Teach me to kill machines.”

Before each round of training, Jool Noret said the same thing to his sensei mek, and Chirox did his best to please his master. With his adaptability algorithm module, the fighting robot was a remarkably intuitive instructor, considering that he was merely programmed and designed to slay humans.

Jool threw himself into his training with an abandon he had never exhibited prior to the loss of his father. It was no longer training— it was an obsession. He had been the cause of Zon Noret’s tragic death, and to assuage his conscience he therefore needed to inflict more damage on Omnius than two Swordmasters. It was his burden. Jool had never wanted the old veteran to be harmed, but the tough philosophy of Ginaz taught that there were no accidents, no excuses for failure. Every event was the result of a sequence of actions. Intentions were irrelevant to actual outcomes.

Jool had no one but himself to blame, no one who could accept his apology or help to shoulder his responsibility. The young man’s guilt was so much a part of him now that it became a driving force. With his dying breath, Zon Noret had commanded him to become a great fighter, the best Ginaz had ever seen.

Jool accepted the task with a vengeance.

A nearly superhuman increase in skills, even at his already-high level, seemed to flow from within, awakened by his own passion and drive. According to Ginaz beliefs, the spirit of an earlier, unknown mercenary warrior shared his body, an entity that was reincarnated but unaware. He could feel the ancestral instinct burning through his veins and filling each muscle fiber as he battled Chirox with an array of weapons, from sophisticated scrambler-pulse rods to simple clubs to his bare hands.

The yellow optic sensors of the sensei mek glowed as he learned to increase his level of skill to keep pace with his student. “You are as swift as a machine, Jool Noret, and as resilient as a human. Together, these factors make you a formidable foe.”

Noret used his father’s pulse sword, paralyzing the sensei mek one component at a time without suffering more than a bruise or a scratch. “I intend to become the bane of Omnius, his bête noire.” Jool drove forward faster and harder, pressing even the supercharged abilities of the mek, which had continued to adapt and increase.

Eventually, the determined warrior outstripped the machine.

Standing on the same beach where his father had been slain, the younger Noret attacked the combat robot’s armored left leg, then the right, and worked his way up, shutting down all six fighting arms, one system after another, until finally Chirox was no more than a twisted metallic statue. Only the robot’s optic sensors remained bright, like stars in the dark night sky. Without rancor or joy, simply intensity, Noret bounded into the air and delivered a hard kick to the mek’s torso, toppling the machine backward into the soft, trampled sand.

“There, I have vanquished you.” He loomed over his fallen mechanical teacher.”Again.”

From the ground, the robot’s response was flat and emotionless, but Noret thought he detected a note of pride. “My adaptability module has reached its maximum capacity, Master Noret. Until you program me with further proficiencies, you have absorbed everything I can teach you.” The mek’s left leg twitched as the adaptive circuits reset themselves. “You are ready for anything a thinking machine can throw against you.”

ON THE MAIN island of the Ginaz archipelago, Jool Noret fought other mercenary trainees. Under careful supervision and weapons restrictions, most of the students survived.

Every member of the Council of Veterans had known Jool’s fallen father, had fought with him in many battles against the machines, but the young man needed to earn his own honor and respect. It was a means to an end. He was desperate to be off fighting in the Jihad, so that he could begin destroying the forces of Omnius… and repaying his oppressive personal debt.

The population of Ginaz was scattered across hundreds of small, lush islands that provided a range of terrain. The natives could have led peaceful lives— plentiful fish, tropical fruits, and nuts grew in the rich volcanic soil— but instead they had developed a rigorous warrior culture that achieved fame across the League of Nobles.

The young men and women used the varied terrain and natural hazards of the numerous islands to practice their fighting skills. The natives had always opposed the thinking machines, all the way back to the initial Time of Titans. Isolated Ginaz had been the only society to throw off the program-corrupted robots that the Titan Barbarossa had unleashed against the Old Empire in the initial conquest. In a quarter century Serena Butler’s Jihad had intensified to a fever pitch, which placed extraordinary demands upon Ginaz to provide more and more desperately needed warriors.

Just as the computer evermind could copy itself and transmit updates to endure one destruction after another, each Ginaz mercenary believed that after death his fighting spirit was transferred like a data file into the body vessel of his successor. It was more than reincarnation; it was a direct continuation of the battle… a handoff from one warrior to another.

Since so many of their people were killed in battle, the island society had to adapt, encouraging more offspring than usual. Young Ginaz students traveled from island to island and took mates indiscriminately. It was considered a candidate’s duty to have three children before journeying offworld to fight in the furious Jihad: one child to replace the father, one to replace the mother, and a third as a spiritual duty to those who could not reproduce, for whatever reason.

Mercenary women who became pregnant while out on long assignments returned home to Ginaz for the last few months before childbirth, where they helped to teach the others. They remained only long enough to deliver the children and regain their strength, then were off again on the next available ship to a new machine battlefield.

There were always plenty of battles to be fought.

Older men from the Council of Veterans, like Zon Noret, were considered excellent breeding stock, since they had shown their physical superiority by surviving a certain number of missions and injuries. Jool believed this, and knew that he himself was a fortuitous blending of powerful genes.

Many of the war children never learned the identities of their fathers. Some never even knew their mothers. Jool Noret was one of only a few whose father had returned to claim him, so that he could follow his son’s development and training. And then, a year ago, through his own hubris and inattention, Jool had caused the death of Zon Noret, a skilled mercenary needed by the Jihad. How much had that single mistake cost the war effort?

He already knew that it had cost him a great deal personally, and he doubted his conscience would ever give him any breathing room. Driven and obsessed, he had to do the fighting of two Ginaz mercenaries, or more. Jool could only wait until his father returned as a restless warrior spirit eager to fight again, reborn in the body of a new, eager fighter….

Now, while he awaited final testing, Jool dug his fingers into the warm afternoon sand, felt the beat of his pulse and the perspiration on his skin. With each breath, he was reminded of how much he longed to contribute his skills to the Jihad and make his mark. Somewhere inside, he carried the spirit of an unknown, unawakened comrade. Today, if the Council of Veterans found him worthy, Jool would discover whose spirit burned within him.

He clenched sand in his hands, then lifted a fistful and watched the grains trickle through his fingers. He would have to earn the privilege….

The new group of potential mercenaries had diverse specialties. Some were proficient at hand-to-hand combat against the thinking machines; others had developed more esoteric sabotage or destruction skills. All of them, though, were useful additions in the age-old struggle against Omnius.

The new hopefuls dueled each other in a cordoned-off section of rock-strewn beach. Mercenaries did not graduate merely by defeating their opponents, but by demonstrating sufficient talent to prove that the soul of a warrior truly inhabited them. Looking crestfallen, a handful of the trainees failed in their vigorous demonstrations.

Jool Noret did not.

A few of the losers crept away with eyes downcast, seeming to give up in their hearts. Jool watched them, knowing that such easily discouraged fighters would have been liabilities under true battle conditions. Others who had fallen short, however, clearly retained their sparks of defiance and determination; though they had failed this particular testing, they were eager to return to their instructors. They would learn more, improve their abilities, and try again.

The next morning, Jool Noret stood beside six companions, all of whom had been chosen as champions by the Council of Veterans. While white waves crashed against the gnarled black reef, the veterans built a bonfire of driftwood on the beach near a stand of thick, armored palms. A young mute boy with blond hair walked solemnly forward, struggling to carry a basin filled with polished coral disks. As he set the basin down, the chits clattered against each other like the teeth of a skeleton. Jool squinted in the direct equatorial sunlight.

“You will all continue the fight,” said the lead veteran, a one-armed warrior who wore his gray hair braided into a thick rope. Master Shar could no longer fight machines, but he had devoted his life to creating replacement warriors who would cause far more damage than the thinking machines had inflicted on him.

Shar had lost his arm during his last battle. He considered himself too old to fight further and had refused to accept one of the available replacement limbs from the battlefield surgeons’ stores, so that it might be given to a younger soldier, one better able to continue to fight. Despite his handicap, however, the Master retained so much agility that he braided his own hair with one hand and refused any help, though few could understand how the old man accomplished such a feat.

“This is the last time you come before us as trainees.” Shar swept an icicle gaze across the seven young warriors. “When you depart Ginaz for some faraway battlefield, you will go as proud mercenaries, representatives of our skills and our gallant history. Do you all accept this grave responsibility?”

In unison, Noret and his companions shouted their acknowledgment. Master Shar summoned them forward one by one, announcing each of them. Fourth in line, Noret took two steps to the sitting Council of Veterans.

“Jool Noret, you have had most unorthodox training,” said Master Shar. “Your father was a tremendous asset to the mercenaries of Ginaz. He too was trained by this warrior mek Chirox, while your fellows here were instructed by actual combat veterans. Do you feel this is a disadvantage?”

Guilt continued to simmer deep in Jool’s soul as he said, “No, Master Shar, I consider it an advantage. A machine has instructed me in how to kill machines. What teacher could know more about our sworn enemy?”

“Yet that mek killed Zon Noret,” rasped a gray-haired woman, a muscular veteran.

Jool focused on his resolve rather than the roaring sound in his ears. “To make up for the loss of my father, I must destroy twice as many of the enemy.”

A scarred old gnome with broken teeth leaned forward. “This mek was recovered from a robot battleship and reprogrammed. Are you not concerned that he might contain secret internal instructions to make you vulnerable?”

“My sensei mek has already trained four generations of mercenary fighters who were among the best of Ginaz, and I have vowed to surpass all of them. I have learned to kill machines, to seek out the vulnerabilities of all known designs of robots and cymek bodies.” The litany swelled within him, and his voice gathered a frightening strength. “I grew up learning about Serena Butler’s Jihad. I have seen reports of battles on the Synchronized Worlds, our triumphs and failures. My spirit is consumed with the need to destroy Omnius. There is no doubt in my mind that I was born to this.”

Master Shar smiled. “Then there is no doubt in ours, either.” He gestured toward the basin filled with coral disks. “If you possess the spirit of a warrior, now is the time for it to come forth. Choose. Let us see which of our fallen mercenaries has transferred his skills and ambitions into you.”

Jool Noret stared down at the numerous disks, most of them scribed with the name of a Ginaz mercenary who had been slain over the centuries of warfare; some of the chits were blank, denoting a new soul. The young man closed his eyes and plunged his hands into the pile, letting fate guide his selection. Somewhere in here lay a disk with his father’s name on it, but he knew he was not worthy of that one. He could not bear to draw it and hoped his hands did not happen to find it in the basin.

With a burst of courage he seized a disk, pulled it out, and held it up to the sunlight. Opening his eyes, he read the unfamiliar name: Jav Barri.

At last he knew who had been reborn within him. He could look through the Ginaz archives and learn the story of this Jav Barri. But it didn’t matter to him what the former mercenary had done. With his father’s memory, the sensei mek’s training, and the spirit of the fallen mercenary inside him, Jool Noret would make his own mark— or die in the attempt.

Master Shar said, “All of you are now commissioned to destroy thinking machines. This shall be your sacred, sworn duty, and you will be paid well for the sacrifices you make. Tomorrow you depart for Salusa Secundus, where you will be deployed with the Army of the Jihad.”

He paused, and his voice broke as he added, “Make us proud.”