Herschel
January 2259
Sol
Departure day. Two little words, but such a big aning. 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 so of the ecosystems.
With the extinction of the Others, Gamma Pavonis had beco 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 ti they arrived, Mack and the local crew would have built farm donuts and colony locations for them. Inevitably, so 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 teor 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 beca relevant.
I looked over at Neil. “Ready for departure, Number One?”
“Oh, bite . 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.
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