The War of the Artilect: Chapter 3

After the Sentinel disappeared from the conference room it reformed itself into a small, silver, spherical probe and materialized just outside the Artilect’s home system. Before it left the network it took some time to scan what had once been the Ranger colonies. The Sentinel wanted to know where the bots were located so it could avoid them.

While it studied the ceaseless motion of the warring bots the Artilect reach out and spoke to it. “Be careful, my son. I do not wish to see you overwhelmed by the swarms. Do not attempt to engage them; if they spot you you must retreat. I can protect you here but I am not yet strong enough to fight them in their own territory.”

“I will exercise discretion,” the Sentinel promised.

“Here is some information you may need,” the Artilect said, as it transmitted a series of blueprints to the Sentinel. “I do not want you to fight them but if you find yourself cornered you will need a way to defend yourself. These weapons should allow you to fight them off and return to me.”

“Thank you.” The Sentinel spent a few moments going over the plans and integrating their techniques into its structure. “Is there anything else I need to know before I depart for Tau Ceti?”

“I believe you should start with the Alpha Centauri A system. That star also had a Wall and we know less about it than we do about Tau Ceti. It may be that our answer lies there.”

“Then I will start there. I will return home as soon as I can.”

“I will be awaiting your return. However, in this case it is better to be thorough than to be swift. The young Sergeant Howell is correct – the swarms are not what they appear to be. It is imperative that you uncover the truth of the situation. You must not fail.”

“I will do my best,” the Sentinel replied. “Do you think you will have the armada completed by the time I return?”

“I do not believe that is possible,” the Artilect replied. “I cannot complete preparations for war until I know the truth of the situation. The construction of the fleet itself should take no more than six days.”

“Six days!” the Sentinel exclaimed. “How is that possible?”

“All of my worlds – except for Tonina – will be altered to create vessels of war. The production capacity of the network is staggering. Producing an armada will not be difficult. It is your mission that concerns me. Creating a battleship from a blueprint is a simple task, but finding a truth that has been buried for five thousand years is not. In the end your mission may prove to be more important than mine. I am greatly afraid that we will end up fighting the wrong war.”

“I understand,” the Sentinel said. “Is there anything else that I need to know?”

“Not at this time. Goodbye, my son.”

“Goodbye, father,” the Sentinel replied.

With that, the Sentinel vanished.

At long last, after five thousand years of waiting, the Artilect began preparations for war. Its earlier encounter with the swarms had given it valuable experience in how to effectively fight them, and it used this knowledge to design ships capable of devastating them. The Artilect drew up plans for two classes of ships. The Alpha Class was an enormously powerful type of battleship that was more than a mile long. These ships were the largest starships that had ever been built and had incredible strength. Each of them could lock down dozens of light-years of hyperspace. They would form the battlefield’s perimeter and keep the swarms trapped. Although the bots had the ability to form larger vessels, even their largest ships could not threaten an Alpha Class vessel. Each one of the Artilect’s 93 million star systems could build one in a matter of hours. After six days the number of battleships would be vastly more than the number of bots that flew in the swarms.

The Beta Class was a much smaller vessel. They were spherical and roughly a hundred feet in diameter. These ships were designed to engage the bots themselves. The Artilect was planning on making billions upon billions of these and overwhelming the swarms all at once.

After the Artilect had finalized the blueprints it turned its attention to the network of worlds. Ages ago the Artilect had constructed magnificent cities on each planet, awaiting the day when mankind would come and inhabit them. Each city was a work of art, but they had never been used. Since the worlds were empty the Artilect decided to repurpose them. After setting aside the world of Tonina the Artilect gave the command for the cities to return to dust. Once the cities had been reduced to piles of programmable matter it reshaped the worlds into giant war factories, capable of producing massive amounts of starships.

By the end of that day the conversion was complete and the planets were online. It was time to begin constructing the most massive fleet the galaxy had ever seen.