Tau was metal. Tau was chemical. Tau was
electrical. Yet Tau could face death like a man.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Summer 1948.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
A gleaming binary swung in the blue sky, sending a moist warmthacross the swaying fern-growths of the Fourteenth Planet. Featheredcreatures of bright colors flashed through the underbrush and madenoises there. A figure came stalking down through the shaded clearings,and small scaly bodies scurried out of sight, leaving ungainly tracksscrawled in the swamp mud.
Tau, the metal man, a mechanical half-sentient messenger from thefar distant past, strode impassively along, not heeding the smallercreatures of the jungle. He had sighted the tiny habitable world fromthe distant depths of an outer galaxy, and had moored his space-ship ina clearing that was not distant.
He halted his berylite six-foot body in a leafy glade and let the windplay about his cold outer surface. The lens-cased inscrutable orbs inhis head peered about, taking in the scene with photographic detail.
"Life! This is life!" he thought to himself. "This is the life theMaster said I would find some day."
Though his memories were of a distant past, of a remote planet, andof the Master whose atoms might lie even now in the etheric dust, Tauremembered with perfect clarity. He could recall the aged countenanceof the Master, the broad forehead, the jutting chin, and the determinedundertone of his deep voice.
"Men may die," the Master had said, "but their deeds live after them."And Kendall Smith's face had lighted inwardly as though from some deepinspiration. Tau had said nothing in reply, but in the neurochemicalmechanisms of his brain the words had been imprinted forever.
"You're just a robot," the master had said, "with responses andreactions that are the involuntary activations of metal andchemical-change impulse, yet I believe that some day in the aeons whichwill pass, you will learn to reason for yourself to some extent, andperhaps understand your mission. But you will never live, even thoughyou may carry the germs of life into the far distant future."
And now Tau, standing in the mire of that world of the future he hadtalked about, wondered at the mystery which was called Life, anddoubted if he clearly understood what the Master had meant. One thinghe knew certainly, that his metallic body was meant to bridge theepoch which yawned between the life-lines of the past and those of thefuture. Old Kendall Smith, stalking back and forth in his laboratory,had explained as much, and Tau had never forgotten.
"Our life-line is narrowing, the earth is dying," the Master hadexplained. "That one-in-a-million chance of opportune conditions inwhich life may exist is vanishing. I doubt if the circumstances can beduplicated in the entire universe. But someday, by the very laws whichgovern chance, they must return again. It is not within the powersof man to bridge the gap of space and time, but you, Tau, the robot,swinging in the non-conducting realms of the vacuum of space, will benext to eternal."
Tau had learned the secrets of extracting radiant energy from theatom, had become adept in applying the forces to the mechanisms thatpropelled the space-ship and supplied motivation for his own metalbody. Many other secrets the Master had taught him in the laboratories,and he had come to know the uses of the scientific paraphernalia thatwas sealed in the inner heart of the space-craft. When the occasioncame for Tau to use the equipment, Kendall Smith had said, he