Caliban

She stared again at Kresh. He knew. He knew what had happened to Horatio, and she had no doubt whatsoever that he was closing in on the real story behind Caliban as well.

She felt her head throbbing slightly and put her hand up to her turbaned head. She felt the small, discreet bandage on the back of her head under the hat. At least the turban would hide her shaved head and the bandage. No doubt everyone here knew she had been attacked, but there was no need toadvertise it.

She stepped back from the curtain and found herself pacing the stage, lost in thought, lost to the world. But that was too lonely, too nerve-racking. She needed to speak to someone. She turned to her two associates, who were doing their own nervous waiting.

“Do you really think they’ll listen, Jomaine?” she asked. “Do you, Gubber? Do you think they’ll accept our ideas?”

Gubber Anshaw shook his head nervously. “I-I don’t know. I honestly can’t say which way they’ll jump.” He knitted his fingers together and then pulled his hands apart, as if they were two small animals he was having trouble controlling. “For all we know, they’ll form a lynch mob at the end of the night.”

“Nice of you to go out of your way to make Fredda feel better, Gubber,” Jomaine said acidly.

Gubber shrugged awkwardly and rubbed his nose with the tips of his fingers, his hand stiff and flat. “There’ s no call for you to talk that way to me, Jomaine. Fredda asked for my honest opinion-and, and-I gave it to her, that’s all. It’s no reflection on you, Fredda, nor on our work, if the people choose not to accept what you say. We always knew there was a risk. Yes, I was unsure about signing on to the project in the first place, but you long ago convinced me that your approach makes sense. But you said it yourself enough times: You are challenging what amounts to the state religion. If there are enough hard-core true believers out there-”

“Oh, stuff and nonsense,” Jomaine said wearily. “The only thing close to robotics worship is the Ironhead organization, and their only belief is that robots are the magic solution to everything. They’re here looking for a reason to cause trouble. It’s the only reason they go anywhere. And I promise you-if wedon’t give them a reason for a fight, they’ll do their best to find one. The only question is whether the police are here in enough force to keep them from succeeding.”

“But what about the rest of the people out there?” Fredda asked.

“My dear, you are not going to manage a blanket conversion tonight,” Jomaine said in a far gentler voice. “ At best you will open a debate. If we are lucky, people will start thinking about what you say. Some will take one side, some another. They will argue.If we are lucky, things that people have taken for granted all their lives will suddenly be topical issues. That is the best we can hope for.” Jomaine cleared his throat delicately, a prim little noise. “ And,” he added in rather dry tones, “the fact that you are going to present them all with one hell of afait accompli at the end of the evening should intensify that debate, just ever so slightly.”

Fredda smiled. “Yes, I suppose you’re right. It’s not going to be over tonight.” She turned toward Gubber again, but noticed he had wandered off toward the other end of the stage, and was chatting with Tonya Welton while the Governor sat waiting quietly at the table. “It’s gotten to Gubber more than any of us, hasn’t it?” Fredda said. “Since all this started, he’s in the worst shape I’ve ever seen him.”

Jomaine Terach grunted noncommittally. Gubber was undoubtedly even more tightly strung than usual, but Jomaine was not entirely convinced it had all that much to do with ‘the Caliban crisis or the N.L. robots. Jomaine could not imagine that conducting a supposedly secret romance with Tonya Welton would be all that relaxing an activity.

Did Fredda know about the affair? It seemed at least possible she did not. The way gossip moved through the average workplace, the boss was often the last to know.Should I tell her? he asked himself for the hundredth time. And for the hundredth time, he came to the same conclusion. Given the strained relations between Leving Labs and the Limbo Project-in other words, between Fredda and Tonya-Jomaine could see no point in telling Fredda and giving her something else to worry about.

“Come on, Fredda,” he said. “It’s nearly time to start again.”