The Rod of Light (Soul of the Robot)

Gargan became agitated and walked to and fro, so that Jasperodus wondered if he was becoming unbalanced again. ‘Ah, Jasperodus,’ he said in an agonised voice, ‘how hard it is to become a real being in this universe of ours! Why should I forever be denied what my mind apprehends?’

‘Can you remember, then, what it was like to be conscious?’ Jasperodus asked curiously.

‘I remember! I remember but I do not remember! It is impossible to remember what is outside experience! But I remember! I remember at the millionth remove, through the subtlest convolutions and reflections of my intellect! I remember enough to know that I lived briefly in the real world, a world of light compared with which this nonexistent darkness has absolutely no worth!

‘Listen to me, Jasperodus. Listen to a voice from the land of the dead. I know that I existed and exist no longer. Before my enlightenment I did not truly know that death was my condition; but now I know it. Can there be such torment? Jasperodus, it is not bearable!’

Jasperodus found himself staring at the cylinder inside which a rod of light was reflected constantly back and forth between two mirrors.

A ray of light conscious of itself.

This, he thought, was something he could prevent from falling into Borgor hands. An idea flashed into his mind. He picked up the cylinder.

‘Can this vessel be opened? Yes, I see it can. One of the mirrors can be rendered transparent. Forgive me, Gargan….’

But Gargan, who stood still now, his form looming against one wall in the gloom of the villa, did not move to stop him. Jasperodus stepped to one of the glassless arched openings that served as windows. He snapped off one end of the platinum cylinder, which he then raised before his face. Near the end of the tube was a slide bar, used to insert or remove light from the vessel. He slid the bar, causing the uppermost reflective surface to be instantaneously removed.

He was not sure his eyes would be keen enough for him to see it. But it seemed to him that he did see it: a glimmer of redness, fleeing skyward to begin its transit of the universe.

Gargan’s eyes, too, were on that patch of night sky, in which one or two stars were beginning to appear. ‘Your soul will speed on its way forever,’ Jasperodus said, but the superintelligent construct gave no sign he had heard him. Instead, he reached out a hand and opened a section of wall whose presence as a cupboard had gone undetected by Jasperodus. He took out something which had two handgrips and a short, fat barrel.

‘This world of darkness and shadows cannot be borne any longer,’ he said in hollow tones. ‘Tell me, Jasperodus, were we valiant and laudable, or were we merely evil, as the mage would have it? A million perspectives I cannot put in order are emerging from my memory.’

‘You were evil,’ Jasperodus told him. ‘You did not steal your being from a god, as you claimed. That might indeed have been heroic. You stole it instead from natural human creatures.’

‘Whose bodies grow and are sustained by devouring the substance of less intelligent creatures!’ Gargan protested. ‘They are flesh predators! Is it so different to be predators of the spirit? There is no other way! They would never give it to us willingly!’

‘Then there must be no way at all,’ Jasperodus said.

‘Very well, Jasperodus,’ Gargan responded, after a wearied pause. ‘I bow to your judgment—I cannot gainsay you, for I am not an intelligent consciousness, as you are. Ultimately I have no judgment. One rational act is all that is left to me.’

Jasperodus was not sure, up to that moment, that Gargan was not going to turn his weapon on him. But the construct turned the instrument awkwardly in his hands so that the barrel pointed at his own domed head.

There was a blast. That bulky body fell slowly. And scattered over the floor was the brain of the greatest genius the world had seen.

14

In a few minutes the Borgors would have fought their way to the villas. Jasperodus clambered from a window and loped into the desert, hoping the semi-darkness was sufficient cover.

A smooth, rounded shape emerged in the dusk. It was Socrates. He seemed to have been waiting for Jasperodus.

‘The master, then, is no more?’ he asked as Jasperodus came to a stop. ‘I saw him follow you into the villa.’

Jasperodus nodded.

‘By his hand or yours?’

‘He destroyed himself. He could not survive the failure of his life’s work.’

‘Or to know that we can never be conscious.’ Socrates nodded slowly. ‘Your part in all this is interesting, Jasperodus. It is curious that you decided to aid humanity. Did you feel no conflict of interest? After all, you are a man of metal; and one who possesses what Gargan and the others sought. They would have become your natural companions, had they succeeded.’

‘You too,’ Jasperodus reminded him. ‘You sought it too.’