"Dune 03 - Whipping Mek (Short Story)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

flushed hot with embarassment. “That makes sense.”

“Chirox is just a surrogate enemy, a target to fight. He represents all

thinking machines in my mind.”

“Like a whipping boy.”

“A whipping mek.” The mercenary smiled. “We can set it to various

fighting levels for training purposes.” He stepped closer to the ominous-looking

combat robot. “Stand down.”

The robot lowered its weapons-studded limbs, then retracted them into its

core, even the impaired arm, and stood waiting for further commands. With a

sneer, the man slammed the hilt of his pulse sword against the mek’s chest,

knocking the mek backward a step. The optic-sensor eyes flickered orange. The

rest of the machine’s face, with its crudely shaped mouth and nose, did not

move.

Confidently, the man tapped the metallic torso. “This limited robot—I

dislike the term thinking machine—is totally under our control. It has served the

mercenaries of Ginaz for nearly three generations now.” He deactivated his pulse

sword, which was designed to scramble the sophisticated gelcircuitry of a

thinking machine. “I am Zon Noret, one of the fighters assigned to this ship.”

Intrigued, Vergyl ventured closer. “Where did you find this machine?”

“A century ago, a Ginaz salvage scout found a damaged thinking machine

ship, from which he retrieved this broken combat robot. Since then, we’ve wiped

its memories and reinstalled combat programming. It allows us to test ourselves

against machine capabilities.”

DUNE: WHIPPING MEK

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