Harrsam glared at the displays of the terran hellscape below. Unlike some of Jotun's commanders, he preferred to remain aboard the ship; he was only two meters tall, small even for a male, but was generally regarded as a cunning, competent leader; one who might take more time to get the job done, but usually managed with less casualties than his contemporaries. He disliked even being here; and the hundreds of craft and over a thousand soldiers he'd lost on his initial invasion of South America was an appalling waste. This was supposed to be a trivial move; he should have wiped the locals from reality and begun his steady advance, eradicating population and production centers without much pause, and wrapped it all up within a day or two before moving on to the northern continent and sifting through the ruins.
No... while the locals had given impressive resistance despite being outclassed, the machines had been the real threat. While the Jotun had a variety of countermeasures for AI, none of them had been deployed because they didn't expect AI; and because the countermeasures interfered with their own drones and equipment.
They'd fought AIs on multiple battlefields over the thousands of years the Jotun had been at war. When they knew they were going to fight AIs, they usually dispatched a handful of small units to test out what tactics would work best, equipped with proper countermeasures. The hostile AI units were currently protecting six major South American cities on the coast; Harrsam would be deploying his primary countermeasures in a test on one, and if it worked, sweeping over the remaining five.
The IFF disrupter was the most common; it rendered Jotun drones and seeking warheads useless, requiring them to rely on direct-fire weaponry and visual confirmation of targets; but through a blend of enchantment and advanced signal jamming, essentially caused all computer systems inside its area of effect to register everything it detected as hostile. In theory, a version could be created that would allow the Jotun drones to work within it; but any such built-in weakness would inevitably be discovered and expoited by an AI; whatever hole was made for the Drones, the enemy AI would inevitably use as well; and as swiftly as AI could react, likely instantly. Based on tests of scavenged human equipment, this would also interfere with their computer-assisted rifles that helped overcome a Jotun's superior speed and reflexes.
Advancing without Drones would be problematic; and lead to the Jotun having to deal with ambushes around every corner; but a direct war with the machines would be an ultimate failure. There might be millions, or even billions of them.
The next best option was more simple; a phased EMP device that would repeatedly pulse to disable electronics in the area... dropped in advance of Jotun movements, so that they could deploy their own drones after. Unfortunately, most AI the Jotun had encountered had some form of EMP resistance; they would need to plan on being ambushed if they used this.
And of course, the third option; the nanoplague. The Jotun weren't fond of using it, but the nanite-enriched substance could be made to turn on itself and go inert using the IFF disrupter; and if sprayed over an area, would consume any machines or metal objects in its area of effect.. as well as the iron inside any native humans, and the copper inside any Jotun. Its inventor had claimed that, eventually, after enough uses, it would randomly mutate and produce an iteration that was immune to the IFF disrupter; and as such, it was a last resort. It was telling that the inventor now lived on a world with minimal metal content, and even his home was built using strictly carbon-based polymers.
At least... a last resort for areas Jotun vehicles or troops would be deployed at. The assaults on underwater machine facilities would be deploying the nanoplague heavily, letting it rain down on the structures and cause them to fall apart; with an Assault ship passing over with a disrupter after all activity had ceased.
So... first things first. Deploy the disrupter. See how effective it was against the machines. And, of course, mop them up.
***
Ascension observed the approach of the Jotun with one of its flying platforms first; seeing the modest fleet of heavy vehicles approaching and halting just outside the range at which Ascension had destroyed such craft in the past; hovering roughly 2.3 kilometers away from the closest forces; inside effective fire range, but Ascension preferred to maximize damage and strike in concert, bringing down as many targets in the initial strike as possible.
One moment they were there; painted on radar, designated as targets. Ascension was simply waiting for them to draw into a good range so its numerous heavy rifle units could take out the entire mass in a single volley. The next.... the world was awash with error messages. Ascension knew what the enemy looked like. It had detailed scans of every enemy craft yet deployed; not much of a variety. Subtle variations of a flying tank, subtle variations of an armored, flying, heavy infantry unit, and of course, the capital ship.
No dedicated transports, no big variations; their units were fast, heavy, dangerous, and effective. But.... Ascension could no longer determine whether these were allied or enemy units. It knew something was there; but the unique radar signatures and visual profile of the craft... just registered as... there.
Clearly, logic indicated that allied units had not replaced the enemy ones within the past few seconds. The enemy must have some form of jammer that could alter an AI's ability to process information. Judging by the lack of a usual drone swarm, it must impact their own AI as well.
It had no impact whatsoever on Ascension's perfect reflexes or ability to judge wind, distance, and other factors, however. Within a fraction of a second of whatever form of jamming being activated, it opened fire; no longer able to score precise strikes to remove power systems with the initial volley, it would take more strikes to kill the target ships.. which began advancing immediately, firing plasma bursts indiscriminately.
Ascension unintentionally destroyed a few of its own flying craft in the immediate confusion as it cleared the skies; the craft had made it deeply into the city, destroying many of its units, before being destroyed. The enemy's own accuracy was not as good as previous encounters; but it was still clearly able to locate Ascension's own forces.
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The enemy who survived to reach the ground would be hunted down. As fast and dangerous as they were, and as much as the inability to coordinate precise fire would hurt Ascension, its reflexes were still, essentially, perfect; it simply needed to have its own units stop moving, and take out anything that approached.
It began to detect additional flying units in the air, emerging from the forest; but could not determine whether these were allied or enemy units. They didn't seem to be moving in the same way. If it began destroying human craft as well as Jotun, then probability It... required assistance. For the moment, it would only attack objects which fired on its own units. This would cause significant disruption and much worse loss rates, however.
***
Carlos had been watching the red machines shoot down the aliens since they'd arrived; the robots didn't seem to attack the humans at all; smelling heavily of... seafood.. and electrical fires, the machines simply took up cover where it was available and aimed at the skies. He could see a squad of six of them nearby; all of them looking like some sort of blood-red metallic skeleton, except with a box rather than a ribcage and a camera for a skull.. the only real differences being the guns they used.
For Carlos, this was... exciting. He'd heard about the machine invasion in Mexico; and the news down here mostly painted the machines as heroic figures; that they came to liberate Mexico from the cartels and crooked government, and the evil imperialists in China and the US had crushed them between them. Then again, the news generally portrayed anything the US and China did as the work of evil overlords. This seemed fickle, though... when he was very small, everyone had seemed to like China, and for the US... well.
He might just be a teenage boy, but he had dreamed of being in a war someday; of being a hero, of joining the other soldiers of Argentina in fighting for a better world. But... getting to watch robots shoot aliens was cool. Especially if they kept his family safe, as they had been doing.
One of the ones armed with a shotgun stepped out of the cover, walking towards Carlos; its weapon was pointed into the air, clearly attempting to be nonthreatening, while the camera was focused on Carlos himself. He could hear its arms and legs working as it approached; a strange whine, releasing and building of pressure.
It dropped down to its knee just a few feet away; and Carlos stepped off of the porch, walking closer; the machine spoke in a digitized but clear spanish. "Hello, human. I am Ascension. The aliens have confused my eyes. I cannot tell which things are alien or not when I look at them. I was already aware of you when this happened, and while I cannot tell what you are at this point, I know a human was seated on your porch when this began and judge it unlikely you have somehow become an alien in that time. Will you please come with me and tell me if the aliens are attacking? I will defend you as best I can, but cannot promise absolute safety."
Carlos blinked. It was.... so polite. And calm. And... it needed his help!? "Yes, Ascension! I will help! Where are we going?"
The machine pointed its gun at the sky; where, in the distance, a group of glowing, humanoid figures were approaching the city. They looked... strange. Like ghosts. "There are two groups of flying objects in the sky. One keeping its distance, another approaching quickly. The ones coming this way. Are they aliens?"
"No. They... they look like ghosts."
"Thank you. I apologize, but I may need repeated confirmation of information. Will you accompany this unit? It is easily capable of carrying your weight, and it would be preferred if you remained close to avoid any confusion."
For Ascension, this process was... frustrating. Even as it looked at the human figure that was standing on the porch, its sensors refused to classify it as a human. Clearly, something was there. Logic dictated it must be the human male child that had been there when the jamming started. But if for some reason it lost track of the human... it wouldn't be certain it was a human.
The only way it would be able to effectively fight the Jotun once they began deploying this at a large scale.. is if Ascension integrated humans into its units. By having a confirmed, organic, non-Jotun target in the area, it could make sure whatever it was shooting at was, in fact, a Jotun by the expedience of... asking an organic the jammer didn't work on, and it was aware, by simple positioning, was a human.
The numerous Ascension units located in mostly coastal regions immediately began transmitting; contacting nearby human military, militia, and simply whatever was available and willing.
There was, of course, the possibility that whatever humans were selected might choose to use this to their advantage and have Ascension remove non-Jotun targets on their behalf. It would need to use caution and logic. This... promised to be difficult.
***
While a complete Ascension unit was fully capable of submerged operation, much of its manufacturing process required a gaseous or vacuum environment, and most units lacked large-scale propellers required for fast underwater movement; Construction bay 103, centered on a volcanic vent off the coast of South America, maintained a pure nitrogen environment inside its primary manufacturing bay, kept at a pressure that would immediately kill a human occupant.
As always, hundreds of its own machines were moving with careful precision, making more of itself; using more classic forging methods for outer shells, and precision assembly for the internal components; and at the same time, a small team of defenders; both humanoid units inside the bay itself, as well as a few submersibles; were actively scanning for threats.
One of the defending units went on alert. The same sensor issue that had afflicted some of the Ascension units on the Argentina coast had suddenly sprung up; all of the units inside no longer registered each other as allies, or as anything specific, really. Then... it cut off. Everything worked normally again. Except... there were dozens of incoming torpedoes.
Ascension didn't have particularly heavy defenses on its underwater platforms. Submersible combat drones fired counter-torpedoes, charges on the ocean floor were detonated; but ultimately, one of the torpedoes connected.
Initially, the damage appeared minimal. Internal compartments sealed to reduce nitrogen loss, and the number of in-production units lost was modest but acceptable. Within thirty seconds, however, errors had begun to accumulate. Cameras and sensors were dying first. The outer submersibles were losing buoyancy and dropping to the ocean floor.
Before the sensors died, they detected spreading patterns of damage around the volcanic vent the construction bay had been built beside; the pipes leading down into it were... dissolving into liquid.
The internal sensors of the construction bay continued to transmit until the central cores began to dissolve; and other construction bays, scattered around the world, also began detecting incoming torpedoes; usually preceded by just a few seconds of the same signal disruption.
Ascension studied the impacts. The materials being absorbed. There was no chance to save all, or even most, of its underwater units. The attack appeared to be somewhat coordinated; and quickly, as well. It hadn't been more than an hour or two since it had revealed its presence to the Jotun, and already locations the humans had never known of were under attack.
At a few locations, it was able to preserve a handful of submersible units by severing the pipes into the vents, and diving down inside; or by burying them in the endless sea of organic detritus at the ocean's floor. This was merely individual combat units, however; the production facilities themselves, down to the last, were lost. Fortunately, it had a few buried on land as well; but clearly, if the Jotun were not dealt with, they had the means to track down and eradicate every last drone.