Initializing

by E. M. Hardy

  “Listen to the old man, prince.” This was Munjid, who had stepped up beside his peer and placed a heavy hand on his shoulder. “We have an ally now; one that is not just willing to shelter you but is also willing to send troops to aid us in a fight. Leave the other details for later, as we need to get moving now before it is too late. The last thing we need is for the cartels to get their hands on a princeling and dangle him in front of al-Taheri’s ramparts.”

  Martin could see that the young prince was offended by the idea of running away from a fight. He was about to say something nasty when his jinni materialized from the Invisible World.

  “Be brave, not stupid. We do not have the numbers to contest the raiders coming for us, nor the mounts to best them in speed.”

  “You too, Uhi?”

  Uhi rolled her eyes, which Martin could see despite her irises being pure orbs of shimmering red light. “Yes, me too, Suhaib. And besides, we went east searching for new allies to help us against the cartels. Now stop being an annoyance and let your new ally help us out!”

  The prince groaned and crossed his arms while shaking his head. Martin was about to argue the point further when the prince turned to him with a scowl.

  “Fine. I will go along with this plan. I’m not too keen on dying anyway.” Suhaib’s scowl morphed into a grin as he spoke. The guards and armsmen listening in on the conversation heaved a sigh of relief, though they tried to keep it quiet. The prince’s grin widened as he pretended not to hear them, but he quickly flattened it as he began issuing orders to his men to mount their camels and start moving out east, towards Martin’s pyramid.

  ***

  Martin ordered his cow-boxes to unload all their paste while he tasked his dolls with crafting spears, daggers, and javelins before spreading out and digging themselves into the sand. The dolls were far too slow and fragile to be of any use in a fight, but they could continue building the roads and obelisks when the fighting died down.

  Oh, Martin could compel the dolls to fight if he really needed to, but it would be an utter waste. They waddled along on their little nubs called feet, and he had the distinct feeling that they were far happier with the idea of avoiding any kind of scrap. Besides, the dolls didn’t seem to want to fight; they rather liked the idea of hiding instead of getting trampled down by cavalry.

  The cow-boxes, on the other hand, seemed to take some delight in the idea of ramming into things. They wanted an outlet for the energy building up in their systems, like walking long distances while hauling heavy loads, so the idea of butting their non-existent heads sent tickles of pleasure into their essence.

  Weirdly enough, they didn’t appear to mind their death or destruction. The dolls and cow-boxes were like Martin in that way—entities that pool their existence into a collective consciousness. And like Martin, their respective collective consciousness had its own quirks.

  On a whim, Martin decided to query his eyeballs. They didn’t care as they were literally ‘above’ all that. They were content to float in the sky, peering down at things going below them with a detached attitude. He thought about using them like missiles, have them gather speed and crash themselves into the raiders. He felt an angry buzz in his mind, a strong sense of indignation emanating from the eyeballs. Desperate times called for desperate measures, but this wasn’t one of those times. Besides, Martin knew that he only had a handful of eyeballs in the immediate vicinity. The information they provided was too useful to simply turn them into speeding rocks.

  His now-armed walkers ran alongside Suhaib’s forces, who slowed down their camels to match the pace of the walkers and the cow-boxes. The akinji had spotted Suhaib’s forces and were converging on their location from the west, northwest, and southwest. They all made a beeline for Suhaib, changing their direction to try and catch up to their forces. Martin’s eyeballs noticed that Suhaib’s forces were gaining a substantial lead, however, which puzzled him. The raiders had horses, which were supposed to be faster than camels.

  Only then did he realize why. The camels may be slower, but they were galloping on a smooth, steady surface. The horses of the raiders were faster, but their horses were wading through sand that slowed them down. The ten-mile gap became thirteen, then fourteen, and then fifteen. Soon enough, Martin’s walkers couldn’t even see their pursuers in the distance anymore. Only his eyeballs floating high up in the sky with their telescopic lenses let him see just how far away their pursuers were. They would have caught up to Suhaib and Martin’s constructs sooner if they had gone straight for the roads. However, they were constantly adjusting their paths, no doubt wondering in amazement at how camels were outrunning their horses at full gallop.

  That all changed when one of the groups eventually found a road and got on it. Invigorated by their find, they pushed their horses even harder to catch up to Suhaib’s group. The lead was wide, but Martin was worried that the raiders would make it at the pace they were setting.

  His worries were well-founded.

  Suhaib’s sure-footed camels were bred for endurance and longevity in the scorching sands of the Bashri Desert. The horses of the akinji raiders may not have been bred for that same purpose, but they were nonetheless hardy desert creatures. They thundered through the road, churning great billowing clouds of sand and dust in their wake. It was then that Martin noted that the jinn accompanying them were helping in some way. They were ahead of the horses, and seemed to be pushing the air ahead of them. All of a sudden, the horses accelerated even faster. The fifteen-mile gap narrowed to twelve, then ten, then eight—all within a single hour. The two-hundred-odd raiders would be upon Suhaib’s party soon enough, outnumbering them two-to-one and with faster mounts. All they’d need to do is pepper them with arrows and they would be done for.

  Martin had to delay them somehow, and his earlier act of burying his dolls gave him another idea to work with.

  Chapter 18

  Martin’s walker stoically strolled through the streets of the Red City. It was calm, confident, and looked supremely composed to the people staring at it. Nobles, courtesans, eunuchs, attendants, guards, martial artists—all gawked at the strange clay thing being escorted by the General of the White Tiger Shen Feng himself to the palace where the Empress held court. The walker and the general were trailed by ten of the general’s most trusted lieutenants, each dressed with their armor cleaned and polished to perfection—their tassels and epaulettes immaculate in their whiteness, their well-oiled leather gloves gleaming in the sun, their boots shining with not a trace of dust or mud on them.

  Martin, however, was doing all he could to contain his nervousness.

  He had one walker in the Red City, 499 walkers in the Leizhu Swamp, 1,998 walkers running along the road to the Bashri Desert, and another 492 walkers back at the Qleb Sierra pyramid. These were the constructs he had direct control over. He had almost 4,000 other constructs—eyeballs, dolls, and cow-boxes—that were handling their assigned tasks on their own.

  At that moment, separate parts of his consciousness were preparing to fight for the first time. Not against ragtag bands of brigands, but against an entire cavalry troop of akinji. He had no training whatsoever, and he would be squaring off against what Suhaib described as elite cavalrymen that serve as raiders, scouts, and even shock troops for their respective emirates.

  However, the consciousness attached to the walker in the Red City could not worry about that. Martin’s other partitioned consciousnesses had their jobs to do. The knowledge flowed through him even while he ignored them, for his job was to meet with the Empress and declare his vows as a vassal. All the fears, anxieties, misgivings—they were shoved to one side as Martin focused on the ceremony.

  Soon enough, he was climbing up a long and impressive set of stairs that were flanked by guards at every step of the way. He counted exactly 100 steps going up, and there were 100 guards on each side; 200 of them in total. There was a wall every 20 steps, meaning there were five walls separating the complex ho
using the Empress from the rest of the city. More guards were stationed atop the walls, which Martin guessed was for both security and a show of power.

  After all, the leader of this apparently vast empire was seated here—a mere 150 miles away from the Leizhu Swamp Pyramid. Martin could guess why General Shen Feng and the other military leaders were nervous about his presence in the swamp.

  The last wall opened up to a vast courtyard, with even more soldiers standing at attention, their conical helmets covering their faces in shadow and their pikes ramrod straight. At the end of the line of soldiers sat the Empress on her throne, which was made of a red crystal of some kind. It was quite impressive actually, with the seat and hand-rests polished to perfection while the crystal points jutted out angrily from the center. It definitely intimidated Martin, even though it was a stark contrast to the impression that he got from its occupant.

  On that throne sat a relatively small woman that looked almost like a child, which left Martin goggling. Nobody could see it since his walker had no face, but he was flabbergasted that the leader of the Ren empire was just a young teenager. Granted she was dressed in the finest silk attire that mysteriously billowed around her like it was made of clouds. She also wore a huge golden crown in the mixed shapes of phoenixes and dragons, along with a thick veil that covered her entire face in a way that he could not make out a single detail. She was attended by dozens of masked attendants that looked her age, surrounded by big guards that wore their own silks but were positively glowing with collected Chi. Behind the guards stood three elderly men in resplendent robes, each eyeing him with keen interest. All of them sported the white hair of elderly advisors, and they looked properly arrogant in their countenance—probably to offset the Empress’ striking youth. It was strange though, how close they stood behind the Empress. They were overshadowing her, especially when she sat there, protected by her veil and a curtain.

  All this ostentatiousness led Martin to see not the mighty leader of an empire, but a child screened against the world and fiercely shielded by those around her. If anything, it was the calculating looks of the advisors behind the Empress that told him that they were the real powers behind the Ren Empire. Those were opinions he would be keeping to himself, no matter how tempted he was to share them.

  General Shen Feng knelt down, looking down while keeping one fist on the ground. Martin followed suit, as he was taught to do, before the other lieutenants did the same.

  One of her guards, the big burly man with a shaved head and the brightest Chi aura among the guards, stepped forward. “Creature,” he boomed, his voice echoing through the silent courtyard, “You find yourself before Her Majesty, The Daughter of Heaven, She of Ten Thousand Years, The Most Revered and Exalted One, Empress Xi Li. Weep with joy, for you have been granted the utmost privilege of basking in Her Most Glorious presence.”

  General Shen Feng lowered himself further, kneeling with bended knees and bringing his head to touch the ground. Just like before, Martin emulated Shen Feng’s actions and the lieutenants did likewise. They kept the same genuflecting pose until the guard allowed them to rise on one knee, resuming their original position.

  To Martin, all this pomp was an annoying hassle. However, it was a necessary one. He had to keep telling himself that the girl in front of him was the Empress, reminding himself that she was the ruler of the Ren and that he needed to show utmost respect. Starting off on a good footing was worth the skull-numbing tediousness of all this ceremony. He may have gotten off easy with Shen Feng, but the general was not the Empress—a fact that the general repeatedly drilled into Martin’s head the entire journey from the swamp to the city.

  “Creature, you who are neither man nor woman, show your face to Her Majesty.”

  It was a silly command, as this walker and every other walker had no face. But Shen had told him what to do here, that the whole procedure was symbolic. He continued kneeling, and he turned his face up to look at the Empress. He could not read her expression, but she tilted her head in a way that indicated her curiosity. Satisfied, she soon nodded and Martin turned his gaze back down to the ground.

  Her guard had taken a deep breath and was about to continue with the planned speech when the Empress touched his arm. He bit down his words and, to his credit, took the interruption in stride and with complete grace. He knelt beside the Empress in a supreme show of deference and brought himself close enough to hear her whispered command. His face remained flat and neutral as he stood up and glared at Martin’s walker.

  “Hold still and allow yourself to be bound, creature.” He nodded to two of his guards, who advanced upon Martin with grim determination and loosened pieces of rope that had been attached to their belts. This was apparently a common-enough occurrence that the Empress’ guards had bindings on their persons.

  No, this was definitely not part of the original plan. Martin turned to Shen Feng, who spared him a shrug then a reassuring nod before turning his gaze back to the ground. Martin submitted, though the guards binding him moved stiffly, not quite sure how to act around him. In the end, they bound his hands behind him as tightly as they could, with additional bindings to the legs that only allowed him to shuffle a few inches forward at a time.

  Totally not humiliating or anything like that.

  An advisor closed in, whispered something in turn to the Empress. Another advisor approached, and another. Three advisors in their rich silk robes, and the Empress just nodded and waved them away. She in turn looked at her guard, who had been observing her all this time. He bent over and she whispered something into his ear. He froze, the muscles on his face taut with hesitation, and whispered something back to the Empress.

  She hissed her response, and it was loud enough for Martin to hear the rebuke in it.

  The guard, not missing a beat, then straightened up and glared at Martin as he announced his next words. “Come closer, creature. The Daughter of Heaven, She of Ten Thousand Years, wishes to inspect you. Rejoice in her august presence!”

  Martin had no idea what he was supposed to say here, so he tilted his head and shuffled along as the two guards flanked him in front and behind. It was painfully slow progress, what with his feet being restricted so, but he eventually stood in front of the Empress’ throne. The sour-faced spokesperson for the Empress took one step in front of his charge, protectively shielding her with his body while he fingered the stringy tassels attached to his sheathed sword.

  To Martin’s surprise, the Empress deigned to rise from her throne. She slowly walked around the walker, the eyes behind her thick veil no doubt roaming all over him. Martin was used to all sorts of gazes: curious, hostile, amused, indifferent, frightened. This was the first time, however, that he felt like a piece of meat being assessed by a butcher.

  “You are a curious creation, are you not?” Her voice was soft, understated—a far cry from the booming of her guard, which was meant for all to hear. The high pitch also indicated that she was, indeed, a young girl—or at least sounded like one.

  Martin had been drilled by Shen Feng with scripted responses, as the good general expected the Empress to simply vassalize Martin. However, he had no idea how to respond in this situation. What was the protocol when an Empress asked a rhetorical question? What could he say that wouldn’t get this walker pulverized to dust followed by an army stomping all over his other pyramids?

  “Erm, I guess I am… your highness…?”

  After that bone-headed response that ended up becoming a question, Martin was sorely tempted to plant his face in his palm. At least his response was so quiet that only the Empress could hear him.

  She only hummed in response, which sounded a lot like the neutral tones his professors used to adopt when Martin gave a stupid answer but they were just too polite to call him out on it.

  “We believe you have a name. Share it with us.”

  “Martin. Martin Fuller. Uh, your grace.”

  She held a hand to her veiled face and chuckled
. “Be at ease, Martin Fuller, and compose yourself. It pleases us that you are flustered in our presence, but we do not enjoy watching you make a fool of yourself.”

  It was Martin’s turn to be surprised. The first thing that caught his attention was that she pronounced his name properly. Not the stumbling ‘Mar-Tin’ that most Renese called him, but a straight ‘Martin’ with just the right roll and click of the tongue. The second thing was how she cloaked her rebuke in concern. He wasn’t sure if she was putting on a show, but it was nonetheless a welcome reprieve from the way most Renese treated him.

  “Thank you, your highness. I hope that I don’t offend you with my boorishness. Still getting used to the ways of court, and all.” He couldn’t smile with walkers as they were faceless, but he could add cheer to his voice to achieve the same effect.

  The diminutive Empress giggled once more as she continued her examinations. She poked and prodded him at certain places, and she spent an uncomfortable length of time staring at the featureless crotch of his walker.

  “Our curiosity is piqued. Tell us more about yourself.”

  Martin was not sure how to answer that question. He was flustered all over again, but then he remembered the Empress’ admonishment. No, he could not afford to be tongue-tied now; better to improvise with confidence in this case. “Where would you like me to start, your highness?”

  “General of the White Tiger Shen Feng mentioned that you are not of this world. Home is precious, especially for those who find they cannot find their way back to it. So describe your home, Martin Fuller, that we may join you in your journey through your memories.”

  Martin was taken aback. Thoughts of his home had completely slipped his mind. His family, friends, enemies… he was so busy preparing and laying down the framework for his constructs that he never gave them any thought. Overseeing dolls as they built infrastructures, managing the long lines of cow-boxes bringing resources to and fro, negotiating with princes and generals to ensure his survival—these were the only thoughts consuming his mind.