Book 5: Chapter 72: Human Fallout |
Bob
August 2345
Ragnarök
I’d been invited to Bill’s place for a meeting of the Ancient Ones. I wasn’t honestly sure if I really cared for that title, but Bill pointed out that trying to deflect Garfield once he’d made up his mind would just make him double down. I blamed Bill for that; I’m sure I was never that stubborn.
It turned out I was the last to arrive. Bill, Garfield, Howard, and Will turned and acknowledged me as I popped in.
“About time,” Garfield said. “Did we interrupt a date with your girlfriend?”
“Uh … ” The comment was a bit harsh, but possibly not as facetious as Garfield intended. “Maybe don’t make jokes about that while she’s around, okay?”
Garfield frowned. “What’s going on?”
“Maybe nothing. Maybe something. I … we’ve never been what you’d call astute in the ways of relationships—”
“Uh-huh. Look, could be nothing. Don’t mind me.” I tried to keep my face deadpan, but my mind flashed back to several meetings with Theresa. She did seem, well, very touchy-feely. But maybe that was just Quinlan behavior. I’d have to look into it.
“Looks like Bob’s going native again,” Garfield said, with an arch look in my direction. “Meanwhile, the rest of us will—”
“Garfield!” Bill said, a warning tone in his voice.
“Awright, awright. Meeting will come to order.” Garfield crossed his arms and sat back.
“Not quite yet,” Bill replied. “I invited Professor Gilligan here to give us an update on the megastructure projects, since that’s suddenly become relevant.”
I’d met Steven Gilligan a few times at moots. He seemed to fit in quite well with the standard Bob obsessiveness. And the megastructures were interesting in their own right, even without the urgency that Icarus and Daedalus had created.
“While we’re waiting,” Will said, “how’s the huey thing going, Howard? I’m a little out of touch out here.”
We all rolled our eyes. Will was possibly the least out-of-touch Bob in the galaxy.
Howard replied with a wide smile. “The screaming and threats aren’t over by a long shot, but we’ve managed to slap down enough legal actions to be able to fill our first wave of orders. So far, the biggest customers are travel companies who will let you rent a huey by the day or week, for those who want to visit other planets.” He paused. “As expected. Also as expected, the second biggest are companies that cater to, uh, more R-rated interests. That one is, I think, what’s really getting the stuffed shirts upset.”
We shared a chuckle, and then Bill said, “Any chance you’ll be shut down?”
Howard shook his head. “No chance. As Bridget predicted, now people have an opportunity for some of what we enjoy, without the inconvenience of dying first. Any politician speaking up against the hueys is getting voted out in the next election.”
“This will fundamentally change society,” Garfield mused.
“Not sure about that. Other than the travel opportunity, people will be doing a lot of the same things, just more safely. If your ‘chute doesn’t open, for instance, it’s more of an inconvenience than a tragedy, you know?”
Bill was about to add something when Professor Gilligan popped in.
“Hi, Steven, have a seat,” Bill said, and gestured to an empty La-Z-Boy. Steven smiled, dropped into it, and played with the adjustments for a few moments.
Bill waited patiently until he was settled, then said, “So you wanted to give us an update on the megastructure projects?”
“Well, yes. By now you’ve seen the human reaction to the Nemesis announcement.”
We all nodded. By some process of osmosis, George’s original name for the invader had stuck. The incoming dwarf galaxy and its central black hole were both known interchangeably as Nemesis.
“The most charitable description would be a collective species-wide yawn,” Bill replied.
“Yes, well, a hundred thousand years … ”
Bill sighed, exasperated. “But we have to start now—”
“Which is why I’m here, Bill. The directors and shareholders of the various megastructure consortiums are perhaps, by their nature, more forward-thinking than most. We want to talk to you about options. Specifically, I need to ask: Is there any hope of creating a wormhole larger than you currently are able?”
“Absolutely. The Federation’s wormholes can expand up to a thousand kilometers on demand, according to the info Ick and Dae got from the Archivist. And I don’t think even that was a hard limit, just what they’d engineered for.”
“Good. We are proposing a combination of megastructures, SURGE drives, and wormhole transits to get people out of the area. We’d like some initial specs from you, and an agreement going forward.”
“Wow. Ambitious. Has anyone signed up yet?”
“Actually, some group from Takama has expressed a desire to get as far away from their planet as possible. They have already signed with the O’Neill Corporation.”
Will snorted. “I’ve experienced Takama’s atmosphere. I’m not surprised. So how do we begin?”
“We already have. We’re organizing a diplomatic mission to Trantor to attempt to form an agreement with the Pan Galactic Federation, er, PGF.” Steven hesitated. “By the way, when I reference Trantor, I often get suppressed snickers from Bobs. I know it’s also the name of a floating city on Big Top, but that seems insufficient for the reaction. Is there another layer to the joke?”
I chuckled. “Uh-huh. I’ll send you a couple of books. You can’t really understand the Bobs until you read Asimov.”
Steven smiled in response and said, “Until next time, then,” and popped out.
Bill held up a finger. “Steven didn’t mention it, but the O’Neill Corporation is building their cylinder with a SURGE drive. They won’t be settling around the star where the cylinder is being constructed. I’m convinced this might end up being the primary method of colonizing going forward.”
Will replied, “Yeah, I’m in favor of that. On the one hand, I’m glad our descendants are looking for a nice, solid planet to settle on, but on the other, it would be good to have them heading out of the galaxy.” He pointed to me. “Bob is intercepting the Fargo and will be taking up residence. And maybe he’ll finally manage to make it out of human space.”
“Or maybe not,” I said, and got a surprised look from Will. “Like it or not, guys, we’re in a position of responsibility where the UFS and humanity are concerned. It’s informal, since most of the governments would tell us to take a hike if we tried to order them around, but we still can’t just walk away.”
“Maybe we should,” Garfield said, and received shocked looks from the rest of us. “Look,” he continued, “there’s only so much we can do without actually threatening people. There’s a point where we’ll have to cut our losses and just leave with whoever we’ve managed to win over.”
“We’re not there yet,” Bill said.
“No, but we will be at some point. Time to start thinking about it.”
Bill shook his head. “Nope. Not buying it. But here’s an alternative. Let’s send some wormhole endpoints in the direction of some of the satellite galaxies. No specific plans yet, just to have them ready. Then, if we do manage to get some movement with the stupid humans—”
“And Pav, and Quinlans, and Deltans, and dragons,” Howard interjected.
“At least we’ll have something in place,” Bill finished.
“Speaking of the Pav, Quinlans, et cetera,” Will said into the silence. “At least we’ve solved the Fermi paradox. Or Icarus and Daedalus did, anyway.”
“How?” I asked, perplexed.
Will smiled. “The PGF. Any civilization that achieved interstellar flight eventually became part of the Federation. And when they all left, they took every civilization that might have been detectable from Earth or likely to contact us. In the period between their departure and Earth starting to look for alien signatures, no other species achieved the necessary technological level.”
“So,” Garfield fairly growled. “It’s just bad timing?”
“Pretty much.”
That produced another contemplative silence as everyone pondered the vagaries of the universe. I took the opportunity to glance around the room at these four people—my friends, my brothers, my clones. Not complicated at all, no sir. The Milky Way was about to get obliterated; a rogue AI that we’d created was loose in the galaxy; and somehow, we were once again stuck making decisions that would affect billions of sentient beings. Really, there was no amount of heading for the hills that would get me out of this.
Guardians of the Galaxy. Again.
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