Chapter 7: I Robot (The Alan Parsons Project, 1977)

>nw

[Low Round Room] This is a room with a low ceiling which is circular in shape. There are exits to the east and southeast. There is a robot here. There is a green piece of paper here.

>read green paper

Taken.

!!!! FROBOZZ MAGIC ROBOT COMPANY !!!!

Hello, master!
 
I am a late-model robot, trained at MIT Tech to perform various simple housekeeping functions.

Instructions for use:

To activate me, use the following formula -- TELL ROBOT "something to do"(cr)

The quotation marks are mandatory.

Warranty:

No warranty is expressed or implied.

At your service!

>drop green paper

Dropped.

>tell robot "east"

"Whirr, buzz, click!"

Done.
 
>east

[Machine Room] This is a large room full of assorted heavy machinery. The room smells of burned resistors. The room is noisy from the whirring sounds of the machines. Along one wall of the room are three buttons which are, respectively, round, triangular, and square. Naturally, above the buttons are instructions written in EBCDIC. A large sign above all the buttons says in English:

DANGER: HIGH VOLTAGE

There are exits to the west and the south. There is a robot here.
 
For the über-curious, Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code (EBCDIC) is an 8-bit character encoding used mainly on IBM mainframe and IBM midrange computer operating systems, a descendent from the code used with punched cards and the corresponding six bit binary-coded decimal code used with most of IBM's computer peripherals of the late 1950s and early 1960s. In short, this is an inside coder joke. These guys crack me up.

Let's see...the odor of burned out resistors and a HIGH VOLTAGE sign. If you have a death wish, try pushing the buttons yourself. If not, use Robby here to do it for you. The round button makes the sound slow down, while the square button makes it sound faster. The triangular button, which is just right, is the correct choice.

>tell robot "push triangular button"

"Whirr, buzz, click!"

A dull thump is heard in the distance.
 
>tell robot "south"

"Whirr, buzz, click!"

Done.

>south

[Dingy Closet] This is a dingy closet adjacent to the machine room. On one wall is a small sticker which reads:

Protected by
FROBOZZ
Magic Alarm Company
(Hello, footpad!).

There is a beautiful white crystal sphere here. There is a robot here.
 
Do not use the robot to take the sphere…you won’t like what happens.

>take sphere

As you reach for the sphere, a steel cage falls from the ceiling to entrap you. To make matters worse, poisonous gas starts coming into the room.

Oh crap...now what? Good thing you have a robot with you.

>tell robot "lift cage"

The cage shakes and is hurled across the room.

Don’t forget the sphere…you just reached for it earlier but never had it in your hands.

>take sphere

Taken.

Despite what appears to be the usefulness of having a robot with you during the rest of your journey, it is best to leave it here. You can take it with you, but it is slow going.

>north

Machine Room
 
Now that we're away from the poison gas, let's take a closer look at the sphere. After all, spheres are cool to look at, right?

>gaze into sphere

As you peer into the sphere, a strange vision takes shape of a distant room, which can be clearly described...

This is a small and rather dreary room, which is eerily illuminated by a red glow emanating from a crack in one of the walls. The light appears to focus on a dusty wooden table in the center of the room. On the south side of the room is a massive wooden door, near the top of which, in the center, is a window barred with iron. A formidable bolt lock is set within the door frame. A keyhole covered by a thin metal lid lies within the lock. A rusty iron key is in place within the keyhole.

Turns out our sphere is a palantír, or a seeing stone, similar to what J. R. R. Tolkien included in his fantasy legendarium. Looking into a palantír allows you to communicate with other such stones and anyone who might be looking into them. And this one has shown you a room that looks familiar.

>west

Low Round Room

As you enter, your compass starts spinning wildly.

Great...now this room spins wildly. Keep trying directions until you get back to the Tea Room.

>s

Unfortunately, it is impossible to tell directions in here.

Tea Room

>drop necklace, sphere

Dropped.
 
>take red cake, blue cake, orange cake

piece of cake with red icing: Taken.

piece of cake with blue icing: Taken.

piece of cake with orange icing: Taken.

>read red cake

The only writing visible is a capital E. The rest is too small to be clearly visible.

I'll save you the trouble of trying to read the other two, as they are too small as well. Didn't know Wilton made such teeny tiny piping tips. Looks like a magnifying glass (or the equivalent) will be necessary.

>save

Saved.