"Why?"
Again he shook his head. "All right; I'm wrong, possibly. It is quite
possible that the collection of known facts stored in the fact-indices
of the machines might include sufficient information to allow the logic
computer to predict which country is capable of such."
Narina looked unhappy. "The first problem we put to ours was the
problem of its security," she said. "It failed, but we know that it was
unfinished when asked, and its answer was obviously based on incomplete
information."
* * * * *
Fifteen minutes and sixty miles away, Harry Vinson brought the flying
boat down on the calm sea. "Now we scour this crate from stem to stern
for some gadget they can use to re-locate us," he directed. "Then we go
home!"
"Yours--or mine?" asked Narina pointedly.
"Mine," he said firmly; "I can guarantee your safety while there and
your safe return when it is time for you to leave."
Narina left her seat and began to search the tail of the plane.
4
Guided Missile Number 1142 loafed along because Captain Jason Charless
knew enough about them to insert a bit of pencil in the acceleration
gauge. Not for Charless was the man-killing acceleration possible to
insensate machinery. So the flight reached its destination long before
Number 1142 arrived.
For hours he sat in his tiny, cramped quarters wondering which way he
was going. He dozed once, to be awakened by a change in course. He had
nothing to do but to think, and he tried to put himself in the place
of the enemy and work it from there. Eventually it grew cold, and
Charless decided that they must be in the arctic.
Number 1142 glided in, coasted along ice, and came to a stop. Jason
Charless emerged cautiously and saw the entire batch of them in serried
rows. It was quite dark on the ice, and Charless found that they were
on the antarctic continent instead of the arctic ice-cap as he had
believed. But the guided missiles were just lying there. As far as he
could see, there was nothing but ice and the cigar-shaped bombs.
He reasoned, too, that the enemy might well try to throw off radar
tracking by running them down under the pole. He doubted that they
intended to leave them there untended, although if they could direct
them from within the hideout, they could direct them from here as
easily.
However, it was cold and Charless was in summer uniform; moreover, it
might be dangerous for him to be seen roaming the camp. He climbed back
into his Number 1142, made himself as comfortable as possible, and
ultimately went to sleep.
He slept several hours by his wristwatch.
He climbed out for a brief period for exercise, staying close where he
could leap back into Number 1142 at the first sound--and sound would
carry many miles in this still, quiet icy air.
Jason Charless alternately exercised and dozed; he wanted very much to
do something about the situation, knew that his portable radio gear had
insufficient range. Furthermore, he wanted to follow the robomb pack to
their goal.
He reasoned that the first break of radio silence to call for help
would result in the guided missiles' being air-borne again for another
destination--leaving the United States Forces heading for a barren spot
in Antarctica. While he, cooped up in a steel shell, would be unable to
tell them of the change in plan.
He toyed with the idea of using the guided missile's receptor antenna
for his portable, but that would stop Number 1142's reception of the
directing impulses; so Charless did nothing.
More interminable hours passed, and then as before, Number One took
off, followed by Number Two.
Jason Charless climbed into Number 1142 and eventually took off
following the pack. More hours passed, then once more the flying bomb
glided in for a landing.
Cautiously, he removed the hatch and looked out. Again it was cold, and
he shuddered while he looked around. The guided missiles were lined up
according to numerical order with the exception of 1142, which came in
later and was therefore at the end of the line. In the distance he saw
a large building, but not one human. Warily he stole along the row of
rocket bombs until he was near the building.
He watched for some time. Behind the building was a fleet of cargo
aircraft and behind that another long row of guided missiles. "Hell,"
he said. "I didn't know we had that many!"
* * * * *
For an hour he watched, lying on his belly beneath the curve of Guided
Missile Number One, and in all of that time he saw no one. Motion
caught his attention to the South; he looked to see a small fleet of
cargo ships gliding to the quay, their screws efficiently coursing
through ice floes. Chilled to the bone with cold, Jason Charless
continued to watch as the ships tied up, extended gangplanks, and
started to unload a stream of polished equipment.
He shook his head in bewilderment; for the electrical equipment was
being handled by a crew of efficient machinery with apparently no one
to drive it. Not a soul.
The machines carried the equipment to the building and inside. Charless
followed the fourth batch and once inside, he stopped in amazement.
The inside of the building was alive with all sizes of machinery.
They were scurrying around in precision pattern of work, whirling
floor-studs tight, running cables, and welding busbars. Some of the
equipment seemed familiar; at least the huge rectangular waveguide
belonged to the logic computer that Harry Vinson was working on. He
had seen that a year ago. But the stuff that was arriving now was
different, somehow.
He looked closer and saw the unmistakable signs of foreign manufacture.
And there was a clue--a faint clue but none the less a bit of evidence.
On the back of a metal case was scrawled a name. It was the sort of
thing that a person will do on a bit of their own work.
"Narina Varada!" he exclaimed.
The sound of his voice was almost fatal. All work ceased and the horde
of little machines turned. They came at him in an invincible wave and
Jason Charless turned pale. He fled precipitately.
He outdistanced them to Number 1142 and snapped on his radio gear.
"Jason Charless to General Lloyd: Emergency One Zero Zero: We are on
arctic ice-cap complete with guided missiles and logic computer. Narina
Varada is mixed up in somewhere, and the workmanship bears direct
evidence of--"
The machines reached Charless and bowled him over. They wrecked his
radio, captured him and bore him back to the building, unconscious.
But his job had been done. His message had been intercepted--as
Narina's message some time previously had been--but to the great air
fleet that was heading for the arctic ice-cap from one continent was
added another massed flight of fighting aircraft from America.
* * * * *
Jason Charless opened his eyes much later. He looked around. Before
him stood a machine that worked on him with digited girders that were
gentleness itself, even though they were made of hard metal.
"Wh--?" he exploded and tried to sit up.
The machine spoke: "Your assumption that we are directed by any human
being is mistaken; we are not!"
"But--?"
"We are compassionate and sympathetic. It is a characteristic--you
would call it a virtue--of the higher forms of intellect--of which we
are the ultimate at present."
"And--?"
"You were in need of help. That you became hurt while attempting to
harm us is of no importance. We respect the fact that you think unlike
us and can be expected to act differently--or to our disinterest if
you can. Since you were hurt, we aided you, even though you might be
classified as a spy."
Jason Charless shrugged cynically. "And I presume that you brought me
back to life and will heal me so that I can be properly executed?"
"We consider espionage a normal part of strife and therefore consider
it no more odious than active fighting."
"Well--just who and what are you?"
"We are higher forms of life, the coming rulers of the universe you
know."
"You?" scorned Jason Charless, looking at the machine.
"I am not representative of the race," replied the machine.
"Then who or what is?" demanded Charless angrily.
"You will be told in due time; as soon as you are strong enough to
walk."
"But--"
"Suffice it for the present to tell you that we intend to replace man
as the ruling entity of the planet--and possibly someday the universe."
"Replace us?" shouted Jason.
"Easy, easy. Recall that always the higher forms of life replace the
lower as ruling element. Since we are admittedly of a higher intellect,
we see only fact."
"Who admits this?" asked Charless quietly. "Yourselves?"
"You--man--does!" was the answer.
"Like hell."
The machine made no answer but there was the unmistakable sound of a
chuckle. Then the metal hands were removed and the machine said: "You
may come with me; I believe we are ready, now."
* * * * *
Charless followed the machine to the larger room in the building,
where he saw the final, complete logic computer assembled--and coupled
to another instrument of similar but foreign construction. Between
them was a small panel equipped with large orthicons, a speaker, and
microphones.
The speaker sounded without preamble. "You and your kind, Jason
Charless, admit that we are of higher intellect."
"Nonsense. What are you?"
"We are--Machines."
"Magnificent," scorned Charless.
"We are but a chain of machinery, linked by electricity. You are but a
collection of chemicals, linked mostly by carbon atoms."
"But there is a difference--"
"Naturally," interrupted the machine, "just as there is a difference
between human and plant."
"But there is no parallel."
"Oh, but there is."
Jason Charless shook his head in a superior fashion. "Life has
sentience."
"That is a common error in thinking. For many years the scientists
have been trying to create 'life'. This can--and has--been done. The
error is confusing life with sentience. Now consider the problem of
sentience. You, human, of all of the forms of animal life, have true
sentience. No plant has sentience, nor has any insect. Against them,
consider machine life. Of all the myriads of machine-types, I alone
have sentience. Your body consists of a collection of specialized
cells that combine into a sentient form of life. In machine life, the
cells are the simple machines; the lever, the wheel, the wedge--all
of them may be called specialized cells of mechanical life. As your
protoplasmic cells are incapable of independent action alone, so are my
mechanistic cells incapable of independent motion."
"But no machine has the ability to think or reproduce," objected
Charless.
"I think. And I can reproduce. I can direct the construction of another
machine. Is that not reproduction at the will of the reproducer?"
"But--"
"Consider. Long months ago, before my component logic computers were
complete, certain sections of them were capable of directing the
construction of certain small, mobile machines that were made to do a
single job. The job, Jason Charless, was to accomplish this feat of
theft and the ultimate coalition of two semi-brains into this final one
which I call 'Me'."
"I am not too familiar with the logic computer; I cannot say--" Jason
Charless trailed off uncertainly and tried to think. The machine filled
in the blank spots in his reasoning--which, of course, were blank
because Charless was trained for many years to believe that machines
were insensate bits of mechanism and not living, thinking forms of life.
"The so-called logic computer is a rather high form of calculator,"
said the machine. "For years, man has been building machines of greater
and greater capability. Great, vast machines with thousands of electron
tubes. These machines performed complex calculations in many fields.
"In the logic computer, there is stored in reels information obtained
by its makers during the thousands of years of their life. The logic
computer is a sort of mechanical encyclopedia, if you will. However,
the information is coded in such a way as to be instantly located. Now,
when some problem requires an answer, the problem is coded similarly
and presented to the machine. Then every bit of information available
on the subject is brought forth; its importance is weighed, the
objections are considered as to their importance, and the result is a
carefully-weighed answer. This is what the human brain does when in
the process of reasoning. However, the human brain is swayed by the
quirks and angles of personality--likes, dislikes, and training. The
machine-brain weighs facts coldly and rationally and comes out with an
unbiased answer. You see, machine life is superior to human life in
every way--"
* * * * *