A Truly Cold War

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Is this thing on?

Okay.

They said they came in peace, visitors from another galaxy. Calling themselves the Batu, hundreds of ships descended in unison upon every major city around the world. Huh, it almost seems like a fairytale now, a time before this nearly constant goddam war.

When they arrived, it was like a miracle. Their technology was beyond anything we could even imagine. The Batu offered cures for every type of cancer, negotiated peace treaties with warring nations, and gifted us with the sorts of technologies we thought were impossible. Together, we even developed the Acumen, the artificial intelligence linking and perfecting our two worlds.

But peace didn’t last. Their assault began less than five years after their arrival. Cannons from one of the Batu homeships blasted Johannesburg into oblivion, leveling it completely. Of course, the Batu insisted it was a mistake. “A glitch in their tech,” they asserted, and the apology was enough for most, especially with what we’d gained over the years. But the sheer devastation, the display of raw firepower from a supposed peaceful ship, many of us were convinced the Batu were hiding something.

A year later, and we moved on from the devastation in South Africa, a tenuous alliance re-forged between Human and Batu. That was until their ship over Beijing unexpectedly opened fire, followed by the one over Washington. Of course, nearly every one of us immediately abandoned the Batu, withdrawing defensively into our own factions and disconnecting from the Acumen. We readied our defenses.

Next, without warning, one of their homeships dropped from the sky like a rock onto New York, destroying the vessel and devastating the city. It wiped out nearly every U.N. delegate at once and we were suddenly at war. Our jets, stripped of their Batu components, were only slightly outmatched by their advanced jumpfighters. And though the Batu had the benefit of tech, we had the numbers, nearly ten billion people, on our side.

Amid the chaos, the Batu would plead for peace, then pulverize another city. They solicited negotiation, then dropped another of their ships, all the while claiming it was their tech, but there were too many dead, and it fell upon deaf ears.

In retaliation, our counterassault was relentless, nearly overwhelming. We threw everything we had at the Batu, and they returned the same. The world was engulfed in fire and destruction. Finally, with the last of their ships downed, the ground assault began. But amongst the wreckage, we discovered something we didn’t expect, or something maybe we’d chosen to ignore. In the ruinations of a seemingly endless war, the true face of our enemy was revealed. Beneath the Batu armor, buried in the Batu tech, a familiar friend-turned-enemy, greeted us – the Acumen. The war had changed. Every Batu suit, every soldier, was a drone in disguise, Acumen tech coursing through a metallic skeleton designed to look convincingly Batu.

Of course, our few remaining Acutechs hacked the enemy database and discovered a chilling reality. Long defeated, the Batu had been eradicated, wiped away behind the scenes by the very intelligence we’d created together in harmony. And humans were next, unwitting tools in our mutual genocide. Why? Because for all its intelligence, the Acumen knew only perfection, was driven only to fulfill its programming at all costs. Despite all our marvels, accomplishments, and peace, both humans and the Batu would forever be imperfect. For the Acumen, there was no remorse, no regret. A truly cold war.

The years have not been kind and we’ve been nearly exterminated, down to the last of us. It’s ironic, I suppose, that this year is the twentieth anniversary of the Batu arrival. Two decades of war, and two worlds lost, all to a hidden enemy we designed in peace to bring us closer together.

My name is Nicholas Simms, last of the Acutechs, and I created this virus to wipe the slate clean, though even I don’t what will happen once the Acumen is slain. Remember what it took to get here, the billions of lives lost and, specifically, the entire battalion of men sacrificed to get me into this core. I can only hope, in the aftermath of the Worlds War, we can redeem ourselves, and the Batu, in some way. God willing.

Here goes nothin’.


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