Asimov’s Future History Volume 19 Read online

  He rubbed his hands.

  Novi said timidly, “Master?”

  “Yes, Novi?”

  “Will you not be rewarded for what you have done?”

  “Indeed I will. Shandess will retire and I will be First Speaker. Then will come my chance to make us an active factor in revolutionizing the Galaxy.”

  “First Speaker?”

  “Yes, Novi. I will be the most important and the most powerful scholar of them all.”

  “The most important?” She looked woebegone.

  “Why do you make a face, Novi? Don’t you want me to be rewarded?”

  “Yes, Master, I do. – But if you are the most important scholar of them all, you will not want a Hamishwoman near you. It would not be fitting.”

  “Won’t I, though? Who will stop me?” He felt a gush of affection for her. “Novi, you’ll stay with me wherever I go and whatever I am. Do you think I would risk dealing with some of the wolves we occasionally have at the Table without your mind always there to tell me, even before they know themselves, what their emotions might be – your own innocent, absolutely smooth mind. Besides –” He seemed startled by a sudden revelation, “Even aside from that, I – I like having you with me and I intend having you with me. – That is, if you are willing.”

  “Oh, Master,” whispered Novi and, as his arm moved around her waist, her head sank to his shoulder.

  Deep within, where the enveloping mind of Novi could scarcely be aware of it, the essence of Gaia remained and guided events, but it was that impenetrable mask that made the continuance of the great task possible.

  And that mask – the one that belonged to a Hamishwoman – was completely happy. It was so happy that Novi was almost reconciled for the distance she was from herself/them/all, and she was content to be, for the indefinite future, what she seemed to be.

  3.

  PELORAT RUBBED HIS hands and said, with carefully controlled enthusiasm, “How glad I am to be back on Gaia.”

  “Umm,” said Trevize abstractedly.

  “You know what Bliss has told me? The Mayor is going back to Terminus with a commercial treaty with Sayshell. The Speaker from the Second Foundation is going back to Trantor convinced that he has arranged it – and that woman, Novi, is going with him to see to it that the changes that will bring about Galaxia are initiated. And neither Foundation is in the least aware that Gaia exists. It’s absolutely amazing.”

  “I know,” said Trevize. “I was told all this, too. But we know that Gaia exists and we can talk.”

  “Bliss doesn’t think so. She says no one would believe us, and we would know that. Besides, I, for one, have no intention of ever leaving Gaia.”

  Trevize was pulled out of his inner musing. He looked up and said, “What?”

  “I’m going to stay here. – You know, I can’t believe it. Just weeks ago, I was living a lonely life on Terminus, the same life I had lived for decades, immersed in my records and my thoughts and never dreaming anything but that I would go to my death, whenever it might be, still immersed in my records and my thoughts and still living my lonely life – contentedly vegetating. Then, suddenly and unexpectedly, I became a Galactic traveler; I was involved with a Galactic crisis; and – do not laugh, Golan – I have found Bliss.”

  “I’m not laughing, Janov,” said Trevize, “but are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

  “Oh yes. This matter of Earth is no longer important to me. The fact that it was the only world with a diverse ecology and with intelligent life has been adequately explained. The Eternals, you know.”

  “Yes, I know. And you’re going to stay on Gaia?”

  “Absolutely. Earth is the past and I’m tired of the past. Gaia is the future.”

  “You’re not part of Gaia, Janov. Or do you think you can become part of it?”

  “Bliss says that I can become somewhat a part of it – intellectually if not biologically. She’ll help, of course.”

  “But since she is part of it, how can you two find a common life, a common point of view, a common interest –”

  They were in the open and Trevize looked gravely at the quiet, fruitful island, and beyond it the sea, and on the horizon, purpled by distance, another island – all of it peaceful, civilized, alive, and a unit.

  He said, “Janov, she is a world; you are a tiny individual. What if she gets tired of you? She is young –”

  “Golan, I’ve thought of that. I’ve thought of nothing but that for days. I expect her to grow tired of me; I’m no romantic idiot. But whatever she gives me till then will be enough. She has already given me enough. I have received more from her than I dreamed existed in life. If I saw her no more from this moment on, I have ended the winner.”

  “I don’t believe it,” said Trevize gently. “I think you are a romantic idiot and, mind you, I wouldn’t want you any other way. Janov, we haven’t known each other for long, but we’ve been together every moment for weeks and – I’m sorry if it sounds silly – I like you a great deal.”

  “And I, you, Golan,” said Pelorat.

  “And I don’t want you hurt. I must talk to Bliss.”

  “No no. Please don’t. You’ll lecture her.”

  “I won’t lecture her. It’s not entirely to do with you – and I want to talk to her privately. Please, Janov, I don’t want to do it behind your back, so grant me your willingness to have me talk to her and get a few things straight. If I am satisfied, I will give you my heartiest congratulations and goodwill – and I will forever hold my peace, whatever happens.”

  Pelorat shook his head. “You’ll ruin things.”

  “I promise I won’t I beg you –”

  “Well – But do be careful, my dear fellow, won’t you?”

  “You have my solemn word.”

  4.

  BLISS SAID, “PEL says you want to see me.”

  Trevize said, “Yes.”

  They were indoors, in the small apartment allotted to him.

  She sat down gracefully, crossed her legs, and looked up at him shrewdly, her beautiful brown eyes luminous and her long, dark hair glistening.

  She said, “You disapprove of me, don’t you? You have disapproved of me from the start.”

  Trevize remained standing. He said, “You are aware of minds and of their contents. You know what I think of you and why.”

  Slowly Bliss shook her head. “Your mind is out of bounds to Gaia. You know that. Your decision was needed and it had to be the decision of a clear and untouched mind. When your ship was first taken, I placed you and Pel within a soothing field, but that was essential. You would have been damaged – and perhaps rendered useless for a crucial time – by panic or rage. And that was all. I could never go beyond that and I haven’t – so I don’t know what you’re thinking.”

  Trevize said, “The decision I had to make has been made. I decided in favor of Gaia and Galaxia. Why, then, all this talk of a clear and untouched mind? You have what you want and you can do with me now as you wish.”

  “Not at all, Trev. There are other decisions that may be needed in the future. You remain what you are and, while you are alive, you are a rare natural resource of the Galaxy. Undoubtedly there are others like you in the Galaxy and others like you will appear in the future, but for now we know of you – and only you. We still cannot touch you.”

  Trevize considered. “You are Gaia and I don’t want to talk to Gaia. I want to talk to you as an individual, if that has any meaning at all.”

  “It has meaning. We are far from existing in a common melt. I can block off Gaia for a period of time.”

  “Yes,” said Trevize. “I think you can. Have you now done so?”

  “I have now done so.”

  “Then, first, let me tell you that you have played games. You did not enter my mind to influence my decision, perhaps, but you certainly entered Janov’s mind to do so, didn’t you?”

  “Do you think I did?”

  “I think you did. At the crucial moment, Pel
orat reminded me of his own vision of the Galaxy as alive and the thought drove me on to make my decision at that moment. The thought may have been his, but yours was the mind that triggered it, was it not?”

  Bliss said, “The thought was in his mind, but there were many thoughts there. I smoothed the path before that reminiscence of his about the living Galaxy – and not before any other thought of his. That particular thought, therefore, slipped easily out of his consciousness and into words. Mind you, I did not create the thought. It was there.”

  “Nevertheless, that amounted to an indirect tampering with the perfect independence of my decision, did it not?”

  “Gaia felt it necessary.”

  “Did it? – Well, it may make you feel better – or nobler – to know that although Janov’s remark persuaded me to make the decision at that moment, it was the decision I think I would have made even if he had said nothing or if he had tried to argue me into a decision of a different kind. I want you to know that.”

  “I am relieved,” said Bliss coolly. “Is that what you wanted to tell me when you asked to see me?”

  “No.”

  “What else is there?”

  Now Trevize sat down in a chair he had drawn opposite her so that their knees nearly touched. He leaned toward her.

  “When we approached Gaia, it was you on the space station. It was you who trapped us; you who came out to get us; you who have remained with us ever since – except for the meal with Dom, which you did not share with us. In particular, it was you on the Far Star with us, when the decision was made. Always you.”

  “I am Gaia.”

  “That does not explain it. A rabbit is Gaia. A pebble is Gaia. Everything on the planet is Gaia, but they are not all equally Gaia. Some are more equal than others. Why you?”

  “Why do you think?”

  Trevize made the plunge. He said, “Because I don’t think you’re Gaia. I think you’re more than Gaia.”

  Bliss made a derisive sound with her lips.

  Trevize kept to his course. “At the time I was making the decision, the woman with the Speaker –”

  “He called her Novi.”

  “This Novi, then, said that Gaia was set on its course by the robots that no longer exist and that Gaia was taught to follow a version of the Three Laws of Robotics.”

  “That is quite true.”

  “And the robots no longer exist?”

  “So Novi said.”

  “So Novi did not say. I remember her exact words. She said: ‘Gaia was formed thousands of years ago with the help of robots that once, for a brief time, served The human species and now serve them no more.”

  “Well, Trev, doesn’t that mean they exist no more?”

  “No, it means they serve no more. Might they not rule instead?”

  “Ridiculous!”

  “Or supervise? Why were you there at the time of the decision? You did not seem to be essential. It was Novi who conducted matters and she was Gaia. What need of you? Unless –”

  “Well? Unless?”

  “Unless you are the supervisor whose role it is to make certain that Gaia does not forget the Three Laws. Unless you are a robot, so cleverly made that you cannot be told from a human being.”

  “If I cannot be told from a human being, how is it you think that you can tell?” asked Bliss with a trace of sarcasm.

  Trevize sat back. “Do you not all assure me I have the faculty of being sure; of making decisions, seeing solutions, drawing correct conclusions. I don’t claim this; it is what you say of me. Well, from the moment I saw you I felt uneasy. There was something wrong with you. I am certainly as susceptible to feminine allure as Pelorat is – more so, I should think – and you are an attractive woman in appearance. Yet not for one moment did I feel the slightest attraction.”

  “You devastate me.”

  Trevize ignored that. He said, “When you first appeared on our ship, Janov and I had been discussing the possibility of a nonhuman civilization on Gaia, and when Janov saw you, he asked, in his innocence, ‘Are you human?’ Perhaps a robot must answer the truth, but I suppose it can be evasive. You merely said, ‘Don’t I look human?’ Yes, you look human, Bliss, but let me ask you again. Are you human?”

  Bliss said nothing and Trevize continued. “I think that even at that first moment, I felt you were not a woman. You are a robot and I could somehow tell. And because of my feeling, all the events that followed had meaning for me – particularly your absence from the dinner.”

  Bliss said, “Do you think I cannot eat, Trev? Have you forgotten I nibbled a shrimp dish on your ship? I assure you that I am able to eat and perform any of the other biological functions. – Including, before you ask, sex. And yet that in itself, I might as well tell you, does not prove that I am not a robot. Robots had reached the pitch of perfection, even thousands of years ago, where only by their brains were they distinguishable from human beings, and then only by those able to handle mentalic fields. Speaker Gendibal might have been able to tell whether I were robot or human, if he had bothered even once to consider me. Of course, he did not.”

  “Yet, though I am without mentalics, I am nevertheless convinced you are a robot”

  Bliss said, “But what if I am? I admit nothing, but I am curious. What if I am?”

  “You have no need to admit anything. I know you are a robot If I needed a last bit of evidence, it was your calm assurance that you could block off Gaia and speak to me as an individual. I don’t think you could do that if you were part of Gaia – but you are not You are a robot supervisor and, therefore, outside of Gaia. I wonder, come to think of it, how many robot supervisors Gaia requires and possesses?”

  “I repeat: I admit nothing, but I am curious. What if I am a robot?”

  “In that case, what I want to know is: What do you want of Janov Pelorat? He is my friend and he is, in some ways, a child. He thinks he loves you; he thinks he wants only what you are willing to give and that you have already given him enough. He doesn’t know – and cannot conceive – the pain of the loss of love or, for that matter, the peculiar pain of knowing that you are not human –”

  “Do you know the pain of lost love?”

  “I have had my moments. I have not led the sheltered life of Janov. I have not had my life consumed and anesthetized by an intellectual pursuit that swallowed up everything else, even wife and child. He has. Now suddenly, he gives it all up for you. I do not want him hurt. I will not have him hurt. If I have served Gaia, I deserve a reward – and my reward is your assurance that Janov Pelorat’s well-being will be preserved.”

  “Shall I pretend I am a robot and answer you?”

  Trevize said, “Yes. And right now.”

  “Very well, then. Suppose I am a robot, Trev, and suppose I am in a position of supervision. Suppose there are a few, a very few, who have a similar role to myself and suppose we rarely meet. Suppose that our driving force is the need to care for human beings and suppose there are no true humans beings on Gaia, because all are part of an overall planetary being.

  “Suppose that it fulfills us to care for Gaia – but not entirely. Suppose there is something primitive in us that longs for a human being in the sense that existed when robots were first formed and designed. Don’t mistake me; I do not claim to be age-old (assuming I am a robot). I am as old as I told you I was or, at least, (assuming I am a robot) that has been the term of my existence. Still, (assuming I am a robot) my fundamental design would be as it always was and I would long to care for a true human being.

  “Pel is a human being. He is not part of Gaia. He is too old to ever become a true part of Gaia. He wants to stay on Gaia with me, for he does not have the feelings about me that you have. He does not think that I am a robot. Well, I want him, too. If you assume that I am a robot, you see that I would. I am capable of all human reactions and I would love him. If you were to insist I was a robot, you might not consider me capable of love in some mystic human sense, but you would not be able to disti
nguish my reactions from that which you would call love – so what difference would it make?”

  She stopped and looked at him – intransigently proud.

  Trevize said, “You are telling me that you would not abandon him?”

  “If you assume that I am a robot, then you can see for yourself that by First Law I could never abandon him, unless he ordered me to do so and I were, in addition, convinced that he meant it and that I would be hurting him more by staying than by leaving.”

  “Would not a younger man –”

  “What younger man? You are a younger man, but I do not conceive you as needing me in the same sense that Pel does, and, in fact, you do not want me, so that the First Law would prevent me from attempting to cling to you.”

  “Not me. Another younger man –”

  “There is no other. Who is there on Gaia other than Pel and yourself that would qualify as human beings in the non-Gaian sense?”

  Trevize said, more softly, “And if you are not a robot?”

  “Make up your mind,” said Bliss.

  “I say, if you are not a robot?”

  “Then I say that, in that case, you have no right to say anything at all. It is for myself and for Pel to decide.”

  Trev said, “Then I return to my first point. I want my reward and that reward is that you will treat him well. I won’t press the point of your identity. Simply assure me, as one intelligence to another, that you will treat him well.”

  And Bliss said softly, “I will treat him well – not as a reward to you, but because I wish to. It is my earnest desire. I will treat him well.” She called “Pel!” And again, “Pel!”

  Pelorat entered from outside, “Yes, Bliss.”

  Bliss held out her hand to him. “I think Trev wants to say something.”

  Pelorat took her hand and Trevize then took the doubled hand in his two. “Janov,” he said, “I am happy for both of you.”

  Pelorat said, “Oh, my dear fellow.”