by James Rosone
When Pandolly knocked on his door to collect them, Velator was there with him. There was a robot there with him, holding a serving tray and three glasses of brownish-black liquid.
“I know the contents do not look appealing,” Velator said with a hint of amusement. “The taste, however, should be more than good enough for you. This drink will invigorate your mind and body for the remainder of the day. It should help you in processing the rest of today’s events.”
The three humans shared a nervous glance. Then Ethan grabbed the glass and chugged. Seconds later, his entire demeanor perked up. “Wow, this stuff is great! Is there any way we could program this into our food replicators? This stuff is awesome,” Ethan said, to the amusement of Miles and Nina, who then downed their own glasses of the liquid.
Velator smiled. “I will certainly give you a data chip with the information on it for the food replicator. But first, let us continue with the day’s events. There is much more we will pass along to you than just this.”
They spent the rest of the day touring the various sections of the station. Admiral Hunt felt like he was drinking from a firehose, even with the knowledge booster. That evening, they began a long lecture on the alliance: who all was part of the Galactic Empire, what galaxies were part of the GE and how many races were part of it. This was perhaps the most interesting information Miles had ever heard. It was more fascinating than anything the Altairians had shared with him to date. It also explained a lot about why the Altairians had been reluctant to move forward with his mission proposal. Pandolly was right; there was much about the alliance they did not know.
Velator asked Miles a question. “Do you remember yesterday, when I told you we have found a way to integrate machines and humans without replacing one or the other?”
Miles nodded. “I do. You said you’d explain later on why that was important.”
Velator nodded. “More than eight thousand years ago, our people used to be allied with the Collective. Back then, they were a regular species, like you and me. They were biological beings capable of intelligent thought and emotions. They were truly humble and a unique species to be friends with. For thousands of years…we were comrades.
“Then one day, it all changed. Around the same time, we had been pursuing AI and machine automation, but the Collective took it one step further. You see, they had been chasing what you call ‘God’ or the ‘Creator.’ It had been a single-minded pursuit of theirs for hundreds of years. The more advanced they became, the more they searched for evidence of this god or creator of the universe, until one day, one of their researchers concluded that the only way they could know God, could truly be one with Him, was to transcend their physical bodies and consciousness. They believed if they transcended, they would become immortal, just like God is.”
Hunt consciously had to close his open mouth. His jaw had hung open. Transcend their bodies? he wondered.
“One day, it dawned on them how to do this. How to go beyond their physical bodies and the limits they have to becoming one with God, in a way, to become demigods themselves. This is when they transitioned from biological beings to machines—but not machines like your synthetic humanoids. They found a way to take their individual consciousnesses from their biological bodies and upload them into a single electronically-networked consciousness.”
Holy crap, thought Hunt in horror.
“When they did this, the many became one. We witnessed the most horrific destruction in our history. An entire race, an entire society, destroyed itself as they stripped themselves of their bodies and everything that made them unique, individual, and different. This is when the Amoor, as they were called prior to the transcendence, became known as the Collective. In the span of years, we saw an empire that spanned more than fifty planets and sixty billion people disappear as they transcended—”
Nina interrupted to ask, “What happened to their physical bodies?”
Velator didn’t seem the least put off by her interruption. He faced her and said, “They died.”
“How does this transcendence work?” Ethan asked. “How were they able to convert their entire society into this electronic version of themselves, and what happened to those who didn’t comply?”
Velator studied Ethan for a long moment before he replied, “Your father was right to bring you, Ethan. You are a smart and perceptive individual. I am glad you came. As to your question, the Amoor built a machine that an individual lies down or sits on. Equipment was attached to their bodies, and over a period of several hours, their entire consciousness, what you might call a soul, was recorded and then uploaded into the Collective. Once this process was complete, the physical body was administered a drug that ended its existence. At that point, the individual would only reside within the Collective—”
“But what happened to those who didn’t want to do this?” Ethan pressed.
“It was compulsory, from what we were told. Once an individual’s consciousness joined this Collective, they became part of what is called a Hive. Each of their planets has a central Hive, a nerve center that stores their consciousness. Their ships and starbases operate the same way. Those that chose not to join the Hive were separated from those who did. The Amoor did not want to pollute the Hive with the dissent of those who did not join willingly. Those individuals were later assimilated by force into what the Collective now calls Legion. In our language as in yours, Legion means many.”
No one spoke for a moment as they digested what Velator had just told them. Then Miles recapped what he had just learned about the Collective and Legion to make sure there were no misunderstandings. At the end, he verified, “Was that accurate?”
Velator smiled at their Altairian ambassador. “You were right, Pandolly. They are a bright species, considering how long they’ve been traveling the stars.”
Velator turned back to Miles. “Yes, you summarized it well. Do you want to know what they use Legion for, or have you already figured that out?”
Ethan answered this question, although he probably should have waited for his father, the admiral, to do it. “Legion is used to assimilate those who do not willingly join the Collective.”
The Gallentine nodded his head in approval. “Exactly, very astute. This is why the Collective is so dangerous. Their message of transcendence is very seductive, and very destructive. Each new species they encounter either joins their ranks or become assimilated into Legion.”
“If that’s the case, then why is the Collective not assimilating the Orbots, or the Zodarks, or any of the other races that make up the Dominion alliance?” Nina countered.
“That is a good question, Ambassador. Right now, our best guess is that the Collective is not ready to do this yet. When the Amoor began this process of transcendence, it took their species nearly a hundred years to complete. At least, the peaceful transition took one hundred years. During this time, they forbade any procreation. They focused primarily on assimilating the youth and the elderly. Then they created a version of your combat Synths, which became their enforcer. It phased out their actual military. During this transition, the part of their society that did not want to assimilate attempted to break free of them. They considered what was going on a genocide of their people.
“At this point, a civil war broke out. The Collective, using the shared knowledge of billions of Amoor, was terribly effective at waging war. Then, the war turned truly ugly. The biological side of their society used atomic weapons and cyberattacks to try to defeat the Collective. In response, the Collective, essentially a super-advanced AI now embodied by these incredible killing machines, resorted to cyberweapons and nuclear weapons themselves. This began a twenty-year campaign of terror on both sides. At one point, we were going to intervene. Then we received a warning from them that intervening would not be in our best interest. So, we sat on the sidelines and watched in horror as a society of over sixty billion people destroyed itself.”
“When the war ended, the Collective disappeared from space in
teractions with other species. They stayed within their borders for nearly five hundred years. They spent that time rebuilding their society, their infrastructure, and their industry. When they emerged from their self-imposed isolation, they assimilated some of the smaller spacefaring worlds. At first, it was within their galaxy, the Cygnus galaxy, which neighbors our own. For several hundred years, we did not realize what they were doing. They moved slowly at first, then very quickly.”
Miles stopped Velator. “How do you mean they moved slow, then fast?”
“What they do is send an emissary to the species they have their eye on. If it is a species that will help them in their quest to know and understand the Creator, then they will offer them the opportunity to transcend and join them. If they refuse, then they are assimilated into Legion. You see, to continue their journey to reach God, or even one day become God, species need to want to transcend. They have to want to be a part of this journey. Without a desire to do so, they would pollute that effort.”
“If that’s the case, then why do they keep assimilating races into Legion?” asked Miles. “I mean, at this point, they have to have billions of beings from multiple species assimilated into Legion, and all these consciousnesses are essentially loaded into combat robots, or combat Synths as we call them.”
“This is my fault, Admiral. I did not do a good job explaining,” Velator said, holding up one of his hands. “When the Collective encounter a species that does not want to assimilate, they do not then go on to forcibly assimilate everyone right off the bat. They assimilate a very small percentage of their new adversary to gain the insight and information they need to better fight against the rest of the society they are now at war with.
“They then wage a genocide on their enemy, eliminating every remnant of them. Like a logger or tree cutter clears a forest, they extinguish all the living beings on the planets they capture and can then populate the planet with their own beings. But truth be told, they are nothing more than machines at this point, so they are not really populating these newly conquered planets with their own people so much as they are establishing servers to host themselves on. It’s this enormous network of servers and communication nodes that allows the Collective to be everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It’s also how they continue to build their knowledge in their continued quest to become like God.
“This is why they are so dangerous. They are everywhere and nowhere. That is why, when you presented your plan to knock the Zodarks out of the war, we felt compelled to meet with you. The plan is brilliant, and it would likely work. The only flaw in your strategy is that it would most certainly attract the Collective to the Milky Way galaxy. That is not something your galaxy is ready to handle yet.”
“That still doesn’t answer my question about why the Collective has allied themselves with the Orbots or the Zodarks,” Miles pressed.
“Yes, the Orbots and the Zodarks. The Collective is still expanding. Right now, they have nearly conquered their entire galaxy. They have just invaded two other galaxies. They have also just invaded our galaxy. We are heavily engaged in battle with them right now. Thus far, we have managed to contain them, but that may not last. As to the Orbots and Zodarks, the Collective has astutely cultivated some allies in the various galaxies to assist them in their quest to find or become God. They have recruited these allies with the promise that one day, they will be allowed to transcend into the Hive and join them. Until that time, they are giving their allies advanced technology and huge swaths of territory to claim as their own. If they encounter an adversary that is too sophisticated to defeat or they are on the edge of defeat, then they will send the Legion to assist them.
“In the thousands of years we’ve been fighting the Collective, they’ve only dispatched Legion to four galaxies in which their allies were fighting. In each case, the result was the same: most of the galaxy was destroyed, becoming just another part of the Hive.”
Miles shook his head. It was more than he could process, and it made his head swim. He knew it must be doing the same to Nina and Ethan as well.
“Velator,” said Miles softly, “how do we defeat this Collective, then? You’ve been fighting this war against them for thousands of years, as you say. Surely there must be a way to beat them. Please tell me you haven’t been fighting this war with no hope or idea of how to win.”
Velator considered his response for a moment before responding. “We have thought about this for a long time. We have explored many different strategies as well. The strategy we have been employing up to this point has been one of attrition. We identify where they are building their ships or their mining operations and we take them out. We continue to chip away at their communication nodes and the server farms they establish in the various systems they have conquered. The strategy has worked thus far. It is not the fastest approach, but it has had some success.”
“Why not infect them with a computer virus or wage a cyberwar on them?” Ethan questioned.
“We do that when we are able,” Velator replied. “You must understand, at this point, the Hive is an extremely advanced super-AI—far more advanced than anything you can comprehend. The challenge with a cyberattack or virus is creating one that is clever enough to break through their own firewalls and then damage the Collective before they are able to identify what is happening and stop it.”
“If the Collective is one giant AI, how do they manage and fight their ships?” Ethan asked.
Velator smiled at the question. “Ethan, they may be an AI, but they still have physical functions that need to be performed on a ship, like repairing damage sustained during battle, launching a boarding party, or other tasks that require arms and legs. On each ship, they have a collection of humanoid and sometimes quadrupedal machines that will be loaded with the consciousness of an appropriate person with the knowledge and skills needed to fix the ship or accomplish specific tasks. It is the same with their ground combat operations. The big difference, though, is that, when someone like you or me dies, our souls or beings are received by God—or maybe they are not. Either way, our existence in this universe ends. When their mechanical body dies, their consciousness is downloaded into what we have come to call an Ark.”
“An Ark?” asked Miles.
“When the Collective goes into a battle, whether between large groups of warships or ground forces, an Ark ship is usually nearby. When one of their ships is destroyed or a soldier is killed, their consciousness is uploaded to the Ark’s servers. When the Ark returns to a Collective system that has a Hive located within it, the Ark’s servers are refreshed and the consciousness of those lost during the battle are transferred to the Hive, and they live on.”
“So if this Ark ship wasn’t nearby, then the consciousness of those lost during a battle would be gone forever?” asked Ethan.
Velator canted his head as he sized Ethan up. He turned to look at Miles. “Are all your military officers as sharp as your son?”
Smiling at the compliment, Miles countered, “I’d like to think so. Then again, I think he got more of his mother’s smarts than mine.”
Velator laughed at the comment. “To answer your question, Ethan, yes. They essentially die; at least their consciousness ends. This is why you will always see the Collective fleets traveling with an Ark ship.”
Ethan pounced on that revelation. “Velator, if that’s true, then your answer to fighting the Collective is to target their Ark ships. As soon as your ships engage them in a battle, you focus your entire effort on taking out those ships, forcing them to withdraw rather than risk losing the consciousnesses of those involved in the battle.”
Velator shook his head, deflating the younger Hunt’s optimism. “Do you think a superior race like ours, one that has been at war with the Collective for as long as we have, has not tried that? We have, and on some occasions we have been able to destroy one of their Ark ships. You were correct in your assumption that, without an Ark ship present, their fleets do tend to retreat rather than ris
k losing their consciousness. However, these ships are not only heavily protected, they are veritable tanks in battle. They can absorb incredible amounts of damage before they are destroyed. And usually, when they are in danger, they will simply jump away.”
Velator paused for a moment before he continued, “The Collective is not an easy adversary to fight. They are cunning, and they are ruthless. They are also numerous. Then again, perhaps you humans are just what we need. New blood and a new set of eyes to look at the problem.”
For the next six hours, the five of them continued to talk about the Collective, the Hive, and Legion. It was a lot of information to absorb, but it was the last chance they had to talk with their Gallentine host before they transferred to the planet surface to take a brief tour of the capital and meet with the Emperor.
Chapter Seventeen
Fleet Operations
New Eden
RNS George Washington
Admiral Chester Bailey sat facing Captain Fran McKee and Vice Admiral Abigail Halsey. He knew Abigail wasn’t going to like what he was about to do.
Tough luck—she’ll get used to it, Bailey thought.
“Fran, I’m sorry for stopping you from going on leave for a few days while I flew out here. What I need to tell you is best said in person, and frankly, I wanted to be the one to give you the news.”
Bailey noticed Fran squirm a bit in her seat, unsure of what was coming next.
He fished in his pocket for a small black box, pulled it out and handed it to Fran. She took the box and opened it slowly. Then her eyes grew wide as she realized what was in it and what it meant. Her entire life had just changed, and she knew it.
McKee wiped a tear away. “I-I don’t know what to say, sir. I never thought I’d become an admiral. Heck, I didn’t even think I had enough time in grade as a captain to be an admiral.”
