Future Wars . . . and Other Punchlines Read online

  “We have nothing to say to you!” barked the Minister of Defense. He was purple granite, having entered just in time to hear his Ministry insulted.

  “We have no objection to talking to you!” contradicted the President, hastily. Having failed to overawe the Jester through a viewscreen, he could now almost feel the berserker’s weight upon his head.

  “Then let us talk,” said the Jesters image. “But not so privately. This is what I want.”

  What he wanted, he said, was a face-to-face parley with the Committee, to be broadcast live on planetwide tridi. He announced that he would come “properly attended” to the conference. And he gave assurance that the berserker was under his full control, though he did not explain how. It, he said, would not start any shooting.

  The Minister of Defense was not ready to start anything. But he and his aides hastily made secret plans.

  Like almost every other citizen, the presidential candidate of the Liberal party settled himself before a tridi on the fateful evening, to watch the confrontation. He had an air of hopefulness, for any sudden event may bring hope to a political underdog.

  Few others on the planet saw anything encouraging in the berserker’s descent, but there was still no mass panic. Berserkers and war were unreal things to the long-isolated people of Planet A.

  “Are we ready?” asked the Jester nervously, looking over the mechanical delegation which was about to board a launch with him for the descent to Capital City.

  “What you have ordered, I have done,” squeaked the berserker-voice from the shadows above.

  “Remember,” Jester cautioned, “the protoplasmic-units down there are much under the influence of life. So ignore whatever they say. Be careful not to hurt them, but outside of that you can improvise within my general plan.”

  “All this is in my memory from your previous orders,” said the machine patiently.

  “Then let’s go.” Jester straightened his shoulders. “Bring me my cloak!”

  The brilliantly lighted interior of Capital City’s great Meeting Hall displayed a land of rigid, rectilinear beauty. In the center of the Hall there had been placed a long, polished table, flanked on opposing sides by chairs.

  Precisely at the appointed time, the watching millions saw one set of entrance doors swing mathematically open. In marched a dozen human heralds, their faces looking almost robotic under bearskin helmets. They halted with a single snap. Their trumpet-tucket rang out clearly.

  To the taped strains of Pomp and Circumstance, the President, in the full dignity of his cloak of office, then made his entrance.

  He moved at the pace of a man marching to his own execution, but his was the slowness of dignity, not that of fear. The Committee had overruled the purple protestations of the MiniDef, and convinced themselves that the military danger was small. Real berserkers did not ask to parley, they slaughtered. Somehow the Committee could not take the Jester seriously, any more than they could laugh at him. But until they were sure they had him again under their control they would humor him.

  The granite-faced Ministers entered in a double file behind the President. It took almost five minutes of Pomp and Circumstance for them all to position themselves.

  A launch had been seen to descend from the berserker, and vehicles had rolled from the launch to the Meeting Hall. So it was presumed that Jester was ready, and the cameras pivoted dutifully to face the entrance reserved for him.

  Just at the appointed time, the doors of that entrance swung mathematically open, and a dozen man-sized machines entered. They were heralds, for they wore bearskin helmets, and each carried a bright, brassy trumpet.

  All but one, who wore a coonskin cap, marched a half-pace out of step, and was armed with a slide trombone.

  The mechanical tucket was a faithful copy of the human one—almost. The slide-trombonist faltered at the end, and one long sour note trailed away.

  Giving an impression of slow mechanical horror, the berserker-heralds looked at one another. Then one by one their heads turned until all their lenses were focused upon the trombonist.

  It—almost it seemed the figure must be he—looked this way and that. Tapped his trombone, as if to clear it of some defect. Paused.

  Watching, the President was seized by the first pang of a great horror. In the evidence, there had been a film of an Earth man of ancient time, a balding comic violinist, who had had the skill to pause like that, just pause, and evoke from his filmed audience great gales of . . .

  Twice more the robot heralds blew. And twice more the sour note was sounded. When the third attempt failed, the eleven straight-robots looked at one another and nodded agreement.

  Then with robotic speed they drew concealed weapons and shot holes in the offender.

  All across the planet the dike of tension was cracking, dribbles and spurts of laughter forcing through. The dike began to collapse completely as the trombonist was borne solemnly away by a pair of his fellows, his shattered horn clasped lily-fashion on his iron breast.

  But no one in the Meeting Hall was laughing. The Minister of Defense made an innocent-looking gesture, calling off a tentative plan, calling it off. There was to be no attempt to seize the Jester, for the berserker-robot-heralds or whatever they were seemed likely to perform very capably as bodyguards.

  As soon as the riddled herald had been carried out, Jester entered. Pomp and Circumstance began belatedly, as with the bearing of a king he moved to his position at the center of the table, opposite the President. Like the President, the Jester wore an elegant cloak, clasped in front, falling to his ankles. Those that filed in behind him, in the position of aides, were also richly dressed.

  And each of them was a metallic parody, in face and shape, of one of the Ministers of the Committee.

  When the plump robotic analogue of the Minister of Education peered through a lorgnette at the tridi camera, the watching populace turned, in unheard-of millions, to laughter. Those who might be outraged later, remembering, laughed now, in helpless approval of seeming danger turned to farce. All but the very grimmest smiled.

  The Jester-king doffed his cape with a flourish. Beneath it he wore only a preposterous bathing suit. In reply to the President’s coldly formal greeting—the President could not be shaken by anything short of a physical attack—the Jester thoughtfully pursed his lips, then opened them and blew a gummy substance out into a large pink bubble.

  The President maintained his unintentional role of slow-burning straight man, ably supported by all the Committee save one. The Minister of Defense turned his back on the farce and marched to an exit.

  He found two metallic heralds planted before the door, effectively blocking it. Glaring at them, the MiniDef barked an order to move. The metal figures flipped him a comic salute, and stayed where they were.

  Brave in his anger, the MiniDef tried futilely to shove his way past the berserker-heralds. Dodging another salute, he looked round at the sound of great clomping footsteps. His berserker-counterpart was inarching toward him across the Hall. It was a clear foot taller than he, and its barrel chest was armored with a double layer of jangling medals.

  Before the MiniDef paused to consider consequences, his hand had moved to his sidearm. But his metal parody was far faster on the draw; it hauled out a grotesque cannon with a fist-sized bore, and fired instantly.

  “Gah!” The MiniDef staggered back, the world gone red . . . and then he found himself wiping from his face something that tasted suspiciously like tomato. The cannon had propelled a whole fruit, or a convincing and juicy imitation of one.

  The MiniCom jumped to his feet, and began to expound the idea that the proceedings were becoming frivolous. His counterpart also rose, and replied with a burst of gabbles in speed-falsetto.

  The pseudo-Minister of Philosophy rose as if to speak and was pricked with a long pin by a prankish herald, and jetted fluttering through the air, a balloon collapsing in flight. At that the human Committee fell into babel, into panic.

  Und
er the direction of the metal MiniDiet, the real one, arch-villain to the lower masses, began to take unwilling part in a demonstration of dietary discipline. Machines gripped him, spoon-fed him grim gray food, napkined him, squirted drink into his mouth—and then, as if accidentally, they gradually fell out of synch with spoon and squirt, their aim becoming less and less accurate.

  Only the President still stood rooted in dignity. He had one hand cautiously in his trousers pocket, for he had felt a sly robotic touch, and had reason to suspect that his suspenders had been cut.

  As a tomato grazed his nose, and the MiniDiet writhed and choked in the grip of his remorseless feeders, balanced nutrients running from his ears, the President closed his eyes.

  Jester was, after all, only a self-taught amateur working without a visible audience to play to. He was unable to calculate a climax for the show. So when he ran out of jokes he simply called his minions to his side, waved good-bye to the tridi cameras, and exited.

  Outside the Halls, he was much encouraged by the cheers and laughter he received from the crowds fast-gathering in the streets. He had his machines entertain them with an improvised chase-sequence back to the launch parked on the edge of Capital City.

  He was about to board the launch, return to the berserker and await developments when a small group of men hurried out of the crowd, calling to him.

  “Mr. Jester!”

  The performer could now afford to relax and laugh a little himself. “I like the sound of that name! What can I do for you gentlemen?”

  They hurried up to him, smiling. The one who seemed to be their leader said: “Provided you get rid of this berserker or whatever it is, harmlessly—you can join the Liberal party ticket. As Vice President!”

  He had to listen for some minutes before he could believe they were serious. He protested: “But I only wanted to have some fun with them, to shake them up a bit.”

  “You’re a catalyst, Mr. Jester. You’ve formed a rallying point. You’ve shaken up a whole planet and made it think.”

  Jester at last accepted the Liberals’ offer. They were still sitting around in front of the launch, talking and planning, when the light of Planet A’s moon fell full and sudden upon them.

  Looking up, they saw the vast bulk of the berserker dwindling into the heavens, vanishing toward the stars in eerie silence. Cloud streamers went aurora in the upper atmosphere to honor its departure.

  “I don’t know,” Jester said over and over, responding to a dozen excited questions. “I don’t know.” He looked at the sky, puzzled as anyone else. The edge of fear came back. The robotic Committee and heralds, which had been controlled from the berserker, began to collapse one by one, like dying men.

  Suddenly the heavens were briefly alight with a gigantic splashing flare that passed like lightning across the sky, not breaking the silence of the stars. Ten minutes later came the first news bulletin: The berserker had been destroyed.

  Then the President came on tridi, close to the brink of showing emotion. He announced that under the heroic personal leadership of the Minister of Defense, the few gallant warships of Planet A had met and defeated, utterly annihilated, the menace. Not a man had been lost, though the MiniDef’s flagship was thought to be heavily damaged.

  When he heard that his mighty machine ally had been destroyed, Jester felt a pang or something like sorrow. But the pang was quickly obliterated in a greater joy. No one had been hurt, after all. Overcome with relief, Jester looked away from the tridi for a moment.

  He missed the climactic moment of the speech, which came when the President forgetfully removed both hands from his pockets.

  The Minister of Defense—today the new Presidential candidate of a Conservative party stirred to grim enthusiasm by his exploit of the night before—was puzzled by the reactions of some people, who seemed to think he had merely spoiled a jest instead of saving the planet. As if spoiling a jest was not a good thing in itself! But his testimony that the berserker had been a genuine menace after all rallied most people back to the Conservative side again.

  On this busiest of days the MiniDef allowed himself time to visit Liberal headquarters to do a bit of gloating. Graciously he delivered to the opposition leaders what was already becoming his standard speech.

  “When it answered my challenge and came up to fight, we went in with a standard englobement pattern—like hummingbirds round a vulture, I suppose you might say. And did you really think it was jesting? Let me tell you, that berserker peeled away the defensive fields from my ship like they were nothing. And then it launched this ghastly thing at me, a kind of huge disk. My gunners were a little rusty, maybe, anyway they couldn’t stop it and it hit us.

  “I don’t mind saying, I thought I’d bought the farm right then. My ship’s still hanging in orbit for decontamination, I’m afraid I’ll get word any minute that the metal’s melting or something—anyway, we sailed right through and hit the bandit with everything we had.

  “I can’t say too much for my crew. One thing I don’t quite understand; when our missiles struck that berserker just went poof, as if it had no defense up at all. Yes?”

  “Call for you, Minister,” said an aide, who had been standing by with a radiophone, waiting for a chance to break in.

  “Thank you.” The MiniDef listened to the phone, and his smile left him. His form went rigid. “Analysis of the weapon shows what? Synthetic proteins and water?”

  He jumped to his feet glaring upward as if to pierce the ceiling and see his ship in orbit. “What do you mean—no more than a giant custard pie?”

  CUSTER’S LAST JUMP

  by Steven Utley & Howard Waldrop

  Alternate history is a subset of science fiction which has become increasingly popular in the last three decades, and it mostly is dead serious. But here’s an earlier example (from 1976) of the type which is anything but serious, as it supposes what a famous historical event might have been like if the internal combustion engine had been invented much sooner than it was in our timeline, consequently speeding the development of aviation—and of airborne warfare. This story was a Nebula Award finalist.

  Steven Utley (1948-2013) published his first story in 1972, and went on to write well and often, though he once referred to himself as an “internationally unknown author.” Utley was probably best known for his unusual time travel series, the Silurian Tales, chronicling a project with a time tunnel back to what might be considered one of the least interesting periods in Earth’s past, but nonetheless made fascinating by Utley’s writing skill and his gift for strong characterization. All of the Silurian Tales have been collected in two volumes: The 400-Million-Year Itch and Invisible Kingdoms. He probably intended to write more stories in the setting, but cancer didn’t give him the time.

  Howard Waldrop was born in Mississippi, but has spent much of his life in Texas, where he currently resides. His novelet, “The Ugly Chickens,” won both the Nebula Award and the World Fantasy Award. Most of his output consists of short stories, written in a very individual style around striking ideas. His collections of short stories include Howard Who?, All About Strange Monsters of the Recent Past, Night of the Cooters, Going Home Again, and the recent Horse of a Different Color. That last one’s still in print, so order it quick before you have to pay collector’s prices —not that it wouldn’t still be worth it.

  Smithsonian Annals of Flight, Vol. 39: The Air War in the West

  Chapter 27: The Krupp Monoplane

  INTRODUCTION

  Its wings still hold the tears from many bullets. The ailerons are still scorched black, and the exploded Henry machine rifle is bent awkwardly in its blast port.

  The right landing skid is missing, and the frame has been restraightened. It stands in the left wing of the Air Museum today, next to the French Devre jet and the X-FU-5 Flying Flapjack, the world’s fastest fighter aircraft.

  On its rudder is the swastika, an ugly reminder of days of glory fifty years ago. A simple plaque describes the aircraft. It rea
ds:

  CRAZY HORSE’S KRUPP MONOPLANE

  (Captured at the raid on Fort Carson, January 5, 1882)

  GENERAL

  1. To study the history of this plane is to delve into one of the most glorious eras of aviation history. To begin: the aircraft was manufactured by the Krupp plant at Haavesborg, Netherlands. The airframe was completed August 3, 1862, as part of the third shipment of Krupp aircraft to the Confederate States of America under terms of the Agreement of Atlanta of 1861. It was originally equipped with power plant #311 Zed of 87¼ horsepower, manufactured by the Jumo plant at Nordmung, Duchy of Austria, on May 3 of the year 1862. Wingspan of the craft is twenty-three feet, its length is seventeen feet three inches. The aircraft arrived in the port of Charlotte on September 21, 1862, aboard the transport Mendenhall, which had suffered heavy bombardment from GAR picket ships. The aircraft was possibly sent by rail to Confederate Army Air Corps Center at Fort Andrew Mott, Alabama. Unfortunately, records of rail movements during this time were lost in the burning of the Confederate archives at Ittebeha in March 1867, two weeks after the Truce of Haldeman was signed.

  2. The aircraft was damaged during a training flight in December 1862. Student pilot was Flight Subaltern (Cadet) Neldoo J. Smith, CSAAC; flight instructor during the ill-fated flight was Air Captain Winslow Homer Winslow, on interservice instructor-duty loan from the Confederate States Navy.