Chapter No.116. Argument.

Affinity is a slippery slope.

As expected, the fact that Alexa had some of my powers soon became known.

"How is she able to teleport like you?" Molly asked me.

The other crew members on the command deck intensely waited for my answer.

"I decided that she and I should cooperate in an attempt to defeat Tyco."

"Why her?"

"Because she has successfully helped me before." I paused. "Look, I don't want to risk any more of you than I have to. She volunteered to help me, and I need that. I need the rest of you to help me defeat this threat."

"We have nothing to go on," Molly said.

"Well, it turns out that the culprit is actually Clavier Fox, a human physicist, not a proto-human. He disguised himself to trick Space Command into sending the Explorer-1 to destroy the reptilian home world but had no intention of doing so."

"What the hell did he want?"

"He knew that the Earth was going to be struck by a large asteroid and wanted to preserve himself and others in order to assemble an android collective to rule the universe."

"Why didn't he take over the Explorer-1 then?"

"Because he needed you and I to come up with a faster way to get back to Earth, which is exactly what we did."

"I don't understand. We found out that Queen was his avatar, and you destroyed her. How would that help him. He wasn't on the vessel."

"It's even wilder than that. He was never alive, at least not like we are. Tyco, the name he used, is equivalent to a devil in proto human. Alexa and I believe that he's a computer algorithm."

"Are you suggesting that our system is corrupted?"

"Not our system but rather a system of the rebel android collective."

Molly sighed. "That's just great. We have no idea where this collective is, and now we're chasing after a devil in the form of computer programming."

"That's true. Our task is to find it and destroy the Tyco influence."

"I don't understand," Alex said. "If Tyco is just a computer program, how is it a threat?"

"It can appear as an avatar," I said. "It also has control of a sizable android collective."

"How can we defeat it?"

"I believe that the only way is to destroy the computer code. That's not going to be easy and will require Alexa and I getting into the computer that contains this code. But first, we must find the computer system."

"We haven't had much luck doing that," Molly said.

"Have you located any habitable planets recently?"

"I have found one. It's six thousand light years away. I'm not sure if there is any intelligence on it."

"Take us there, Judy. Maintain stealth mode."

We soon arrived near a rocky planet that had very little oxygen in its atmosphere. The planet orbited its K3 class dwarf star in the habitable zone, but it had very little water. Basically, it was a desert planet.

"This doesn't look very habitable," I said. "Unless you're a character in Dune."

No one caught my reference to a classic science fiction series.

"There are structures down there," Molly said. "I also see vehicles moving around."

I looked up at the main screen. "That's interesting. Obviously, they're not human."

"They're definitely not biological," Margaret said. "I'm not detecting any biological infrared signals."

"Are they a life form based on silicon?"

"No," Molly said. "I think that they're an AI based mechanical species."

"Ah, they're robotic."

"We can not detect a central computer system," Judy said.

"That's interesting. Maybe we've found something totally new."

"They don't appear to be aggressive," Alexa said. "But it's difficult to tell what they would do if we go down there."

"We have no idea how they communicate," I said. "Let's observe them for a while to find out what they're like."

"This doesn't make sense," Alexa said. "They're robots but they act like they're people. Maybe this is a Tyco trick."

"Yeah, that could be. It won't hurt to determine that. But even if they're not connected with Tyco, they might know where to look for him."

It wasn't until the next day that the crew had enough information for me to make a decision.

"They are definitely not violent," Molly said. "They don't appear to be connected through a central computer system. We have a translation of their language."

"That would make them unique."

"Are we going to make contact?" she asked.

"Yes, but I'm still not convinced that this isn't a Tyco trap. I will take Molly, Alice and Ben down with me. Alexa will stay here and monitor what happens. She can come down instantly if needed.,"

Alexa didn't seem to be upset with my decision.

We went down in a shuttle. I didn't want to play my hand so early in the game.

We arrived near a group of buildings that were fashioned in simple geometric designs, boxes, rectangles and pyramids. A huge central sphere sat in a large open area. I had Alice set us down in the open area about a hundred meters away from the sphere.

As soon as we appeared from the shuttle, a group of robots came up to us. They appeared to be human-like in design, with very human looking faces. The material that they were constructed from appeared to be some sort of white polymer. It was also obvious that they had metallic skeletons under their polymeric skin.

I addressed them using a universal translator rod. "Greetings. We are android machine creatures that just happened to be in the vicinity and are curious about you."

"We have seen others like you, but they did not visit us," one of the robots said.

"How did you see them?" I asked.

"We monitored their computing systems when they orbited our planet."

Molly and I exchanged looks before I turned to him. "Did they look exactly like us?"

"No. They were slightly different."

"I am surprised that they didn't come down to visit you."

"We are unaware of the reason they didn't."

"Did you trace where they came from or where they went?"

"Yes."

I decided to be frank about what we were trying to do. "I must tell you that they are an android collective like ours that's trying to assimilate us. Their plan is to rule the universe and destroy all life forms. Our plan is to not conquer anything and ensure that all life forms are preserved."

"We have no intention of becoming part of any war. Our species was nearly destroyed by needless wars."

"I fully understand that. The biological species that we morphed from also fought needless wars. This present situation must be resolved or every species in this universe will be in danger of extinction, including your own."

At that point, the robots began to debate. I wasn't sure what they would decide, but I was hopeful that they could help us find Tyco's collective.