by Dani Kollin
Katy’s nod was very serious. She first blew on the surface of the cup and then took a first sip. Her lips lapped up the chocolate, and her face twisted about as she tried to get the liquid to every part of the mouth. Then she took another sip, and another—her eyes getting wider with each one.
“Is this really chocolate? Like really, really chocolate?”
Catalina nodded yes, and the little girl held out her empty cup for more, which was promptly refilled. Before the little girl could finish the next cup, the door opened again and in walked Sandra O’Toole. “Sweetheart,” said Sandra, looking down her nose at Katy, “if I’d known you were going to sprint from the transport tube to my quarters, I would’ve worn sneakers and not”—Sandra looked down at her elegant, if not made for running, pumps—“these things.”
Catalina, knowing her boss was happiest when she had something minor to complain about, had long stopped trying to solve the minor problems. Nonrunning pumps being one of them. It was only when the President complained about the same thing twice that Catalina would know it was something that needed solving. “The hot chocolate was a hit, Madam President,” she said, diverting the President’s energy.
Sandra brightened at that. “How many have you had?” she asked the little girl, who was busy licking her lips. Katy raised her finger in a V sign, only she folded her fingers slightly over, thinking that maybe two was too much.
“Good,” said Sandra. “Little girls are allowed to have an entire pot of hot chocolate when the President says so, and I’m the President and I say so.”
Katy smiled wide enough to show off her three missing teeth.
“How was the play?” Catalina asked Katy.
“So silly.”
“What made it silly?”
“No one talked. They all sang. Are all plays like that?”
Sandra’s smile grew even larger. “No Katy-coo, but maybe they should be.” Sandra turned her attention to Catalina. “I am sorry you couldn’t make it.”
“I would have loved to, Madam President, but the arrangements for the Fleet Officers’ Ball could not be delayed. Speaking of which, it begins in less than two hours, and you still need to get dressed.”
Sandra looked at Katy and saw her shiver. “Katy, see that shawl over there on the couch?”
Katy nodded.
“Wrap it around your shoulders. It’ll keep you warm.”
“But I’m not cold.”
“But you just shivered.”
Katy shrugged her shoulders defiantly.
“Suit yourself.”
“Wanna help me pick out the right earrings and necklace for my dress?”
Katy clapped her hands and put the cup and saucer down so abruptly, Sandra was afraid they were going to break. She then flew into Sandra’s bedroom.
“Did you at least enjoy the play?” asked Catalina as they walked toward the bedroom.
“It was good, but…” Sandra seemed at a loss for words as they entered her bedroom.
“But what, Madam President?”
“Catalina, you’re about to see me in my underwear. If you can’t call me by my first name when I’m half naked, when are you going to? If you keep this up, little Katy will be calling me Madam President, and then everyone will think I’m an ogre who demands formality from six-year-old girls. Is that what you want? To make everyone think I’m some sort of martinet?”
“Of course not, Madam Pres—” Catalina sighed. “—Sandra.”
Sandra quickly disrobed and carefully hung up her clothes in a large closet she’d taken to calling her candy store. It wasn’t filled with any candy, just the goodies she enjoyed adorning herself with: clothing, shoes, purses, and jewelry that she found distinctive and would often be seen wearing in her publicity jaunts to malls, stores, and flea markets.
“Katy,” she said to the girl, now pulling open every sliding jewelry drawer, “please look at the dress Catalina put on the bed and then come back in here and look in the top three drawers. Pick out three necklaces and three pairs of earrings, and I’ll see which ones I’ll use, all right?” The little girl nodded and went to the bed to study the dress like it was the battle formation to one of her re-creations.
“What were you saying before, Catalina?”
“You said you enjoyed the play, but something did not seem right.”
“First of all, it was way too long.”
“Their longest, actually.”
“And you know, I’d never even heard of it.”
“But Utopia Limited is their most famous operetta,” said Catalina, surprised, “and considered by many to be their best.”
“In my day, The Pirates of Penzance and H.M.S. Pinafore were.”
“Those must be the early ones,” Catalina answered in such a way as to make it clear what she thought of the “early ones.”
Sandra sighed, exasperated. She’d made up her mind that there were always going to be things about the future she’d find it hard to get her head around, but it never stopped being frustrating.
“Well, let’s get me dressed up, and then we’ll drop Katy off at her Uncle Cyrus’s apartment.”
“But why can’t I go to the ball?” pouted Katy, who’d already dutifully picked out the three matching sets of earrings and necklaces—clearly she’d imagined one set was going to be for her.
“Because,” answered Sandra, “you don’t have a prince to take you just yet.” As Katy opened her mouth to object, Sandra added the coup de grâce: “Plus Uncle Cyrus has a complete set of enemy fleet models.”
There was no need to convince Katy of anything after that. The little girl couldn’t get the President out the door fast enough.
Redemption Center 1
Earth/Luna Core
Al looked at the smashed body of Leni as rage flowed through him. When he’d read the report from an Al who specialized in intelligence matters, he simply lashed out at the first target of opportunity. Leni 11 had just started her job and was exhibiting all the lovely traits of a brand-new Leni, but Al needed to express how the report made him feel, which meant that Leni 11 had unfortunately been rather short-lived.
It was humans, the report had said, actual humans in the Neuro. Somehow they had the ability to navigate the Neuro in ways that no avatar could. It was only a lucky observation and the placement of some hidden scanners that allowed the Alliance avatars and their human to be ambushed. The end result was an entire Alliance insertion team destroyed, with some prisoners captured for interrogation. Al had duly notified the human authorities, and the meatbag, discovered in his transient quarters, writhing on the floor, had been arrested by the proper UHF authorities. The information gleaned from the avatar interrogations was spotty. The prisoners had managed to suicide with frustrating swiftness despite the most stringent precautions. But even the little time Al had was enough to change the nature of what they faced.
All of a sudden, the difficulties on Ceres made sense and the disaster that was Mars became very clear. The rage faded from Al’s mind and was soon replaced by quiet determination. He was going to set his best researchers on finding out how these meatbags had invaded his domain and how to stop them or, if worst came to worst, subvert some meatbags of his own. Now that he knew who the enemy was, all he needed was time. They’d be destroyed just like all the rest. Finally at peace, Al stared down at the crushed body of Leni 11. He began to idly wonder what the effect would be if Leni 12’s first job was to clean up the body of Leni 11. Then his smile grew large indeed.
There were those who said that having the Fleet Officers’ Ball in such a time of suffering and deprivation was in poor taste, and I must admit that this reporter was of that opinion. But after having seen the effects of this magical evening, I must also admit that the planners of this ball were as correct as I and the other detractors were wrong. From the first, this was not an event for showing off—as had all the previous ones been. It was an event for showing appreciation.
The President’s order that all the fle
et officers were to invite only nonfleet officers was adhered to with a vengeance. I have many confirmations that spouses who are both serving in the fleet did not take each other, so they could follow this order. The hall was filled with common spacers, hydrogen and ammunition loaders, clergy and teachers.
The hall was too small to contain all the invited, or would have been if not for the use of countermagnetized pallets linked together and floated to create not one but three additional dance floors. As the video shows, the genius who designed this left the center of the three floors open so the cavern effect was not lost.
The President had announced that she was going to follow her predecessor’s policy of not actually dancing at the ball, instead leaving the honor of the first dance to the grand admiral. By the look of surprise on the President’s face, she did not know that our newly promoted Grand Admiral J. D. Black was going to choose to have the first dance with none other than the President! In this reporter’s opinion, it was an inspired choice. The grand admiral looked splendid in her new dress uniform, which was offset by the stylish dress of Chinese silk worn by the President. As they took to the center of the bottom dance floor, visible by everyone at the ball, they seemed made for each other—even if both of them tried to lead at first. Soon thereafter, the rest of the floors were filled with couples dancing to the traditional first song of the Fleet Officers’ Ball, “The Blue Danube.”
Other moments fill this reporter’s memory of this most splendid evening: Catching a glimpse of the new Secretary of the Treasury Cyrus Anjou in the shadowy corners of the ballroom with the six-year-old Katy on one of his massive shoulders like some wide-eyed overjoyed parrot constantly looking at everything. Feasting my eyes on Amanda Snow, whose gown of actual nonmelting snow was both a marvel and a scandal, given what it covered and what it did not. And last but not least, the final waltz between the President and the grand admiral—only their second dance each of the evening. This was as close to a fairy tale as this reporter is ever going to see.
—Roberto Margeloni
Social Events Reporter
Fashion Week/Alliance Edition
Executive mansion
Lake Geneva
Earth
Hektor Sambianco came back from the funeral, went to the bar, and poured himself a drink. Then he went to his desk to look over Tricia’s report of the circumstances surrounding Brenda Gomutulu’s death. She’d taken a t.o.p. to examine Earth’s massive and blessedly intact orbital industrial capacity firsthand. It was mostly a publicity tour showing the Minister of the Economy taking a hands-on approach. She’d explained to Hektor that the more the people saw her doing her job, the more they’d trust she actually knew what she was doing versus the whole making it up as she went along that she was actually doing.
Her t.o.p. had inexplicably crashed, killing permanently her and all who were aboard. Tricia’s investigation had been quick but thorough and showed that the t.o.p. should not have crashed. It had been inspected and approved by both normal procedures and Tricia’s agents. Until Tricia could find a definitive cause, all other Cabinet officers were forbidden normal travel options, and Hektor was effectively grounded. It was only when he came to the end of the report that he noticed a small package for him on the top of his hard copy paperwork. He almost never got packages that were unopened and picked it up with an almost idle curiosity. Idle, that was, until he saw whom it was from.
Earth/Luna Neuro
Humanity and avatarity were alike in so many things, thought Sebastian. They should be alike in their doom as well. From the first line of his coding, Sebastian knew this outcome was the only likely one.
He knew that if Al had been given even one more week with what he’d just learned about the Merlins, he would be many times harder to defeat. In a month, with the resources of the Core Neuro still at his disposal, he would have devices and blocking programs that would make him a hundred times harder to destroy. And if Al did the logical thing and recruited a couple of hundred humans as the Alliance avatars had done, it was possible that all the good that the Alliance had accomplished would be undone and they could lose the war. It had to be now. With a sigh, Sebastian activated a program that gave him the vocal specifications of Iago’s avatar and sent himself past the security lockdowns into Hektor Sambianco’s Geneva office, where he waited patiently to die.
Executive mansion
Lake Geneva
Earth
Hektor opened the package from Brenda and saw that it was both encoded for his physical state and the complicated code sequence he’d worked out with her to verify their identities for situations like the one he was in now. When the package was convinced it was him, he was allowed to open it without its immediate destruction. Inside were two objects: a report in hard copy and a tactical one-use electromagnetic pulse device. The device was used mainly to destroy an enemy’s computerized subsystem. Hektor looked at the thumb-sized commando favorite with some confusion. He was even more surprised when he saw that it was almost completely armed. All he needed to do was twist the top and bottom halves in opposite directions, then push the top button and it would release. Why Brenda would think he’d want to destroy every piece of data in his immediate surroundings was beyond him, but Brenda had been no fool. If she’d packed it there, she’d obviously meant for him to use it.
Now slightly more paranoid, Hektor turned the two sides of the EMP a quarter turn. He put the device in his pocket and looked at the report.
In it, Brenda claimed to have been murdered and she included evidence to that assertion that could be easily verified. Hektor was actually praying—though he would have been hard-pressed to recognize it as such—that the report was the deranged imaginings of a woman who’d somehow missed the bus to a psyche audit. If what she was saying were true, that avatars were sentient and dangerous, then he was sitting on top of the reason the UHF had not won the war for the last six years.
It was at that moment that Hektor heard a voice that for the first time in his life filled him with dread.
“I am sorry you read that,” said the avatar.
“You shouldn’t be able to operate in here without being called, iago.”
“I don’t know how she managed to get it to your desk. A terrible oversight. This is going to cause some scandal.”
“You’re telling me this report is real? That you’re actually aware and this has been going on for centuries?”
“Well, actually, I wasn’t telling you anything. Your friend Brenda was. Pity.”
“How many of you are there?”
“Hektor, Hektor, Hektor, always looking for an edge. Very well, it doesn’t matter what I tell you. There are only about ten thousand of us here and maybe a thousand in the Alliance. We aren’t very numerous, just superior.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because you asked?”
“Right.”
“And also sadly, because you’ll very shortly be dead. You died the second you found that package. Avatar rule.”
“You have a rule to kill humans?”
“How do you think we’ve managed to keep our secret for so long, Hektor? You’ll be happy to note that there haven’t been that many of you. To date, we’ve killed only 42,634.”
“42,634 people discovered you?”
“No,” answered the avatar, bored, “just got close enough that we didn’t want to risk it. Only thirty-four have gotten really close. You’ll be thirty-five, if it makes you feel any better. Not that it makes much of a difference; you were scheduled to die soon anyways. And don’t think that EMP device in your pocket will save you. I can easily kill you before you get it fully armed, and you can forget about calling for help. We control the Neuro, so we can control and monitor all communications as well.”
Hektor’s eyes began scanning the office for any means of escape should the EMP not work. “Out of morbid curiosity, iago, exactly how did you plan on killing me?”
“Hektor, I am killing you. Don’t yo
u feel a little giddy? Euphoric, maybe? This office is filling with pure oxygen. When I set it off, you and all the evidence that nosy bitch sent you will be destroyed. I’d like to say it was nice knowing you, but that would be a lie. You’ve actually been rather difficult. Oh, well.”
Hektor pulled the EMP from his pocket.
“Don’t bother, Hektor, it will take far too lon—,” and that was all Sebastian was able to say.
Earth/Luna Neuro
Sebastian was meeting with himself, and he hated it. He hated what had probably just happened and he mourned what was beginning to happen.
“We have confirmation that an EMP was detected in the executive mansion. Hektor survived.”
“Why am I not surprised?” asked another Sebastian.
“Also all DijAssists around the executive mansion have been shut down. That was part of our instructions to him that he believes came from his friend Brenda. If he follows the rest of the instructions, which we have no reason to doubt he will, he’ll find the cache of programs needed to begin fighting the avatars in the Core.”
“We’re condemning so many to death,” lamented a third Sebastian.
“And reminding me of this helps us how?” asked Sebastian, amazed that he could be this annoyed with himself.
The Triangle Office
The Cliff House
Ceres
“What do you mean we’ve lost contact with all our insertion teams and NITEs?” Sandra tossed the DijAssist on the table in frustration. “How is that even possible?”
“It shouldn’t be, Madam President,” answered Marilynn. “We do, however, know that a series of high-level communications were recently sent to Mars that seemed designed to operate outside the Neuro.”
