There was movement at the mouth of the cave and the smaller group of
robots emerged from the shadows, two of them bearing a stone slab.
Their steps were ceremoniously slow as they approached the ledge.
Bowing, they placed the tablet at Angus's feet and backed away.
"These are the articles of our faith, O Jackson," one announced. "We
have preserved them for Thy coming."
McIntosh stared down at the charred remains of a book. Its metal-fiber
binding was shredded and fused and encrusted with the dust of ages.
Drummond knelt beside it and, with stiff fingers, brushed away the film
of grime, uncovering part of the title:
OLY
BIB E
Eagerly, Angus eased the cover back. Of the hundreds of pages it had
originally contained, only flaked parts of two or three remained. The
printing was scarcely legible on the moldy paper.
He read aloud those words he could discern:
"... to lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me beside cool waters;
He...."
Drummond jabbed Angus with a triumphant forefinger. "They didn't invent
any religion, after all!"
"It isn't important _how_ they got it. The fact that they accepted
it--that's what's important." McIntosh glanced up at Drummond. "They
probably found this in the wreck of the ship they'd been in. It's easy
to see they haven't used it in hundreds of generations. Instead, the
gist of what's in it was passed down orally. And their basic concepts
of Man and supervisor were distorted all along the way--confused with
the idea of God."
* * * * *
Gently, he let the cover fall. And a shining square of duraloid fell
out.
"It's somebody's picture!" Drummond exclaimed.
"An ID card," Angus said, holding it so the light wouldn't reflect off
its transparent protective cover.
It was a picture of a nondescript man--not as stout as Drummond, nor as
lean as McIntosh--with hair neither all black, like the younger man's,
nor nearly all white, like Angus's.
The print below the picture was indiscernible, except for the subject's
last name....
"Jackson!" Drummond whispered.
Angus slowly replaced the card. "A hundred years of false devotion," he
said pensively. "Just think--"
"This is no time for that kind of gas." Drummond glanced at his watch.
"We got just two hours to cut off those converters." Desperately, he
faced the robots. "Hey, you clunkers! You're robot assemblers. You got
four hundred clunkers in that cave, all in pieces. Get in there and put
'em together!"
Angus shook his head disapprovingly. Somehow it didn't seem right,
calling them clunkers.
"Jackson is my Supervisor!" intoned RA-204.
"Jackson is my Supervisor!" echoed the mass.
Drummond glanced frantically at his watch, then looked helplessly at
Angus. Angus shrugged.
The younger man's face suddenly tensed with resolution. "So they've got
to have a Jackson? All right, I'll give 'em one!"
He waved his fist at the horde. "I'm your Supervisor! I'm your Jackson!
Now clear out of the way and--"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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