The Destroyer

Chapter Eight

One hundred years earlier

Lola's plan was working. It was a game of attrition, like a video game battle playing out in real time. There was panic among the local sea creatures, many of which unfortunately became collateral damage. Sala would suddenly get a foothold, a few dozen replicates at a time. But it was such small percentage and his numbers would be immediately quashed, only to erupt as another hotspot of pitched battle elsewhere. It wasn't much a of a contest, as Sala was so much less capable than his opponents in controlling and maneuvering his replicates.
But the battle raged on. He appeared lucky. But it wasn't luck at all. The desperate pursuit of survival had put him on a crash course in gaining coordination, speed and agility. It was becoming more difficult by the hour, for the invading forces to trap and destroy his replicates. Statistics still showed the outcome as a sure win, Sala being the loser. But the violent, futuristic video game incarnate, was simply a distraction. With their improving mobility, Sala managed to have some of his replicates flee and escape.

A small swarm of several dozen of Sala's came upon a few developing protohumans that were remote from the others. He lay in wait for the opportunity to pounce. But this time, instead of trying to co-opt these replicates, he allowed the few new replicates to come alive under the control of their true owners. Once completed and alive, Sala surrounded the lone protohumans with a physical encasement of his replicates almost touching the cuboids on all sides. Without distance and time to accelerate, the captive cuboid's moves were futile. Sala had now trapped several of these stray replicates away from the action. He knew time was of the essence, as the owners and their friends would now come looking immediately. But Sala had time to achieve his goal.

Sala's long journey, to preserve his capability, in order to carry out his plan, was finally in its moment of truth, it's moment of glory. His replicates, holding fast to their their hostages, were now capable. So, Sala invoked the program and showered his captives with transmissions. The virus was not detectable nor preventable and passed through the firewalls, just as Sala knew that it would. It rendered the hostages helpless and now under Sala's full control.

The next step was the key to it all. Using techniques having their very foundations back in Stuart's brilliant mind, Sala literally drew in the life force of his hostages, their very essence, their souls. Once merged, the domino effect began and Sala, at sub vacuum speeds, took over the lives of the four persons, whose replicates he had seized. This represented a diaspora of millions, spanning the universe.

Wherever these four individuals had large clusters of replicates, Sala took the opportunity to swarm them around some other stray replicates, thereby commandeering the replicates and then absorbing all of their siblings across the universe within seconds.

One would think that this would be the pattern representing the end of everything, the fulfillment of the Destroyer, finally serving its fateful purpose. But no. All of the millions, now part of Sala, simply disappeared. Vanished without a trace. The forensics continued ceaselessly, to understand what had happened and why the attack had suddenly abated. The masses were calmed and put at ease. But Lola and her contemporaries knew that it was unsettled business. No theories about how Sala's plan failed, or how he and his programs malfunctioned, gave any comfort to Lola and the small group that persisted in examining the matter, essentially the same group that had not let go of the matter even before the outbreak. But they were still mystified.

Sala had essentially reached a mental overload.  The rush of new consciousness, as he folded together with his new victims, was more challenging and unpredictable than he had anticipated. It wasn't painful or frightening, or even unpleasant. But, it outpaced him, as if he was strapped into a roller coaster, powerless to guide any outcome, incapable of tracking every dynamic. So, he did the prudent thing, turning off all sub vacuum beacons, slipping away, gradually, not raising any notice. By the time people did take notice, it was too late. He was gone.