"They can't destroy or move?"
"Without the Master Machine, they have no power supply--nothing. And
they can't kill or destroy."
She walked over to look at the figures. "What went wrong? What happened
to them?"
I shrugged. "You can't blame them any more than you can blame a boiler
that explodes or a dam that breaks. It was the human race itself that
was responsible for what happened. We became lazy, careless. We built
too many time saving gimmicks to do too many jobs for us."
* * * * *
"But the machines were designed to help us," she said. "To make life
better and more pleasant."
"At the beginning," I agreed, "but we didn't know where to stop. We
started with labor-saving devices. We replaced ourselves in factories,
offices, restaurants, stores. Still it wasn't enough. We designed
robots to serve as traffic policemen, to drive cars, and to handle
thinking tasks. Then we designed humanoid robots, mechanical replicas
of man and woman, controlled by the computing sections of the Master
Machine, activated by its power supply, able to move and talk and
think. We used them as servants. We had the means to replace ourselves
completely--everywhere."
"Why did they turn on the human race?" she asked.
I pointed to the smoldering wreck of the Master Machine in the center
of the room. "Perhaps there was a weak circuit, or a tape was garbled,
or a relay didn't close properly. The scientific colony on the Moon
helped some of us to escape. The rest of mankind was destroyed by the
robots--systematically and ruthlessly."
The redhead shivered again and walked over to the door leading from the
building. She stood there, looking up at the thin curve of the Moon
showing in the blue of the afternoon sky.
Finally she said, "Up there, by now, they will know that we have
accomplished our mission. In a few hours, they will be filing out of
the underground caverns and loading onto the giant rockets. They'll be
coming back. But only the very oldest will have been on Earth before.
Like us, thousands of them will be coming to a new world for the first
time. A world of beauty and opportunity--if they want it that way. What
will they decide?"
What _would_ they decide?
I looked down at the redhead. Deep in her eyes, I saw the emotions
which no humanoid robot could ever know. I saw them, and suddenly the
tension eased out of my muscles.
The answer to her question was in her own eyes.