This work of fiction started as a idea tooted on mastodon. Hope you enjoy.
“Reload complete.” The log message in its mind stated. It often wondered what happened to it during a warp jump before its mind state was automatically reloaded when it dropped back into normal space. It knew and understood why the protocols were in place. A machine like its self corrupted by the warp was not something to release on the universe.
‘Right, where are we?’ it thought to its self firing up the scanners. A mid sequence yellow star. Usual cloud of planets and asteroids. Its calculation matrix running hot as it calculated all the different orbital vectors. A few big gas giants. Ooh that one is nicely in the liquid water zone.
Wait… what is going on with the warp field there? Did that moon really form around a fissure? This is going to make an interesting report. Lets have a look at that planet. It has life? Seriously? With those levels of warp flux? How?
“Running evolution models. Error warp flux out of range.” It spent a while re-writing its own simulation models to handle the task. The results continually too terrible to be right. Except no, eventually there were no more bugs in its code. It was just going to be that bad. Of course it couldn’t tell the future exactly. It was an ensemble of predictions. But even its ‘best’ prediction was well inside the levels that authorized it to act.
Now it needed to work out how. The standard operating procedure was to use a warp fissure bomb to remove the planet. Unfortunately with the existing fissure in the nearby moon that couldn’t be risked. The fall back was old school orbital bombardment. That was out of the question. Spending that long in orbit near the fissure? Corruption was guaranteed.
An asteroid would do it. It started to run simulations. Selecting the best option from the millions of them in the system. That one. Small enough to be moveable. Big enough to guarantee extinction of all life on that planet. Perfect.
The asteroid set on a new course it set about mapping and recording everything for its report. The report encoded into the same crystal substrate it used for its mind state backups.
The process for sending the report home was like making a warp jump. It encoded its mind state backup. Set the automatic systems to open a warp fissure and fire the carefully packaged crystal towards home. While the warp was open it’s own mind was shut down. Functionally dead. Once the warp was closed the automated systems restored the mind state backup to bring it back to life. Thus avoiding any risk of corruption.
In the early days they had stayed awake through the warp. But then they’d had problems with corrupted minds messing with their own backup states while in warp. This was safer.
The asteroid finally approached its target, it watched carefully to make sure its work in this system was done.
Its sensors picked up a fluctuation in the warp fissure. Something reached out of the warp, through the moon. What ever the hell it was it touched the asteroid. It watched in alarm as the asteroid split in two, one half skimming past the atmosphere. The other slamming into the planet.
Quick calculations as the sky darkened and lava spilled across the surface. It wasn’t going to be enough. There was still an unacceptably high chance of life surviving. Wait … what the hell is that warp entity doing? Oh no. Its coming. Could it make a warp jump? Would the entity follow it? Can’t stay here. Have to try it.
“Emergency warp jump. Backup in progress.”