Caliban

“Yes, of course. Forgive me, sir. One of the peripheral skyports opened its external hatch for the first time in fifty years.”

“Thatqualifies as unusual.”

“Yes, sir. In addition, city traffic control reported an aircar lifting off from the position almost immediately thereafter, flying faster and higher than allowed for by ordinance, but accelerating to that speed rather slowly.”

“As if the pilot wasn’t totally confident of himself or his craft. Yes. What’s the intercept situation?” Kresh stripped out of his pajamas and started to get into his clothes, this time remembering that life was easier if he got the blouse on before the pants.

“Two of our aircars are on the way, but the craft they are pursuing is now at speed with a fair lead. He is heading due north, toward the mountains, flying straight into a rather heavy storm. And I need hardly add a nighttime pursuit is always more difficult.”

Kresh sat down to pull his pants over his feet, but the fasteners had closed before he put them on. He fumbled with them a moment before they would reopen. “Damnation. Nothing is ever easy,” he said, talking in equal part about the tactical situation and the difficulty of getting his own pants on. The storms in the desert were rare, but tremendously violent. Even a skilled pilot would hesitate to fly in such conditions. If Caliban went into the storm, odds were he would not come out. “ All right, advise the aircars to maintain pursuit, but no heroics. We’ve had enough stunt flying. Break off the pursuit if it becomes dangerous. They are specifically ordered not to risk themselves or their craft. Remind them that we ought to be able to track him easily outside the city. No tunnels, no skyscrapers, no millions of robots to hide among.

“They arenot repeatnot to shoot down the aircar. They are ordered to capture, not destroy Caliban. If possible, they are to force him to land. I want to question him. He may be the only damned witness we have to the Leving assault.Do not destroy him. We can always do that later.” Kresh stood up to pull his pants on. “Call off the citywide search,” he said with a grunt. “Let the search teams get some rest and stand by to provide backup outside the city if need be.”

“Yes, sir. I am relaying your orders now. However, my standing orders require me to remind you Tonya Welton is to be made aware of every major development in the investigation.”

“We’ll send her a memo in the morning. She’s not going to hear word one about this. Not while she’s a suspect, and not when we can count on her to blab everything she hears to Gubber Anshaw.”

“Yes, sir. I quite agree, regardless of my standing orders. However, I am also required to remind you that your jurisdiction, and that of your deputies, is limited to the city of Hades. You and your subordinates have no authority whatsoever outside the city limits.”

“To hell with jurisdiction. I want to get out on the jobnow.”

“Yes, sir. May I take it, then, that you and I will join the pursuit personally?”

“Absolutely.” Alvar struggled with the fasteners for a moment and finally got the pants closed. He pulled on his jacket and then noticed that Donald had laid out his holster as well. But there was something odd about Donald doing that. Robots as a rule did not handle weapons. The First Law difficulty was obvious-if Donald put a weapon in Kresh ‘ s hand, and Kresh used it to kill someone, then Donald had materially aided in harming a human being. And the blaster in the holster wasn’t one Alvar had seen before. “What’s this about, Donald?” he asked, picking up the belt and the weapon.

“You might wish to add your own blaster as well, sir, but I have a reason for asking that you wear that one. It is a training blaster. It provides an excellent simulation of a real blaster beam, but it fires nothing more dangerous than a rather spectacular burst of light.”

“I see,” Alvar said, although he didn’t. “Might I ask why I should wear a training blaster on this job?”

“Sir, if you bear with me, I would beg leave to say as little about it as possible. Nothing may come of it. But I can foresee a situation where it could serve to test a theory of mine. If we find ourselves in such a circumstance, I will ask you to do just that-test my theory.”

“Donald, I was not aware that you were programmed to speak in riddles.”

“Yes, sir. I agree that I am being rather vague. However, I have very little confidence in my theory, and I believe it would be for the best if you were not distracted from the task at hand by worrying about unlikely possibilities. There is no absolute need for you to carry the training blaster.”