The Questor Tapes (2 page)

Darro’s eyes flicked around the room, taking it in with one look. The others went back to their monitoring rather self-consciously. The project chief crossed to the cosmetology section, where Dr. Chen was using a computer screen on which color slides flashed up. The finely detailed pictures were followed by complete information on the molding of features, skin pigmentation, hair implantation, and on other cosmetic instructions.

“Decided on the features you’ll give it, Doctor?”

Chen looked around at the big man standing behind him. “Naturally, I would prefer Asian, Mr. Darro. I see great beauty in the shape and color of my people’s faces.” He smiled ruefully. “But when we hooked up its eye units, they turned a rather occidental blue.”

Darro grunted. “Apparently Vaslovik had his own ideas on what he wanted.”

“One of his many reputations,” Chen said. He turned to the computer and keyed in a new diagram.

The screen obediently displayed a large color schematic of the mechanism, which served as the android’s eyes. The rounded front surface resembled an anatomical rendering of a healthy human eye. Chen tapped it with a finger.

“The part of it we will see looks remarkably human and will probably have normal eye movements, secretions, and so on.”

Chen pushed another switch, and the diagram changed to reveal the complex microelectronic structure behind the rounded front area. Chen shook his head. “But exactly how the eye mechanism
operates
is still guesswork.” He switched the screen diagram again, bringing in a closer, more detailed view of the delicate works. “We have never seen half the micro units Vaslovik used here. Or in the other components, for that matter.”

“Fully disconnected,” Robinson said from behind them.

Darro turned and moved back toward the assembly pallet. Dr. Bradley scanned the body monitor again. The levels were all satisfactory and no different from any average-human-body readings, as far as they went. There was no brain activity, no muscular movement except for that required by the rise and fall of the chest and the pumping of lubricant through the veins. “Readings excellent. Running very smoothly on its own,” she said.

Michaels nodded and gestured to Jerry. “Seal it up, Mr. Robinson.”

Jerry picked up a heat-molding tool and triggered it. The tip glowed red in a few seconds. He moved the flap of plastiskin into place, covering the exposed transistor packs in its side. The android’s chest continued to move in even cadence, and Jerry hesitated for an instant. The eyes were closed, and the head still looked alien.
It’s a machine,
Jerry reminded himself.
Get on with it.

He applied the molding tip to the loose flap, holding the plastiskin in place to assure smooth bonding. The “skin” sizzled, but the accompanying odor was not unpleasant. Some smoke curled up from under the molding tip as Jerry moved it along the flap.

“You’re not burning it?” Darro asked.

“No. That’s just normal residue in sealing up.” Jerry stepped back so that Darro could see. The sealed area was clean and smooth, totally unblemished, as if the flap had never existed.

Darro nodded, impressed. “Another of Vaslovik’s little inventions?”

“Mine.” Jerry shrugged lightly. “I knew we’d need something like it. If it’s supposed to look like a man, the seams can’t show.”

The project chief studied him intently but did not comment. Jerry had a feeling that the fact was registered, filed, and could be recalled instantly if Darro needed it. The young engineer turned his attention to the android.

Dr. Audret moved an information-input device over the android’s head. It was a dome-shaped object, linked directly into the lab’s programming computers. Audret glanced over at Gorlov. The Russian activated the data-tape turntables. Jerry shifted his weight nervously, impatiently, and Darro instantly snapped his attention from the android to the engineer.

“Programming ready,” Gorlov said.

Darro watched Jerry. “The moment of truth.”

Jerry suddenly stepped forward, his hand instinctively reaching out in a plea. “Please! I’m sorry—but I think you’re wrong to use your programming instead of Dr. Vaslovik’s.”

The scientists turned to look at him with some surprise. Dr. Audret was the first to speak. “Monsieur Robinson, I think we all consider you a talented young engineer, but since this is a scientific decision—”

Jerry interrupted, turning to Darro as project chief. “Mr. Darro. Dr. Vaslovik’s notes
specifically state
we should activate it with
his
programming tape. They now want to use their own computerized, hybrid mush—”

Darro cut in, hard and cold. “As project administrator, Mr. Robinson, I will not interfere with scientific decisions. Nor will you.”

“It is a useless discussion,” Audret said. “We all know half the Vaslovik tape has been erased—”

“By the attempts of
your
cryptographers to decode it,” Jerry snapped.

Gorlov muscled into the debate, interposing himself between Robinson and Audret. “Naturally we wished to learn what instructions Dr. Vaslovik left for the android. Unfortunately, we did not.”

“No, you only managed to destroy what might mean the success of this project.”

The Russian lifted his hands in a little gesture of acknowledgment. “Once we saw there was nothing to be gained and only certain loss if we continued, we ceased to experiment with the Vaslovik tape. We have selected university tapes of your systematized knowledge since our tests show that orderly data fed into the android will form patterns in the brain-case bionic plasma.”

Darro glanced back to Jerry. The young engineer was upset. To Darro, he seemed more concerned than a technician should be over the proposed programming.

“How can you be that sure?” Robinson demanded. “All we’ve done is assemble the parts and material Vaslovik provided, and no one here even understands them or—”

Darro interrupted him again, the hard edge still in his voice. “No more than I understand this change in the normally cooperative Mr. Robinson. Is it possible, when you worked for Dr. Vaslovik, that you learned something you haven’t told us about?”

“I didn’t even know what he was training me
for.
He never so much as mentioned an android.”

“Then you have no valid argument against the step proposed by the scientists, have you?” Darro looked around at them again and nodded. “Enough debate, gentlemen. Please proceed.”

Gorlov and Audret moved away to the computer controls and activated them. The reels of programmed information began to spin . . . first one, then another, until four of the dozen began to register, status lights flashing on the consoles. A flicker of colored-light pinpoints reflected from the information-input dome down onto the android’s smooth, bald skull.

Jerry nervously bit his lip, his eyes darting from computers to android and back. Darro watched Robinson. But, like the others, even the implacable project chief ultimately was drawn to the unmoving figure on the assembly slab.

Phyllis Bradley bent over the EEG oscilloscope, hoping to see something but afraid she would not. There were so many unknowns . . . Suddenly the straight line on the scope fluttered and then began to pick up a muted pattern. She kept her voice impassive, fighting the surge of excitement she felt. “Getting brain-wave readings.”

Jerry stepped forward slightly, unaware of Darro’s scrutiny. He
had
seen a movement in the android. The thumb of the right hand twitched.
There
. . . it jumped again! There was a moment of non-movement. Jerry had a fleeting impression that the only creature in the lab that had moved was the android. Everyone else was suspended in mid-breath, waiting. Then there was a slight, convulsive twitch of the right leg . . . again . . . and again.

Gorlov, practical and pragmatic as always, turned to Darro. “This run includes mathematics, engineering, various sciences. Although we cannot expect the android to understand or use such information, it will begin setting orderly patterns.”

“The greater the number of these molecular patterns, the more likely it is that it will be capable of simple thought processes,” Audret said.

The computer data tapes spun to a halt, and the soft accompanying hum ceased. Everyone’s eyes went to the android. But the man-shaped thing lay still and unmoving again.

Dr. Bradley’s voice whispered across the silence. “Brain-wave production, zero.”

“Well,” Michaels said briskly, “only a first try. We have a good deal more programming to feed in.” He motioned to Gorlov and Audret, who busied themselves with the other computers.

Again, the reels began to spin, the hum growing louder as the full ensemble of twelve gradually engaged. The flickering pinpoints of light bombarded the android’s skull in a dazzling dance of color. The exact method of information absorption was not understood—another of Vaslovik’s inventions. The android’s limbs quivered slightly, much less than before.

Darro had not missed the difference in response. “Dr. Gorlov?”

Gorlov tried to sound hopeful. “The limited results of the first run indicate that many more patterns will be necessary.” He glanced pointedly at Robinson. “We
are
using Dr. Vaslovik’s specified input procedures.”

“This run is longer,” Audret said, “giving far more patterns, far more complex than the initial ones. University tapes on logic, literature, medicine . . .”

“Let’s hope you haven’t burned it out,” Jerry said.

He nodded toward the android. It lay immobile, with the single exception of the breathing motion of the chest. The tapes on the twelve computers spun to a stop, and Phyllis Bradley consulted the EEG oscilloscope.

“Cerebral activation, zero. No brain waves at all this time.”

Jerry examined the toes of his clean suit with intense interest. Darro almost wished the engineer would say “I told you so” just to get it out of the way. Jerry chose to let it hang there, implied, in the disappointed silence that clogged the atmosphere of the lab.

Audret finally spoke. “We have no option but to try the Vaslovik tape.”

Darro flicked a look at the small computer, which stood apart from the others. Its size and shape differentiated it from the prim, square mechanisms that crowded together in the computer section. The tape loaded on its reels was also a sharp departure from the norm in color and width; and when Gorlov activated the machine, the tape whirled at a different rate of speed. The polka of varicolored light pinpoints began to play over the android’s head.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, abruptly, the android’s body went into convulsions. Jerry jumped back as the torso and limbs strained against the heavy metal straps. The thing’s arms and legs flailed at the restraints with superhuman strength; but the face remained expressionless, the eyes still closed. The voices of the science-team members bubbled up, drowning out the hiss of the turning tape and the clatter of the android’s limbs against the assembly pallet.

The tape ended, and the android’s body fell back on the slab, limp. Jerry Robinson had held more hope for Vaslovik’s programming than he cared to admit. The failure of the android assured a failure of Jerry’s faith.

2

T
he Cal Tech lab was littered with all the data that had been applied to Project Questor from the beginning, three years before, to the moment of failure on the assembly slab. The scientists conducted a postmortem that went on for six hours. Jerry Robinson sat with them but did not contribute. He was rummaging around in his own thoughts, trying to avoid the shards of shattered hopes. Darro stood slightly away from the group, watching and listening, weighing the arguments and reactions.

Gorlov’s voice rose stridently over the others. “It is
impossible
to overload its brain case. Dr. Vaslovik’s own notes indicate a billion billion potential configurations.”

The android lay on the assembly slab, all but forgotten in the debate over its construction and programming. The basic activation devices still functioned, also forgotten.

“It should work!” Bradley said. “Every stage of assembly tested out perfectly.”

The android’s eyes snapped open, a bright, pleasant blue, clearly conscious and menacing without brows or lashes to soften them. It turned its head toward the conference table where the science-team members sat. The overhead lights in the assembly area had been turned off, and the android’s slight, noiseless move went unnoticed.

“Perhaps some basic error made by Vaslovik?” Chen suggested. “On a project such as this, one might become so subjective that some slight miscalculation would be easy to overlook.”

“Not likely,” Jerry said. “Not Vaslovik.”

Michaels nodded and pushed a pad around on the table. “I agree. Every unit Dr. Vaslovik provided worked as predicted.”

“Unless he built in some factor his notes do not mention. I agree with Dr. Bradley . . . it should work!”

Darro finally stepped forward. He moved deliberately, assuring their attention before he spoke. “I think we’re all quite naturally disappointed. May I suggest a fresh start tomorrow?” He held up a hand to wave off the rumble of protests that began immediately. “We’ve all had a long day, and you’ve pored over the project notes for hours. You need some time off to gain a fresh perspective.”