Berserker Prime

by Fred Saberhagen

  Kardec’s scream was quenched in the middle, cut off in the airless space, as soon as the communicator circuits were ripped away from his helmet. Life went out, as swiftly and invisibly as air, as the lights when the power was cut off. A bloated object drifted, leaking little jets of pink fog at several places.

  For a moment or two, there was spasmodic motion among the survivors, drawing away from the invaders, as people thrown into raw panic might pull back from machinery run amok, and also from the remains of their victims.

  For several seconds, a kind of precarious stillness held in the cabin. Then one of the machines was speaking to them again, issuing orders to its surviving prisoners. As before, its voice was a raw shock, some kind of a bad joke usurping their helmet intercom. It sounded as if it might have been created in some monstrous attempt at heavy-handed humor. The machine was making gestures as it spoke, which seemed to identify it as the source of the wireless voice.

  The machine spoke to Lee in a peculiar voice. The speech was halting, the choice of words and syntax limited and sometimes wrong.

  “You are prisoner. Resistance will bring punishment. Stand. Walk. That way.” An arm with metal grippers at the end jabbed in a pointing motion.

  The little ship’s artificial gravity had suddenly failed, but that caused little difficulty for trained cadets. Lee stood and moved as he was told, using the handgrips. Once something that felt hard as a gun barrel jabbed him in the back, and he winced but did not turn.

  When one of the boarding machines turned suddenly in the aisle to confront Lee from less than an arm’s length away, he could see the film of fresh blood clinging to a gripper. He heard himself give a cowardly yelp of terror, totally convinced that in another moment he would be as dead as Kardec and Ting Wu.

  Like every other Twin Worlds citizen of his age, he had lived among robots and been served by them all his life. Not one of them had ever frightened him before. It was as if a chair or table had turned murderous. Its lenses seemed to stare at him for an eternal moment. Then it turned away again.

  Some of his uniformed classmates were screaming, and it seemed that another one had fainted.

  Carter Hemphill was at Lee’s side, offering useful advice or practical help. Hemphill was one of the saner, cooler cadets, not truly brilliant, or necessarily the fastest thinker in the class. But sharp on his technology. Lee could hear him reminding someone else to manually check the setting on a certain helmet valve, more likely, the cadet was nervously trying to do something the wrong way.

  Moving forward, Lee got one quick glimpse of more human wreckage in the small control cabin, when the machines conducted the survivors out. Kardec, De Carlo, and now their pilot, whose name they had never learned. At least three people dead. The robot, Random, had been released, and it was standing still, no doubt trying, as always, to compute what it should be doing next.

  At the moment, Lee’s mind, reeling in deep shock, could focus on nothing but a hazy protest: The fact of war was no surprise, it was expected, they had been training for it.

  War was supposed to be horrible, everyone solemnly agreed on that. But it wasn’t supposed to be like this, the enemy just sending machines to do their dirty work. Lee had always known that there was a good chance, exactly how good was always hazy, that someday he and his classmates would face the real combat for which they had trained intensely. But if and when they did, it would be an event out of a training holograph, a contest with effective weapons in hand or under remote control, against other ED humans who were similarly armed.

  Part of his mind kept madly protesting that it was truly unsporting of the Huveans to wage war in this unorthodox style, springing this surprise of invincible machines to do their fighting for them. Unsporting and treacherous, and more than that, it was just plain wrong, awkwardly crazy, for the Huveans to attack by means of bizarre, irresponsible robots … machines horribly empowered to make their own decisions on when to take a human life.

  …and in the back of Lee’s mind he was aware of another incomprehensible fact. How could the Huveans ever have developed machines like these, weapons so advanced? Developed and produced them in such secrecy that Twin Worlds intelligence knew nothing about them, had failed to brief its fledgling troops that anything of the kind might…?

  So far the invading machines were taking care to preserve most of the spacesuits and other clothing.

  One at a time, Lee and his classmates were made to stand, examined, then ordered to resume their seats. When the lead machine stopped in the narrow aisle, gripping one seat to hold itself in place, and focused its lenses at him, Lee could feel his knees turning to water.

  A machine was reading his name, aloud, from the chest stripe on his spacesuit: Xenophanes Lee…

  “Here.” He spoke up almost calmly, as if he were answering at roll call. Later he would remember the way he had responded to this new authority, and almost be able to laugh at it.

  After the examination, Lee and his fellow survivors remained in their seats, while the ruined ship was towed away by the strange ship, or machine, that had so easily grappled and captured their own, even as one of the boarding devices had taken charge of Random, holding both of Random’s wrists imprisoned in one gripper. The attacker was evidently very powerful, though not very big.

  The ports were open, allowing the freshly caught prisoners to get a good look at the surface of the planet from which they had lifted off, perhaps less than a standard hour ago, and also at some of the other things going on in relatively nearby space.

  There was almost silence, except for the ragged, sobbing breathing of one pair of lungs, coming over the common radio link which still connected all the helmeted cadets.

  A long time seemed to pass. Then: “This isn’t really war,” Lee heard himself say quietly.

  “What?” The question was anonymous, a gasp in a voice so ragged it could not be recognized.

  “What would you call it, then?” asked Hemphill. His young voice quavered once, on the first word; after that his tone was remote, detached, as if his mind were drifting somewhere above all this, taking only a distant interest.

  Lee hoped that he could sound as calm. “In class they taught us that wars occur because someone hopes to gain something from them.”

  There was silence. Somehow he had thought that the machines would forbid talk, but nothing of the kind had happened.

  He went on: “The people who begin them think they’re acting rationally. They start a war believing they’ll somehow come out ahead when the fighting’s over, that they’ll own more land, or more slaves, or gold, or have more power. Or they’ll be safer, having destroyed their enemies. Sometimes the goal was even more ambitious, that all the wrong-thinking people, all the evildoers whose sins cried out for punishment, would be dead.”

  There was just light enough in the constricted, awkward space for him to see that Hemphill was nodding slowly. No one else replied, but Lee thought the others were more or less paying attention. One or two had raised their heads.

  “Go on,” prodded Hemphill.

  Lee swallowed and nodded. He continued: “But what’s happening to us is different.”

  “How?”

  “Because. Whoever programmed these machines gave them the right to decide life or death….”

  “Any plain, stupid bomb does that.”

  “No.” Lee was surprising himself, how calm and thoughtful he could be. “A bomb just, just goes bang. It knows and cares nothing about what it’s blowing up. If this, this thing that talks to us, if it’s truly only a machinelike our robots” he gestured vaguely in Random’s direction”it’s smart enough to recognize a human. It’s free to decide to kill.”

  “And so, you’re saying”

  “I’m saying, how can the people who built it, and someone must have, hope to gain anything by it? They had to be thinking beings, some branch of Galactic humanity, like us and the Carmpan, and they could have had no idea of making war on us.”

  “Why not?�
�� That was the voice of Feretti on the helmet intercom. They must all be listening to Lee. No one seemed to have frozen yet, to have utterly stopped thinking. That was a good sign.

  “Why not?” It had seemed so obvious to Lee, but when he had to spell it out in words, it became harder. “Because they couldn’t have been afraid of us, or wanted to punish us for evildoing. Or be trying to take away our gold, or slaves, or planets, because I don’t see how they could have known that we even existed. Our only sin is just being alive. Being in the wrong place, maybe.” He wasn’t sure that he was making sense.

  Cusanus spoke up in her distinctive voice: “This is all some horrible mistake.”

  “Mistake?”

  One of the cadets had been keeping a steady lookout at a port, and now killed the conversation with an interruption. “Yes, it seems we do have a destination. Here it comes.”

  They shoved and struggled for position at the cleared ports. There were a couple of exclamations, then a strained silence, punctuated by heavy breathing. Not all of them could believe what they were seeing.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Another message from President Belgola, originating in presidential headquarters on Timber, was received aboard the Morholt.

  A low-rank human handed Gregor the small shiny case, starkly labeled as private and confidential, and addressed to plenipotentiary Gregor aboard the Morholt, in care of Admiral Radigast.

  The little module was larger than most communications, with an ominously special look about it. “If you will excuse me for a moment, admiral?”

  Gregor got only a weary nod in reply. Sitting on the edge of his combat couch, holding the message unit in his gloved hands, Gregor turned it on and looked at the fist-sized virtual display, oriented to be visible and audible to him alone.

  Belgola’s familiar round face appeared in the middle of the image. As usual, the president, even before he said a word, seemed to radiate optimism.

  The president’s voice, vaguely aristocratic, was much more distinctive than his appearance. “Gregor, my trusted counselor, I hope this finds you well. Before you begin to view this recording, I must inform you that it incorporates some very advanced technology, improvements you will probably not have seen before. It is computer augmented and controlled, and you will find it interactive to an unprecedented degree.

  “Any questions you may have should be directed to this image, the one you now see and hear, just as if you and I were speaking face to face. As in a very real sense, you are; a subunit of Logos has been inserted into this message module, and you may take its answers as coming directly from me, with full presidential authority.”

  With that the image paused, as if realizing that Gregor would need a little time to digest the claim it had just made. After a few seconds it went on smoothly. “When our conversation is concluded, you will return this unit by courier to presidential headquarters on Timber.” Again there was a slight pause. “When you are ready to go on, tell me so.”

  Gregor opened his mouth, then closed it silently. He needed a somewhat longer pause for digestion than perhaps the president, or whatever entity it was before him that now claimed to represent the president, had imagined. Meanwhile the miniature image of Belgola stood patiently beaming back at him, still radiating confidence. Around it glowed an aura of graphic decoration, consisting of waves of pastel color, and the suggestion of intricate Mandelbrot patterns, all making the central figure a little hard to see, while still quite recognizable. It was the kind of thing children might use to embellish their birthday greetings to one another. Maybe, thought Gregor, some glitch in the computer system was responsible. Or some new attempt to foil enemy code breaking?

  Meanwhile, part of Gregor’s mind had taken note of the fact that the presidential image was oddly dressed. What Gregor could see of his garb was disconcertingly informal, suggesting underwear or pajamas, perhaps a worker in light technology. And his hair had recently been cut quite short. Whatever it was, he looked more like a laboratory researcher than a statesman or commander in chief.

  And what was all that equipment vaguely visible in the miniaturized background? The room in which the recording had been made did not look like any part of any presidential office that Gregor could remember.

  Gregor could recognize, in the near background of the image, a computer console that he supposed might contain Logosor the Oracle. For convenience, it might have been mounted on a standard robot chassis, enabling it to walk about on two robotic legs, though the head was anything but anthropomorphic.

  The thing, whatever it was, seemed to be looking over the president’s shoulder. For a moment Gregor could imagine it had laid an inhuman hand on the man’s back, and was reaching inside his torso, pulling strings.

  The plenipotentiary squinted at the image, holding his breath, for a moment he thought he had actually seen some evidence of thin strands, perhaps wires or fiberoptic lines, making connections from somewhere offstage to the president’s head.

  Aware that the admiral was looking at him curiously from a couple of meters away, Gregor did not turn his gaze in that direction. Instead he cleared his throat and told the image: “Go ahead.”

  At first he found the content of the actual message reassuring. The president offered no excuse for dropping out of touch, but otherwise began by giving an impression of clear-minded reason. Belgola had a calm and reasonable voice that had been a considerable asset in his career up till now.

  But after the first few sentences, things began to take a different turn. Belgola was saying: “…there is no reason why we should be surprised by the discovery that we are not, after all, the dominant life form in the Galaxy.

  “As our situation is new, we must act anew, and think anew. Now I intend to discuss my resignation. And to state the reasons, which are undeniable, why no human being should succeed me in this office.”

  Gregor’s finger found the small switch on the bottom of the recording that shut it off. He turned to the man beside him. “Admiral, I wonder if we could have a brief talk in private. Either your quarters or mine.”

  The chewing motion of the admiral’s jaw slowed to a halt. “What’s going on, plenipotentiary?”

  “I’ve just got a good start at playing the president’s message.”

  “And whatever it is has made you a little spacesick,” Radigast finished. He did not sound surprised, but he was squinting, as if he winced in anticipation from something he might be about to see.

  “Your cabin will do fine.”

  A minute later, seated on his own berth with the admiral at his side, the display now enlarged on his cabin’s holostage, Gregor started the message over from the beginning.

  When they came to the bit about thinking anew, Gregor paused the presentation again, and commented: “I just checked. The data bank attributes that last bit as a quotation from Lincoln.”

  The pause command had caught the image with its mouth open, but a moment later the mouth closed, on its own, and Belgola’s recorded face resumed an expression of patient waiting.

  “Yeah. But not Gettysburg,” murmured Radigast, surprising the diplomat. “Second inaugural? I’m not sure. Anyway, it seems our glorious leader steals from only the motherless best to write his letters.”

  “Yes.” Gregor nodded slowly. It was not the thoughts the president might steal or borrow that worried him, it was the ideas he might come up with on his own. He sighed. “Shall we go on?”

  Radigast nodded. “Let him rip.”

  “as our situation is new, we must act anew, and think anew. Now I intend to discuss my resignation. And the reasons why no human being should succeed me in this office.” This time the wording was somewhat different.

  Gregor paused the show again. “Oh God,” said Radigast, quietly. It seemed more a prayer than a blasphemy. “Gregor, what are we going to do?”

  “I suppose we’d better begin by hearing him out.”

  Set in motion again, Belgola’s image, or his optelectronic clone, went on to be
labor an obvious point that, the citizens who had entrusted their lives to Prairie’s deep shelters were rapidly losing their original confidence in their home defenses, having already seen their entire fleet get the hell knocked out of it by a single opponent, their confidence was badly frayed already.

  “In this situation, I am no longer qualified to lead, no organic being is, or can be, so qualified.”

  The admiral muttered bad words. “Of course, if he can’t do it, how could anyone?”

  The rather ordinary face in the recording seemed serenely ready to contemplate the universe, from its owner’s rightful place at the pinnacle of all organic beings.

  Belgola’s voice went on: “It was foolish to put our trust in shelters in the first place.”

  The admiral grumbled. “All right, all right. Where do we put it, then?”

  Evidently the president’s image had heard that. It stopped, looking from right to left in the attitude of a speaker confronted with a heckler, but unable to tell just where the jeers were coming from. “Please rephrase your comment.”

  Radigast raised a hand to his mouth, miming the zippering of his lips.

  After a silent pause of several seconds, the speech resumed. Gregor wondered if Belgolaor whatever part of him was present, would add the fleet to the list of entities that should not be trusted? Not quite. “Brave as our spacefarers are, they are no more than human.”

  The president admitted he had been wrong in giving blunt orders to stop the intruder, at that time he had thought it was quite likely some Huvean device. But “I am countermanding that order now.”

  He went on to explain that a thorough discussion with Logos had convinced him of his error. He, President Belgola, was perfectly ready to dismiss any possibility that the amazing enemy might ultimately be controlled by some living intelligence aboard.