The Machine Crusade

by Brian Herbert

  "Is that within tolerances?" Ishmael asked guardedly. "Unless we seal the hull seams tight, we might cause the deaths of thousands of crew members."

  Alüd didn't seem bothered as he continued firing the hot riveting gun. He yanked away the greasy cloth that covered his face so that Ishmael could see his hard smile. "Then I'll apologize to them when I hear their distant spirits screaming in the depths of Heol, where all evil men must go. Besides, if they don't bother to test the components in orbit, they deserve to suck vacuum."

  While he had kept a relatively stable assignment and had found some measure of happiness with his family, Ishmael's deeply troubled friend had been transferred dozens of times. Shouting above the din of the construction yards, Alüd had told him about his wife, whom he loved passionately, and one newborn son, whom he barely remembered. But ten years ago a workmaster had caught Alüd salting the fuel in a big mining grinder; in punishment, he had been transferred away from the work group and sent to the other side of Poritrin.

  Alüd had never seen his wife again, never held his son. No wonder the man was bitter and angry. But though he had obviously brought the disaster upon himself, Alüd wanted to hear none of Ishmael's admonishments. To him, no one but the people of Poritrin were to blame. Why should he care about the lives of crew members aboard these ships?

  Oddly enough, the workmasters and shipbuilders didn't seem to care about quality either, as if they were more concerned with assembling the vessels rapidly than with making them functional. Or safe.

  Ishmael went back to work diligently. It never paid to delve into details and questions that might arouse the ire of the crew supervisors. He passed time more easily if he kept himself numb on the outside, hiding the spark of his own identity deep within. At night, when he recited Sutras for his Zensunni followers, he recalled life on Harmonthep, listening to his grandfather quote the same scriptures…

  Unexpectedly, shift bells rang, and the lights increased inside the clamorous refinery. Sparks fell to the ground like tiny meteors, and pulleys raised the machinery back to the ceilings of the highbays. Bellowed words from speaker boxes were fractured into gibberish by the background din. Uniformed supervisors strode around the decks, assigning crews to staging areas.

  "Lord Niko Bludd grants all people of Poritrin, even slave workers, this hour of relaxation and contemplation to commemorate the victory of civilization over barbarism, the triumph of order over chaos."

  The hissing racket of the refinery and shipyards dwindled. The slave crews interrupted their conversations and looked toward the speaker boxes. Supervisors stood on high platforms, glaring at the people to make certain they were paying attention.

  The announcement continued, clearer now, the recorded words of Lord Bludd. "Twenty-four years ago today, my Dragoon forces put an end to a violent and illegal uprising led by the criminal Bel Moulay. This man deluded our hardworking slaves, confusing them with irrational promises that lured them into a hopeless, nonsensical fight Luckily, our civilization was able to restore the rule of order."

  "Today is the anniversary of the execution of this evil man. We celebrate the triumphs of Poritrin society and the League of Nobles. All humans must put aside their differences and fight our common enemy, the thinking machines."

  Alüd scowled, struggling to suppress a defiant outburst. Ishmael knew what his friend was thinking. The Buddislamic slaves, by working in war industries, contributed unwillingly to the military effort against Omnius. Yet to the captives, the Poritrin slavekeepers and machines were both demons — only of different sorts.

  "Tonight, every Poritrin citizen is invited to join in feasts and festivities. Fireflowers and skypaintings will be launched from rafts in the river. Slaves are also welcome to observe, provided they remain within designated holding areas. Working together, combining our strength, Poritrin can be assured of victory against Omnius and freedom from the thinking machines. Let no man forget the potential of the human race."

  The announcement ended and the work supervisors dutifully applauded, but the slaves were slow to add their cheers. Alüd's expression darkened behind his black beard, and he pulled up the rag to cover his face again; Ishmael doubted the unobservant crew leaders noticed his look of pure hatred.

  After night fell and the slaves returned to their camp compound in the marshy river delta, Lord Bludd launched his extravagant festivities. Hundreds of phosphorescent balloons rose into the sky. Celebratory music wafted across the water. Even after two decades on Poritrin, the melodies sounded slightly atonal and alien to Ishmael as he sat with his wife Ozza and their two daughters.

  Poritrin nobles professed to follow gentle, bucolic Navachristianity, but their core beliefs did not extend to their daily lives. They had their festivals, and embraced religious trappings, but the Poritrin upper classes did little to demonstrate their true faith. For centuries their economy had run on slave labor, ever since they had cast aside sophisticated technology, forsaking anything that reminded them of thinking machines.

  Slaves learned to snatch whatever moments and memories they could find. Ishmael's girls Chamal and Falina were fascinated by the spectacle, but he remained quietly beside his wife, thinking his own thoughts. The celebration reminded him of the brutal crackdown the gold-armored Dragoon guards had mounted against the insurgents two decades ago. Lord Bludd had commanded all slaves to witness the execution of the rebel leader, and he and Alüd had watched in horror as the executioners stripped Bel Moulay naked and hacked him to pieces. That uprising had given the slaves a brief flicker of hope, but the death of their fiery leader had crushed their spirit and left a dark scar on their hearts.

  Finally, Ishmael gathered with other slaves so that they could hold a memorial for the fallen Bel Moulay. He saw that Alüd had also come into the compound, wanting Ishmael's company and shared memories of the tragic event that had shaped their boyhood.

  Alüd stood beside Ozza, fidgeting, as Ishmael quoted the familiar Sutras that promised eventual paradise and freedom. They ignored the ghostly sounds of music and the militaristic bangs and pops of fire-flowers. Finally, using the words he had repeated often — too often — Ishmael said to the listeners, "God promises that one day our people will be free."

  Alüd's dark eyes reflected the glow of the story fire. His voice was low, but clear, making Ishmael uneasy with the simmering threat: "This I swear:— one day we shall have our revenge."

  Invention is an art form.

  —Tio Holtzman, acceptance speech for Poritrin Medal of Valor

  While the swarm of new ships was rushed through construction on Poritrin, Savant Holtzman performed his work on Salusa Secundus. The legendary inventor stood inside an isolated laboratory chamber within one of the most secure zones, pacing with his hands on his hips and frowning in disapproval. It was the persona he showed whenever people expected him to do something important.

  With armored walls and power conduits cut off from the rest of Zimia's grid, the large government facility was supposedly safe and protected. In theory, the hostage Omnius was completely contained.

  But this lab was not set up the way Holtzman would have liked. He preferred to choose his own diagnostic tools, analytical systems, and slave assistants who could be conveniently blamed if anything went wrong. A small, aging man with a gray beard, Holtzman prided himself on being able to manage resources. The Savant was sure he could provide these Jihad military scientists with good advice. If words failed him, he might have to refer the matter to his many eager assistants back on Poritrin, who constantly found ways to impress him.

  From behind secure transparent barriers, the team of legislative observers watched his every move, along with the Cogitor Kwyna, who had once again been removed from her place of restful contemplation in the City of Introspection. Even through the impenetrable barriers, Holtzman could sense the watchers' anger and fear.

  A silver gelsphere floated in front of him, glistening as it spun in the air within the invisible suspensor field. This incarnatio
n of the evermind was completely under his power. Where once he had felt fear at being so close, now the greatest enemy of the human race seemed like such a small thing. A child's toy! He could have held the complex sphere in the palm of one hand.

  The silver gelsphere contained a complete copy of the computer evermind, albeit a somewhat dated version now. During the atomic raid on Earth at the very beginning of the Jihad, Vorian Atreides had seized this update from a fleeing robot vessel. Over the years, the League's "prisoner" had provided valuable insights into thinking machine plans and reactions.

  The evermind's programs had been copied, dissected, and examined by League cybernetic experts. As the first rule, all data was considered suspect, perhaps intentionally distorted by Omnius, though such deceit was supposedly impossible for the computer mind.

  The Army of the Jihad had undertaken a few military ventures based upon information obtained from the evermind copy. When the fighters launched an offensive against cloud-locked Bela Tegeuse, they had obtained detailed specifications from the captive Omnius. But that engagement had ended inconclusively.

  Now, after twenty-four years without updates, the intelligence data stored in the captive evermind had grown stale. The captive Omnius had been Unable to warn them of the return of the robot war fleet against Zimia— though that second attempt had been thwarted by Primero Xavier Harkonnen — nor had the evermind prepared the League for the unexpected massacre on Honru, which had cost the lives of so many undefended colonists. Still, it had been of some value.

  Holtzman scratched his thick mane of hair as he watched the sphere spin in the air. Despite its shortcomings, this one provides us with clues. It is just a matter of interpreting them correctly.

  "Erasmus often praised the unending creativity of human imagination," said a bored synthesized voice from speakers linked to the sphere, "but your interrogations have grown tedious. After so many years, have you not learned everything from me that your small minds can grasp?"

  Holtzman slipped a hand into a pocket of his white smock. "Oh, I am not here to entertain you, Omnius. Not at all."

  Over the years, he had communicated with this Omnius, but never with such intensity. In the weeks that he had recently focused on the effort, the famed inventor had failed to secure any breakthroughs, despite his past successes in other realms. Holtzman hoped he had not painted himself into a corner with everyone's unrealistic expectations.

  He tried to count back, remembering when things had happened. It had been a full quarter century since he had invited the young genius Norma Cenva to work with him. A stunted and unattractive girl of fifteen then, Norma was an ugly duckling compared to the statuesque beauty of her mother, a powerful Rossak Sorceress. But Holtzman had read some of the girl's innovative papers and determined that she had much to offer.

  Norma had not disappointed him. Not at first. She worked diligently, developing one strange scheme after another. His highly successful scrambler fields protected entire planets from the thinking machines, but Norma had suggested adapting the concept to smaller portable scramblers used for offensive purposes on Synchronized Worlds. Norma had also used his field equations to concoct the now-ubiquitous suspen-sor platforms… and from there, bobbing glowglobes, lights that never dimmed. They were baubles, toys — albeit extraordinarily popular and profitable ones.

  During the same period Holtzman and his patron Lord Niko Bludd had developed and marketed personal shields, which brought profits to Poritrin as fast as League ships could bring statements from the central bank accounts. Unfortunately, the commercial exploitation of glowglobes had somehow slipped out of their control. Norma Cenva had simply handed the technology to her friend Aurelius Venport, whose VenKee Enterprises had widely exploited and distributed the devices.

  But the naive woman's suspensor and glowglobe concept had been developed while she was working under his auspices, using his original field equations. Lord Bludd had already filed briefs in League court, demanding restitution of all profits VenKee Enterprises had reaped from unauthorized use of proprietary technologies. Undoubtedly, they would win.

  Now, as the Savant stared at the floating silver gelsphere, like a wizard attempting to decipher a spell, he wondered what Norma would have done if she'd been here. Ignoring his advice, Norma had devoted years of effort to reconfiguring a massive set of equations derived from his own original field work. She would not explain the details to him, suggesting that the Savant himself might not understand them. Such disparaging remarks irritated him, but he put them in context. Despite some contributions to the war effort, Norma was losing focus on what was important; she was becoming useless to him.

  By now, after showing infinite patience, Holtzman had become disenchanted with her. With little choice in the matter he had gradually cut her off from his numerous other projects and sought other assistants — brilliant young inventors who were looking for a big break. He gave priority to his eager and ambitious team of worshipful young assistants who were full of brains and ingenuity. So, the Savant had moved Norma Cenva from prime laboratory space in his main tower to a far inferior set of workrooms down by the docks. She didn't even seem to mind.

  Now he wondered if she might give him any clues to understanding Omnius.

  The gelsphere looked like a spinning metal planet glinting in the chamber's light. So many threads of the evermind's information led in countless directions, and the incredibly intricate Al-mind defied complete examination.

  But the great Tio Holtzman needed to show some sort of progress. One way or another.

  Smiling, he lifted a small transmitter from his pocket. Something waits to be discovered here, on a deeper level. I am certain of it. "This is just a faint pulse from one of my scrambler generators. I know it will wreak serious havoc on gelcircuitry systems, so perhaps it will give you sufficient incentive to cooperate."

  "I see. Erasmus also explained to me the human penchant for torture." The synthesized voice was suddenly laced with static.

  A voice intervened from the observation alcove, Kwyna's secondary, speaking for the ancient Cogitor. "That could lead to irreparable damage, Savant Holtzman."

  "Aid it could lead to important answers," the scientist insisted. "After all these years, it is time to put Omnius to the test. What do we have to lose at this point?"

  "Too dangerous," one of the council observers said, rising to his feet. "We've never been able to replicate of the sphere itself, so this is the only…"

  "Do not interfere with my work! You have zero authority here!"

  As one of his conditions for participating in this project, Tio Holtzman did not answer to anyone, not even to the Cogitor Kwyna. Still, the observers — especially uneducated and superstitious politicians breathing down his neck — remained an irritation. The Savant would have preferred to give them written reports and summaries, which he could slant any way he liked. But Holtzman had something to gain here, certain ideas he wanted to explore.

  "I have already been thoroughly interrogated and debriefed," Omnius pointed out in a bland voice. "I presume you have put the military information to good use, the fleet placements, the cymek strategies."

  "Everything is too far out of date to be of any use to us," Holtzman lied. In reality, the Army of the Jihad had staged half a dozen surprise raids on thinking machine forces in the early years after obtaining the sphere, using the information from Omnius to good advantage. The machines had seemed so predictable in their military operations then, using old methods over and over, traveling the same galactic paths, using familiar defensive and offensive maneuvers.

  Machine fleets had been attacking or retreating depending upon probabilities, worked out in detail by on-board computer systems. For the Jihad leaders, it was simply a matter of determining what the enemy was likely to do. Traps were laid, showing purported Jihad weaknesses in order to lure machine forces in. Then, at precisely the right moment, the trap would be sprung, and hidden Jihad forces moved in for the kill. Many robot fleets had been d
estroyed in such engagements.

  After initial Jihad successes, however, the thinking machines began to "predict" that they would be tricked, and they were no longer so easy to fool. For the past seven years, the information from Omnius had been of decreasing value.

  Smiling, Holtzman refocused on the shimmering gelsphere in front of him. "I would hate to have all of your thoughts eradicated in a single pulse, Omnius. You are hiding something from me, aren't you?"

  "I could never conceal anything from the great scientific and technical prowess of Savant Tio Holtzman," the voice retorted with an odd undertone of sarcasm. But how could a computer be… sarcastic?

  "People say you are Satan in a bottle." The scientist calmly adjusted the transmitter and heard high-pitched machine sounds in response. "More like Satan in a bind, I'd say. You'll never know what memories I have just erased, what thoughts and decisions you just lost."

  The legislative observers squirmed. So far, he hadn't actually harmed the silvery ball. At least he didn't think so; one of his assistants had invented this particular device. "Are you ready to tell me your secrets?"

  "Your question is vague and meaningless. Without specificity, I cannot answer." Omnius did not sound defiant; he simply stated a fact. "All the primitive libraries and databases on this planet could not contain the data I hold within my evermind."

  Holtzman wondered what the Jihad Council expected him to discover. Though grudgingly passive, the captive evermind had been relatively forthcoming. Scowling, he prepared to adjust the pulser to a higher setting.

  "Much as I enjoy seeing Omnius writhe in pain, that will be sufficient for now, Savant Holtzman." Grand Patriarch Iblis Ginjo entered the secure chamber, blithely walking past the barriers and into the lab itself. He wore one of his trademark black blazers adorned with golden tracery.