by Isaac Asimov
“Actually, that’s not a very difficult question to answer, R. Daneel. Earth, in prehyperspatial days, had had experience with a primitive form of nuclear energy, and it wasn’t a happy experience. When the time came to choose between solar power and microfusion, Earthpeople saw microfusion as a form of nuclear energy and turned away from it. Other worlds, which did not have our direct experience with the primitive form of nuclear energy, had no reason to turn away from microfusion.”
“May I ask what this primitive form of nuclear energy to which you refer might be, madam?”
“Uranium fission,” said Quintana. “It’s completely different from microfusion. Fission involves the splitting of massive nuclei, such as those of uranium. Microfusion involves the joining of light nuclei, such as those of hydrogen. They’re both forms of nuclear energy, however.”
“I presume that uranium would be the fuel for fission devices.”
“Yes – or other massive nuclei, such as those of thorium or plutonium.”
“But uranium and these others are exceedingly rare metals. Could they support a fission-using society?”
“Those elements are rare on other worlds. On Earth, they are not exactly common, but neither are they terribly rare. Uranium and thorium are widely spread in the crust in small, quantities and are concentrated in a few places.”
“And are there any fission-power devices on Earth now, madam?”
“No,” said Quintana flatly. “Nowhere and in no fashion. Human beings would far sooner burn oil – or even wood – than fission uranium. The very word ‘uranium’ is taboo in polite society. You wouldn’t be asking me these questions or I giving you these answers if you were a human being and an Earthman.”
Daneel persisted. “But are you certain, madam? Is there no secret device that makes use of fission that, for the sake of national security –”
“No, robot,” said Quintana, frowning. “I tell you – no such device. None!”
Daneel rose. “I thank you, madam, and I ask your pardon for taking your time and for probing what would seem to be a sensitive subject. With your permission, I shall leave you now.”
Quintana waved a careless hand. “You’re welcome, R. Daneel.”
She turned again to her neighbor, secure in the knowledge that in the crowds of Earth, people never attempted to overhear a nearby conversation or, if they did, never admitted the fact. She said, “Would you imagine having a discussion on energetics with a robot?”
As for Daneel, he returned to his original place and said softly to Giskard, “Nothing, friend Giskard. Nothing helpful.”
Then he added sadly, “Perhaps I asked the wrong questions. Partner Elijah would have asked the right ones.”
17. The Assassin
78.
SECRETARY-GENERAL EDGAR Andrev, chief executive of Earth, was a rather tall and imposing man, clean-shaven in the Spacer style. He moved always in a measured fashion, as though on constant display, and he had a twinkling way about him as though he was always very pleased with himself. His voice was a bit too high-pitched for his body, but it fell well short of being squeaky. Without seeming obdurate, he was not easily swayed.
And he wasn’t this time. “Impossible,” he said firmly to D. G. “She must make her appearance.”
“She’s had a hard day, Secretary-General,” said D. G... She is not accustomed to crowds or to these surroundings. I am responsible to Baleyworld for her well-being and my personal honor is at stake.”
“I appreciate your position,” said Andrev, “but I represent, and I cannot deny Earthpeople their view of her. The corridors are filled, the hyperwave channels are ready, and I would not be able to hide her, even if I desperately wished to do so. After this – and how long can it last? Half an hour? – she can retire and she need not make another appearance till her speech tomorrow night.”
“Her comfort must be cared for,” said D. G., tacitly abandoning his position. “She has to be kept at some distance from the crowd.”
“There will be a cordon of security guards that will give her ample breathing space. The front row of the crowd will be kept well back. They’re out there now. If we don’t announce that she will soon appear, there might well be disorder.”
D. G. said, “It shouldn’t have been arranged. It isn’t safe. There are Earthpeople who aren’t fond of Spacers.”
The Secretary-General shrugged. “I wish you could tell me how I could possibly have kept it from being arranged. At the present moment she is a heroine and she cannot be withheld. Nor will anyone offer her anything but cheers – for the moment. But if she doesn’t appear, that will change. Now, let us go.”
D. G. backed away discontentedly. He caught Gladia’s eye. She looked tired and more than a little unhappy.
He said, “You must, Gladia. There’s no way out.”
For a moment, she stared down at her hands as though wondering if they could do anything to protect her, then she straightened herself and lifted her chin – a small Spacer amid this horde of barbarians. “If I must, I must. Will you remain with me?”
“Unless they remove me physically.”
“And my robots?”
D. G. hesitated. “Gladia, how will two robots be able to help you in the midst of millions of human beings?”
“I know, D. G. And I also know that I will have to do without them eventually if I am to continue this mission of mine. But not just yet, please. For the moment, I will feel safer with them, whether that makes sense or not. If these Earth officials want me to acknowledge the crowd, to smile, to wave, to do whatever it is I am supposed to do, the presence of Daneel and Giskard will comfort me. – Look, D. G., giving in to them on a very big thing, even though I am so uneasy that I think nothing would be so nice as to run away. Let them give in to me on this very little thing.”
“I’ll try,” said D. G., in clear discouragement and, as he stepped toward Andrev, Giskard moved quietly with him.
A few minutes later, when Gladia, surrounded by a carefully picked contingent of officials, moved forward toward an open balcony, D. G. remained a little behind Gladia, flanked on his left by Giskard and on his right by Daneel.
The Secretary-General had said ruefully, “All right, all right. I don’t know how you managed to make me agree, but all right.” He rubbed his forehead, aware of a small vague ache in his right temple. For some reason he caught Giskard’s eye and turned away with a stifled shudder. “But you must keep them motionless, Captain, remember. And please keep the one that looks like a robot as unobtrusive as you can. He makes me uneasy and I don’t want people any more aware of him than they have to be.”
D. G. said, “They will be looking at Gladia, Secretary-General. They will see no one else.”
“I hope so,” said Andrev waspishly. He paused to take a message capsule someone placed in his hand. He put it into his pocket, then walked on and didn’t think of it again till they had reached the balcony.
79.
To Gladia, it seemed that each time she moved into another scene, it grew worse – more people, more noise, more confusing light, more invasion of every sense perception.
There was shouting. She could hear her own name being shouted out. With difficulty, she overcame her own tendency to retreat and become immobile. She lifted her arm and waved it and smiled and the shouting became louder. someone began to speak, his voice booming out over the loudspeaker system, his image on a large screen high above them so that it could be visible to all the crowd. Undoubtedly, it was also visible on innumerable screens in innumerable meeting halls in every Section of every City on the planet.
Gladia sighed with relief at having someone else in the spotlight. She tried to shrink within herself and let the sound of the speaker distract the attention of the crowd.
Secretary-General Andrev, seeking cover under the voice, even as Gladia did, was rather thankful that, in giving precedence to Gladia, it had not seemed necessary for him to speak on this occasion. He suddenly remembered the message h
e had pocketed.
He frowned in sudden disturbance over what it might be that warranted the interruption of so important a ceremony and then experienced a reverse feeling of intense irritation over the fact that it would probably prove to be utterly unimportant.
He pressed the ball of his right thumb hard against the slight concavity designed to accept the pressure and the capsule opened. He removed the thin piece of plastipaper, read the message it contained, and then watched it crumble and fragment. He brushed away the impalpable powder that remained and gestured imperiously to D. G.
It was scarcely necessary to whisper under the conditions of the vast and continuing noise in the square.
Andrev said, “You said you encountered an Auroran war vessel within the space of the Solar System.”
“Yes – and I imagine Earth’s sensors detected it.”
“Of course they did. You said there were no hostile actions on either side.”
“No weapon was used. They demanded Madam Gladia and her robots. I refused and they left. I explained all this.”
“How long did it all take?”
“Not very long. Several hours.”
“You mean that Aurora sent a warship just to argue back and forth with you for a couple of hours and then leave.”
D. G. shrugged. “Secretary-General, I don’t know their motivations. I can only report what happened.”
The Secretary-General stared at him haughtily. “But you do not report all that happened. The information of the sensors has now been thoroughly analyzed by computer and it would seem that you attacked.”
“I did not fire a kilowatt of energy, sir.”
“Have you considered kinetic energy? You used the ship itself as a projectile.”
“So it may have seemed to them. They did not choose to withstand me and call what might have been a bluff.”
“But was it a bluff?”
“It might have been.”
“It seems to me, Captain, that you were ready to destroy two ships inside the Solar System and perhaps create a war crisis. That was a terrible chance to take.”
“I did not think it would come to actual destruction and it didn’t.”
“But the whole process delayed you and occupied your attention.”
“Yes, I suppose so, but why are you pointing this out?”
“Because our sensors did observe one thing you did not observe – or, at any rate, did not report.”
“What might that be, Secretary-General?”
“It caught the launching of an orbital module, which seems to have had two human beings on board and which descended toward Earth.”
The two were immersed in a world of their own. No other human being on the balcony was paying any attention to them. Only the two robots flanking D. G. were staring at them and listening.
It was at this point that the speaker ceased, his last words being, “Lady Gladia, born a Spacer on the world of Solaria, living as a Spacer on the world of Aurora, but becoming a Citizen of the Galaxy on the Settler world of Baleyworld.” He turned to her and gestured expansively, “Lady Gladia –”
The sound of the crowd became a long, happy rumble and the many-headed crowd became a forest of waving arms. Gladia felt a gentle hand on her shoulder and heard a voice in her ear that said, “Please. A few words, my lady.”
Gladia said weakly, “People of Earth.” The words boomed out and, uncannily, silence fell. Gladia said again, more firmly, “People of Earth, I stand before you a human being as you are. A bit older, I admit, so that I lack your youth, your hopefulness, your capacity for enthusiasm. My misfortune is tempered at this moment, however, by the fact that in your presence I feel myself catching your fire, so that the cloak of age falls away –”
Applause swelled and someone on the balcony said to someone else, “She’s making them happy they’re shortlived. That Spacer woman has the impudence of a devil.”
Andrev was not paying attention. He said to D. G., “The whole episode with you may have been a device to get those men on Earth.”
D. G. said, “I had no way of knowing that. I could think of very little else but saving Lady Gladia and my ship. Where have they landed?”
“We don’t know. They have not landed in any of the City spaceports.”
D. G. said, “I guess they wouldn’t.”
“Not that it matters,” said the Secretary-General, “except to give me passing annoyance. Over the past several years, there have been a number of landings of this sort, though none so carefully prepared. Nothing’s ever happened and we pay no attention. Earth, after all, is an open world. It is humanity’s home and any person from any world can come and go freely – even Spacers, if they wish.”
D. G. rubbed his beard with a rasping noise. “And yet their intentions might not be to do us any good whatever.”
(Gladia was saying, “I wish you all well on this world of human origin, on this well-packed special world, and in this marvel of a City –” and acknowledged the gathering applause with a smile and a wave as she stood there and allowed the enthusiasm to catch – and gather.)
Andrev raised his voice, to be heard over the clamor of the crowd. “Whatever their intentions, it can come to nothing. The peace that has descended on Earth since the Spacers withdrew and Settlement began is unbreakable within and without. For many decades now, the wilder spirits among ourselves have been leaving for the Settler worlds so that a spirit such as yours, Captain, which can dare risk the destruction of two vessels within the space of the Solar system is not to be found on Earth. There is no substantial level of crime on Earth any longer, no violence. The security guards assigned to control this crowd have no weapons because they have no need for any.”
And as he spoke, from the anonymity of the vast crowd a blaster pointed upward toward the balcony and was carefully aimed.
80.
A number of things happened at nearly the same time.
Giskard’s head had turned to stare at the crowd, drawn by some sudden effect.
Daneel’s eyes followed, saw the aimed blaster, and, with faster-than-human reflexes, he lunged.
The sound of the blaster rang out.
The people on the balcony froze and then broke out into loud exclamations.
D. G. seized Gladia and snatched her to one side.
The noise from the crowd erupted into a full-throated and terrifying roar.
Daneel’s lunge had been directed at Giskard and he knocked the other robot down.
The shot from the blaster entered the room behind the balcony and gouged a hole out of a portion of the ceiling. A line drawn from the blaster to the hole might have passed through that portion of space occupied a second earlier by Giskard’s head.
Giskard muttered as he was forced down. “Not human. A robot.”
Daneel, releasing Giskard, surveyed the scene quickly. Ground level was some six meters beneath the balcony and the space below was empty. The security guards were struggling their way toward the region of upheaval within the crowd that marked the spot where the would-be assassin had stood.
Daneel vaulted over the balcony and dropped, his metal skeleton absorbing the shock easily, as a human being’s would not have.
He ran toward the crowd.
Daneel had no choice. He had never encountered anything like this before. The supreme need was to reach the robot with the blaster before it was destroyed and, with that in mind, Daneel found that, for the first time in his existence, he could not stand on the niceties of preserving individual human beings from harm. He had to shake them up somewhat.
He tossed them aside, in actual fact, as he plowed into the crowd, crying out in stentorian fashion, “Make way! Make way! The person with the blaster must be questioned!”
Security guards fell in behind him and they found the “person” at last, down and somewhat battered.
Even on an Earth that prided itself on being nonviolent, an eruption of rage against an obvious murderer left its mark. The assassin had bee
n seized, kicked, and beaten. It was only the very density of the crowd that had saved the assassin from being tom apart. The multiple assailants, getting in each other’s way, succeeded in doing comparatively little.
The security guards pushed back the crowd with difficulty. On the ground near the prone robot was the blaster. Daneel ignored it.
Daneel was kneeling by the captured assassin. He said, “Can you talk?”
Bright eyes stared up at Daneel’s. “I can,” said the assassin in a voice that was low but quite normal otherwise.
“Are you of Auroran origin?”
The assassin did not answer.
Daneel said quickly, “I know you are. It was an unnecessary question. Where on this planet is your base?”
The assassin did not answer.
Daneel said, “Your base? Where is it? You must answer. I am ordering you to answer.”
The assassin said. “You cannot order me. You are R. Daneel Olivaw. I have been told of you and I need not obey you.”
Daneel looked up, touched the nearest guard, and said, “Sir, would you ask this person where his base is?”
The guard, startled, tried to speak but only a hoarse croak emerged. He swallowed in embarrassment, cleared his throat, and then barked out, “Where is your base?”
“I am forbidden to answer that question, sir,” said the assassin.
“You must,” said Daneel firmly. “A planetary official is asking it. – Sir, would you order him to answer it?”
The guard echoed, “I order you to answer it, prisoner.”
“I am forbidden to answer that question, sir.”
The guard reached downward to seize the assassin roughly by the shoulder, but Daneel said rapidly, “I would suggest that it would not be useful to offer force, sir.”
Daneel looked about. Much of the clamor of the crowd had died down. There seemed to be a tension in the air, as though a million people were waiting anxiously to see what Daneel would do.
Daneel said to the several guards who had now clustered about him and the prone assassin, “Would you clear the way for me, sirs? I must take the prisoner to Lady Gladia. It may be that she can force an answer.”