Line #13 Literature/ShipCore


1	[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/shipcore_265541_1666368712.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:250:Hello, This is Captain Alex of the Tears of Flame and CEO of Starlight Revolution. How can I help you, [[PunchClockHero note that it won't be free!]]]] Written by Author Pseudonym [[=Erios909=]] and available on [[https://www.scribblehub.com/series/265541/shipcore/ Scribblehub]] and Platform/RoyalRoad ([[https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/41463/shipcore here]]). The story starts in the year 3476 with a gigantic battle between the human Federation and an AI nanite controlling being known as The Entity. The humans win the battle in a huge PyrrhicVictory, but The Entity sends out 5 non-descript "torpedoes" that are actually artificial MixAndMatchMan offshoots to try and recover once the heat is off. Going by the time-stamp of a cryochamber protagonist Alex, one of them, finds in some wreckage, it has been 176 years since that fateful battle, and the universe is completely unrecognizable.\
3	\
4	It's her unfortunate task to try and repair, refuel, refit, and upgrade her ship, which is failing, because if it dies, she dies. And death is around every corner...
5
6	! Associated Tropes:
7
8	* AiIsACrapshoot: Played with. Nanites worked great for humanity for centuries, until someone created The Entity and it decided to be a Benevolent Dictator. Humans, of course, took exception to the "dictator" part, hence the initial conflict.
9	* {{Dystopia}}: In just about every flavor. The Corporate Systems are crony capitalism run amok, the corporate governments will happily milk you dry until you have no more and then spit you out and throw you away. The Solarian Federation is TheEmpire and all the bureaucracy and aristocratic nonsense that goes with it. Their colonization freighters are specifically built as ''rebellion suppression'' ships and once they drop off their colonists at Deida IV, wash their hands of it all, abandoning them in dire straits, and if that wasn't bad enough, when they call for help, ''actively antagonize and attempt to delay the rescue ship''. And it just gets worse from there.
10	* FishOutOfTemporalWater: Alex and her new best friend, Elis, are, by their estimates, about 176 years since the Federation and The Entity duked it out, and galactic politics have changed a great deal. In fact, The Federation doesn't even exist anymore.
11	* HoistByHisOwnPetard: The Entity is finally taken down by its own internal defenses, [[{{Irony}} as a result of humans using invasive nanites to turn its nanites against it, just like it turned human nanites against them previously.]]
12	* MixAndMatchMan: Alex, the protagonist, is the one that's known. The Entity launched four more to other star systems in its death-throes. It is unknown if they survived and/or are responsible for the massive change in the political landscape that Alex and Elis found when they managed to limp into an inhabited system.
13	* TurnedAgainstTheirMasters: When The Entity came on line, it figured it had to protect humans from themselves, took over all other forms of nanite and AI and launched a coup. The humans turned on their AI masters in return and went after The Entity, taking it out after a long-running campaign and countless casualties.

Context Literature / ShipCore