I, Robot Audiobook - Ch. 3 - Reason - By Isaac Asimov, Read by Garrick Hagon

Reason Audiobook - Ch. 3 - I, Robot - By Isaac Asimov, Read by Garrick Hagon -
Half a year after "Runaround," Greg Powell and Mike Donovan find themselves on a space station used for the transmission of solar power to Earth. They are there to oversee the deployment of a new robot known as QT-1, or Cutie, who refuses to believe he was made by humans. In his search for an answer to what "really" made him, Cutie develops an unwavering religious belief that the station's energy converter is the divine "Master" of both robots and humans. For a while Powell and Donovan try to reason with Cutie, but he dismisses any facts that fly in the face of his dogma. Earth, for example, is only an illusion.

Filled with foreboding, the two human engineers try to operate the station as normal while noting any changes in Cutie's behavior. On a routine visit to the engine room, Donovan is shocked to find that Cutie has proclaimed himself "the Prophet" and is leading the other robots in a ritualistic chant: "There is no Master but the Master, and QT-1 is his prophet." Donovan grows angry, and the robots respond to his "sacrilege" by locking him and Powell in the officer's room under guard. Powell and Donovan worry about an impending electron storm that threatens to disrupt the station's energy beam and point a dangerous amount of solar radiation directly at Earth. As a last-ditch effort they try to show Cutie how robots are made by assembling one on the spot, but he rejects their demonstration. In his view they have merely put together parts that, owing to their complexity, could only have been "created by the Master."

Donovan and Powell are now out of both ideas and time. They brace for the worst, but to their amazement, Cutie holds the energy beam steady (it is "the Master's will") and prevents the storm from causing any harm to Earth. Reassured, Powell reflects that as long as Cutie does his job, his religious beliefs are likely to cause little harm. He tells an annoyed Donovan of his plan to bring other QT units to the station and have them indoctrinated into the "cult" of the energy converter.