Urban Warfare (SupCom Multicross SI)

[Guardian Box]

Something we have way too much of and something we don't have nearly enough of.

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It seemed like a good deal at first to be honest, even despite the initial shadiness of the offer.

Would I like to become a Perfect Immortal Machine, a Brutally Efficient Self-Replicating Mechanism of War? Who wouldn't? Flesh is weak after all, and my new body would be that of an immortal titan compared to the wet meat-sack of my previous existence.

Would I like for my consciousness to run on a quantum supercomputer that's basically magic compared to the greatest achievements of computational engineering my homeworld couldn't even dream of in a thousand years? Of course I was all over that.

Would I like the capability to construct unstoppable armies in minutes and be able to lay sieges to entire planets if I ran unchecked for over an hour? Hell the fuck yes.

Would I like to run around the multiverse, righting wrongs and fighting the good fight? Acquiring, reverse-engineering, refining and improving upon new and exotic technologies? Become a saviour of billions while my unstoppable tide of metal juggernauts laid waste to and inspired the fear of God in any creature which stood against the path towards unity and order in whichever place I end up in?

I cannot comprehend how anyone could've refused.

So here I stood, on non-existing ground in non-existent space, my body that of an upgraded UEF Armoured Command Unit, a veritable titan of metal and cutting edge technology. My mind, running on the closest equivalent of a planetary supercomputer, was busy with billions of operations at once, performing simulations and toying with the unit design program. I waited for the non-being responsible for all of that to drop me somewhere in the multiverse, listening to its briefing on the target 'verse in question.

It goals were simple and clear, really, and well in line with the UEF mandate – unite the place, and restore order, no matter the cost. The place in question was very sparsely populated, most of the inhabitants couldn't pose a threat to even my weakest units. It also wasn't that big, since apparently I wouldn't even need to venture into space and could just walk wherever I wanted to. Supposedly, this was some sort of post-apocalyptic setting, and my greatest opponents would be some ancient computer system barely holding onto things and a bunch of anarchist who enjoy the chaos and lack of any rule but their own.

It sounded like a nice and easy start on my journey through the multiverse. An easy, primitive planet with need of my benevolent guidance backed by some superior fire-power, ready for re-establishment of some kind of order. There even might be some useful technology around to scrounge up and add to my technological base.

So with a light heart and hope for a quick resolution to the incoming conflict I took a Step, and was whisked away.

–-

I arrived on the target like a Commander should, in a massive megaton-range explosion of quantum-stuff and nuclear fire. After the few seconds it took for the highly volatile energy around me to dissipate, I activated my sensors and took a good look around.

I was standing in a crater of half-melted metal. I was in a giant, perfectly cube-shaped chamber, exactly 50 kilometres across, with walls and ceiling adorned in seemingly random patterns of blinking lights. My sensors could detect perfectly identical chambers all around and above me, I counted over a three dozen in total before my sensors couldn't penetrate further behind the stacks of 10 meter thick walls separating the chambers. I couldn't discern any purpose such creations could have.

Even with my highest intensity scans, I couldn't penetrate more than 10 meters below me. Exactly the size of the walls and ceilings separating the chambers. Exactly how deep the crater I was standing in was deep.

I looked down on the pristine metallic material I was standing on. It survived the explosion of my arrival without a scratch. Crude visual scans were the only thing that worked, and they showed not even a single atom out of place in the perfect structure.

With rising dread and maximum mental acceleration I turned my attention to the ping of alarm my threat detection systems raised. Part of the cooling slagged metal of the chamber floor was undulating, floating upwards, growing, consuming the surrounding material and slowly transforming into a robotic, human-sized doll-like creature.

I knew where I was. Oh Gods above and below and in-between did I know where I was.

'This... this isn't fair at all'

Before the Safeguard Exterminator could finish downloading I ordered my titanic body to run as if the hounds of hell were after me.

To be fair, I'd have preferred if they were.