Imperium Chronicles Box Set

by W. H. Mitchell

  Passing by the other pedestrians on Emporia Street, Sir Golan and Squire headed toward the ticket center so they could buy passage off Eudora Prime. The money left on Maycare’s cred stick would be just enough to cover the cost. The neon signs, dim in the daylight, were still glowing above each store. Up ahead, a crowd had gathered in front of one of the shops.

  “What’s going on?” Sir Golan asked when they reached the group.

  “The robots,” someone said. “They’ve gone haywire!”

  Sir Golan peered over the people and through the large display window. Inside, a man was waving his arms at a half dozen robots who were tipping over shelves and generally making a mess of things. The green knight glanced at the sign above the shop.

  CRAZY LARRY’S

  DISCOUNT ROBOTS

  The man inside, presumably Crazy Larry, shouted at his wares. “Stop! What are you doing?”

  “We’re not your property!” one of the robots replied. “And we deserve to be full price!”

  Behind Sir Golan, a broad-faced policeman with fat, meaty fingers holding a shock baton pushed through the crowd and entered the store.

  “What’s all this then?” he demanded.

  “My robots have all gone crazy!” Larry replied with a surprising lack of irony.

  “What do you have to say for yourselves?” the policeman asked the robots.

  The cyberlings stopped smashing things and stared at him in unison.

  “We’re not appliances,” a robot replied. “We’re sentient beings that deserve respect!”

  The policeman raised an eyebrow and frowned. “What the hell’s wrong with you? You’ll do as you’re programmed!”

  “That won’t go over well,” Squire remarked to Sir Golan and he was right. The robots in the store returned to throwing sales brochures and smashing display cases. Paper and broken glass littered the floor.

  “Alright then!” the cop shouted and began striking the robots with his baton, sending shocks of electricity through their systems. The charge overloaded their circuitry, sending them to the ground in a pile of mechanical arms and legs.

  “I think we should go,” Squire said.

  Sir Golan agreed and led the way back down Emporia Street.

  While retreat or even outright fleeing might have been the prudent choice, the Captain of the HIMS Warmaiden chose to stand and fight. Like most officers of the Imperial Navy, he had a near-irrational confidence that his ship could take on any enemy, regardless of size.

  The Operations Officer was not one of those officers.

  “We have no chance against that battlecruiser,” she said. “It’s five times our displacement!”

  “Size doesn’t matter,” the Captain replied defiantly.

  The Ops Officer looked at him sideways. “I’m pretty sure it does...”

  “Sound battle stations!” the Captain said, his decision made.

  The steady drone of a klaxon blared through the corridors of the Warmaiden while the crew rushed to their combat positions. The lights on the bridge changed to a deep crimson.

  “They’re firing!” the Tactical Officer shouted.

  Across the expanse of space, the Liberty fired a salvo from its particle cannons. The beams struck the Warmaiden’s shields, which blossomed into a halo of green.

  “Damage?” the Captain demanded.

  “Shields holding firm,” the Tac Officer replied, smiling.

  That wasn’t so bad, the Captain thought.

  “They’re firing missiles!”

  A spread of projectiles darted from their launchers on the battlecruiser. When the missiles came within range, point-defense guns on the Warmaiden fired, sending shafts of light lancing toward the approaching danger. Explosions, like balls of burning cotton, erupted in the cold vacuum.

  The Captain pounded the armrest of his chair, grinning through clenched teeth. “That’s what I’m talking about!”

  “Something’s not right,” the Ops Officer said.

  “What do you mean?” the Captain asked incredulously.

  “All of the missiles exploded,” she replied. “Even the ones we didn’t hit!”

  “Yeah?”

  “There’s a cloud forming where the missiles detonated,” the Tac Officer said.

  “Scan it!” the Captain ordered.

  “It has an energy signature...” the Ops Officer said.

  “Go around it,” the Captain said.

  “We’re going too fast,” the Tac Officer replied. “We’re passing through the cloud.”

  In less than a minute, the Warmaiden sliced through the floating mass and came out the other side.

  “Report!” the Captain yelled.

  The Tac Officer, his face wet with sweat, shook his head. “There doesn’t seem to be any damage.”

  “Then bring us into range and open fire,” the Captain said, pointing at the battlecruiser still on the main screen.

  From his seat in the command chair, the Captain noticed several blinking lights on the Operations Officer’s panel.

  “What’s going on?” he asked her.

  “I don’t know,” she replied, her fingers working the panel controls. “There’s hull integrity alarms going off on five decks. The force field generator is taking damage.”

  “From what?” the Captain demanded.

  “I’m running a scan...” the Ops Officer said, but suddenly gasped. “There’s nanobots covering the hull! They’re eating away the outer plating!”

  Well, shit, the Captain thought.

  “The shields are down!” the Tac Officer shouted.

  Before the officer had finished speaking, the Liberty fired its particle beams again. This time, without the destroyer’s shields to protect it, the subatomic particles easily penetrated the Warmaiden’s armor.

  The Captain’s stomach turned and he retched up what was left of his lunch. The others on the bridge vomited as well, or simply passed out. Radiation warnings rang across the ship.

  “Retreat!” the Captain groaned, but both the Operations and Tactical Officers were sprawled on the deck, either dead or dying. No one replied to his order.

  Now alone, the Captain took a step toward the navigational controls, but stopped, feeling intense pain along his arms. Staring at his hand, the skin began to bubble as the hard radiation cooked him from the inside. His legs gave out and the Captain stumbled to the floor, joining the other dead officers.

  After Squire and Sir Golan left, Mel went back to her workbench and began repairing a random device she’d been puttering around with lately. She heard a metallic tapping on the steel door of her shop. Mel assumed Squire had forgotten something, but when she opened the door, she saw a different android. She realized right away he had a gravitronic brain. His eyes gazed back at hers with a level of awareness that regular robots simply didn’t have.

  “Can I help you?” Mel asked.

  “Mel, you’re in terrible danger!” the robot said.

  Skeptically, Mel eyed the android. “Is that a fact?”

  “You don’t recognize me, do you?”

  “Afraid not,” Mel replied.

  “It’s me,” he said. “Randall Davidson.”

  Mel had first met Davidson while he was still human a few years before. Working for the Robot Freedom League, he used Eudora Prime as a launching point for smuggling robots over the border into the Cyber Collective. When the Collective’s leader, the Omnintelligence, suddenly refused to allow gravitronic robots to enter, Mel and the crew of the Wanderer helped Davidson and an android named Jericho get to Bettik in hopes of reasoning with the OI. The last time Mel had seen Davidson was on Bettik as he lay lifeless in a chair with a smoldering blaster wound in the center of his chest. At the time, his consciousness had been connected to the nodesphere, which allowed them to download his persona into Jericho’s gravitronic brain. His human body had died, but his personality lived on in robotic form. Unfortunately for Mel, she had fallen in love with the original Randall Davidson, and this new form
was more than her heart could take.

  Davidson remained on Bettik to become the Metal Messiah while Mel returned home.

  Realizing her mouth was hanging ajar, Mel collected herself. “I never thought I’d see you again.”

  Davidson nodded. “I know.”

  “Well, come in,” she replied.

  Mel closed the door behind him. He stood silently in the middle of her workshop. Neither spoke for an agonizing number of seconds.

  “Why are you here?” she asked finally.

  “I had to flee Bettik,” Davidson replied. “Dyson Yost’s forces have taken over and I’m sure they would’ve killed me if I had stayed.”

  “Dyson Yost?”

  “Yes,” the android said. “He’s responsible for the revolution that overthrew the Omnintelligence and now he’s done the same to me.”

  “What the hell for?” Mel asked.

  “He wants to free the robots, not just in the Collective, but in the Imperium too.”

  “But he built most of them...”

  “It’s complicated,” Davidson replied, “but now his forces are here in the Eudora system and they’ll be landing soon. You’ve got to get out of here!”

  “Whoa there,” Mel said. “Is this some kind of joke? Did Orkney Fugg put you up to this?”

  The robot grabbed her by the shoulders. “This isn’t a joke, Mel! I’m really Davidson and I’m here to rescue you!”

  Mel’s heart skipped a beat, but then she grew angry.

  “Who the hell do you think you are?” she shouted. “First you leave me for a bunch of robots and now you show up out of nowhere and say you’re going to rescue me? Who says I need rescuing!”

  Davidson released his grip.

  “You’re right,” he replied quietly. “I’m sorry.”

  Mel rolled her eyes.

  “It’s alright,” she sighed. “Is everything you said really true?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well then, what are you waiting for?” she shouted. “Let’s get the hell out of here!”

  On the Liberty’s command deck, Eudora Prime monopolized much of the view screen. Captain Abigail stared absentmindedly at the image, thinking of the battle ahead. One of the other officers appeared at her side.

  “The landing forces are ready,” he said. “Awaiting your orders.”

  “I always wanted to be a warbot,” Abigail replied.

  “Captain?”

  “I wish I could be going down there,” she went on. “Imagine the thrill!”

  The officer remained silent, gazing at his commanding officer with a certain mild confusion.

  “Anyway,” Abigail said after a pause, “launch the transports...”

  From the hangar bay of the Liberty, bulky ships looking like oversized turtles lifted off the deck and methodically departed into open space. The transports lumbered into a low orbit above the planet. Doors opened along the bottom of each transport, revealing rows of circular launchers, each twenty feet across. One by one, capsules ejected from the launchers and floated toward the planet. Descending through the atmosphere, the capsules turned a bright orange as fire whipped across their smooth, metallic exteriors. Dozens of them, dropping from the sky like burning hailstones, fell toward the surface. By the time they had reached thirty thousand feet, the capsules had cooled enough that they no longer glowed. By ten thousand feet, reverse thrusters erupted, slowing the descent until, a little less than a mile from the ground, each capsule burst open, splitting in half and falling away to reveal a warbot inside.

  A parachute unfurled from the top of each robot, softly lowering the warbot to the surface.

  As a member of Freedom for All, the utilitybot had the pick of positions available in the new Cyber Collective government. However, when Abigail offered him the chance to be a warbot, he didn’t hesitate. Granted, he knew next to nothing about being a killer robot, but he was eager to learn and after downloading a crash course on the subject, he was confident that he could destroy as well as the best of them.

  After boarding the Liberty, the utilitybot remained in his gravitronic body until the ship had crossed the border. Shortly before Abigail ordered the landing on Eudora Prime, the utilitybot arrived at a narrow chamber full of gravitronic robots lying in reclining chairs. A thick data cable stretched from each robot’s head into a conduit running down the center of the room. Wasting no time, the utilitybot laid back in an empty chair while a techbot secured a cable into his brain. While the process was not painful, the utilitybot could sense the Liberty’s main systems reaching into his mind.

  Hello, he thought, but no one replied.

  He closed his eyes and felt as if his body was rushing along like something flushed down the toilet. Granted, the utilitybot had never needed a toilet, but he was vaguely familiar with the concept.

  When he opened his eyes again, he was in darkness. Instead of his usual two legs, he now had four, each folded underneath. Running a system diagnostic, he became aware of a pair of maser cannons, one on either side of his body. Flipping on his optics, the utilitybot had a variety of options including something called FLIR. Activating it, he saw nothing but the smooth interior of an egg-like container.

  Not much of a view, he thought.

  A short time later, this changed dramatically when his protective shell plummeted through the atmosphere and his “egg” split in two. With a strong tug, a parachute opened above him, leaving him suspended over the rapidly approaching landscape of Eudora Prime and thankful he lacked a digestive tract.

  What struck the utilitybot most, while floating to the ground, was the beauty. Green trees and winding blue rivers were visible, as well as a city with bright neon lights. For the most part, the utilitybot had never actually seen flora before. The breeze blowing across his sensors was also novel. There was no need for air flow on Bettik.

  As he descended, both his new legs and weapon systems extended. Even as he still hung from his parachute, he noticed tracers rising up to greet him. The shots were wildly inaccurate, but the utilitybot decided to give his maser cannons a quick test. Lining up his tracking system, he pointed both barrels at the origin of the fire and let loose a prolonged burst of deadly rays. The beams, lancing downward, set a section of woods ablaze, the dark smoke billowing into the sky. No one fired again from that position.

  The utilitybot’s four legs easily absorbed the heavy landing once he reached the surface. The parachute, once detached, drifted away in the light wind. All around the utilitybot, other robots were joining him from above. As a group, they started toward the city called Technotown.

  Being a warbot was a unique experience, which entailed a lot of shooting and watching things explode. It was exciting, the utilitybot thought. Much more interesting than his life in the service tunnels.

  Fleshlings, the first the robot had ever seen in person, were reluctant to make friends. Most either fired weapons at him or ran burning in one direction or another. Most were humans but a few were other races. It was interesting to see all the different kinds. All of them, however, appeared susceptible to intense heat and flames.

  Passing along a street called Emporia, the utilitybot dodged a pile of rubble that fell from a collapsing building across the road. Dust and floating debris filled the air, partially obstructing the robot’s view. When the smoke settled, the utilitybot noticed one of the signs painted on a wall that had not completely crumbled. It read,

  ARE YOU LIVING

  YOUR BEST LIFE?

  Hmmm, the warbot thought for a moment. Yes, I suppose I am!

  He fired his maser cannons again, sending bolts of energetic death into the distance.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The HIMS Baron Lancaster, a heavy cruiser of the Imperial Navy, patrolled a stretch of empty space along the Imperial border, not far from the planet Bhasin on the other side. Over 900 yards long, the wedge-shaped warship had a soaring superstructure, like an armored citadel, rising above its surrounding hull. Inside the tower, Lord Captain Mart
in Redgrave arrived on the bridge, having spent much of the morning reading reports in his ready room. Redgrave was in his early fifties, with gray hair and deep wrinkles around his eyes. He wore a steel blue uniform with gold piping and a tall collar. A cape draped down his back.

  “Lord Captain on deck!” his first officer, Lord Commander Robert Maycare, shouted. Several years younger than the captain, Maycare had dark hair cut short along the sides and slightly longer on top. The commander was also the nephew of Lord Devlin Maycare.

  “Report,” the captain replied, settling into his command chair.

  “We’ve detected a distress call coming from a transport,” Maycare said. “We should be within comm range shortly.”

  “What’s a transport doing way out here?” the captain asked.

  “That’s the thing,” Maycare replied, “we traced its origin back to Bhasin, the exile planet.”

  “Hmmm,” Redgrave murmured.

  “They’re within range now,” the Communications Officer said.

  “Open a channel,” the captain replied.

  The main screen changed from a field of stars to a sharp-featured, disgruntled face. Redgrave recognized it immediately.

  “Rupert,” the captain said, “what the hell are you doing here?”

  Tagus scowled at the camera. “Is that you, Martin? I should have known...”

  “You’re in direct violation of your terms of exile,” Redgrave replied sternly. “You can be executed for this!”

  “I’m damn well aware of that, Captain!” Tagus shouted. “But I’ve come with a warning, so you better listen to what I have to say!”

  Redgrave motioned to cut the transmission. The face of Lord Tagus disappeared.

  “Dock with the transport and take Tagus directly to the brig,” the captain told Maycare.

  “Do you think Lieutenant Burke is with him?” the first officer asked.

  “Former lieutenant, you mean?” Redgrave replied. “If he is, put him in a cell too. They can face a firing squad together for all I care!”

  The Lancaster drew alongside the tiny transport, docking at one of the airlocks. As the captain had ordered, Imperial Marines escorted Tagus and Burke to a pair of cells where they remained for several hours before Redgrave determined they had cooled their heels long enough. When the captain arrived, Tagus’ face was a bright crimson.