We Are Legion (We Are Bob)

Book 3: Chapter 58: Arrival

Book 3: Chapter 58: Arrival

Herschel

April 2257

Sol

I was jittery with excitement. In a few more minutes, we’d have decelerated enough to be able to VR-sync with stationary Bobs. We were never really out of touch, of course, but email was such a dry method of communications. No one used it for anything but reports and updates.

Finally, my latest ping gave a positive return. With a whoop, we threw our VRs open and sent a sync request to Riker.

25

“What?” I looked at Neil. “Are we in the dog house?”

He shrugged, plainly as perplexed as me. “I hope not. If I’m going to be in trouble, I want to have earned it.”

25

“Oh.” Well, that made more sense. There was a limit to how many people you could host in your ship VR. We must have just caught him at a bad time. I sat back, ordered a coffee, and tried to relax.

Finally, Riker popped into our VR. Usually, it would be the other way around, but today didn’t seem to be running per usual so far, so I didn’t comment.

“Hi guys. I’m glad to see you’re finally here.”

“What’s going on, Riker?”

“That, at least, isn’t a problem. We’ve been considering the transportation issue for a lot of years. We can move a million people at a time. Mind you, it makes a third-world airline feel like First Class, but if your life is at stake, you’ll put up with a chicken in your lap.”

Neil and I exchanged a glance. Things were getting scary.

“Will you guys be ready to load?”

“We’re all set up with our pods,” Neil replied. “We’ve prepped several bays for your pods. We prepared for a full fourteen million, so overkill, a bit.”

I shrugged at Will. “We’ve been considering issues for several years as well. I think we’re ready for whatever you throw at us.”

Will nodded. “Let’s hope we’re as ready for the Others.”

“How will you decide who to load?”

Will groaned audibly. “That is an issue that I admit I’ve been carefully avoiding thinking about. We’ll be abandoning almost half of the population of Earth to whatever fate the Others are able to dish out. No matter how you phrase it, this is going to be difficult.”

Neil stared at the ceiling for a moment. “Lottery?”

“That would be the most fair, I guess,” Will replied. “But I think we have to worry about efficiency. So biggest enclaves first, and move in an efficient path from one to the next. We can’t hop all over the planet just because of a random draw.”

“Wow.” This was mind-boggling, and not in a good way. “You’re going to make arbitrary decisions about who lives and who dies. How do you live with that?”

Will’s face took on a haunted look. “I don’t know, Herschel. I just don’t know.”