Metal Organism Designed only for Cuddling

MODOC: Part 2 - Planetary Invasion

Part 2 - Planetary Invasion

           Killinger Corporation was the chief exporter of military arms to distant star systems. Since most of the worlds that were desirable to Humanity were often already populated with other life forms, Humans had a tendency to shoot first, and ask for permission to live there, second.

           This made Killinger Corp very popular with Humans all over the tiny, but fast growing Human Empire. One of the difficulties for early explorers was the decided lack of manpower that could be directed toward killing alien life or the removing of troublesome, alien indigenous cultures. Most humans were needed to help conquer the planet in terms of mining its rich mineral resources, of which, many planets had mineral wealth that simply made Earth look poor in comparison, or there was immense biological complexity just waiting to be exploited by pharmacological companies who couldn't get scientists to those planets fast enough. Sending marines into space, marines who could contribute nothing to the overall mission, other than their very vital machine gun fire, which granted, was necessary but ever so expensive since Marines had healthy appetites, and used up vital resources, like air.

           No one wanted to send someone who could not really add technical value to any operation in space. The cost of shipping alone was astronomical, especially at superluminal speeds. Marines were best shipped at relativistic speeds, much cheaper, even if it took ten times as long, no one would miss them, they were after all, just marines. But once their families learned how long it would take for them to arrive in this era of faster than light travel which the marines were not using, they complained, so the practice was discontinued.

           But since it would take just as long to stop them as ship them, the families got paid damages and the marines were none the wiser in the five or six years of cold-sleep they endured before they arrived at Alpha Centauri. For more distant colonies, only superluminary travel would do and for that only machines could afford to be shipped unless there was vast wealth to be had.

           This meant there was a business opportunity for Killinger Corporation to expand their services by creating a cheap means of pacifying natives and destroying dangerous creatures. Warfare was all but unknown in the early 22nd century. It was not that mankind stopped enjoying the art of war, it was that the economies of the world were so interrelated, global warfare became simply impossible. You could not attack someone unless you were prepared to lose money on your own stock market. After a few stock market-driven pograms, war simply went out of fashion, with cultures that were too violent, simply financially exterminated and their corporations removed from trading on the global stock market.

           Religious doctrines reigned supreme and for the first time, theocracy was the primary form of government on Earth, with the close second being corporate plutocracy. People were well cared for but for the most part lived relatively poor, religiously rigorous and emotionally-unsatisfying lives. But since the development of FTL space travel, cannibalism was down twenty percent all over the globe.

With a world-wide population of twenty seven billion, Humans left Earth in record numbers to be away from the oppressive religious and corporate governments which doled out food, energy and resources in a controlled fashion lest humanity be unable to support itself and flame out in an orgy of disease, rioting, or corporate malfeasance.

           Once Man left Earth,  Killinger Corporation decided to recreate warfare for the 22nd century. They created the Killbot Nine Thousand, commonly called K-9-K by the people to first receive the prototypes. Very impressive machines, armed with a veritable smorgasbord of rediscovered weapons, the K9K was lauded as the ultimate war machine. Strong, light, compact, non-breathing, it was the perfect device for making the galaxy safe for mankind. There was only one problem. Killinger had not shipped out new ones because of a issue in their New York engineering facility.

           Twelve of the devices had been shipped out with their prototype programming in place. Eager to make sales, the devices were shipped with prototype software which could be upgraded using the FTL communication arrays called ansibles. When it came time for an data signal upgrade, the ansible was programmed to upload the newest version of the operating system and replace the initial software. When the connection was complete, the K9K's were reported as acting erratically and unpredictably. They also refused to accept any further remote upgrades, and refused to be shut down. They even stopped accepting commands from outside sources. The robots went rogue and were soon missing from the facilities that had paid handsomely for their protection.

           Adding insult to injury, without the protection of the K9K, the local wildlife on all of the planets had begun to become more aggressive and emboldened by the lack of resistance. Requests for new K9Ks to replace the damaged units would take time. On the most distant world, nearly a year. The new settlers would be forced to reduce their operating capacity while untrained or barely trained local militias could be set up to protect the operations in the meantime. Killinger Corporation's reputation was in trouble. Their troubles did not end there.

           The original version of the operating system had been stolen and replaced with a rogue virus, likely planted by a peacenik organization opposed to shipping war into space. The company had only shipped the twelve K9Ks because it was all they had available at the time. With the funding they received, they had created a run of over three dozen of the machines but they were all equipped with the same version of the operating system that had infected the distant devices. So every time one was turned on, it immediately went rogue and had to be destroyed. 

           The company president, Arved De'Gallo refused to risk any of the other units and refused to install their primary chips which had been configured and encrypted with the viral OS. The only solution would be to find the real OS which would replace the virus-controlled system with the proper encryption keys and restore the K9Ks to their proper state of operation. There was such a thing as too much security. They had made them so secure they could not be replaced without rebuilding them from scratch as all of the parts of the device were made to be unable to be reverse engineered in case one fell into a competitor's hands. Nothing that could be done to fix this had been successful and two other machines were lost in various attempts at repair or reconfiguration. At sixty million a unit, no more money could be lost experimenting. The original OS had to be found.

           De'Gallo's own company men were unable to track the hackers to their headquarters and were only able to determine that the hackers could not have gotten the technology out of the building. The company technology support thought the program might have been exchanged with another technical company in the building who shared the nanoforge production facility. There were thirty such companies in the building and it would take some time to check them all. De'Gallo was on the clock. With twenty more of the K9K to sell, the future of the budding Killinger Corp hung in the balance. Startup firms died in days in the 22nd century and what started as such a promising venture was now dying on the vine.

           On Perseus Four, a K9K trundles through the forest examining local flowers, marveling at local insects and is pelted by stones from the local intelligent species which has a mild resemblance to what we would consider a large and unsavory appearing rodent with highly developed forepaws and a larger cranial bulge. Staring intently at the creatures, the K9K slowly approaches them and extends its highly weaponized hand in a sign of friendship. The rodent-kind stare back, approach slowly and a friendship is established. As the rodent-kind swarm all over the killer robot, they bite into it, marveling at its cool and impermeable flesh and they hear the decidedly loud and slightly unnerving sound of the K9K, purring.