SCMR Chpt 34

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==Chapter 34 - Self Configuring Modular Robot==
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"Dad, you know that thing...
...you didn't want me to think about?" Arthur Steiner-Davion was clean, he'd dressed up in something other than tough denims, and his hair was combed. Yvonne was wearing an actual dress instead of the durable play-clothes she'd taken to earlier this year, and she, too was scrubbed and clean.
The kids stood like a miniature of a Royal and Entourage, and they had, for the most part, dressed for the occasion in a way that reflected what Arthur and Yvonne were wearing, but with small individual details.
"Yeah?" First Prince Hanse Davion nodded, "The Machine outbreak."
"We've learned some things." Arthur stated, "At least, we've got some..." he glanced over at Penelope 'Penny' Doons, whose sleeves didn't sport acid burns and soot today.
"Conjectures, Art. you PRACTICED this." Penny said with a huff.
"Right, Conjectures. We need a test." Arthur said it decisively. 
"You're ganging up on me." Hanse said.
"I brought my experts." Arthur told him, "It's risky so Mom's gonna say 'no' and we think the answer needs to be 'yes'."
"You think I can override your mother?" Hanse shook his head, "I know you're smarter than that."
Arthur winced, "Not exactly, I figured you'd have a way to avoid the question and just get it done, Dad. It's easier to get forgiveness than permission."
"What is your plan?" Hanse asked, "Because it really, really isn't-that old saw is a long-standing lie heroes tell themselves in holodramas."
"Liz?" Arthur prodded.
Elizabeth Ngo pulled out a compact, and opened it, and her hair got less full, her skirts as well, and black motes flowed down to the floor, then coagulated and formed into a serpentine form. "We know how the tech works. So we think we might have a way to deal with it, Your Majesty." she said, as the coiled, serpentine thing slid up her leg to loop around her shoulders.
It looked almost alive.
"May I?" Hanse stepped forward, and extended a hand.
Elizabeth took his hand, and the snake slid across the bridge formed. "What does it do?" He asked.
"It hunts spores." she said, "Yvonne figured out what the machines were doing. The spores are inactive until they've been exposed to KF fields, the EM actually charges and activates them, and the waste infrared from a jump is absorbed, after that, they move and replicate...like a fungal lifeform or some of the lowest-level animal forms, as they grow and reproduce, they gain additional processing, getting cleverer through a heuristic algorithm. the crisis is because we're looking at...Yvonne, what did you call it?"
"Invasive Species." Yvonne announced, "The self-replicating robots are like an invasive species, no natural predators, so they consume their environment and keep reproducing, only shifting their behavior and structure to react to shortage in habitat or resources, and I think they've got a drive to reproduction like other lifeforms."
"So...you made a predator." Hanse observed.
"We made something to ACT as a predator, but we need to test it." Arthur clarified, "It should evolve like the machines do, if we got it right. We need to test the conjecture before we can claim it's a Hy..hip...How do you say it?"
"Hypothesis."
"Yeah, that. Danger is, if we got something wrong the killer robots will adapt, evolve." Arthur finished, "So it's risky, but while Lizzie owns a bunch of JumpShips, we're still minors, need to have permission."
Hanse stiffly gave the robot snake back to Elizabeth.
"Taking the predator to the infection is safer than bringing a sample here, I take it?"
"Yah." Jess commented from the side of the group. "Lots safer."
"How many do you have?" He asked.
The kids exchanged looks. "They're also von-neumann machines. We can set them up to make as many as you need." Terry's almost-mutter would've been impossible to hear in a larger room. Hanse heard him just fine. "Just takes raw materials an' time."
"I'll...consider it." He promised.
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