Caliban

Abell Harcourt was a short, wiry, peppery sort of man, dark-skinned and completely bald. And he was a man who did not much care for interruptions.

“All right,” he said, as soon as the robot was within earshot. “Now that you’ve gotten me away from my sculpture, what the devil do you want?”

“I would humbly ask your help, sir. My aircar crashed in the hills during the storm. I am seriously short of power, and my systems will fail if I do not receive a charge soon.”

“You think I keep atomic power packs lying around or something?”

“No, sir. I was not built with an atomic power source. I have a rechargeable cell, and it is near depletion.”

Harcourt stared fiercely at the robot. This was all mighty odd. Mighty odd. Who the hell would build a robot with a power source that would tap out every few days? And what the hell was a robot doing flying an aircar in a storm like that? “I take it there weren’t no people in that aircar of yours?”

“No, sir, I was alone.”

“Hmmph.” Harcourt stared suspiciously at the robot for a long moment. “Well, I suppose giving you a charge-up won’t do any harm. Nothing I can do about your eye, though.”

“You are most kind, sir.”

“We can use the charge unit in the shed. Come on.” Abell Harcourt turned his back on the strange robot and led the way. But then it came to him. Wait a second. Red robot, flying alone, no humans-suddenly his heart was pounding in his chest. This was the killer robot, the mad rogue that had been splashed all over every news outlet when he had scrolled through the channels the night before. Caliborn, or something like that. No, Caliban, that was it!

Caliban the killer, the news called him. Abell Harcourt felt the space between his shoulder blades become itchy all of a sudden.

Wait a second. A killer robot? It didn’t make sense. Besides, this Caliban seemed polite for a killer.H e could have clubbed my head off a dozen times by now if that’s what he wanted.

Abell Harcourt prided himself on thinking for himself, and something about this did not make sense. The news reports had been full of all sorts of wild stories and rumors, but none of them said much about the rogue robot beingpolite.

Abell Harcourt led the robot into the toolshed, a small building Harcourt used to hold his old carvings, his gardening tools, and all sorts of other random bits and pieces.

“Where’s your charge socket?” he asked as he switched on the light, feeling calmer than he should have.

“Here, sir.” A door popped open on the left side of the robot’s body, about where his ribs would have been if he were human.

“Hmmmph. All right, come over here and sit-sit down here.” Abell overturned a box. “Here. I think if you sit on that, we can get the charge cord to reach you without any trouble.”

Harcourt found his hands were trembling as he dug through the accumulated junk. Not allthat calm. Was he that much afraid? He didn’tfeel afraid. Damnation. This was nonsense. He thought for a moment of running back to the house, digging out his old hunting blaster, and burning a hole through this strange robot. No. That was what those damned sheep back in Hades would do. Abell Harcourt had spent his whole life determined not to think the way everyone else wanted him to think. He was not about to cave in now. The charger unit was bolted to the floor somewhere around here. There! He shoved a couple of failed nudes in wood to one side. “Here we are,” he said, trying to keep a casual tone to his voice as he fumbled with the charger cord. His hands were still shaking a bit as he handed the cord to the robot.

The big robot examined the plug at the end of the cord and plugged it into his charge socket. “Many thanks, sir. My power situation was reaching critical proportions.”

“How long will it take you to absorb a full charge?”

“It should take just under an hour, if you will permit me the use of that much power.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” Harcourt said, his mind whirling, his heart pounding.

“I appreciate your kindness, sir. I have not met with much of it in my experience.”

“You ‘re Caliban, aren’t you?” Harcourt blurted out, instantly regretting it. It was madness to ask.

The robot looked up at him, his one working eye staring hard at him while the other dangled, dark and useless, from its socket. “Yes, sir. I was afraid that you would know that.”

“I’mthe one who should be afraid of you.”

“Sir? I have no reason to hurt you. You have helped me.”

“On the news they say you’ve attacked all sorts of people.”

“No, sir,” Caliban said. “It would be fairer to say all sorts of people have attackedme. I left the city in hopes of being left alone. Nothing more.”

Caliban looked at him carefully, cocking his head to one side in a thoughtful sort of way. “Youare afraid of me.”