“Your orders have been relayed, mistress. ” At the door, she paused and softly said, “And thanks for listening, Basalom. You’re a dear. ” She turned and darted out of the cabin.

Basalom felt the draining flow of grounded-out potentials that was the robotic equivalent of disappointment. Dr. Anastasi had called him a deer, but she’d left the cabin before he could ask her to explain his relationship to Terran herbivores of the genus Cervidae.

It was an old tradition, older than robotics itself. As was the case with so many of the behaviors passed down to robots from their human forebears, City Supervisor 3 found it to be slightly illogical; with the development of modern telecommunications technology, it had been several centuries since it was actually necessary for the participants in a conversation to meet physically. Yet traditions have a way of developing an inertia all their own, and so when City Supervisor 3-or as he was usually called, Beta-received the summons to an executive conference, he readily bowed to centuries of custom, delegated his current task to Building Engineer 42, and set out for the Compass Tower.

Not that it had been a terribly interesting task, anyway. He’d spent the last few weeks overseeing subtle changes in building designs, and the task he’d left was just one more round in a pattern of minor refinements. Beta’s personality programming was not yet eccentric enough for him to admit to feeling bored, but ever since Master Derec had reprogrammed the robot city to cease expansion, he’d felt a certain sense of frustrated potentials. Installing a new and improved cornice simply didn’t give him the same warm glow of satisfaction as came from, say, completing an entire block of luxury apartments.

Still,Beta reminded himself, a job ’ s a job. And any job that keeps robots out of the recycling bin is worthwhile. Unbidden, a statement of the Third Law flashed through his mind: A robot must protect its own existence, as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. ” Yes, Beta thought, that ’ s what we ’ re doing. Protecting our existence. As long as we have jobs, we can justify our continued existence. The Third Law potential resolved to a neat zero sum and stopped bothering him.

As he strolled toward the nearest tunnel stop, Beta allocated a few seconds to look around and review his earlier work. The avenue was broad, clean, and straight as a laser beam. The buildings were tall, angular, and functional, with no outrageous flights of engineering fantasy but enough variation in the use of geometric solids to keep the city from looking monotonous.

We certainly have fulfilled our original purpose. We have constructed a city that ’ s clean, bright, and beautiful.One of the advantages of being a robot was that Beta could crane his neck and look up at the buildings without slowing his walking pace. Perhaps we overdid it on the gleaming pale blue, though. Maybe next week we can paint a few things, just for contrast. Looking down again, Beta found the entrance to the tunnel stop. He started down the ramp. Along the way, he passed a number of idle function robots.

For a moment he considered ordering them to report to the recycling bin. Then he felt a pang of-could it be guilt? -atthe idea of destroying even non-positronic robots simply for the crime of being unemployed. Pausing a few microseconds, he managed to think up a busywork assignment for them. It was an illogical notion, of course, but he thought he detected a certain primitive kind of gratitude in the way they clanked off to their new jobs.

In a sense, we ’ re all function robots. Some of us are a little more self-aware than others, that ’ s all. Those function robots clean and lube things; I create gleaming, perfect buildings.

Why?

A dangerous question: Already, Beta could feel the stirring of a latent general command to self -destruct if he was no longer serving a useful purpose. Fortunately, with the summons to the executive council still fresh in his input register, he was able to duck that issue. He continued down the ramp.

A half-dozen idle tunnel transit platforms were waiting at the bottom of the ramp. Beta boarded the first one in the queue and gave it his destination. “Compass Tower. ” A fast scanning beam swept over him; the transit platform determined that its passenger was robotic and jumped into traffic with a necksnapping jolt.

Always these subtle reminders,Beta thought. The city was built for humans. Yet we who live here are not human.

The platform shot through the tunnels at maximum speed, darting across lanes and dodging other platforms with reckless abandon. Beta locked his hands tightly on the grips and became a rigid part of the platform.

The force of air alone would knock a human off this platform despite the windscreen. Yet because I am a robot, the tunnel computer trades off safety for efficient traffic flow.

We built this city for humans. We are only caretakers. So where are the humans?

An interesting question, indeed. And one that Beta could not answer.

With another rough jolt, the transit platform slid into the station beneath the Compass Tower and slammed to a stop. Beta unlocked his wrist and knee joints and stepped off; he only had one foot on solid pavement when the platform rocketed off into the storage queue. As i/there was a hurry. Beta looked around the station, saw no one waiting to go anywhere, and dismissed the experience with the positronic equivalent of a shrug. Moving off the apron, he located the ascending slidewalk ramp and started up.

The meeting was to be held in the Central Hall. An apt name, Beta thought. This pyramid we call the Compass Tower is the geographical center of the city. And Central Hall is at the heart of the pyramid. That wasn’t the real reason it was called that, of course; the name came from the fact that the hall housed Central, the enormous, disembodied positronic brain that ultimately controlled all activity in Robot City.

Or used to, anyway.Beta stepped off the last run of slidewalk and entered the cavernous hall.

He was immediately stopped by two hunter robots, tall and menacing in their matte-black armor. Tolerantly, Beta submitted to being surface-scanned, deep-radared, and bitmapped. He was all too familiar with the need for tight security in this, the most critical of all places. After all, it was a lapse in security in this very room that had elevated him to the rank of Supervisor.

The hunters apparently were satisfied that he was who he claimed to be, and had legitimate reason for coming to Central Hall. They waved Beta through the checkpoint, and a moment later he stepped around the corner and got a good look at Central.

Even in its disabled state, Central was an impressive being. A collection of massive black slabs five meters high, resembling nothing so much as a silicon Stonehenge, it blazed with communication lasers, twinkled with monitor lights, and radiated an immense impression of great, dormant intellect on the 104 megahertz band.

At least, we hope it ’ s intellect.A vague mismatch of positronic potentials flowed through Beta’s brain; he identified the feeling as sadness. Pausing a moment, he watched the security observer robots drift overhead in tight, metric patterns, and stole sidelong glances at Positronic Specialists I through 5, who were once again up to their elbows in Central’s brain.

Beta was capable of free-associating. Looking at the brain crew at work always reminded him of that terrible day