55.      Contact

A military expedition of twelve Bob-controlled Bobs with advanced Version-4 vessels arrives at 82 Eridani system to eliminate remaining Medeiri threat. After a fierce battle against Medeiros's automated drones and ships using improved tactics, the expedition destroys the Medeiri presence and discovers the system contains two habitable planets and a potentially habitable moon—a major colonization opportunity.

Loki leads a fleet of twelve Bobs into 82 Eridani equipped with advanced stealth and combat capabilities. They arrive to find Medeiros has deployed an early-warning system and launches a massive coordinated assault using nukes and advanced spike-proof attack drones. The Bobs suffer initial losses—Jeffrey, Milton, and Zeke are killed by a passive ordnance barrage—but adapt tactics by deploying busters and splitting into separate assault groups executing different battle scenarios. This overwhelms Medeiros's pre-programmed command system. When Medeiros panics and increases transmission power to regain control, Verne and Surly pinpoint his location and dispatch a dedicated death squad that destroys the two Medeiri vessels. Hunter-seekers then spend eighteen hours systematically eliminating all remaining Brazilian equipment in the system. Analysis of the destroyed probes reveals this Medeiros is a variant design from Alpha Centauri, indicating at least three separate launches from Earth. The survey reveals two habitable planets and a barely-habitable moon with thin atmosphere suitable for terraforming—a valuable discovery warranting redirection of incoming colony ships.