News From Elsewhere (17 page)

With a startled oath, Captain Trenoy switched in. “Whizbang! What the devil’s happening?”

There was no answer for several seconds, then a slurred voice mumbled, “Steel, steel, glorious steel! You’ll never know how metallic I feel. ...”

“Whizbang! Answer my question!” Trenoy put every ounce of authority into his command. The response was not encouraging.

“With nuts on his fingers and bolts on his toes, Whizbang needs oiling wherever he goes. . . .” The voice trailed away to a crooning whisper. Then silence.

The three men stared at each other in consternation. “He’s off his head,” snapped Luiss. “Some damn silly short circuit has given him DT’s.”

Dr. Blane looked thoughtful. “He was perfectly all right until those butterflies began to concentrate. I wonder . . .” “What are you thinking of—radiation?” asked Captain Trenoy.

“Something like that,” agreed Blane. “It doesn’t sound like a mechanical breakdown. I’ve never heard of a robot getting lightheaded because of a short circuit. It’s as if something—some force—had disturbed his equilibrium.” “The ST-EX robots were proofed against every known type of radiation before we left Earth,” objected the Captain.

“I know,” said Blane. “But obviously this is something they weren’t proofed against.”

“The simple solution is usually correct,” said Luiss.

“He’s had a breakdown in the language areas. He was all right while he was in the rocket.”

“I’ll try him again,” said Trenoy. He switched over. “Whizbang! Can you hear me? Over.”

Silence!

“Whizbang! What’s happening? Over.”

Silence.

“Whizbang! I order you back to the rocket. Make ready to return to ship! Over.”

Still silence.

“Where do we go from here?” asked Captain Trenoy at length. “Any suggestions, gentlemen?”

“Somebody will have to go down in the reserve rocket,” said Dr. Luiss. “That somebody had better be me.”

“Control your curiosity and be rational,” reproved Dr. Blane. “What’s the point of hazarding our only other rocket
and
a human being? Have another think.”

“Total control!” exclaimed the Captain. “The servomechanisms for the oubliette and entry-port were synchronized with the auto-pilot before Whizbang went down. Even if we can’t get him back to the ferry rocket, we can bring the rocket back here. Then someone might go down and see what’s happened to him.”

Before Captain Trenoy settled down at the remote control panel, he made a further effort to contact the enigmatic robot, but met with no success. While he was bringing the rocket back to the four-hundred-mile orbit, Drs. Blane and Luiss developed a quiet and friendly argument concerning the probable cause of Whizbang’s failure to respond. Then, as Whizbang still presumably had the transceiver on his chest, Dr. Blane tried to break down his problematic silence by a series of commands, exhortations, trick statements, and desperate pleas for help. He met with no result.

“You see,” said Luiss triumphantly. “It’s a mechanical breakdown. If he won’t even let out a bleat when you tell him it’s a matter of life and death, it means only one thing: somewhere the circuit is wrecked.”

Dr. Blane still shook his head. “Robots have certain powers of volition,” he said slowly. “Weaker, of course, than human volition. . . . Now let us suppose, for the purpose of hypothesis, that something with greater-than-human volition was able to establish contact with him.

Suppose it
willed
him to disobey orders.”

“Moonshine,” pronounced Dr. Luiss skeptically. “Are you suggesting that Whizbang got himself hypnotized? Because if so, you’re getting unnecessarily melodramatic.”

“One has to consider possibilities,” said Dr. Blane evenly.

“But that’s an impossibility! You might just as well consider the possibility of the ground opening up and swallowing him.”

“It can’t be ruled out,” said Blane without humor. “Who are we to assume that the life forms on Planet Five behave conventionally? Those butterflies, for example, might—”

“Might lay duck eggs,” grinned Luiss. “Go take a sedative, Doctor. Your imagination is slightly fantastic.”

“So, very often, is the truth,” retorted Blane.

While he had been talking, Dr. Blane had watched the progress of the ferry rocket by radar screen and visulator. He saw now that it was within ordinary visual range and, not wishing to prolong a useless discussion, climbed into the astrodome to watch it dock alongside the
Prometheus.

“I still think only one man should go, and that he should not leave the rocket—unless, of course, he finds a reasonable explanation for Whizbang’s silence.” Watching the Captain closely. Dr. Blane could see, even before he replied, that Trenoy was unconvinced.

“Perhaps you are letting superstition take precedence over scientific caution,” said Captain Trenoy with the faintest of smiles. “I think our arrangements will be quite adequate. We shall take ultrasonic vibrators and H.F.C. beam apparatus. Unless there is an emergency, one of us will remain in the rocket all the time.”

“You may encounter something against which the vibrators and H.F.C. weapon will be useless.”

“In that case, it certainly won’t be physical,” observed Dr. Luiss with irony.

“Exactly,” said Blane. He wanted to add something else, but couldn’t find the right words.

“We’d better get moving,” remarked Trenoy. “We may have a small search on our hands before we find Whizbang.”

Dr. Blane accepted defeat gracefully. “Good hunting,” 
he said. “I’ll be glued to the transceiver.”

“We’ll bring you back a couple of tame butterflies to play with,” promised Luiss gaily as he fixed the headpiece on his pressure suit.

When they had checked their pressure and personal radios, the two men left the navigation deck and made their way to the starboard airlock and entry-port. From the astrodome, Dr. Blane watched the small ferry rocket fall out of the orbit as it gathered negative speed. Twenty minutes later he heard Luiss’s voice telling
him
that they had touched down safely at the landing area.

“We can see Whizbang,” said Luiss excitedly. “He’s about a couple of hundred yards away, balancing on one foot like a heavyweight ballerina. The butterflies are still circling over him.” He chuckled. “Bet they’re thinking that if he’s a specimen of alien culture, they did well to remain butterflies. . . . He looks, though, almost as if he belongs to the landscape.”

“Any other signs of life—apart from the butterflies?” asked Dr. Blane.

“No, not yet. I’m going out to have a look at our petrified robot, so I’ll hand over to Captain Trenoy.”

Dr. Blane’s hands were trembling, his face was white. He paced the navigation deck rapidly, casting suspicious glances now and again at the nine-foot robot, who stood waiting patiently.

“Tell me your story again,” he commanded. “We will consider the inaccuracy in relation to the whole.” It was no good calling the robot a liar, because Whizbang was mechanically incapable of lying. He was, however, quite capable of being inaccurate.

Responding to the order, he again related his story in a voice that faltered only very slightly when he came to the part that Dr. Blane was able to disprove.

“The first thing I remember, sir,” said Whizbang, “was Dr. Luiss bawling at me for being what he called a broken-down cretin. Previous to that, my only recollection is of reporting back to ship as I began the first radial test and the butterflies came.”

“Where were the butterflies when Dr. Luiss spoke to y
ou?”

“They were circling the rocket again, sir, but there were 
none near me or Dr. Luiss. The clouds skimming over the pampas seemed bigger than before, but that was probably because Dr. Luiss had disturbed them. He told me he’d given the group circling above my head half a second of ultrasonic vibration, and that it had scared them away.” “Did he tell you his further intentions?”

“He said he was going to look around within a hundred-yard radius and collect samples. Then he ordered me back to the rocket.”

“What did Captain Trenoy do?”

“He questioned me and then spoke to you, sir, describing the landscape in detail and giving you a commentary on Dr. Luiss’s activities.”

“Why did Captain Trenoy leave the rocket?”

“Dr. Luiss called to him over the personal wavelength in a very excited voice. He said that he’d found the skeleton of a large quadruped with a cranial capacity of approximately one cubic foot. He said that the animals on Planet Five must have reached a very high evolutionary stage. Finally he suggested that Captain Trenoy come and have a look for
him
self, leaving me in the rocket. The Captain said it didn’t seem a very intelligent procedure, but Dr. Luiss replied that there were no living animals in sight, that the pampas were far enough away to give a reasonable safety margin, and that if the butterflies came near they could certainly be dispersed by ultrasonics.”

Dr. Blane nodded. “That’s true. I heard snatches of their conversation over the transceiver. Did Captain Trenoy give you any instructions before he left?”

“He put me through a simple test to make sure that my memory and reasoning ability were not damaged. Then he told me to stay in the rocket and not leave it under any circumstances.”

“At which point,” said Dr. Blane thoughtfully, “you took over the commentary.”

“That is so,” agreed Whizbang with a trace of hesitation. “I continued with the commentary until you gave me instructions to return to the
Prometheus ”

“But since I did not radio those instructions,” said Blane, staring hard at the robot, “we are left with two possibilities. Name them!”

The robot was silent for a moment. Then he spoke slowly. “One: that my circuits are damaged. Two: that

some other entity caused me to receive the message.” “Which do you think it is?” snapped Blane.

“If you would like to test me, sir..began Whizbang. “To hell with tests! Which is it?”

“I
think
my circuits are intact.”

“Then you think the message originated elsewhere?” “Yes, sir—if you are sure you did not send it.”

Blane controlled himself with difficulty. “We’ll leave that for the moment. Repeat verbatim your commentary to the point where I apparently ordered you to return.” “Whizbang to
Prometheus
,” said the robot. “Captain Trenoy is now descending through the oubliette to join Dr. Luiss. Dr. Luiss is examining the skeleton of the quadruped. The nearest butterflies are about two hundred yards away. There is a small cloud of them rising from the pampas. They appear to be circling aimlessly at an altitude of a hundred and fifty feet. . . . Captain Trenoy has now joined Dr. Luiss. They are digging together by the side of the skeleton. . . . The butterflies are drifting slightly. Captain Trenoy glances at them every few seconds while continuing his work. Now the cloud is almost above the skeleton at about two hundred feet . . . Suddenly the two men stand up. They stare at the butterflies. Dr. Luiss remarks over his personal radio that it is the most incredible thing he ever heard. Suddenly the butterflies drop fifty feet. At the same time Captain Trenoy and Dr. Luiss begin to unscrew their headpieces very slowly. . . .” Whizbang stopped.

“Go on! Go on!” urged Dr. Blane.

“Then, sir,” said Whizbang, “I heard your voice through the transceiver. You said:
‘Prometheus
to Whizbang. Return to orbit immediately. Urgent! Return to orbit immediately. Over and out.’ ”

“What happened next?” asked Blane.

“I informed Captain Trenoy over the ground radio. He said: ‘You must obey, Whizbang. You must always obey.* So I sealed the rocket and took off as rapidly as possible. By the time I had equalized gravity and was beginning to release power, the butterflies had dropped another fifty feet. Captain Trenoy and Dr. Luiss were standing motionless. They had taken off their headpieces. . . . Then I had to let in power, and the rocket climbed.”

“Was Captain Trenoy’s voice normal?”

“No, sir. He spoke slowly and very quietly.”

“Are you sure it was his voice?”

“Yes, sir.”

For two or three minutes Dr. Blane strode nervously up and down, tortured by indecision. Finally he made up his mind.

“I am going down, Whizbang.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You will remain on duty here.”

Dr. Blane set the rocket down gently. He unstrapped himself, stood up, and gazed through the plastigl-ass dome. A quarter of a mile away, he saw two motionless figures standing erect on a stretch of brown and crimson rock. Focusing the binoculars, Dr. Blane made out a cloud of butterflies hovering about ten feet above the men. The heads of his two companions were strangely obscured, but dull sunlight glinted on the surface of a headpiece lying at the feet of one of them.

Grimly, Dr. Blane reached for the two ultrasonic vibrators. Placing them carefully in the pockets of his pressure suit, he descended through the oubliette. A few seconds later he stood on the strange surface of Planet Five.

Gripping a vibrator in each hand, he looked cautiously around him, and then up at the sky. Apart from the cloud above the two men a quarter of a mile away, and the endless activity on the pampas, there did not seem to be any immediate danger.