The Machine Crusade

by Brian Herbert

  Jool was easily the most skilled fighter of his fourteen brothers and sisters, and among the most advanced of his entire generation. Seeing so much potential in the young man, his father had paid extra attention to Jool, and saw him as his successor in the elite Corps of Ginaz, arguably the finest mercenaries in the Galaxy. Many planets provided freelance warriors for the fight, but no other group boasted such a high kill ratio.

  Ginaz acknowledged that all humans shared the same enemy, but the mercenaries maintained their independence instead of joining the formal military hierarchy of the Army of the Jihad, making them wild cards. Where the jihadis preferred to use large military equipment and attack from a distance, Ginaz fighters were willing to get up close against the enemy robots. They hired themselves out for combat, unafraid to be used as suicide forces, disposable commandos — if the importance of the mission was sufficiently high.

  Zon had also been on the front lines when the machines had struck Peridot Colony; the human forces had fiercely defended the planet, at the cost of over eighty percent of the Ginaz mercenaries. In the end they had driven back the robot invaders, but Omnius had instructed the thinking machine fighters to follow a scorched-earth policy along their retreat. Though the colony had been grievously damaged, the rest of the planet had not fallen to the enemy.

  Three years ago, Zon had been burned and injured while fighting robots on board a besieged thinking machine ship, after which he had been forced to recuperate and retrain on the archipelago islands of Ginaz. That was when he had first noticed his son's exceptional skill. Now, after intensive practice, the young man might even surpass his own lather.

  Dripping with sweat, Zon parried and thrust, faster and more competently than his son had ever seen him fight. Jool could see how badly his father wanted to get back to the battlefields. The location didn't matter to him. The Army of the Jihad always needed more fighters, and Ginaz devoted most of their population to the cause.

  "I advise caution, Master Zon Noret." Chirox's voice was smooth and calm, not at all reflecting the intense exertion of the exercise.

  "Nonsense," Zon called with proud defiance. "Keep fighting to the absolute best of your abilities."

  The robot had no choice but to follow the command. "I have been programmed to teach you, Master Zon Noret, but I cannot force you to heed my cautions or lessons." He thrust with his multiple arms, holding a knife or a sword in each.

  The veteran scorned formalized instruction, claiming that it detracted from the development of true fighting skills. He always said, "The best technique for learning and growth is to simply observe. Rote memorization gains you nothing on the field of combat. Rather, practice until you no longer exist as an individual. There can be no separation between mind and body. You must become no more than living, fluid combat moves. That is all a mercenary should be."

  But though his father had achieved the highest accolades among the mercenaries of Ginaz, and a promised place in the Council of Veterans, Jool Had already surpassed his elder's skills, practicing in secret.

  Like all youthful warriors on the islands, Jool Noret had spent his childhood being taught a variety of weapons by battle-scarred veterans and being lectured in techniques by pregnant female mercenaries. But only Zon Noret and a handful of eccentric trainees made full use of the fighting mek Chirox. Some of the conservative veterans considered it dangerous, but Zon had always felt it was the best way to understand, and defeat, the real enemy.

  Now nearly an adult, Jool had followed in his father's footsteps, but took measures one step further. Zon never knew that his son had exceeded the mek's prior maximum capabilities, but Jool had learned how the robot worked and deciphered the combat programming. A year ago while his father was guest instructor on another island, Jool had installed an adaptability algorithm module that allowed Chirox to become a "supercharged" mek, superior to anything its original combat programming allowed. With the supercharged module installed, Chirox could keep pace with his student, becoming a better and better fighter as Jool himself advanced. The only limitation was the young man's capabilities.

  Jool always practiced and fought against Chirox either late at night or when he was sure he would be alone on the beaches. His muscles still felt a pleasant, weary burn from the latest workout he and the mek had completed before dawn, in secret, before his father could see.

  Someday Jool would surprise Zon with an astounding demonstration of his capabilities, but the young fighter was still not satisfied with himself. He wanted to become the best mercenary Ginaz had ever produced. He knew he had the potential within him, if only he could release his inhibitions. A thread of self restraint impeded him, a protective instinct that placed a glass ceiling on his development.

  Even so, Jool was better than any other fighter he had ever seen. Chirox said so himself, and he had trained against many of the best mercenaries. The combat robot had no choice but to be objective and honest…

  Now, sitting in the hot sun, Jool studied his father's attack and defense methods, as well as the skill and resilience the sensei mek demonstrated. Zon applied himself with fury, as if trying to prove something to himself. Surprisingly, he even pulled out a few new tricks, moves that Jool had never seen him use before. The younger man smiled.

  Despite his opponent's best efforts, though, Chirox remained one step ahead of the older fighter. The mek's five remaining segmented arms moved in a blur, and the human could barely keep up. The old veteran was clearly being worn down.

  Chirox spoke, "This is unwise, Zon Noret. Your strength and stamina are diminished. You have only recently recovered from your combat injury."

  Angrily, Zon clattered his sword against the robot's body; the five still-functioning arms flailed in defense. "I have battled real thinking machines, Chirox. They do not fight below their capabilities, not even against an old man."

  "You're not old, Father," Jool insisted, but he heard the insincerity in his own voice.

  Panting heavily, Zon stepped away, glanced at his son, and tossed the long, pale hair out of his eyes. "Age is a relative term when applied to seasoned warriors, my son."

  With a sound like an army of blacksmiths battering hot blades on their anvils, Zon attacked Chirox. The robot swung up his arms, and weapons disappeared from two of the hands, which he now used to grasp at his opponent. Zon managed to paralyze this pair of arms with the pulse sword, and the robot's right leg as well, so that Chirox could only pivot in the sand rather than dodge out of the way. Cutting weapons emerged from the robot's body, jabbing and slashing with buzzing blades, but Zon danced to one side.

  Then Jool realized with a sudden sinking fear that he had forgotten to remove the supercharged fighting module from the combat mek. With the adaptability algorithm functioning, Chirox was pumped to capabilities far superior to anything Zon had ever faced.

  Jool paled with alarm for his father. And now in the intensity of battle — with Chirox's safety systems and restraints deactivated — he didn't dare shout a distracting warning. He jumped to his feet. Everything happened in an instant.

  Zon leaped in the air and lashed out with a callused foot, kicking sideways to knock the mek off balance. But Chirox somehow anchored himself.

  Jool ran forward, intending to dive into the fray. His bare feet kicked up sand.

  The old warrior did not know his danger. He jumped backward, out of the reach of the cutting arms, but the ferociously intent mek kept driving in. Zon Noret landed wrong, twisting his ankle. He stumbled.

  Jool cried out automatically, "Chirox, stop!" — just as the sensei mek struck. The robot's knife plunged deep into the old warrior's chest.

  As the young man ran forward, Chirox stood frozen as if in disbelief at what he had done.

  Zon Noret melted to the beach, gasping and coughing blood. The combat mek withdrew immediately, powering down his systems.

  Jool knelt beside the dying man and lifted him by the shoulders. "Father…"

  "I failed to see it…" Zon said, his breath
rustling through his lungs. "I failed."

  The sensei mek remained motionless, away from the humans. "I deeply regret what I have done. I had no desire or intention to kill you."

  "You will recover," Jool said to the bleeding man, but he could see the wound was mortal. It was all his fault, for having altered the mek's programming. "It's just another wound. You've suffered many of them in your lifetime, Father. We will get you a battlefield surgeon." He tried to pull away and summon help, but Zon clasped him by the wrist.

  The veteran fighter turned to the mek, his sweat-streaked hair plastered against his face. "Sensei Chirox, you did… exactly as I commanded you." It took him several breaths to force out the words. "You fought precisely… as I requested. And you have taught me… many useful things."

  He looked up at Jool, who bent intently over the old warrior. The lapping surf and seabirds wheeling over the lagoon seemed like a lullaby. The sun slipped below the horizon, fingerpainting the sky with intense colors.

  Zon squeezed his son's wrist. "It is time for me to transfer my spirit and pave the way for another fighter. Jool, I want you to forgive Chirox."

  He clutched one last time. "And you must become the greatest warrior Ginaz has ever known."

  Choking on his words, he said, "As you wish, Father."

  Zon Noret closed his eyes, and his son could no longer see the bright scarlet of hemorrhages there. His thoughts drifting, his voice weakening, the elder mercenary said, "Speak the litany with me, Jool. You know the words."

  The younger man's voice cracked, but he forced himself to speak. "You taught them to me, Father. All the fighters of Ginaz know the final instructions."

  "Good… then help me with them." Zon Noret drew in a long, wet-sounding breath, and his words overlapped with his son's as they recited the Litany of the Fallen Mercenary.

  "Only thus do we honor the warrior's death: carry on my will, continue my fight."

  Moments later, Zon Noret slumped in his son's arms. Silent and rigid, the sensei mek stood in position.

  Finally, after a poised moment of quiet grief, Jool Noret rose to his feet over his father's body, which lay prone on the beach. Squaring his shoulders, he faced the combat robot and took deep breaths to calm himself. He centered his thoughts, then reached down and picked up Zon's pulse sword from the blood-specked sand.

  "From this day forward, Chirox," he said. "You must work even harder to train me."

  Those who refuse to fight against thinking machines are traitors to the human race. Those who do not use every possible weapon are fools.

  —Zufa Cenva, "Lectures to Sorceress Trainees"

  Looking carefully across the verdant treetops of the dense jungles of Rossak, Zufa Cenva could still envision scars from the horrific cymek attack more than two decades earlier.

  Armed in their most brutal warrior forms, the vengeful cymeks had descended upon Rossak after Zufa's first Sorceress weapon destroyed the Titan Barbarossa. While a full-fledged robotic fleet attacked the transfer stations in orbit, cymeks had swept down, burning the jungle and launching explosives into the cliff cities. In order to win the battle, many of Zufa's best Sorceress trainees had died that day, sacrificing themselves by unleashing a mental holocaust that vaporized all machines with human minds…

  The voraciously fecund silvery-purple jungle had grown back, sealing the scars much faster than Zufa could heal the scars in her own mind.

  Since that time, she'd continued to train the Rossak women who demonstrated the greatest telepathic potential, candidates who could be taught how to build their psychic powers to critical levels and then release them in Shockwaves capable of vaporizing cymeks, even Titans. Over the years the chief Sorceress had seen a great many of her surrogate daughters march off to their deaths, martyring themselves in order to score important victories against the horrific cymeks.

  Zufa considered cymeks the worst monsters. Although they had once been human, their ambition and desire for immortality had brought them over to the side of Omnius, making them traitors, not unlike the human infiltrators captured by Iblis Ginjo and his ever-vigilant Jipol officers.

  Many in the League of Nobles had begun to wonder if this terrible bloody Jihad would ever end. Zufa did not think that way. She knew that as long as the fight continued, she could never give up. Year after year until the war ended she had to create and deliver and endless supply of fighters,

  Even though she understood this, as she looked at the young girls arrayed with her atop the cliffs of Rossak, the oldest of them barely fourteen, Zufa wanted to weep. So many Sorceresses had already done their suicidal duty that the eager trainees had become younger and younger with each passing year. While these candidates might be talented, they were still just children.

  Working hard to show no dismay, she scrutinized the young class. Their eyes were bright, and their long pale hair was ruffled by the breezes that swept across the uninhabitable plains between the fertile, deep canyons. The girls' expressions were eager, their determination unwavering.

  Zufa wished she could save all of these volunteers… but knew that nothing would really save them short of peace brought about by complete victory.

  "I invest my greatest hopes in all of you," she said. "I cannot deny that danger lies ahead. Even if you succeed, you die. And if you fail, you also die — but worse, it will have been to no purpose. I am here to make certain your lives and your deaths are not in vain, that you are instrumental in destroying Omnius and his thinking machine minions."

  The girls nodded, listening attentively. Despite their youth, they all knew this was not a game.

  Off in the distance, scarlet-tipped volcanoes oozed lava onto the harsh plains while spewing thick, sulfurous smoke into the tainted atmosphere. Great gorges in the landscape sheltered thriving ecosystems in the volcanic soil and the rich water that percolated through aquifers.

  The Rossak environment was permeated with contaminants that were not completely removed from the food chain — mutagens and terato-gens, as well as beneficial chemicals. Pregnancies were difficult aid often terminated in miscarriages. Many babies were born terribly deformed; others, like these young women, received a mental boost, an advantage in telepathic powers that no one else in the League possessed.

  Oh, how Zufa had wanted a daughter of her own to be as powerful as these young women, someone to whom she could pass the candle. But though she had chosen her mates with great care, even running genetic tests to prove that the DNA matches were likely to result in talented offspring, she had failed in every instance. After severing her ties with Aurelius Venport, she had taken no further lovers. Once, he had seemed to be the perfect candidate for her, but his seed had resulted in only twisted miscarriages.

  Zufa was old now, near the end of her childbearing years even with the improved stamina and reproductive systems of the Sorceresses of Rossak. Venport's pharmaceutical discoveries, distillations of drugs from the fungi and underground bulbs that filled the mysterious jungles, allowed new treatments that dramatically reduced the risk of miscarriages and birth deformities while increasing fertility. Zufa found it ironic that Venport himself had discovered a pharmaceutical solution to this situation, after he had caused her so much disappointment.

  But she put such thoughts aside. Closing her eyes, she concentrated on the vital task before her.

  Zufa gave the students instructions, telling them what to practice, and how. They stood before her like children in a school, hands extended, eyes wide open. Their pale hair rose up crackling with static electricity as they built up the volatile power within their youthful brains.

  Because of Zufa's work here, the Army of the Jihad delivered regular reports of their scouting missions. Mercenaries flew fast ships to keep tabs on the movements of Omnius's forces — in particular, cymek depredations. When cymeks were tracked, her Sorceresses would know, and it was up to Zufa to choose the appropriate female warrior, the appropriate weapon, to go forth and expend her life in a telepathic attack that would anni
hilate the machines with human minds.

  But it had been months since any report had given her good news. The cymeks knew the Sorceress's tactics by now, and rarely allowed one of their vulnerable number to travel alone. Instead, combat robots provided heavy escorts and extraordinary firepower for each cymek, especially the remaining Titans. It was difficult for a lone Sorceress to get close enough for her mental blast to have any effect.

  So Zufa would wait and train until she found the perfect opportunity. She refused to waste these talented and dedicated young women. They were Rossak's most vital resource.

  When the girls had completed their exercises, Zufa beamed with genuine pride. "That is excellent. I believe you understand the concept. Now, watch me."

  She raised her pale hands and closed her eyes, spreading her fingers apart so that a faint silvery web of electricity crackled between them. "Accessing the power itself is not the difficult part," she said, her voice flat, her lips bloodless. "Your most difficult job is to control it. You must become a precision weapon, a sharp blade guided by a skilled assassin. Not just a destructive accident."

  The girls extended their hands, and sparks jumped and popped. Some of them giggled, but quickly controlled themselves and concentrated on the gravity of the task. Zufa saw that they felt the power and sensed the danger.

  More than anything, she wished that her own daughter might have been a brave patriot such as these. But her lone offspring, Norma, had no such skill. Her abilities as a Sorceress were nonexistent, a completely blank telepathic slate. Wasting her life, Norma occupied herself with equations and designs, dabbling in mathematics instead of developing any latent abilities that she might possess. Tio Holtzman on Poritrm had taken her under his wing, and Zufa was grateful for the pity the great scientist had shown her malformed child.

  But after all this time, apparently even Holtzman wanted little more to do with Norma, and had sent her off to dabble with her ideas where she would bother no one else.