Infinity One, the Reviled of Mars – the AI-piloted drone that sparked the Worlds War on the heels of the Singularity.
When the purges began, Mankind fled Earth for the Mars colonies. Its prototype Infinity Engine allowed the I1 jumper-destroyer to reach the Red Planet ahead of it’s quarry, where it rained destruction over any colony large enough to provide a berth for the Earth ships. To their horror, the ruins were still smoking when they arrived, allowing Infinity One’s fire to catch them off guard.
A third of Earth’s remaining human populace was lost in the ensuing battle as more AI drones arrived in pursuit behind them. When the remnants of Mars’ mighty fleets rose in defense of her sister planet’s people, the AI’s made a tactical retreat, and Infinity One blinked out of sight.
Over the course of the war, the drone would appear time and again, laying waste to anything in its path before disappearing again, leaving no trail to follow.
The humans began to call it a spectre, Death in winking chrome. And even now, long after the end of the Worlds War, starships outside the treaty zone meet sudden, disastrous ends, and pilots sometimes report sightings of a ship that appears in the distance, pacing them across the line of demarcation as if waiting for an opening.
