Zimia was a stunning city, the cultural pinnacle of free humanity. Tree-lined boulevards fanned out like the spokes of a wheel from a complex of governmental buildings and an immense memorial plaza. Men in doublet-suits and ladies in ornamented official dresses walked briskly about the square.

Iblis Ginjo frowned as he hurried across the expanse toward the stately Hall of Parliament. Such an orderly arrangement could give the illusion of security, that the surroundings would never change.

But nothing is permanent. Nothing is secure.

He was in the business of inspiring people, galvanizing them into action by convincing them that the evil machines could attack any world at any time, and that there were sinister human spies who secretly gave their loyalty to Omnius, even here in the heart of the League.

Sometimes Iblis had to embellish reality, for the greater good of the struggle.

A broad-shouldered man with a squarish face and straight dark brown hair, he wore a loose black blazer adorned with gold stitching and sparkling bangles. Several steps behind him, half a dozen Jihad Police— Jipol agents— followed, always alert, ready to draw their weapons quickly. Turncoat humans or assassins loyal to the machines could be lurking anywhere.

Two decades ago, Iblis had granted himself the title “Grand Patriarch of Serena Butler’s Jihad,” and the throng embraced him every time he appeared in public. He spoke for them, rallied them, told them what to think and how to react. Like Vorian Atreides, Iblis had once been a human trustee of the thinking machines on Earth. Now he was an orator and statesman of the highest order: a king, politician, religious leader, and military commander all wrapped in one charismatic package. He had carved his own path, an unprecedented course that allowed him to move in the elite circles of human leadership. He knew history, and saw his place in it clearly.

As he climbed the broad steps of the Hall of Parliament and entered the high-ceilinged, frescoed foyer, representatives and clerks fell silent. Iblis loved to see people fumbling around in awe of him, red-faced and stammering.

He paused with appropriate reverence at the ornate alcove shrine to Serena Butler’s murdered child Manion, an angelic sculpture with arms open wide to receive a daily burden of fresh flowers, pale orange marigolds that looked like small, bright supernovas, the blossom that had been adopted as “Manion’s flower.”

Inside, the great hall was full, every chair occupied by a nobleman or planetary representative. Even the aisles were packed with distinguished guests seated on portable, new-model suspensor chairs that floated in available spaces.

A monk in a saffron-yellow robe sat near the front of the assembly, monitoring a heavy translucent container that held a live human brain inside a life-support bath of bluish electrafluid. As Iblis glanced at the revered Cogitor, he felt a giddy rush of genuine pleasure at the memory it inspired of the ancient philosopher-brain named Eklo, who had shared his knowledge when Iblis had been a mere slave supervisor on Earth. Those had been heady days, full of possibilities….

This Cogitor, a female thinker known as Kwyna, was more reluctant to help him, to offer her advice. Even so, Iblis often went to the tranquil City of Introspection to sit by Kwyna’s preservation canister, hoping to learn. He had met only two Cogitors in his life, but the magnificent organic thinking units never failed to impress him.

They were so superior to Omnius, so elegant and so infinitely human… despite their obvious physical limitations.

The Parliament’s business had already been under way for hours, but nothing important would happen until he arrived. It had all been arranged. His quiet allies among the League representatives would clog the governmental works with irrelevant bureaucracy, just to make him look more effective when he cut through all the dithering.

On the podium, the planetary representative from Hagal, Hosten Fru, droned on about a minor commercial problem, a dispute between VenKee Enterprises and the Poritrin government over patents and distribution rights for glowglobes, which had become increasingly popular.

“The original concept is based on work done by an assistant to Savant Tio Holtzman, but VenKee Enterprises has marketed the technology without any compensation to Poritrin,” Hosten Fru said. “I suggest we assign a committee to look into the matter and give it due consideration—”

Iblis smiled to himself. Yes, a committee will ensure a complete lack of resolution on the issue. Hosten Fru was a seemingly incompetent politician who blocked League business with inane problems, making the cumbersome government appear as ineffectual as the passive Old Empire. No one knew that the Hagal representative was one of Iblis’s secret allies. It served Iblis’s purposes perfectly: the more people saw how incapable the League Assembly was of solving simple problems, especially during crises, the more decisions were relegated to the Jihad Council, which he controlled….

Beaming with confidence, Iblis Ginjo made his grand entrance. As the proxy for Serena Butler herself, he was the spokesman for humanity and its Holy Jihad against the thinking machines.

Ten violent years after the atomic destruction of Earth, old Manion Butler had retired as League Viceroy, asking that his daughter Serena be appointed to take his place. She had been voted in by acclamation, but insisted that she be called only the “Interim Viceroy” until the conclusion of the war. Delighted, Iblis had insinuated himself as her closest advisor, writing speeches for her, building the fervor for the crusade against the thinking machines.

Head high, he strode down the carpeted aisle to the front of the speaking chamber. Imagers projected Iblis’s oversized features on the sides of the enclosure. Immediately deferential, Hosten Fru summed up and bowed, stepping away from the podium. “I relinquish my remaining time to the Grand Patriarch.”

Iblis walked across the stage, folded his hands in front of him, and formally nodded his gratitude to the Hagal representative, who hurried out of the speaking zone. Before he could gather his thoughts, though, an interruption came from the floor.

“Point of order!” He recognized the woman as Muñoza Chen, a troublesome representative from the remote League World of Pincknon.

Iblis turned to her, forcing an expression of patience onto his face as she stood and said, “Earlier today, I questioned the additional responsibilities transferred without due process from the Parliament to the Jihad Council. That discussion was tabled until an authorized member of the Council could address this Assembly.” She crossed her arms over her small chest. “I believe Grand Patriarch Ginjo is empowered to speak on behalf of the Council.”

He offered her a cool smile. “That is not why I have come to address the Assembly today, Madame Chen.”

The annoying woman refused to sit down. “Pending business is on the table, sir. Standard procedure requires that we attempt to resolve the matter before proceeding to anything else.”

He sensed the impatient mood of the crowd and knew how to use it to his advantage. They had come to hear him speak, not to witness tedious discussions about an irrelevant motion. “You are providing an excellent object lesson as to why the Jihad Council had to be formed, to make swift and necessary decisions, without this quagmire of bureaucracy.”

The audience grumbled their agreement. Now his smile warmed.

For the first thirteen years after Serena Butler had announced her Jihad, the League Parliament had struggled to run urgent wartime matters with the same cumbersome system that had operated during the prior centuries of uneasy peace. But after the debacles at Ellram and Peridot Colony, when the politicians had dickered for so long that entire protectorates had been wiped out before rescue missions could arrive, an indignant Serena had addressed the Parliament. She had expressed her outrage and (far worse to the people) her disappointment because they had put petty squabbles ahead of their real enemy.

Standing beside her, Iblis Ginjo had seized the initiative and suggested the formation of a “Jihad Council,” which would oversee all matters that directly related to the Jihad, while less urgent commercial, social, and domestic items could be discussed and debated in unhurried Parliament sessions. Wartime matters required swift and decisive leadership that could only be hampered by the thousand voices of Parliament.

Or so Iblis had convinced them; his proposal passed overwhelmingly.

Even so, a decade later, old political ways still inhibited progress. Now, delighted to hear grumbling agreement from the seats, Iblis looked at the Pincknon representative with long-suffering patience. “What is your question?”

Muñoza Chen did not seem to notice the muttered comments around her. “Your Council keeps finding more and more areas that fall under the umbrella of its jurisdiction. Originally, you were limited to oversight of the Army of the Jihad with respect to its military operations, as well as domestic security embodied in Jipol. Now the Council administers to refugees, distributes supplies, imposes new tariffs and taxes. Where will this disturbing expansion of authority end?”

Iblis made a mental note to have his police commander, Yorek Thurr, begin discreet inquiries and investigations into this woman’s background. It might even be necessary to have someone “discover” damning evidence of Chen’s “collusion” with the thinking machines. Yorek Thurr was skilled in arranging such things. Perhaps she had a medical condition that could lead to her “unfortunate” death.

He answered calmly. “Administering to survivors and refugees in war zones has obvious relevance to the Council’s mandate, as do the training of battlefield surgeons and the distribution of necessary medical supplies and food shipments. When we recaptured Tyndall from the machines only last year, the Jihad Council instituted relief operations immediately. By enacting emergency taxes and commandeering luxury supplies from comfortable League Worlds, we gave those poor people shelter, medicines, hope. Had we left such matters to the League Parliament, Madame Chen, you would still be discussing it in open session.” He turned to the podium and then said, as if in afterthought, “I have heard no complaints from the population of Tyndall.”

“But for the Council to expand its purview without a vote of—”

Iblis made an impatient noise. “I can discuss such questions with you for hours, but is that truly what these people wish to hear?” He lifted his hands in question, and well-timed shouts and boos echoed through the stands; some catcalls were initiated by his own people, of course, but many were spontaneous. “However, I come before this assembly today to share certain knowledge recently revealed in ancient Muadru inscriptions.”

In his strong hands, he gripped an important piece of history, an ancient wafer of etched stone sandwiched between shatterproof plaz sheets. He propped the frame on the podium. “This runestone fragment was unearthed on an empty world two centuries ago but has remained untranslated. Until now.”

The intrigued audience fell silent. Ignored, Muñoza Chen faltered, then sat down awkwardly, without ever officially withdrawing her question.

“These ciphers were written by a long-dead prophet in a tongue known as Muadru, etched permanently into coated rock. The words from the past are believed to be from Earth, the mother world of humanity.” He turned to look at the yellow-robed secondary beside the ancient brain in its preservation canister. “The Cogitor Kwyna, by assisting me in the translation of these archaic rune symbols, has enabled me to understand. Kwyna, would you provide your guidance now?”

Uncertainly, the monk secondary stood and then carried the ornate brain canister to a golden table beside the speaking podium. Iblis felt thrilled to stand beside such a magnificent mind. The saphron-robed man waited.

Strengthened by his proximity to Kwyna, Iblis traced the complex runes with a fingertip. The audience remained silent and deeply engrossed as he began to read, enunciating the sharp lingual clicks and soft, rolling syllables. Odd, incomprehensible sounds resonated through the great meeting hall, casting a spell over the audience.

When Iblis paused, the Cogitor’s attendant pressed his palm against the curved jar containing Kwyna’s living brain, then slowly eased his fingers into the pale blue fluid. Through this connection, he translated the Muadru words in a voice that sounded far away— as if he spoke from the distance of ages past.

The runestone had been damaged in an ancient cataclysm that left scorch marks and deep gouges, he said. While some of his sentences were missing words, the remainder told of a terrible ancient war in which many people had died horribly. Finally, he said, “Quoting the unnamed prophet, ‘A millennium of tribulations will occur before our people find their way to paradise.’”

Waiting for this moment, Iblis flashed a bright, exuberant grin and shouted: “Is it not clear? Free humans have suffered a thousand years under the cymeks and their machine masters. Do you not see? Our time of tribulation is over— if only we choose to make it so.”

The blue electrafluid in the Cogitor’s canister swirled, and the secondary relayed Kwyna’s message to the assemblage. “That slice of runestone does not contain the entire prophecy. The message is incomplete.”

Iblis pressed forward with his agenda. “We must always face both the danger, and the promise, of the unknown. One of our battle groups has gone to IV Anbus to defend against the latest robotic incursion— but that is not enough. As free people, we must act forcefully to recapture all Synchronized Worlds, freeing their enslaved human populations. Only in this way will our tribulations ever end, as the runestone prophecy proclaims. As foretold, a thousand years have passed. Now we must seize our road to paradise and cast aside the demon machines. I call for an expansion of Jihad forces, additional warships and dedicated soldiers, renewed offensives against Omnius.”

Increased turbulence stirred the blue fluid in the canister. “And more deaths,” the secondary translated.

“And more heroes!” Iblis raised his voice, face lit by a fervent glow. “As the wise Kwyna says, this rune fragment is all we have. Thus, as human beings, we must choose the best interpretation. Do we have the heart to pay the price necessary to make the prophecy come true?”

Abruptly, before Kwyna could issue any contrary remark, the Grand Patriarch thanked the Cogitor and her attendant monk. Though Iblis revered the female philosopher, sadly Kwyna had spent much time in contradictory philosophies and contemplation, without understanding the realities of the Jihad.

Iblis, though, had practical objectives. His enthusiastic audience cared nothing for philosophical hairsplitting.

The Grand Patriarch’s voice resonated, rising and falling at appropriate, calculated moments. “Our victory is paid for with human blood. Serena Butler’s tiny son has already paid that price, as have millions of valiant jihadi soldiers. The ultimate victory not only merits such an expense, it requires it. To lose is unthinkable. Our very existence hangs in the balance.”

Around the hall, heads nodded, and Iblis maintained an inward, concealed smile of satisfaction. Though the secondary monk remained silent beside the plaz brain canister, the Grand Patriarch sensed that Kwyna might even agree. No one could resist his words, his passion. Visible tears of appreciation sparkled in Iblis’s eyes, just enough to show how much he really cared about humankind.