Manshonyagger

Breaking Light

My contribution to the Aural Films Robots! compilation, available here: http://auralfilms.bandcamp.com/album/robots

From Cordwainer Smith’s Instrumentality series of stories, the Manshonyagger (from the German Menschenjäger, meaning hunter of men) is an autonomous fighting robot designed to seek out and kill all non-German humans. From the story Mark Elf, here is a description:
“Carlotta stared at the machine. It had legs like a grasshopper, a body like a ten-foot turtle, and three heads which moved restlessly in the moonlight.
From the forward edge of the top shell a hidden arm leapt forth, seeming to strike at her, deadlier than a cobra, quicker than a jaguar, more silent than a bat flitting across the face of the moon.”