When the operation was complete, One said, "There are one hundred and ten chambers which the sensors do not monitor."
Kickaha groaned and said. "You mean we'd have to get into all of them to make sure no living being is in one of them?"
"That is one method."
"What's the other?"
"This system can monitor the control chamber. It's controlled by that switch there." One pointed. "That also enables the operator to hook into the control-room sensories. These can be used to look into the one hundred and ten chambers. The man named Ore did not know that. The switch is not on the panel in the control room however. It is under the panel and labeled as an energy generator control. Only the master knew about it."
"Then how did you come to know about it?"
"I learned about it while I was scanning the displays here."
"Then why didn't you tell me?"
"You didn't ask me."
Kickaha repressed another groan. The robots were so smart yet so dumb.
"Connect this system with the control room's."
"Yes, master."
One strode ponderously to the control board and turned a switch marked, in Lord letters: HEAT. Heat for what? Obviously, it was so designated to make any unauthorized operator ignore it. Immediately, lights began pulsing here and there, a switch turned by itself, and one of the large video screens above the panel came to life.
Kickaha looked into the room from a unit apparently high on the wall and pointing downward. It was directed toward the central chair in a row of five or six before the wide panel. In this sat a man with his back to Kickaha.
For a second he thought that it must be the Englishman who had helped Ore. But this man was bigger than the one described by Ore, and his hair was not brown but yellow.
He was looking at a video screen just above him. It showed Kickaha and the robot behind him, looking at the man.
The operator rose with a howl of fury, spun out of his chair, and shook his fist at the unit receiving his image.
He was Urthona.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
THE LORD WAS clad only in a ragged skin bound around his waist. A longitudinal depression, the scan from the axe wound, ran down the center of his chest. His hair fell over his shoulders to his nipples. His skin was smeared with the oily dirt of his world, and a bump on his forehead indicated a hard contact with some harder object. Moreover, his nose had been broken.
Kickaha was shocked for a few seconds, then he went into action. He ran toward the switch to turn it off. Urthona's voice screamed through the video. "One! Kill him! Kill him!"
"Kill who, master?" One said calmly.
"You blithering metal idiot! That man! Kickaha!"
Kickaha turned the switch and whirled. The robot was advancing on him, its arms out, fingers half-clenched.
Kickaha drew his knife. Shockingly, Urthona's voice came out of the robot's unmoving lips. "I see you, you leblabbiy! I'm going to kill you!"
For a second Kickaha didn't know what was happening. Then illumination came. Urthona had switched on a transceiver inside the robot's body and was speaking through it. Probably, he was also watching his victim-to-be through One's eyes.
That had one advantage for Kickaha. As long as Urthona was watching the conflict from the control room, he wasn't gating here.
Kickaha leaped toward the robot, stopped, jumped back, slashed with his knife with no purpose but to test the speed of One's reaction. The robot made no attempt to parry with his arm or grab the knife, however. He continued walking toward Kickaha.
Kickaha leaped past One and his blade flickered in and out. Score one. The point had broken the shield painted to look like a human eyeball. But had it destroyed the video sensor behind it?
No time to find out. He came in again, this time on the left side. The robot was still turning when the knife shattered the other eyeball.
By now Kickaha knew that One wasn't quick enough for him. It undoubtedly was far stronger, but here swiftness was the key to victory. He ran around behind One and stopped. The robot continued on its path. It had to be blinded, which meant that Urthona would know this and would at once take some other action.
He looked around quickly. There were stretches of bare wall which could conceal a gate. But wouldn't Urthona place the gate where he could step out hidden from the sight of anyone in the room? Such as, for instance, the space behind the control console. It wasn't against the wall.
He ran to it and stepped behind it. Seconds, a minute, passed. Was Urthona delaying because he wanted to get a weapon first? If so, he would have to go to a hidden cache, since Ore had jettisoned every weapon he could locate.
Or was the staying in the control room, where he was safe? From there he could order all the robots in the palace and there were several score or more, to converge on this room.
Or had he gated to a room nearby and now was creeping up on his enemy? If so, he would make sure he had a beamer in his hand.
There was a thump as the robot blindly blundered into the wall. At least, Kickaha supposed that was the noise. He didn't want to stick his head out to see.
His only warning was a shimmering, a circle of wavy light taller than a tall man, on the wall to his right. Abruptly, it became a round hole in the wall. Urthona stepped through it, but Kickaha was upon him, hurling him back, desperate to get both of them in the control room before the gate closed.
They fell out onto the floor, Kickaha on top of the Lord, fingers locked on the wrist of the hand that held a beamer. The other laid the edge of the knife against the jugular vein. Urthona's eyes were glazed, the back of his head having thumped against the floor.
Kickaha twisted the wrist; the beamer clattered on the tile floor. He rolled away, grabbed the weapon, and was up on his feet.
Snarling, shaking, Urthona started to get up. He sank down as Kickaha ordered him to stay put.
The robot, Number Six, started towards them. Kickaha quickly ordered Urthona to command Six to take no action. The Lord did so, and the robot retreated to a wall.
Grinning, Kickaha said, "I never thought the day'd come when I'd be glad to see you. But I am. You're the cat's paw that pulled the chestnuts out of the fire for me. Me and Anana."
Urthona looked as if he just couldn't believe that this was happening to him. No wonder. After all he'd endured and the good luck he'd had to find a boulder with a gate in it. For all he knew, his enemies were stranded on his world or more probably dead. He was king of the palace again.
It must have been a shock when he found the door to the control room welded shut. Somebody had gotten in after all. Possibly a Lord of another world who'd managed to gate in, though that wasn't likely. He must have figured that somehow Ore or Anana and Kickaha had gotten in. But they couldn't get into the control room, where the center of power was. The first thing he had probably done though, was to cancel the decaying orbit of his palace. After setting it in a safe path, he would have started checking the sensory system. The regular one, first. No doubt one of the flashing red lights on the central console indicated that someone was in a trap. He'd checked that and discovered that Ore was in the cube.
But he must also have seen Anana. Had he ordered the robot Two to kill her?
He asked Urthona. The Lord shook his head as if he was trying to throw his troubles out.
"No," he said slowly. "I saw her there, but she wasn't doing anything to endanger me for the moment. I started then to check out the auxiliary sensories just to make sure no one else was aboard. I hadn't gotten to the room in which you were yet. You connected with the control room... and ... damn you! If only I'd gotten here a few minutes earlier."