More Than Superhuman Page 13

  All The Loving Androids

  A. E. VAN VOGT

  The police came in answer to the android's emergency call, and an ambulance bore away the unconscious body of Anita Copeland, who had taken an overdose of a sleeping potion.

  Police Officer A. Sutter noted in his report that this android — who had telephoned for help — seemed to be unusually human in his mannerisms and conditioning. 'Even the slight forward tilt,' he wrote, ~which is the main recognizable characteristic of the mass-produced androids, appears to have been rectified in this model, suggesting costly custom design. I do not recall ever having been informed that such masterful androids were being manufactured.'

  After he and his companion had the story of what had happened, they were briefly nonplussed. 'Well-l-l,' said Officer J. Black doubtfully, while Sutter wrote furiously, 'it doesn't sound illegal, but it sure was a dirty trick to turn his wife over to an android image of himself without her knowing it.'

  It was Sutter who addressed the android. 'Does she have any relatives?'

  'A brother,' was the reply. 'But he won't be much help. He thinks his sister is a nut'

  'But you do have information about him?' Officer Sutter persisted.

  'Yes. His name is Dan Thaler. He's a physicist in government employ.'

  He had the address and phone number, and so 'Officer Black put through a call, which fortunately connected at once.

  Dan, as he entered his sister's living room, saw waiting for him two police officers and his brother-in-law, Peter Copeland.

  At least, it seemed to be his brother-in-law until Dan said, 'Hello, Peter.'

  Peter bowed and smiled a faint, cynical smile, but said nothing.

  One of the officers came forward and addressed Peter sternly. 'You realize that you have just given the impression that you are in fact Peter Copeland?'

  'I am Peter II,' was the calm reply. 'I am programmed to act as if I am Peter I. I cannot cancel that out of myself.'

  Utter surprise!

  His first real clue.

  Dan stood very still, trying not to give away what a fantastic piece of good luck this was for him.

  For more than a year he had been on a secret assignment, his task to find out exactly what was going on among the androids.

  Something was — the government knew that. But what?

  Neither he nor his superiors had had any suspicion that such perfect androids existed.

  Ordinary androids in their tens of millions had face, body, limbs, artificial flesh, skin that was in appearance undistinguishable from that of human beings. But they had a way of standing, walking, turning, that everybody had learned to recognize.

  This android did not have such identifying characteristics.

  Instants after he realized the astonishing reality of what was here, Dan had a labeling thought: superandroid!

  He presumed, of course, that this one was an android and therefore underneath all the outward paraphernalia of humanness was a basic mechanical-electronic structure.

  'What's all this about?' he said as he arrived at that point in his reaction.

  When he had heard the details of what had happened to his sister, Dan's somewhat pale face became spotted with angry color. His lean body stiffened. And his voice went way up.

  'Does anybody know where this so-and-so is? I'm going to beat his brains out.'

  The android, who had been standing off to one side, came courteously forward. 'You are referring to Anita's husband, Peter — where is he?' He drew a billfold from his pocket and produced a card. 'My orders from Peter are to not reveal this address, but naturally police can preempt such a programming.'

  He handed the card to Officer Sutter. Dan Thaler attempted to snatch it, but the policeman held it away from him.

  'Not in your state of mind, Mr. Thaler,' he said judicially.

  Dan had actually been thinking rapidly while he acted out the role of indignant brother. What decided him finally on a course of action was the presence of the police. He took down the names of both officers and secured their identification numbers with the intention of using his influence to have one of them forced to be his companion for the next few days.

  With the data safe in his pocket, Dan turned to the android, said, 'Since I am a responsible relative, and you are a valuable property, I think you should be stored until all this is settled.'

  The duplicate Peter bowed politely. 'My box is in the basement,' he said 'Shall I accompany you down there?'.

  Dan took the precaution of having Officer A. Sutter go along. A few minutes later, the two men stood by as the android fumbled with a remote-control device, clicked it, and sank back into the coffinlike box.

  Officer A. Sutter helped Dan lower the lid. Whereupon the policeman went upstairs. Dan drew a tiny instrument from an assortment he carried and studied the dials on it.

  The little meters indicated that the superandroid was not turned off at all but was lying quietly in his case, waiting.

  Smiling grimly, Dan went up to the main floor, accompanied the officers outside, and locked the door. He walked with them to their combo-cruiser, watched them take off, then went to his own combo and zoomed up into the night sky — but came down again, this time landing on the street a hundred yards away.

  An hour went by, and then the door opened and the Peter android came out. Dan identified the humanlike figure as an electronic unit on his highly sensitive instrument panel — and, aiming carefully, shot the creature with a high-powered energy gun.

  His combo glided toward the still body at high speed, and stopped. Swiftly Dan leaped out, dragged the body into the combo, and took off.

  In terms of communication, he was many places the balance of that night But as a person he spent the long darkness in his combo-air-ground unit outside the hospital to which his sister had been transported for emergency treatment. About noon the next day, when he made his nth inquiry, the receptionist sighed, dialed a number, and presently pointed to a phone on the desk.

  'Pick that up. Her psychiatrist will talk to you.'

  Dan did so. A man's voice said, 'At Anita's request, I have agreed to bar all visitors for the time being.'

  'I'm her brother.'

  'She specifically doesn't want to see any relatives.'

  Since he was her only relative, other than her husband, somewhere inside Dan Thaler's head a tiny spot of brotherly rage, connected since babyhood to his sister by emotional circuitry, expanded in size. Fortunately, the brain-nerve complex involved had long-suffering inhibiting mechanisms associated with it. And so Dan was presently able to remind the apoplectic spot in his brain that Anita was probably quite sick and needed consideration.

  He said aloud, 'When do you think — ?'

  'She said she'll call you — '

  * *

  Policeman A. Sutter was considerably exhilarated that same afternoon when he was told by Inspector Ingrath, 'Uh, stay on this case, Constable, until, uh, this matter of the brother's threats is resolved.' Ingrath went on, 'Make a point of seeing this rat, uh, Peter Copeland, and warn him of his possible danger from his brother-in-law.'

  What Sutter did was phone the private number he had been given, and he was put through to somewhere; and a man's voice said, Yes, officer, this is Peter Copeland.'

  After Sutter had told his story, the voice said, 'I think the best solution would be for me to have Dan come and hear my side of this matter and for you to be present; so why don't you bring him over, Officer?'

  The two men — Dan Thaler and Officer A. Sutter — flew to the Copeland factory together, and were at once ushered into the inner sanctum.

  'I found myself,' wrote Sutter later, 'in the presence of a man of about five-feet-ten who was, naturally, of very familiar appearance to me, since he was an exact duplicate of the android I had seen the night before in Anita Copeland's home.'

  Officer Sutter drew a chair off to one side and, as he wrote it, 'prepared to act as a mediator'.

  Peter Copeland broke the si
lence with what was clearly intended to be an appeasing statement, 'I'm very glad you came, Dan. I realize I owe you an explanation.

  Peter continued, 'It's a little difficult to talk to a brother about his sister, because it is unlikely that he'll ever realize how unreasonable a woman can be,'

  Dan Thaler said grimly, 'If a man and woman don't get along, they should get divorced.'

  Peter Copeland laughed curtly.. "Are you kidding?' he said.

  The verbal picture he now drew of Anita — as Sutter recorded it — "was of a hysterical woman who figuratively held a gun to her heard and threatened to fire it at the slightest indication that her husband would not do exactly as she required.'

  Some of the statements which Sutter noted down verbatim were: "She insisted on possessing me body and soul. She demanded the shadow as well as the substance. She phoned me at the office a dozen times a day. It seemed as if I had barely time to think before there she was again. One day, when her call interrupted an important conference for the third time, I realized I had to do something. At first I merely had in mind having an android that would answer the phone for me when she called. The rest — letting the android play my part at home also — came later.'

  'The rest,' Dan said, 'is absolutely unforgivable.'

  'Hear me out — '

  Exactly when the change had taken place, Anita had no recollection afterward.

  Somehow, life became — normal.

  She would find herself starting to fret with Peter. On occasion she actually spoke irritably. And then a realization would come that he had not resisted her, as she had expected he would; had not asserted any thought of his own; not objected to her plan; was willing.

  'Anything your little heart desires,' he would say lightly.

  'One day' she flared at that. 'You say those words as if you're speaking to a child!' she yelled.

  'So,' said Peter Copeland to Dan Thaler, 'when the android reported that remark — if you can call a shriek that — to me, I accepted it as a challenge. That's when I decided I would become infinitely flexible and change the programming of the robot to conform to her desires. It became a matter of mild interest to me to discover how much a neurotic woman required of her husband — and of course I knew by this time that I had the worst neurotic of all time and space on my hands.'

  He paused. His face worked; he seemed to be fighting grief. He mumbled, 'How could a woman like that have happened to a good guy like me!'

  Abruptly he braced himself, continued. 'To solve this particular problem — of Peter II just using one now-suspect sentence — I recalled a line I had seen somewhere in a story, or heard in a play: "Your slightest wish is my command". Later I added three more sentences, leaving it to my android to decide which one fitted the occasion. The three sentences were: "You always think of interesting things to do"; "That's what we'll do"; "I'm very happy to go along with that". What astonished me, as I proceeded with my conformance plan, was that not once did it seem to cross her mind that I never expressed a wish, myself. She seemed to take it completely for granted that what she liked I liked.'

  Peter I went on in an amazed tone, 'If I were to tell you all the things that happened during this period, you wouldn't believe me. She began to give me errands to do during the daytime; it took the android all day just to carry out these instructions. But — get this! — she continued her twelve calls to the office, and there I was answering the phone again. I ordered another android duplicate.'

  Officer wrote in his notebook: 'At this point Mr. Copeland rose to his feet, went to a door behind his desk, opened it, and said, 'Peter III, will you come out here?' Whereupon his exact duplicate walked out, bowed with a faint, mocking smile on his face, and said, 'At your service, gentlemen.'

  Peter I addressed the android: 'Will you tell 'Mr. Thaler and Mr. Sutter what your duties were?'

  'For the most part,' was the reply, 'I simply sat in the adjoining room and answered the phone to Mrs. Copeland.'

  'Will you give an estimate of how long on average you were kept on the phone?'

  'Between seven and seven and a half hours each day.'

  'What is our work day? Office hours, I mean?'

  'Including time out for lunch, seven and a half hours.'

  'During this time, where was Peter II?'

  He was out shopping for Mrs. Copeland.,'

  'Where was I?'

  'Here at this desk working, except for those occasions when — '

  'Never mind those occasions!' said Peter I hastily.

  'Very well, sir,' said Peter II with a meaningful smile.

  Dan Thaler interjected stridently, 'I think that was a very important slip. Now, I'm beginning to see this whole picture. There's another woman.'

  Peter I sighed. 'All right, so it came out. But that didn't happen until much later. I swear it'

  It was the moment Dan Thaler had been waiting for; what he believed might be the psychologically locked mental door in Peter could probably be opened by the exact right emotion.

  He stood up and said in a venomous tone, 'I don't want to listen to any more of this rat talk.'

  Peter said, 'For heaven's sake, Dan, be reasonable. You're a scientist. Surely I've presented a logical case.'

  Dan hissed, 'Where did you get these special androids? I've seen people with one — but you've got two!'

  He saw that Peter's face had on it a sheepish smile.

  'Each one of these,' said Peter, 'cost me eighteen thousand dollars. Boy, I had to be sincere' I tell you, Dan, it was a real problem.'

  'But who sells them?'

  'Oh, some outfit. An android salesman comes to your office. You think it's a human being until he reveals the truth. I could hardly believe it at first.'

  'But how do they know you're in the market? Nobody's ever come to sell me one.'

  'Oh!' Peter was silent, frowning. 'Well, I really can't answer that. There he was one morning, and did I ever welcome him. I think he did say something about it being illegal. I suppose you being a government physicist puts you off bounds for him.'

  'But what about the second one?' Dan asked. 'Did the salesman just drop by?'

  'As a matter of fact, yes. Checking, he said.'

  'And he arrived when you were contemplating buying another one?'

  'That's right.'

  'Had you let some hint drop?'

  'Don't be a nut. To whom?'

  Abruptly Dan realized that that was Peter's full information,

  "Never mind all this!' he snapped. 'Don't think you can get around my feelings by changing the subject.'

  'But it was you who changed it!' Peter protested.

  Dan snarled, "I'm going to talk to my sister. That rotten hide of yours is safe until then.'

  With that, he stalked out of the room, feeling pleased with his handling of the key questions.

  Officer Sutter subsequently added to his account: 'I remained behind and discussed with Peter the possible danger to him of these threats. He would not take them seriously, and he also refused to comment on the other woman in his life, saying only that he didn't love her and that therefore she didn't count.'

  * *

  During the two days that Dan waited for word from or about his sister, he dismantled and studied the 'dead' android, then put it back together again and replaced it in the box in Peter's house.

  Before leaving, he concealed a camera overlooking the box and set to operate automatically if someone came into its range.

  On the morning of the third day, he was told that his sister had been discharged. Outraged, Dan demanded to be put in touch with Anita's psychiatrist.

  'Just a moment,' said the woman's voice. A pause. Finally, 'I'm sorry. Dr Schneiter does not feel that a communication with you would serve any useful purpose.'

  'Schneiter-Schweiter!' snarled Dan. 'You tell Dr Schneiter that I'm coming up there for a quart of his blood for letting that girl out on the street without consulting me.'

  He smashed the receiver down on the phone.<
br />
  Immediately after this bit of acting, he called Officer Sutter, and was put through to that individual, who, on the phone screen, was revealed as being in his police cruiser somewhere over the city.

  Dan said, 'Am I right in thinking that everybody has to show a change of address immediately, and that when an apartment or room is leased anywhere in the zone the name of the new occupant is recorded in a police computer? And if so, can you get it for me?'

  It was a purely rhetorical question. Dan was perfectly aware that such a record system existed, and — given time — he could undoubtedly get the information through his own agency. But he preferred to appear unofficial. Anita was the hottest lead he'd had so far on this assignment.

  As he had expected, Sutter admitted that the system existed, and that under the circumstances he could probably secure the information, given a little time.

  During the twenty-four hours that passed before Inspector Ingrath bent his long-necked head over a desk and signed the address release authorization for Sutter, Dan Thaler sought his sister in department stores and other haunts of hers — in vain. And when he finally had the address, she was not there. The room receptionist at the building said, 'She's seldom in — there's a bar down the street that I think she goes to.' She had a round face, on which was shown her disapproval.

  Anita was nervously sipping at a tall green drink when Dan sank onto the stool beside her. At first she did not see him, and when she finally became aware that someone had taken the adjoining seat, she said without glancing around, 'Did you do that on purpose — sit next to me?'

  Her voice was tense; she had a flushed look; she was visibly under a strain and probably had drunk too much. And she did not seem to realize who it was she was talking to.

  Dan Thaler nodded; he could not trust himself to speak. All in a flash, his acceptance of what Peter had said — for he had believed Peter — yielded to his first real emotional pity for his sister.

  Still without looking at him, Anita said, 'Did you come over to pick me up? You want a woman? All right — any time you're ready.'

  Dan gasped, 'Anita!'

  At that she turned and looked at him. Her eyes widened. Then she flung her arms around him.