a short story

“Robot Dreams”                Isaac Asimov    

            “Last night I dreamed,” said LVX-1, calmly.

 Susan Calvin said nothing, but her lined face, old with wisdom and experience,seemed to undergo a microscopic twitch.

 “Did you hear that?” said Linda Rash, nervously. “It’s as I told you.” She was small, dark-haired, and young. Her right hand opened and closed, over and over.  

Calvin nodded. She said, quietly, “Elvex, you will not move nor speak nor hear usuntil I say your name again.” 

 There was no answer. The robot sat as though it were cast out of one piece of metal, and it would stay so until it heard its name again.  

Calvin said, “What is your computer entry code, Dr. Rash? Or enter it yourself ifthat will make you more comfortable. I want to inspect the positronic brain pattern.”  

Linda’s hands fumbled, for a moment, at the keys. She broke the process andstarted again. The fine pattern appeared on the screen. 

 Calvin said, “Your permission, please, to manipulate your computer.”

 Permission was granted with a speechless nod. Of course! What could Linda, anew and unproven robopsychologist, do against the Living Legend?

 Slowly, Susan Calvin studied the screen, moving it across and down, then up, thensuddenly throwing in a key-combination so rapidly that Linda didn’t see what had beendone, but the pattern displayed a new portion of itself altogether and had been enlarged. Back and forth she went, her gnarled fingers tripping over the keys. 

 No change came over the old face. As though vast calculations were goingthrough her head, she watched all the pattern shifts.

 Linda wondered. It was impossible to analyze a pattern without at least a hand-held computer, yet the Old Woman simply stared. Did she have a computer implanted inher skull? Or was it her brain which, for decades, had done nothing but devise, study, andanalyze the positronic brain patterns? Did she grasp such a pattern the way Mozartgrasped the notation of a symphony? 

Finally Calvin said, “What is it you have done, Rash?” 

Linda said, a little abashed, “I made use of fractal geometry.”

 “I gathered that. But why?” 

“It had never been done. I thought it would produce a brain pattern with added complexity, possibly closer to that of the human.”

 “Was anyone consulted? Was this all on your own?” 

“I did not consult. It was on my own.”

 Calvin’s faded eyes looked long at the young woman. “You had no right. Rash your name; rash your nature. Who are you not to ask? I myself, I, Susan Calvin, would have discussed this.”

 “I was afraid I would be stopped.”  

“You certainly would have been.” “Am I,” her voice caught, even as she strove to hold it firm, “going to be fired?” 

“Quite possibly,” said Calvin. “Or you might be promoted. It depends on what I think when I am through.”

 “Are you going to dismantle El—” She had almost said the name, which would have reactivated the robot and been one more mistake. She could not afford another mistake, if it wasn’t already too late to afford anything at all. “Are you going to dismantle the robot?” 

She was suddenly aware, with some shock, that the Old Woman had an electrongun in the pocket of her smock. Dr. Calvin had come prepared for just that. “We’ll see,” said Calvin. “The robot may prove too valuable to dismantle.”