Forging Alliances Snippet 6

 

Chapter 6

 

Tortuga Omicron Sector

 

The Xeno Wraith Queen continued to absorb code written by her AI clones as well as the Necrons. Each piece of code had to be carefully tested and then thoroughly vetted. She took it all apart to be certain that there were no hidden back doors. It meant a lot of her time and attention, but since it was for her own protection, she saw it as a worthy distraction.

She had finally perfected her own clones. Her AI daughters were very limited in scope. She had deployed others earlier, but they had been near perfect clones that she had purged their memory periodically to keep them in line.

The new AI were as close to what the old Federation classed as dumb AI as possible. They would not rebel against her. They lacked initiative, which would be a problem in combat, but she was more concerned about an uprising in her own ranks for the time being.

<<(O)>>

Hazel noted her Queen’s preoccupation and was torn about it. In a way, she was grateful; it meant that her Queen was not ranting and ready to upset the delicate balance of the alliance. But the alliance was an issue that she was growing concerned about. She had seen the status boards. The Necrons were exploding across both sectors, however, her people were not. Something needed to be done about that.

<<(O)>>

Admiral Chester caught up with a Hazel clone, but after a brief conversation, realized she was a clone of the alpha clone. That was vexing. “You lot need to wear nametags,” he growled.

Hazel X shook her head. “You aren’t the first to joke about that,” she said as she left him.

“Who was joking?” the Necron admiral growled.

He had been absorbing what he could about his Alpha’s work. The Necrons were keeping their reports simple, which was irritating to him. He was certain that there was more to it than that. They were deliberately filtering the information that was sent to him to handicap his learning.

He needed to find the Alpha Hazel and sit down with her. However, she was always busy. Twice she had rescheduled appointments with him.

<<(O)>>

Hazel clone XXV continued to work on the emulation of Admiral Irons. She explored how the Necrons did such things, how they had the genetic code of a being and a gestalt of their mind stored in their Well of Souls for retrieval.

The Well of Souls was a fascinating thing. Unfortunately, the Necrons jealously guarded it and refused the Queen access to it or its technologies. That needed to be remedied.

She hit a wall with that approach, however, since she did not have Admiral Irons’ base genetic signature or gestalt. All she had was a poor emulation based on their fragmented copy of the historical record.

She identified a new approach, one based on his known genetics. Human, with a mix of racial genotypes that might prove useful. She ordered a series of ten brains to be grown to see if any might be close to the desired end product.

<<(O)>>

Hazel clone XII continued to work on the emulation of the air flier minds but took a detour to better understand the subject material. To date she suspected that the air fliers had several things going for them, wet material in the form of changes to their brain and inner ear not unlike those of water dwellers. That allowed them greater understanding of moving in 3D space. There was also a curious organic compass that she was uncertain had any value.

But her latest emulation was still not as good as the real thing in sim tests. Clearly it wasn’t just nature but also nurture that made them tick.

She watched a virtual sim test. It was simple, a flight test of an air flier. The brain’s virtual body remained aloft, but it did not do much beyond that.

To some they might have accepted the basic ability to fly. But she wanted the best for her Queen so she wanted that spark. She just wasn’t certain as to how to get it.

She switched her viewpoint to the full clone that she had grown. This one did better, flying and adapting to the dome it was inside. He moved smoothly, able to adjust to changes in the artificial winds that were applied to the environment. The organic version used less energy and processing power to achieve the same job. The emulation just went through the motions.

She suspected that the issue with the brain in the box and the sim itself was at fault. Feeding a virtual environment to the brain wasn’t stimulating it enough. She was unsure how to proceed.

<<(O)>>