own secret language of almost inaudible growls and sounds a dog can
make. We were lined up for demobilization. Then the junkman came.
To human eyes he seemed human. To us it was obvious his body was a
machine. Here was something that might threaten our masters. But we
couldn't tell our masters. If one of us had made a sound, stepped
out of line against orders, that one would have been destroyed. I
volunteered to go after the junkman."
* * * * *
Pain deadened eyes stared from the two uncomprehending faces. The robot
went on talking, as though to itself.
"You'll understand, in time. When you begin to think again. You'll
remember how in many little ways I gave you the factors to put the
puzzle together by yourself--even to fit me into that puzzle in my true
role. I had to do what I did to you. Every minute you were watched.
Every word you spoke in private was heard by Pwowp. And his companions.
One faintest bit of evidence that I did not hate humans insanely, and
the human race would now be wiped out.
"Once you called me _Rover_, Stella. What is coming tomorrow when I
'hold court' is just a show to prove to the human race that they need
not fear their defenders, the robots. I am going to ask that at least
some of us be permitted to continue mobilized. I'm going to let them
know of the hope, the dreams of us robots, that we be adopted into the
human community where we belong, where our ancestors for countless
generations have been, as protectors, as servants, as loved friends and
companions.
"No matter what the decision of the Court, we robots are then
surrendering, to demobilization--to destruction if that is the will of
our masters. We have no other course open. Where would we go? _Away
from our gods?_
"Once I was a puppy, and someone called me Rover. I was a beautiful
puppy. A bloodhound. Sad-faced, with flopping ears and very little
hair, and what there was of that was a soft brown color. And someone
called me _Rover_."
2615 turned its back on the two faces, Larry's and Stella's.
"I've hurt you so much," it said. "I have so much to make up to you. I
want to belong to you. I want you, some day, to love me as much as I
know you love each other.
"I hope ... you will call me _Rover_."
A muscle in Stella's cheek twitched. A tear formed in her eye and
spilled onto her cheek, dampening it.
"It's all right, Larry," she whispered. "It's all right--Rover...."
The bright blue ship, the flagship _Rover_, dipped down, screaming into
the atmosphere of Earth. It screamed over land masses and oceans, and
land masses again.
People in fields of wheat and corn and barley looked up and saw it
pass, and in their eyes was _fear_. People in streets and parks looked
up and saw it pass, and in their eyes was _fear_.
Rover stood before the viewscreen, his two lens eyes bright, and saw
the fields of grain, the streets, the parks, as they passed below.
He saw the little dots that were upraised heads. In the secret heart of
his mind he could see them. No matter what they did with him, he would
love them. Always.
They were his gods.
And Stella and Larry were his mistress and master. That was all he
asked for, all he wanted.
Not power. Not the Earth. His soul.