Penny Royal (the Black AI)
An artificial intelligence constructed in Factory Station Room 101, during the Polity war against the prador. Its crystal mind was faulty, burdened with emotions it could not encompass when it was hurled into the heat of battle. Running the destroyer that it named Puling Child, it fought and survived, then annihilated eight thousand troops on its own side before going AWOL. It changed into something dark then – a swarm robot whose integrated form was like a giant sea urchin. Blacklisted by the Polity for ensuing atrocities, it based itself in the Graveyard – a borderland created between the Polity and the Prador Kingdom after the war. There it continued its evil games, offering transformations for the right price, but ones that were never good for the recipients. It was nearly destroyed in a deal that went wrong. Later restored to function by the scorpion war drone Amistad, it apparently became a good AI . . . But now the black AI is on the move again, its plans obscure and its actions often devastating. It is regarded by the Polity as a paradigm-changing threat.
Thorvald Spear
Resurrected from a recording of his own mind, a hundred years after the war, he is the only survivor of the eight thousand troops slaughtered by Penny Royal on the planet Panarchia. He resolved to have his revenge on the AI and to that end sought out its old destroyer, whose location he had learned during the war. Taking command of it, he set out in search of the rogue AI. During this search he discovered that his very desire for vengeance had been created by Penny Royal, for it had tampered with his memories. Nevertheless his quest is reinforced by an artefact he found aboard the destroyer – one of Penny Royal’s spines. It is downloading memories of its victims into his mind. He now believes he is the instrument the AI, created for its own destruction.
Riss
An assassin drone and terror weapon. Made in Room 101 in the shape of a prador parasite which has a passing resemblance to a cobra, her purpose was to inject prador with parasite eggs, spreading infection and terror amidst them. The end of the war meant she lost her purpose for being and, while searching for a new purpose, lost even more when she encountered Penny Royal. Thorvald Spear found her somnolent and bereft near the AI’s home base in the Graveyard. She now accompanies him in his quest for vengeance.
Sverl
A prador who disagreed with the new king’s decision to make peace with the Polity. He went renegade and hid out with other prador of similar mind in the Graveyard. He could not understand how it was possible that the prador had started to lose against weak humans and their detestable AIs. He sought understanding of this conundrum from Penny Royal, but got more than he bargained for. Penny Royal initiated his transformation into a grotesque amalgam of prador, human and AI, so he could better understand each. Now he seeks some resolution to his situation and feels only the black AI can provide it.
Cvorn
Another prador who joined Sverl in exile. Upon discovering Sverl’s transformation, he allied with other prador to attack him. During a planetary battle he put the shell people of that world – humans who are worshipfully trying to turn themselves into prador – in danger. The attempt failed and Cvorn fled, but he still remains a danger to Sverl and the shell people Sverl has chosen to protect.
Captain Blite
A trader whose business edges into illegality. During a deal that turned sour he encountered Penny Royal, who killed his crew. His second encounter with the AI was when it used him and his ship as an escape from the world of Masada. With his ship under the control of the black AI, Blite has witnessed its obscure business in the Graveyard and elsewhere and come to realize that it may be correcting past wrongs. After recognizing this, he and his crew were abandoned again on Masada, but the advanced technology left aboard their ship (not to mention their first-hand knowledge of Penny Royal) means they are now of great interest to the Polity AIs. Blite also feels in his gut that his business with Penny Royal is not yet done . . .