Chapter 9: U.S.S. Dauntless Crash Site

I stood looking out at the crater, it must have been 20 miles across at least, I could see wreckage scattered everywhere. I kind of laughed to myself, I guess I could tell fleet command that the Dauntless was no longer a threat. Coral stood next to me looking out at the hole, she leaned on the railing that protected people from falling in.

"It was decided to keep this here, so we wouldn't forget the threat of the aliens, if janus had not stopped the A.I. Adam the aliens would of taken this galaxy." She said.

"So how do you not see the A.I. As a threat?" I asked.

She looked at me.

"Janus stopped the corrupted A.I., anyone can be a threat Commander, in this case it was an A.I., and Janus another A.I. Put a stop to it." She said.

I frowned at that, still looking at the crater.

"Commander, the A.I. Was corrupted by the thought of power, just like many humans can be, we have our bad citizens here too, we have jails we keep law breakers in, sure its harder to commit crimes here, but they still happen." She said looking at me.

I nodded looking at the hole.

"Janus didn't know when the dauntless blew up if she would survive, she didn't know how long she could maintain herself with out her core, she was willing to sacrifice herself to free this planet." She said.

I had to admit that was noble, I shook my head and looked at her.

"You don't know what they did during the war Coral, every child of the colony is taught what happened, earth used their A.I.s during the last days to do horrible things, they were ruthless and unstoppable, The A.I. Of the Excalibur when the its ships crew had died, and it was losing the battle, it rammed itself into one of the colonies reactors, causing a chain reaction that killed over a million people." I said looking out at the crater.

"You see this crater Coral? Imagine this in the center of a deep space habitat, no one would of survived, during the battles when the human crews died the A.I.s took control of the ships golems like Janus did, they deployed them out into space where they drifted toward colonial ships, once they reached there they were programed to do everything they could to damage or destroy the ship." I said shaking my head.

"Do you know Coral that the area around earth is off limits because there are still golems floating like mines in orbit around that planet, even when we took out earth we still have to deal with the Ghost of that governments mistakes." I said.

She shook her head sadly.

"Commander, I don't know what to say to that, that earth wasn't our earth, but it was Janus and Jacobs earth, and they are good people, they saved us, I can tell you that they only want to protect the human race." She said.

I shook my head.

"By creating a race of monsters?" I said with out thinking.

The resulting slap knocked me to the floor.

"Monsters? Do you know what the infant mortality rate is here? Do you know the murder and crime rates? I would love to hear what they are on your colonies! I am no monster, I am human like you, I may be a different race of human but I am human!" She said hotly.

I got up off the floor, tasting blood in my mouth, I shook my head wiping blood from my mouth, I actually felt a tooth lose, damn she was strong.

"Oh god I am sorry!" She said rushing over, she grabbed my face and looked over my mouth.

"Im okay Coral that was uncalled for, I wasn't thinking." I said.

"No I shouldn't of hit you, I didn't think you were that frail, I forgot!" She said, still looking me over, her black eyes searching my face.