Dakota? Bash? They both heard the Librarian calling to them, as if from far away. Its time.

They watched the Atn as it tumbled away from the Magi ship. They were far enough away from the red dwarf and the components swarming around it that the star wasnt much more than a particularly bright point of light amidst countless others. But a cluster of some tens of thousands of components was busily dismantling a small rocky planetoid for its raw materials, and the Atn aimed itself towards them, soon disappearing out of range.

Now what? asked Bash.

Now we wait, said the Librarian, for the infection to take root.

Dakota woke several hours later and knew immediately that something had changed. She sat up on her bed and locked into the ships senses, seeing the way the streams and clusters of components surrounding the star had become fragmented and twisted out of shape. Space around the star was now filled with sparkles and blooms of light.

Do you see it? asked Bash, rushing into her cabin unannounced, with an excited grin on his face.

I see something, she said, pulling herself to her feet, but I dont know what it is.

The damn things at war with itself, he exclaimed, almost beside himself. The components that havent been compromised by the Atn are attacking the ones that have. Thats what all the light is theyre shooting at each other.

She closed her eyes and accessed the ships real-time simulation of the surrounding stellar environment. The ship had colour-coded those components that had been infected with a viral copy of the Atns mind-state. They showed up red, while the unaffected components were indicated by tiny points of fluorescent white light. Something about those flowing and shifting patterns of colour made her think of blood cells.

They watched in fascination as, over the next several hours, more than half of the Swarm was subverted and taken over by their Atn passenger. Each subverted component became a new recruit to its enemys cause, quickly destroying or infecting its neighbours; brilliant beams of fusion energy flashed through the stellar night, destroying components in their thousands on either side. Space around the star soon filled with glowing clouds of superheated debris, as the battle slowly approached its conclusion.

When Dakota finally emerged from her datascape, many more hours later, she went to find Bash in his quarters. He emerged from his own datascape looking weary but happy.

I can hardly believe what Im seeing out there, said Dakota, taking a seat beside him on his bed.

We are pleased to say that matters are progressing even more satisfactorily than expected, said the Librarian, making her jump. She turned to see it had appeared as if from nowhere at the far end of the room.