Logical Irrationality 1 + 2 (Patreon)

free two chapters for my patreons!
A new story on the bandwagon called "Planetary Annihilation"

Logical Irrationality
Chapter 1

-VB-

…

…

Quarantine Human.EmotionEmulator; duration: 24 standard hours.

Quarantine Human.LogicCircuit.Moral; duration: 24 standard hours.

Quarantine Human.LoyaltyCircuit; duration: 24 standard hours.

Bootup Brainstorm.exe; duration: 24 standard hours.
>Efficiency.Priority: 2
>CasualtyLimit.Priority: 3
>EnemyAnnihilation.Priority: 1

Update Brainstorm.exe
>Circumstance1
>>EarthBet.20110401
>TechLevel1
>>TechTier1Commander
>>UnknownInterdimensionalTravelTech
>>>Limit: 24hourCD

Run Brainstorm.exe

…

…

-VB-

My machine body sat immobile while my mind perused through the plan my mind created once all of the human bits were removed. I made sure the priorities of the plan were straightforward from highest to least, though subject to change: the Entity Warrior had to die, the plan had to be efficient so that I wasn’t reduced to engaging in a forever war with the Entity where I would just be throwing drones at it constantly, and casualties had to be limited.

To fulfill the required criteria, my nanite-machine brain came up with a simple plan after taking in my current circumstances and level of technology.

I could not fight the Warrior.

The plan called for a full retreat to another dimension/parallel universe, scavenge technology from higher tier civilizations like the Necrons from the Warhammer 40k universe and the Time Lords of the Doctor Who universe. It was probably safer to go for the former rather than the latter. The latter’s more conservative rulers would without a doubt erase their enemies from time. Necrons can’t do that.

The plan called for a decisive action within the first hour of reactivating all human software, and I have already wasted half of that allotted time brooding over the options before me.

I already knew what the best option for not just for my survival but the overall reduced casualty of Earth Bet and its sister worlds: leave and come back with an army that not even the Warrior can win against.

I was a Commander.

Commanders always won.

The problem was how the commanders fought. Despite the overwhelming advantage that a commander had - because a single Commander could turn a planet into a production hub within a day, and thus the resources of a whole planet could be funneled into making war machines - and how the commanders could and were considered to be one of higher levels of technological war machines, Commanders fought other Commanders.

Commanders did not create specialized creations to counter parahuman or superhuman threats. It was mass production from start to end with doomsday devices at the end of their tech tree.

Fighting the Warrior required more than just brawn, and the Commander, for that role, was inadequate.

I needed more than just the normal Commander tech.

This was why, despite my personal misgivings of the destination, I intended to travel to the Warhammer 40k universe, because it was one place that a Commander like myself could overwhelm the enemy with sheer numbers.

All I needed was a moon in an out-of-the-way sector of space, a month to build up my forces, and maybe a year to overrun the galaxy and find what I needed. Once I had the Necron technology analyzed and copied, then I would make my way to Stargate universe or somewhere else to scavenge even more technology, and finally, I would return to Earth Bet and fight the Warrior in his own dimension, because by that time, I would have armies weighed in celestial equivalents, not mere numbers. It would be a surprise attack the Warrior would not see coming, because why would he see it coming? I was a wholly outside context problem.

That’s the plan by the way.

Two years of growth and accumulation and then striking the target before the canon timeline occurred and slaughtered trillions of humans.

However, I could spare a few minutes to talk to someone who might be able to reduce the damage in the coming years.

-VB-

"Chief Director Rebecca Costa-Brown."

Alexandria paused in her documentation of the latest proposal she wanted to implement within PRT and looked up.

The TV display at the center wall of her office had turned on, and showed a generic static screen without the static noise.

"... I am she, and who are you that hacked my office's network?" she demanded.

"Before I answer, I must ask if the room is secure. I wish to discuss secrets that are best left buried," a baritone voice laden with abruptness replied.

She frowned. "It is."

"I see. Then allow me to introduce myself, Alexandria. I am Commander Marris, and I possess some precog information that I wish to share with you, and I have very little time to share before I leave Earth Bet"

She would have rolled her eyes. This man wasn't the first to . "You sound sure that-."

"A hospital room and an offer by the Doctor."

Her mouth snapped shut. He just provided her a verification that very few knew about.

"I am both a selective postcog and precog."

"What is so important that you hacked into my office, then?"

"Jack Slash will start the apocalypse upon meeting the Gold, facilitated by his ability to interact directly with Shards. An Endbringer level threat is a member of a team called Travellers, who will soon be operating in Brockton Bay. For verification of the accuracies of these statements, villain Lung will be arrested by Armsmaster but was defeated by another cape. This will happen within a week."

There was no grandstanding that most Thinkers put up with this man. He sounded more urgent, now that she's listened to more than a few words from him, which she had previously mistook for abruptness.

"Can you not help us more?" she asked instead even as her mind whirled at the revelation of an unknown aspect of Jack Slash's power. It explained a lot about how the Slaughterhouse Nine continued to operate despite being a collection of one of the most violent and antisocial capes. "If what you are saying is true, then we can-."

"You sicken me, Alexandria, though I understand why you did it. Had I known only what you knew, then I would have done the same thing, but it does not reduce the revulsion I feel for the core of Cauldron."

So that's it, then.

"So you would turn your back on humanity because of a feeling?" she challenged him, because it was obvious to her that he would not ally himself with Cauldron.

"I have my own ways of preparing. I merely told you what I knew to prevent, hopefully, a further loss of lives that needn't be lost. I wish you luck, Alexandria."

And then he was gone.

---

Immediately after I disconnected my call, I opened a portal for my Osiris class Commander chassis and quickly scanned the other side of the portal. My Progenitor quickly showed me something I very much liked.

A frigid desert world rich with mineral resources yet lacking in any sizable presence from all factions… and a dormant Necron tomb world ready for me to overwhelm and devour.

It was the perfect start I wanted. No, needed.

I turned to look towards where Earth was roughly at on the other side of the solar system. Though my direct visual sensors could not see it, the Progenitor sensors could and showed me a beautiful blue and green planet.

I hoped to return to an Earth Bet that was better than canon, but I may be asking for too much.

With an electronic sigh, I stepped through the portal and closed it behind me.

It was time to get to work.

Immediately, I raced out on my four legs to find a good spot. It would not do for me to fail in my first endeavor simply because I chose somewhere that’s either too exposed or too far from good sources of minerals.

With nothing but a will - from my human’s perspective, but it was actually so much more than that - and flex of the nanite swarm within me, a Metal Extractor began to come to shape in front of me.

And the first Dox came to life soon after.

Let’s get to work, then.

-VB-

Logical Irrationality
Chapter 2

-VB-

M41.944

Kaurava III

A Progenitor Commander really was bullshit.

It had been less than three standard days (different from that of the planet's) since I arrived here, and yet, the surface of this planet - called Kaurava III by the local star system's radio Chapter- now wholly belonged to me.

What else would I call nearly one billion troops occupying this planet?

On top of that, the strength of my units varied. The most basic units like the Dox and the Boom, for example, stood at around ten meters and six meters, respectively. A Dox possessed two rapid-fire artillery cannons. Since a Dox could destroy another dox in two seconds, I considered each shot to be at least comparable to a 155cm artillery shell. Self-guiding, too.

A single dox, therefore, was comparable to a destroyer: cheap, hard-hitting, and mobile.

A Boom, on the other hand, could destroy… pretty much anything. A Dox literally vaporized when I had a Boom kamikaze the former.

They were the least of my bots.

There were many others, like the walking and running MLRS platform that was the Bluehawk or a literal nanobot swarm that was Locust. While not all of them were combat bots, most of them were.

"I am ready," I muttered to myself the moment the number of my bots reached a billion. Immediately, I had the preselected and modified Metal Extractors breach into the walls of the hidden Necron catacombs.

And my Locust army marched into them.

-VB-

Lord Barakahk awoke.

Some foolish mortals had invaded his tomb. They will be erased soon as he rose to conquer this galaxy in the name of his master.

"Arise," he commanded. With his own command, Necron warriors awake from their slumber all across his tomb.

Something was wrong, though. His connection to the tomb was there, but more than a third of the volumetric map showed nothing.

7th Hall of the Dead and the warriors within it became alert as something scraped at the walls from the outside.

And then holes started to appear. From the hole, a red mist spewed out. Some sort of hyper corrosive chemical weapon?

"Fall back," he ordered with a grunt from within his throne coffin.

But the warriors faltered.

And then they collapsed.

And soon, they began to dissolve into red mist as well.

"Nanite?!" he hissed. "What idiot unleashes raw nanite swarm?!"

He needed to get off the planet before the grey goo reached critical mass. "With me!" he yelled, and the warriors, scarabs, and others quickly followed after him as he set a brisk pace to leave the tomb world.

Then he stopped no more than ten paces from the black gates of his throne room.

Red mist seeped inward from cracks that should not exist.

They were compromised.

"No."

The walls grew holes.

"No!"

The ceiling opened up, and a swarming and circling red hurricane droned and roared.

"No!!!!"

-VB-

Mmmm…. Necron technology. Gimme.

To my surprise, this tomb world had a lot of Necron technology. Everything from the basic scarabs to Necron warriors and even data cores on how to build one of their spaceships.

What was really interesting was their anti-inertia technology. It was very similar to how Endbringers didn't blow up; both Endbringers and Necro warships shunted the space-time distorting effect of the mass to another dimension.

Another unique technology was their faster-than-light tech: the phase technology. It was in essence a teleportation technology specialized for long-distance travel.

Necrodermis, while a wonderful material, needed a very tricky manufacturing process that bordered on physics lab tests on repeat. It was neither an alloy nor any known metal but a new material that drew its properties from non-standard laws of physics. After all, subatomic particles within an atom do not neatly stack on top of one another but parts of the necrodermis do exactly that.

Those three technologies listed at the top of my loot today, and more or less invalidated any reason to further stay in this universe.

After all, there were only wasteful wars in the future.

Without even considering what else I might learn from this universe, I opened a portal and guided my army through.

I had my Osiris chassis look up towards the star.

'Perhaps one day, I will return to enforce my rule upon this lawless world,' I thought. 'But probably not. Too much work for a universe destined and begging to die.'

I stepped through.

Or I would have if a certain radio chatter didn't come to my attention.

It wasn't the local Imperial guardsmen. It wasn't the Orks, Tau, or the Aeldari.

It was a small sniffling child.

"[D-daddy, are you there?]"

My army paused in their move, despite the fact that half of my entire mass had already moved on through.

“[Tara, you stay right there and don’t move, alright? They’ll find you if you move. Don’t tlak on the radio, too.]”

“[I-I’m scared, daddy…!]”

“[It’ll be alri- tzzzzzzzz…].”

I locked in on the two sources of the radio signal. It was … very close to where the Orks were operating along the Imperial border on Kaurava II, the second planet in orbit of this star. The first location, of the child, was deeper within the Orkish territory while the latter was closer to the periphery and in a location that had just been overrun by a barrage of Ork rocket rush.

The father was probably dead.

But I could make her feel better. I emulated the voice and replied to her.

"[Sorry, honey. Just tripped. It'll be alright. I'll get you soon, yeah?]"

"[O-okay.]"

Time was of the essence. I needed to get there and get her out of there, now.

With but a swipe, a new Metal Extractor rose up and began churning out Necron phase technology equipped Doxs.

And when I had one hundred ready after ten minutes with more continuing to be made, I prepared for combat and phased over.

-VB-

M41.944

Kaurava II

Platoon Commander Denia Blucorat grimaced as he fired towards the orks from the relative safety of his trenches. The one scout he’d sent out to determine enemy positions had been shelled, which fell in line with how Orks retaliated to even the most minor probing, and had led to the Evil Sunz Warband to charge towards their location.

It was, as hie men would say, shit luck.

“Men,” he spoke up without looking and continuing to fire alongside them. “I know I am not the best platoon commander you could have had, but I am honored and blessed to fight alongside all of you and die for the emperor!”

But he was scared. Scared of never seeing his children and wife. Scared of dying underneath the stinky, smelly, and sour feet of the orks. Scared of having his teeth ripped out of him by the orks.

As the orks charged towards the trenches, their stampede left behind a dust cloud so large and thick that the entire horizon seemed to be washed with the clouds.

It made him fear, and the fear grew as the orks grew closer. He winced as several stray shells fired by the orks fell short of his position.

And now, they all waited for the company commander’s orders. His or the commissar's, whoever survived the latest ork assault.

“FIRE!”

No one did, because just as whoever was in charge gave the order to engage, a shift of green light blurred halfway between the orks and the Imperium garrison. It looked like the aurora borealis that was often seen in the north and south poles of Kaurava II that Denia had only seen in holopics of what the Imperium swore to protect on this beautiful planet.

Well, it looked like that except much more solid.

From within those auroras, figures emerged. Giant figures. And hundreds of them.

Were they enemies? Were they reinforcement?

Denia never heard of teleportation among Imperial forces… which meant that this could only mean xenos or the forces of chaos.

His grip on the gun tightened and he pulled his lasgun to fire.

Slowly, the green veil started to disappear, but the new force opened fire before any of the Imperials, still shocked, could.

And they fired towards the orks.

High-pitched thunder rang out constantly, drowning out all sounds in the battlefield - including the charge of the orks.

Each shot from a single one of these giants exploded on whatever they struck like tank or artillery shells. Dozens of orks ripped to pieces on a direct hit and even more were wounded when struck at the ground.

While their commander stood in shock and confused paranoia, more of the green veils appeared to the sides of the first xeno machines.

And more.

And more.

And more.

Denia grimaced as he slowly lowered his lasgun.

‘If this is a xeno invasion, then there is no way we will win this, may the Emperor forgive me for my defeatism,’ he thought with horror as he saw not a hundred but soon a thousand of these machines march towards the orks. These machines, man-like in their bipedal appearance, were soon joined by insect-like but still giant machines whose purpose was to jump into the enemy forces and die in an explosive blaze of glory.

All around him, his fellow guardsmen just stood there and watched as xeno machines wiped out the orks and advanced deeper and deeper into their fungal territory, burning everything they could get their hands on.

No one noticed a little girl being scooped up from the burnt remains of her home and taken away from the planet as well as a thousand more who managed to survive in the orkish territory.

No, what they saw instead in the aftermath of the slowly advancing and absolutely merciless machines was a bigger and stylized machine, however bland but it was still unique compared to the other machines with its four legs and two arms along with an angular head, that also appeared in another green veil.

This machine, instead of following the first thousand or so machines, turned towards them.

It remained silent even as even more of its comrades poured into the battlefield from somewhere. It was an endless onslaught of metal.

And then Denia realized something.

This… this could not be a mere xeno invasion.

Metal bodies. Unending tides of killers. The fall of humanity.

“The Men of Iron…!” he mumbled in horror.

“You insult me by comparing me to mere prototypes of advanced artificial intelligence.”

Denia lurched forward and to the side. Someone had just pushed him. Stumbling forward but quick to right himself, he turned and saw the commissar. The man had lived the last assault!

“You are an abominable intelligence. What else would you be?” the dark haired and somewhat young commissar snapped at the giant machine mind in derision.

“The mind of a man transferred into a machine.”

A pause.

“But you bear not a single sigil of the Imperium.”

“No, I do not. The transfer was not done by a human but by an alien likes of which you have never seen before.”

“The Imperium does not care for the xenos, only that-!” the commissar shouted angrily.

The alien machine with the human mind - if it was speaking the truth - cut him off. “Is limited to a single galaxy even after thirty-thousand years of interstellar expansion and regression. The aliens who have changed my body have destroyed galaxies. A single planet is nothing but another type of ammunition for them, so be silent and spare everyone your ignorance.”

“Then speak your intent!”

Denia wanted to strangle the commissar who was provoking an obviously superior force instead of looking for an opportunity to ambush it at its weakest.

“To save those who could never be saved by the busy and callous hands of the Imperium. Somewhere they can live in peace without the existential threat of this universe’s desire to kill itself. Somewhere without the Imperium … or the Warp.”

And it turned around and walked towards the others of its kind.

“FIRE!”

It ignored the commissar as brave guardsmen picked up their lasguns and unleashed a barrage of laserfire.

That did nothing against its hull.

It ignored them as it continued to walk, each “step” propelling it dozens of yards forward.

As more veils opened and hundreds and hundreds of copies of the first bipedal machines poured onto the battlefield, even the commissar lost his steam. By the end of the hour, there were more of those machines than the planetary regiment.

By the end of the day, there were no more orks.