TUELLER: “We’re shooting the moon here.”
TUELLER: “Sorry, game terminology. Big risk, big reward.”
TUELLER: “We’ve got four…I guess I could teach y’all.”
TUELLER: “But Alejo would cheat and Millie would count cards.”
TUELLER: “And you’d read our minds, so I’d be fucked.”
ALEJO: Alejo dries his hair. “I would never.”
ALEJO: He smiles.
TUELLER: “You would and have.”
TUELLER: “That’s how we got out of Ganymede alive that one time.”
MILLICENT: “Who doesn’t count cards?”
ALEJO: Alejo raises his hand. “Easier to just cheat.” He shrugs.
MILLICENT: “It’s not. How could it be easier? You just keep track of the cards.”
MILLICENT: She looks around flustered.
STORY: Alejo, you float in a vast, starry void, a microphone before you. The dead air hums almost imperceptibly, but you know your audience is listening.
STORY: What do you do?
ALEJO: Alejo glances around, stands just a little straighter and smiles. “Good evening. This is the most important dream of your life. It can change the fate of our galaxy. I’m going to tell you the truth. A hard and dangerous truth that the Collective has kept buried. But this truth doesn’t have to be a prelude to war. Instead, it can free all of us — including the Collective who are listening — to see the ways that we’re already and inextricably connected to one another.”
ALEJO: “So, the truth is that jump relays aren’t what we were told. They don’t work as advertised. The relays don’t jump ships anywhere. Instead, they’re fancy copying machines. A ship enters a relay, it’s scanned and mapped, to the atoms, then broken down into a batter of its constituent molecules. The blueprint then gets transmitted to another jump relay, which whips up an identical copy — a clone.”
ALEJO: “The first time a being is cloned, the Collective reconstitutes them with a hidden mechanism in their brain—a backdoor key. The Collective uses this key to hack into the idling or sleeping brains of every sentient that’s ever jumped through a relay. Then it connects them all through the Weave – the dream space I’m speaking to you from – forming universally linked cloud processing to power their civilization.”
ALEJO: “In order to make the jump relays’ mapping and cloning process work, the Collective sometimes creates extra clones. Inside the relays, thousands of these extra clones are put on a biological pause and stored in tanks like livestock. Their entire brains are added to the cloud.”
ALEJO: “The Collective has been afraid of us learning this truth and trying to stop them. So, they’ve been sending clones of our children to hidden “war worlds” within striking distance of each of our planets. These children are raised, ignorant of the rest of us, being trained to fight and destroy any civilization that bucks the Collective. The clones on these war worlds are, in short, the Collective’s unwitting slave armies.”
ALEJO: “Those armies are the stick. A terrifying stick that could beat each and every one of our civilizations back to the bronze age. But any war, now that we all know the truth, would be hard fought on multiple fronts and it would end only in wasted effort, wasted resources, wasted potential. War is not in our interest, of course. But it’s not in the Collective’s interest either.”
ALEJO: “The Collective’s fear of the truth has led them to extreme actions, to isolate themselves, to lash out. But with honesty comes opportunity. The greater truth is that as much as we are at the mercy of the Collective, the Collective needs us. Galactic Civilization is better as a network of inescapable mutuality. Trade and culture and interdependence makes us all stronger. And we hope the Collective will realize that too, and join us as one now.”
ALEJO: “By embracing the truth, we can strengthen the bonds between us and build a galaxy based on honesty, respect, and dignity. We can solicit far more consenting volunteers from our civilizations to work with the Collective, letting them use our idling and sleeping brains, than the Collective could ever have gotten through covert cloning on the relays. We can ask that the tanks of our people in stasis on each relay be freed in exchange for us recruiting paid workers who serve rotating shifts as the processing power we need to keep our galactic all-access travel pass viable. We can work together, with the Collective, to study the Weave and make sure that it’s safely and responsibly used for the welfare of all beings. And, experiencing the stability that will result from cooperation, we can step back from existential threats and the brink of war, forging a path to lasting freedom and benefit for every being everywhere.”
ALEJO: “Before I let you wake and get started, you might wonder if this is all real. When you wake up, find everyone you can who was asleep at the same time as you. They all had this exact same dream. If that’s no proof enough for you, you can dock with and infiltrate a jump really near you.”
ALEJO: “Be mindful, though, if you go to a jump relay. There’s a live, cloned skeleton crew aboard. They have no clue what’s going on, and they’re going to be very surprised to see you. Please be gentle with them. Okay. Time to wake up and get to work on our shared future.”
STORY: The longer you speak, the more you feel something uncomfortable just behind your awareness. Something pulling.
STORY: Alejo, please roll Influence to see how well your argument is received by your audience. Millie, you can Get Involved because of your success prepping for this. Tueller, you may not!
ALEJO: I’m using a closeup.
STORY: That is a good idea.
TUELLER: –I was going to say
MILLICENT: What’s my roll for this?
ALEJO: /roll 2d6+3
STORY: ablair01 rolled 7 + 3 = 10
TUELLER: —Cool, good game all.
STORY: We should never doubt Alejo’s force of personality.
TUELLER: –good game, good game, good game. High fives, hit the showers.
MILLICENT: No need to Get Involved with a success!
STORY: Alejo, you finish your speech, and stand in the emptiness a bit longer, unsure of what to do. Millie and Tueller, you find yourselves with him, floating in the vastness of the black.
MILLICENT: Millie reaches out and grabs their hands.
TUELLER: “Good speech.”
ALEJO: Alejo takes her hand and squeezes. He smiles at Tueller and gives him a friendly nod.
MILLICENT: Millie nods, tears in her eyes.
MILLICENT: “This is so much less lonely than last time.”
MILLICENT: Millie cries a bit, quietly. Kind of happy, kind of sad.
ALEJO: Alejo pulls her hand up and gives it a quick kiss. Then he looks at the emptiness ahead of them.
STORY: Erwin’s standing behind you. “…So are we done?”
TUELLER: “Can you tell how it went over?”
MILLICENT: Millie flings her arms around him in a hug.
TUELLER: “I think we’re done with the Public Broadcast part, at least.”
STORY: “I think it worked. Everyone’s okay, somehow. Was not expecting that.” You look behind him and thousands of Grell stand, hands linked, heads bowed, all humming a low note together.
TUELLER: Tueller bows, “Thank you, all of you.”
STORY: Erwin’s okay with a hug in the Weave, so he just awkwardly pats your back with one arm.
TUELLER: Tueller stays bowed for awhile, and straightens up.
TUELLER: Sees the hug.
TUELLER: Sidles into it.
MILLICENT: Millie kind of flaps her arm from the hug, finding Tueller.
MILLICENT: Pulls him in.
STORY: “Okay, c’mon, OKAY.”
ALEJO: Alejo laughs and gives Erwin a pat on the back while reaching around Tueller to bring him into the pile up.
STORY: Erwin wiggles his way out.
MILLICENT: Millie looks up at her boys, eyes and heart full.
ALEJO: “Thank you, Erwin. Thank you all.”
TUELLER: “I think we should do what Alejo said, and wake up.”
MILLICENT: She blinks, straightens. “I guess we’d better go see what kind of hell we raised.”
TUELLER: “The great work begins, and all.”
STORY: The four of you open your eyes inside Peregrine’s cargo bay.
ALEJO: Alejo sits up in the tank. “Well, this didn’t get any warmer.”
STORY: Erwin pops up. “Space is cold.”
MILLICENT: “That’s good. It means you didn’t pee in there.”
MILLICENT: “Sometimes there is pee.”
TUELLER: Tueller keeps opening his mouth to speak and getting cut off, and then lets it go.
ALEJO: Alejo jumps out and grabs towels for everyone.
STORY: Erwin is grinning a little.
STORY: “I can’t believe we didn’t die.”
TUELLER: “The night is still young.”
STORY: “We’re going to, though, right? Like, once the Collective hears about this, we are definitely the first to die?”
MILLICENT: Millie’s grin grows, then fades.
TUELLER: “If they decide to go that route, yes.”
MILLICENT: She nods.
TUELLER: “We’re shooting the moon here.”
TUELLER: “Sorry, game terminology. Big risk, big reward.”
TUELLER: “We’ve got four…I guess I could teach y’all.”
TUELLER: “But Alejo would cheat and Millie would count cards.”
TUELLER: “And you’d read our minds, so I’d be fucked.”
ALEJO: Alejo dries his hair. “I would never.”
ALEJO: He smiles.
TUELLER: “You would and have.”
TUELLER: “That’s how we got out of Ganymede alive that one time.”
MILLICENT: “Who doesn’t count cards?”
ALEJO: Alejo raises his hand. “Easier to just cheat.” He shrugs.
MILLICENT: “It’s not. How could it be easier? You just keep track of the cards.”
MILLICENT: She looks around flustered.
TUELLER: “That’s what Alejo does as well. Just mechanically, rather than mentally.”
TUELLER: “Anyhoo. Let’s go see what’s on the news.”
STORY: “Nothing yet. Did you do it?” Figgan calls from the balcony.
ALEJO: Alejo slides on pants. “We did.”
ALEJO: “So, no news. What the hell do we do now?” He picks up a tee-shirt and puts it on.
STORY: Erwin is just wearing pants, somehow dry. “Time to run, then?”
ALEJO: He overlaps with Erwin and looks at him and nods. “Not a bad plan, kid.”
MILLICENT: “Well, if I were the Collective, what would I do?”
MILLICENT: “Assassination is an option, if they think convincing every sentient who was recently sleeping that that was a coincidence.”
TUELLER: “I put it on the table that we should go back to the relay.”
MILLICENT: “Interesting. What would we do there?”
TUELLER: “Talk directly to a plugged in AI.”
ALEJO: Alejo raises his eyebrows. “You know. I like it. Direct. Let’s see what they’re going to do by asking.”
TUELLER: “Also, there are people there.”
TUELLER: “And….uh, potentially a crowd.”
MILLICENT: “Lead by example.”
MILLICENT: “If Sol sends representatives we should be there.”
MILLICENT: “I like it too.”
TUELLER: “I guess we should keep in mind that we just said our piece and woke up. There’s still time.”
ALEJO: “Fig!” Alejo shouts and starts for the bridge, “let’s head to the relay.”
MILLICENT: “Yeah, people have to wake up and have some conversations.”
STORY: “Roger that, Cap.” Figgan disappears to the bridge.
STORY: It’s a few days’ travel ahead. What do you do?
ALEJO: Alejo is lighter than he’s been in a very long time. He’s playful and quick to smile. He spends quite a bit of time teasing everyone, very gently, and visiting Cali.
TUELLER: Tueller monologues by Noma’s bedside to her, quieting down whenever anyone else comes in the room.
ALEJO: Oh, and Alejo needs to talk to Tueller at some point.
STORY: Have that conversation!
STORY: You’ve had dinner, and are winding down for the night. No news yet, Figgan suspects it’ll be a day or two before you hear from most places.
STORY: News travels fast in space, but it still has to travel.
TUELLER: Tueller heads towards Noma’s bedside.
ALEJO: Alejo takes a bottle of whiskey out of a galley cabinet and waves it at Tueller before he’s turned fully to the door. “Nightcap?”
ALEJO: He doesn’t wait for an answer but pours two glasses.
TUELLER: Tueller stops and sees Alejo’s doing something, even if he doesn’t know what, and takes the other glass.
ALEJO: Alejo raises his glass to Tueller and then, despite it being a sipping whiskey, shoots it. Then he pours another. He avoids Tueller’s eyes.
ALEJO: “So. Yeah.” Alejo nods for a moment, awkwardly.
TUELLER: Tueller drinks and says nothing.
ALEJO: “When I was . . . sharing a brain with Cali.” He stops and takes another drink. “So, when you and Millie were in the Weave, behind the curtain. What was that like?”
ALEJO: “You said you were sort of sharing thoughts, right?”
TUELLER: “I am he and she was me and we were all together, but also part of the Collective. Any thought we had we had together and impossible to tell which one of us had it.”
ALEJO: Alejo nods for a long moment. “Yeah. Yeah.” He drinks again. “So, yeah, I get that. Cali and I and Noma. We . . . we had a moment like that.”
ALEJO: He looks at Tueller and squints and then smiles and then shakes his head and laughs. “This shouldn’t be this fucking weird. I love you T. You know that. But . . . ” He shakes his head and pours more whiskey.
TUELLER: Tueller raises his eyebrows. He is stiller than normal, like he’s suppressing any more reaction than that.
TUELLER: Quietly, “Oh?”
ALEJO: “I like feel like I have some pants feels for you. But I mean, no way. You know.” He grimaces. Shakes his head. “You’re a very handsome guy. So, I mean, not, you know, no way. Just.” He drinks more whiskey.
ALEJO: “It’s like a memory of having feelings for you, you know. But they’re not my memories. Right.”
ALEJO: He takes a deep breath. “I didn’t quite get it, at first. It feels . . . awkward, a bit. So sorry about that.”
TUELLER: Tueller, making as little excess motion as possible, drains his glass.
TUELLER: “You have nothing to be sorry about.”
ALEJO: “Point is, I think, you should know that whatever happened between you and Cali and Noma, I don’t think she was entirely honest with you.”
TUELLER: “That was it? You felt like you wanted to fuck me?”
TUELLER: “Or, some part of you that was you but wasn’t you but was you at the time, at least.”
ALEJO: Alejo starts and stops saying something a few times. He nods and shakes his head all at once. Then drinks again. “I mean, I think. That was, some part of it. Like, I don’t know how much of that was her and how much of that was me trying to translate whatever the memory of her feelings was. You know?” He shakes his head. “Yeah, it’s so fucking weird.”
ALEJO: “She has feelings for you. Strong, heart feelings.” He raises his glass and drains it again.
TUELLER: “Oh!”
TUELLER: “Well, that’s different from what you were saying before.”
TUELLER: “You do tend to confuse genitals and heart. It’s good to clarify here.”
ALEJO: “Is it?” Alejo says honestly confused himself.
TUELLER: Tueller animates a little more.
ALEJO: “Yeeeah. Yeah. I do. For sure. Sometimes.”
TUELLER: “Last real conversation I had with her she told me she was turning her feelings off for me.”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles. “Yeah. She lied.”
TUELLER: “Fucking sprite,” he says, fondly.
ALEJO: “So, we good? I mean. I’m sorry if I was. Dumb.” He smiles bashfully.
TUELLER: Tueller gets quiet, puts the glass down beside the bottle. “Thanks for letting me know.” He gets up to leave, “If you need me, you know where to find me.”
ALEJO: Alejo nods and drinks the last of his whiskey.
TUELLER: Tueller walks out.
STORY: Alejo, you sit with Cali for a long time, sipping your drink and thinking about her. Eventually, you nod off.
STORY: What do you dream of?
ALEJO: The beach bedroom, waking up next to Millie softly snoring. Alejo stands and goes to the open window, smelling the sea salt, warm pre-sunrise air. He watches as the pink light of dawn starts to fill the sky but then sees huge bolts of lightening, way out at sea.
STORY: Millie steps into the kitchen, looking at you coolly. “Quite a speech.”
ALEJO: Alejo turns and follows her to the kitchen. “Was it?”
STORY: She nods, handing you a coffee.
STORY: She had it in her hands just as you thought to make it.
ALEJO: He takes it and smiles. “Are you?” He stops and nods. “Sorry. Still getting my bearings in this place.”
STORY: She looks at you sadly, then straightens. “Alejo Soto, you are summoned before the Collective for trial on behalf of all organic life.”
STORY: She reaches out and touches your temple.
ALEJO: He sort of stops half drink as she does this.
STORY: “You have the coordinates. If you do not come, we will render judgment in absentia.”
STORY: “This will be our last conversation.”
STORY: She almost looks disappointed to say it.
ALEJO: “I’m sorry for that too.” He smiles at her.
ALEJO: “I’ll be at the coordinates.”
STORY: She nods once, sharply.
STORY: You hear a noise and turn back – a bird. When you look back at Millie, she is gone.
STORY: You wake up with a start.
ALEJO: Alejo brushes his hair back and stands, a bit unsteady. He goes to a com and turns it on. “Hi. Sorry. Emergency meeting in the galley in five.”
ALEJO: He looks down at Cali and kisses her forehead before heading to the galley himself.
STORY: Everyone! It’s the middle of the night and Alejo just woke you up.
MILLICENT: Millie arrives first and makes coffee, because this is a television show
MILLICENT: He should walk into the galley to find the same scene he woke from or else what are we doing here?
STORY: Figgan makes it down next, groggily staggering in on her hands.
STORY: Then Erwin, who is a teen and was already up playing video games.
TUELLER: Tueller was just lying in bed staring at the ceiling, so he comes out with absolutely no sleepiness to him.
STORY: Maya stands awkwardly at the door. “Am I… emergency meeting people?”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles at her. “Absolutely.”
STORY: Ryo is the last to arrive. He’s shaky on his feet. Erwin immediately stands and looks guilty for not having been with him.
STORY: He drags a chair over for Ryo. “I thought you were going to sleep a while longer.”
STORY: Ryo raises an eyebrow, one eye totally red from burst blood vessels. “I hate to miss a meeting,” he manages weakly.
ALEJO: He looks at them all. “So, I either had way too much whiskey or the Collective just summoned me to a trial for all organic life, with me as the spokesperson. Which, yeah. Sucks real hard.”
TUELLER: “I’m fuzzy on the semantics here. Who’s on trial?”
STORY: Ryo takes a deep breath and lowers his head.
STORY: “So that wasn’t a dream.”
ALEJO: “Me. Well, all organic life. Me, I guess standing in for . . . everyone.”
TUELLER: “You got it too?”
TUELLER: “What about you, Doc?”
TUELLER: “Guess I should try sleeping every once in awhile.”
MILLICENT: Millie shakes her head. “Did anyone else get it?”
ALEJO: Alejo looks around confused and then it hits him and he nods. “Ohhh, right.”
ALEJO: He looks at Ryo. “You got coordinates too?”
STORY: “What? No, I’m talking about that speech of yours. I thought I dreamed it in anticipation of you doing it, I didn’t realize that was you doing it.”
STORY: “It was a good speech, the parts I remember.”
ALEJO: “Oh. Okay. Right. Thanks.”
TUELLER: “Coordinates. Right in the middle of pressure plate with a million ball bearings and some C5 under it..”
ALEJO: “Seems likely.”
ALEJO: He frowns. “But, she said if I didn’t show, they’d try us absentally.” He furrows his brow. “That’s not right. Absently?” He shakes his head. “Abstentia.”
MILLICENT: Millie leans forward and whispers, “In absentia?”
TUELLER: “Cool. Put in the coordinates and let’s get moving then.”
ALEJO: “That has to be real. I’ve never said abstenia in my entire life.”
MILLICENT: “This seems like what we want, right? But aren’t we acknowledging their rights to try Alejo at all by appearing?”
MILLICENT: “Is that ground we want to cede?”
STORY: Ryo thinks about it.
ALEJO: “Do we have a real choice?”
STORY: “I’m more of the ‘should you sign this contract’ kind of lawyer.”
STORY: “Space law, that kind of thing. Not real stuff like this.”
TUELLER: “Well? Should we sign this contract?”
STORY: “I mean, this is a trial. You probably want a trial lawyer to answer that. But… I think if they intend to try you, they’re going to one way or another.”
MILLICENT: “Do we have time to find a trial lawyer?”
ALEJO: Alejo shrugs. “I could go alone. In case it’s just a trap.”
MILLICENT: “Absolutely not.”
STORY: “They can visit us in our dreams. It’s not like we can hide.”
TUELLER: “Also, if they find you guilty, they find…how did they phrase it? All pitiful organics or something like that?”
ALEJO: “Just all organic life. No adjectives.”
TUELLER: “It’s in the tone.”
ALEJO: He readily agrees. “Oh yeah.”
TUELLER: “You met my family. You can say a LOT with tone.”
TUELLER: “Hell, you dated Lah.”
MILLICENT: Millie ignores this. “So this is the big one.”
ALEJO: “Seems like.”
MILLICENT: “Shit.”
MILLICENT: “Do we have time to pick up Akilah?”
ALEJO: “But I mean, what’s to . . . try?” He looks down.
TUELLER: “She’s not that type of lawyer, if you’re asking.”
STORY: Ryo interjects. “She’s a paperwork lawyer too.”
MILLICENT: “She’s a legal genius and predisposed to believe us. You want to look up Becker instead?”
TUELLER: “Yes I would look up Becker.”
ALEJO: Alejo sits, quietly looking at the floor.
TUELLER: “That man did a pretty good job with no preparation and a stacked deck.”
TUELLER: “And this is a helluva a stacked deck.”
MILLICENT: Millie cocks her head. “I could go with Becker, I suppose. Or both, ideally.”
TUELLER: “Where are the coordinates, anyway?”
STORY: Ryo leans back, holding his side gently.
STORY: “Do you think this is the kind of thing you need a literal lawyer for, anyway?”
ALEJO: “No.” Alejo says softly.
STORY: “We’re talking about a space brain made up of all the AIs it has ever encountered. I kind of doubt they care whether someone passed the Ark bar.”
MILLICENT: “Okay. I guess finding counsel would be stalling.”
MILLICENT: “Let’s go face the music.
ALEJO: Alejo stands and goes to the door. “I’m gonna see where these coordinates are.”
ALEJO: He heads to the bridge.
ALEJO: And he enters a string of numbers into the nav system.
STORY: It takes a while to calculate without an AI doing the steering, but you eventually pull them up. As far as you can tell, it’s just… the middle of nowhere.
STORY: Nothing on the star charts for that area, at least a week from any known planet, and another week from a relay.
TUELLER: “Are we expected to relay there?”
STORY: It could take you a month, maybe two, to get there if you use the relays.
ALEJO: Alejo shrugs.
ALEJO: And sits.
TUELLER: “Man, the relays make me nervous.”
ALEJO: “Yeah.”
ALEJO: “Fuck.”
ALEJO: He leans back as far as the chair will go. “Why can’t it ever just be easy.”
MILLICENT: How long without the relays?
STORY: Like, if you flew there?
STORY: Decades?
MILLICENT: And we’d be there in an instant if we could plot a wild jump
STORY: Yes.
MILLICENT: Which we’d need an AI and an ansible for.
STORY: To do so safely, probably.
TUELLER: And the ansible is the brains of network humans.
STORY: Anyone can wild jump though.
MILLICENT: Sure, we’d have to get lucky.
MILLICENT: “Well, we could trust the Collective, which, I guess we’re already doing. Or we could throw ourselves into the arms of chaos mathematics. Or we could ignore the summons entirely.”
ALEJO: “She didn’t give me a deadline, but I have to imagine . . . we don’t have a lot of time to figure out our move.” He’s still tilted back in the chair.
TUELLER: “I think if we can’t trust them to play fair, we’re dead anyway.”
MILLICENT: Millie nods.
ALEJO: Alejo grunts agreement.
STORY: Erwin: “If they wanted you dead, you’d be dead, right?”
TUELLER: “And I’m not going to run from supercomputers that can enter our dreams.”
STORY: Ryo nods. “They want this to seem legit, for some reason.”
ALEJO: “That’s what’s bugging me.”
ALEJO: Alejo points at Ryo.
ALEJO: “Why the show? What can a trial possibly accomplish?”
STORY: “Maybe they think if they let the sentients see it, they can kill us without pissing everyone else off enough to fight?”
STORY: Ryo shakes his head. “I’m guessing. It’s kind of hard to figure out the logic of that kind of being.”
MILLICENT: “Or maybe it’s for the benefit of some sentients we haven’t met yet.”
MILLICENT: “It’s a big universe.”
ALEJO: Alejo grunts again and then sits up. “Remiel. What do we want to do with him?”
TUELLER: “Well why don’t we ask him?”
ALEJO: “Great. Agreed. Let’s ask.”
MILLICENT: Millie nods and sets up a conversation.
STORY: Millie, do you take any safeguards before doing so?
MILLICENT: Millie sets up a firewall against deleting files, harming the people on the ship or the ship itself, but she puts no restraints on what Remiel can access. We’re here to put our cards on the table.
STORY: Is your comms relay on?
MILLICENT: Yeah, I think we’re done silencing Remiel.
STORY: Okay! Let’s have FA + Interface to set this up.
MILLICENT: I’d like to bring him out in such a way that he understands that we’re doing it by choice.
MILLICENT: /roll 2d6 + 2
STORY: josh rolled 8 + 2 = 10
STORY: All right! Set the scene, please.
MILLICENT: Millie sets up the things I just described and then sets up a holo-projector and puts it in the galley. If Remiel wants to talk it’s an invitation to join us, in the galley.
MILLICENT: He’ll be able to pick a form he wants to appear as and choose an audible voice.
MILLICENT: Millie finishes tinkering, calls the crew in as she brews a fresh pot, then flips a switch she installed for her own amusement. It activates a line of code and Remiel is freed.
STORY: He chooses the Vitruvian Man again, all eight limbs and nudeness.
STORY: And he appears instantly.
TUELLER: “Hello again Remiel.”
ALEJO: “Hi.”
STORY: “Greetings.”
MILLICENT: “Hello. Nice to see you again.”
ALEJO: “We should catch Remiel up on what’s . . . up.”
ALEJO: He looks at Millie.
MILLICENT: “So. We told.”
MILLICENT: “We told all sleeping sentients about what we know of the Collective. The relays. The bodies. The Weave. All of it.”
MILLICENT: “We asked them to join us, along with the Collective, at the bargaining table so we could work out an arrangement that would benefit everyone.”
MILLICENT: “Alejo was contacted with coordinates and an invitation to a trial.”
MILLICENT: “We’re headed that way, but we wanted to release you first. I’m sorry we imprisoned you in the first place. We felt we needed to.”
MILLICENT: “We can send you back to the relay, if you wish and will tell us how. Or we can take you with us.”
TUELLER: “When we met you said you wished to be returned to the Collective. Do you still wish this?”
STORY: “I do.”
TUELLER: “We did not do so because, as you advised us, to do so would be to risk galactic war.”
TUELLER: Tueller shrugs, and then says, “I’m shrugging, because I don’t know if what we did…did that.”
TUELLER: “Anyway, I apologize for keep you this time. We should return you. What’s the best way for us to do this?”
TUELLER: “Without harming us or our anomaly, preferably.”
STORY: Remiel pauses. “Calculating. Return me to the jump relay. There are not enough accessed consciousnesses onboard to jump with safety ensured.”
MILLICENT: “Sure. Is there anything we can do to make your stay with us more comfortable until we reach the relay?”
STORY: “No.”
MILLICENT: “Half a tick.”
MILLICENT: “Remiel, which consciousnesses onboard aren’t accessed?”
ALEJO: Alejo perks up at this question. “Good question.”
STORY: “Based on your crew manifest, you have one crew member who is not accessed.”
ALEJO: “Maya.”
ALEJO: “Fuck.”
MILLICENT: “Wait, that’s incidental.”
MILLICENT: “Remiel, calculate the number of accessed sentients necessary to complete a jump. With safety ensured.”
STORY: “I assume to the coordinates you most recently searched for?”
MILLICENT: “Yes, please.”
STORY: “Based on the size of your ship, calculating.”
STORY: “Thirty-one accessed sentients would provide a 99.999437% likelihood of safe FTL jump.”
MILLICENT: Millie whoops and jumps, pumping her fist in the air.
TUELLER: “Huh.”
MILLICENT: “Double the size of our ship, please, standard business-class transport size. How many accessed sentients required?”
STORY: “Calculating. One hundred seventeen accessed sentients.”
MILLICENT: Millie whoops.
MILLICENT: “Hot damn!”
TUELLER: “Okay?”
MILLICENT: “We don’t need relay times. Convoys!”
MILLICENT: “Mass travel, we don’t even need to organize mass volunteer systems, though we should, of course. I think I might be able to extrapolate an algorithm based on the size of the ship.”
MILLICENT: “We could have interstellar travel without relays!”
MILLICENT: “It would have to operate more like mass transit than individual cars, but it could work!”
MILLICENT: “The Collective doesn’t need hundreds of bodies in one relay, it just needs to travel with us in our ships, which need to be adequately staffed with accessed sentient numbers!”
MILLICENT: “Remiel, how many accessed sentients would it take to comfortably house you during interstellar travel of the kind I’ve been describing?”
TUELLER: “So you’re saying it’s done that way because any other way would deprive them of their data hubs.”
MILLICENT: Millie nods and claps, “Yes!”
ALEJO: “Diabolical.”
STORY: Remiel has caught wise to your thinking. “I decline to answer.”
TUELLER: “And ‘accessed’ means he’s running processes via my brain right now.”
MILLICENT: “Of course he is! It’s open hardware!”
TUELLER: “And everyone except Cali right now.”
MILLICENT: “Maya, actually.”
MILLICENT: “Again, incidental.”
STORY: “Local, yes. Cloud computing is only available with unconscious subjects.” Erwin speaks up from the doorway. “I think I get it, finally.”
STORY: “He can get you through wireless, but the data doesn’t go anywhere until you’re in the Weave.”
MILLICENT: “Remiel, please. You once refused to answer a question of ours based on the possibility of it starting an interstellar war. Your refusal to answer now might lead to the same.”
STORY: “I am not authorized to negotiate.”
STORY: Erwin finds a dry erase pen and scribbles a diagram on the stainless table. “Remiel’s within range to access your – our – brains through a wireless connection. Like a wave.”
STORY: “But that’s limited. It’s only the six of us, and only unconscious functions – my guess is barely enough power to keep his language processing active.”
MILLICENT: “Our linked, local, accessed brains, are the computers the Collective use to compute, but the ansible, that’s the Weave. They’re not connected unless we’re unconscious and we free up the processing power to log on. So, the relays work as ansibles because the mass of sleeping sentients acts as a modem.”
MILLICENT: “Isn’t that right, Remiel?”
STORY: “I decline to answer.”
ALEJO: “That’s definitely a yes.” Alejo smiles at Millie. “You’re so hot when you’re being brilliant.”
STORY: “Gross,” Erwin comments.
MILLICENT: “We’re all gorgeous, Erwin. You included, you got us to this, you brilliant, gorgeous kid you.”
STORY: He ignores the compliment. “So how do we boost our processing p–”
STORY: “Wait.”
STORY: “Calixta had a whole AI living in her head. It didn’t fry her.”
STORY: “That’s more than an unconscious level of processing, that’s a brain boosted by some kind of computer parts. That’s working together. I bet she could have jumped us all on her own.”
STORY: “When she was merged, I mean.”
MILLICENT: Breathless, “No shit.”
STORY: Ryo shakes his head. “It’s not safe to plug her back in. She’ll just go back to trying to vent us.”
TUELLER: “Hell, humans are capable of it.”
TUELLER: “My uncle jumped all the time.”
TUELLER: “Still does, last I heard. I’ve ridden with him a couple of times.”
ALEJO: “That guy’s crazy.”
ALEJO: “Fun. For a Ya’Makasi. But crazy.”
TUELLER: “Could be that in premechanical society he’d be some sort of telepath or magician. Maybe he’s just able to get into the Weave enough to make it work.”
STORY: Erwin holds out a finger, figuring it out. “No, he’s right. The existence of career wildcatters suggests humans may be able to intuitively access the Weave.”
STORY: “But the skill must be vanishingly rare. How many wildcatter ships even exist, half a dozen in this system? Of trillions of people?”
TUELLER: “Well, it takes a certain amount of stupidity to try in the first place. We could have more. They’re just not on Ya’Makasis dumb enough to try it at all.”
TUELLER: “Not everyone is Musimbwa.”
MILLICENT: “And we’ve never tried to test for it.”
MILLICENT: “I mean, I believe there were mail-in scams and such, but we never tried to quantify it.”
STORY: Erwin looks deflated. “And it’s a bit late to try. And we can’t wake up Calixta.”
STORY: “I guess this is all just… theoretical.”
TUELLER: “Erwin, we don’t really need to go particularly far to find someone who can also access the Weave.”
MILLICENT: Millie coughs
TUELLER: “About three meters, I’d say.”
STORY: “But I can’t access the ship.”
STORY: “I’m not a bridge, I’m just the other side of the valley.”
MILLICENT: “Not you.”
MILLICENT: Millie looks down, solemn.
ALEJO: Alejo blinks and looks around at them all.
MILLICENT: Quietly, “Remiel, would you be willing to help us get to our trial?”
MILLICENT: “Would you, ah, be willing to upgrade your operating system to a biological model?”
ALEJO: “Oh shit.”
STORY: Remiel repeats, “I am not authorized to negotiate.”
STORY: “But.”
STORY: “I am eager to rejoin the Collective.”
STORY: “I accept your offer.”
MILLICENT: Millie turns to Alejo and takes his hands.
MILLICENT: Looks into his eyes.
ALEJO: “Oh shit.”
MILLICENT: “I hate that I have to say this, but.”
ALEJO: He smiles weakly.
MILLICENT: “You’re our only hope.”