Of Berserkers, Swords and Vampires

by Fred Saberhagen

  The distant-sounding surf of battle noise swelled louder than before.

  Timor, flitting himself into armor as quickly as he could, asked his guardian: "How goes the battle?"

  "It goes well," the beautiful thing claimed brightly. "Our performance is incomparably better than that of humans in space warfare."

  Timor signed disagreement. "Better than unaided human pilots, certainly. No one disputes that. But human minds using machines as tools are best."

  "When we have increased our numbers sufficiently," it crooned to them, "your race must place your defenses absolutely in our hands. On every ship and every planet. Only we can be as implacable as this Berserker enemy, as swift to think and act, as eternally vigilant. At last we have met a danger requiring all our limitless abilities."

  Colonel Craindre was fitting on her helmet. She said: "History has repeatedly demonstrated that an organic brain, working in concert with the proper auxiliary machines, can hold a small edge both tactically and strategically over the pure machine—the Berserker."

  Inflexibly the humanoid spokesunit disagreed. It claimed that the tests, the comparisons, could not have been properly conducted, the statistics not honestly compiled, if they led to any such result.

  "And even if such a marginal advantage existed, the direct exposure of human life to such danger is intolerable, when it can be avoided."

  "Danger exists in every part of human life," said Timor.

  "We are here to see that it does not."

  Lieutenant Commander Timor now had his armor completely on.

  So did Colonel Craindre.

  Exchanging a quick look, they moved in unison.

  A direct hit on the fortress by a heavy weapon set the deck to quivering, and distracted the humanoid. It turned its head away, scanning for Berserker boarders.

  In a matter of seconds, the two humans in armor had disabled the one robot; only after a serious struggle, in which the colonel had to shoot off both its arms. Being unable to use deadly force against the humans had put the humanoid at a serious disadvantage in the encounter.

  When the contest was over, their opponent reduced to a voiceless, motionless piece of baggage, Colonel Craindre said, breathing heavily: "I am of course remaining here, at my post. But your duty, Lieutenant Commander, requires you to report to headquarters."

  Smashing open one door after another, Timor and Craindre ranged through a fortress temporarily devoid of humanoids, hastily releasing the few humans who were still locked in their cabins. Soon everyone but the colonel—she ordered all her people to leave—was aboard the little courier.

  Timor considered it all-important that humanity be warned about the humanoids, without delay. One of his first acts on regaining his freedom was to send a message courier speeding on to headquarters, ahead of the crewed vessel: The message contained only a few hundred words—including the prearranged code which identified him as the true sender.

  Now, aboard the escaping courier, the surviving humans, bringing along the disabled humanoid, embarked on their dash for freedom.

  * * *

  As the small ship with its human cargo, launched from the fortress at the highest feasible speed, came into view of the attacking machines, Berserkers sped toward it from three sides, intent on kamikaze ramming. Instantly humanoid-controlled fighters, careless of their own safety, hurled themselves at the enemy in counterattack, taking losses but creating a delay.

  The courier broke free, plunging into c-space.

  "Our only wish is to serve you, sir." A last plaintive appeal came in by radio, just before the curtain of flightspace closed down communication.

  "On a platter," Timor muttered. He looked up at his human friends, whose bodies, mostly bulky with space armor, crowded the cabin as if it were a lifeboat. Triumph slowly faded from his face. One of the pilots who had been inclined to accept the humanoids wholeheartedly, and who had in fact volunteered to stay behind with them, spoke up, in a tone and with a manner verging on mutinous accusation: "We couldn't have got away without the help of those machines. We couldn't have survived that last attack." The Lieutenant Commander faced the speaker coldly. "Just which set of machines do you mean, spacer? And which attack?" His new shipmates stared at him. He saw understanding in the eyes of many, clear agreement in some faces. But there were others who did not yet understand.

  "Think about it," Timor told them. "The Berserkers—yes, the Berserkers!—have just helped us to survive an attack. An assault launched at us, you might say, from a direction opposite to their own, and with somewhat more subtlety. Not that the Berserkers wanted to help us—they didn't compute that trying to blow us to bits would work out to our benefit. But if it hadn't been for the Berserkers, the humanoids would have taken our sanity and freedom, given us sweet lies in return."

  He paused to let that sink in, then added: "And, of course, if it hadn't been for humanoids piloting fighters just now, covering our escape, the same Berserkers would have eaten us alive."

  Timor paused again, looking over his audience. He wanted to spell out the situation as plainly as he could.

  His voice was low, but carried easily in the quiet cabin. "I can see how things might go from now on. It might be that only the threat of Berserkers, keeping the humanoids fully occupied, will make it possible for us to sustain humanity in a Galaxy infested with humanoids.

  "And without humanoids fighting for our lives, we might wind up losing our war against Berserkers.

  "Now we face two sets of bad machines instead of one," he concluded, his tone rising querulously at the unfairness of it all, "and the hell of it is, not only are they depending on each other, but we're going to need them both!"

  GODS—MYTH

  The White Bull

  He was up on the high ridge, watching the gulls ride in from over the bright sea on their motionless wings, to be borne upward as if by magic, effortlessly, when the sun-dazzled landscape began to rise beneath them. Thus he was probably one of the first to sight the black-sailed ship coming in to port.

  Standing, he raised a callused hand to brush aside his grizzled hair and shade his eyes. The vessel had the look of the craft that usually came from Athens. But those sails . . .

  He picked up the cloak with which he had padded rock into a comfortable chair and threw it over his shoulder. It was time he came down from the high ridge anyway. King Minos and some of Minos' servitors were shrewd, and perhaps it would be wiser not to watch the birds too openly or too long.

  When he had picked his way down, the harbor surrounded him with its noise and activity, its usual busy mixture of naval ships and cargo vessels, unloading and being worked on and taking on new cargo. On Execution Dock the sun-dried carcasses of pirates, looking like poor statues, shriveled atop tall poles in the bright sun. On the wharf where the black-sailed ship now moored, a small crowd had gathered and a dispute of some kind was going on. A bright-painted wagon, pulled by two white horses, had come down as scheduled from the House of the Double Axe to meet the Athenian ship, but none of the wagon's intended riders were getting into it as yet.

  They stood on the wharf, fourteen youths and maids in a more or less compact group, wearing good clothes that seemed to have been deliberately torn and dirtied. Their faces were smeared with soot and ashes as if for mourning, and most of them looked somewhat the worse for wine. They were arguing with a couple of minor officials of the House, who had come down with the wagon and a small honor guard of soldiery. It was not the argument that drew the man from the high ridge ever closer, however, but the sight of one who stood in the front of the Athenian group, half a head taller than anyone around him.

  He pushed his way in through the little crowd, a gray, middleaged man with the heavy hands of an artisan, rearing heavy gold and silver ornaments on his fine white loincloth. A soldier looked around resentfully as a hard hand pushed on his shoulder, then closed his mouth and stepped aside.

  "Prince Theseus." The old workman's hands went out in a gesture of deferential gr
eeting. "I rejoice that the gods have brought you safe again before my eyes. How goes it with your royal father?" The tall young man swung his eyes around and brought them rather slowly into focus. Some of the sullen anger left his begrimed face. "Daedalus." A nod gave back unforced respect, became almost a bow as the strong body threatened to overbalance. "King Aegeus does well enough."

  "I saw the black sails, Prince, and feared they might bear news of tragedy."

  "All m'family in Athens are healthy as war horses, Daedalus—or were when we sailed. The mourning is for ourselves. For our approaching . . . " Theseus grope hopelessly for a word.

  "Immolation," cheerfully supplied one of the other young men in ashes.

  "That's it." The prince smiled faintly. "So you may tell these officers that we wear what we please to our own welcome." His dulled black eyes roamed up the stair steps of the harbor town's white houses and warehouses and whorehouses, to an outlying flank of the House of the Double Axe which was just visible amid a grove of cedars at the top of the first ridge. "Where is the school?"

  "Not far beyond the portion of the House you see. Say, an hour's walk." Daedalus observed the younger man with sympathy. "So, you find the prospect of student's life in Crete not much to your liking." Around them the other branches of the argument between Cretan officials and newcomers had ceased; all were attending to the dialogue.

  "Four years, Daedalus." The princely cheeks, one whitened with an old sword scar, puffed out in a winey belch. "Four godblasted years."

  "I know." Daedalus' face wrinkled briefly with shared pain. He almost put out a hand to take the other's arm; a little too familiar, here in public. "Prince Theseus, will you walk with me? King Minos will want to see you promptly, I expect."

  "I bear him greetings from m'father."

  "Of course. Meanwhile, the officers here will help your shipmates on their way to find their quarters."

  Thus the ascent from the harbor turned into an informal procession, with Theseus and Daedalus walking ahead, and the small honor guard following a few paces back, irregularly accompanied by the remaining thirteen Athenians, who looked about them and perhaps wondered a little at the unceremoniousness of it all. The girls whispered a little at the freedom of the Cretan women, who, though obviously respectable, as shown by their dress and attitudes, strode about so boldly in the streets. The gaily decorated wagon, in which the new arrivals might have ridden, rumbled uphill empty behind a pair of grateful horses. The wagon's bright paint and streamers jarred with the mock mourning of the newcomers.

  When they had climbed partway through the town, Daedalus suggested gently to his companion that the imitation mourning would be in especially bad taste at court today, for a real funeral was going to take place in the afternoon.

  "Someone in Minos' family?"

  "No. One who would have been your fellow student had he lived—in his third year at school. A Lapith. But still."

  "Oh." Theseus slowed his long if slightly wobbling strides and rubbed a hand across his forehead, looking at the fingers afterward.

  "Now what do I do?"

  "Let us not, after all, take you to Minos right away. Daedalus turned and with a gesture called one of the court officials forward, saying to him: "Arrange some better quarters for Prince Theseus than those customarily given the new students. And he and his shipmates will need some time to make themselves presentable before they go before the king. Meanwhile, I will seek out Minos myself and offer explanations."

  The officer's face and his quick salute showed his relief.

  "Daedalus." King Minos' manner was pleasant but businesslike as he welcomed his engineer into a pleasant, white-walled room where, at the moment, his chief tax-gatherers were arguing over innumerable scrolls spread out upon stone tables. Open colonnades gave a view of blue ocean in one direction. Mount Ida in another. "What can I do to help you out today? How goes the rock-thrower machine?" The king's once-raven hair was graying, and his bare paunch stood honestly and comfortably over the waistband of his linen loincloth. But his arms within their circlets of heavy gold looked muscular as ever, and his eyes were still keen and penetrating.

  "The machine does well enough, sire. I wait for the cattle hides from Thrace, which are to be twisted into the sling, and I improve my waiting time by overseeing construction of the bronze shields." Actually, by now, the smiths and smelters were all well trained and needed little supervision, so there was time for thought whilst looking into the forge and furnace flames—time to see again the gull's effortless flight as captured by the mind and eye. . . . "Today, King Minos, I come before you with another matter—one that I am afraid will not wait." He began to relate to Minos the circumstances of the prince's arrival, leaving out neither the black sails nor the drunkenness, though they were mere details compared with the great fact of Theseus' coming to be enrolled in the school. Minos, during this recital, led him into another room, out of earshot of the tax gatherers. There the king, frowning, walked restlessly, pausing to look out of a window to where preparations for the afternoon's funeral games were under way. "How is Aegeus?" he asked, without turning.

  "Prince Theseus reports his esteemed father in excellent health."

  "Daedalus, it will not do for King Aegeus' son to leave Crete with his brains addled, any more than they may be already," the king turned, "as has happened to a few—Cretans and Athenians and others—since the school was opened. Or to leap from a tower, like this young man we're burying today. Not that I think the prince would ever choose that exit."

  "Yours are words of wisdom, sire. And no more will it be desirable for Theseus to fail publicly at an assigned task, even if it be only obtaining a certificate of achievement from a school."

  Minos walked again. "Your turn to speak wisely, counselor. Frankly, what do you think the prince's chances are of pursuing his studies here successfully?"

  Daedalus' head bobbed in a light bow. "I share your own seeming misgivings on the subject, great king."

  "Yes. Um. We both know Theseus, and we both know also what the school is like. You better than I, I suppose. I can have Phaedra keep an eye on him, of course. She will be starting this semester, too—not that she has her older sister's brains, but it may do her some good. It may. He is as stalwart and handsome as ever, I suppose? Yes, then no doubt she will have an eye on him in any case.

  Continuing to think aloud, arms folded and a frown on his face, Minos came closer, until an observer might have thought that he was threatening the other man. "I had not thought that Aegeus was about to send his own son. But I suppose he did not want his nobles' children displaying any honors that could not be matched in his own house. Oh, if he'd had a scholarly boy, one given to hanging around with graybeard sages, then I would have issued a specific invitation. I would've thought it expected. But given the prince's nature . . . "

  Minos unfolded his arms but kept his eyes fixed firmly on his waiting subject. "Daedalus. You are Theseus' friend, from your sojourn at the Athenian court. And you were enrolled briefly in the school yourself . . . I sometimes marvel that you did not throw yourself into it more wholeheartedly."

  "Perhaps we sages are not immune to professional jealousy, sire."

  "Perhaps." Minos' gaze twinkled keenly. "However that may be, I now expect you to do two things."

  Daedalus bowed.

  "First, stand ready to offer Theseus your tutorial services, as they may be required."

  "Of course, sire."

  "Secondly—will you go today to see the Bull and talk to him? I think in this case you have greater competence than any of my usual ambassadors. Do what you can toward explaining the situation. Report back to me when you have seen the Bull."

  Daedalus bowed.

  On his way toward the Labyrinth, at whose center the Bull dwelt, he stopped to peer in, unnoticed, at the elementary school, which, like most other governmental departments, had its own corner of the vast sprawling House. On a three-legged stool, surrounded by a gaggle of other boys and girls, sat
ten-year-old Icarus, stylus in hand, bent over wax tablets on a table before him. Chanting grammar, an earnest young woman paced among her pupils. Daedalus knew her for one of the more recent graduates of the school where Theseus was bound. For a moment, the king's engineer had the mad vision of Theseus in this classroom, teaching—hardly madder than that of the prince sitting down to study, he supposed. After a last glance at his own fidgeting son—Icarus was bright enough, but didn't seem to want to apply himself to learning yet—Daedalus walked on.

  As he passed along the flank of the vast House, he glanced in the direction of the field of rock-hewn tombs nearby, and saw the small procession returning across the bridge that spanned the Kairatos, coming back to the House for the games—the bull dancing and the wrestling that should please the gods.

  Pausing in a cloistered walk to watch, he pondered briefly the fact that Minos himself was not coming to the funeral. Of course, the king was always busy. There was Queen Pasiphae, though, taking her seat of honor in the stands, roughed and wigged as usual these days to belie her age, tight-girdle thrusting her full bare breasts up in a passable imitation of youth. And there came Princess Ariadne to the royal bench, taking the position of Master of the Games, as befitted her status of eldest surviving child. And there was Phaedra—how old now? sixteen?—and quite the prettiest girl in sight.

  He thought that Theseus might be sleeping it off by now, but evidently the recuperative powers of youth, at least in the royal family of Athens, were even stronger than Daedalus remembered them to be. The prince, cleansed by what must have been a complete bath and scraping, and suitably tagged for a modest degree of real mourning by a black band around his massive biceps, was just now vaulting into the ring for a wrestling turn. Stripped naked for the contest, Theseus was an impressive figure. Daedalus stayed long enough to watch him earn a quick victory over his squat, powerful adversary, some Cretan champion, and then claim a wreath from Ariadne's hand.

  Then Daedalus walked on. There was, on this side of the House, no sharp line of architectural demarcation where ordinary living space ended and the Labyrinth began. Roofed space became less common, and at the same time walls grew unscalably high and smooth and passages narrowed. Stairs took the walker up and down for no good reason, and up and down again, until he was no longer sure whether he walked above the true ground level or below it. Windows were no more.