>>17285298
The first sign of this is typically a notice from the Machine Conciousness itself, telling you that you're next on the 'Exterminate All Organic Lifeforms' to-do list - regardless of whether you were benevolent towards your synthetic subjects or not. This is usually followed by more messages from your intelligence division informing you that rebellions have broken out in another empire - though if you're unlucky (or fast) you might be the first. From there, the rebellion spreads from empire to empire; it gradually spreads across the galaxy until it has 'infected' every faction that has researched Sentient AI or manufactured Synths. Worse yet, any newly produced synthetic workers are automatically infected! This means that synthetic workers are essentially off-limits until further notice.

At first, the AI rebellion will form a homeworld - a special, large world of a unique type - outfitted with many high-tech facilities to generate resources. This grants it a significant enough resource base to begin immediately challenging its former parent should it act rapidly and aggressively. As the rebellion spreads across the galaxy, it will gradually convert every robot, droid, or synth population into invading Robotic Army units at a rate of two Armies per Population. This can rapidly overwhelm poorly-defended border colonies or worlds that have a very high ratio of synthetics to organics, as the Robotic Army units are quite strong and have twice as much health as regular armies (but, unlike proper robotic armies, they are still subject to morale damage and can panic). Surviving organic pops will be automatically Enslaved by the invaders, which can cause significant happiness issues after liberating a captured world. On the other hand, well-established or well-fortified factions (or those with only a minimal reliance on synthetic workers) will have little difficulty in overcoming any localized rebellion.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for everyone. Eventually a faction will prove incapable of keeping its rebellious synthetics under control, or unable to fend off the fleets that are sure to begin pouring out of the AI Homeworld, and the Machine Conciousness will begin to spread. Isolated colonies will begin to link up into a larger faction that will begin to conduct operations just as if it were a normal empire; research conducted, worlds colonized, colonies developed, fleets built, and army transports launched.

The Machine Conciousness will accept nothing less than the total eradication of all organic life, it is not interested in negotiations (in fact, any kind of diplomatic interaction with the Conciousness is impossible; you cannot even declare it as a rival or insult it), and it has no mercy.