Barrington Bayley - Barrington Bayley SF Gateway Omnibus - The Soul of the Robot, The Knights of the Limits, The Fall of Chronopolis

Jasperodus and his helpers had been secretly preparing the revolt for months. In the middle of one sunny morning Jasperodus gave the word. A raggle-taggle army of robots, slotmen and indigenous poor suddenly gathered in the streets of Subuh and went pouring into the city. An hour later, when the city guard had been called out, contingents in other boroughs rose to enter the battle.

The rebels were armed with bullet guns, some beamers, pikes, swords and cudgels. Alongside each robot Jasperodus had placed an accompanying human so as to ensure his loyalty in the face of counteracting commands from the enemy. Otherwise organisation was fragmentary except for a small corps – the humans wearing brief uniforms of grey battle-jerkins and berets – surrounding Jasperodus.

His lieutenant was a man known as Arcturus, something of a minor leader in his own right. A product of his environment, he had a physique that was potentially powerful, but he was spindled, his features made pasty as a consequence of infantile under-nourishment. A man of rare intelligence for the Subuh, he was one of the few to have ingested the theory behind Jasperodus’ advocacy of communal land-ownership. His own ideas went further, however. He subscribed to some obscure doctrine that was not at all clear to Jasperodus, whereby everything was to be held in common and all labour centrally directed.

By mid-afternoon several parts of Tansiann were burning. Roiling smoke drifted over the city; from wherever one stood could be heard the distant sounds of clamour. As Jasperodus had anticipated, a large mass of people not privy to his plans had joined the tumult, either as a welcome diversion from frustrating normality or as a chance to loot, and the unrestrained violence of the mob was thus raging in a number of quarters. Members of the city guard, understanding what lay in store and having witnessed the fate of some of their comrades, had already taken to throwing away their uniforms.

Not all went without opposition. The middle-class and upper-class suburbs showed a surprising ability to react quickly to an emergency. Tenure, Elan and others had become efficient, armed camps which had repulsed the first ragged waves of invasion and looked like holding out for some time.

The storming of the palace took place in the evening. Here the fighting was fiercest, for while the palace had never been conceived as a citadel, the palace guard resisted strenuously and were better trained, so that four hours later only half the vast complex was in rebel hands. Just the same Jasperodus pressed the attack; he was determined that his presence should be seen and felt by the notables and staff who had thought him long gone. Finally, round about midnight, the sound of gunfire died down, and a motley mob sauntered wonderingly through intricate plazas and terraces, through apartments and halls the luxury and grandeur of which they had never known.

Together with many other prisoners Ax Oleander was captured. The unpopular vizier, found huddling in a wardrobe in his apartments, would have been lynched had not Jasperodus himself rescued him and consigned him to incarceration in the cellars. Later Jasperodus was to be much amused by a perusal of his private papers, which revealed certain treasonable contacts with the government of Borgor. Even if the Empire should fall to its long-standing enemy the oily vizier meant to survive.

The tensions of battle momentarily over, uninhibited revels began. Jasperodus climbed a tower and spent some time alone, watching the flames leap up here and there from the spreading darkness below.

The next day he was out with Arcturus and members of his corps, attempting to put some order into the chaos he had created. Most of the battalion commanders were nowhere to be found. The hastily-formed army was too busy enjoying the fruits of its partial victory to be much bothered with discipline. Nevertheless he managed to reconstitute the harried and defeated fire service, pressing extra men into duty as fire-fighters. The quicker he could repair the ravages he had wrought the easier it would be to win the confidence of the general citizenry.

About mid-morning, in the middle-class Condra district, a robot ran towards him carrying a field vid-set attached by cable and drum to a nearby public booth. It had been planned to use Tansiann’s vid-line service in this way, but up until now no one had apparently felt the need for communication. He accepted the set and found himself staring, on the tiny monochrome screen, into the crudely-made face of a low-order robot he identified, after a moment’s thought, as one by the name of Chisel.

‘What is it?’ he snapped. ‘You belong to the guard party, do you not?’

Chisel’s head moved aberratedly, as though he were suffering strain. ‘There has been an attack, sir! Men came to the house looking for Major Inwing, whom they attempted to murder.’

‘What transpired?’

The robot began to babble incoherently before Jasperodus calmed him down and extracted the story.

The would-be killers had known their business. Despite the mixed human-robot guard they had got into the house in a surprise attack and two of them had penetrated to Inwing’s room, injuring him before being killed by Rovise, captain of the guard.

Rovise had acted well. Only he, Chisel and another robot called Bootmaker by this time remained to defend their charge. He had ordered the robots to lower the unconscious Inwing through the window and carry him away from the back of the house, holding off further sallies while they did so.

‘What are Inwing’s injuries?’ Jasperodus demanded. ‘Describe.’

‘A bullet hit him in the head. I do not think his brain-case is broken. He is alive, but unconscious.’

‘Who is with him?’

Only myself and Bootmaker, who is even less intelligent than I! Tell me what to do, sir!’

Jasperodus recalled with a sudden chill that when still in Charrane’s favour he had once drawn up contingency measures to be used in case of insurgency. These measures included highly trained assassination squads to knock out traitors and rebel leaders. There was no question but that these squads were now operating, and that Cree was a target. His peccancies on the eve of his disappearance had no doubt been linked to Jasperodus’ re-emergence, which was more than enough to identify him with the revolt.

Jasperodus cursed himself. Once on the trail the assassins were sufficiently skilled as detectives not to let go – and they were utterly dedicated. It was only a matter of time before they gained their objective, unless he could help Inwing.

And the worst of it was that Chisel – as the unlucky construct himself well knew – was simply not intelligent enough to handle the situation. He and his helpmate were of an elementary type of androform robot, generally expected to act only under supervision. For instance, they had thoughtlessly fled with Inwing in a direction taking them away from the enclave, instead of into it where they could have counted on finding protection.

‘Give me orders, sir!’ Chisel pleaded urgently. ‘Rovise gave us no further instructions beyond this point, and is doubtless now dead.’

It came home forcibly to Jasperodus that it was necessary to direct Chisel in the most simplistic, most unequivocal of terms. The situation was precarious. The robots were quite capable of forgetting the real purpose of their mission, or of putting some other interpretation on it instead.

He mustered his sternest, most commanding voice. ‘You are to prevent the assassins from killing Major Inwing, using any means whatsoever that are available. That is a prime directive, which must engage all your attention, permanently and without attenuation. Do you understand?’

Chisel nodded feverishly. ‘I understand. Prevent the assassins from killing Major Inwing – at whatever cost. I understand. We obey!’