— He's curious, is all. You puzzle him. All humans puzzle him. And you puzzle me. Why back to your beginning?

— It's not my beginning, said Decker. I began very far from here.

— Your beginning on this planet, then.