Caliban

Fredda stared down at them as they formed up in the aisle.The simplest and most impossible of all demands, she thought.Make it stop, keep the world from changing, leave things as they are. It was a lot to wrap up in one word, but the meaning came through loud and clear.

“NO, NO, NO!”

Now they were a solid mass of bodies moving down the center aisle, toward the block of seats where the Settlers sat.

“NO, NO, NO!”

The deputies struggled to break up the Ironheads, but they were hopelessly outnumbered. Now the Settlers were getting to their feet, some of them attempting to flee, others seeming just as eager for the fight as the Ironheads, slowed only by the press of bystanders intent on nothing more than escape.

Fredda looked to the front row, to the only robot in the audience. She was about to call out a warning, but Alvar Kresh knew what to do. He reached around to Donald’ s back, pulled open an access panel, and stabbed down on a button inside. Donald collapsed to the floor. After all, she had just got done saying robots were no good in a riot. First Law conflicts would send even a police robot like Donald right into a major, and probably fatal, brainlock. Kresh had shut his assistant down just barely in time. Kresh looked up at Fredda, and she looked back at him. Their eyes met, and in some strange way the two of them were alone in that moment, two combatants eye-to-eye, all the pretense, all the side issues, stripped away.

And Fredda Leving was terrified to discover how much of herself she saw in Alvar Kresh.

THEaudience was a mob, a whirl of bodies rushing in all directions, and Kresh was jostled, shoved, knocked down to land on Donald. He got to his feet, turned, and looked back toward Fredda Leving. But the moment, whatever it had been, was already gone. A metallic hand snatched at Fredda’s injured shoulder. Alvar saw her jump in surprise, flinch back from the contact.

It was Tonya Welton’s robot, Ariel. Alvar saw Fredda turn and face the robot, saw Ariel urge her toward the backstage area, away from the chaos in the auditorium. She allowed herself to be led away, hustled with the others through the door that led off the backstage area. There was something strange in that moment, something Alvar could not quite place. But there was no time to think it over. The Ironheads and Settlers were closing in on each other, and the riot was about to begin in earnest. Alvar Kresh turned to lend a hand to his deputies.

He threw himself into the fight.

15

ALVAR Kresh had not been in the middle of a real brawl for longer than he could remember. The blood rushed into his veins, and he felt an eager desire for battle. He launched himself into the fight and then-and then he quite suddenly remembered why he always tried to avoid riot duty back when he was a deputy.

A stranger’s elbow jammed into his ribs, an anonymous hand clawed at his face, and a disembodied boot crushed down on his toes. All three assaults were completely unintentional. He could not even tell which people, in the press of bodies, were responsible. Therewere no people in the melee, just a random collection of fists and feet, bodies and shouts. One moment, Alvar found himself buried beneath a tangle of Settlers and deputies, and the next he was suspended in midair over a tangle of Ironheads.

Alvar was overwhelmed. The shouts, the cries, the noise, the shock of feelingpain, were tremendous. Robot-protected Spacers rarely had the chance to feel pain of any sort, and Alvar was amazed at the intensity of the sensation.

He winced and writhed, every instinct telling him to get free, get away. But both duty and desire fought against those impulses: He had a job to do here, and a few debts to pay as well. Alvar Kresh did not get many chances to bust heads.

The bodies crushed together, punches flew. At first, the two sides seemed evenly matched, but then the Ironheads began to give way. The Ironheads specialized in hit-and-run attacks on property. Never before had they faced a pitched battle against whatever rowdies the Settlers could field.

And the Settlers here at the lecture were a pretty rough lot. There were no front-office types here, no executives who stayed clean during a workday. Whoever had picked out the Settler delegation to this lecture had sent the roughnecks.

The differences in experience and attitude began to show. When an Ironhead punched a Settler, the Settler would stand there and take it. But when a Settler landed one good punch on an Ironhead, the Head would drop to the ground, moaning in pain.