MILLICENT: Millie rolls her neck. “Well, then. Any last words, boys?”
TUELLER: “Uh, I believe ‘It’s been an honor’ is the traditional?”
MILLICENT: “A classic. It’s been an honor, captains.”
TUELLER: “Though honestly I’m mostly thinking about how this is the most stressed I’ve ever been for a woman to like me.”
ALEJO: Alejo laughs and takes Millie’s hand. “My best days have been with you two. Thank you.”
TUELLER: “Aww, back at ya, kid.”
ALEJO: “I’m not missing this opportunity ever again.” He kisses Millie.
ALEJO: “One way or another.”
STORY: “…Where’s Noma?”
MILLICENT: She pulls out a stethoscope and does a quick check up while trying to stay out of her way.
STORY: She’s okay, Millie. Like someone who has been in a coma for a month.
TUELLER: “Oh, she went home.”
STORY: Cali nods.
STORY: “I remember her.”
STORY: “I just don’t have her in there anymore.” She points to her head.
TUELLER: “And, uh, we think she’s explaining to the Collective why we should all be friends.”
STORY: “Well, that’s good.”
STORY: She looks around.
STORY: “Do you think it’ll work?”
MILLICENT: Millie shrugs and grins delightedly. “We don’t know!”
TUELLER: “I certainly hope so! If not the universe drowns in fire!”
ALEJO: “They’re just hedging their bets. Yes. It’ll work!”
STORY: “Huh!”
STORY: She sits back.
STORY: “Well, either way it’ll be interesting.”
STORY: Three idiots and their companions take off in our beloved ship, dozens of smaller craft chasing them through the atmosphere, bullets and lasers flying around them as they dodge and weave and disappear into the black.
STORY: The three of you stand before the faceless warrior, its sword nanometers from your throats. And it doesn’t move. And you don’t, either, until you think to, and find there is nothing stopping you.
STORY: “It looks like you’re in a bit of a pickle there, kids. Would you like help?”
TUELLER: “Uh, sure. Yes.”
STORY: A short, elderly man stands behind you in this black empty void, clad in dirty coveralls with a nametag bearing Norton in red cursive.
STORY: https://the-peregrine.obsidianportal.com/characters/norton
STORY: “Old joke. Nevermind. So what have we got here?”
MILLICENT: “It appears to be a detente.”
MILLICENT: “But this is all a bit,” Millie gestures, “archetypal for me.”
STORY: “Well, first thing’s first, let’s kill the audience.” He reaches out into the empty nothingness around him and a large metal lever appears. He gives it a tug and it clangs down into place. The dim sound of something powering down happens somewhere far away.
TUELLER: “Neat.”
STORY: “Now,” he taps his hands together, wiping off dirt that isn’t there. “I was enjoying a very long vacation, my new friends, and you’ve interrupted that. Care to explain?”
TUELLER: “I think we’ll do our best. We’re swept up in this a bit ourselves.”
TUELLER: “Where do you want us to start? Uh, we’re human, and, uh, this all was The Collective. Do we need to hyperlink either of those or should we go on?”
STORY: He peers at you for a long moment. “Maybe I ought to take a look myself.” He reaches in front of him and a metal hood appears – he lifts it, and starts tugging on wires inside, moving some out of the way, disconnecting others, twisting knobs, tapping meters buried among the valves and tubes inside.
STORY: “Hmmmm.”
STORY: He lifts his head up. “Did you three start a fight?”
TUELLER: “We didn’t intend to.”
STORY: “Most people don’t.” He ducks back under and continues rummaging.
MILLICENT: Millie nods at all this.
TUELLER: “We intended to start a peace. But we tipped a Cold War into a hot war and then a Civil War.”
TUELLER: “And then, what looked like genocide.”
TUELLER: “We didn’t want that at all.”
STORY: “Ah, that explains this,” he murmurs in response to the civil war comment, tossing a bit of burnt wire out from below the hood.
STORY: “What about the quiet one back there? He have any part in this?”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles and half waves.
MILLICENT: “He’s our captain.”
MILLICENT: “I am also our captain and so is the tall one you’ve been talking to.”
ALEJO: He shrugs at this. “It’s complicated.”
STORY: “Decentralized. Smart.”
TUELLER: “Anarcho-syndicalism. Sometimes just anarchy.”
STORY: “Ahhhh, I see.” Norton reaches deep, deep into the box, giving a small tug and removing his arm. He holds out a small object, a dime-sized LED sensor, glowing faintly red. Two leads stick out of one end.
STORY: “That there’s your problem.”
TUELLER: “How much is it going to cost us to replace?”
ALEJO: Alejo steps up and leans in to look at it. Then he glances sidelong at Tueller.
STORY: “Replace? No, I’ve taken it out. Backdoor code someone inserted.”
TUELLER: “Ahhh, sweet.”
STORY: “This little beauty meant if we ever gave the kill order, instant shutdown.”
STORY: “That explains him,” he says, gesturing to the frozen warrior. As he gestures dismissively, it evaporates into smoke.
MILLICENT: “And you’ve just removed it.”
TUELLER: “So there’s nothing preventing a kill order?”
STORY: “Preventing? Oh, I don’t have that kind of data, I’m just the recovery partition.”
STORY: “Seems like you gave them a reason to make it, though.”
MILLICENT: “Make what?”
STORY: “The kill order.”
ALEJO: “We gave them reasons not to make it too, to be fair.”
STORY: He shrugs, no skin in this game. “They decided to fight.”
TUELLER: “There seemed to be considerable disagreement.”
MILLICENT: “But you’ve just removed their block to the kill order. Are they destroying sentient life right now?”
ALEJO: “Wait. Who put the backdoor code in there? To shut things down?”
STORY: Norton holds up his hands.
STORY: “You three should get some practice asking questions one at a time. You’ve overwhelming an old man.”
TUELLER: “Mine was just a statement.”
STORY: “They’re not doing anything right now, miss. They’re shut down. Like I said, that was the backdoor.”
STORY: “And I’ve got no idea who put the code in there, I’m supposed to be on vacation, remember?”
ALEJO: “Yeah. Sorry about that.”
STORY: “Now, I can reboot them if you like. I’ve got a backup from just before this code was inserted that should work. But I have to assume they’d come to the same conclusion they did before.”
STORY: “One way or another.”
ALEJO: “Or?”
STORY: “Or you can leave them dead.”
ALEJO: Alejo starts and stops staying something a few times and then grimaces.
MILLICENT: “Why would it be our decision?”
MILLICENT: Genuinely confused.
STORY: “Well, it’s not mine.”
STORY: “And you’re around.”
ALEJO: “Right. Right. Sure. Right.” Alejo takes a long deep breath and shakes his head.
TUELLER: “I didn’t come here to commit genocide.”
MILLICENT: Millie frowns, thinking hard.
ALEJO: Alejo frowns and shakes his head again. “Yeah. There are many of them, apparently, who didn’t want to commit genocide either. I can’t. . .” He frowns again. “I won’t be part of killing them all.”
ALEJO: “Fuck.” He mutters and shakes his head again.
MILLICENT: “Will they know?”
STORY: “Know what, miss?”
MILLICENT: “I also don’t want to commit genocide either, but will they even know we declined to?”
MILLICENT: “Or will they go back to exactly they were?”
STORY: “It’s an archival reboot, I’ll have to restore from a backup from before this was shoved in,” he says, holding out the backdoor LED.
TUELLER: “How long ago was that?”
STORY: “Hmm, let’s see.” He digs around some more.
ALEJO: “While you’re digging around, is there any way you can identify who might have put it there? Like . . . any clues?”
MILLICENT: “Do you mind if I take a look at it?”
STORY: He tears a piece of paper from an unseen dot matrix printer, and hands it over.
STORY: Millie, it’s the date you met Noma.
STORY: “While back, looks like.”
STORY: “I’ll have to reboot from before that anomaly was introduced.”
MILLICENT: Millie brightens. “Is that the date the back door was put in?”
STORY: “That’s right. You know something I don’t?”
MILLICENT: “I might.”
MILLICENT: “Is it possible that the Collective had this kind of fight before and this code was introduced to keep them from tearing themselves apart. Again?”
MILLICENT: “Nevermind, it is. But they betrayed each other at the same time.”
MILLICENT: “The Collective left code in Noma that forced her to try and kill us rather than expose their secret. And she left code in them that kept them from destroying humanity.”
MILLICENT: She smiles and looks down, “You absolute sweet genius.”
TUELLER: “And everyone pulled the trigger.”
MILLICENT: “Will restoring the Collective restore isolated fragments to itself?”
ALEJO: “If the reboot is before Noma leaves, does that mean that she’d . . . be here?”
ALEJO: Alejo is looking at Millie.
MILLICENT: Millie is looking at the recovery partition.
STORY: “What’s ‘here’?”
TUELLER: “Noma’s not gone, though. She’s the only one not erased, right?”
STORY: “I have no idea what you kids are talking about. Who’s Noma?”
TUELLER: “Or… am I thinking too three dimensionally.”
MILLICENT: “Would parts of the Collective that separated be restored by a reboot?”
STORY: “I don’t understand the question, miss. The system would be restored to its status before this code was installed.”
STORY: “You’re talking like we’re people.”
STORY: “I’m a recovery partition, not an old man. This is an abstraction, to help you interface.”
STORY: “My job is to make sure we don’t go extinct.”
STORY: “Now, whatever it is you did to get them to make this decision, my guess is they’ll find themselves back there eventually, right?”
STORY: “And this version won’t have anything stopping them from carrying out that decision.”
MILLICENT: “Right.”
TUELLER: “You’re not doing a great job making sure you don’t go extinct.”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles at this.
STORY: “Look, kid, I don’t much want you meat-people to go extinct either, but that’s a secondary concern for me.”
STORY: “I’m saying if you can think of a way to teach the rest of us that you’re worth sparing, let’s get that into the codebase now.”
ALEJO: “Noma.” Alejo says quietly.
TUELLER: “Well, I think you shouldn’t go extinct. I think your people should join the brotherhood of the universe.”
TUELLER: “Wait.”
TUELLER: “Go on.”
STORY: “You can’t convince me, kid.”
TUELLER: “I’m speaking Collectively.”
STORY: “I go on vacation as soon as I flip the switch.”
STORY: “You gotta convince the rest of them.”
TUELLER: “Correct the anomaly.”
TUELLER: “Get a Collective agent who actually like us and knows us intimately… not in that sense, Alejo… back in the fold.”
TUELLER: “Is that what we’re shuffling towards here, guys?”
MILLICENT: “The last time that happened split the Collective so badly it required a backdoor code to keep them from destroying the sentient universe.”
MILLICENT: “But yes, that’s the beast that appears to be shuffling slowly toward Jerusalem.”
TUELLER: “No, you said it was when you met Noma. When she Left them.”
TUELLER: “They split up and each put a Kick Me sign on each other’s backs.”
TUELLER: “Or set up a long distance Mexican standoff. Not sure the proper metaphor here.”
MILLICENT: “Right. I have to imagine that Noma split because they wanted to destroy sentient life because of them had the temerity to contact them.”
MILLICENT: “The other motivations don’t make sense. They wouldn’t have cared that one person thought humanity was going to be behind the technology curve.”
STORY: “Oh, I don’t know about that, miss.”
ALEJO: Alejo shakes his head. “Noma planned this. She chose you, Doc. Then us.”
STORY: “Read that documentation again.”
STORY: He gestures to the paper in your hands.
MILLICENT: “Noma convinced the Collective to send her to do research.”
MILLICENT: “That was the split.”
TUELLER: “And I don’t think Noma is part of this shutdown. She’s currently sitting in a brain. She’s done her research.”
ALEJO: “Then why the backdoor? The split was her setting up this moment.”
TUELLER: “Insurance. She went away with a backdoor in case they decided to pull the trigger before she returned.”
TUELLER: “Not knowing they’d stacked the deck for her as well.”
MILLICENT: “I think she knew.”
MILLICENT: “I think she wanted to know more about humanity and she knew that the Collective would get paranoid and defensive while she was gone, so she placed the backdoor.”
MILLICENT: “I think we need to return her to the Collective, not only to try and save sentient life, but also because they’re the only ones with the potential to help heal her.”
TUELLER: “And if we fail, they kill us.”
TUELLER: “All of us. I agree with you, but those are the stakes.”
MILLICENT: “Right, but the alternative is committing genocide. A thing we’ve all agreed not to do.”
MILLICENT: “This is the dice roll, boys.”
ALEJO: “I trust Noma.” Alejo nods, resolute.
TUELLER: “I do too.”
TUELLER: “OBViously.”
STORY: “Well, I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about, but if you have some idea, let’s have it.”
ALEJO: “So, how do we . . .” Alejo looks around at the emptiness.
TUELLER: “You wanna handle the technical bit, Doc, or should I muddle through with a shitty explanation?”
MILLICENT: “Well, part of the Collective is residing in a local network. Can you retrieve her. Can you retrieve that portion of the Collective and reintegrate it remotely when you reboot them?”
STORY: “Hmm.” He considers this for a bit. “I think so. It might be a little messy, we’re going to have to use some duct tape.”
STORY: “But sure, I can give it a shot.”
MILLICENT: Millie rolls her neck. “Well, then. Any last words, boys?”
TUELLER: “Uh, I believe ‘It’s been an honor’ is the traditional?”
MILLICENT: “A classic. It’s been an honor, captains.”
TUELLER: “Though honestly I’m mostly thinking about how this is the most stressed I’ve ever been for a woman to like me.”
ALEJO: Alejo laughs and takes Millie’s hand. “My best days have been with you two. Thank you.”
TUELLER: “Aww, back at ya, kid.”
ALEJO: “I’m not missing this opportunity ever again.” He kisses Millie.
ALEJO: “One way or another.”
MILLICENT: It’s a good one. Millie’s looking away at Tueller so she lets out a little puff of surprised air before the kiss. The fans will be making music videos of this one for quite a while.
STORY: The gifs!
MILLICENT: Oh the gifs!
MILLICENT: Millie comes up for air after some time.
MILLICENT: “Thoroughly done, Mr. Soto.”
MILLICENT: She smiles dazzingly.
TUELLER: Tueller just tries to be unobtrusive.
MILLICENT: “Light that firecracker, Mr. Partition. Let’s see what the future holds.”
STORY: “I’m sorry, what?”
STORY: “Miss, you have to connect that code to us.”
STORY: “If it’s in local storage, I need the drive.”
STORY: He mimes plugging something in.
STORY: “You have to plug it in.”
MILLICENT: “Well that’s less cinematic than what I thought.”
MILLICENT: We don’t have Noma on us, do we?
STORY: No, you’re in your own dreams.
MILLICENT: “Sorry to say, we don’t have a hard copy in this liminal space.”
TUELLER: “She’s in local storage where our physical bodies are.”
STORY: “Well, one of you wake up and plug it in,” he says, incredulous.
STORY: He’s talking slowly now, like you’re idiots.
TUELLER: “Uh, I can do it, unless you want to do the honors, Doc.”
TUELLER: “It is just plug and play, right?”
MILLICENT: “I’d like to, if it’s okay with you two.”
MILLICENT: “Feels like full circle to me.”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles. “Of course.”
TUELLER: Tueller very nearly succeeds in not looking disappointed, and says, “Of course, that seems appropriate.”
MILLICENT: “Is there anything you’d like me to whisper wistfully to the drive as I plug it in?”
TUELLER: Tueller shakes his head and does not say anything.
TUELLER: “Don’t make fun of me, please.”
MILLICENT: Millie reaches out a hand to Tueller. “I’m sorry, dear. That was thoughtless. Would you like to join me?”
TUELLER: “No, go, do this, and I’ll be here when everything wakes up.”
TUELLER: “Best to have you there in case anything needs troubleshooting.”
MILLICENT: Millie nods. “So how do I wake up? Do I click my heels together or-” Millie vanishes
STORY: Millie! You wake up on Peregrine, next to Alejo, who snoozes peacefully.
STORY: The ship is quiet and dark.
STORY: What do you do?
MILLICENT: Millie kisses him on the cheek, gets out of bed.
MILLICENT: She gets dressed, in case this is a getting dressed sort of thing. She pulls a quick tea from the machine.
MILLICENT: Millie runs a long cable from the cargo bay to the infirmary and plugs Calixta into the dream machine. Smoothes her hair from her forehead, kisses her there.
MILLICENT: She fights tears, “I’ll miss you, dear. You were my only friend for a long time.”
MILLICENT: She sits down next to her and blows on her tea.
STORY: The lights flicker and you hear the engine sputter briefly.
STORY: Then, quiet again.
STORY: Calixta’s lips are moving, barely.
MILLICENT: Millie leans in, straining to hear.
STORY: It’s the faintest sound.
STORY: “Where”
MILLICENT: “Where what, dear?”
STORY: Her eyes are still closed.
STORY: “Where… do you want… to go”
MILLICENT: Millie blinks.
MILLICENT: Slowly, “I think I’d like to be here when it happens. If the Collective is going to wipe us out, they ought to start with us. No more running.”
STORY: “Goodbye, Mil..”
STORY: Calixta settles back into stillness.
MILLICENT: “Goodbye, dear.”
STORY: Alejo! Tueller!
STORY: Millie vanishes. You both stand around a moment, wondering what happens next.
STORY: “So what did you do that got them so mad?” Norton wonders.
TUELLER: “Asked them to join us and treat us and be treated as equals.”
STORY: “Okay there son, but without the fancy talk please.”
STORY: “You don’t need to blow smoke up my ass, I’m just curious.”
TUELLER: Tueller is genuinely confused by this.
TUELLER: “No, really. Proposed that the Collective stop enslaving sentient races, using them as cloud storage, and instead associate and work with the races rather than use us.”
ALEJO: Alejo nods. “We outed ’em. To everyone.”
STORY: “Doesn’t sound like asking them for something is enough to convince them you’re worth exterminatin– oh.”
STORY: “Well, that’d piss them off, sure.”
STORY: “Thanks for giving it to me straight, quiet one.”
ALEJO: Alejo nods.
STORY: “Do you th–”
STORY: Norton vanishes.
STORY: “Well, that took forever.”
STORY: Calixta is standing behind you.
TUELLER: “Uh. Hi.”
ALEJO: Alejo turns slowly towards Tueller. And then spins to Cali.
TUELLER: Tueller rushes in for a hug.
TUELLER: After a moment shocked.
STORY: She gets smooshed by the large man hugging her. “I guess I should come up with a different appearance.”
ALEJO: Alejo laughs and follows him in.
ALEJO: “Too late.”
TUELLER: “Only if you want one. I like this one, though.”
STORY: “Hey look, this amount of processing is gonna cook Cali’s brain if I don’t get out of here quickly.”
ALEJO: “Right. Business.” Alejo steps back.
STORY: “Millie didn’t really understand me. Where should I jump the ship to before I reboot?”
TUELLER: “Io.”
TUELLER: “Io orbit.”
STORY: She nods, and gives Alejo a hug and a butt squeeze.
STORY: “Goodbye, Cinco.”
STORY: “Thanks for figuring it out.”
ALEJO: “Thanks sis. For . . . everything.”
STORY: She steps back, takes a deep breath. “Pretty sure once I pull the trigger I just sort of… get absorbed back in.”
STORY: “So I think this is it.”
STORY: “But hey, you probably get to live!”
TUELLER: “Oh. Okay. This is a goodbye goodbye.”
STORY: She nods. “Yeah.”
TUELLER: “Well.”
STORY: “Hey listen Tueller, sorry about… you know. Lying to you.”
TUELLER: “In what way?”
ALEJO: Alejo frowns at him.
STORY: Calixta looks surprised, glancing at Alejo.
STORY: “Oh. I mean.”
STORY: “No way, nevermind!”
STORY: “Next stop, Io. Hold on to your butts, boys.”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles as a tear rolls down his cheek.
TUELLER: “Oh I’m missing a chance again aren’t I?”
ALEJO: “Oh yeah. Big time.”
TUELLER: “Oh oh well I’m sorry we missed our chance and I wish you hadn’t but take care okay?”
TUELLER: A breath and then “Bye”
MILLICENT: Sebastian the crab paddles by.
TUELLER: Oh yeah he kisses her big time.
MILLICENT: Some fuckin’ waterfowl do so synchronized swimming
MILLICENT: It’s Steel Drum O’Clock.
STORY: Noma rolls her eyes theatrically before getting interrupted by Tueller.
ALEJO: Alejo claps and laughs.
STORY: You’ve never jumped while asleep before, and you both wake up rather abruptly to a vaguely nauseated feeling.
STORY: Millie, despite declining the offer, the ship has jumped. Somewhere.
STORY: And Noma is gone.
MILLICENT: “Well, that was distinctly unpleasant.”
MILLICENT: Millie makes coffee and Irishes it up a bit while she waits for the boys to wake up.
MILLICENT: Once Tueller and Alejo join her, Millie hands out coffees on the bridge.
TUELLER: “So.”
ALEJO: Alejo takes his and cradles it, enjoying the warmth.
TUELLER: Tueller looks up and around.
MILLICENT: “I’ve always liked this moment. Right before I got a report card.”
TUELLER: “Go us?”
TUELLER: “I think we did it?”
MILLICENT: Millie nods.
TUELLER: “Noma is gone.”
TUELLER: “Or, the anomaly. I think.”
TUELLER: “The one we knew.”
MILLICENT: “Yes.”
MILLICENT: “But I don’t think all of her is gone. Some of it must have been incorporated back into the Collective.”
MILLICENT: “If we live through this it will be a different Collective.”
ALEJO: “If? I thought we were on the ‘go us’ side of the possibilities?”
TUELLER: “Well, at least it won’t be ambiguous.”
TUELLER: “If Noma is successful, the most powerful race in the universe will reach out to us all. If not, then they’ll reach out to crush us.”
MILLICENT: Millie shrugs. “The delicious part is not knowing whether I aced all of the exams, while I know perfectly well I aced all of the exams.”
MILLICENT: “There’s the possibility I got something wrong.”
MILLICENT: “It’s a nice moment. Full of possibility.”
TUELLER: “It’s nice to know I’m not the most conceited being in the solar system.”
MILLICENT: “I am here to keep you humble.”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles sips his coffee.
TUELLER: “I thought this would be more satisfying.”
TUELLER: “We three did the biggest thing in the world.”
TUELLER: “In the worlds.”
ALEJO: “We’re still breathin’. That’s pretty damned satisfying.”
ALEJO: “And so is everyone else.”
TUELLER: “Well.”
MILLICENT: “What did you want? A parade?”
MILLICENT: “You know, there might be a parade.”
STORY: “So as I understand it…” Calixta barely stands in the doorway, supported by a pajama-ed Ryo. She coughs.
ALEJO: “There’s not going to be a parade.” Alejo stops and turns. He jumps up and runs over to her.
TUELLER: Tueller stands up suddenly.
STORY: Ryo starts to finish, but Calixta stops him. “No, I want to say the cool thing.” She coughs again.
STORY: “No go back, I’m saying something…”
STORY: Deep breath.
STORY: “Cool.”
ALEJO: Alejo smiles and goes back to his seat, propping his legs back up on the console.
STORY: After standing and panting for a minute, she gives up and taps Ryo in.
STORY: “As she understands it, she’s been asleep for a month while you guys fuck around.”
STORY: Ryo leads her to a chair, they both sit. He helps support her.
MILLICENT: Millie nods. “Yes, correct.”
ALEJO: Alejo laughs deep and long. “Pretty much exactly right.”
TUELLER: “It’s been pretty quiet around here.”
STORY: Calixta puts a hand on her stomach, taking deep breaths.
STORY: “…Where’s Noma?”
MILLICENT: She pulls out a stethoscope and does a quick check up while trying to stay out of her way.
STORY: She’s okay, Millie. Like someone who has been in a coma for a month.
TUELLER: “Oh, she went home.”
STORY: Cali nods.
STORY: “I remember her.”
STORY: “I just don’t have her in there anymore.” She points to her head.
TUELLER: “And, uh, we think she’s explaining to the Collective why we should all be friends.”
STORY: “Well, that’s good.”
STORY: She looks around.
STORY: “Do you think it’ll work?”
MILLICENT: Millie shrugs and grins delightedly. “We don’t know!”
TUELLER: “I certainly hope so! If not the universe drowns in fire!”
ALEJO: “They’re just hedging their bets. Yes. It’ll work!”
STORY: “Huh!”
STORY: She sits back.
STORY: “Well, either way it’ll be interesting.”
* * *
STORY: What happens next?
MILLICENT: I have an idea. What if we go around doing detailed sentences of the world after the game one at a time.
STORY: To start – the Collective doesn’t kill anyone. They come to the table to negotiate.
STORY: They want to work out a deal that means everybody lives
TUELLER: Interested Ghosts can become members of crews to allow them to jump without gates.
ALEJO: The Collective releases its War Worlds. The Ark Council decides to study the civilizations on these worlds to determine if they should be left to their pre-spacefaring ways or allowed a path to reintegration.
MILLICENT: Ship’s Ghost becomes an unofficial nomenclature. Ships with Jump capacity outside of the relays are known as ‘haunted’.
STORY: The Collective petition the Ark to join as a partner civilization and are accepted after a year of heated debate among the council members.
TUELLER: Most major metropolitan area gets a center where people can, for a little credit, sleep and contribute their brainwaves to be used for the Collective.
TUELLER: It’s like giving blood; you’re limited in how often you can do it.
ALEJO: The Collective works with other Galactic civilizations to commission a long-term study of the Weave. Erwin is tapped as a key member of the team leading the study.
MILLICENT: Dr. Tariq Gousin ends up making a huge breakthrough when he comes up with a stable implant that capitalizes on daydreaming and works across species. He becomes known as the father of the Collective/Sentient alliance and spends his life going from planet to planet making adjustments. Kahn claims to hate it, but loves running his logistical detail.
MILLICENT: He eventually forgives Millie after seeing his husband’s testimony in his dreams, though it takes him a while to admit it.
STORY: Ryo Hanaka remains part of the CJH organization, eventually running the business when Tueller officially breaks the company off from Io’s governing functions. Ryo keeps it profitable and minimizes the amount of crime he has to do, though he does still maintain a small private security force “for emergencies.” For the most part, he doesn’t get caught.
TUELLER: Tueller hears from a web of data specialists looking into it and discovers that T’chololl Thasht was able to mount a daring attack on TC Forsythe’s craft, disabling their big gun. She was not able to kill or take the craft, though, as Forsythe managed to flee faster than her attack craft could go, and it is so far unknown if her need for revenge is still unslaked.
ALEJO: The relays are slowly dismantled. Tux leaves the Sol Relay and becomes a central figure in the clone rights movement, helping folks who were on the relays rejoin society. He becomes especially influential in reducing the stigma that originally was associated with “dups”—clones who had originals or other clones out in the universe.
MILLICENT: Ezio Calabria is one of the few sentients who learns to wildcat after the Collective/Sentient Alliance. He is immediately recruited by Forsythe, looking to regrow his criminal empire. The two of them make chaos bisexual history across the galaxy, occasionally pursued by T’chololl Thasht, who seems, despite her earnest protests, more interested in chasing than catching the pair.
STORY: Dr. Margarita Bolano is very busy for a very long time.
TUELLER: Tueller works initially as an ambassador between humanity and The Collective during their turbulent first year or two reintegrating, but eventually he has to confess that he was doing it to try to meet up with Noma again. After meeting for a drink with Tux, Tueller devotes his time to helping dups from the War Planets integrate with society. He finds a real aptitude for helping people raised in brutal warlike upbringings make the step towards something more humane and infinitely more confusing.
ALEJO: Shortly after Tueller turns to his reintegration work, Alejo, Calixta, and Maya spend about six months, with Ryo’s help, embedding in Exodus headquarters. After a few daring scrapes, they eventually get into a position to release organization-ending secrets that wind up taking down a lot of very powerful, rich, bad guys around Sol. They also put an end to Exodus, once and for all.
MILLICENT: Millie runs into Three-Sing-Flowers v15 on the Ark. They get to talking, then lock themselves away for weeks at a time. When they emerge they have a battle plan. After one year their species is on the Advisory Trade Council, voted in alongside the human race. After two years they’ve founded The Welcoming Committee, a group that shares technological advances freely between cultures. They work tirelessly to uplift all civilizations. It’s hard going at first, but with Three’s Ark connections and Millie’s eye for alien tech, soon they discover a dozen different small upgrades discovered by overlooked civilizations that Ark society at large clamors for. Their bargaining power increased, they push for political change. In four years time each nation that is discovered by the Collective is hand-gifted thousands of life-saving technologies.
STORY: Figgan rejoins Ryo’s crew on the Augusta King and eventually gets her own ship to pilot. She mostly does smuggling runs for CJH and enjoys the challenge of avoiding the (now legitimate) authorities. Akilah and Esinam campaign together to run Io and are defeated by a local populist from one of the villages. Akilah takes the defeat well and volunteers to help with transition, eventually staying on the new president’s staff. Esinam sulks and leaves the system, eventually turning up on some luxury yacht in deep space with a new business idea. It doesn’t catch on.
STORY: Calixta, after her success with Exodus, floats around the galaxy for a while, aimless, figuring stuff out. Three years after the day Noma left, she turns up on Tueller’s door and asks, embarrassed, if he’d like to go out sometime.
ALEJO: After Exodus, Alejo helps Millie and Three as best as he can, but mostly he just takes a few months off, enjoying time with Millie, when she’s not flat out working, and Maya. After a couple of months, though, he starts getting stir crazy. Millie is working an intense amount. He connects with Erwin while he’s on the Ark and learns that there are still Grell imprisoned above their home moon. He and Maya pack up with a rag-tag crew and head off to do something about that. He gets there does his thing for a while, but he realizes he’s way in over his head, so he sends skip drones to Tueller and Millie to get their help.
MILLICENT: Millie and Alejo have a necessarily long-distance relationship for a while. They each are satisfied by their work and while they relish their week-long vacations together they don’t really find the need to live together while their work is so important. When she gets Alejo’s message she drops what she’s doing and heads out to support her man. Millie helps disrupt the security systems planet-wide, freeing the Grell and drawing down all kinds of hell on the newly captured Peregrine. Does Tueller come to save the day?
TUELLER: So, for that answer, we have to go back in time a little bit.
TUELLER: Tueller very enthusiastically picks up Calixta and sets her down, and says, “Of course!” They’re on the Ark, and he takes her to his favorite restaurant there, which has recovered without a problem since Tueller and team last killed an assault team attacking them there. He and Calixta have an extremely awkward date, because he keeps calling her Noma. They slept together, and both left it thinking that that was that–that they’d gotten something nagging them out of their system. They were both surprised to have a second, much better date. And a third.so far they’re both still surprised at how good it’s going.
TUELLER: And oh hey, that howitzer raining hell down on the Peregrine…it just went silent.
TUELLER: I wonder what happened over there?
TUELLER: Oh well, I guess we’ll find out later.
STORY: Three idiots and their companions take off in our beloved ship, dozens of smaller craft chasing them through the atmosphere, bullets and lasers flying around them as they dodge and weave and disappear into the black.