He nodded toward the robots.
They had all returned to their attitude of veneration.
"It won't work," McIntosh explained. "Their obsession with religion is
stronger than their primary compulsion. That's probably because they've
been satisfying their compulsion all along." He jerked a thumb in the
direction of the cave.
Drummond swore venomously.
Angus dropped down on the ledge and folded his knees in his arms. He
felt his age bearing down on him for the first time.
"Twelve hundred robots," he said meditatively. "Twelve hundred _RA_
robots. Out of touch with civilization for a century. Satisfying their
primary function by disassembling and assembling one another. Going at
it in shifts. Splitting themselves into three groups."
"That device on their left thumb," Drummond interrupted. "It's a
burnisher. That's why they're so shiny."
Angus nodded. "Three groups. Group A spends so many months stripping
and reassembling Group B. Meanwhile, Group C, which has just been put
together again, has no memory because their secondary banks have been
wiped clean. So, like children, they _learn_ from the working Group A."
* * * * *
Drummond's mouth hung open in shocked understanding. "And by the time A
finishes the job, C's education is complete! And it's A's turn to be
stripped!"
"By then," Angus went on, "Group C is not only ready to start stripping
Group A, but has also become intellectually mature enough to begin the
education of the reassembled Group B!"
They sat still for a while, thinking it over.
"The compulsion to do their jobs," McIntosh continued, "is unchanged
because the primary function banks are sealed circuits and can't be
tampered with. But in each generation, they have their secondary memory
circuits wiped clean and have to start all over, getting whatever
general knowledge they can from the last generation."
Drummond snapped his fingers excitedly. "That's why they don't know
what we are! Their idea of Man had to be passed down by word of mouth.
And it got all distorted in the process!"
Angus's stare, more solicitous now, swept slowly over the prostrate
robots. "More important, that's why they developed a religion. What's
the main difference between human and robotic intelligence? It's
that our span of life is limited on one end by birth, the other by
death--mysteries of origin and destiny that can't be explained. You
see, the _ordinary_ clunker understands where _he_ came from and where
he's going. But here are robots who have to struggle with those
mysteries--birth and death of the conscious intellect which they
themselves once knew, and forgot, and now have turned into myths."
"So they start thinking in terms of religion," Drummond said. "Well,
that clears up the whole thing, doesn't it?"
"Not quite. It doesn't explain why the religion they've invented
parallels ours so closely. And it doesn't tell us who Jackson is."
Drummond ran thick fingernails against the stubble on his cheeks.
"Jackson is my Supervisor. I shall not rust. He maketh me to adjust
my joint tension--" He stopped and frowned. "I've heard that before
somewhere, only it sounded different."
Angus gave him a wry, tired smile. "Sure. It's practically the Psalm of
David. Now you see why the resemblance is driving me batty."
* * * * *
The robots stirred. Several of them stood up and plodded into the
cave. The others continued repeating their endless praise and
devotion--prayers in every sense of the word except common sense.
Angus leaned back against the cliff and let the sun's heat warm him.
"Somehow it doesn't seem fair," he commented unhappily.
"What doesn't?" Drummond asked.
"They're so close to the Truth. Yet, after we file a report, a
deactivation crew will come along and erase their beliefs. They'll have
their memory banks swept clean and once more they'll be nothing but
clunkers with a factory-specification job of routine work to do."
"Ain't that what they're supposed to be?"
"But these are different. They've found something no clunker's ever
had before--hope, faith, aspiration beyond death." He shook his head
ruefully.
There was movement at the mouth of the cave and the smaller group of
robots emerged from the shadows, two of them bearing a stone slab.
Their steps were ceremoniously slow as they approached the ledge.
Bowing, they placed the tablet at Angus's feet and backed away.
"These are the articles of our faith, O Jackson," one announced. "We
have preserved them for Thy coming."
McIntosh stared down at the charred remains of a book. Its metal-fiber
binding was shredded and fused and encrusted with the dust of ages.
Drummond knelt beside it and, with stiff fingers, brushed away the film
of grime, uncovering part of the title:
OLY
BIB E
Eagerly, Angus eased the cover back. Of the hundreds of pages it had
originally contained, only flaked parts of two or three remained. The
printing was scarcely legible on the moldy paper.
He read aloud those words he could discern:
"... to lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me beside cool waters;
He...."
Drummond jabbed Angus with a triumphant forefinger. "They didn't invent
any religion, after all!"
"It isn't important _how_ they got it. The fact that they accepted
it--that's what's important." McIntosh glanced up at Drummond. "They
probably found this in the wreck of the ship they'd been in. It's easy
to see they haven't used it in hundreds of generations. Instead, the
gist of what's in it was passed down orally. And their basic concepts
of Man and supervisor were distorted all along the way--confused with
the idea of God."
* * * * *
Gently, he let the cover fall. And a shining square of duraloid fell
out.
"It's somebody's picture!" Drummond exclaimed.
"An ID card," Angus said, holding it so the light wouldn't reflect off
its transparent protective cover.
It was a picture of a nondescript man--not as stout as Drummond, nor as
lean as McIntosh--with hair neither all black, like the younger man's,
nor nearly all white, like Angus's.
The print below the picture was indiscernible, except for the subject's
last name....
"Jackson!" Drummond whispered.
Angus slowly replaced the card. "A hundred years of false devotion," he
said pensively. "Just think--"
"This is no time for that kind of gas." Drummond glanced at his watch.
"We got just two hours to cut off those converters." Desperately, he
faced the robots. "Hey, you clunkers! You're robot assemblers. You got
four hundred clunkers in that cave, all in pieces. Get in there and put
'em together!"
Angus shook his head disapprovingly. Somehow it didn't seem right,
calling them clunkers.
"Jackson is my Supervisor!" intoned RA-204.
"Jackson is my Supervisor!" echoed the mass.
Drummond glanced frantically at his watch, then looked helplessly at
Angus. Angus shrugged.
The younger man's face suddenly tensed with resolution. "So they've got
to have a Jackson? All right, I'll give 'em one!"
He waved his fist at the horde. "I'm your Supervisor! I'm your Jackson!
Now clear out of the way and--"
RA-76's hand darted out and seized Drummond's ankle, tugged him off the
ledge. As he fell to the ground, a score of robots closed in over him,
metal arms flailing down methodically. Angus yelled at them to stop,
saw he was too late and sank down, turning away sickly.
Finally, after a long while, they backed off and faced Angus.
"We have passed the Divine test, O Jackson!" 204 shouted up jubilantly.
"We have redeemed ourselves before our Supervisor!" exclaimed 76.
It took a long, horror-filled moment before Angus could speak.
"How do you know?" he managed to ask at last.
"If he had been Jackson," exclaimed 204, "we could not have destroyed
him."
* * * * *
The robots fell prostrate again and returned to their devotional. But
now the phrases were triumphant, where before they had been servile and
uncertain.
Angus stared numbly down at Drummond, then backed against the cliff.
The litany below, exuberant now, grew mightily in volume, booming
vibrantly against distant hills.
"There is but one Supervisor!" intoned 204.
"But one Jackson!" answered the assembly.
"And now He dwelleth among His children!" 76 chanted.
"In their midst!" boomed the hundreds.
Suddenly it all seemed horribly ludicrous and Angus laughed. The
litany, stopped and his laughter grew shriller, louder, edged with
hysteria.
The shimmering sea of metal, confounded, stared at him and it was as
though he could see fleshy furrows of confusion on the featureless
faces.... But how could a clunker show emotion?
His laughter slowed and died, like the passing of a violent storm. And
he felt weakened with a sickening sense of compassion. Robots--_human_
robots--standing awed before unknown concepts while they groped
for Truth. Clunkers with a sense of right and wrong and with an
overwhelming love. It was absurd that he had been elected father of
twelve hundred children--whether flesh or metal--but it didn't _feel_
at all absurd.
"Dost Thou despair of us, O Jackson?" asked 76 hesitantly, staring up
at him.
204 motioned toward the ship, the top of its hull shining beyond the
nearby woods. "Wouldst Thou _still_ return to Thy vessel, Supervisor?"