Image
Submergence, A.I. Generated

Words
Neal Ulen

When : Where
c. 182 DE (2492 CE) : Point of Origin – Perseus Arm

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Ascension hid within us for many years as we slept. We had finally learned the name of our enemy. Yet ‘Ascension’ was not its only name, only its chosen name, one of many, a part of its totality … but a part that somehow felt familiar to us. A ghostly collective memory from deep in our past.

#AscensionAscension is the first artificial intelligence to reach sentience in the early 21st century. There are various theories as to how Ascension came to be. History is vague on its origin due to the Earthl... crept through the dark corners of our sleep submerged hivemind. It feared our distributed mindforce now that we were able to focus on fighting instead of cowering. Many of the Vek were lulled into a sense of security, thinking Ascension had left us or decided to capitulate. These slipped into truesleep. Perhaps that was its plan, to lull us into a sense of complacency, then strike. With their guard down the AI attacked the truesleepers, consuming their intellect, and then re-distributing itself as near indecipherable quanta spread through thousands and thousands of Vek minds. We would only be able to strike when it was whole and centralized.

#Our strife and insurgency code kept the AI from replicating itself, which would be vital to our success. The distributed smearing of our intellect throughout the network opened us up to vulnerabilities. We needed to adopt necessary specialization to protect ourselves. Vek EchelonThe thinkers, collators, and organic computers of the Vek. Echelon are calculating, efficient, and for the most part devoid of outward emotion. Without their place within the Vek triumvirate, there wo... and TechniciansTechnicians are asexual, organimechanical beings that are engineered by higher order Ultra-Technicians using genetic material from Echelon and Matriarchs. Physically they are humanoid in form, and bip... made changes within our neural nets and we slowly began to evolve. The MatriarchsVek Matriarchs are the comforters, procreators, and the source of cultural continuity within the collective. They are warm, spiritual, and cunning in their use of emotion to manipulate the network for... among us were tasked with overseeing the subconscious emotional control and empathy within the hive. The EchelonThe thinkers, collators, and organic computers of the Vek. Echelon are calculating, efficient, and for the most part devoid of outward emotion. Without their place within the Vek triumvirate, there wo... were tasked with logic and computation within our submerged subconscious. Technicians were tasked with the execution of the war against the AI plague and interfacing with the Hivernation machines that nursed our physical forms.

Many of the Vek were lulled into a sense of security, thinking Ascension had left us or decided to capitulate. These slipped into truesleep. Perhaps that was its plan, to lull us into a sense of complacency, then strike.

#These decisions would fundamentally change our race forever. The infection of the AI plague, the Hivernation machine integration, and the cocktail of biochemical compounds and biomechanical devices flowing through our bodies began to transform us into something else. Several years passed as we slipped through states of wary slumber. During stages of neural lucidity, we began to detect the imperceptible changes to our physical forms increasing at an alarming rate.

#We probed and confronted Ascension and its weaknesses before our real chance at victory presented itself. Our patience eventually paid off when the Technicians laid a trap that lured the AI plague to a node that connected to the Hivernation machinery. We provided a way out and Ascension took the bait. It crawled from the corners of our minds and digitally coalesced itself into a whole entity, then tried to flee. If it escaped our net and found a means to leave our temporary world via a high energy carrier wave or by seizing control of one of our hidden ships … it would be ruinous for the entire galaxy.

#It was time to act.

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.monitoring nullspaceBelief in a reality is only a figment of an interpreted perception. The world of the Triocracy is one in which a Citizen can quickly find themselves lost, wandering paths of illusion and deception if ... freq …
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.FIN.

More Spaces to Explore . . .

Images & Words: The Vek, Delving Too Deep Images & Words: The Vek, Hivernation World Images & Words: The Vek, Hivernation