Great Sky River

by Gregory Benford

  They all pulled weapons. Hatchet blinked, as though he had never seen anything like it. “Fan out,” he whispered.

  The mech came on. Killeen heard in his sensorium an abrupt series like quick, strangled coughs. A voice, but not a human one. It spoke again. Cut-short exclamations, rapid but unforced, natural but eerie. Not words, not more than quick bursts of air expelled through a narrow, hoarse throat—

  Hatchet said wonderingly, “What the hell… ?”

  Killeen’s Arthur Aspect broke in:

  Barking! That is the sound of a terrestrial dog barking. I haven’t heard that call-code for so long….

  Into Killeen’s eye leaped a picture of a furry, four-legged animal yelping and scampering over a green field, chasing a blue ball that hopped away downhill. Something in the sound that flooded his ears carried a meaning of salute, of an element he had always missed.

  “That mech,” he said. “It’s calling us.”

  Their talk had attracted it. Shibo was already braced, tracking the quick form as it raced down the network of racked supplies, leading it slightly so she could fire instantly if needed. Killeen put his hand on her shoulder. “No. I think it’s all right. There’s something…”

  The barking rose to a crescendo, then abruptly cut off.

  A warm, mellow woman’s voice said clearly, “Humankind! I picked up your scent. It is the longlost!”

  Hatchet called out, “Don’t move.”

  “To hear the voice of man is to obey it,” the mech called from somewhere in the racks. “I used the correct call, did I not?”

  “You did,” Killeen answered, peering through the twilight glow of distant lamps. Its steel hide was pocked, seamed, pitted. The worn jacket was crisscrossed with melted lines, rivets, weldings long since ripped away, tap-in spots, and rough scars. At a prompting from Arthur, Killeen added, “Good dog.”

  “Ruff! Ruff!… I… well, I am not actually a dog, you know.”

  Shibo said wryly, “We guessed.”

  The womanly mech voice came from an aged acoustic speaker mounted directly between two optical sensors.

  These glittered, tracking Killeen intently as he approached. Shibo and Hatchet edged in at the flanks, still ready. Shibo looked distant for a moment, consulting her own Aspects. Killeen saw Cermo-the-Slow easing around behind the mech, grinning in anticipation of blowing it away. He raised a cautionary hand.

  “Barking is simply an attention-getting device.” The mech had a full-bodied, resonant voice now. Killeen wondered if dogs spoke.

  Of course not! The dog was an animal which long ago came to think of humans as, well, as sort of gods. They herded other animals, guarded things— Ah! Now I see it! This is an original, humanmade machine. Or at least it contains elements of some device humans must have made.

  Humans made mechs? Killeen wondered. The idea was as odd as the assertion that humans had made the Taj Mahal building they had seen.

  Shibo said, “That you did.”

  “I was told to use that call-approach method. To differentiate myself from hostile mechs.” The machine scuffed its treads enthusiastically against the rough cement floor. Its throaty alto vibrated with emotion. Unable to restrain itself any longer, it rumbled up to within arm’s length of Killeen, crying, “It has been so long!”

  Killeen was startled. “How… how long?”

  “I don’t know. My inboard time sequencing was reordered long ago by the mechmind in these factories. I hope you realize I never would have labored for these beings if I had been able to escape them. I was wholly loyal to human direction.”

  Hatchet approached and the machine caught sight of him. “Oh, another human! So many still alive. Ruff!” The voice attained a timbre of awe.

  This machine is remarkably doglike. Listen to that devotion. There must have been dog memory passed down from the original expedition vaults themselves. That ancient trove…

  Hatchet asked, “What you want?”

  “I… I was only meaning to serve you, sir.” A whimper filled each word with remorse.

  “How?”

  “I… You must understand, I have been a good servant. All this while. I kept my instructions buried, where the mechmind could not find them.”

  Hatchet’s forehead wrinkled. “You work here?”

  “Yessir! I am valued for my ability to haul and to repair and to find lost items of the general inventory.” It scuffed around anxiously, as though it wanted to lick Hatchet’s hand. “Also I—”

  “Shut up,” Hatchet said with evident satisfaction. “What can you do for us?”

  “Well, I can do all the tasks I am routinely assigned, sir. But there is—there is—there is—”

  It is hung up in a command loop. There must be some information it cannot reveal unless we give it the right association or code word.

  “Shut up,” Hatchet said firmly.

  The mech’s stuttering stopped. It began, “I am most sorry for that. Ruff! I seem to have—”

  “Look,” Killeen said, “you know this factory, right? Are there any mechs around that are dangerous for us?”

  “I… Not in this part of my workworld, no.”

  “How near?”

  “Five prantanouf.”

  “What?”

  “A distance the mechs use. I… do not remember how to say it in this speak.” The mech’s womanly voice became distressed, whimpering, almost tear-filled. “I… I am sorry… I…”

  “Never mind. Do they know we’re here?”

  The mech paused as though listening. “No. Sir.”

  “How’d you find us?”

  “I have sensors which pick up the human effusions. Wondrous manscents. They are long buried by the sludge the mechmind has carbuncled onto me. Still, they alerted me to your presence.”

  Killeen wondered how such a humanmade machine could have survived so long among the alien mechs. Arthur put in sardonically:

  Precisely because of its unthinking obedience. Uncomfortably, that is exactly what humans required of animals if they were to survive domestication. We were not morally superior ourselves, when we had the power…

  Aspect Nialdi’s stem voice immediately broke in:

  That was the proper role of animals. Partners and servants of humankind! You cannot compare—

  Killeen cut off a rising babble of Aspect voices within himself.

  The mech paused, its opticals registering others of the party who approached as they heard the talk. “Many humans. You have lived after all!”

  “You worked in Citadel?” Shibo asked.

  “Yes yes, madam.” The mech lowered its front section in a stiff parody of a bow. “I functioned first in the Chandelier.”

  Killeen blinked in astonishment. Arthur was babbling in his mind, a thin excited voice which he batted away like a fly. “Tell us what you remember before you came here.”

  “I was a worker for the humans who built the first Arcologies. Then, later, Citadels. I designed and labored for the three Citadels Pawn.”

  “When did you run away to the mechs?” Hatchet demanded roughly, suspiciously.

  “I did not run away!” The machine sounded insulted, like a woman whose honor has been slighted in a casual comment. “Some human machines did so, I know. I was not among them! I was taken.”

  “Co-opted?” Shibo asked.

  “My circuits overridden. New imperatives written directly into my substrate.”

  Killeen said, “They took the Citadel?” and watched the machine carefully. He knew of no machines controlled by men, ever. Certainly Family Bishop had none at the time of the Calamity.

  “Oh, no. No. In those ages the mechs were a small band. They avoided humanity’s Citadels, their festivals for breeding, all. They captured me when I was… was… was… was…”

  The mech’s audio rasped as it went into a circular-command loop. Something it yearned to say was blocked by a deeper prohibition.

  “Stop!” Killeen ordered. He was beginning to believe the machine. His A
rthur Aspect piped in:

  We termed them “manmechs,” in my day. The Expedition had an entire complement of intelligent machines, after all, and kept them in good running order. Otherwise, how could the first generation have been kindled? Humanmade robots united the sperm and ova brought from Earth. They tended the young, grew the first food—

  So they did! Doubly evil, then, the manmechs’ own perverse and traitorous act, to form alliance with those who pillaged the Chandeliers and now hound us in every cranny. This is an enemy of all mankind, this thing that insults us with its bark and woman’s soft tones. Kill it! That is the only—

  The mech civilizations captured this manmech. You cannot attribute evil to it if it had no choice! The mechs transformed some of its functions, but apparently never extracted its fundamental human-command overrides.

  Killeen asked, “How come they didn’t just tear it up, mine it for materials?”

  It knows us. They kept this foul betrayer because it can deceive us yet again! That is why I command you to destroy it. Now! Yet—

  Probably it satisfies some arcane function in mech society. Or its survival from the early days may be mere chance. I advise against any sudden action such as the frothing nonsense Nialdi advances.

  You risk all if you suffer the traitor to—

  Killeen cut off the Nialdi Aspect. He had no time for that now. Nialdi and Arthur kept sputtering and sparring with each other. He let them run as tiny mouse-voices in the back of his mind, to bleed off their tensions, but otherwise ignored them.

  The machine coughed, barked angrily three times, and came back to normal. “I… am sorry. I cannot reveal that information without a key word command.”

  “How’d the mechs get you?” Hatchet asked.

  “There was nothing I could do. I went with the mech civilization and lost my place at the foot of beloved humanity.” These words were darkly plaintive, half from broken memories and half a plea for understanding.

  The cluster of humans looked at one another, confused. “You figure it tells true?” Cermo-the-Slow asked Hatchet.

  “Could be.”

  “Damn strange, you ask me,” Cermo said flatly, shaking his head.

  “Mechs’ve never tried this before,” Shibo said. “Not like a mech trick, this. I trust it.”

  Killeen said, “Yeasay. Mechs just try kill us, not confuse us.”

  The Kings and Rooks spoke, guardedly agreeing. The ancient manmech’s acoustic sensors swiveled eagerly to ward each speaker in turn, small polymer cups tilting around its oblong body.

  Hatchet’s yellow upper teeth chewed at his lip, his triangular face for once giving away his uncertainty. He reached up and unconsciously fingered his knobby chin, squeezing it slightly, as if to press firmness into the rest of his face. “Okay. So what? We’re ’bout done here. Let’s

  go.”

  The machine barked nervously, a high animated yelp. Then the womanly voice murmured, “But no! You cannot leave me here, sir. I am yours. Humanity’s.”

  Hatchet looked uncomfortable. “Say now, I…”

  “But you must.” The woman’s voice gained an edge of seductive softness. “I have been loyal to you these long times. And I must deliver my message to the Citadel Pawn.”

  “Citadel Pawn’s destroyed,” Killeen said. “We are all the Citadel Families that remain.”

  “No! Gone? But then well I… well I… well I…” “Shut up!” Hatchet said irritably. “Come on, let’s get movin’.” He walked away.

  “No, I must follow. You are my—”

  “Yeasay, follow,” Shibo said gently. “But quiet.”

  There were only a few more items on the Crafter’s list. The party carried these out to the grate-door. The Crafter was approaching as they shouldered the last pieces onto the pile. Suddenly the grate-door began rising.

  “Get to it!” Hatchet called.

  At his signal the team began to quickly carry the items out and load them into a side pouch which the Crafter popped open. Killeen and Shibo and Cermo joined in the hurried scramble. Only moments before they had been joking at the curious machine. Now there was a taut watchfulness as they finished the job, fully exposed to the slanting pale light of Denixrise.

  Killeen and Shibo carried Toby out as the last pieces went into the pouch. They got him safely onto a ledge halfway up the Crafter body. They were all getting tired and it was hard to get Toby up the incline. Bud broke into Killeen’s attention:

  Crafter says climb up.

  We go to another factory.

  Killeen relayed this blank-faced to Hatchet, who asked, “How come?”

  “The Crafter says he has something for us.” This was a flat lie, since Bud said:

  Crafter wants Toby’s help.

  Impossible, Killeen thought. 1. You will see, Crafter says.

  Killeen said, “Can the Crafter release this manmech? Says it can’t leave this factory ’plex.”

  Bud said nothing for a long moment. Then:

  Crafter has freed manmech.

  Favor to you.

  It says, remember, it wants Toby’s help.

  “We’ll see,” Killeen said guardedly.

  The manmech began to crawl up a side ramp of the Crafter. Bud said hurriedly:

  Crafter won’t carry manmech.

  “Why not?”

  Manmech is now free mech.

  Can trigger detectors.

  Make it stay off.

  “I want it with us.”

  Crafter will kill then.

  “No, just a—”

  Killeen heard the Crafter transmit a seething burst of static, which sent the manmech reeling.

  That was warning.

  The manmech cried, “Humans! Do not leave me!”

  Tight-lipped, Killeen called, “No choice. You’re free now. Good luck!”

  As they lumbered away from the cubic factory the grate-door came ratcheting down. Looking back at it, Killeen felt a washed-out sense of relief. They had come through the dark tunnels and survived.

  He was saddened to see the dog-woman manmech come clattering after them. He would’ve liked to ask that strange combination about its ancient life. A living entity was far more gripping than the desiccated little lectures the Aspects gave him. He was trying to learn more from his Aspects, but they lacked the manmech’s poignant, humble truth.

  He shook his head. His father had told him once that the smartest people were those who, once they saw they had no choices left, forgot the matter. He had never mastered that art. He shut off his comm, so he would not have to hear the manmech’s fading, plaintive yelps and forlorn baying.

  The Crafter accelerated away. Its antennae swerved and buzzed with anxious energy.

  He lay back to rest. Toby moaned nearby. The boy’s nerveweave was beginning to fray and fret. Killeen levered his bad arm under his son’s neck to provide some pillow. He closed his eyes. Sleep crowded in on him. He set himself against it. He had to think. To prepare for the real reason he had come here.

  THREE

  At first he thought it was a mountain. Then he saw its myriad worked edges and the smooth oblique inclines. It was a complex so large it seemed to be the landscape, dwarfing hills nearby.

  The Renegade Crafter drove toward the towering network at top speed. They crossed an open plain that was seamless and hard. Other mechs shot along cross-paths. The silence was eerie. Some mechs swelled, humming, and then shrank without seeming to be moving at all. Killeen could not follow the fast, undaunted traffic. It was like the swarms of birds he had seen around the Metropolis, but each moving in unalterable straight lines.

  The Crafter did not slow at all. Its antennae sent pops and buzzes in all directions. A wedge-backed hauler bore down on them. It passed so close Killeen could see parts-index markings on its hull tabs. The backwash slapped them a hard crack! A black circle opened at the base of the mountain. Killeen glanced upward and saw ornate slate walls. An orange detonation unfurled halfway up the mountain face. Before he could see
what caused it the tunnel swallowed them.

  Even then the Renegade did not slow. They hurtled through unremitting black. A warm wind brushed them.

  Killeen lay still, feeling the hum of the Crafter’s momentum, waiting. He listened to Hatchet talking to some of the others on a hush-circuit. Hatchet gave orders for when they stopped, his muted mutter laced with anxiety. Everything depended on surprise.

  They slowed.

  Coasted in complete dark.

  Slammed to a halt.

  The team clambered down. Killeen didn’t move but he felt Shibo nearby.

  Abruptly, red light flooded them from above. They were in a huge vault. Blocky containers nearly filled the volume, stacked in an elaborate rising weave of interlocking helices. Killeen could see no mechs.

  He and Shibo carried Toby off the Crafter. He could not see how the team neutralized two small mechs but he heard the quick scratching electromagnetic fight.

  “Hustle!” Hatchet called to them. They scattered among oblong canisters. Something like glass snapped under Killeen’s boots. Toby grunted and stifled a groan. Killeen did not look back to see what the Renegade was doing.

  They reached a small knothole hatch. Already most of the team was through it. A fried mech stood smoldering nearby. Killeen carried Toby through on the carrysling with Shibo ahead, her pistol out.

  Beyond was a simple square zone. Bluewhite mechs sped across it. They paid no attention to the small human band that emerged from a sheer, unmarked wall. More storage facilities, Killeen guessed. A distant booming came down from the ceiling.

  —Tough part comin’ up,— Hatchet sent.

  The team ran toward a small arch. Plainly it was an entrance gate. Elaborate signifier emblems studded both sides. Killeen knew some recognition-code inputs from the days when he had scavenged with his father. He peered at the polished polycopper casings with embedded, snaking lines. These engraved silvery circuits were new to him.