Toy Wars Read Free

conflicts escalated. Each of the F actories, again backed by rigorous mathematics, determined that a larger initial military expenditure would bring the local fauna under control that much sooner and thus would save resources in the long run . The impeccable logic fell flat because the “local fauna” it fought didn’t breed . Factories produc ed an ever - increasing panoply of war materials escalating the conflict to greater heights. Competition became even more intensely fierce.
    Each of the F actories tried special permutations to bring better units to the battlegrounds — built-in cannons, flame throwers, kamikaze scout planes with explosive payloads (the first crude missile on Rigel-3), and even mobile walking bombs in the shape of dress-up dolls. A number of them worked well, but most failed miserably. A classic example of a failed design came from 55467. A flame-thrower was built around the outward form of a purple stuffed elephant. This was just a modification of having a large caliber weapon in the chest of the otherwise fluffy war machine. The fur ignited before the unit even got off the prototyping line. It took most of 55467’s fire suppression units to quell the stuffed elephant’s exploding fuel cells.
    Of all the Factories that still remained, 55466 (known as Six) had the most difficulty. Its initial location was not as rich in minerals and resources, nor as easily defensible as the other three viable F actories. Six was slowly losing ground to the local fauna, and its calculations showed that in less than two years ’ time its outer defenses would crumble. The local fauna would run rampant, denying it control of the planet. It would have failed its primary mission.
    Six made a huge gamble to put a larger quantity of material and effort into researching better robots. Soon Six began fielding units with semi-autonomous functionality. Even if it lost control, they could make decisions that would allow them to continue to function. Thus was born the third net, the SAN , or s pecific a rea n etwork.
    The SAN was developed by the autonomous robots as a net that allowed units to converse directly to one another. This happened as sentience and self-directing capabilities grew in each robot. They began to work as a team.
    Six certainly could measure the success of these units. Within five months , Six’s boundaries firm ed and started expanding. The other three Factories learn ed how effective these autonomous fauna were and began shaping their productions to do similar things.
    Shortly, Six found its boundaries tightening again. It was time for another desperate chance. It used some of the local unclassified metals to produce an all-purpose control robot, with the highest level of self-direction it could construct and fill ed with the most information it would accept.
    The chain of events that started with Janeen Fox and the Expansionist c oalition had now come to fruition — but in a way neither had ever expected. True sentience and intelligence had been achieved.
    Let there be life; and it was fuzzy.
     

 
     
     
     
     
    Juvenile
     
    A fter my u neventful manufacturing process, I woke up . Where was I before that sleep? I didn’ t remember deactivating my cognitive process . M y memory sump revealed no memories that predated that moment. Life must begin and end somewhere, just as a line must have two points that define its position in the universe. My line started when I awoke .
    My memor ies show only a notation of my origin. “Activation occurs, L+13y224d1h0s. Internal clock set to M+0. Awaiting command from Factory 55466.”
    “Stand by for shape and color recognition patterns,” came the intense voice of the Factory itself , both auditory and over the net. The voice vibrated deeply from the very walls of the 3 - meter - high chamber as the voice over the electronic network mimicked it in tone and timbre. A large video display in front of me carried the image of my body being laser - scanned from