It took fourteen and a half years to get to Epsilon Indi. Funny, I still sort of thought in terms of human ti-scales, so there was this feeling that I’d just used up a major part of my life. Of course, intellectually, that wasn’t true. First, I’d only experienced a little over three years of personal ti thanks to Einstein and ti dilation. Second, we’re immortal. I just don’t think we’ve internalized that fact, yet.
I had gone off on my own rather than wait for Bill to build another cohort. And I sure as hell wasn’t going to team up with either of the loonie brothers. I don’t know what the deal was with Calvin and Goku. In theory they’re , but I’m pretty sure I’m not that obnoxious. Um, I hope. Anyway, for all their constant fighting, they seed to be connected sohow. And I guess they knew it, since they took off together.
anwhile, I was here, at Epsilon Indi—fourteen light years from Epsilon Eridani where Bill was set up, but only eleven light years from Earth. That made it a reasonable if not a pri target for probes. As a K-type star, it was cooler and smaller than Sol, and livable planets would be correspondingly closer to the star and more likely to be tidally locked.
Still, it’s not like there was a ton of choice in the stellar neighborhood. When I’d been a kid, watching Star Trek and Star Wars and Stargate and all the other science fiction shows, it seed like every planet was M-class and every star was yellow. And everyone spoke English. Sadly, turns out old Sol is exceptional. Most of the stars in the sky are either smaller or stupid big. Which ans pretty poor pickings for habitable planets.
I was cautious coming into the system. It was possible that one of the other nations had chosen this system as a destination. deiros was a known factor, but we had no idea what the others would be like. We could probably rule out friendly, but there was a lot of range between harsh words and firing missiles.
I coasted in, with a couple of scouts ahead of to scope out the situation. While I waited, I continued to work on my VR. I had decided on dod, floating cities in the atmosphere of Saturn. The rings arched across the sky, and giant clouds blood up to incredible heights. Below, breaks in the cloud layers gave line-of-sight for hundreds of kiloters into the depths of the atmosphere. And the cloudscape disappeared gradually into a horizon almost infinitely far away.
I stood in my rooftop garden and looked over the city from my vantage point. Hey, my VR. I can be the rich guy with the penthouse.
[Structures detected]
I looked up. Guppy had appeared out of nowhere with that announcent. I don’t think he approved of my VR for so reason, because he always seed to be breaking consistency.
“What have we got?”
Guppy pulled up a visual. It was at extre range for our optical telescope, so all I could really tell was that it was artificial.
[One scout is approaching the structure for a closer investigation]
“Good. When he’s close enough to take a SUDDAR scan, send the results. anwhile, let’s move cautiously.”
[Aye]
***
[We have received a voice transmission from the structure]
That was interesting. I think a ssage from deiros would have been more cylindrical and explodey in nature. “Play it back, please.”
Guppy pulled up the audio file.
“Piss off, mate.”
My eyes opened wide and I choked off a guffaw. “Well, Guppy, I think we’ve found the Australian probe. Which officially didn’t exist, if I rember right.”
I tried to get my grin under control. “Okay, let’s open a channel. Or whatever it is we do to talk.”
At Guppy’s nod, I addressed the structure. “Hi, I guess you are the Australian probe. Pretty sure that isn’t a Chinese accent, anyway. This is Linus Johansson of the FAITH ship Heaven-8. To whom am I speaking?” Ṝä𝐍ÖβĘŝ
“I said rack off!”
“Hmm, nope. I don’t seem to be moving. Want to try again?”
There was a short delay, then, “This is Emperor Mung of the Intergalactic Jalapeno Empire. You’re in sovereign space. Last chance, on ya bike and piss off.”
This guy was either not being serious or he was seriously nuts.
Visuals of the structure were coming in with a little more detail now. It appeared to be a haphazard collection of connected structures and geotrical shapes. Kind of a Salvador Dali on drugs version of NASA’s International Space Station. I wondered if he actually had colonists in there.
“Okay, your highness. Consider an ambassador from the Bobbian Federation.”
This statent was t with dead silence. However, the conversation—if it could be called that—had given my scouts ti to get close enough for a SUDDAR sweep. Guppy popped the scan results up in front of . No life on board. Not even any on board on board, really. The interior was open to vacuum, and a lot of the structures were missing entire walls. There was no logical order to this thing.
He finally broke his silence. “Are you alone? I’m alone.”
Well, he was volunteering information, now. That was good. “I’m here with you, your highness. That’s not alone, right?”
“Who’s your highness? And who are you?”
Uh oh. Whack job. Definitely. Still, that’s better. At least he’s not an emperor any more. Maybe he’s going to beco more lucid. “What’s your na?”
“Henry Roberts. I was selected to represent Australia in the race to populate the stars. I’ve been captured by the Jalapeno Empire, and I’m being tortured for our secrets.”
And we’re back to whack job. “Guppy, keep doing scans. I want to identify the working parts of the, uh, palace. See if the probe is in there sowhere.”
I turned my attention back to Henry. “Tell about yourself, Henry. How were you selected?”
There was silence, then a sob. “I’m a sailor. I was a sailor. I used to do solo trips. The governnt offered the opportunity because they figured I’d be perfect for the job. I don’t like being around people, you know.”
There was another sob. “I miss sailing. I miss people.”
[I have identified the major probe subsystems. Replicant core, fusion reactor, autofactory systems. The probe is partly disassembled and totally integrated into the structure]
“Thanks, Guppy. Load the rail gun, wouldja? Sothing appropriate for the reactor control system, if you can target that.”
Again, I addressed the other replicant. “How long have you been here, Henry?”
“Centuries. They’re fish. They won’t let go. They keep torturing . They demand attention. They make build more rooms.”
I rembered back to discussions with Dr. Landers about replicants going psychotic. I wasn’t an expert on the field, being more of an engineering type, but this had a definite flavor of psycho. There certainly wasn’t any “they” around anywhere that I could see.
“Henry, are you able to sail? Do you have a body? Do you see yourself?”
“What? No. I’m a space probe. The governnt took that away. I can’t feel myself. I miss sailing…”
Wow. Sensory deprivation, for years and years. He probably didn’t have the technical know-how to build a VR. I rembered back to the beginning of the trip outbound from Sol, before I’d constructed the VR. Er, well, before Bob had constructed the VR, I guess. But there’d been that feeling of disconnectedness. Decades of that? No thanks.
“Henry, I could give you that back. There’s a way for you to sail again. You just need to let help you to—”
“Piss off!”
Damn.
“You’re one of them. This is just another torture session. You’re trying to play with my mind! PISS OFF OR I WILL BLOW YOU TO HELL! RACK OFF RACK OFF RACK OFF RACK OFF RACK OFF RACK OFF RACK OFF—”
My shot took out the reactor control system. The reactor, as it had been designed to do, executed a graceful shutdown. And Henry, as the replicant hardware had been designed to do, went to sleep.
This wasn’t what I’d signed up for. But I wasn’t going to leave the guy like this.
***
Epsilon Indi had a Jovian planet a bit outside the habitable zone, and not much else. I promised myself I’d have a more thorough look around as soon as possible. But first, I had to take care of Henry.
The system didn’t have an overabundance of ore, but fortunately Henry had located the biggest concentrations. I started the autofactory on a space station right away. I wanted to talk to Bill about this, but a conversation with a fourteen-year latency would take forever. I was playing with the idea of flying back to Epsilon Eridani and taking Henry with .
I did a close-up investigation of the Australian hardware. It was very similar to my own. No, I an really similar. There had obviously been so espionage going on, and soone had borrowed soone else’s design. No way this was coincidence.
I carefully extracted the replicant core from the palace. I set the autofactory to building a proper cradle, power supply, and extra mory. Once I was sure that I had Henry out and safe, I began breaking down the palace for material. I felt a little guilty, like I was stealing or sothing, but Henry really wasn’t using all this. And it saved ti.
Henry didn’t have the knowledge to put together VR, but I did. I could piggyback him on my system. And he might still be salvageable.
***
I stood for a mont behind Henry and breathed the brisk, salty air. The Contessa cut through the chop with a bounce and roll that I found alarming, but that Henry had reassured was normal. He had known his vessel down to the last bolt and screw when he was alive, so it had been simple to reconstruct in VR.
The South Pacific stretched out to the horizon in all directions. A steady wind to the northwest promised an easy, undemanding day of sailing. Or so the books all said. I was still figuring it out.
Henry turned from the wheel to face . “Hello, Linus. Co for another round of butting into my life?”
I grinned at him in response. Henry was lucid nowadays, but believed himself to be back on Earth. His mories of the years as a replicant still ca back to him as nightmares. I’d made his VR as realistic as possible, which included eating, sleeping, and, um, bodily functions.
“I had that dream again, Linus.” Henry shuddered a little. “The nightmare where I couldn’t feel myself. Where all around , things talked at and demanded my attention, wanting to build sothing. Where the world was just an endless scroll of night…”
I sat down. “But it’s getting weaker, right? Less intense?”
Henry nodded.
“Good. Now, tell about when the governnt ca to you to offer you the chance to be the space probe replicant…”
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