We Are Legion (We Are Bob)

Book 3: Chapter 53: Protection

Book 3: Chapter 53: Protection

Bill

August 2230

Gamma Pavonis

Claude gave me an unbelieving look. “Come on, Bill. Do you seriously think we’ll just leave?”

I sighed and rubbed my eyes with thumb and forefinger. VR or not, it still felt good.

I was visiting Claude’s VR, which was currently a beach scene, complete with gulls, sand, and deck chairs. I was impressed with the level of detail. The breeze felt cool and smelled salty, and the sand was warm on my bare feet. The overall effect was seductive. With an effort of will, I brought myself back on task.

“I’m not trying to order you to, Claude. It’s not like I have any authority. But you were at the moot. Neil is probably right, and the Others are probably heading for Earth. We need—”

“That’s a lot of probablys.”

“With a large downside if the statement turns out to be right.” Claude was beginning to get my goat, and I delivered this statement with a glare.

He must have picked up on it, because Claude held up his hands in a fending-off pose. “Hey, no offense, big guy, but there’s some significant downside here as well. Gamma Pavonis 3 is an ideal colonization target for humans, and the system is probably high on the list of targets for the Others. This isn’t clear-cut.”

“I know, Claude, and it would be a major downer if the Others harvested this system. But I don’t think you’re being entirely rational. Gamma Pavonis is a colonization candidate, but at the moment that’s all it is. There’s no one here. Other than you and the other Bobs, I mean. No one would die if the Others show up—no humans, no non-human intelligences. On the other hand, if they’re heading for Earth…”

“Got it, Bill, got it. But, assuming Neil is right, we’d get there just in time to join the fight, but not really in time to do anything in the way of preparations.”

I looked up and took a deep breath. We seemed to be circling the drain, again. After the loss at Delta Pavonis, Claude had returned to Gamma Pavonis, accompanied by a couple dozen surviving Bobs, and vowed to protect Gamma Pavonis at all costs. It was a noble goal, but in my opinion misguided. Thus this meeting, which so far wasn’t going well.

I dropped my gaze back to Claude and gave him my hardest glare. “The same could be said of staying here. If they show up tomorrow, you’ve got nothing.”

“Not quite nothing, Bill. We’ve been prepping since we got back here from Delta Pavonis. If the Others’ group that hit Delta unloads in GL 877, then turns right around and heads here, they still can’t get here in less than another decade. And we’re going heads-down-ass-up taking advantage of geometric progression to build a large enough defense force.”

“And for what? There’s no damned way that Will is going to send a colony ship here, not while the Others continue to be a threat right on your doorstep.”

“Which brings us to your plan to take the fight to the Others. And not to put too fine a point on it, but you aren’t doing anything to help us prepare for something like that. We talked about that at the moot as well.” Claude was glaring at me, now. We were definitely covering old territory. And we would reach the same conclusion.

“We can’t split our efforts, Claude. Right now, we’re not sure if we’ll be prepared when the Others show up, and that’s without sending some of our assets your way. If we can get you guys to Earth in time—”

“You’ll need more than numbers, Bill. Delta Pavonis taught us that. A million buster-sized pinholes in the death asteroids and cargo ships won’t take them down. You need nukes, you need—”

“—exactly the same stuff that you’re building for the defense of this planet. Look, Claude, we’ve been over this before. Hell, I just caught myself starting to recite my arguments in a sing-song tone. Talk about rehearsed! We’re splitting our resources and efforts by protecting a second beachhead. It’s as simple as that.”

We exchanged glares for a few milliseconds, but it was clear that nothing had changed and no one was going to concede anything. Stalemate. Again.

I nodded and stood up. “Okay, if anything changes—”

“—we’ll revisit things, of course.” Claude gave me a shrug. The closest I was going to get to a concession. I raised my hand in salute and popped out. ????B??

* * *

I hadn’t really expected to win Claude over this time, but the failure still rankled. I couldn’t take time out to pout, though. My next scheduled stop was in Delta Pavonis. We still had a lot of hardware in the system, in the form of drones. As far as I knew, all the Bobs had left by now, but we still needed to keep an eye on things.

I took over a drone that was parked in orbit around DP-4, and trained the optics on the planet below. I hadn’t yet decided if this habit was essential monitoring, or some form of penance. Either way, every time I looked at the planet, my guts twisted in knots. It had been thirteen years since the Others scoured the planet clean, and the normal cleansing effect of weather was starting to show. The planet didn’t look quite as gray; the polar caps, especially, were back to a brilliant white. The oceans were beginning to show more blue than gray as well.

Unfortunately, the land was all grays and browns, and that wouldn’t change. Jacques, every bit as stubborn as his clone-mate Claude, had refused to give up any of the samples he’d taken. He’d explained, reasonably enough, that the biosamples were intended for the Pav on HIP84051-2, and he wasn’t going to take a chance on his inventory. He did promise to take more samples, if and when everything was established on the new planet.

It wasn’t completely unreasonable. I snorted in amusement at the thought. Jacques wasn’t unreasonable, but his impatience with discussions could be irritating. More of that Bobbian variation between clones, apparently.

Well, whatever. It might take fifty or a hundred years, but eventually, I wanted to start rebuilding the Pav ecosystems. It would be great, someday, to offer the Pav their old world back. And the metals issue could be dealt with.

But Claude was right about one thing—none of this was practical as long as the Others continued to be a threat.