by Isaac Hooke
“So, what do you propose?” Jain asked.
“We jump to their staging system first, destroy its infrastructure, and any ships that have gathered there for the next attack on your world,” Hephaestus said. “They only have one other staging system at the moment, and that is being utilized in the fight against the Fresnal. It will take them at least a week to recover. Maybe a month. Your world will be safe from attacks in the interim.”
“The Link have been fighting these Fresnal for over a hundred years, haven’t they?” Defense Secretary Anderson asked.
“They have,” Hephaestus agreed.
“Then how can we ever hope of a quick resolution to this war?” Anderson said. “How can we hope to accomplish something in weeks, that the Fresnal have not accomplished in a century?”
“Because, we are four races, and the Fresnal are one,” Hephaestus said. “Together, we can defeat them. Three of our races are also former Link members. We have knowledge the Fresnal do not have. Could not have. It is this knowledge, in combination with our alliance, that will allow us to prevail.”
“I hope you’re right,” Anderson said.
Hephaestus merely stared at him.
“What about the Eastern Galactic Front?” Anderson said. He glanced at the president. “We can’t just abandon them. They still haven’t got all the colonists out.”
President Wilcox nodded. “They haven’t, but the attacks have abated in that system. The Link is concentrating its efforts on Earth for now.”
“We could send some ships to help with the evacuation, if it makes the secretary feel any better,” Tanis suggested.
“No,” Wilcox said. “If the Link attacks again, we’ll consider intervening, especially if they send some world killers. But until then, we’ll concentrate on dealing as much damage to the Link as we can, while we can. And that means as many ships as we’re comfortable sparing. In fact, I might even recall some ships from the Eastern Galactic Front to join us.”
“We can’t bring the whole fleet, of course,” Tanis said. “We need to leave some portion behind to protect Earth.”
“That’s very true,” Wilcox said. “I’ll leave that up to you and the defense secretary to determine.”
“Bring as many ships as you’re comfortable with,” Hephaestus said. “I will be bringing the entire Mimic fleet under my command.”
“I might leave one or two Banthar motherships behind,” Eric said. “But the rest are coming with me. I figure they’ll jump in and let us know if attackers reach Earth.”
“Jhagan tells me he intends to bring all ten Tyrnari vessels,” Jason said.
“And the Void Warriors are definitely going,” Jain said.
The conversation continued for about an hour thereafter. Hephaestus explained what to expect, and the participants in the meeting developed a plan of attack.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Jain said.
Eric chuckled.
“What is it?” Jain asked.
“Nothing,” Eric said. “Just that, you always say that.”
Jain smiled. “I suppose I do. But only because it’s true.”
Eric nodded. “We’re Mind Refurbs, you’d think we wouldn’t have any problems with tactical combat.”
“You would,” Jain said. “But that holds true only in an equal battle. The problem is, the battles we’ve been fighting have been far from equal. But that’s all right. We’re used to being the underdog by now.”
Jason sat on the picnic table of his mountain cabin, staring across the shores of the lake nestled amid those peaks.
Maeran joined him, sitting on the tabletop beside him, and using the bench as a footrest.
He glanced at the beautiful dark skinned woman. She wore her hair in the usual coiffured curls that reached below her shoulders. On her brow, a small golden chain ran along her hairline, framing her forehead before passing into the hair above the ears like a pair of glasses. She had forsaken her thick gold earrings today, and wore a blue dress fringed with silver thread at the sleeves.
“It’s so peaceful here,” she said.
Jason nodded. “That’s why I chose it. A place to de-stress from the worries of the real world.”
“Sometimes, I think about logging off the real world forever,” she said. “And just staying here, in VR. Not necessarily in this particular environment, but one of my own making. Or perhaps one of those shared MMORPG worlds that so many humans are addicted to.”
He smiled. “Yeah. I’ve heard some of them become Mind Refurbs, and don’t bother to get android bodies. They just inject themselves into their favorite MMORPGs, and just live out their lives in them. Well, I say live out their lives as if it has an end, but there is no end for a Mind Refurb, is there?”
She glanced at him. “Unless we fail here.”
“Unless we fail,” he agreed. “But we won’t.”
“I feel a little abused by the humans,” Maeran said. “They attack our base on and off, for over fifty years. And then, all of a sudden, when Earth is in danger, we’re their best friends.”
“The president and I are on a first name basis, now,” Jason said. “So I think that’s going to change.”
“Really?” Maeran said. “If you’re on a first name basis, why are you calling him ‘the president?’”
“It was just a figure of speech,” Jason said.
She returned her attention to the lake. “Lori tells me she wants to marry you when this is done.”
“You all know my stance on marriage,” Jason said.
A hint of a smile appeared on her lips. “I used to think I loved you. And the thought of losing you to someone like Lori would have been devastating to me. But now, I don’t really care, even if you did marry her. Because to be honest, when this is over, I think I’m going to go my own way. If the humans accept us, I plan to live among them.”
Jason felt a sudden sense of panic. If he lost her, other women were sure to leave as well. The life he’d built for himself in the uninhabited zone would be lost. “You can’t leave.”
She stared at him indignantly. “And why not? Just because I occasionally share my bed with you doesn’t make me your property.”
“The humans will never accept you,” he said. “You’ll always be an outcast. You inhabit a Grazer mech! You can’t even fit through a doorway, let alone a sidewalk.”
“I’ll get my consciousness removed from the mech and installed in an android,” she said. “Like the Bolt Eaters. And the Void Warriors. The military can keep their Grazer mech.”
“You really want to give up who you are?” he said.
“The Grazer isn’t me.” She indicated her body. “This is. This has always been me. The Grazer was merely the tool I needed to survive. And now that I no longer need that tool, or won’t, when this is done, I plan to give it up. I’m not going back to the uninhabited zone. I won’t. That life isn’t for me. It took me fifty years to realize it. Don’t get me wrong, you’re a good person. And so are the other women. But I guess I’m just sick of sharing you. I want a man all my own. Someone I don’t have to share.”
“But a human can never love an android,” he said, struggling to come up with some excuse for her to stay.
“That’s not true,” she said. “Check the census department. Humans routinely marry androids.”
“Yeah, but those are the weirdos with their sexbots,” he said.
“Not true,” she said. “By law, for the marriage to be legal, the robot has to have a fully sentient AI core installed.”
“Fine,” he said. “Then they’re installing AI cores into their sexbots. But that doesn’t make them anything more.”
“Actually, it does,” she said. “You of all people should know that. Sentient AIs have the same level of consciousness as us Mind Refurbs. In any case, you’re sidetracking me from my point, which is a human can love an android. There are also other Mind Refurbs I can date now. A whole population of them. There are specific dating sites and apps that cater d
irectly to that population.”
Jason sighed, and then slumped. He looked down, gazing at the virtual grass between his feet. “I’m sorry. I just didn’t want to lose you. I’m worried the other women are going to follow your example. I guess I should get used to the fact that they’re all going to have a lot of options once this is done, and humanity allows us back into the fold.”
“I think you might be surprised at how many stay with you,” she told him. “But if you’re worried, why not offer to bring them all to North America with you? You can all give up your mechs, and accept androids in trade from the military.”
“Assuming the military will allow it,” he said.
She smiled. “Hey, you know the president on a first name basis, remember?”
He chuckled. “Yeah. I suppose it’s possible. But I’m not sure I want to give Bokerov sole control of the uninhabited zone. Once we’re gone, the whole continent will be his, from Russia, through Europe, to the tip of Africa. Someone has to protect the world from him.”
“Let it go,” she said. “Let the human military deal with him.”
“What about the Rex Wolves?” Jason said.
She shrugged. “Set them free.”
“You’ve obviously never been a pet owner,” he told her. “You can’t just ‘set free’ your pets. That’s like ‘setting free’ your children at the shopping mall by abandoning them. No. I’m staying in the uninhabited zone.”
She shrugged. “The choice is yours. But don’t blame me if others grow restless, and want to leave.”
“I won’t blame you,” he said. “I know that the only one to blame is myself. If anyone else wants to leave, anyone, including the clones, I won’t stop them.”
“Good,” she said. She patted his knee. “Thanks for the talk.” She vanished.
He rubbed his eyes. “Thanks for the talk. Blah.”
Lori materialized beside him, seated on the table on his other side. Like Maeran had done, her feet were resting on the bench like a footrest.
“Did you…?” he asked.
She grinned. “Yup! Heard everything.”
He looked away, shaking his head.
She shoved herself into his side and wrapped an arm around his shoulder, giving him a tight squeeze. “Love you! Of course I’m never leaving, no matter what you decide.”
“Okay,” he said. “That’s reassuring.”
“But I want to get married and have virtual kids,” she said.
“That’s a no from me on both counts,” he said.
“But if all the other women leave, then why not?” she said.
Sophie approached from the cabin. “What’s this about us leaving?”
“Jason is getting rid of you all so he can marry me!” Lori exclaimed.
Sophie frowned. “Really. Well, you won’t get rid of me so easily.”
“I have no plans to,” Jason said.
“He told Maeran that when this is done, he’s letting us all go,” Lori told her.
He crossed his arms. “No, that’s not what I said. I told her I wasn’t going to keep any of you with me in the uninhabited zone, if you didn’t want to stay.”
“Well, I’m not going,” Sophie said. She sat on the bench beside him and threaded her fingers through his. She kissed him on the cheek.
“You say that now,” he told her. “But after this next mission, you might feel differently.”
“Why?” she said. “I’ve reviewed our role. It’s going to be hard, yes, but no harder than anything we’ve done before.”
“Well, I mean if we’re successful, when we return to Earth, in theory the humans will welcome us with open arms,” Jason said. “You won’t be compelled to stay in the uninhabited zone with me.”
“Silly, we stay because we want to,” Sophie told him.
“You and Lori, maybe,” he said. “But I’m not sure everyone else feels that way.”
She shrugged. “I guess we’ll see. If they want to go, that’s all the better for me and Lori.”
“That’s right!” Lori said. “We can both marry him!”
Jason rubbed his eyes. The current mission couldn’t start soon enough.
4
Eric had returned his consciousness to Banthar Prime to deal with the latest attack by the group known as Repelling the Entity. That was what some of the Banthar called him: the Entity, rather than the Essential. They had staged a simultaneous attack against multiple server farms across the planet, but he’d judiciously deployed Sloths and other mech classes to defend the buildings, and splattered the streets with their snail insides.
When that was done, he’d returned his consciousness to Little Earth. It seemed so empty there, without the other Bolt Eaters. That place too, had sustained an attack, and some of the buildings were badly damaged now. Repair swarms roved across the structures as they watched; the places would be good as new.
“There has to be a way to stop these attacks,” Eric said.
“The only way is to return control of the planet to the Banthar,” Dee said. “Repelling the Entity believe you are leading them down the path to destruction, by severing your ties with the Link.”
“It’s possible that I am,” he said. “Have you found out which member or members of the Ruling Council are part of this group?”
While he was busy fighting off-world, he had Dee look into the ties he suspected some of the councilors had with the rebel group. As a test, during one of the council meetings he casually mentioned his plans to add server buildings to one of the remote Banthar cities, as part of his project to upgrade his ever expanding consciousness; the next day, when the termites began construction, bombs had detonated throughout the area.
A little too coincidental.
Since then, Dee had been following around the different Banthar members with stealth drones, and surveilling their residences 24/7, as well as spying on their online activity.
“Not yet,” Dee said.
“Well, we’ll catch them eventually,” Eric said. “And when we do, I’ll have to make an example of the snails for the others. Serve up some escargot with garlic butter!”
“Maybe if you stopped referring to them as ‘snails’ it might help,” Dee said.
“I guess I can’t help it with organics any more,” he said. “I feel leaps and bounds above them. Banthar are like snails to me. And humans, they’re like monkeys. Well, not that I’ve met any humans in a long time. But still, you get my point. Hell, even Mind Refurbs are starting to feel lesser to me. It’s a bit of a problem. That’s what happens when you put your mind into a planet-wide neural network. Feelings of superiority are bound to come up, now and again, I suppose.” He shook his head. “Jain once told me he thought I was humble, but he was wrong. Oh sure, I put on a good act of it sometimes, but the truth is, I'm the furthest from humble that anyone can be. I wish I was. I truly do. I want to be a better person. A good person. Well, Mind Refurb, I suppose. But it's hard with so much power."
"You are humble, when you interact with Bambi and Crusher," Dee said. "They help ground you. As do the other Bolt Eaters."
“That’s true, I guess,” Eric said.
“Sometimes you’re too hard on yourself,” Dee said.
“Hey, you were the one who was just scolding me for calling the Banthar snails,” Eric said. “And now here you go and walk back the comment.”
“I’m not walking it back,” Dee said. “I still believe you should stop calling them snails in private.”
He smiled widely. “Well, good. I wouldn’t have it any other way. You say the Bolt Eaters help keep me grounded? So do you. But speaking of the Bolt Eaters, I should probably pay them a visit. And I’ll do my best not to call the Banthar snails, going forward. But no guarantees.”
He logged out of the android on Banthar Prime, and used the open rift gates to Earth system to resume control of the AI core of the Bethunia II, the Banthar mothership he’d left in Earth’s orbit.
He switched to the vessel’s default VR env
ironment: a sailing ship crossing a translucent ocean, with the stars visible in the sky and below the ocean corresponding with the actual data returned by his forward cameras.
He could see the Bug Killer to his left, and the other Banthar ships to his right, all represented in that virtual environment.
But the deck was empty.
Must be in their own private VRs.
He logged out of that VR and switched instead to his own private VR, which he shared with Bambi and Crusher.
He appeared in his VR apartment loft, which was modeled on the same apartment he had lived in while consulting for high tech companies as a human.
“About time you showed up,” Slate said.
Eric turned around to discover the other Bolt Eaters lounging on his furniture. They’d created some new pieces for themselves. They all held mugs that varied in height from shot glasses to large tankards. All filled with alcohol.
“That’s right, help yourself to all my drinks,” Eric said.
“Will do,” Slate said, raising his wine glass in toast and taking a long sip.
Bambi and Crusher made room on one of the couches, and Eric squeezed between them.
He ran his gaze across the group. “You all look a little subdued.”
“Do you blame us?” Brontosaurus said. “Given what’s coming?”
“Suppose not,” Eric said.
“Getting shit-faced is the only way for us to relax,” Hicks said.
“Except virtual drunkenness was never really the same as real drunkenness,” Eric told him.
“About that,” Frogger said. “I might have some new routines for you if you’re interested.”
Eric studied his mind twin. “Actually, getting drunk was actually the thing I hated most about drinking. So I think I’ll pass.”
“I feel the same way, of course,” Frogger said. “And let’s just say, developing these subroutines wasn’t all that fun for me, considering I had to test them out on myself. But I took one for the team, and I think the results are worth it.”
“Still passing,” Eric said.