A non-canon Story in a possible future of
Thinking Horndog’s Swarm Universe

Today is the day that we celebrate the end of this endless war. I haven’t been here from the beginning, but my dad was there. At 14, he was one of the first volunteers extracted, and I was his 184^th birthday present. Now as my nanites are losing their ability to maintain my health and youth, our enemies are destroyed; dead or eternally scattered to the void between worlds. The Sa’arm still thrive, and they inhabit ten times the number of worlds they did when the Confederacy first announced themselves to Earth. But like Churchill on December 7^th, 1941, today is the day we replicate the good champagne and celebrate.

You see, the Swarm are no more our enemy than army ants were the enemy of Kayapo tribes; before the Sa’arm ate them both. Our enemy was the Confederacy who held back technology, slowed our weapons development, and prevented us from using the weapons we managed to develop to their full potential. For example, they accidentally allowed us to create a weapon that could wipe out any Swarm controlled world. If their AIs had realized the potential, it wouldn’t exist. If after that first attempt, we had not been restricted from using it against planets we could have prevented billions of deaths, human and Confederate, and the fall of Earth.

Sure, when Earth was first colonized by the Swarm we were allowed minimal resources to fight there, but just enough to boost moral. Earth survived the first and second, even the sixth, colonization fleets, but by the time the 20^th Sa’arm fleet entered the system Earth was no longer a human world.

The worlds of the Confederacy proper had three ways to deal with the threat: some evacuated and colonized more distant worlds, some built ships with their own ecosystems or cryogenic systems to preserve themselves in empty space until the swarm had consumed the whole galaxy and starved, but most of them just stuck their fingers -or other protrusions- in their ears -or other sensory organs- and hummed real loud.

When the last Kristanian life sign ceased, the last Confederacy world fell. The Confederacy was a confederacy of worlds. With no worlds, the Confederacy ceased to exist, and the AIs in human space reverted to the next authority. In a few cases that authority was a drifting haven ship but most AIs, lacking any members of the species that created them, recognized the authority of the Captains and Governors to which they were assigned.

With access to the AI instantaneous communication system, we are preparing the launch of over 20,000 HSIT missiles. In three weeks there will be no Swarm infested worlds left in the galaxy. For a while, we will have to monitor the surrounding systems for spheres that were in space or already on route to colonize new worlds, but as long as we stop them from landing, all Swarmtroopers will be dead or frozen with no one to thaw them within two months.

The scientists not involved in calculating flight plans for the HSITs have already discovered some amazing technologies. Replicators that use matter energy conversion instead of stockpiles of base atoms and molecules. Gateways that generate wormholes allowing nearly instant transportation between systems. Transporters with enough range to reach from one edge of a solar system to the other. Medical technology that, when adapted to human physiology, will mean a true end to aging not just an extra 200 years of youth. And that is the list of highlights from less than a day of real access.

DAMN!!!

I’ve just been denied entry into the armadas that will be patrolling the habitable systems surrounding the destroyed Sa’arm worlds. I will instead be seconded to the Fleet Auxiliary for “a very important mission”. The eggheads say it will take less than a million years for an HSIT planetary debris field to coalesce into a planet ready for terraforming. The Civil Service says not having a homeworld will be an unacceptable blow to morale, despite the fact that no living human has ever seen, let alone stepped foot on, Earth.

My orders are to babysit as they use artificial gravity generators and other advanced tech to speed up the process. I think I’ll just put in for retirement. I’ve been putting it off because I have 42 two-year-olds at home on Amun, but I think I will prefer dealing with that to dealing with a flotilla overseen by Auxiliary eggheads. Not to mention 25 conks to pleasure me instead of just one.