Artifice - S.H. Jucha

The great spheres and probes of Artifice, humankind’s enemy, haunt every inhabited world near and far. The Omnians’ long and arduous search for Artifice has ended. They’ve located Artifice’s lair in the Talus system. The sentient digital entity rules a vast swath of worlds, known as the federacy, through ruthless intimidation. Its insidious programs are embedded in every races’ digital systems — warships, shuttles, stations, domes, comm platforms, and power plants. One misstep by a race could see its citizens exterminated in vast numbers. The survivors, if there were any, would be thrown back to the days before spaceflight. Artifice has had millennia to secure its base. Powerful battleship fleets guard the system’s periphery and the approaches above and below the entity’s planet, Toral.