The Communist Machinery

[zeta.foxtrot]

The Dropship ride from Zhukovski station to the surface of planet JiangXi was uneventful. It was quite a bit rougher than a docking ring transit, as atmospheric buffeting rocked the ship about. Some of the weaker stomached of the scientists, whom were used to unchanging artificial gravity on space stations, went for the air-sick bags immediately. Stronger willed men, like Dr. White, dealt with it.

"Professor. We will be landing near the entrance to the TALOS facility in ten minuites. We will need to transverse several blocks of ruins to get to it's entrance. You and your men will be accompanied by an armed escort. There is no cause for concern."

"Yes yes, I know all this." White replied, thoroughly uninterested in what the Coalition Lieutenant had to say.

His contempt for the Coalition had only increased after becoming jaded with the security and what he perceived tactless intimidation tactics that were ubiquitous around here. Captian Breen was no longer with them, having taken the Windhunter out of Coalition Territory on Komm's orders. It made him uneasy, as it meant there would be no easy escape should the coalition double cross them.

---

Beneath the dropship, the bombed-out ruins of New Hangzhou city sprawled out. The nuclear shock offensive by the Phantoms had irradiated much of the planet, leaving only the decaying shells of buildings and a few, mutated, desperate inhabitants. The Jungle was already busily reclaiming what the Phantoms had not totally destroyed.

The ship landed at a small coalition outpost. Little more than a landing pad, fuel depot, and a series of guard towers and gun turrets. White stood and gathered his duffel bag containing a myriad of scientific equipment, before standing up and exiting the transport. His skin felt the sudden sticky embrace of the humid jungle air, contrasting with the cold, air-conditioned interior of the ship.

"...radiation exposure levels in the area are within safe tolerances assuming you do not linger on the surface and remain in shielded vehicles or buildings. Mutated 'wildlife' and malfunctioning security drones will be your main concerns..." Spoke a Coalition officer, standing beside the small line of scientists and Coalition naval infantry.

White took note of this, as he walked out into the bright sunlight and acrid heat of the Jungle air. He was lead into a large APC, equipped with vine cutters, oversized monster truck-style wheels, and bulldozer blade plows for maneuvering in the chaotic environment. It was also, fortunately, air conditioned.

The drive from the landing pad to the TALOS facility entrance was somewhat livelier then the dropship trip. White had a small view-port to look out of, but what he saw would shock less stoic individuals. Near the entrance to the outpost, he watched as a firing squad of coalition infantry execute a number of obviously mutated former inhabitants of the city. Apparently they strayed far too close to the TALOS facility for comfort.

Eventually, the small convoy arrived as close to the entrance as could be brought. They would have to make a short trek through a series of dense ruins to the bulkhead doors. Exiting the vehicle, the squishy, unarmed scientists were surrounded by a large platoon of coalition infantrymen. Rifles raised and at the ready, all aiming outward.

"Stay close. If you drop your guard out here, you're liable to end up on something's dinner menu."

The group began the somewhat windy trek into a structure which might have at one time been a parking garage, or the base of a skyscraper. While it had obviously been structurally re-inforced after the fact, there were massive holes in the ceiling through which vines and sunlight poured through.

The group wound it's way through the first set of buildings, before walking across a rather unpaved trail, which had apparently been the site of a recent mudslide. A few bent light poles were poking up through the mud, and what looked like rooftop antennae. It soon occurred that they were standing atop a buil-

*CRASH!*

Without warning, a large sinkhole opened up beneath the group, causing White and several scientists and soldiers to fall through into the building. Fortunately, their fall was cushioned by the accumulation of relatively soft soil which fell with them...

"ARE YOU OKAY?" The voice of the coalition lieutenant bellowed, over the rumble of debris falling into the chamber. White himself was uninjured, save a few cuts and bruises. Quickly he picked himself up and dusted himself off. Looking around the dark chamber in which they lay.

Immediately, he saw a bright red light, staring back at him. The clank of metal on concrete stomping toward him. Quickly, he drew the scientific flashlight he always kept on his person, pointing it at the source...

An apparently damaged metal automaton was shambling toward them, almost zombie like. It's shell was grimy and rust-covered, but it obviously still worked. While it was missing an arm, it's remaining one was tipped in a very menacing looking sword blade.

УНИЧТОЖИТЬ! The machine yelled, in a harsh artificial tone, before charging as fast as it could on it's thin metal legs, directly for Komm. Shocked, he attempted to shield himself, and block the incoming machine, before two shots rang out, causing the robot's torso to explode into a shower of shrapnel and oil.

The coalition lieutenant and marine escort stood flanking White, rifles raised as the drone's remains clanked to the ground.

"What the hell was that?!" The shaken-up scientist demanded.

"Old security drone. They were used at the time of the TALOS facility's operation. The surviving ones follow the last programming they were left with; Kill All Intruders."

"Bloody well hope there aren't any more of them!" Komm snarked, dusting himself off. The seemingly stoic lieutenant simply slung his rifle and walked ahead.

"We are very close to the entrance. It is just beyond this building. Let's move."

---

A few hours later, after a rather invasive decontamination procedure, and a brief period of 'settling in', the Scientists had begun the nuts and bolts of their research.

The TALOS facility still remained highly classified, and many sections were deemed off limits. Armed guards were everywhere, and many signs had been hastily painted over. However, in this case, White felt somewhat more at home.

This was still a prim and proper research facility. Rough around the edges, but it was somewhere he could get actual work done, hopefully with as little red tape as possible.

"Doctor Itou, I want you to run an initial litnancy test on the code fragment. Use one of the sacrificial servers the coalition provided. Observe everything the code does. See what it's doing."

"Very well. I will set to it momentarily." The diminutive Kusarian man, White's current go-to man, half-bowed and quickly made his way down to the room where the Consortium DCU containing the code was being kept.

Effectively dubbed 'the sarcophagus', it was an incredibly thick walled, incredibly well shielded room. No electronics of any kind were inside, save the non-networked 'sacrificial' computers the coalition used to study the code. A series of monitors were set up connected to the CPU, each displaying code fragments and constant diagnostics on various programs, so that the scientists could see in real time what was happening, and infer results from that.

Ito went through the large bulkhead that isolated the room, and began his procedure. Checking that the control core was functioning normally, he instructed the engineer in charge of physically operating the equipment to start plugging things in.

Specially constructed adapter conduits were linked from the server to the infected Drone Controller, and Ito and the other scientists on hand sat back and observed the screens. Their trained eyes looking for anything anomalous. It wasn't long before they inferred something rather peculiar...

...nothing.

"Is it hooked up right?" Ito asked, referring to the lanky coalition engineer who was going over the conduit bundle.

"Well I donno, why don't you come here and lick it. Tell me." He replied in jest, but stating the rather obvious.

A brief moment of horror occurred to Dr. Ito, as according to what he had inferred, the code could potentially infect him as easily as a machine.

"Do we have a link with the Drone Core?"

"I'm seeing it in here. Really weird architecture, but it's there. The code just plain isn't doing anything." Replied one of the junior scientists observing the monitors.

Ito nodded, walking out of the sarcophagus and yelling up to White. "The code isn't doing anything. It could be dead?"

White replied. "Don't be silly, that code is far smarter then all of us. It probably knows that we're trying to study it and is laying low. You'll have to take the long watch. Have eyes on those screens at all times."

Dr. Ito was less than enthused, that he now had to have a staring contest with an intelligent computer virus. Quickly, he walked over to the only other piece of technology allowed in the sarcophagus, a coffee maker, and acquired a cup. Sitting back in his seat and stared at the screens.

He took a long sip of the coffee. Immediately noting the displeasing chemically taste. 'Typical cheap coalition' he thought. 'Can't even make decent coffee'.

---

"Where the HELL is Garcia? Does he have ANY idea what he's doing!?" Atticus Komm yelled out, as he burst through the doors into the Laboratory, obviously irate.

Dr. White was the first man in his path, and naturally the first to get spat on when Komm began ranting. "How the hell should I know? What's got your knickers in a twist? What about Garc..."

"He's planning to infect a consensus AI with the Alpha Code!"

This stopped White in his tracks.

"We've barely arrived. And he's already planning to go ahead with it. I thought I spelled it out for him. It must not come in contact with any technology of any sort! Did you run a litnancy test yet?"

"Ito is running one now, but the code knows we're on to it. It won't do anything with us watching it."

Komm immediately headed down the stares to the entrance of the sarcophagus as Professor White was speaking, in order to personally give a verbal slapping to whoever went ahead and started hooking up computers and planning AI integration before he arrived. However, when her turned the corner to enter the sarcophagus, he stopped abruptly, a look of shock on his face.

Dr. Ito was sprawled on the floor, completely and unnaturally drained of color. Dead.