“No thank you, my dear. I’d rather fight ten cymeks than try to dissuade you when you’ve set your mind to something.” Serena responded to his kiss with surprising passion. He stepped back, breathing hard, and straightened his uniform. “I need to go.”
“Can I make it up to you at dinner tonight? A little tête-à-tête, just the two of us?” Her eyes sparkled. “It’s important to me, especially now.”
“I’ll be there.”
WITH A SIGH of relief after quelling Xavier’s suspicions, Serena returned to the Winter Sun Room where her team had gathered. She wiped a sparkle of sweat from her forehead. Several faces turned toward her, and she raised a hand to allay concerns.
Late morning sunlight splashed across the chairs, the tile counters and a breakfast table now strewn with plans, maps, and resource charts. “We’ve got to get back to work,” said the grizzled veteran Ort Wibsen. “Don’t have much time if you want to put this in motion.”
“That is absolutely my intention, Commander Wibsen. Anybody with doubts should have left us days ago.”
Serena’s father believed that she spent her mornings in the bright, cheery room just reading, but for weeks she had been exploring schemes…gathering volunteers, expert personnel, and raw materials. No one could stop Serena Butler from devoting her energies to humanitarian work.
“I tried to follow proper channels and make the League take action,” she said, “but sometimes people must be coerced into making the right decision. They must be led to it, like a stubborn Salusan stallion.”
After the Parliament laughed at her “naïve foolishness,” Serena had marched out of the temporary meeting hall but did not accept defeat. She decided to change tactics, even if she had to organize and finance a mission herself.
When Xavier learned of her plan, after it was too late to stop her, she hoped he would be proud of her.
Now she studied the team she had gathered from the Armada’s most overlooked experts in commando operations: captains, supply runners, even infiltration specialists. Ten men and women turned to look at her. She clicked a remote control switch to close the overhead louvers. The brightness of the room diminished, though muted sunlight continued to filter in.
“If we can reclaim Giedi Prime, it will be twice the moral victory that the machines had,” Serena said. “We will show that they cannot hold us.”
Wibsen looked as if he had never ceased fighting, though he had been off active duty for over a decade. “All of us are more than happy to tackle a task that will have tangible results. I’ve been itching to strike a blow against the damned machines.”
Ort Wibsen was an old space commander who had been forced to retire—ostensibly because of his age. More likely it had to do with his coarse personality, a penchant for arguing with superiors, and history of ignoring the details of orders. In spite of his surliness he was exactly the man Serena needed to lead a mission that other League members would have declared insane, or at least unwise.
“Then this is your chance, Commander,” she said.
Pinquer Jibb, the curly-haired and still-haggard-looking messenger who had fled the conquest of Giedi Prime to deliver his terrible news, sat stiff-backed, looking around the room. “I’ve provided you with all the background material you need. I’ve compiled detailed reports. The subsidiary shield-generator station was nearly finished when the machines attacked the planet. We merely need to slip in and get it running.” His haunted eyes grew fiery. “Plenty members of the Giedi Home Guard must have survived. They’ll be doing everything they can behind enemy lines, but that won’t be enough unless we help them.”
“If we can get the secondary shield generators functional, the cymeks and robots on the surface will fall to a concerted defense from the Armada.” She scanned the others in the room. “Do you think we’ll be able to do that?”
Brigit Paterson, a masculine-looking woman, frowned. “What makes you think the Armada will join the fight? After my engineers get the job done, how will we make sure the military comes in to save our butts?”
Serena gave her a grim smile. “You leave that to me.”
Serena had been raised with the best schools and tutors, groomed to become a leader. With so much that needed to be done, she could not sit in a comfortable manor house and fail to use the Butler wealth and power.
Now she was about to put that determination to the test.
“Commander Wibsen, do you have the information I requested?”
With his deeply creased face and rough voice, the veteran seemed more like a man of the outdoors than an intricate strategist. But no one in Zimia knew more about military operations than he did.
“Some of it’s good, some of it’s bad. After crushing the government in Giedi City, the machines kept a robot fleet in orbit. Mop-up work on the ground is being led by one Titan and a lot of neo-cymeks.” He coughed, scowled, and adjusted a medication dispenser implanted in his sternum.
“Omnius can keep sending in more machines, or even manufacture reinforcements using the captured industries of Giedi Prime,” said Pinquer Jibb, his voice urgent. “Unless we get the secondary shield complex working.”
“Then that’s what we have to do,” Serena said. “The Home Guard was dispersed across the settled continent, and many of the outlying regiments seem to have gone underground to form a fifth column. If we can contact them, organize them, we might be able to damage the machine conquerors.”
“I can help with that,” Jibb insisted. “It’s our only chance.”
“I still think it’s foolhardy,” Wibsen said. “But what the hell. I didn’t say I wasn’t going to go.”
“Is the ship ready?” Serena asked, impatient.
“It is, but there’s a great deal lacking in this operation, if you ask me.”
Brigit Paterson said to Serena, “I have secured detailed maps, plans, and blueprints of all aspects of Giedi Prime and Giedi City, including full functional diagrams of the subsidiary scrambler-shield generators.” She extended a stack of thin film sheets densely packed with information. “Pinquer says they’re up to date.”
With boundless enthusiasm and passion, Serena had always demonstrated skill in putting things together. Two years ago, she had led a relief team to Caladan, an Unallied Planet where thousands of refugees from the Synchronized Worlds had fled. On her most recent crusade, a year ago, she had delivered three space transports full of medical supplies to closed-off Tlulax, where the inhabitants were suffering from mysterious diseases. Now that Tlulaxa flesh merchants had provided medical aid and replacement organs from their biological tanks—including saving her beloved Xavier—she felt that her investment in effort had paid off fully.
Now Serena had called in favors, resulting in a mission that bore some similiarities to her earlier successful efforts. She expected another clear success, despite the dangers.
With beatific confidence, Serena looked around the table again. She envisioned the mission succeeding. Eleven people willing to challenge a set of conquerors and overcome the odds. “We have no higher priorities.”
Ort Wibsen had worked between traditional channels to obtain a fast blockade runner. Paterson’s engineering crew had equipped the vessel with the best experimental materials she could scavenge from weapons manufactories. Using personal accounts and falsified documentation, Serena had funded whatever the old commander needed. She wanted the best possible chance for her impetuous mission to succeed.
Serena said, “Every person in the League has lost someone to the thinking-machine onslaught, and now we’re going to do something about it.”
“Let’s get busy then,” Pinquer Jibb said. “Time for payback.”
THAT EVENING, ALONE in the grand dining hall, Serena and Xavier sat across from each another. Servers bustled back and forth in red-and-gold jackets and black trousers.
As he sampled golden duckling fillets on his plate, Xavier talked excitedly about Armada mobilization plans and methods of protecting the League Worlds.
/> “Let’s not talk business tonight.” With a charming smile, Serena rose to her feet and glided around the table, taking a seat next to him, very close. “I savor each moment with you, Xavier,” she said, giving nothing away about her plan.
He smiled back at her. “After the poison gas, I can’t savor much else. But you, Serena, are better than the finest banquet or the sweetest perfume.”
Stroking his cheek, she said, “I think we should tell the servants to go to their quarters. My father is in the city and my sister is gone for the evening. Should we waste this time alone?”
He reached out to brush her arm, then drew her close and grinned. “I’m not hungry anyway.”
“I am.” Passionately, she kissed his ear, then his cheek, finally finding his mouth. He ran his fingers through her hair, touching the back of her head and kissing her more deeply.
They left the remnants of the fine meal on the table. She took his hand and together they hurried to her chambers. The door was heavy, and locked easily. She already had a fire lit in the fireplace, giving the room an orange, cheery glow. They kissed again and again, trying to unfasten laces and buttons and clips without breaking apart from each other.
Serena could barely control her urgency, not just to feel his intimate touch, but to etch every sensation into her mind. He did not know that she intended to slip away afterward, and she needed something to remember about this night, to compensate for the time they would be apart.
His fingers were like fire as they traced down her naked back. She could think of nothing but the moment as she pulled off his shirt.
WITH THE MEMORY of her lover’s embrace still tingling along the nerves of her body, Serena left the sleeping manor. She set out into the quiet depths of night, bound to rendezvous with her team at a private field on the outskirts of the Zimia spaceport.
Anxious to be away, her optimism subduing her anxiety, Serena joined her ten commando volunteers. Within the hour they departed in a fast, cloud-gray blockade runner loaded with engineering tools, weapons, and hope.
Religion, time and time again, brings down empires, rotting them from within.
—IBLIS GINJO,
early planning for the Jihad
The conquered planet Earth seemed to be a dumping ground for grandiose monuments that celebrated the fictitious glories of the Titans.
Gazing from his vantage at yet another huge construction project designed by the prideful imaginations of the cymeks, the crew leader paced along a high wooden platform. His people were good workers, dedicated to him—but the work itself seemed pointless. When this ornate pedestal was completed and shored up with reinforced arcs, it would become the platform for a colossal statue representing the idealized, long-lost human form of the Titan Ajax.
As one of the most successful trustee humans on Earth, Iblis Ginjo took his job very seriously. He scrutinized the throng of slaves scurrying about below. He had convinced them to be enthusiastic, drumming up their attentiveness through well-chosen phrases and rewards…though Iblis hated to waste such loyalty and hard work on a brutal bully such as Ajax.
Still, every person had his part in the giant machine of civilization. Iblis had to make sure there were no malfunctions, not on his watch.
The crew leader was not required to be here; his subordinate trustees could just as easily stand under the hot sun and supervise. But Iblis preferred this to his other duties. Seeing him watch over them, the slaves seemed to add a bit more to the tasks. He took pride in what they could accomplish, if managed well, and they genuinely wanted to please him.
Otherwise, he would spend tedious hours involved in the processing of new slaves and assigning them to various work crews. Often the untamed ones needed special training, or resisted violently—problems that hindered the smooth flow of daily work.
Erasmus, the strangely independent and eccentric robot, had recently issued an order to inspect any hrethgir captives taken from newly conquered Giedi Prime, in particular any human who showed qualities of independence and leadership. Iblis would stay on the alert for a suitable candidate…without drawing attention to himself.
He didn’t care about Omnius’s goals for their own sake, but as a crew leader he received certain considerations based on performance. Though such perks made life tolerable, he distributed most of the rewards among his crews.
With a broad face and thick hair that fell across his brow, Iblis had a strong, virile appearance. Able to get more work out of the slaves than any other boss, he knew the best tools and incentives, the manipulation of gentle promises rather than harsh threats. Food, rest days, sexual services from the reproductive slaves—whatever it took to motivate them. He had even been asked to speak some of his thoughts at the school for trustees, but his techniques were not widely adopted among the other privileged humans.
Most crew bosses relied on deprivation and torture, but Iblis considered that a waste. He had risen to his position largely through the force of his personality and the allegiance he engendered in his slaves. Even difficult men invariably succumbed to his will. The machines sensed this innate ability, so Omnius gave him the freedom to do his work.
At a glance, Iblis counted half a dozen monoliths around the hilltop Forum, each pedestal containing the huge statue of one of the Twenty Titans, beginning with Tlaloc, then Agamemnon, then Juno, Barbarossa, Tamerlane, and Alexander. An immense likeness of Ajax would occupy the one here, not because Ajax was so important, but because he was violently impatient. Dante could wait, and Xerxes.
Iblis couldn’t remember the rest of the Titans off the top of his head, but he always learned more than he wanted to know as each statue was built. The work would never end. Iblis had been personally involved in every one of the ostentatious sculptures over the past five years, first as a construction slave and later as crew boss.
It was late in the summer season, warmer than usual. Heat devils danced off rooftops around the Forum. Directly under him on the dusty ground, his construction crew wore drab browns, grays, and blacks—durable clothing that required only occasional washing or repairs.
Below Iblis’s platform, a team boss bellowed out orders. Supervisory robots moved about, making no move to assist the straining laborers. Watcheyes floated overhead, recording everything for Omnius. Iblis hardly noticed them anymore. Humans were industrious, ingenious, and—unlike machines—flexible, as long as they were given incentives and rewards, encouraged in the proper ways, guided to the best behavior. The thinking machines could not understand the subtleties, but Iblis knew that each minor reward he gave his workers was an investment that paid off tenfold.
According to tradition, the slaves often sang work songs and engaged in boisterous team competitions; they were silent now, groaning as they hauled structural blocks into place though in their habitation hives, workers sometimes grumbled about the labor. The cymeks were anxious to see the pedestal completed so they could erect the statue of Ajax, which was being fabricated elsewhere by another crew. Each segment of the project followed a rigid schedule, with no excuses permitted for lateness or shoddy quality.
For now, Iblis was glad his people could work in peace, without the intimidating scrutiny of Ajax. Iblis did not know where the Titan might be at the moment, but could only hope he would prey on other hapless individuals today. Iblis had work to do and a schedule to keep.
In his opinion, the monoliths were useless—huge obelisks, pillars, statues, and Grogyptian facades for empty, unnecessary buildings. But it was not his position to question such time-consuming projects. Iblis knew full well that the monuments fulfilled an important psychological need for the usurped tyrants. Besides, such work kept slaves busy and gave them visible results of their labor.
Following their humiliating overthrow by Omnius centuries ago, the Titans had constantly scrambled to recover lost status. Iblis thought the cymeks went overboard, building cyclopean statues and pyramids just to make themselves feel more important. They strutted around in showy but old-fashioned mac
hine bodies, bragging about military conquests.
Iblis wondered how much of it was really true. After all, how could anyone question those who controlled history? The wild humans in the unruly League worlds probably had a different view of the conquests.
He wiped sweat from his brow and smelled the gritty dust that rose from the work below. He looked at the electronic notepad in his hand, checking the progress against the schedule tally. Everything was proceeding well, as expected.
With his sharp eyes, he spotted a man leaning against a shaded wall, taking an unauthorized rest. With a smile, Iblis pointed an “encourager” pulse weapon at him and skimmed the man’s left leg with a beam of energy. The slave slapped the hot spot on his skin and whirled to look up at Iblis.
“Are you trying to make me look bad?” Iblis yelled. “What if Ajax came around and saw you falling asleep there? Would he kill you first, or me?”
Abashed, the man shouldered his way into the crowd of sweating laborers, where he resumed his work with renewed vigor.
Some work bosses found it necessary to kill slaves as examples to the others, but Iblis had never resorted to that tactic and vowed that he never would. He was certain it would break the inexplicable spell he had over the men. Instead, he only had to show disappointment in them, and they worked harder.
Every few days he delivered stirring, impromptu speeches. On such occasions the slaves received water and rest breaks, giving them renewed energy that more than made up for the time spent. The way he strung phrases together often brought cheers and enthusiasm, and only a few questions from bold slaves who wondered why they should be excited about yet another monument. The work leader’s talent lay in being utterly convincing.
Iblis hated the machine overlords, but concealed his feelings so effectively that his superiors actually trusted him. Now, in a fanciful moment, he envisioned destroying the computer evermind and installing himself in its place. Much more than a mere trustee. Think of it—Iblis Ginjo, ruler of all, knower of all!
The Butlerian Jihad Page 16
