Robots and Empire (Page 84)
- Page 1
- Page 1
- Page 1
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 2
- Page 2
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 3
- Page 3
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 4
- Page 4
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 5
- Page 5
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 6
- Page 6
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 7
- Page 7
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 8
- Page 8
- Page 8
- Page 9
- Page 9
- Page 9
- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 10
- Page 10
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 11
- Page 11
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 12
- Page 12
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 13
- Page 13
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 14
- Page 14
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 15
- Page 15
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 16
- Page 16
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 17
- Page 17
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 18
- Page 18
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 19
- Page 19
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 20
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 21
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 22
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 23
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 24
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 25
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 26
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 27
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 28
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 29
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 30
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 31
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 32
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 33
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 34
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 35
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 36
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 37
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 38
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 39
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 40
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 53
- Page 54
- Page 54
- Page 55
- Page 55
- Page 56
- Page 56
- Page 57
- Page 57
- Page 58
- Page 58
- Page 59
- Page 59
- Page 60
- Page 60
- Page 61
- Page 61
- Page 62
- Page 62
- Page 63
- Page 63
- Page 64
- Page 64
- Page 65
- Page 65
- Page 66
- Page 66
- Page 67
- Page 67
- Page 68
- Page 68
- Page 69
- Page 69
- Page 70
- Page 70
- Page 71
- Page 71
- Page 72
- Page 72
- Page 73
- Page 73
- Page 74
- Page 74
- Page 75
- Page 75
- Page 76
- Page 76
- Page 77
- Page 77
- Page 78
- Page 78
- Page 79
- Page 79
- Page 80
- Page 80
- Page 81
- Page 81
- Page 82
- Page 82
- Page 83
- Page 83
- Page 84
- Page 84
- Page 85
- Page 85
- Page 86
- Page 86
- Page 87
- Page 87
- Page 88
- Page 88
- Page 89
- Page 89
- Page 90
- Page 90
- Page 91
- Page 91
- Page 92
- Page 92
- Page 93
- Page 93
- Page 94
- Page 94
- Page 95
- Page 95
- Page 96
- Page 96
- Page 97
- Page 97
- Page 98
- Page 98
- Page 99
- Page 99
- Page 100
- Page 100
- Page 101
- Page 101
- Page 102
- Page 102
- Page 103
- Page 103
- Page 104
- Page 104
- Page 105
- Page 105
- Page 106
- Page 106
- Page 107
- Page 107
- Page 108
- Page 108
- Page 109
- Page 109
- Page 110
- Page 110
- Page 111
- Page 111
- Page 112
- Page 112
- Page 113
- Page 113
- Page 114
- Page 114
- Page 115
- Page 115
- Page 116
- Page 116
- Page 117
- Page 117
- Page 118
- Page 118
- Page 119
- Page 119
- Page 120
- Page 120
- Page 121
- Page 121
- Page 122
- Page 122
- Page 123
- Page 123
- Page 124
- Page 124
- Page 125
- Page 125
- Page 126
- Page 126
- Page 127
- Page 127
- Page 128
- Page 128
- Page 129
- Page 129
- Page 130
- Page 130
- Page 131
- Page 131
- Page 132
- Page 132
- Page 133
- Page 133
- Page 134
- Page 134
- Page 135
- Page 135
- Page 136
- Page 136
- Page 137
- Page 137
- Page 138
- Page 138
- Page 139
- Page 139
And that, too, seemed to emphasize her mirror-image relationship with the Solarian woman who, for thoroughly independent reasons, had denied her first husband as Vasilia had denied her father. The Solarian woman, too, could not live with the early surnames fastened upon her and ended with a first name only – Gladia.
Vasilia and Gladia, misfits, deniers – They even resembled each other.
Vasilia stole a look at the mirror hanging in her spaceship cabin. She had not seen Gladia in many decades, but she was sure that the resemblance remained. They were both small and slim. Both were blond and their faces were somewhat alike.
But it was Vasilia who always lost and Gladia who always won. When Vasilia had left her father and had struck him from her life, he had found Gladia instead – and she was the pliant and passive daughter he wanted, the daughter that Vasilia could never be.
Nevertheless, it embittered Vasilia. She herself was a roboticist; as competent and as skillful, at last, as ever Fastolfe had been, while Gladia was merely an artist, who amused herself with force-field coloring and with the illusions of robotic clothing. How could Fastolfe have been satisfied to lose the one and gain, in her place, nothing more than the other?
And when that policeman from Earth, Elijah Baley, had come to Aurora, he had bullied Vasilia into revealing far more of her thoughts and feelings than she had ever granted anyone else. He was, however, softness itself to Gladia and had helped her – and her protector, Fastolfe – win out against all the odds, though to this day Vasilia had not been able to understand clearly how that had happened.
It was Gladia who had been at Fastolfe’s bedside during the final illness, who had held his hand to the end, and who had heard his last words. Why Vasilia should resent that, she didn’t know, for she herself would, under no circumstances, have acknowledged the old man’s existence to the extent of visiting him to witness his passage into nonexistence in an absolute, rather than a subjective sense – and yet she raged against Gladia’s presence.
It’s the way I feel, she told herself defiantly, and I owe no one an explanation.
And she had lost Giskard. Giskard had been her robot, Vasilia’s own robot when she had been a young girl, the robot granted her by a then seemingly fond father. It was Giskard through whom she had learned robotics and from whom she had felt the first genuine affection. She had not, as a child, speculated on the Three Laws or dealt with the philosophy of positronic automatism. Giskard had seemed affectionate, he had acted as though he were affectionate, and that was enough for a child. She had never found such affection in any human being – certainly not her father.
To this day, she had yet to be weak enough to play the foolish love game with anyone. Her bitterness over her loss of Giskard had taught her that any initial gain was not worth the final deprivation.
When she had left home, disowning her father, he would not let Giskard go with her, even though she herself had improved Giskard immeasurably in the course of her careful reprogramming of him. And when her father had died, he had left Giskard to the Solarian woman. He had also left her Daneel, but Vasilia cared nothing for that pale imitation of a man. She wanted Giskard, who was her own.
Vasilia was on her way back to Solaria now. Her tour was quite done. In fact, as far as usefulness was concerned, it had been essentially over months ago. But she had remained on Hesperos for a needed rest, as she had explained in her official notice to the Institute.
Now, however, Fastolfe was dead and she could return. And while she could not undo the past entirely, she could undo part of it. Giskard must be hers again.
She was determined on that.
55
Amadiro was quite ambivalent in his response to Vasilia’s return. She had not come back until old Fastolfe (he could say the name to himself quite easily now that he was dead) was a month in his um. That flattered his opinion of his own understanding. After all, he had told Mandamus her motive had been that of remaining away from Aurora till her father died.
Then, too, Vasilia was comfortably transparent. She lacked the exasperating quality of Mandamus, his new favorite, who always seemed to have yet another unexpressed thought tucked away – no matter how thoroughly he seemed to have discharged the contents of his mind.
On the other hand, she was irritatingly hard to control the least likely to go quietly along the path he indicated. Leave it to her to probe the otherworld Spacers to the bone during the years she had spent away from Aurora – but then leave it also to her to interpret it all in dark and riddling words.
So he greeted her with an enthusiasm that was somewhere between feigned and unfeigned.
"Vasilia, I’m so happy to have you back. The Institute flies on one wing when you’re gone."
Vasilia laughed. "Come, Kelden" – she alone had no hesitation or inhibition in using his given name, though she was two and a half decades younger than he – "that one remaining wing is yours and how long has it been now since you ceased being perfectly certain that your one wing was sufficient?"
"Since you decided to stretch out your absence to years. Do you find Aurora much changed in the interval?"
"Not a bit – which ought perhaps to be a concern of ours. Changelessness is decay."
"A paradox. There is no decay without a change for the worse."
"Changelessness is a change for the worse, Kelden, in comparison to the surrounding Settler worlds. They change rapidly, extending their control into more numerous worlds and over each individual world more thoroughly. They increase their strength and power and self-assurance, while we sit here dreaming and find our unchanging might diminishing steadily in comparison."
"Beautiful, Vasilia! I think you memorized that carefully on your flight here. However, there has been a change in the political situation on Aurora."
- Page 1
- Page 1
- Page 1
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 2
- Page 2
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 3
- Page 3
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 4
- Page 4
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 5
- Page 5
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 6
- Page 6
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 7
- Page 7
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 8
- Page 8
- Page 8
- Page 9
- Page 9
- Page 9
- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 10
- Page 10
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 11
- Page 11
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 12
- Page 12
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 13
- Page 13
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 14
- Page 14
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 15
- Page 15
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 16
- Page 16
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 17
- Page 17
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 18
- Page 18
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 19
- Page 19
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 20
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 21
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 22
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 23
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 24
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 25
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 26
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 27
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 28
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 29
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 30
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 31
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 32
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 33
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 34
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 35
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 36
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 37
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 38
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 39
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 40
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 53
- Page 54
- Page 54
- Page 55
- Page 55
- Page 56
- Page 56
- Page 57
- Page 57
- Page 58
- Page 58
- Page 59
- Page 59
- Page 60
- Page 60
- Page 61
- Page 61
- Page 62
- Page 62
- Page 63
- Page 63
- Page 64
- Page 64
- Page 65
- Page 65
- Page 66
- Page 66
- Page 67
- Page 67
- Page 68
- Page 68
- Page 69
- Page 69
- Page 70
- Page 70
- Page 71
- Page 71
- Page 72
- Page 72
- Page 73
- Page 73
- Page 74
- Page 74
- Page 75
- Page 75
- Page 76
- Page 76
- Page 77
- Page 77
- Page 78
- Page 78
- Page 79
- Page 79
- Page 80
- Page 80
- Page 81
- Page 81
- Page 82
- Page 82
- Page 83
- Page 83
- Page 84
- Page 84
- Page 85
- Page 85
- Page 86
- Page 86
- Page 87
- Page 87
- Page 88
- Page 88
- Page 89
- Page 89
- Page 90
- Page 90
- Page 91
- Page 91
- Page 92
- Page 92
- Page 93
- Page 93
- Page 94
- Page 94
- Page 95
- Page 95
- Page 96
- Page 96
- Page 97
- Page 97
- Page 98
- Page 98
- Page 99
- Page 99
- Page 100
- Page 100
- Page 101
- Page 101
- Page 102
- Page 102
- Page 103
- Page 103
- Page 104
- Page 104
- Page 105
- Page 105
- Page 106
- Page 106
- Page 107
- Page 107
- Page 108
- Page 108
- Page 109
- Page 109
- Page 110
- Page 110
- Page 111
- Page 111
- Page 112
- Page 112
- Page 113
- Page 113
- Page 114
- Page 114
- Page 115
- Page 115
- Page 116
- Page 116
- Page 117
- Page 117
- Page 118
- Page 118
- Page 119
- Page 119
- Page 120
- Page 120
- Page 121
- Page 121
- Page 122
- Page 122
- Page 123
- Page 123
- Page 124
- Page 124
- Page 125
- Page 125
- Page 126
- Page 126
- Page 127
- Page 127
- Page 128
- Page 128
- Page 129
- Page 129
- Page 130
- Page 130
- Page 131
- Page 131
- Page 132
- Page 132
- Page 133
- Page 133
- Page 134
- Page 134
- Page 135
- Page 135
- Page 136
- Page 136
- Page 137
- Page 137
- Page 138
- Page 138
- Page 139
- Page 139