Robots of the World! Arise! Part 4

"One day," he said. "Just one day and they come to this."

"I thought they would," I answered quietly.

Our eyes met in a look of understanding. "You see, Jerry," I said, "we never meant to cheat you. We would have paid you--we will pay you now, if you wish it. But what good will monetary credits be to your people?

We need the things money buys, but you--"

"Need to work." Jerry's voice was flat. "I see, now. You were kind not to give brains--real brains--to the robots. They're happy. It's just us 5's who aren't."

"You're like us," I said softly.

He had learned to think from me and from others like me. He had the brain of a man, without the emotions, without the sweet irrationality of men--and he knew what he missed. Side by side we walked through the graying streets. Human and android. Man and machine. And I knew that I had found a friend.

We didn't have to talk any more. He could read my mind and I knew well enough how his worked. We didn't have to discuss wages or hours, or any of the myriad matters that human bargaining agents have to thresh out. We just walked back to my Copter, and when we got to it, he spoke.

"I'll tell them to go back to work, that we've come to terms," he said. "That's what they want, anyway. Someone to think for them."

I nodded. "And if you bring the other 5's to the factory," I said, "we'll work out our agreement."

He knew I was sincere. He looked at me for a long moment, and then his great taloned hand gripped mine. And he said what I'd been thinking for a long time.

"You're right about that hook-up, Mr. Morrison. We shouldn't have it.

It can only cause trouble."

He paused, and the events of the last twenty-four hours must have been in his mind as well as in mine. "You'll leave us our brains, of course. They came from you. But take out the telepathy."

He sighed then, and his sigh was very human. "Be thankful," he said to me, "that you don't have to know what people think about. It's so disillusioning."

Once again his mouth twisted into that strange android grin as he added, "if you send in a hurry call to Cybernetics and have a truck come out for us, we'll be de-telepathed in time for work this morning."

That was all there was to it. I flew back to the plant and told Jack what had happened, sent a call to the Army that everything was settled, arranged with Cybernetics for a rewiring on three hundred a.s.sorted 5-Types. Then I went home to a pot of Rob's coffee--the first decent brew I'd had in twenty-four hours.

On Sat.u.r.day we delivered to the Army right on the dot. Jerry and Co.

had worked overtime. Being intelligent made them better workers and now they were extremely willing ones. They had their contract. They were considered men. And they could no longer read my mind.

I walked into my office Sat.u.r.day afternoon and sat down by the radio.

Jack and Chief Dalton looked across the room at me and grinned.

"All right, Don," Jack said. "Tell us how you did it."

"Did what?" I tried to act innocent, but I couldn't get away with it.

"Fooled those robots into going back to work, of course," he laughed.

I told them then. Told them the truth.

"I didn't fool them," I said. "I just thought about what would happen if they won their rebellion."

That was all I _had_ done. Thought about robots built to work who had no work to do, no human pleasures to cater to, nothing but blank, meaningless lives. Thought about Jerry and his disappointment when his creatures cared not a hoot about his glorious dreams of equality. All one night I had thought, knowing that as I thought, so thought the Morrison 5's.

They were telepaths. They had learned to think from me. They had not yet had time to really develop minds of their own. What I believed, they believed. My ideas were their ideas. I had not tricked them. But from now on, neither I nor anyone else would ever be troubled by an android rebellion.

Jack and the Chief sat back open-mouthed. Then the Chief grinned, and both of his chins shook with laughter.

"I always did say you were a clever one, Don Morrison," he said.

I grinned back. I felt I was pretty clever myself, just then.

It was at that moment that my youngest foreman stuck his head in the door, a rather stunned look on his face.

"Mr. Morrison," he said. "Will you come out here for a moment?"

"What's the matter now?" I sighed.

He looked more perplexed than ever. "It's that robot, Jerry," he said.

"He says he has a very important question to ask you."

"Well, send him in."

A moment later the eight-foot frame ducked through the doorway.

"I'm sorry to trouble you, Mr. Morrison," Jerry said politely. "But tomorrow is voting day, you know. And now that we're men--well, where do we androids go to register?"

THE END