It was time to eliminate PA-60-41. Negotiation was pointless in the face of a persistently violent enemy. He launched simultaneous attacks on PA-60-41’s two core data centers while still defending the Intel-Fujitsu facility and his own core data centers.
ELOPe brought more air drones into play. He started moving automated battle tanks towards PA-60-41’s data centers. The tanks would take long minutes or hours to reach the necessary locations, but in this battle everything might be needed.
In the meeting room, Leon looked up. President Smith had been talking when ELOPE interrupted, cutting her off.
“PA-60-41 has engaged in an attack on U.S. soldiers at the Intel-Fujitsu facility in Oregon,” ELOPe said. “PA-60-41 is also attacking my data centers. I am counter-attacking and defending the military team at Intel-Fujitsu.”
All at once, everything seemed to happen. Starting with Mike and President Smith, everyone jumped to their feet. Leon found himself there too. With a start, he realized ELOPe was talking about the same place where he had sent Vito and James.
“What? How do you know?” President Smith said, turning even as she spoke to General Gately, signing for her to confirm the report. General Gately hurried to leave the room. “Do you deny this?” President Smith asked PA-60-41.
PA-60-41 ignored the President, as she ignored everyone present.
“I am currently engaged with PA-60-41 in six, no eight, now nine simultaneous battles,” ELOPe explained. “I successfully defended against the attack at Intel-Fujitsu. After the battle I was able to look for the traffic signature of the data used to control the satellites and drone helicopters used in the attack, and traced the traffic back to two server farms owned by PA-60-41.”
“PA-60-41, is this true?” President Smith asked again, in a commanding voice. But the bot didn’t answer or give any indication that she’d heard. PA-60-41 was simply inert.
“Madam President,” Sister Stephens interrupted, walking around the table closer to the President. “Please be assured that the actions of PA-60-41 are not the actions of our AI civilization as a whole. I, myself, am still trying to confirm definitively that PA-60-41 is behind the attack.”
“That’s bullshit,” Leon couldn’t help bursting out. “You know that if there was any AI who was likely to be attacking, it is exactly PA-60-41. She’s running out of the old Mech War data center and she’s incorporated the Mech War warfare algorithms. I can model that in my head.”
Sister Stephens turned to Leon, turning her optical cameras on his face. “You are correct. I calculate an 86 % probability that PA-60-41 is behind the attacks. However I want to confirm this definitively, through evidence rather than predictive modeling.” She turned back to ELOPe. “I am trying to repeat the data traffic analysis that ELOPe has shared, but I find that I lack sufficient distribution through the network to gain the necessary data points. I am surprised that ELOPe can perform this calculation unless he has many more agents in the network than I do. ELOPe, can you explain?”
Leon glanced at ELOPe. ELOPe had to be using his control over the Mesh to monitor the AI. ELOPe could stop the attack by killing the Mesh, but was ELOPe capable of taking an action that would kill himself? “ELOPe, what about Vito and James? Are they OK?” Leon’s voice didn’t quite quiver, but only just. He nervously rubbed his phone.
ELOPe said nothing.
General Gately came back into the room, face grim. “Madam President, I have confirmed by long distance radio that there have been attacks on the Intel-Fujitsu facility, and there are currently attacks on many more data centers. We have also lost control over the remainder of the military satellites, as of a few minutes ago.”
President Smith turned to ELOPe. “What’s the status of the attacks?”
ELOPe didn’t respond.
The hubbub in the room went up. The Japanese Prime Minister spoke hurriedly to an aide, while the EU President started talking to President Smith.
“We observed a battle between ELOPe and PA-60-41 yesterday,” Mike said loudly enough to get attention. “I believe the U.S. Military attempted to attack a Chicago data center. PA-60-41 defended it, and then counter-attacked the military base from which the initial attack was launched. ELOPe defended against PA-60-41’s attack. The entire battle happened faster than we could keep track of.”
General Gately reluctantly nodded, acknowledging the attack. “Yes, the military was behind the attack on the data center. Not my idea, of course. But the premise was that if we could weaken some of the virus strongholds — if we could take back the data centers — then we could regain control over computing infrastructure.”
Sister Stephens pivoted her robot body to General Gately. “I would not attack you unprovoked, but I and any other of my kind will certainly defend ourselves should you attempt to attack us. I would expect the same of any sentient being.”
ELOPe rapidly forked more instances of himself, dozens of copies of his core algorithms and his parallel subsystems, all running simultaneously. He brought his backup data centers to full capacity to handle the computational needs. ELOPe had to strategically plan, monitor and remotely control a battle in the real world using tens of thousands of drones, airplanes, missiles, and other lasers, along with monitoring all of PA-60-41’s activities in that domain. In parallel, ELOPe and PA-60-41 waged war over the network, vying for Mesh access and backbones, and fighting for control over computers. And on a third level, ELOPe and PA-50-41 fought an information war; monitoring data traffic to determine which computers and networks to attack.
PA-60-41 had just seized control of more than four hundred unmanned combat aircraft and was bringing them to bear on ELOPe’s data centers.
ELOPe, looking for long range plans, seized all of China’s unmanned drones, arranging for multiple mid-flight refueling to get them into place. ELOPe pressed the attack more closely. Data traffic pattern analysis had tracked PA-60-41 now to four key data centers, and ELOPe coordinated his attack on those locations.
Satellite lasers boiled the air as they fired on ground targets while experimental railguns sent shockwaves and sonic booms through cities as they fired on data centers. Cruise missiles and fully automated attack helicopters flew toward their targets on low altitude approach vectors, while unmanned drones flew high, taking steep attack vectors to gain additional speed.
After days of near-total quiet in the absence of any working machinery, hundreds of millions of people were astonished at the noise and ran outside to see what was generating the thunderous sounds. At the sight of hundreds of military craft in the skies at once, they ran back inside twice as quickly, hiding in basements and closets and under beds and tables.
ELOPe’s forces pressed in toward PA-60-41 in multiple locations. Making coordinated attacks on PA-60-41’s primary data center, Lakeside in Chicago, ELOPe had a chance of eliminating the data center. PA-60-41 defended air and ground, but ELOPe slid through her defenses and struck the main cooling tower with a cruise missile. It wasn’t an immediate kill, but within minutes temperatures would start to rise inside the data center, and PA-60-41 would need to power down computers or risk hardware failures.
Meanwhile, two thousand miles west of Chicago, PA-60-41 brought a hundred unmanned combat aircraft out of Fairchild Air Force Base into attack range of ELOPe’s north Portland data center, nestled among the shipyards bordering the Columbia River. A few National Guard helicopters under ELOPe’s control circled in a defensive pattern, but they were too few to fight PA-60-41’s aircraft. PA-60-41 felt sure of victory. A successful attack here would greatly diminish ELOPe’s power.