“And not an easy one to answer.” Bobcat sighed. “I’ve spoken with ADAM, and AIs are dead out. If this goes on for too long an AI could go crazy, or in any case there is a large enough chance to make it too risky.”
Tina thought about that. “What is too large a chance?”
“Somewhere less than one tenth of one percent,” Bobcat admitted. “That could mean it happens once in a thousand years, but if it did?” He put his hands together, one still holding his beer, and exploded them out. “BOOOOM!”
“Plus, we need to deal with the ones near Earth.” William leaned forward and put his elbows on the table. “I’m sure the closer to a body they are, the bigger the chance for issues to occur. When one of them drops from the net, it needs to engage some sort of heavy manual override so it doesn’t blow the hell up.”
“Security password?” Marcus said. “I’m just starting this ball rolling. It won’t work, because the enemy just needs to learn it and poof! All of the BYPSs turn and aim toward Earth and fry the hell out of it.”
“Earth kabobs,” William said.
“More like a marshmallow for s’mores.” Tina looked up to the ceiling. “No, that isn’t the right metaphor either.”
“Genetic?” William kicked in.
“What happens if the genetic material either dies or is stolen?”
“We need a guard post,” Tina said aloud. She was staring into the distance when the weight of the three pairs of eyes caused her to look around. “What?”
Bobcat rolled his bottle. “Keep going.”
“Guard post?” she asked, and he nodded. “Well, I was thinking that we need someone or something which can answer the door, or maybe forward the call.”
“That…” Marcus thought out loud, “might work.”
“We can’t just have an AI or some people sitting around with their thumbs up their butts for a hundred years.”
“No, not there,” Marcus answered. “We need to figure out how to make a long-distance call through the Etheric.”
“I thought we couldn’t travel that far?” William asked.
“We can’t, exactly. However, I was reading about some research Anne is doing that might apply,” Marcus told them. “She was playing with inter-Etheric communication and alter-waves, but she had a hiccup and then went off on another adventure. By the time she was finished she was focused on another research project. I picked up what she had in her notes.”
The four of them were quiet for a minute before William asked, “Are we going to become the next AT&T?”
“Who?” Tina asked.
“Old American company that helped wire and then wirelessly enable telephone calls back on Earth,” William supplied. “I mean, that’s what we are talking about doing, right?”
“Fuuuuuuuck.” Bobcat downed his beer, then grabbed another and swallowed half the bottle. When he finished he used his beer bottle to point to the remaining beer. “You’d better drink up.”
“Why?” Tina asked as she reached toward them. She grabbed one for herself and another for Marcus. “What did you realize?”
“I realized,” Bobcat answered, “that we have a shot with this idea.”
“That’s good,” William supplied as he sipped his only beer. “Right?”
“What do you think our timeline will be?” Bobcat asked.
“How much time do we think we need?” Marcus shot back.
“Fat chance,” Tina answered. “I see what Bobcat is saying. Someone better grab more beers.”
“Why?” Marcus asked as Bobcat nodded to Tina and stood up, heading for the fridge one more time.
“We only have three more Mountain Tigers,” he called back to the table.
“Mine!” Tina yelled. “Well, at least one!” She turned to Marcus. “Because we have exactly as long as it takes Bethany Anne to figure out how to get our asses to Earth and Michael.
“That could take a decade,” Marcus argued.
William snorted and nodded to Marcus. “You, sir, are thinking like a scientist.”
“Of course,” Marcus answered. “I am a scientist!”
Tina shook her head. “I give us maybe a year, but more probably six months,” she said, downing her bottle as she reached out to take the beer Bobcat offered her before he sat down. “We better order more Mountain Tiger,” she added.
Bobcat nodded, then looked at the clock and patted William on the back. “Don’t you have a date tonight?”
William’s color drained as he looked up at the old-fashioned clock, then grabbed his tablet and checked his calendar. He relaxed a moment later, wiping sweat off his brow. “You ass!” he told Bobcat. “My date is next week!”
QBBS Meredith Reynolds, Empress’ Suite
Stephen walked into Bethany Anne’s front meeting room and snagged a Coke from the fridge. He sat down on the couch to drink it as he waited for her to come in.
The door opened behind him just five seconds later. “Sorry I’m late,” she told him as Ashur padded in behind her.
“I’ve seen more of you than usual,” Stephen said to Ashur. “What’s up?”
Ashur dropped to the floor, and Stephen would have sworn he sighed. “Babies,” Ashur told him, his voice coming from his collar.
“You expecting?” Stephen asked. “Or rather, is Bellatrix?”
“No, thank the makers of the Universe. She wants more, and I’m dodging left and right,” Ashur replied. “She knows that Bethany Anne running off like she did bothered me, so I can get away with staying glued to her side—at least for now.”
“It’s my penance,” Bethany Anne agreed, sitting down on the couch across from Stephen. She leaned down to pet Ashur’s head. “Seems dogs do know how to create a guilt trip.”
“Desperate times call for desperate measures, my Empress,” Ashur replied. “A little to the left… Yeahhhhh, right there,” he said, cocking his head to the right and allowing Bethany Anne to continue to scratch him. “Why would anyone want to give this up for another set of trouble with four paws?”
“I have no comment,” Stephen replied to Ashur, and looked at Bethany Anne. “You called?”
“Yes.” She leaned back, taking her hand off Ashur’s head.
Ashur looked at Stephen. “You bastard!” he said before he laid his head on the floor.
“I have plans for my planet,” she told him.
“Yes?”
“I brought Addix back from Ixtali. I want to leave a group on Devon to make sure it is properly developed and ready to be a rest stop for my teams as we traipse around the Galaxy. I need someone to manage it for me.”
“Addix?” Stephen replied. “I assume you mean someone other than Lerr’ek, our Zhyn friend?”
“Yes.” She nodded as she got up and walked to her fridge, and pulled out a Coke with her left hand. Using her fingernail, she popped the top off and caught it with her right hand, casually tossing it into the small can on the countertop before returning to the couch.
“Lerr’ek is doing fine, but long term I think he will want more action. Plus, he is too squishy.”
Stephen looked at her funny. “Zhyn aren’t usually described as ‘squishy.’ Scaly, hard, blue…but never squishy.”
Bethany Anne though about it for a moment. “I’m trying to express that he is killable. Unlike you and some of the others, he can’t come back given enough energy, time, and opportunity.”
“And you don’t trust him enough to upgrade him?” Stephen asked.
“He has some honor, but his fear of Baba Yaga drives him at the moment. He’s in for his ten, and then his option is to leave and go do something else somewhere else.”
“He will have to be mind-wiped if that happens.”
“Yeahhh.” Bethany Anne sighed. “I hate that, but Devon needs to disappear into the history books.
Stephen took a drink. “Addix can make that happen.”
“Oh?” She raised an eyebrow. “How?”
“Think about it. She has access, I suspect, to all
the Ixtali methods for data acquisition. She would be perfect to manage an operation that provides incorrect data and disburses it.”
“What about Nathan?”
“He can add to it, but the responsibility would be on Addix. She will be in the middle of the storm, so to speak, and able to deal with accidents more readily.”
Bethany Anne nodded, twirling her fingers for him to keep going.
“You want this all handed to you on a silver platter?”
“Yes,” she replied. “I’m lazy. Get moving.”
“Ok.” Stephen put his Coke down. “I’m thinking that we… What?” He stopped, looking at the face she was giving him.
“When I said ‘Get moving’ I didn’t mean explain more.” She smiled, pointing her bottle like a baton to indicate that Stephen should stand up and leave her suite. “I meant, go check on Addix, make plans, and get moving to Devon to implement them.”
“Oh, Jumping Jehoshaphat!” Stephen got up and walked to the fridge and grabbed two more bottles. “Jennifer?” he asked on his way out of the suite.
“Take her with you!” Bethany Anne proposed. “I suggest locating quarters and checking on all the projects!”
“Wonderful!” Stephen replied as he opened the door.
“Don’t forget my garages!” she called as he shut the door.
Stephen walked down the hallway on his way to Medical. Garages? He thought about that a moment before rolling his eyes. Who called military bases where you parked superdreadnoughts “garages?”
A moment later he smiled. I wonder what Reynolds is up to?
CHAPTER SIX
QBBS Meredith Reynolds, General Lance Reynolds’ Office
There was a knock at Lance’s door. He looked up as he chewed on his unlit cigar, then glanced at his calendar. It was clear. He looked down at his tablet again to read the rest of the reports on the status of the gate movement, ignoring the person outside his door.
The knock came again, but before Lance could growl “Go away” the door opened and Felix Castile walked in.
“Got a minute, General?” he asked, a smile on his face.
“No,” Lance replied. “And why are you in here, Felix?”
“My security code…” Felix started.
“Has been severed,” Lance bit out. “Did you hear that, Meredith?”
“Yes, of course,” the EI answered. “Do you need a removal team?”
Felix looked at the speaker and his eyes narrowed in annoyance. “I’m not someone you remove.”
“Not yet,” Lance replied, still annoyed at the man. “I didn’t invite you into my office, and yet here you are.”
Felix calmly closed the door as he spoke. “That’s because I’ve been trying to get on your calendar for three days, General Reynolds.”
“You and everyone else, Felix,” Lance replied. “What’s your point?”
Felix was forcing his smile at this point. “I would imagine not everyone was as helpful.”
“As what?” Lance replied. “I believe you have an inflated opinion of your value to the military. Throwing three parties for the Guardians and the Guardian Marines was casual help. Perhaps placing your ships as support carriers is a next step, and physically carrying supplies onto a planet where you can smell the dust from the houses destroyed one block over is yet another level.”
Felix reached down to straighten his cuffs. “Yes, well,” he looked up, “be that as it may, I helped. Now I would like a little quid pro quo.”
Lance’s eyes narrowed, but Felix ignored the warning.
“I would like to be on the Empress’ ships when she goes back to Earth. I’m not asking to be on the ArchAngel, although I could argue that it would be appropriate. However, I get that there are many people whose backs you have to scratch, so I won’t push it.”
Lance’s blood began to boil as Felix continued.
“I would like the chance to bring back genetic material for commercial purposes. I would be happy to provide the Federation with a three-percent fee for every product we bring to market from research into the genetics. Now…”
Lance subvocalized, “Meredith?”
“Yes, sir?” Meredith replied in his ear.
“Figure out which is the worst removal team I have and send them here post haste.”
“Yes, General,” she replied.
Thirty-two seconds—and a continuous blather from Felix, who hadn’t noticed—later, Lance was looking at the clock on the wall behind the man. Two Guardians rapped their knuckles on the door and stepped in, stopping Felix in mid-sentence.
“Finally! You shut up.” Lance took his cigar out of his mouth, the end nearly bitten in two. “The answer is HELL NO, you cannot go to Earth. You are obviously an idiot when it comes to military decorum, and your use of your security clearance was a breach of personal etiquette. You are a self-serving shit-hole side of swine whose mere presence makes me wish to take a damned shower. Now get the hell out of my office—which you didn’t have permission to enter in the first place—and get the hell out of my sight. If you try this bullshit with Bethany Anne, expect to die in a horrible way.”
Felix stared at Lance with his mouth open.
“Further,” Lance stabbed his cigar in Felix’s direction, “there are no backscratching ticks going to Earth. Every person has been vetted as having a need to be there if they are coming back to the Federation, or they won’t be coming back here at all. Your ass doesn’t count for either option. So unless you wish to get tossed out an airlock and told to walk back to the Meredith Reynolds, which I suspect would happen in about thirty seconds if you ever got in front of Bethany Anne, you should kiss the ground I walk on that I’m not letting you commit suicide by brown-nosing the wrong woman. Consider the absolutely minuscule good will you created by throwing those parties paid back in spades.”
He waved his cigar at the guards. “Now get out of my face, my office, and my life.”
Lance rolled his eyes as he listened to Felix’s bitching, muffled by his closed door as it was, for a full thirty seconds before it faded away.
“Sometimes,” Lance grouched as he resumed reading his reports, “I wish I could throw people into the Etheric.”
QBBS Meredith Reynolds, Private Meeting Room, Secured Level
Bethany Anne’s chin rested on the palm of her hand as she listened to those around her discuss moving the gate and how to make it happen faster.
“Guys?” she ground out. Dan and Marcus, who had been arguing a moment before, turned to look at her. “Don’t make me grab two bricks to get the ideas coming a little quicker.” She smirked. “No pun intended.”
Dan smirked. Marcus missed it.
She leaned toward them and nodded to those around the table. “Ok, Dan, Bobcat, William, Marcus, Tina, Dad, Admiral Thomas, Kael-ven, and those listening, I appreciate your present efforts,” she paused for a moment, “but they all suck.”
She stabbed the table with her finger. “I want to be back on Earth yesterday. Seeing as how I am here and not on Earth, I’ll settle for tomorrow. When tomorrow comes and I’m not on Earth, a drop of annoyance is going to develop in my bloodstream.”
She tried to smile, but it didn’t help.
“I am not telling you this to threaten. I’m informing every one of you because I love you, and you know this about me as much as I know this about me. I’ll become a royal bitch if we continue this for too long.” She pointed behind her. “Michael is about a bazillion miles—”
“Actually he is—oof!” Marcus grabbed the side of his stomach closest to Tina.
Tina smiled at Bethany Anne. “Please continue.”
Bethany Anne smirked. “Yes, thank you. Marcus, I don’t need to know the actual miles.” She looked down the table. “Now, I respect and love you all, but you are giving me shit,” she made a square with both hands, “that is INSIDE THE BOX!”
“I know it’s inside the box and you know it is inside the box, so let’s dispense with the inside-the-box shit! At
the current rate I will be here ten fucking years. A byproduct will be making your lives and my own a horrible, no good, existence. This will occur as I work to make the journey take place faster. I believe we can achieve a better state of affairs.”
She pointed to those around the table. “We left our planet, kicked Kurtherian ass, and brought justice and laws and all sorts of cool shit to lots of aliens we never thought we would meet a hundred and fifty-plus years ago. All I’m asking is to grab a relatively large, priceless, unique, and somewhat delicate gate and move it, then reprogram it to allow us to fly through it to Earth so I can get me some Michael. I will be a happier woman…after I beat him senseless.”
Admiral Thomas spoke up. “Has anyone suggested not beating Michael up first?”
“And lived to tell about it?” Bethany Anne asked.
“Well, of course.”
“No,” she replied, “but I will take that suggestion as guidance for the future, and since I hold you in such high-esteem for your previous service I won’t tell you it isn’t going to happen. But,” she winked at Admiral Thomas and then whispered loudly, “it isn’t!”
He waved a hand in her direction. “Ok, just wanted to make sure all options were on the table.”
“He almost got himself killed, which wasn’t one of his choices when saving the base,” Bethany Anne replied, “so let’s get me back to him quicker. That way I will have less need to take out my frustration at missing him on him. That will leave more time for the romantic parts all the holodramas will talk about.”
“We could always destroy it,” Dan supplied.
Bethany Anne looked sideways at Dan and was about to reply when she noticed he wasn’t joking. In fact, his eyes had a distant look. “What are you thinking?”
“We need to hide it.” Dan’s focus turned to her. “Best way to hide it is to destroy it.”
“Nice,” Bethany Anne replied dryly. “I want the damned gate!” She waved to the rest of the table. “Were you not listening to the BA rant just a moment ago? I can have Meredith replay it for you while I choke you for suggesting we destroy my way of getting back to Michael.” She smiled. “I assure you, you will remember the second time you listen.”
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