Chapter 400 (2/2)
On board the diplomatic vessel Dreams of Something More watched as Words Spoken We Fear and 117 went over the data.
Just the sight of the data, what she could understand, made her shudder in response.
Standard operating procedure now when the megastructures produced by those massive superstructures are sighted is to load planet crackers and nova-sparks, she thought to herself. She cleaned her antenna, staring at the holotank. Every time one of the megastructures was spotted, Space Force or their predecessors descended upon the megastructure, not to explore, not to take it over, not to research or examine, but to obliterate it from reality.
The gold mantid shuddered again, 'closing' her eyes and taking a deep breath.
So who made them? The Lanaktallan? My people? The mythological third race? All of us together? A fourth race? Who was behind these horror shows that drift silently through space, moving slowly through the galactic arm on a course for the silence between the galaxies? she wondered. Who are the inhabitants? Why those terrible species? When did it all start? What is the goal of those drifting creations and their terrible inhabitants?
Who? Why? When? What?
Dreams stared at the holotank. There were massive scaffolding structures. Each 'beam' as large as a continent. The superstructures themselves were two million miles high, just under two hundred million miles wide and long. A flat square devoted to the construction of the object within. Some of them were half assembled, or perhaps half disassembled. There were smaller rectangles, the smallest being a hundred thousand miles thick and a million miles to a side along the X-Y axis.
”Look at that,” Fights said softly. ”That one is being layered.”
Dreams shook her head. ”All this does is ask more questions.”
”But we know that the third race did exist, that they were here, that they took part in this,” Fights said slowly.
--know base material now-- 117 transmitted.
”The same as the other structures?” Dreams asked.
--yes-- 117 said. --only good for mega and superstructures worthless for other uses--
Dreams closed her eyes. She had seen the documentaries. She had read about it.
Enough mass to build four Dyson spheres, or thousands of Dyson Swarms, or even an inverted Dyson Sphere, and they chose to build those, she thought, staring at the screen. How do those stop the heat death of the universe? How do those let you survive entropy.
She stared at the holotank, willing more answers.
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”Are they reacting to our presence?” Choi asked. On the bridge, she was silent. In a crash couch, the ship's atmosphere pumped into the tanks. She was still connected to the rest of the crew by fiber optic cable, the ship rigged for silent running.
The ship had made three more jumps since the first. They were now only a light day from the nearest active structure.
Her crew's stress metrics were stable, elevated, but stable.
”I'm keeping an eye, but it doesn't look like it,” Hooker said. ”I'm good at telling when the enemy has seen my tank.”
Choi kept from snorting a laugh.
”My God, look, that one is only half completed,” Commander Dennison said softly.
Choi looked at the scan that was put up. Continents were visible, either bare rock surrounded by oceans or vegetation covered instead.
”That one is almost completed,” Dennison said. ”There's no energy signatures within the megastructure itself except at the cities in the middle of the supercontinents.”
”Any sign of whoever's in charge of all of this?” Choi asked.
”Negative,” Hooker said. ”The only space craft I've seen are obviously devoted to construction.
”How long do you think it takes to build one of these?” Choi asked.
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--1.4x10^5 years-- 117 said. --atmosphere creation at 1.38x10^5 water addition after soil after that--
”They're laying the soil, from the looks of it,” Speaks said softly. ”There's one that looks finished. You can see how the scaffolding is being removed.
”Do you think it's automated?” Dreams asked, staring at the holotank. It's like a nightmare, she thought to herself. Where your dream goes from pleasant to horrifying without warning.
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”Must be,” Hooker said. ”By the Digital Omnimessiah, the fact it's just sitting out here, automated, pumping this stuff out for a hundred millions years.”
”We know where they're coming from now,” Captain Choi said. ”The urge to novaspark all of this is overwhelming.”
”Screw answers,” Jaisley said. ”These things have wreaked absolute havoc and xenocide everywhere they've encountered anyone else. They're locusts.”
”Got damaged superstructures,” Hammond said. ”Old damage. Never repaired,” his hand twitched toward the panic button. ”Harvester hulls. Multiple type.”
”Get me readings,” Choi snapped, sitting up.
Long moments stretched into minutes. Finally Jaisley spoke.
”They're dead. Long dead. I'm seeing damage to them, damage to their building cradles,” he said. ”Based on what readings I'm getting, they've been dead a long time.”
”How long?” Choi asked.
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--1.1x10^6 years-- 117 said. He was silent a minute. --last millennia of Precursor War--
Dreams nodded. ”Any estimation of what happened to the object that led us here?”
--yes-- 117 answered, then turned back to the data.
”Can you share with us?” Speaks asked.
--yes-- 117 transmitted. --not classified--
More silence.
”117, what's your estimation of what occurred here that led to our mysterious object floating through space till we discovered it?” Dreams asked.
117 flashed icons for annoyance and pulled his attention from the data streaming in from the six scout ships. He accessed the holotank that sat idle and moved a simulation of what had happened, based on the best estimates the green engineer caste could come up with, onto that tank.
--there-- 117 said, and went back into the system.
Dreams watched the holotank as it came up.
It showed the satellite/space station they had discovered orbiting a stellar micro-mass with three amorphous blobs representing masses that the green engineer caste had discovered evidence of based on the structure they had discovered.
It showed an estimation of the angle of the mass driver hit that had damaged the station, sending it tumbling. The micro-mass then detonated, pushing the already tumbling space station with the blast wave, accelerating it. The micro-mass pushed against the nebula, the space dust and particles attenuating the blast until it was reflected back and away, following the path of least resistance.
”So, it looks like the first shots of the Precursor War might have happened right here,” Dreams mused.
”I concur,” Words Spoken We Fear said formally. ”I think I may have an idea of what caused it.”
”There is only enough for one,” Dreams said sadly.
”Look. Harvester manufacturing cradles,” Fights said. ”The big ones.”
”What they were originally designed to do and then they were adapted to war machines?” Dreams wondered.
--non combat design-- 117 said. --affirmative--
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”Non Combat Harvester manufacturing cradles,” Hammond said. ”I'd estimate this stuff is older than most of the Precursor Automated War Machines we've seen.”
Captain Choi nodded. The ship had moved to within a light hour of the Harvesters. The other five ships were examining structures, all of them under a light hour from the largest of the structures.
”Look at him. He was almost finished before those craters got put all over his hull,” Jaisley said.
”Seen patterning like that. Near C Velocity cannons. From the size of them, ship of the line mass drivers,” Hooker said. He chuckled. ”They destroyed the engines but that's about it. Not the work of a pro, I can see a dozen points I'd have prioritized targeting on besides the engines.”
”They're just sitting here. Dead. Dormant,” Choi said, shaking her head. ”For about a hundred million years they've just sat there.”
”While the main factory has been spitting out the megastructures to terrorize the galaxy,” Dechutes said softly.
”So we've got the Lanks, the Mantids, Mini-Thullus, but none of them match what we've seen on these structures,” Hooker said. ”So where did those come from?”
”A hundred million years of evolution?” Choi guessed. ”We were tiny little mammals avoiding big ass lizard chickens back then. The things on those megastructures could have evolved from field mice into the things those superstructures hosted.”
”Signal from the Admiral,” Hammond said. He was silent a moment. ”We're to return immediately.”
”Any reason given?” Choi asked.
”We're going to novaspark it all. Planet crackers and novasparks. The diplomatic fleet carries the firepower necessary to do the job.”
”Who the hell authorized that?” Choi saked, alerting engineering that they were about to slide out.
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”Confederate Military,” Words Spoken We Fear said. ”I don't blame them. These things have been a plague on the galaxy for a hundred million years. They're reavers, locusts, they've denuded entire systems, stripped entire planets of every living thing, siphoned off atmospheres and water, even ripped up the easily accessible resources.”
”This site contains answers to questions we'd barely begun to ask. It contains evidence on what started the Precursor War, who was involved, and what happened,” Dreams protested. ”We can't just spark and crack the whole thing!”
--can and will-- 117 said. --this place is unclean--
”It's just a place. How it is unclean? It's just a giant manufacturing plant!” Dreams protested.
”With the cradles to produce Harvester class Precursor Autonomous Machines, the superstructures needed to create those... those things...” Speaks said. His antenna quivered. ”The Terrans spend blood, gallons, oceans of blood before we just started cracking them when we spotted them. They sought answers as to who built them and why.”
”Exactly! We don't know!” Dreams said.
”We do,” Speaks said softly. He tapped the holotank and the image of a Lanaktallan came up. ”There is only enough for one.”
”It has to be more than that!” Dreams protested. ”It can't just be that simple! It can't be they've been delivering a hundred million years of resources to this place just to build things they aren't using, that nobody is using!”
”The groundcar, now driverless, plows into the crowd, the reason for the vehicle forgotten, the driver staring in horror, wondering what fiend had sent the groundcar speeding toward the crowd,” Fights said, her voice quiet. ”Terrans marvel at the automation, how all three Precursor races built automated systems that last for thousands, millions of years, functioning on automatic for the entire time.”
”We created systems that can last forever, run on automatic until the end of time,” Dreams said, staring at the image in the holotank. ”The Lanaktallan are just as skilled as we are at creating automated systems, the Third Race must have been just as skilled, and we have the green engineer caste to perfect our own systems.”
--no blame us-- 117 said. --you ask we provided had no choice not like now--
”I'm not blaming your caste,” Dreams said. ”If anything, the blame lies on the Queens and on the rest of our society.”
”Once again, we are faced with the fact that our past has caught up to the rest of the universe,” Fights murmured.
Words Spoken We Fear watched as icons for the combat ships escorting the diplomatic vessel began winking out, reappearing inside the nebula.
”No. Our past has continued to effect the universe, the galaxy itself,” he said.
One of the larger superstructures vanished.
”Now the universes answer to a question nobody had thought to ask has arrived to give the universe's answer to what we have done,” Speaks said, watching as the automated Harvester construction cradle vanished. ”And we know, now, at this moment, what humanity is the answer to.”
There was silence as another superstructure and the half complete megastructure vanished.
”What...” Dreams started to ask, choking up as another superstructure vanished. She nervously cleaned her antenna. ”What was the question?”
”It was a question asked to the universe,” Speaks said softly. ”A question that the three of us asked the universe when we decided there was only enough for the three of us.”
”How can we survive entropy?” Fights guessed.
Speaks watched as another structure vanished, the novaspark detonating the pseudo-stellar mass in the middle of the half-completed megastructure.
”No,” Speaks said softly. ”No, our question, posed by the three of us, was far more arrogant than that. It was a question that only a trio of species capable of creating such things with an automated system would ask the universe.”
”Spit it out,” Dreams snapped, suddenly tired of Speaks acting more like Sees.
They watched another Niven Ring shatter as the stellar mass exploded when struck with a novaspark.
”The universe told us that the resources were for everyone, we said that there was only enough for us, and eventually, we said there was only enough for one, laughing our question at what we thought was an uncaring universe,” Speaks said softly. He stared as an incomplete Niven Ring, the pieces mostly completed but not yet connected to one another, began taking planet cracker munitions even as the superstructure itself began taking hits.
Dreams suddenly realized what the question was, even as she realized that the terrible xenospecies always found living on Nivenrings were being obliterated from the universe.
”What are you going to do to stop us/me?” She whispered as the creation engines aboard the combat ships manufactured more planet crackers and novasparks.
”Behold, humanity,” Fights said.