Jack Chalker: Melchior's Fire

All at once it tipped over, and magma started running up one side and dissolving the rock shelf, causing even more instability. When it was about a third dissolved, the weight of the C&C became too much to support and the rest of the solid rock suddenly and completely flipped over, leaving a pool of bubbling, churning liquid rock where it had been.

“Well, so much for the rescue beam,” Cross said, turning and starting slowly away.

Nagel paced her for a bit. “Well, there’s one thing. At least we don’t have to worry about the security system being inadequate…”

“Now we’re citizens of Melchior, I guess,” she said to him. “But, God, I hope I live long enough to see Normie show up to film his epic…”

True to its programming, Eyegor had used the special interface Norman Sanders’s workers had put in while refitting the Stanley that effectively gave it, not the captain, control of the ship.

The captain found herself totally helpless, cut off from any control other than simple automated systems, unable to even see where or what Eyegor was doing. Still, she could communicate with the robot, so long as the robot allowed it.

“Eyegor,” she pleaded, “you cannot do this. You have left humans who might still be alive in a hostile and probably fatal position, violating every bit of mandatory robotic programming, and now you believe you can pilot this ship safely back. You can’t. It was built around and designed for a cyborg unit such as myself. It cannot be handled by someone not designed for it.”

“All basic directives of robotics have been suspended in my logic core,” Eyegor responded. “I am left entirely with the compulsion to carry out my primary mission at any cost. I have been fed all details on celestial and wormhole navigation and the capabilities of this ship by the auxiliary programming modules placed in this manual override chamber, and to supplement I have access to your entire database libraries. Much of the ship is automatic. I see no reason why I should not be able to pilot it home.”

“You don’t understand how complex this all is!” the captain pleaded. “All you will do is destroy us both!”

“I have no choice. I must bring this ship and this cargo back. Since any reactivation of your control would also cause you to return to Melchior, I cannot allow this. I am in any event finding this ship remarkably easy to handle.”

“You idiot! This is interplanetary space. It’s complex, but countless thousands have done it over time. Interstellar wormholes, particularly wild holes, are something else. Experience, nuance, becoming totally one with your ship, all those are essential!”

“I do not believe you. I believe it is your programming speaking, or perhaps your human part. I do not have the latter and am unencumbered by the morals of the former. Ah! There is the field up ahead, and we need only one more calculation to determine where and when the next hole will generate!”

“This is our last chance!” the captain pleased. “Otherwise your programming will not be fulfilled because you will not get back! Let me take it! I’ll take it through! I swear I will.”

“Oaths to a robot are a bizarre and illogical concept,” Eyegor noted. “Your crew is dead. You may well be susceptible to the effects of this many stones yourself. I am immune. Ah! There! The last one! My calculations now bear out my contention and the contention of my programmers and the simulations they were based upon. Accelerate, max speed, full shields and ram on, aiming point and destination fixed. Simplicity itself. Now I will demonstrate to you that your major problem is that you still have a human component. Without this component, you would be capable of much more. Now… full boost… half light speed… wild hole opens thus… We’re in! ”

“Eyegore, you blockhead! You were almost three degrees off your entry!”

“Impossible! I am incapable of such a simple mathematical error. If that were true, we’d have struck the wall by—”

There was a roar, and the sound of things that could not be compressed being compressed all around.

And then there was silence.

Somehow, back on the Three Kings, there was a sound that almost seemed like laughter. But it did not come from those trapped on Balshazzar, nor those stuck and swearing revenge watching Melchior’s fires, but from somewhere else.

Nobody ever looked twice at Kaspar.