The Genie and the Engineer 3: Ravages of War

by Glenn Michaels

  On the other hand, Paul and the Scotties were still dealing with the problem of all the Oni. The original estimate by Uncle Sam had been surprisingly close, the actual Oni population coming in at 43,210 individuals. And, just like the wizards of Errabêlu, the Scotties had similarly stripped the Oni of their magical powers, rendering them “harmless”…well, in that one particular regard.

  But the problem had then become what to do with the Oni after that. It wasn’t as if they could be released into the general population of Earth. Their presence alone would create panic among Normals. And, too, there was the problem that without magical powers, the Oni were simply unable to fend for themselves in a human society. They lacked the ability for speech as well as lacking the intellect needed to interact appropriately with humans.

  Therefore, Paul had been forced to fall back on a more imperfect solution. The Oni were transported to a few uninhabited islands scattered around the globe. The most unfortunate side-effect of that decision was that the Oni and their island locations required constant support and supervision by the Scotties. The islands were too small, their ecologies too limited to supply all the water, food, and other resources that 43,210 Oni required. Also, there were too many humans (treasure hunters, vacationers, geologists, environmentalists, oceanographers and other marine specialists) wandering the globe, some of whom, eventually speaking, would visit one or more of these impromptu prisons—unless the Scotties were present to ward them off, of course.

  Fortunately, not many of the Scotties were needed to act as prison wardens or guards. A platoon or so for each of the island prisons was sufficient. And with Daneel 1’s rotation of the duty, no one Scottie was going to get stuck with that responsibility for more than a few days per year.

  There was one positive aspect to the problem. Paul had been surprised to discover that the average life expectancy of a “de-frocked” Oni was a mere forty years. True, with magical powers, they had generally lived to be much older, on average 350 years old. But without their powers, the Oni lifespan was much shorter. And since they were also sex-less and totally lacking in the ability to reproduce, then there really was no long term problem to be dealt with. Sooner or later, the Oni would die off and the need to guard them would simply go away. Personally, Paul planned to have a party on the day the last one died.

  His prediction concerning the world’s reaction to the unexplained magical incidents of the war with Errabêlu had been largely correct. Most of the evidence (such as the wonderful cell phone videos of Godzilla storming the beaches of Tokyo!) had been suppressed by the governments of Earth. In a few cases, the Scotties had pitched in and helped a little as well. To be sure, there were a lot of stories floating around, especially on the internet. But the public at large treated them in the same manner that they had always dealt with ghost stories, UFO sightings, and other unexplained phenomena of the past. It was all ignored.

  Indeed, it looked as if international affairs were proceeding along a great deal more successfully than personal ones. To be specific, Capie and he were worried about Alisha. No two people had been more shocked than they had been when they discovered, two weeks after she was born, that Alisha didn’t have any magical mental barriers; that she had, instead, been born a full wizard.

  Many times since her birth, Paul had asked himself if Alisha’s lack of a magical barrier was some type of accident or, like with recessive genes, a very rare event. Otherwise, all that the wizards of Errabêlu had needed to do to create a few more wizards to swell their ranks was to have a few children…

  Which they apparently hadn’t been interested in. The having the children part, that is. Being parents probably didn’t fit in very well with their lifestyles. So, by opting not to have children, they had probably unintentionally cut themselves off from adding wizards to their ranks. For which Paul was profoundly grateful.

  But none of that helped Paul with the problem of how to raise Alisha. Needless to say, her magical abilities had created a whole host of problems with raising her, not the least of which was to keep her away from Normals. And especially away from Normal children. Even now, she was too young to understand that she was “different” from other children and that she needed to hide her magical abilities.

  It helped that all of the Scotties wanted to spend time with her, to be her friend and play games. And Alisha never seemed to tire of their company. But both Paul and Capie knew that their daughter needed to spend time with other children too and to learn to bridge the differences between them. If nothing else, such contact would keep her from becoming arrogant, haughty, and superior like unto the wizards of Errabêlu.

  The one option they had was to immerse Alisha in stories of nobility. In a way, Alisha was of “noble” birth, which made her situation roughly akin to that of a princess, destined for a higher level of responsibilities. So they had started her early on stories with those themes. One of the first had been Mark Twain’s The Prince and the Pauper, but there were many other similar stories that emphasized the duties of royalty.

  Alisha loved them all. But she was too young yet to realize how they would personally impact her. And later, her brother to be. When Alisha did finally understand…well, Paul felt pretty gloomy about it. That would be the day she would understand how she had been robbed of a “normal” childhood.

  “Thinking about Alisha, again, aren’t you?” Capie asked, half in accusation.

  “Something like that,” Paul admitted, glancing down at the white sand.

  Capie hugged him tightly. “It will be okay. It will help when Junior is born.”

  Paul gripped his chest with one hand, feigning a heart attack. “We will NOT call him Junior! I was thinking maybe Christopher Kenneth Armstead instead.”

  “After our fathers? The name Chris is fine with me. But I thought you didn’t get along with your father.”

  Paul thought back, to the near-death experience he had undergone in Chicago. “Now that I’m a father myself, let’s say I’ve had a change of heart.”

  She nodded and they walked a ways further.

  “So, when do you start building starships?” she asked with feigned nonchalance.

  Paul came to a sudden stop, as if he had hit a brick wall. He stared wide-eyed at his wife.

  “Starships? What are you talking about?” he asked with contrived innocence.

  Capie grinned mischievously at him. “You think I wouldn’t find out? That little research team you put together with Gerty 2 and the money you funneled to Japan? Ha, you silly man! I know all your tricks! And don’t think you’re going anywhere without me or the kids! So…answer the question. When do you start building them?”

  Paul grunted and looked imploringly up into the sky. “I was thinking maybe four years on lab research, looking at the science behind portals. Then a few more years for the preliminary hardware…”

  THE END?