Infinite Exploration

by D. L. Harrison

  I waved a hand, “That’s fine, we don’t need their universe or humanity to be copies of us. We’re just giving humanity a fighting chance to build a society out in space. They’ll find their own way, forge their own space and policies. As long as they don’t turn into genocidal assholes, we’ll keep our distance and watch out for them.”

  Cassie smirked, “The general might not know it was you, or another you, but if you plan was to give him nightmares then I’m sure you just succeeded. They have to be freaking out right now. An enemy they were losing to was just erased from space, after all, with no sign of the ones that did it, or even how it was done.”

  I grinned, “Why, I hadn’t considered that possibility at all,” I lied in a teasing tone.

  Earth had forty colonies in that universe, and they had a fighting chance. Their ships weren’t nearly as powerful as mine, but they were more than a match for old Gray technology and the other remaining surrounding empires.

  Cassie snickered.

  We repeated it for universe five, removing the Vrok and Stolthrim who threatened the Atans empire, who like it or not were keeping the humans in that universe safe. I wondered again why they’d attack the Atans. I could only conclude they hadn’t done any research, and they’d decided the Atans were as monstrous as the Grays’ database had suggested. Perhaps fourteen years ago Tam’Diaz had gone to Earth for help like they had here, and whoever was in charge back then fired on them because of that misapprehension which started the war that led to humanity becoming confined.

  There was no way to tell, since the stealth network said what the universe and empires looked like now, we had no way to tell what had happened fourteen years ago to lead to the Earth being a food growing world for the herd.

  The partial proof of that, at least coincidental, was that the three galaxies I’d saved fourteen years ago here, were fully Stolthrim galaxies in that universe now.

  Either way, I bet the hidden aid freaked out the Atans too. The truth was I’d have done it just to help, but there were those selfish reasons we had to keep hidden, and as I’d said before, no one trusted another that acted in pure benevolence.

  That left us with two more universes to help, and we’d help another one in two days from then, when the next stealth fleet had been built and had time to gather some reconnaissance data.

  But the last two were rather sticky. I chose to tackle the evil me last.

  “This next one has the Vrok controlling the seventy-six galaxies, and they have fleets of ships on all fourteen borders. Humanity is no better than a food world and the Vrok has knocked them back to nineteen fifties technology, save nuclear arms which were removed.

  “So, we take out the Vrok, then what. We have two choices, I think. We contact Earth, maybe try to find me there and do a partial uplift? No jumping technology, and not even the new communicators. No quantum fabric tech at all, but everything else? We need someone to guard the borders, or Earth will just be overwhelmed by another empire long before they can reach space on their own.”

  Melody nodded, “Second option?”

  “We sent fifty-six million scout destroyers over there, four million at all fourteen borders. And the humans can grow and regain space in their own time. As will all the other worlds, none of the races are FTL anymore, they were all thrown out of space by the Vrok.”

  Jessica said, “Maybe, but all they have to do is rebuild, they already have FTL knowledge. Or at least, about twenty-three thousand of them. They’ll be back in space long before Earth advances to it naturally, by centuries.”

  I nodded, “So we’d have to keep an eye on Earth, and make sure none of the internal fifty galaxy races becomes a threat to humanity. Uplift, or actively protect the galaxies ourselves. There’re negatives to both ideas. Uplifting them would be a larger initial effort, but once it was done, they’d be running things.”

  Melody had been doing something with her magic, so I looked over when she pulled it back.

  “You died on that world. Dale caught up to you in the hospital.”

  Oh, well damn.

  “So, we’d have to give the tech save quantum fabric technology to multiple countries, to ensure a balance of power.”

  Cassie said, “It’d take time to build it.”

  I shook my head, “I can make a new station and use our small ships on the borders and to protect their solar system. I just need to move them over, exchange quantum pairs, and then remove the communicators and all the quantum fabric technology from the nanites. It’d take me an hour to write the script. Right before I moved the stuff over, we can use the other ships to take out the Vrok and check the Stolthrgim, then move it over, contact the US, Russia, China, and the UK, and hand over the station.

  “Better yet I can make four stations, and then give them all an equal amount of internal ships and borders to defend. We can also tell them where all the colonizable worlds are within five hundred light years. By the time the other races rebuild and get back in space, humanity will be spread out a bit.”

  Cassie nodded, “Okay, that avoids days and weeks of build time, but it’s still weeks if not months of effort getting them familiar with controlling things. Are you going to leave Darrell in control of those ships? Or make them run them from the stations?”

  “Second one, I think. Darrell?”

  Darrell said, “That’s fine. I don’t mind helping other humanities, but my focus is on this universe and on our family.”

  Our family? I let that go without comment. He kind of was part of the family though, wasn’t he?

  “So, are you suggesting we just do it ourselves, or write these humans off as Vrok meals?”

  Melody gasped, and I winked.

  Cassie glared, “The first one. It’s probably more work for us in the long run, but Darrell can keep an eye on it and ensure humanity isn’t put in danger. I worry we’ll destabilize their world and humanity itself will self-destruct. Make them earn it, while we keep them safe. Not to mention keeping the cross-universe thing a secret. Every humanity we contact in a different universe raises the probability another humanity will gain this technology, or perhaps even another race.”

  I sighed, “Alright. We’ll take over the borders, and we’ll confine the Vrok. Guess I found a good use for all those extra ships, at forty-eight million a pop it’ll take quite a while to go through the extra trillions we have. I’m assuming this won’t be the last time we take this course.”

  It didn’t take too long to set up. We even had all the coordinates, we just had to change the major note in the quantum resonance to get ships to all those borders. Once more the Vrok and Stolthgrim was taken care of, and this time we had all the borders. Essentially protecting over twelve million intelligent species in seventy-six galaxies in that universe.

  Now for the hard one, and I didn’t even know where to start.

  Chapter Eight

  “Okay, what do we know about evil me?”

  Melody giggled.

  Cassie said, “First, our universe. I just got a message the U.N. finally came to decision after two days of arguing. We’re going to put forward a treaty with rules of war, and any war crimes will be dealt with severely. Of course, the only war crime in space was committing genocide or making a living world uninhabitable, or both.”

  “That sounds good.”

  Cassie nodded, “It is, it gets around our objections for it quite nicely. China is still trying to gather support for sanctions against Astraeus, but they’re having trouble getting traction. No one else is happy with them having ships as advanced as yours that can be used against Earth or other colonies.”

  “That sounds good too.”

  Cassie nodded, “The council demanded I leave for reassignment, and made subtle threats when I said no. I’m pretty much no longer part of the elder council.”

  “That sounds… not good.”

  Melody snickered, “Is dad always like this?”

  Jessica nodded, “It’s a cross we bear.”

 
Cassie and Melody both giggled.

  I said, “Like what?”

  Cassie said, “Irreverent and a bit of a joker.”

  I frowned, “I take war seriously, but if I took the shenanigans of the eight seriously, I’d have crushed them under my bootheel and started ruling all of humanity by now.”

  Cassie snickered, “Exactly, she didn’t say it was a bad thing.”

  Melody nodded, “It’s… stress relieving. I was expecting this to be all serious, but it’s kind of fun.”

  Jessica winked.

  “Does that mean I can retire in five years.”

  Melody shook her head, “Afraid not, dad. I’m taking over mom’s job so she can focus on research and drop management. Maybe the baby will want to rule, it’s only eighteen more years.”

  “Now who’s a joker? You’re going to be mom’s boss?”

  She grinned, and nodded, “That’s the plan. I can keep up on all the projects in just seconds a day with my magic, while mom has to waste hours a day trying to keep track of it all, while working on her own projects. It appeals to me too, mom’s not pushing me or anything.”

  I sighed faux mournfully, “Don’t you want to rule?”

  Cassie held up a hand, interrupting our banter, “Anyway. The fallout from destroying the shuttle isn’t great, but it could’ve been worse. Tensions on the genocide issue are at a standstill right now, thanks to the U.N.s decision, and I expect they should start to fall if the Interstellar Union votes for the war crimes treaty. That way we can stop the races bent on genocide, without suppressing or giving the appearance of suppressing the sovereignty of other races.”

  “Speaking of suppression,” I said casually.

  Melody giggled again, as she brought up what data we had on the universe with evil me, who of course was suppressing humanity.

  Then she made a face.

  “Okay, mom, Aunt Jayna, and Aunt Cassie died when trying to leave earth in the shuttle to Jupiter. They were shot down before the first attack even came, which left that universe’s version of you alone. After stopping the Sonex, he beat the U.S. ships that tried to destroy the station. That’s about when things really started to diverge.

  “He sent away his Threx, and he didn’t open trade with the Vax at all. He just started building. By the time the U.S. brought in their second wave of ships, he’d so out built them there was no contest. He automated the ships a lot earlier than you did Dad, since there was no one to fly them.

  “He didn’t need the Vax’s warning about the Grays, because he never stopped building ships, and was able to overwhelm them on his own and guard the borders. I don’t know if he planned it that way from the beginning, or simply went after the Grays because he didn’t trust them. Of course, he also missed out on all of mom’s advances, but he won with numbers alone.

  “It wasn’t until the Vrok attacked that he really upgraded the Grays’ ships at all, and he did what you did and upgraded the fleet with Vrok technology. His ships are a hybrid of old nanites and Vrok systems, since he didn’t have me and mom to figure out how to make it all work with nanites. No jump drives or quantum communicators either.

  “He also didn’t secure the Vrok’s borders, just the original fifty. I’d suspect he has a stealth fleet as well keeping an eye on everyone, though I can’t prove that.”

  I frowned, “Alright, I think I can see all that happening, but why isn’t he selling colony ships and letting humanity spread out?”

  Cassie gave me a comforting look, “Bitter, alone, and mistrustful of all the nations on Earth. He’s quarantined them, just like he did with the Grays and the Vrok.”

  I sighed, “I find it hard to imagine my life without my family and all of you in it. So, should we do anything about it?”

  Melody frowned, “Seriously?”

  I shrugged, “We take no action, but we leave the stealth network there unlike other universes where we don’t act. Without the Vax life extension, he won’t be around nearly as long as we will. Humanity will eventually reach out to the stars, and they’ll take over the station to defend the borders in that universe, if we just leave it alone. Sure, he’s suppressing humanity’s growth, but he’s also protecting them. If the switchover doesn’t happen smoothly at the end of his life, or he suddenly decides to attack and rule Earth, we can step in.

  “It’s either that, or we kill my other self now and then see what happens. It also wouldn’t be easy to do, because if we destroy that station all the fleets will be uncontrollable.”

  Darrell said, “On the contrary, without Diana he never developed the disintegration beam. We could target him inside the station with a thin beam, that should turn a three-foot-wide tunnel of nanites through the station into dust. That would preserve the station and it’s connections.”

  I frowned, “Sure, he didn’t develop it, but the Vrok’s shields could defend from it, and he has that technology.”

  Melody said, “He only adapted the subspace shields and weapons, and ignored the other esoteric field geometries he didn’t understand. The ones that protect from gravity and disintegration beams.”

  I nodded, “Okay, so we kill him, take over the station, split it up into six smaller stations that each protect one border and controls a sixth of his offensive fleet. Then turn the stations over to the U.S., China, Russia, UK, Japan, and Israel? All without revealing our presence, somehow. Well also update the database if necessary, so they find the ready to move in worlds within five hundred light years, and also advice on trading with the Vax, Arnis, Vonerith, and Katera. They can take it from there, however they want. Hell, I can even upload my original colony ship designs, so they can start building those when they want.”

  I was still stuck on the idea of killing myself. My other self anyway, but the others all seemed to think it was a swell idea. I tried not to feel offended. The other me was bitter and spiteful, but it was difficult. He even kind of deserved it. I’d fought defensively and spared as many lives as I could while securing my own. He’d been far more… aggressive, according to the data. His world was absolutely terrified of him.

  That version of me hadn’t started out a terrorist, he’d been like me, but then he’d gone too far without Diana’s love and Cassie’s influence to keep him on the straight and narrow.

  Cassie tilted her head, then smiled, “We could take him out, then you can leave a suicide note of sorts, with instructions and explanations of the planets and trade database we add. They’d have no reason to suspect it wasn’t their Scott leaving that note or sending shuttles to six countries, nor would they learn about the infinite quantum universes.”

  I sighed, “That would work for hiding our involvement. So, you’re not worried about unbalancing this Earth, like the last one?”

  Cassie shrugged, “This isn’t an uplift, they already have the technology. And outside of the subspace beams and shields it’s all Grays’ stuff. They’re even using the old fusion reactors. Splitting it up between six countries will work well too, for balance of power. If they abuse our gift of the stars, we’ll have to reassess, but remember all the idiots who came after you have been replaced by time and elections.”

  I said, “Alright, we all think this is a good idea?”

  Melody nodded, as did the others.

  This was definitely going to be the hardest of the four, which was wrong. Because in the first three universes I’d killed billions of Stolthrim and hundreds of millions of Vrok when I’d destroyed their fleets, but he was another me, and as selfish as it was that felt so much worse to me.

  The plan went perfectly, to a point.

  A single scout-destroyer jumped to the opposite side of the station from the moon. The station saw it right away of course, but between the moon and the station any sensors Earth had pointed that way would be blind to the event.

  The disintegrator beam fired and went through the shields, station, and evil me like they weren’t even there. The station returned fire with a couple of thousand beams automatically, and the s
cout destroyer jumped back to our universe before its shields collapsed. At the same time, the temporary hole in their shields allowed one of the baseball sized stealth ships to jump inside the station before the nanites fully reformed the hull and missing shield emitters.

  I pushed away my doubts and sent my magic through those quantum links, and then dove into the station itself. It didn’t take long to delete the logs of what just happened, set it up to split the station in six ways, split the paired links so each station got a four million ship defense fleet, as well as hundreds of millions of platforms each for internal defense and repurposing.

  My other self had built an amazing amount of ships.

  I uploaded the data for the eight thousand living worlds within five hundred light years of Earth as well as the oldest version of the colony ships and the trade database. Just for fun, I modified the nanites so that they’d be locked out from attacking Earth or each other, just like the ships I sold locally at home. That last hadn’t been mentioned in our planning, but it seemed prudent to do so.

  Of course, that’s all I restricted. They’d have full control otherwise, to build more ships, add ship templates, and all that other stuff. Just no killing each other with them.

  At that point, I left the planned note and activated the program. As the space station flowed apart into six stations that would take a high orbit directly around Earth. I also launched six shuttles to land at bases in the six countries I’d chosen to inherit the stations. Then I sent the message as I pulled my magic back.

  All that had gone perfectly to plan.

  What didn’t go to plan was the U.S. and China opened fire on the shuttle and destroyed it when it entered their airspace, while Russia, England, Japan, and Israel allowed the shuttle to land but made no efforts to approach it. Apparently, they didn’t believe me. They must’ve thought other me was up to something nefarious.

  It made me wonder for a moment what my world would think of me mucking about in other universes, probably nothing good.