“But there’s thousands of copies of Pete out there,” said Mitchie.
“That was an emergency measure,” said Pete. “As other people volunteer to take over roles I’m turning nodes over to them and merging my copies. Eventually I’ll be an individual again.”
“It will be same with ships,” said Belenko. “We are finding the thousand best pilots and we will each take a ship out to fight. Once we have agreement.”
Galen leaned back in his chair. “Agreement?”
The robot rolled forward, almost touching the table. “Before we fight, we must have formal acknowledgement of our status as citizens and ownership of Earth.”
The suits burst out with a jumble of objections. Mitchie made out claims that the emulations weren’t real people and land was needed for colonists.
Belenko snarled, “When I pilot warship I am real enough to be destroyed.”
“We are willing to trade land and services to colonists for appropriate compensation,” said Havis, who Mitchie was classing as the good cop.
The wrangling went on for a bit. As it steadied down to a list of bargaining positions Admiral Galen stood up. “Ladies, Gentlemen, my digital friends, these are civilian matters with no need for military input. Please let me know when Earth’s fleet will be ready for action. Good day.”
As Galen walked out of the tent Mitchie scurried to follow him.
The admiral muttered, “Those damn vultures have been wanting to slice up the planet since before we got here. I’m not sorry to see them cut out.”
Mitchie limited her response to a nod.
He looked down at her as they walked. “You did good work delivering Pete here. Hell of a risk. I should have said that earlier.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I can’t promote you any more, and you don’t care much for medals. What do you want?”
“Out.” No hesitation.
“Out? As in a discharge?”
“Discharge, retirement, or a nice safe jail cell. I’ve rolled the dice so much all my luck is used up. I want out.”
“All right. I’ll make it happen. What about the rest of your crew?”
“Senior Chief Kwan wanted to quit a while back. Centurion Hiroshi is ready to be skipper. He deserves a cruiser though.”
“I have a few cruisers needing new commanders. None from Shishi though.”
“The rest you’ll have to ask. I don’t know which way they’ll go.”
“That’s what staff is for. Write me up a nice letter of resignation, Captain. I’ll accept it in a day or two.”
“Thank you, Admiral.” Her salute was the sharpest she’d made in a year.
Galen went off to the headquarters tent.
Mitchie turned toward the hospital.
She made a point of visiting the casualties daily. They were mostly Marines who’d broken bones in bad landings. Mitchie chatted with each about his progress and offered sympathy to a new arrival, a rating who dodged the wrong way when a forklift spilled a load.
The head doctor, ready to give his report, was surprised when Mitchie made a personal request.
“That’s—um, well . . . ma’am, I’m a trauma surgeon.”
“Pretend it’s shrapnel.”
He agreed to do the procedure in the morning.
***
It went quickly. She was out of the hospital in an hour.
The base was in an uproar. The negotiations had gone until midnight, and revealed that the digital pilots were trying to use the organic people as leverage in the emulations’ internal arguments over resource allocation. Now the base personnel were arguing over which faction was in the right.
As Mitchie passed the mess tent she noticed someone had painted “INSTANTIATE THE POOR” on the side wall.
Not my problem, she thought.
Back on Joshua Chamberlain she found Guo in the galley. “Hey. I have news.”
“Oh?”
“I put in my resignation. It’s been accepted. I told them you wanted out too.”
Guo stood and wrapped his arms tightly around her.
“There’s more. Hiroshi gets command. There’s some data and samples to be delivered to the Secure Research Facility, so we can ride home with him. And I just had my implant yanked so,” she poked him in the chest, “if you do your part I could be in second trimester by the time we get home.”
A quick kiss was followed by Mitchie squeaking as Guo scooped her up in his arms. She stuck out too far to fit easily through their cabin hatch like that, but he managed to maneuver her through without bumping her head or ankles. She had to pull the hatch closed.
Guo tossed her on the bed and said, “Let’s get to work.”
Mitchie giggled.
EPILOGUE
Long Ranch, Akiak, gravity 10.3 m/s2
Mitchie hopped up from the couch—well, lurched up—as she heard the outer door open. She pulled on a house robe for warmth but didn’t bother belting it. It wouldn’t close over her seven month belly anyway.
She reached the slush room as Guo came through the inner door. A frigid puff of air from the first autumn blizzard came with him, trapped between the cold lock doors.
“Did you—what happened?” she burst out.
“Relax, it’s not my blood. One of the cows delivered early.” Guo pulled off his gloves and started unbuckling the parka.
“I thought you were going to fix Monty’s tractor, not play vet.” She caught the heavy coat and hung it up.
“I did. Then he plowed a path through the drifts to the calving barn while I walked behind carrying the newborn.” He fiddled with the boots until she pried them off.
“Hmph. He has ranch hands for that.”
“They couldn’t make it through the drifts, not having a fancy tracked off-roader like us. Besides, he’s a relative and a neighbor. Have to help him.”
Extracting him from the insulated pants took some concentration. Once Guo was down to shirtsleeves Mitchie took a house robe from the warming cabinet. That gadget had convinced the family these two had too much money.
Guo let out an “Aaaahh” as the thick cloth pressed heat into him. Mitchie led him into the inner room where hot tea was waiting.
“Oh, family news,” he said after the first sip. “Your cousin Washington who moved to Happy Valley?”
“Yes?”
“The baby’s a girl. They’re naming her Saskatchewan but she’ll be called Sassy.”
“Nice. Was Montana jealous?”
“Maybe a little.” He took a larger sip.
“My news is the interstellar mail courier had messages for us. I saved them until you were home.” She handed Guo his datasheet and opened her own.
“Oh, Lian finally wrote,” said Guo. “The twins are fine. Surgically delivered, because they’re all control freaks there. She has a new job, proctor at the Scent Garden. And a new apartment. Sounds like they skipped the trial but fired her without severance, she’s vague about it.” Some irritation leaked into his voice. “She says she doesn’t need any help.”
“Probably doesn’t. It’s cradle to grave there.”
“I should be doing something to take care of the kids.”
“You’ll get your chance.” Mitchie started her next letter. “Why is Guen bothering me with this? It’s just politics, politics, Ping is an asshole—”
“Which is also politics.”
“—and more politics. Ah! Wayne Searcher proposed. The wedding is two weeks from now, we’d never make it.”
Guo snorted. Travel time was the least obstacle between them and attending a wedding.
“Hmmm. She’s dancing around it. I wonder if they picked a quick date so we wouldn’t be back.”
“Having me there would be a little awkward.”
“I think it could be hilarious.”
“Good thing she scheduled it while we’re out here. I’ll come up with a present from the two of us.”
“Thanks.”
Guo opened his next message.
“Bakhunin says the DCC is debating a constitution based on my proposal.”
“Do they like it?” she asked.
“He says the ones who see themselves getting more influence in that system like it, the others hate it.”
“So about what you expected.”
“Yes. He wants me to attend a session. I’ll let him down gently.”
Mitchie pulled up her next letter. “Oh, crap. Oh crap. Oh crap.”
“What?”
“Rabbi Orbakh wants me to know the Earth Collective gave robot bodies to him and two hundred and forty three other pilgrims and hired a ship to take them to the Disconnect. Oh, crap.”
Guo lowered his datasheet. “That’s more ranch hands than Montana and Alberta together have work for.”
“Oh, crap. I’ll write some letters. Maybe Bonaventure and Shishi will take some.”
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About the Author
Karl Gallagher has earned engineering degrees from MIT and USC, controlled weather satellites for the Air Force, designed weather satellites for TRW, designed a rocketship for a start-up, and done systems engineering for a fighter plane. He is husband to Laura and father to Maggie, James, and dearly missed Alanna.
About Kelt Haven Press
Kelt Haven Press is releasing print, ebook, and audiobooks by Karl K. Gallagher. For updates see:
www.kelthavenpress.com
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Torchship Captain Page 37