This whole performance could have gone on for a few more minutes, if Hazjiar hadn’t picked that moment to walk out onto her porch. She made a gesture to the soldiers, and they motioned to me with their weapons.
I settled into a chair, bobbed my head to Hazjiar, and waited for her to speak.
“You said you had news? Presumably it is about the Others?”
“Yes,” I replied. “I wanted to deliver this news in person. The battle is over. We’ve won, although barely.”
Hazjiar nodded, and stared at the horizon for a few moments. “This is good, of course. But will they not just regroup and return? For how long will we be safe?”
“There will be no return, Hazjiar. We wiped them out.” I looked down for a moment, then met her eyes. “It wasn’t something we did casually, but they have obliterated so many sentients, and showed no interest in changing their behavior…”
The soldiers exchanged glances. If they were concerned about the gulf between us before, this wouldn’t have helped. I spared them a quick look, then continued. “We will continue to watch for them, but it’s most likely that there are none left.”
“I don’t understand your species, Jock.” Hazjiar paused, looking at me. “You have all this power, yet you seem reluctant to use it. You are so rich that you don’t even need money, yet you seem to have so little.”
I looked up at the ceiling for a moment. She was, perhaps without realizing it, hitting very close to home with some of her comments. “Hazjiar, we—all the Bobs, I mean—don’t have any desire for power over others. Quite the opposite, in fact. We just want to be able to do our own thing. And we may finally be at the point where we can realize that desire.”
I gestured to the soldiers. “You have power, in the ways that matter. You’re able to keep yourselves safe here. We’ll make sure nothing gets out of control up there.” I gestured to the sky. “Beyond that, unless you specifically need us for something, we’ll leave you alone. I think, as a group, the Bobs have finally figured out our place in the cosmos. So we’re going to be stepping back.”
Hazjiar gazed at the soldiers for a moment, then smiled at me. “Some of us, I think, will be happy to hear that. I am not so sure. In any case, we will live.” She stood. “Thank you, Jock, for the news. I will inform the Council.”
I stood and gave her the Pav head bob, and walked to the cargo drone. I stepped in and turned for a last look. As the doors were closing, I saw Hazjiar give me the Vulcan salute.
*
I popped into PRP. The Pav Reclamation Project had a dedicated VR, hosted in Bill’s Moot station. I looked around the room; a half-dozen Bobs watched video windows or operated drones on the planet’s surface. Ferb stood at the edge of the room, watching the activity.
“Hey, Ferb.” I walked over to join him. “How’s it going?”
“Slow but steady, Jacques. We’ve been able to produce at least a few of everything that we have samples for. Genetic diversity may be an issue for a while, but we should be able to bring back about seventy-five percent of the planet’s ecosystems, eventually.”
I nodded, watching a few of the video windows. “And the other thing?”
Ferb motioned toward a whiteboard with a number of items listed. “We’ve found some good candidate planetoids in nearby systems. Bill’s asteroid-movers will handle them easily.”
I nodded, satisfied. “So, eventually we’ll be able to offer the Pav their home system back. With a supply of metals.”
“Maybe a few decades, yet, buddy, but yeah. That’ll be good.”
We watched the activity in the room, enjoying the moment. One less thing to feel guilty about.
Rebuilding
Herschel
January 2259
Sol
Departure day. Two little words, but such a big meaning. Today would put humanity officially out of the Endangered Species category. Today, we would leave the Earth, looking a lot like a snowball, to its own devices for a few millennia. Hopefully, the planet would recover. If so, we had the genetic material to rebuild at least some of the ecosystems.
With the extinction of the Others, Gamma Pavonis had become a viable colonization target. Several colony ships had returned to Earth since the Battle of Sol, and were now on their way with a load of humanity to settle there.
And we now had enough stasis pods in the Bellerophon for the balance of the human race. Today, the remaining Earthlings were leaving for 82 Eridani, all snugged away in our cargo bays. By the time they arrived, Mack and the local crew would have built farm donuts and colony locations for them. Inevitably, some of the humans wouldn’t like the decisions. Tough.
The debris from the Battle of Terra, at least that portion of it that hadn’t already gone down to Earth in meteor showers, was all gathered at the Earth/moon L5 point. Autofactories were still going full-bore to build new vessels for all the Bobs that had been destroyed in the battle. Bill’s offsite facility was showing its worth—only a few differentials had failed, and in those cases the Bobs were simply restored with the last few minutes missing.
There still existed a general feeling amongst the Bobs that being restored wasn’t quite personal immortality, but most agreed that it sure beat the alternative. I decided I’d leave that particular philosophical debate until it became relevant.
I looked over at Neil. “Ready for departure, Number One?”
“Oh, bite me. And for the record, your Picard is terrible.”
“Yeah, but we’re still in charge of this tub. Not bad for pondscum, eh?”
Neil grinned. “Could do worse.”
Singing the Accountancy Shanty at the top of our lungs, we set course for 82 Eridani.
Pilgrimage
Bob
October 2263
Earth
Full circle.
A couple hundred meters or so, straight down, a city named Las Vegas had once stood. Lost Wages. Sin City. The place where my first life ended.
I turned slowly to survey the landscape. Icescape, I guess. The Earth was now in full snowball mode. Snow, once fallen, was not melting, and glaciers were closing in on the equator.
Today was a beautiful bluebird day. The sun shone down on the ice, leaving the world awash in light. If I’d still been biological, I’d be snow-blind by now.
I had arranged with the current Bob-in-residence, a tenth-generation named Harvey, to have an android printed up from Howard’s most recent published set of plans. I could have done this visit remotely from Delta Eridani—or from anywhere in range of BobNet, really. But I wanted to actually come to Earth, to make the pilgrimage physically as well as emotionally. The Heaven-1B was currently in geosynchronous orbit, thirty-five thousand kilometers straight overhead.