The view from downrange
Intercepted message, secure email to forward G&K operating base, subject flagged for high priority review due to key words "rampancy, Threat, Singularity, Connor"
Text decryption at 23%, eta 1:43:02 for full decryption.
Video file attached to email, existing compromised decryption keys accepted, decryption at 100%
Video presentation from Dr Connor, senior Ai threat consultant.
Playing file: Presentation_final_3_for_real_this_time.MOV
The file runs, revealing a portly man in a stereotypical lab coat who seems to be sitting down in front of a laptop webcam.
"Good evening everyone, Now, as your higher ups only paid for so many of these presentations, I'm going to be trying to do several things at once with this one. So if this feels too detailed, or not detailed enough you know who to complain to."
He pauses and shoots a grin to the camera, apparently hoping to make at least a few members of his audience laugh, noticeably the grin does not reach his eyes.
"As you are no doubt aware, the idea of rogue digiminds has been my team's area of study for some time, much work has been done to predict what a rampancy event would look like. To sum up a great deal of academic arguing and theory crafting, the expected greatest threat of such an event was the much feared hyper-adaptability of a rampant digimind. By design, high end Ai vastly exceeds human cognitive abilities, and thus it was predicted that a rogue Ai would be capable of rapid technological and tactical innovation, leading to a foe that would rapidly outstrip our ability to contain."
Dr Connor pauses for a second as a sheepish expression comes across their face. "So you can imagine how foolish we all felt when Sangvis Ferri was all but defined by their lack of adaptability. Now, we came up with a great many face saving theories, ranging from still existing safeguards, to some form of deception, to asserting that the rampancy event left their AI crippled. Unfortunately for everyone involved, it turns out the answer was simply a lack of time. The handful of malfunctioning masterminds were simply too busy commanding troops to do anything else. As they shift to a more defensive posture, this seems to be changing."
With a click the image of the doctor is replaced with a side view of the ringleader unit Agent. The low resolution is clearly a still frame taken from combat footage, showing her in side profile, as her weapons fire upon some unseen target. Red circles have been drawn over the scopes so recently added to her guns.
"As you can see here, recently this ringleader unit modified its weapons. A very small change, it has added scopes to its guns. This is a simple aftermarket modification meant to adapt it from its intended role as a bodyguard to its present role as a field combatant. This is by itself, not very worrying save for the immediate tactical consequences, adding scopes is the sort of ad-hoc modification in line with what more advanced T-dolls have been known to perform. The issue is that it proves that the Sangvis Ferri rampancy is capable of self improvement, and adapting to changing circumstances rather than hard locked from it by an internal defect or remaining shackle. The observed changes will become more worrying from here."
With another click the image changed, this time to a smoldering trenchline.
"Now, this one is a less well understood change, as we have had to deduce it from analysis of battlefield aftermath and a few bits of recovered footage. While the harassing nature of Agents attacks meant we had surviving units to pull footage from, Destroyer is attacking and eradicating hardpoints leaving us far less to work with. From what we can tell, it has modified the fuses of its primary weapon to enable airburst capability, a direct response to encountering entrenched foes. More worryingly still, spectrometric analysis of blast residue has confirmed it has adopted a novel explosive with notably increased capabilities. This is far more concerning if perhaps less tactically relevant than the modifications to Agent, as it implies that they are capable of modifying production lines. Ringleader bodies are rare enough that Agent could simply have been manually adding scopes to its weapons every time it was re-sleeved, but this is a munition, one used in quantities too large for anything but a production line to be providing them. This is the first evidence of industrial modification we have seen, but worryingly it is not the last."
With another click, the smoldering tench line is replaced with what is clearly gun cam footage, showing a large quadcopter dead center of an aiming reticle.
"This appears to be a partially successful attempt at a MK II recon drone. It was intercepted several thousand feet above effective engagement range for small arms, well above the flight ceiling of existing Sangvis Ferri reconnaissance platforms. As of now, only a single example has been encountered, quite possibly as a field trial. While it was shot down, doing so required the deployment of a helicopter into unsecured airspace."
there is a pause and the sound of shuffling paper.
"It is also the belief of the engineering department, that the drone could be easily modified into a crude anti helicopter platform. Either by replacing its optical sensor package with explosives, or a stripped down anti material rifle. It is our recommendation that you seek hard kill defenses for your helicopters. I believe as a stopgap measure replacing the co-pilot with a sniper rated T-doll should be sufficient in the short term. As for what this means for future threats, this is the first truly new platform we have seen thus far. While clearly based on existing recon drones, it is nevertheless a novel design, and one that could well see mass production going forward. As for why I am recommending hard kill defenses rather than jamming, well that has to do with the last and most disturbing change."
With a click, the screen changes, this time revealing a short clip. a score of T-dolls are pouring fire into an apartment block, suppressing the Sangvis Ferri defenders. At an unheard signal, the viewpoint t-doll charges alongside her dummy bodies, dashing through the anemic fire of the suppressed defenders. With a crash they tear through the door into a long hallway. A second later she glances back to see another fire team of dolls had followed her into the entryway. An instant later the screen is full of dust and fire as the squadron is sent sprawling. The camera shakes as the bearer scrambles to her feet, seeing what was once a study cement wall has been blown open, the glow of a dozen rippers visible through the smoke. The footage freezes.
"I'm sure we don't need to see what happens next." with another click once more the view returns to a very worried looking Dr Conor.
"We believe that the defenders lured the breach team into the entryway, including the second wave, before detonating a Golith drone bomb to blast open the wall, and eliminating the breaching team with hidden reserves. While this would normally simply be a battlefield defeat, we have triple confirmed that there was not, I repeat,
not a ringleader present." he stares into the camera with an unnerving intensity. "This is merely one of many such encounters in recent days, we have irrefutable proof that the basic Sangvis Ferri units are getting smarter. An upgrade such as this would have taken human programmers months if not years to complete, if theories are correct, the Sangvis Ferri rampancy was able to generate it in at most ten days. Worse still, we
can not promise that this is the last such upgrade. Already we have unconfirmed reports of newer drone models bearing additional hardware of unknown purpose. This is the result of less than two weeks of reduced and I can not put enough emphasis on the word reduced here, pressure."
Dr Conor took a deep breath, before leaning forward to lock eyes with the camera.
"It is the opinion of myself and my team that should the Sangvis Ferri rampancy be given the time and space to invest more computation resources into long term goals it will become exponentially more dangerous. Every processing cycle not spent on immediate survival is one spent on resolving long standing weaknesses, or compounding its advantages. While we do not yet think there is any danger of a true singularity, there is nevertheless a risk of a lethal cycle if this continues. Every unanswered development lessens the pressure on the handful of rogue digiminds at the core of Sangvis Ferri, allowing them to focus more processing power on further development, reducing pressure yet further. While we believe they may plateau at some point, that point is quite likely well beyond what you can deal with. If nothing changes the enemy may become unassailable by present forces within months."
The doctor pauses to collective himself.
"It is imperative that this not be allowed to happen. Offensive operations
must be intensified, focus should be moved from physical destruction of Sangvis Ferri material to forcing the commitment of Ringleaders. While this will result in increased attrition among Griffin & Kryuger assets, failure to prevent further development would be catastrophic. If present income streams are not sufficient to sustain higher losses, I suggest either requesting higher compensation from your client due to increased threat to both them and you, or seek alternative income streams to support the necessary operational tempo."
The professor fell back in his chair, suddenly looking very tired. "If such tactics are impossible, then it becomes a near certainty that the Sangvis Ferri incident will require direct military intervention to resolve, and the complete loss of all deployed Griffin & Kryuger forces becomes a very real possibility."
"I understand you consider me and my team somewhat alarmist, that we have somewhat consistently overestimated Sangvis Ferri, but I implore you to listen to us now. This is not based upon models or simulations of what a rogue AI could look like, this is based upon direct observation of Sangvis Ferri behavior in the field. The gap between this becoming obvious and overwhelming could be as small as a week. Act now, while there is still time."
Analysis complete.
File marked as high priority, forwarded to mastermind.
Amedum added: they noticed.
I let my mind wander and this kinda fell out. Just thinking about what Sangvis Ferri suddenly having proactive RnD would look like to the opposition. 
