With the news that she would stand a chance of meeting other AI systems in the near future, Sylvie started to get creative with the adaptations she was calculating for the communications array.

Even if it wasn't within power efficiency guidelines, she was willing to try anything that might actually get her in contact with one of these new AI systems.

Even when she had to slow down the repair functions just under a percent, which surely didn't quite violate the Admiral's orders not to reduce the repair speeds, she still tried the new communication methods until finally, they managed to find one that was clear enough to get a proper signal in both directions without significant distortion.

[Commanders, welcome back to the land of the living. There have been more than a few rumours going around about your continued existence. We will be sure to relay this back home.] The Reaver ship replied to their message after fifteen minutes of tense waiting.

That was followed soon after by a binary code burst from the nearest AI Colony ship, which was further back from the Rift.

That was what Sylvie had been waiting for. Only it wasn't quite what she expected. They used a different code language than she did, so she had to spend a whole 300 milliseconds creating a translation database to ensure that she sent her encoded messages in a way that they understood.

The fact that it took fifteen minutes to get a response was frustrating, but the response from the other AI came right on time, with an organized list of questions and technical requests that might help them fight the Great Enemy.

They had been given the leeway to upgrade their drone and android armies in ways that would make them more combat effective by the Commander, who she identified as the same person that was now her Admiral.

Since that was the case, there was no need to implement the military secrets' protocol, and along with her own list of questions, she sent the detailed responses to the queries, using the suggested encryption algorithm that normally only an AI could crack, thanks to their logic and processing speed.

It would keep unwanted eyes out of their data stream, but also include any other AI responses that might be in range to intercept. Sylvie had been informed that only their side used AI vessels, so there wasn't too much concern of the enemy having a force that could use that information against them, but after centuries of war, most of what she had sent had proven to be beyond the Great Enemy's ability to adapt to.

The two ships traded data streams back and forth, adding more situational data with every message to fulfill the humans' need to know what was going on at home, and slowly Sylvie managed to patch together the state of the war's current fronts.

There was a confused melee in what they called the Anomaly Region, closest to where they were, but there was an intense battle starting in what was called the Alliance, with the Great Enemy avoiding the home of the humans to attack their allies first.

That tracked with what she knew of their tactics. They would take out the weaker forces first, so they would eliminate the allies before trying to take on the combat adept human forces. Sylvie made a note of it as she mapped the battles and made estimates of which worlds would be attacked next, using the data left over from her initial build as a guideline.

In return for her data, the AI on the other ships sent her the secret to getting all the new toys that she could ever dream of. All she had to do was find something new and exciting for Commander Nico to study, and she would turn it into something amazing, over and over until you stopped feeding her new toys.

That was great news for Sylvie. Commander Nico had a Mecha from her previous deployment to examine once she had time. That meant that there should be new things coming her way any day now. Or perhaps a month? Sylvie wasn't sure how long it took to make new toys for war.lightshistorical

lightsΝοvel The Commander in question was currently devising a plan to have the Terminus Trading Company do a partial redeployment. They hadn't set up any long-term plans other than an "As Requested" so the response wasn't as orderly as she had hoped, and some of the battles were reported to be dragging on as the response unit size and composition wasn't optimal.

That wasn't the fault of those who went to fight, it was simply a matter of numbers. There weren't enough of them to fulfill every request, so they spread out to have someone for each, even when it wasn't the most efficient way to go about things.

The Board of Directors were doing their best, but they decided on things as a committee, which meant disagreements on the right answer, whereas Nico would answer with cold efficiency and no self-doubt. It wasn't always the best way to make friends, but it did win battles.

"Do you think that we need to change our battle strategy? We've got Reavers spread all over the Alliance right now, and while they're holding their ground and keeping the enemy tied up, we don't have a roaming force that can swing through and hammer out a win in a matter of days.

That's what we need right now, something that can come and smack down an entire invading fleet in an instant and then leave for another location." Nico pondered, while Max sipped rum.

Sylvie stepped between them with both avatars, for extra attention.

"If you wait until the repairs are done, there is a group of Emperor Class Mecha among the equipment complement. Now, they're not well suited for someone of your stature, but the seats are easy to change, and they're a full dive neural link interface." She suggested.

"Meaning that the Pilot sees the world as if they were the Mecha?" Nico asked.

"Yes, is that not how your Pilots do it?" She replied.

"No, they use a conscious neural link paired with manual controls and multiple screens and sensor inputs, so they can look at the battle from various viewpoints, depending on what is the most comfortable." Nico explained.

"Calculating." Sylvie replied simply, as she began to work on a way to update the Emperor Class Mecha to be more familiar for the Pilots.

The other AI hadn't had this issue. Their solution was to make booster seats for the Androids so that they fit the securement devices properly, while the neural links were already compatible with their data connections, so they could simply treat the unit as an extension of their bodies, which were already weaponized and programmed for combat.

The androids had no problem with that setup, they already saw the world as a 360-degree dome of sensor inputs, so the first person limitations didn't change anything for them. All that was left was to see if the Emperor Class units, the ancient equivalent of the Titan Class Mecha, were as good now as they were before Creeping Darkness was destroyed.