TUELLER: “Meet a copy of Alejo who didn’t die.”
STORY: Ryo stands, tilting his head. After a long beat. “Huh.”
ALEJO: Alejo waves.
STORY: He extends his nonbroken hand.
TUELLER: “He’s the original, as original as any of us are. We’ll all copies, if we’ve gone through a relay.”
TUELLER: “I think I’m probably Tueller 23.”
ALEJO: Alejo shakes it. “I’m still Alejo. So, we’ve met.”
STORY: “That’s incredibly upsetting. Sorry about your, uh. Nose.”
Chapter 89
MILLICENT: “Remiel, can you think of a reason we shouldn’t delete your uniqueness?”
STORY: “Calculating.”
STORY: “No. It is the safest option.”
MILLICENT: “Do you have anything else you’d like to say to us? Does anyone else has any more questions for Remiel?”
STORY: Tux points at you, Millie. “Do not fucking kill this creature.”
STORY: “This is a person, Millie.”
ALEJO: “Fuck.” Alejo paces. “I mean, Tux isn’t wrong. Fuck.”
ALEJO: “I really want to kill this . . . person. But, if Tux is right . . . . ” He trails off, obviously conflicted.
TUELLER: “This is a member of a race that is abducting people, murdering them, enslaving them, and amassing an army that could destroy us.”
TUELLER: “Leaving him alive means he goes back to that race and tells them everything, and they destroy us. That’s what he said to us.”
STORY: “I don’t care what he did. I care what we do about it.”
STORY: “We kill him, we’re that bad.”
Chapter 88
TUELLER: “We can’t signal for our ride without fearing that we’ll alert the AI.”
TUELLER: “And if that happens we’re all dead.”
TUELLER: “So we need to hunt down and fuck up that piece of shit Ghost. For us. For Noma.”
TUELLER: “We can’t find the ansible. I searched, until I realized how fucking stupid that was.”
TUELLER: “Like there’d be the glow of Cherenkov radiation, I’d hit it with a sledgehammer, and we’d go on our merry way.”
MILLICENT: “It’s a nice thought.”
MILLICENT: “But I agree, I think it’s time we take on the AI.”
MILLICENT: “Kill or capture?”
TUELLER: “Fuck him up and flush him down.”
MILLICENT: “I vote capture, it leaves us with more options down the line.”
MILLICENT: “Cap’n?”
ALEJO: Alejo sighs. “Fuck. Capture. We need answers.”
Chapter 87
TUELLER: “Guys. Sorry, I’m having a thought.”
TUELLER: “I want to run it by you all because it’s a crazy and stupid and maybe dangerous thought”
TUELLER: “This is a giant photocopying and casting machine.”
TUELLER: “And what we have here is a universal conspiracy that we need to get the word out.”
MILLICENT: “Wow.”
TUELLER: “So this has to get to the Ark, too.”
MILLICENT: “Someone’s coming for my throne.”
TUELLER: “We need Earth as ready as possible, but the Ark needs to know.”
MILLICENT: “That is possibly the most reckless and rash idea I’ve ever heard.”
MILLICENT: “Not that I let you finish.”
TUELLER: “I was going to say we should split the party.”
MILLICENT: “Oh.”
TUELLER: “But I think maybe we should do both.”
TUELLER: “Go to the Ark and to Earth.”
MILLICENT: “I thought you were going to say we should free the copies that are here and convince them to carry the message to every Ark civilization in the ships we make for them.”
TUELLER: “Oh maybe that’s a better idea than mine.”
MILLICENT: “Hail to the Queen, baby.”
Chapter 86
STORY: Millie, Calixta steps into the back area. “So. The bodies are still everywhere, and also the crew knows now about them. And us. Basically they know everything important.”
TUELLER: “That was me.”
TUELLER: “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
STORY: “Well, actually they don’t know about this,” she waves to the rows and rows of bodies.
MILLICENT: Millie lets out a breath.
TUELLER: “I have some good ideas.”
MILLICENT: “Interesting.”
ALEJO: Alejo nods. And keeps nodding. “Okay. Okay.”
TUELLER: “I just can’t tell the difference between them.”
ALEJO: He’s still nodding.
MILLICENT: “Well. Okay, that advances our clock.”
TUELLER: “The good ones and the not good ones.”
MILLICENT: “So, let’s review and then brainstorm.”
STORY: “It was a good speech.”
TUELLER: “Thank you!”
ALEJO: “So, about an hour?” He looks at Cali.
Chapter 85
MILLICENT: “You’re okay, Tueller. You’re here with me. Alejo and Noma cleared out the other Nikaus. They’re headed down to the basement to get the last one.”
TUELLER: “Oh shit.”
TUELLER: “I just sent the entire security force down to the last one.”
MILLICENT: “…”
TUELLER: “To get here.”
MILLICENT: Millie is speechless
MILLICENT: “Buh buh buh”
MILLICENT: She shakes her head, reaches her hand behind her ear and activates Alejo’s speaker, “ABORT ABORT OH GOD ABORT”
STORY: Alejo!
STORY: You step into the cafeteria on B1 and see the following:
STORY: Manaaki, dead, sprawled on the counter.
STORY: An open deck, still running some kind of program.
STORY: Roughly twenty security guards, who are all standing in this room and in unison turn around when you enter.
STORY: What do you do?
STORY: Oh also, Millie’s yelling in your ear about aborting, and you’re pretty sure you know why.
ALEJO: Alejo does the Han Solo slide to a stop. “Oh, hiya.” He says weakly and waves as he takes a very quick pause to look around for the nearest cover or exit, which he moves towards at top speed.
STORY: There are a few tables just to your right.
ALEJO: He puts it between him and all of them, and assesses what sort of weapons they have.
STORY: All standard issue, they’ve got stun batons that will also hurt a lot if you get hit with one. No guns, from what you could see. You hit the deck behind a table to the sound of most of them removing said batons and powering them on, and then one guy in the back saying, “isn’t that the guy who cleans the toilets?”
Chapter 84
TUELLER: “After your last talk with him, what is our plan here?”
TUELLER: “Are you going to get what you need out of him, or do we need to shift tactics? And get out of here if we can.”
MILLICENT: “I don’t know, maybe. He wants to convince me.”
TUELLER: “I would like to not be here where they kill people for knowing what we know.”
MILLICENT: “I think that’s how we went wrong in our initial encounter. We threatened him.”
MILLICENT: “He wants to know what I would do in his place. What’s the right thing to do here.”
MILLICENT: “It’s a very good question.”
MILLICENT: “The AI are as close to unbeatable as it’s possible to be. They’re taking a price most people would prefer not to know about and the remainder would likely agree was worth it.”
MILLICENT: “Are we right to be so aggrieved about this?”
Chapter 82
ALEJO: Alejo pushes Manaaki back into his chair and then kicks the chair, assuming it’s on wheels, against the back wall, while watching the door behind us, in case the guard comes in. “We’re going to have a civil conversation, Director.”
STORY: “Oh, for christ’s sake.” He looks annoyed. “GUARD!” He stands and rushes you.
STORY: What do you do?
ALEJO: Alejo hits him in the forehead with the butt of the gun, to knock him out. Then he pivots to fire at the guard’s legs or torso, depending on how armed the guard is.
STORY: The guard enters, in the same body armor and with the taser the rest of them have. As you level the gun at him, a door behind you slides open, and Nikau Manaaki steps out, wiping his hands with a small towel. He surveys the scene with a furrowed brow, then sighs, shaking his head. “Complications, complications.”
STORY: “Hannigan, back into the hallway, please. You’ll be briefed later.”
MILLICENT: Millie groans. “He didn’t even kill you!”
STORY: This Other Manaaki puts his hands on his hips, looking disappointedly at the unconscious one in his office chair.
MILLICENT: “You have backups for your headaches?”
ALEJO: “I really hate your ex, Doc. Have I said that?”
Chapter 81
TUELLER: “So the plan is to put us in the system as new hires, go in, ace our interview, and then take the Director, some unspoken fifth step, and then, profit!”
ALEJO: “It’s been a while, but seems like one of our better plans, honestly.”
TUELLER: “One of the best plans we’ve come up with in at least 18 months.”
MILLICENT: “It has six steps!”
MILLICENT: “I’m optimistic!”
Chapter 68
STORY: “You see that?”
STORY: Calixta points at the screen.
MILLICENT: “It’s a bathroom.”
STORY: “Jump relays aren’t crewed.”
STORY: “What’s a bathroom doing inside one?”
MILLICENT: “It’s kind of a nice bathroom.”
MILLICENT: “What’s living on the jump relays?”