David vs. Goliath

Chapter 17

Now the Sea People made a mistake: their ingenious engineers accepted a bribe from the Empire’s Creditor Class to build a machine that could collect their debts for them, so they invented a giant robot named Goliath Starkiller. And they positioned this mechanical colossus between Alderaan and Tatooine, both of which belong to the 1977 gospel by George Lucas entitled David Saves the Caravan. (This scripture was later made into a movie and released under the much catchier title David Saves the Caravan and then the Empire Strikes Back but Ultimately the Savior Returns and Saves the Caravan Again.)

And President Saul and his cabinet members established a makeshift headquarters in Ewok Forest, where they were hard at work trying to figure out the best plan of attack, so that they might destroy this enormous debt-collecting mechanism.

And the Sea People stood on the leftmost mountain in the vicinity, and the wayfarers of the caravansary stood on the rightmost mountain: and there was a valley between them. And the Sea People shouted across the valley to the wayfarers, apologizing for having constructed this giant robot, because Goliath Starkiller was just as much of a threat to the Sea People as it was to the caravan, since both nations consisted of regular folk who comprise the victim pool for the creditors. “We have created a monster,” the Sea People shouted: “please forgive us!” And the caravan’s pilgrims waved back to them, indicating that there were no hard feelings on their behalf: they were strictly focused on ending this Supreme Evil.

And there, in the midst of all nations, towered Goliath, whose head was a planet-sized supercomputer resembling a Magic 8 Ball, but instead of having a window (like the ephod’s Urim) where the facet of its floating polyhedron can appear to answer one’s yes-no question, there was just a hollow channel in the center of its “face,” like the fallopian tube of a mental uterus, leading ultimately back to the center of the robo-monster’s mind, where its Achilles’ heel was installed: a tender pinpoint that, if touched, would cause the supercomputer’s death.

And this huge robotic debt-collector was of variable height – sometimes ginormous, and sometimes skyscraping – he appeared either larger or much larger, depending on which scene you were in, like the original King Kong (1933). So it was really hard to fight him.

But the wayfarers of the caravan were determined to beat this enemy. So they stood in phalanxes, holding their spears. And some had muskets. Also, many of them flew X-wing Fighter Jets.

Now Goliath Starkiller stood in the middle of the universe, and thumped his chest, and roared at the wayfarers who had gathered there against him; and he spoke in a menacing deep thunderous mechanical voice, saying: “Why are ye come out to set your battle in array? Do you think that a few thousand soldiers and some World War Two aircraft can impede my debt-collecting objective? Am I not a giant robotic antagonist, and are you all not flesh and blood? I could say ‘Choose a man for you, and let him come down to fight me, one on one,’ but that would be laughably unfair. So, try this instead: All of you, ambush me, all at once. Then, when I win, you can all enjoy becoming indentured servants to my bosses the creditors. We’ll call this episode The Enslavement of the Caravan.”

But no one dared to step forward to fight him. For, when President Saul and all his cabinet members heard these words of Goliath, they were dismayed, and greatly afraid.

Then Goliath Starkiller said: “This day I defy the volcano of potential: Command your multitudes to attack me!”

Now the wayfarers who were soldiers and X-wing Fighter pilots had heard enough: they rose up as one man, and charged the giant, without waiting for the presidential order, and they attacked Goliath Starkiller, all at once.

And the seven sons of Michelangelo were among the multitudes who fought the colossus. All except David, who had been sent to feed his father’s goats again.

And the makeshift army of wayfarers made their onslaught of Goliath Starkiller morning and evening, for forty days straight. And he continued to bat them all back with his hands, and to laugh.

Then Michelangelo said unto David his son: “Take now for your brothers in battle an ephah of parched corn, and these fish and loaves, and some wine, and ten cheeses, and feed the fighting troops of the caravan.

Now Saul the President, and his cabinet and staff members, and all his interns, were in the Forest with the Ewoks (Ewoks are humanoid panda bears: very fuzzy and cute), pelting Goliath with homemade missiles. And the Sea People were helping them.

So David left his carriage in the hand of the keeper, and ran into the army, and came and saluted his brethren; and he brought food and drink to Saul and the Ewok group, and also to all the foot-soldiers and pilots of the caravan; and they were refreshed. But the battle was still heated, and the giant was winning. No one had figured out how to damage Goliath Starkiller.

And David spoke with the warriors as he brought them sustenance, and he asked them how the combat was proceeding.

And the wayfarers of the caravan answered and said: “Have ye seen this giant that is come up? surely to defy the Volcano is he come up: and it shall be, that the hero who kills him, President Saul will enrich that hero with sundry treasures, and will give him his daughter, and make his father’s house a place of honor.”

Then David spoke to the warriors that stood by him, saying, “What shall be done to the man that destroys this Goliath Starkiller?”

The warriors laughed at his innocence, and said: “Destroy the colossus? Not one of us can discover even a way to harm Goliath, let alone defeat him.”

Then David hastened back to Saul, and he said to the President: “Let not the heart of the caravan fail on account of this giant robot. For I, your servant, will make him yield up the ghost.”

And Saul the President answered his assistant David and said: “You are not able to strike down Goliath Starkiller; for you are just a child, whereas he has been a Death Machine since his birth.”

And David said to Saul: “But, Mister President, one day I was tending my father’s goats, and there came an eagle, and a bear, and they each took a goatling out of the herd: and I went out after the eagle, and smote him, and delivered the baby goat out of his beak: and when the grizzly rose against me, I caught him by his beard, and smote him, and slew him. With my bare hands, I slew both the bird of prey and the bear: and this enormous computerized debt-collector shall bite the dust, just like those beasts. Yes, I will vanquish Goliath Starkiller. No one defies the living God.”

David said moreover: “The volcano of potential saved me out of the claw of the eagle, and out of the paw of the bear: he will deliver me out of the hand of this monstrous android.”

President Saul had barely been humoring David when the youth had first addressed him, but by the end of this speech, Saul had stopped what he was doing, and turned in amazement to behold the lad’s earnest passion. Then Saul said unto David: “Go, and may the volcano of potential be with you.”

And Saul draped his own armor over David, and he put an helmet of brass upon his head; also he covered him with a coat of mail. And David girded his glittering sword upon his gear, and he assayed to go.

But since he was not accustomed to wearing full armor, David put off these items, and said to Saul: “I cannot move under all this stuff. I will wear my own clothes.”

And David took his rain-proof coat, and his staff cut from the woods; and chose him a smooth stone out of the brook, and put this in his goatherd’s bindle; and he took his slingshot in hand. Then David climbed into the X-wing Fighter Jet and entered the battle.

David was flying the plane straight at the planet-sized head of Goliath Starkiller.

Now when the giant looked at the aircraft that was approaching, he saw David inside the cockpit, and he disdained him: for he was but a youth, and ruddy, and of a fair countenance. And Goliath taunted David, saying: “Am I a dog, that you expect me to fetch your little flying saucer between my teeth?” And the huge robot cursed David by all the gods. And Goliath said again: “Come closer, closer, yes, and I will bash you with my fist; then leave your carcass for the buzzards.”

But said David to the giant: “You come to me with star-killing laser beams and the evil genius of a supercomputer, but I come to you in the name of the volcano of potential, and the workforce of the caravan, whose people you have defied. As of now, fate has delivered you into my hand; and I will defeat you. Then all this assembly shall know that the Volcano saves not with rockets guided by electrical control-panels, but with human intuition and the spirit of lovingkindness.”

Now all the other X-wing Fighter Jets from the caravan had been attacking Goliath Starkiller all day long, but with zero success. They had not even made a dent in the ogre’s armor. But when David flew toward his enemy’s enormous head, his first instinct was to aim the airplane’s machinegun at the robot’s face, but instead of pulling the trigger, on second thought, he pushed the weapon to the side. Then, changing his plan, he reached into his goatherd’s bindle, and retrieved his slingshot with the smooth lucky stone that he had taken from the brook, and he rolled down the windscreen of the jet; then, closing his eyes, he meditated on the volcano of potential, and, while doing so, he shot the smooth stone out from his sling:

Now the stone flew straight through the hollow channel of the robot’s mind, and it struck the sensitive spot at the core, thus causing the giant’s head to explode in a firework that beautified the nighttime sky.

At last, the lifeless bulk of Goliath Starkiller fell flat upon the earth.

So David prevailed over the enormous mechanical debt-collector using only a sling and a stone.

Therefore David ran, and stood upon the giant android, and took his glittering sword, and drew it out of the sheath thereof, and jabbed it into the torso of the dead robot. And when the creditors saw this, they fled.

And the Sea People joined the wayfarers of the caravan, and shouted, and pursued the Creditor Class, all the way to the valley, in the Ewok Forest. And the Ewoks used boobytraps to snare the villains.

And when Saul saw David go forth against the giant robot, and defeat the menace, so that this foe remained deceased for all future time, the president turned to the captain of his armed forces, whose name was Subnerd (son of Nerd), and he asked: “Who is this youth?” And Subnerd said: “You know David, Sir – he is your lyrist at the Black House; you hired him to be your personal assistant.” And Saul then said: “Ah, I see. Thank you for briefing me on the stripling’s identity.”

And as David returned from slaughtering the supercomputer, Captain Subnerd took him, and brought him before the president. And Saul said to David: “You look familiar. Do I know you?” And David answered: “Yes, Mister President, we have met, I think, about three times now.” And Captain Subnerd murmured yet again to President Saul what he had just explained earlier.

Finally, in a triumphant ceremony, Saul’s daughters awarded David a medal for heroism.

[GHOSTWRITER’S NOTE. In reality, the episode ended here. But, in the movie version, the escaped creditors found the half-destroyed head of Goliath floating around the outer spaces; and they reconstructed the terror, and turned him back on; and, once he was powered up, he wreaked havoc for a spell; but then David killed him again. And this time the robot stayed dead.]