The Machine Crusade

by Brian Herbert

  Hearing a familiar voice in the corridor, his pulse jumped.

  "Which room is he in? I need to see the Grand Patriarch immediately." Iblis grabbed a tattered robe, wetted down his hair, and made himself halfway presentable before he opened the door, smiling.

  Backed by Niriem and four other Seraphim, Serena confronted! the Jipol guards that Iblis had left in the hall. Dressed in an elegant white robe with gold trim and a medallion emblazoned with her martyred baby's image, she looked grossly out of place in such a seedy establishment. Upon seeing the stoic female guardians standing so close to Serena, Iblis felt a wash of relief. Long ago, he had created the Seraphim to act as a buffer between the Priestess and inconvenient reality. They still reported to him whenever she did something unexpected… but they were beginning to show a disturbing amount of loyalty to her. Niriem, at least, was still his.

  Serena grimaced in clear disapproval of Iblis's nocturnal activities. "Don't waste your energies in this way, Iblis. We have vital work to do. Especially now."

  With a confident gesture for him to follow, she strode back down the corridor. Her attendants waited for Iblis and the Jipol guards to join them.

  When he had seated himself next to her in the private vehicle with Niriem driving, Iblis took a last look at the ramshackle surroundings.

  "Sometimes, Serena, I get away from the sparkling towers and fine governmental residences so that I can remember how bad it used to be on Earth. I gain perspective. When I look inside the dingy rooms and see the dregs of humanity — the drug addicts, drunks, and whores — I am reminded of what our valiant jihadis are fighting for. To rise above this." Gaining momentum, he thought swiftly and lowered his voice to a hushed whisper. "I came here to think of a way to salvage the Jihad."

  "I am listening." Her lavender eyes glistened with desperation.

  Iblis felt surprisingly calm. His voice was firm, with enough of an edge to make her hear and understand the difficult truths. "I was born a slave and fought my way through the ranks to trustee. Eventually, I became the leader of a revolt and the Grand Patriarch of our Holy Jihad." With a bitter expression he leaned closer to her. "But I could never compete with you, Serena Butler. It was always your name they shouted. You were the aristocrat who tried to help the masses out of some guilt for all the riches your noble family had garnered on the backs of ordinary people."

  "Noblesse oblige. Are you attempting to psychoanalyze me?"

  "Just placing things in perspective. If I could do what I am about to propose, I would. But… it must be you, Serena. Only you. That is, if you are willing to pay the price." He leaned closer, his eyes fiery as he tried to summon all of his skills.

  "I would do anything to win the Jihad." Her face was beatific with resolve. Her eyes seemed to catch fire, like his. "Anything." She realized exactly what she was saying, and Iblis knew he had her.

  "Over the years, I have helped to fan the flames, but now the conflagration has diminished to embers. Like a wind storm, you must fan those embers into an unstoppable holocaust. All along, you and I have scorned people for not making the necessary sacrifices — and now there is something you must do."

  She waited.

  "Remember how Erasmus murdered little Manion? In the moment that your child died, you threw yourself on a robot master without regard for your own safety."

  Serena pulled away, as if Shaitan had just whispered in her ear. She knew Iblis had his own agenda and that he benefited personally from his position. She also knew, however, that even though they played the game differently, they both wanted the same result.

  Iblis continued with greater fervor. "In that instant, you ignited the Jihad. First Erasmus showed all the workers in the square below how monstrous the thinking machines were, and you provided proof that a mere human could fight back and win!"

  As she listened, tears streamed down her face, but Serena did not brush them away.

  "Now, after so many years of fighting, our people have forgotten how terrible their enemy is. If they could only remember that horrific murder of your child, not a single person would accept any sort of peace with Omnius. We must show them again how evil the enemy is, must make them see it through their weariness and pain. We need to remind them of why Omnius and all his minions must be destroyed!"

  His eyes blazed at her, and for a moment she saw billions of eyes burning within his. Even from this small pulpit within a private ground-car, even after his night of debauchery, Iblis Ginjo remained a man of substance, and Serena could not ignore him.

  In a conspiratorial tone, he said, "Humanity has forgotten the spark. You've got to make a grand gesture, something the people will never forget."

  She studied his smooth face. After years of doubts, she decided that Iblis Ginjo had more good in him than bad. Despite his selfish motivations, she knew he would make sure the fight continued. And nothing mattered more than that.

  "It will require a great deal of courage," he said.

  "I know. I believe I possess sufficient… resolve."

  Serena stood proudly before the full League Assembly. She and Iblis had worked out their plans in detail, had set all the wheels in motion. Yorek Thurr and his shadowy Jipol operatives were taking care of the fine points. Even her own Seraphim would play their part, though Niriem protested mightily. Still, Serena was the Priestess of the Jihad, and when she issued a directive, her guards could not refuse her.

  As she had feared, and expected, the Assembly had voted to accept the cessation of hostilities brokered by the Cogitors. The League would withdraw the Army of the Jihad from any Synchronized Worlds, issuing instructions that thinking machine forces were not to be harassed — and Omnius would take similar actions. This left the representatives to dicker over who would be the emissary for free humanity, who would go to Corrin and finalize the treaty with the primary evermind incarnation.

  Serena stunned them all. She demanded to speak from the podium, as was her right as the Interim Viceroy — a title she had never formally relinquished. The audience grumbled, expecting that she would rail at them again for the unacceptable peace terms.

  Instead, Serena said, "After much consideration, I have decided that I should be the one to journey to Corrin." Murmurs of shock and surprise carried through the hall, like the waves of a sea whipped up by an unexpected hurricane. No one had foreseen this. She continued with an earnest smile. "Who better to carry the banner of free humanity than the Priestess of the Jihad herself?"

  Better that the mainspring of this religious insanity is not wound all the way up. The universe is not ready for such loud ticking.

  —Cogitor Kwyna, City of Introspection Archives

  Convinced that serena Butler's personal acceptance of the peace accord would send precisely the right signal to Omnius, the Jihad Council and the League Parliament approved her request. They were overjoyed that she had turned her passion to the cause of peace, so that humans and machines could coexist in harmony. Celebrations overflowed the streets of Zimia.

  Her plan terrified Xavier Harkonnen. He suspected immediately that she had not truly changed her mind, but he also knew that no one would listen to him. Especially not now.

  The Parliament offered the Priestess a small, fast diplomatic ship. She would be accompanied by five of her chosen Seraphim as an honor guard, but she had refused any other security detail or entourage." Omnius will not be impressed by pomp, and if the machines intend outright treachery, what difference would a dozen guards make, or a hundred, or even a thousand?" Then, she had added with a rueful smile, "Besides, why bring soldiers if I am on a peace mission? That sends entirely the wrong signal."

  Exhausted from nearly four decades of bloody fighting, the people were delirious at the prospect of reconciliation. They lionized Vidad and his fellow Cogitors. They launched exuberant victory parades, imagining how their lives would now be different, never again without the fear of awful machine raids. They desperately wanted to believe in the possibility of a safe future.

  Xa
vier thought they were all fools for trusting the promises of Omnius. Serena must feel that way herself, so he could not fathom what she really had in mind.

  Dressed in a formal crimson-and-green uniform, adorned with every insignia and medal he had ever received, the old Primero took a military groundcar to the arched gates of the City of Introspection. At the apex of the main arch, a stylized image of the angelic child — his own son — watched over the compound.

  Deferring to the high-ranking officer, the jihadis stepped aside, but the white-robed women remained where they were. Sunlight gleamed off their golden skullcaps. "The Priestess of the Jihad does not receive visitors."

  "She will see me." Xavier squared his shoulders and lifted his gaze to the idealized icon of the innocent murdered child. "I demand it in the name of my son Manion Butler." This caused the Seraphim to falter, and Xavier pushed through the gate into the walled religious retreat where Serena had sequestered herself for so long.

  Smiling and expectant, she met him near the garden fish ponds. Long ago, this was where she had summoned Xavier and Vorian to recruit them as her greatest officers of the Jihad. When Xavier saw her in this peaceful place, an avalanche of memories assailed him, and his knees felt weak.

  For a moment he stood without speaking, and Serena took the initiative. "My dear Xavier, I wish now that we had spent more time together as friends. But the Jihad has consumed us for so long."

  "We could have more time if you refused to go to Corrin." His voice carried a gruff edge. "The thought that you would willingly cease all hostilities against your mortal enemies is as false as a robot's grin."

  "Machines have rigid programming, but one of the strengths of humanity is that we are able to change our minds. We can alter our opinions. We can even be… capricious when it suits us."

  "Do you expect me to believe that?" He wanted to embrace her or just stand closer, but she remained where she was, and he stood as stiffly as a statue.

  "Believe what you wish," she said with a bittersweet smile. "You used to be able to see into my heart. Come, follow me." She led him along a gem-gravel path toward a sheltered, private area.

  As he walked beside her, Xavier said, "I wish things had been different, Serena. I mourn not only my lost son, but the love you and I should have had, the years of contentment together." He sighed. "Not that I would ever change a moment of my life with Octa."

  "I love you both, Xavier. We must accept the present no matter how we wish we might have changed the past. I am glad you and my sister found a measure of happiness in the midst of this tempest." Serena stroked his clean-shaven cheek, gazing at him with a determined expression. "We are defined by our tragedies and our martyrs. Without little Manion, humans never would have had the incentive to rise up and fight Omnius in the first place."

  His heart skipped a beat when he realized where she was leading him. He had not visited the primary shrine for many years, but now saw the crystalline coffin, the plaz-walled crypt that contained the remains of their dead son. He remembered taking the child's preserved body from the Dream Voyager, after Vorian Atreides had escaped from Earth with Serena and Iblis.

  When she sensed him drawing back, Serena urged him forward. "This Jihad is for our son. Everything I've done for decades has been to avenge him — and all the other sons and daughters of captive humans on every Synchronized World. You heard the shouting in the Hall of Parliament. The League wants to accept the ridiculous peace proposal. If I don't go to Corrin, someone else will — and that will lead to an even greater disaster."

  She and Xavier stood close together, looking down silently at the innocent boy who had been murdered by the robot Erasmus. On various League planets, Xavier had seen hundreds of shrines and memorials to this revered child, bedecked with orange marigolds and loving paintings. At the recollection, his throat felt as dry as tinder, and his sense of personal outrage and deep loss increased with each passing moment.

  He grumbled. "But if we give up without a resolution, it will be like our first strike on Bela Tegeuse. Before long, the machines will come back stronger than before, and all of our battles, the sacrifices of our fallen heroes, will have been for naught."

  Serena's shoulders drooped. "Unless I can inspire them to a greater fervor, the Jihad will fall into the gutter of history. "Her lips turned down in a frown, and her haunted eyes showed depths of unspeakable disappointment—an expression she never revealed to her cheering public. "What else can I do, Xavier? The Cogitors offer an easy way out, and everyone wants to leap at the chance. My Jihad has failed through the lack of human will." Her voice was so quiet that he could barely hear her. "At times my shame is so great I can barely hold my head up and look at the sky."

  The sun reflected like a flare off the crystal coffin's polished surface. Amazed at the high quality of facial and bodily reconstruction, Xavier bent to look closely at the peaceful face of the little boy, the son he wished he had known. Manion looked so peaceful.

  Then, at the base of the boy's chin, he saw a fold of what looked like flesh-toned polymer, a tiny glint of metal wire, and lines of adhesive that seemed to be sagging after decades of Salusan sunlight magnified by the prismatic chamber. He realized that this could not be the mangled child who had been brought back from the riots on Earth. It was a facsimile, a sham!

  Serena looked into his face, noted Xavier's questions and doubts, and spoke before he could say anything. "Yes, I discovered the ruse years ago. No one else comes here and looks as closely as I do… or as you just did. Iblis created what was necessary at the time. His intentions were noble."

  He responded in a hushed voice so the Seraphim would not overhear. "But this is a fraud!"

  "It is a symbol. I did not notice the fake until the people had already rallied around Manion the Innocent and sworn to fight the Jihad. After that, what would I gain if I exposed the ruse?" She arched her eyebrows. "Surely, you don't believe that all the artifacts in all the shrines and reliquaries across the League Worlds are real?"

  He frowned. "I… never gave it much consideration."

  "This is a shrine to our fallen son, who was slain by the evil Erasmus. That is real enough and cannot be denied." She traced her fingertips on the slick crystal, her face distant and wistful. Then she rallied her determination and looked directly at him. "It doesn't make any difference, Xavier. What I believe — what the people believe — is the only thing that matters. A symbol always has more power than reality."

  He accepted only reluctantly. "I don't like this deceit… but you're right: it doesn't change what truly happened to our child. It makes no difference to our reasons for hating Omnius."

  She put her arms around him, and as he embraced her, he longed for the decades they had lost. "If all my devotees were like you, Xavier, we would have defeated Omnius in a year."

  He hung his head. "I'm just an old battle-scarred soldier now. The other commanders are much younger. They've forgotten the determination that made the Jihad such a fierce struggle. They've known nothing else, and they see me as just a grandfatherly figure who tells old war stories."

  Serena smoothed her silk-trimmed robes. "And now I need you to look to the future, Xavier. I intend to go to Corrin and face Omnius, but you must stay here and continue my fight. Iblis has already promised me that. You, too, must do whatever is necessary to guarantee that we will not lose everything we have fought for."

  "There's nothing I could say to stop you from going, is there?"

  Her smile was distant. "I must do what I can."

  Xavier left the City of Introspection, feeling a leaden sense of foreboding. Something in Serena's eyes, in her tone of voice, told him she intended to do a terrible, irrevocable thing, and he would not be able to stop her.

  My heart is stretched and pulled in so many ways. Why must Duty and Love tug in opposite directions?

  —Primero Vorian Atreides, private logs

  IT was meant only as a test-run for the streamlined space-folding ships newly constructed for the Arm
y of the Jihad. The Holtzman Effect engines developed by Norma Cenva made it possible to journey from; the shipyards on Kolhar to any other place he wished, in a negligible travel time.

  Vorian Atreides knew exactly where he intended to go: Caladan. At last!

  Unaware of the turmoil in the League or of the unsatisfying accords; the Ivory Tower Cogitors had negotiated with Omnius, Vor insisted on tailing this "test-run" by himself. Though he was fifty-nine years old, he still: felt young and enthusiastic.

  Working under the intense supervision of Norma Cenva, the Jihad engineers had constructed several experimental military vessels smal-ler than the VenKee cargo ships and far better suited for reconnaissance.

  Naturally, such new vessels needed to be taken on thorough shakedown cruises. Vor knew how to fly virtually any ship, and was ready to do this test personally. His fellow officers objected that a key military leader should never tackle a mission so fraught with risks and uncertainties, but Vorian Atreides had never stood on ceremony — often to the frustration and dismay of his friend Xavier.

  Despite the navigational uncertainties involved in his headlong rush across the folded fabric of space, Vor took no one with him. He knew the risks were real after having seen records of VenKee's merchant flights, and did not want to endanger anyone else.

  "You all look so serious, so tragic! I've made up my mind, and none of you have the rank to countermand my order." He smiled. "Does anyone want to take bets on how soon I return?"

  The space-folding engines worked perfectly.

  From the cockpit of the scout ship, surrounded by gleaming instruments and blinking lights, the brief journey felt to Vor like a fantastic dream, not a real experience. He didn't seem to move at all. At first, his recon craft was near the bleak world of Kolhar. Then the cosmos bent and twisted around him, flooding with colors and images that he never imagined existed. Before he knew it, he had arrived at the ocean world that he remembered so clearly from his time here almost ten years ago. The whole journey took only a few seconds.