A Plague of Demons

by Keith Laumer

  Reaching farther, I encountered the confused mutter of a far-flung communications system, a muted surf-roar of commands, acknowledgments, an incoherent clutter of operational messages, meaningless to me.

  I touched the mind of the fighting machine beside me, groped along the dark passages of its dulled nerve-complex, found the personality center. A sharp probing impulse elicited nothing; the ego was paralyzed. I withdrew to its peripheral awareness level; a dim glow of consciousness lingered there.

  "Who are you?" I called.

  "Unit Eighty-three, of the line." The reply was a flat monotone.

  "You were a man-once," I told it. "What was your name?"

  "Unit Eighty-three of the line," the monotone repeated. "Combat-ready, standing by at low alert. Awaiting orders."

  I tried another; the result was the same. There was no hint of personality in the captive brains; they were complex neurotronic circuits, nothing more-compact, efficient, with trained reflex-patterns, cheaper and easier to gather from the warring tribes of Earth than to duplicate mechanically.

  I stirred another quiescent brain, probed at the numbed ego, pried without success at the opaque shield of stunned tissue that surrounded it. It was hopeless; I would find no allies here-only slaves of the aliens.

  Free inside the alien fortress-in a flawless camouflage-I was helpless without information. I needed to know what and where the Command-voice was, the disposition of other brigades, the long-range plan of action, who the enemy was that we fought on the fire-shattered plain-and on what world the plain lay. I would learn nothing here, packed in a subterranean depot. It was time to take risks.

  An impulse to my drive mechanism sent me forward out of the lineup; I swung around, moved off toward the tunnel through which I had entered the cave. In the utter silence, the clash of my treads transmitted through my frame was deafening. I filtered out the noise, tuned my receptivity for sounds of other activity nearby. There was none.

  Past the ranked combat units, high and grim in the lightless place, the tunnel mouth gaped dark. I entered it, ascended the sloping passage, reached a massive barrier of flint-steel. I felt for the presence of a control-field, sensed the imbecile mechanism of the lock. A touch and it responded, sent out the pulse that rolled the immense doors back. I moved out into the open, under a blazing black sky.

  I studied the landscape, realizing for the first time that my field of vision included the entire circumference of the horizon. Nothing stirred, all across the barren waste. Here and there the ruins of a combat unit showed dark against gray dust. The flaring purple sun was low over the far ridges now; a profusion of glittering stars seemed to hang close overhead. I didn't know in what direction the alien headquarters might lie. I picked a route that led across level ground toward a lone promontory and started toward it.

  Chapter Thirteen

  From my vantage point atop the conical hill, I saw the tips of saw-toothed peaks that formed a wide ring around my position, their bases out of sight over the near horizon. My sense of scale was confused by the strange aspect reality assumed through unfamiliar senses. Instinct told me that the shattered slab before me was perhaps five yards long; I stirred it with my treads, saw it bound away, flip lightly over, and sink to rest, stirring coarse dust that boiled up, dropped back like mud under water.

  I was no better at judging my own size. Was I a vast, multiton apparatus, or a tiny fighting machine no bigger than a one-man jet-ped? The horizon seemed close; was it really only a mile or two away-or was my visual range so far extended that a hundred miles seemed only a step?"

  Self-analysis wasn't getting me any closer to my objective-alien intelligence. Perhaps beyond the shelter of the wide crater I would see some indications of life. I headed for a cleft between steep cliffs. I churned up through dust that fountained behind me, and gained the pass. The view ahead showed the same sterile rock and dust that I had left behind. I went on down the slope, out across the plain, skirting burned-out machines, some of fantastic design, others like my own grim body. I passed small craters-whether natural formations or the results of bombardment, I couldn't tell. The distant babble of confused commands was a background to the crackle of star-static. I felt neither hunger nor fatigue-only a burning desire to know what lay beyond the next ridge-and a fear that I might be found and destroyed before I had taken my revenge for what had been done to me…

  ***

  The strange machine appeared suddenly at the top of a sheer cliff that ran obliquely across my route. It saw me at the same instant that I saw it. The machine pivoted, depressing its guns to bear on me. In place of the simple markings of the battle units I had seen, there were complicated insignia painted in garish color across its hull. I halted, waiting.

  "IDENTIFY YOURSELF!" the familiar voice of my Brigade commander boomed in my mind.

  "Unit Eighty-four of the line, combat ready…" As I reported, I extended a probing impulse across the insubstantial not-space, touched the shape of the mind behind the voice. With an instantaneous reflex, it struck at me. The slave circuits of my brain resonated with the power of the blow-but in that instant I had seen the strange workings of the alien mind, scanned the pattern of its assault-and now I traced the path of primary volition, then struck back, caught the alien ego in an unbreakable grip.

  "Who are you?" I demanded.

  It gibbered, writhed, fought to escape. I held it tighter-like gripping a lashing snake in bare hands.

  "Answer, or I destroy you!"

  "I am Zixz, Centurion of the line, of the Nest of the Thousand Agonies Suffered Gladly. What Over-mind are you?"

  "Where do you come from?"

  "I was spawned in the muck beds of Kzak, by order of the Bed-master-"

  "You're not human; why were you installed in a machine?"

  "I was condemned for the crime of inferiority; here I expiate that fault."

  "What world is this?"

  The reply was a meaningless identity-symbol.

  "Why do you fight this war?"

  The alien mind howled out its war slogan-as incomprehensible as an astrologer's jargon. I silenced it.

  "How many Brigades are engaged?"

  "Four thousand, but not all are at full strength."

  "Who is the enemy?"

  The symbol that the alien hurled at me was a compound of horrors.

  "Where is your headquarters?" I demanded.

  I caught an instant's glimpse of twisted towers, deep caverns, and a concept: the Place That Must Be Defended Then the alien lunged against my control, shrieked an alarm I tightened my grip-and sudden silence fell. Cautiously, I relaxed. A few threads of dying thought spiraled up from the broken mind; then it winked out like a quenched ember. I had killed the Centurion Zixz…

  And into the void, a thunderous command roared.

  "COMMAND UNIT ZIXZ! REPORT YOUR BRIGADE!"

  Quickly, I shaped a concept, counterfeiting the dead Centurion's mind-pattern: "Brigade strength ninety-one; ready for combat."

  "YOUR NEST WILL SUFFER, FOOL! THE OVER-MIND DOES NOT COMMAND TWICE! ORDER YOUR UNITS INTO ACTION! CLOSE THE GAP IN THE BATTLE ARRAY!"

  "Delayed by necessity for destruction of defective unit," I countered. "Proceeding as ordered."

  "COMMAND UNIT ZIXZ! I PROMISE LIQUID FIRE ACROSS THE MUCK BEDS OF KZAK FOR THIS DERELICTION! TO THE ATTACK-"

  I broke in, still feigning the mind-voice of Zixz:

  "Massive enemy flanking attack! New weapons of unfamiliar capability! Nondetectible units assaulting me in overwhelming numbers…" But while I transmitted the false report to the Over-mind, I extended a delicate sensing line, brushed over the other, felt out the form of a mighty intelligence, vastly more powerful than that of Zixz. And yet the structure was familiar, like that of the Centurion, magnified, reinforced. And here was the primary volitional path…

  I moved along it as lightly as a spider stalking a gnat. I came into a vast mind-cavern, ablaze with the power of a massive intellect.

  "REINFORCEMENT
S DISPATCHED!" the great mind roared. At this close range, it was deafening. "RELEASE TO YOUR HOME NEST IF YOU HOLD! PROCEED WITH ADDITIONAL DATA!"

  Busily, I concocted fantastic mass and firepower readings, fanciful descriptions of complex and meaningless enemy maneuvers; and while I held the Over-mind's attention, I searched-and found its memory vaults.

  There was the image of a great nest, seething with voracious life-a nest that covered a world, leaped to another, swelled through an ever-increasing volume of space, driven by lusts that burned like living fire in each tiny mote.

  I saw the outward-writhing pseudopods of this burgeoning race as they met, slashed at each other with mindless fury-and then flowed on, over every obstacle, changing, adapting to burning suns and worlds of ice, to the near-null gravity of tiny rock-worlds and the smashing forces of titan collapsed-matter stars.

  The wave reached the edge of its galaxy, boiled up, reached out into the void. Defeated, it recoiled on itself, churning back toward galactic center-stronger now, more ruthless, filled with a vast frustrated rage that shrieked its insatiable needs, devouring all in its path-and coming together at last in an eruption of mad vitality that rent the very fabric of space…

  And from the void at the heart of the universe, the wave rolled out again, tempered in the fires of uncounted ages of ravening combat, devouring its substance now in a new upsurge of violence that made the past invasions seem as somnolent as spawning pools.

  And again the edge of the galaxy was reached, and there the wave built, poised, while from behind, the hordes arose with the voracity of atomic fires And the fire leaped, fell into far space, burned out, and was lost.

  But pressure built, and again lusting life leaped outward, reaching And again fell short. And leaped again. And again…

  Forces readjusted, adapted, gained new balances. Ferocity was tempered as pressures slackened. But the need was as great as ever. Frantic, the Nest-mind sought for an answer-a key to survival. A million ways were tried, and the nest-motes died, and a million million more methods were attempted, and a million myriads fell, burned to nothingness in uncounted holocausts.

  And still the Nest-mind thrust outward…

  And it bridged the gap to the next galaxy. Over the slim link, life flowed, fighting, slashing, devouring, leaping from new feeding ground to newer, filling the galaxy, boiling up in a transcendent fury of hunger. Again a leap into nothingness-and a new galaxy was reached.

  Nothing remained in the Nest-mind of its original character. It had become a vast mechanism for growth, a disease of life that radiated outward from a center so distant in the universe that the mind itself in time forgot its beginnings. Units broke free, withered, faded, died. Random islands of the raging vitality consumed themselves, disappeared. A long arm turned back, groped its way along the chains of burned-out worlds, scavenging, growing, to lance in the end into the original nest-place, to devastate it and go on, blind, insensate, insatiable-and finding no new feeding grounds beyond, it turned upon itself…

  Eons passed. Scattered across a volume of space that was a major fraction of the Macrocosm, the isolated colonies burned out their destinies, consumed their worlds, died, turned to dust. New worlds formed from their substance. Gradually, the ancient plague subsided.

  But in one minor globular cluster, a remnant survived. Nature's vast mechanism of profusion had served its purpose. In the hot muck-beds of the virgin worlds of this cluster, a purpose grew, stabilized, came to fruition. New life-forms sprang from the purpose, new parameters of existence evolved. Questing fibrils of the mother nest spread out, formed themselves into miniscule spores, set themselves adrift from world to world.

  By the uncounted billions, they died. But here and there, they found haven, took root, became life-seeding warm seas, spreading out on dead shelves of rock and the familiar muck…

  The life-force had found stability, a pattern of existence; but the primal urge to expansion remained. Expansion required a drive, a lust unsatisfied.

  A dichotomy came into being. All across the spectrum of reality, a fissure appeared. Existence segregated itself into two categories, inherently opposed. Conflict renewed; pressure built; expansion resumed. Again, life was on the march toward its unimagined destiny.

  On every world where the opposed forces met, the struggle was joined. Each force knew the other, instinctively recognized the ancient enemy. Each side called itself by a name, and the antagonist by another.

  One name was Good, and the other Evil.

  A variety of symbols came into being, and across the worlds, the struggle swayed, reaching ever outward…

  And a time came on a remote, isolated world, when traitorous Good met treacherous Evil and joined, against all nature, in a new formula of existence. Now, in this unholy amalgam, the ancient drives met and mingled, fought and struck a balance. A transcendent value-scale evolved-new abilities, unheard-of in the galaxy; an empathy possible only to a monstrous hybrid; an unnatural negation of the primal drive, a perversion of that terrible energy into new channels. Under the stimulus of internal stresses, minds of undreamed-of power sprang into being. At every level from the cellular upward, death conflicted with life; sloth with vaulting ambition; greed with instinct for asceticism. And out of the synthesis of opposites, a cancerous growth called Beauty came into being; obscene antisurvival concepts named Loyalty, Courage, Justice were born into the universe.

  Wherever the elemental Purities encountered this monstrous hybrid, a battle of extermination was joined. Good could compromise with Evil, but neither could meet with the half-breed, Art. A new war raged across the minor galaxy and left annihilation in its wake.

  So it went for ages, until a lone, surviving pocket of hybrids was discovered. The instinct to destroy the Unnatural Ones raged strong-but the race-lesson of restraint and exploitation was stronger. Guarding their secret find, the Pure ones took specimens, sampled their capabilities, needs, drives. Here were minds of great power-computers of magnificent compactness and ability-a resource not to be wasted. A decision was reached: the anomalies would be nurtured, allowed to evolve a primitive social organization-and then harvested, pressed into the service of the Pure. Sometimes the thought came that such a race, released, might rip asunder the ancient contours of the universe…

  But this was a nightmare concept, to be passed over with a shudder. Control was complete. There was no danger. The hybrids were securely enslaved…

  I withdrew from the Over-mind, and for a moment I held the long perspective of that view-saw my world as the insignificant scintilla that it was among the stars, my race a sinister tribe of barbaric freaks, harvested like wild honey…

  A great gleaming planet had risen above the broken horizon, casting a bluish light across the darkling plateau. I saw the gleam of white from a misty patch on the overcurve of the glaring world, the pale outlines of unfamiliar continents. What world was this, and how far in space from the planet I called home?

  ***

  There was no time now to indulge the pangs of homesickness. The Over-mind continued to pour out orders to its dead Centurion, and I babbled responses, describing the maneuvering of immense imaginary fleets, fabulous aerial assaults, weapons of incredible destructive power-and while I transmitted, I raced along the base of the cliff toward the shelter of a distant ringwall.

  In the open now, I saw the dust clouds of distant Brigades on the move, coming closer. I altered course, steered for a smaller crater, almost lost over the curve of the lunar horizon. I skirted a vast tumulus of broken rock, thundered out into the clear Spread all across my route, a full Brigade of heavy combat units churned toward me under a pall of dust. I swung away to the left. At once, a harsh voice rang in my mind: "LONE UNIT! WHAT IS YOUR BRIGADE?"

  I ignored the call, saw a dozen units detach themselves and race to intercept me. I halted, swung to bring my guns to bear on the line ahead. I opened my receptors, and heard a harsh command:

  "RENEGADE UNIT! HALT AND SUBMIT OR BE DESTROYED."
>
  For a moment I hesitated, ready to pour my fire into the aliens-a move that would mean nothing but my instant annihilation. And the machines that faced me were no more than helpless pawns-slaves of the Over-mind. I would have to surrender. My freedom had been short-and had gained me nothing.

  We came in between high walls built in the shadow of a mighty ringwall that towered thousands of feet into the black sky. From embrasures on all sides, the snouts of heavy guns thrust down, covering a bleak, half-mile-square enclosure. I rolled forward, felt the Centurion's control withdraw. Guns still trained on me, the Centurion and his squad backed through the ponderous entry-gate. A portcullis of massive spikes rose up to bar the exit.

  I surveyed my prison, saw a scarred combat unit parked by the featureless wall at its far side. I was not the only erring trooper of the monster Brigades, it seemed. Perhaps here was another rebel-another mind that had freed itself from enemy control.

  On impulse I reached out, tried for contact with the lone unit. I found the familiar pattern of conditioned reaction, probed deeper-and encountered a shield of total opacity. Not even the mighty Over-mind had resonated with such overtones of mental power as this impervious barrier…

  Then I felt the probe of the stranger's mind reach out to me. Instantly, I erected a resistance-and still the intruder pressed me. I retreated, withdrew awareness to my innermost identity center… and felt the touch of the other's mind, questing, probing. I gathered my forces, prepared a maximum counter-blast…

  With a sudden thrust, the newcomer penetrated my defenses and confronted me.

  "Gosh," a familiar voice exclaimed in my mind. "What're you doin' here, Jones?"

  Chapter Fourteen

  "That's how it was, Jones," Joel said. "For a while I just watched; I looked at the country and tried to figure out where I was. All I knew, I was Unit One Hundred of the line-and I was Joel, too. But everything was different. There was fighting going on 'bout all the time. I got to worrying maybe I'd get hurt; this new body I got's tough, but a direct hit could knock it out-I saw it happen to others. I tried to talk to some of 'em after I got the knack of it-but all they knew was their number and the orders of the day.