"Asimov, Isaac - Robot City - Robots and Aliens 03 - Intruder - Robert Thurston" - читать интересную книгу автора (Asimov Isaac)

Adam came by, now doing a full-scale imitation of Avery, with the right walk, the tics, the jumpy inflections in his voice, the sarcastic tone. Avery yelled in frustration and took a swipe at Adam, landing a weak blow to his back.
?Ozymandias,? Ariel said, ?you just tried to hit Adam.?
?That?s right. I wish I could mangle him into spare parts.?
?But you?re a robot.?
?Yes, what of it??
?Well, you just said robots shouldn?t be aggressive. You just put yourself in danger by hitting Adam. You reacted to him in a very human way. How could you possibly be a robot??
?I am a robot.?
?No, you?re a human being.?
?I was once, but I?m not now.?
Now Ariel was frustrated. The idea that he was a robot seemed fixed in Avery?s unpositronic brain. Yet she sensed that his anger over what the Silversides were doing could be used to shake him out of his delusion.
?Are ?u all fright, Arriel?? Wolruf said.
?I?m okay. I just had a foolish idea I could do something here, that?s all.?
?Iss there anything I may do??
?Take me home to Aurora.?
?If I could??
?No, Wolruf, no. I didn?t really mean it anyway. I?m happy here in scenic Robot City. I plan to be president of the Chamber of Commerce.?
She was about to tell the Silversides that they could end their playacting, just as Eve passed her. Eve stopped in front of Avery and leaned in toward him, continuing her muttering in his voice. He pushed her away. She slid backward a few feet, then came close to him again.
?Stay away from me!? Avery cried. ?That?s an order. Second Law.?
Ariel moved in closer, too.
?You?re a robot. You can?t invoke Second Law.?
?What? Oh? Yes. Get her away from me.?
?No. Go ahead, Eve. Stalk him. Whatever he goes, you go. You, too, Adam. Encroach.?
They surrounded Avery. Whenever he broke away from them, one of them zoomed in on him again. He flailed out at them, and they sidestepped his badly thrown blows.
Finally, he broke into a run, pursued by Adam and Eve. Near the desk he spun around, and Ariel saw he had something in his hand. A moment passed before she realized what it was. She had not seen it in a long time.
The weapon was Avery?s electronic disrupter, a device that emitted an ion stream that would interfere with the circuits of any advanced machine. Any machine, like the Silversides. And he was raising it to aim at them.
Ariel, who had been standing behind the Silversides, ran between them, and roughly pushed them away. In the back of her mind, she realized that she?d just violated another of the Laws of Humanics, the one that said humans must not harm robots. Both Silversides went flying sideways.
Her move came just in time. Avery?s shot went right over Ariel?s head and would undoubtedly have affected circuitry in Adam or Eve.
She continued her rush to Avery, jumping at him, knocking the electronic disrupter out of his hand and throwing him to the floor.
?Some robot you are,? she said, breathing heavily. ?You don?t even make a decent human being.?
?Ariel,? Avery said weakly. He struggled to his feet. ?I don?t?that is, I?I?m?I am?I??
He looked sick. All the color had drained from his face. Ariel could see that it wasn?t the result of the fighting. It was something else. From the look of him, he could be dying.
?You better sit down,? Ariel said. ?Adam??
Adam picked up a chair and brought it to Avery, who settled heavily down upon it. Eve walked to Adam and the two took up a position behind Avery?s chair. The fact they looked so much alike was disconcerting to Ariel, as if she were about to talk to a group called the Avery Trio.
?Are you all right?? Ariel asked Avery.
?I?I think so.?
?Robots don?t get sick, you know. They don?t suffer from heart palpitations or exhaustion. They??
?It?s okay, Ariel. You don?t have to speak to me as if I were a child. I know who I am. I may not like it. I may want to live forever. I may want to be a robot. But I know who I am.?
?And that is??
?Ariel, please.?
?No, I?m a literalist. Are you a robot, Dr. Avery??
?No.?
?Say it out.?
?I. Am. Not. A. Robot.?
Ariel smiled.
?Well,? she said, ?that?s a start.?

CHAPTER 14
A DISCONNECTED DETECTIVE

Bogie stood in the corner where Derec had placed him so long ago. Timestep was across the room in another corner. While it was impossible for Bogie to be bored or to consider the possibilities of nothingness while in fact doing nothing for several consecutive days, he was aware that he had been in the corner for some time. It seemed to him that his position must be very much like the detectives on stakeout in several of the films he had researched. In scenes where they had waxed philosophical in tough-guy language, with plenty of wise-cracks and sentimental observations about life, they had had to pass time with only their own words to keep them company, plus a few doughnuts. Bogie would, he decided, prefer to do a stakeout for Derec than merely to stand in a corner awaiting his next order.