Caliban

“Very well, go on.”

“Every single robot flatly refused to identify who had given the order. Our robopsychologists unanimously agree that the block restraining them is unbreakable. The psychologists took several robots to and past the breaking point, pressuring them to answer, and all refused to talk right up to the moment they brainlocked. The robots died rather than talk, even when told that their silence might well allow Fredda Leving’s attacker to go free.”

Alvar looked at Donald in amazement. “Burning devils. It’s almost unheard-of for a block to be that good. Whoever placed it must have done a damned convincing job of saying harm would certainly come to himself—or herself—if the robots talked.”

“Yes, sir. That is the obvious conclusion. There would be no other way to keep a robot from refusing to assist the police in capturing a murderer. Even so, it would require a human with remarkable skill in giving orders, and an intimate knowledge of the relative potentials of the Three Laws as programmed into each class of robot, to resist police questioning. I would venture a guess that it was only the shock of seeing Fredda Leving unconscious and bleeding that allowed Daabor 5132 to say as much as it did before expiring.”

“Yes, yes. But why was this order given more than once? Why would the order- giver need that sort of privacy repeatedly?”

“I cannot say, sir. But the last point is perhaps the most remarkable. The block was placed with such skill that no human at the lab was even aware that the block had been placed. A whole lab full of robot specialists never even noticed that all the robots would not, could not, talk about being ordered to clear off again and again. The degree of skill required to—”

Suddenly Donald stopped moving and seemed to come to attention. “Sir, I am receiving an incoming call for you from Tonya Welton on your private line.”

“Devil and fire, what the hell does that woman want? All right, put her through. And you might as well give me full visual.”

Donald turned his back on Kresh. A flat vertical televisor panel extruded itself from between his shoulders and slid up behind the back of his head. As it rose up, it was showing a shifting abstract pattern, but then it resolved to a sharp image of Tonya Welton. “Sheriff Kresh,” she said. “Glad I got through to you. You should come here, to Settlertown, now.”

Kresh felt a sharp stab of anger. How dare she order him around? “There’s not that much new at this end, Madame Welton,” Kresh said. “Perhaps if we delayed our next meeting until I’ve had a chance to develop more information—”

“That’s not why I need you, Sheriff. There’s something you should see. Here, in Settlertown. Or more accurately, over it.”

Donald spoke, swiveling his head a bit. “Sir, I am now receiving reports from headquarters confirming a disturbance in Settlertown.”

Kresh felt a knot in the pit of his stomach. “Burning hellfire, not again.”

“Oh, yes, again,” Welton said, cool anger in her voice. “Deliberate provocation, and I don’t know how calm I can keep my people. Your deputies are here, of course—but it’s worse than last time. Much worse.”

Kresh shut his eyes and wished desperately for things to stop happening. Not that such wishes were likely to come true any time soon. “Very well, Madame Welton. We’re on the way.”

5

MURDER. Riot. What the hell was going on, anyway? Alvar Kresh powered up his aircar and took the controls. It took little more than a glare in Donald’s direction to make it clear to the robot that Alvar intended to fly himself, just at the moment, and was not going to take any nonsense.

But still, no sense in getting Donald upset for no reason. Alvar took off, flying with a nicely calculated degree of care, guiding the craft just cautiously enough to keep Donald from taking over.

Violent crime wasn’t supposed to happen on Spacer worlds. The endless wealth and unlimited prosperity provided by robotic labor was supposed to eliminate poverty, and so remove any motive for crime.

Nice theory, of course, but it did not quite work out that way. If only it did, Alvar Kresh would have a much more peaceful time of it. For there was always someone relatively poorer than someone else. Someone with only a small mansion instead of a big one, who dreamed of owning a palace. Someone jealous of someone’s greater affluence, determined to redress the unfair imbalance.

And no matter how rich you were, only one person could own a given object. Spacer society had more than its share of artists, and thus more than its share of art, some small fraction of it remarkably good. The burning desire to own an original and unique work of art was common motive for burglary.

There were plenty of other motives for crime besides poverty and greed, of course. People still got drunk and lusted after other people’s spouses, and got into arguments with their neighbors. There were still lovers’ quarrels, and domestic incidents.

Love and jealousy sparked many a crime of passion, if you could call a crime passionate when it required intricate, detailed planning to arrange for your victim to be somewhere robots weren’t…

Others broke the law seeking after a different kind of gain than wealth or love. Simcor Beddle, for example. He hungered after power, and was willing to risk arrest—for himself and for his Ironheads—in order to get it.

And that was just the start of the list of motives. Inferno society was deeply hierarchical, its upper crust burdened with an incredibly complex system of proper behavior. It was vital to keep up appearances, and virtually impossible to avoid making a misstep sometime. In short, upper-class Inferno was a perfect breeding ground for blackmailers and revenge seekers.

Then there was industrial espionage, more than likely the motive for the attack on Fredda Leving. If there was little original research performed on Inferno, that just made the little that was done that much more precious.

But none of these motives would have much force if not for another factor, one that, in Alvar’s opinion, few observers and theorists gave anywhere near sufficient weight: Boredom.

There was nothing much to do on a Spacer world. There were certain personality types that did not adapt well to the endless leisure, the endless robotic protection and pampering. Some small fraction of such types became thrillseekers.

There was one last thing to throw into the mix, of course—the Settlers. They had been here just over a standard year, and the Sheriff’s Department had never been busier. There had been endless barroom brawls, scuffles in the street, mass demonstrations—and riots.

Such as the one they were coming up on now. They were nearly at Settlertown.

Kresh let Donald take the controls. He wanted to be able to see it all from the air, watch the riot in progress, learn the pattern, learn how to counter the Ironheads’ latest moves. He had to keep one step ahead of them, keep them from getting completely out of control.

Which was ironic, of course, because he believed in everything the Ironheads professed. But a lawman could not let his politics prevent him from quashing a riot.

Settlertown. Now there was a mad lapse of policy, one that could only result in the sort of strife that had apparently just broken out again. Chanto Grieg and the City Council had granted the Settlers an enclave inside Hades, given them a large tract of unused land, meant for an industrial park that had never been built. If Grieg had to have the damned Settlers on the planet, why in the devil’s name couldn’t he have granted them an enclave well and safely outside the city limits? Putting them inside Hades was an incitement to riot all by itself.

But no, Grieg let the Settlers in, and the Settlers went to work. And there, coming into view at the horizon, was the result, barely a year after the land was granted. No building in view, of course, but that was deceiving. The Settlers preferred to put their buildings underground, leaving the landscape undisturbed. And if there was no landscape to speak of, why, then, they would build one.

Alvar’s eyes dropped from the horizon to watch the landscape below. The city of Hades swept past, its proud towers a bit tired and sand-blown, many of its parks faded about the edges, the empty quarters at the edge of town