I could only imagine some of the provocative things the big man could’ve said at that moment, and I was fully prepared for civil war to erupt within our group. I readied myself to fight.
Fortunately, Davos exhibited a bit more tact than I had expected.
“Your ancestors created the Machine,” he said. “Many ages ago, they built a malevolent, all-powerful computer mind that has continually interfered in the affairs of the various civilizations of the galaxy, and sought to dominate them. Why did they create this thing?”
Binari was frowning. “I take issue with your characterization of the Machine as being built malevolent. While there have been moments—isolated instances, across many thousands of years of its activities—in which it has behaved in a, shall we say, less than benevolent manner, even so, the original concept was for—”
Davos had raised one of his big gray hands placatingly. “Yes, yes,” he said. “I should not have used that term. Disregard it, then, and address the rest of my question. Please.”
The Rao appeared to settle down. He pursed his lips, thinking, then, “Our only objective was to create an autonomous system that could look after the best interests of all sentient life in our galaxy. We felt it was a gift we could bestow upon the other races: enforcement of a peaceful environment across all the star systems.” He smiled proudly up at us. “The Machine and its Hands were meant to uphold law and order and eliminate the dangers all sentient, spacefaring races must face and overcome. Freed of the need to police the lanes of travel between the stars, freed of worry over attacks and disruptions by brigands and pirates and other criminal activity, freed of concerns over outside forces invading, the various races of the galaxy could create a golden age where free commerce and prosperity reigned.”
“And you believe the Machine has accomplished this feat?” Mirana asked.
“Who could argue it has not?” Binari continued to smile. “Yes, it was offline for a time. But now it has revived, taken on a new generation of Hands—humans this time—and it saved us all at the end of the Nightfall War. Just as it was meant to do.” His smile broadened. “So you see? Entirely positive. Entirely effective. Our gift to the galaxy.”
Davos was staring back at him. He continued to do so for several more seconds, waiting, but the little Rao said nothing more. At last Davos said, “This is all well and good, but there was more to it. Far more. We both know this.”
Binari shook his head quickly. “No, no. I have told you everything.”
Davos frowned. “Do not treat with me as if I am some backwards fool.” He rose and began to pace. “Your kind has no control over the Machine, and has not for ages. You could not even begin to construct anything remotely as complex at present—which is why so few outside of my own kind have ever suspected the Rao were responsible to begin with.” He stopped pacing and leaned down, looming over the smaller figure. “What happened?”
The broad smile on Binari‘s face began to fade a bit. Clearly uncomfortable, he looked at me pleadingly, but I shrugged. “Full disclosure is what you said you wanted to give us,” I told him.
The smile was entirely gone now. He sat there quietly for a time, staring off into the gray void that surrounded us. Perhaps he was debating internally what he was willing to confess; perhaps he was dreaming up, testing and discarding various falsehoods; perhaps he simply stalled for time. All the while, the massive form of Davos hovered over him, silently reminding him that the questions still hung in the air.
At last, with no alternatives, he relented.
“First,” he began, “you must understand my people’s view of organic life. Or at least the view we all held at the time of the Machine’s creation.” He cleared his throat, then closed his eyes and blurted, “We believed that organic life has no purpose.”
“What?” we all gasped at once.
He held up a tiny hand. “Amend that, then: no noble purpose.” He charged ahead before anyone could interrupt again. “Life exists only to reproduce itself and to spread. These are purposes, yes—but they are not noble. They are base and natural and hardly laudatory. Life lacked a higher, more noble purpose. Do you see?”
“I see the mindset of a people who could callously enslave my entire race,” Davos spat.
“Easy,” I said to him, still concerned that this line of discussion might lead us to violence but now equally interested in learning the information myself.
“Go on,” Davos growled.
Binari appeared shaken but he took a deep breath and started again. “We saw organic life—even our own—as pointless, but we felt we could give it one. A higher purpose. Because, as we began to study and master mechanical systems and artificial intelligence, we realized the one advantage organic life held over it: organic life can arise naturally, on its own. Mechanical life—artificial intelligence—which we by then believed to be superior in every other way, including in longevity—cannot arise naturally. It must be created. Therefore we concluded that the sole noble purpose of organic life is to arise on its own and then create artificial intelligence.”
“Which then seeks to enslave or destroy organic life,” Davos stated angrily.
“No, no,” Binari argued, waving his hands. “Not at all. We only sought to create mechanical life that would serve in a benevolent manner, looking after the organic beings that had created it. Nurturing them and making their brief lives better.”
“Then you failed,” Davos said.
Binari looked down, seeming defeated already.
“Tell them,” Davos said. “Tell them why your people no longer possess such great power, such high levels of advancement. Tell them why the Machine no longer follows your orders—has not done so for ages—and in fact scarcely acknowledges you exist. You who created it.”
“Yes,” he whispered. “Yes—very well.” He gathered himself and looked up at us. “Many millennia ago, our greatest scientists and technicians created the Machine as a worlds-spanning supercomputer to manage our entire civilization for us. But very quickly we came to realize that it was doing what it wanted—what it decided was best—not what we wished it to do. Protests broke out across all our worlds, quickly giving way to open rebellion—against the Machine and against our government that had pushed for its construction. Eventually the more experimentalist faction that controlled our empire fell, replaced by reactionaries who hated and feared the Machine. They resolved to deactivate it, if possible, and to destroy it if not.” He shook his head. “What followed was a war. An utterly destructive, cataclysmic war across all our planets and a number of others in the stellar neighborhood. The damage to all was massive. In the end, the Machine was the victor—the Machine and its Hands, who at that time were all members of Davos’ race.”
“Your slaves,” Davos spat.
“No! Never our slaves,” Binari shot back. “Slaves of the Machine? Perhaps, eventually. But that was never our intent.” He looked at me. “We had encountered Davos’ race, the gray giants, early in our space travels. They were an agrarian people, confined by their lack of advancement to a single world. We lifted them up, introduced them to technology. Later, the Machine concluded they would make much better Hands than my people, who obviously are much smaller, weaker.”
“And so it enslaved us.”
“No! It took you in, gave you noble purpose, brought you into its service across its growing domain.”
“As slaves. Yes.”
Binari made a gurgling sound in his throat as his face revealed his frustration.
Davos merely glared down at him.
I allowed the emotions to roil for a few moments, then, “Continue,” I said, my tone carrying clear messages for each of them.
Davos backed off. Binari composed himself.
“The war,” Binari said, “nearly destroyed my people.”
“You mean the Machine did,” Davos said.
“The Hands did!”
“Enough!” I met Davos’ eyes and held them. “You have made your views on the Rao
and the Machine explicit,” I told him. “Allow Binari to tell his tale.”
The big man gazed back at me a long moment and I wondered if I would have to test the blade in my right hand against his rough hide. The air around us grew suddenly colder as I clenched my left fist. At last he blinked, nodded once and looked away. I unclenched my fist and the temperature returned to normal.
Huddled in his coat and hood, Binari picked up the threads once more.
“Our homeworld was devastated. The only Rao to survive that war against the Machine were those living on far-flung colony worlds. But they were not a large number. And of course those survivors had come to distrust advanced technology entirely. Oh, they still love their advanced tools and weapons, with which they have battled humans and Dyonari for many centuries across the galaxy, along our common borders. They love those things as long as there is no chance of them becoming sentient. The Rao cannot abide thinking machines with any degree of autonomy. They despise advanced machine intelligence.”
Binari ended his tale and smiled flatly. “So now you know the story,” he said. “The story of my people’s great hubris. Our rise and our fall.”
“You created the Machine that once held the galaxy in thrall,” Davos said. “It fell, and now has risen, and once again dominates us all.”
Binari shook his head. “I do not see it that way. I believe the Machine as it exists now—as it has existed ever since its mysterious return to operations, during the recent Nightfall War—is entirely benevolent.”
Davos’ eyes flared. He jabbed a blunt gray finger at the Rao. “Ah! You reveal yourself, then!”
Binari blinked. “What?”
“You are a Rao. You just told us how all Rao now despise artificial intelligences. And yet you make excuses for the Machine itself—the most powerful and dangerous one ever created!” He snorted. “I know this is all falsehood. You lie continuously. All you have said is mere obfuscation, to conceal your true motives and actions.”
Binari opened his mouth, seemed to consider what to say, then simply closed it again and stared off into the distance.
“Tell them,” Davos demanded. “Tell us all what a Technologist actually is!”
“You cannot know that,” Binari snapped, before realizing he had said too much and curling back in on himself again, pulling his cloak tighter around him.
Now I was intrigued as well. “Tell us, Binari,” I ordered.
The Rao looked at me, at Mirana. His expression was one of hurt, of offense. Finding no sympathy from either of us, he moved to stubborn and obstinate intransigence. Still we waited, surrounding him, making it very clear we would have the truth from him.
“Very well,” he said, his voice small now. “I am marooned at the end of the universe, facing imminent annihilation alongside a gray giant that wishes me dead, a capricious ice goddess and a warrior of a race that has bedeviled my people for millennia. None could fault me for divulging secrets under such adversity.”
“Yes,” Davos said with obvious sarcasm, “you have defended your secrets honorably, as befits the mighty warrior you are. Now speak!”
Binari growled in the back of his throat for several seconds, clearly sensing the insult in Davos’ words and attitude, but at last he relented.
“You know I am called a Technologist,” he said, his voice small but rising. “We have always let it be known that our faction serves mainly as the most passionate advocates for limited advancement. We openly use what remains of our ancient technology to help others, to advance the causes of the Rao. But there is more to it than that.”
“Yes?” I asked, anxious to hear the real truth at last.
“We actually despise the Machine,” he said. “We wish to see it utterly destroyed.”
I was shocked. “What?” I whispered. Mirana echoed my surprise.
Davos did not.
I looked at him. He was grinning now. Grinning down at Binari.
“This,” he said, “is the truth at last.”
Binari looked up at him.
“And,” the big gray man added, “it is the only reason I have not heretofore slain you.”
Binari blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I knew it all along,” Davos said. “You know I traffic in knowledge, in information, in and out of and all around the great Mosaic City. I speak with scientists and sorcerers, warriors and wizards, gods and aliens of every stripe. I know much, little Rao. Including who and what you truly are.” He chuckled. “I merely wanted to hear you admit it—and I wanted our friends here to hear it as well, from your own mouth.”
Binari blinked again, then nodded. “I see,” he said.
Davos bent down and rested his big hand on Binari’s little shoulder. The Rao flinched, but settled as he realized the gesture was not a threatening one. Davos squeezed him gently, encouragingly. “We are on the same side, you and I,” he said. “And when I called you ‘Builder,’ I was not referring to the ancient Machine we have all been speaking of—was I, Binari?”
This time Binari only laughed once, humorlessly. “I can no longer be surprised, it seems. Truly you know all, Davos.”
I was perplexed by this last bit. “Then what is he building?” I asked.
“Another Machine,” Davos said.
My eyes widened. I looked to Mirana, who appeared equally startled. “What in the name of the Golden City are you talking about?” I demanded. “Another Machine?”
“We have been working in secret for millennia to construct a rival Machine that could perhaps overthrow the original,” Binari told us.
“But—if you create another one, and even if it succeeds…” I shook my head. “How would that be any better than the current situation? Would you not be trading one tyrannical overlord for another?”
“No,” Binari replied, “because the new Machine is not mechanical, not artificial. It is organic.”
I attempted to process this. “You’re saying the faction called the Technologists are in fact opposed to the technological Machine intelligence, and are working on an organic supercomputer?”
“It is a misdirection that has served us well for many, many years,” Binari stated with some degree of pride.
“Where is this organic Machine?” Mirana asked, astonished. “What is it?”
“It has existed in several iterations over the ages,” Binari said. “But overall it has always been formed as a sort of group association—a hive mind, if you will—of powerful psychic intellects, pooled together.”
“Tell them of your greatest failure,” Davos said.
“I would rather not,” Binari replied.
“Yet you will,” I stated.
“...Yes. Fine. Why hold anything back at this point?” He shook his head. “We created the Phaedrons.”
At this Mirana and I simply gawked at him. The horrific creatures that had nearly brought about the conquest of the galaxy during the Nightfall War? The monstrous beings such as the one I had slain in the lower levels of Cevelar’s castle? The Rao were responsible for them, too?
“That cannot be,” I said when my voice had returned. “They come from outside of this galaxy.”
“Because we exiled them there,” Binari said, “once we realized they could not be controlled.”
“That word again,” Davos said. “Controlled. Truly the Rao desire control over everything. It is their great flaw as a people, and it has led to so much tragedy.”
“Yes,” Binari admitted, nodding. “I cannot disagree with that assessment. But now we seek to repair what has gone so very wrong.”
“How—why—would you create such monstrous beings?” I asked.
“They were an offshoot of efforts to enhance psychic powers. They are a cyborg, cybernetic race, uplifted to sentience by our technology. It is why they appear a strange combination of organic and metal components. That is precisely what they are.” He shrugged. “They rebelled and attacked us, as well as the Machine. I am not certain of it, but I suspect this was the cause of the Machi
ne going silent for so long—they must have damaged it.”
I nodded at this. It made sense, based on my knowledge of history.
“We could not entirely destroy the Phaedrons,” he said, “but we defeated them and pushed them back, out of our star systems, eventually out of the galaxy entirely. We hoped and believed they would trouble us no more. But then, a few years ago, someone or something got to them, stirred them up again, and hurled them against all our worlds.” He looked at Davos. “You must give the Machine the credit for stopping them then,” he said.
“One of your bad creations stopped another of your bad creations,” he said.
“Why were you attempting to enhance psychic powers?” I asked, remaining focused on what I felt was the important thing here.
Binari turned from Davos to me. He spread his hands. “We could not, would not construct another mechanical intelligence. So we decided to create an organic, psychic one instead. We have been secretly engineering a sort of Counter-Machine, powered by psychic beings across the galaxy, though they know it not. The Counter-Machine gathers up all of their mental manifestations, channels that energy, enhances and amplifies it.”
“Toward what end?” I asked.
“Toward the eventual destruction of the Machine.”
I considered this, then nodded. “And then what?”
Binari frowned at this. “What do you mean?”
“Assuming this can be done—what will become of the Counter-Machine?”
He shrugged. “It will disperse. It is, after all, powered not by mechanical means but by harvesting the telepathic energies of sentient beings on hundreds of worlds.”
I was not convinced. Knowing the history of the Rao—and knowing it so much better, now—I saw no reason to believe that part of his story. Nevertheless, I pressed on.
“And when do you anticipate your Counter-Machine will be able to strike—to defeat the Machine?” I asked.
Karilyne- Heart Cold as Ice Page 19