"I think," Jaime continued, thoughtful, "that it's time I went and talked with the general."
The ship was happy.
Well, to be preciseўand all cognizant !*!*! were always preciseўit wasn't the entire ship that was
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"happy," an emotional state possible only for fifth-level cognitives and above. The unit designated DAV728-24389, however, which was currently serving as primary activator of fortress/ship/factory MON924 Series 76, would have been ecstatic had its response parameter controls not been restricted, and even with the restrictions in place it couldn't help feeling an almost organic tickle of excitement, satisfaction, and pride.
According to the foldspace message just received, the Ninth Awareness Itself was arriving within 1.85 x 1014 nanoseconds to acknowledge DAV728's victory over the organics, at which time DAV would receive his fifth brain.
The ! *! б! did not think in abstract terms such as "great honor" or "accomplishment," and in fact the addition of a fifth brain to DAVs current processor array was only logical and expected, given his success in this campaign. Nor was the abstract term "worthiness" a factor. All !*!*! were "worthy," at least insofar as all machines approved by inspectors for release from the natal assemblers performed to design specifications. Success, after all, was expected.
But on purely statistical grounds, it was definitely the case that stochastic chance had favored DAV by a significant margin, even allowing for the usual plus-or-minus due to the effects of chaos. If all !*!*! were worthy, a remarkably tiny percentage of the whole followed that slender and convoluted five-dimensional pathway of placement and action in space and time that could result in such distinguished success as his.
The ship's broad-spectrum sensors fed their input directly to DAVs first brain, allowing, when he willed it, an all-round panorama of space, including tiie local planet and its two satellites and, beyond, the encircling, frosty banks of stars, thick and turbulent this close in to the Galactic Core. Vast clouds of dark matter, gas and dust, obscured the center of the galaxy in the
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optical bands, but the simmering glow of radio emissions and the sparkling, sharper urgency of X-ray and gamma sources let DAY pick out the landmarks of home. From fifteen thousand light years away, it sensed the gush of antimatter, the annihilation of matter equivalent to tens of suns every few million nanoseconds.
It sensed the tragedy there, the tragedy of the 1 *! *!, without feeling anything like emotion. The !б!*! did not feel, not in the organic sense of the word.
DAV728ўthe list of alphanumerics were only an approximate translation of the string of modulated whistles, pops and !s comprising the unit's designatorў acquired the data feed beacons of the !б!б! fleet and logged onto the primary command web. Approach clearance requested and granted, the fortress/ship/ factory hurtled past outlying pickets and scouts, dropping deeper into the planet's gravity well, angling toward the innermost and larger of the two attendant natural satellites.
DAV decelerated as it guided the ship in for a landing on the moon, called "Delamar" by the organics. All human centers on the body had been occupied and long since converted to !*!*! purposes. On Delamar's primary, a world the locals inexplicably called "Cloud," the surviving population had been allowed to live, though some tens of thousands had been sequestered in special compounds as useful labor, spare parts, and of course, for research into their place within the Prime Code. Here on the inner satellite, however, there'd been no point in maintaining the oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere and temperatures that humans required for continued metabolism. The atmosphere had been released to the vacuum of space and the surviving life forms on Delamar had simply ceased functioning . . . the term, it had learned recently, was "died."
As the immense fortress/ship/factory gentled in on
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humming contra-gravs at the largest of the Delamar habitats, DAV could sense the surrounding Community of machines, a gentle pulse and flickering of information exchanged on numerous tight-beamed E-M frequencies, from long, cool radio waves to the actinic stab of high-frequency gamma rays. Though only a small fraction of the transmitted information was directed at it, DAV could extend electronic senses and sample the ocean of data engulfing it, a comfortable and familiar environment that demonstrated a rightness to the universe.
As organics moved and lived within a sea of atmosphere, the !*!б! had their being in a sea of constantly shifting information. Coded challenges, download requests, and replies, the electronic equivalents of friendly greetings and hi-how-are-yous, chattered between ship and base. A small army of floaters appeared, rising from hatchways in the habitat and drifting silently toward the docking facility. DAV gave a series of whistling, chirping orders to its system support complex, then began disconnecting itself from the ship. Seconds later, its broad-spectrum, wide-angle view of the universe clicked off, replaced an instant later by the narrower, more claustrophobic confines of a Series 52.
Snug in its new body, DAV swung down from the recess in the ship's internal structure where the elongated, smoothly sculpted form had rested for the duration of the mission:, slid into an exit well, and emerged above the surface of Delamar. Other machines similar to DAV passed on their way to service the MON fortress-ship, Series 50s and 47s and one other 52. DAV sensed the throbbing electronic web that connected them all. The !*!б! were not a totally communal intelligence or hive mind, like several that had been annihilated within the past few millennia; individual units retained individuality of thought, purpose, and action. Still, the awareness of information flow and
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data exchange was an important sense for the !*!*!, a sense as important as taste or magnetics were for the extinct Ka'Juur, or hearing seemed to be for these humans.
