We Are Legion (We Are Bob)
Book 4: Chapter 20: Moving On

Bob

August 2334

Misty Falls

“We’ll need to look in your trunk, sir,” one of the cops said to me.

I stood frozen for a second, trying to decide if I should make a break for it. Theresa’s voice cut through the silence. “Why in particular would you need to see the contents of my trunk, officer?”

He turned to her, surprise on his face. “Your trunk?”

She gave him an arch look. “Do I look like I can carry that thing around on my own? I’ve paid him two coppers to porter for me. If you keep us too long, the captain will have to delay departure.”

“Oh, uh, and you are?”

“I am Theresa Sykorski, late of the University of Peachland.”

The cop stepped back, abashed, and I couldn’t blame him. This was the first I’d heard that Theresa had a family name. And a well-known one, apparently. That she hadn’t thrown it in Snidely’s face showed an amazing level of restraint.

But meanwhile, the cops were almost falling over themselves trying to placate her. She gave them a sniff and gestured imperiously for me to follow.

As we marched away, I muttered to her, “You could have left him some fur.”

She laughed and stopped. “Let that be my parting gift to you, Enoki. I hope I might someday learn more of your world. And of my world, for that matter. Goodbye.”

I said goodbye and headed quickly down the nearest street, trying not to choke up.

I had a whole six irons in pay from my time on the Hurricane. With the two still in my stomach, I was a wealthy man. Okay, not man, Quinlan. Okay, not wealthy either. I could survive for a few days if I had to pay for a hotel. Like it or not, I was going to have to get back on a boat quickly. But I couldn’t go back to the dock now. The cops would certainly remember me and the trunk. I could change my appearance, but not the trunk. Or could I?

I tried to remember where the shipping office was. I’d seen it out of the corner of my eye as we left the port area. Quickly I played back the video archive until I found it.

I headed back toward the dock, taking the long way around so that the shipping office would be between me and the cops, assuming they were still maintaining watch. On the way, I gradually changed my appearance, using features from random pedestrians to produce a mash-up that shouldn’t resemble any one individual. I just hoped I was getting it right; I couldn’t take out my spider to get a selfie. If people screamed and turned away, I’d have to start over.

As hoped, the shipping office sold shipping containers. At one iron apiece, they weren’t expensive, or high quality. But the idea wasn’t high security; it was to hide the contents. A row of eyelets around the lid allowed the user to essentially tie it shut as with a shoelace. It was good enough.

The clerk wanted to sell me postage as well, but I initially demurred since I would be travelling with the package. Still, it was probably better to do things the normal way. Finally, I paid the three irons, then filled in the tag with just my name and “Garack’s Spine.” But I insisted that I would deliver the box to an appropriate boat. “Knock yourself out,” he said, holding up his hands in mock surrender.

I headed back to the dock, shipping container held awkwardly in both hands, and stopped at the dockmaster’s office. “Good day, sir,” I said to the person at the counter. “Could you tell me if any ships heading downriver are looking for deckhands?”

The counter guy glanced at the container in my hands with a frown. “Uh, deckhands? Or postal run?”

“Both. I have a package that I have to send downriver as well. Killing two fish with one spear. Doesn’t have to be the same boat.”

He nodded, satisfied, and gave me a couple of names. Explanation notwithstanding, I wasn’t going to put Bender on a different vessel. I had to hope the boat looking for help would also take an extra shipping container. ℝ𝓪₦ÓΒΕṡ

I thanked him and headed for the indicated berth.

The Clipper was somewhat less barge-like than the Hurricane had been. It even had a below-deck area fit for habitation, if you didn’t mind crouching a little. It also appeared to be in a state of chaos. People were running around while the captain screamed orders with the same volume and enthusiasm as Lisa’s best work. I watched for about five seconds, simply absorbing the frenetic energy.

I waved at one of the deckhands, and he slowed down to acknowledge me but didn’t come to a complete stop. Definitely stressed. I walked along with him. “I was told you need a deckhand?”

“Ya think? What’s the box?”

“A parcel. I’ve paid postage—”

“Whatever. Put it with the postage items on deck. Standard pay. See that pile of crates? Goes over there. Get to work.”

I was left opening and closing my mouth for a moment, wondering when I’d get to present my sales pitch. Reluctantly accepting victory, I placed my box in the postal pile, then jumped to work, grabbing boxes and lugging them up the gangplank. They were heavy, and there were a lot of them, but the manny was more than up to the task. I had to dive into the water twice to cool off, but everyone else was doing the same, as usual.

In short order, I had the pallet moved. “Next?” I said to the same deckhand, who turned out to be the foreman. With a pleased expression, he pointed to another pile of boxes.

About two hours later, it began to look like we were catching up. I did a quick cooling dunk, then joined the other deckhands. The foreman slapped me on the shoulder. “Good work. I hope you can keep up that level of energy. It looks like we’re going to be shorthanded.”

“Why’s that?” I asked.

“Cops came by and arrested two of our crew for no reason I could see. Took their personal effects too. It’s supposed to be just for one night, but we can’t wait. We have performance clauses on this shipment, so we’re leaving by dusk if the captain has to row the boat himself.”

“Which explains why he seemed excited,” I replied.

Foreman-guy laughed. “Yeah. Excited. That’s what we call it. He used some threats I’ve never heard before. I think he was saving them for today.”

I grinned. “I’m Sam G—” Oops. I almost gave myself a last name again. Nope, didn’t need the notoriety.

My faux pas didn’t register, though, or maybe the translation software hadn’t passed it on. The foreman, whose name was Ralph, introduced the team, just as the captain started up with another tirade.

“Time to cast off, people,” Ralph said, rolling his eyes in the captain’s direction. We got back to work, aided by more of the captain’s helpful suggestions. I did notice that those suggestions tended to be anatomically related. This guy ran a theme, I guess.

The duties on the Clipper were generally the same as on the Hurricane, with a few extra tweaks since it was a bigger boat and a full-on catamaran design. We moved a few items belowdecks on Ralph’s orders and checked the sails once more, and we were done until the next time the captain’s head exploded.

I’d almost tripped, on several occasions, over a quartet of Quinlans who had parked their butts in the middle of the deck. A few choice words from Ralph and they found a more out-of-the-way location. Now that I had the time to actually look at them, I realized they were probably a sabbat. It was odd that they’d be paying for passage when we weren’t going through a connector or segment boundary, where the turbulence could get uncomfortable and tiring to fight.

“Hi, all,” I said, holding up a hand. “I’m Sam. Lately out of a sabbat myself. We just went our own ways a couple of weeks ago.”

“Hello, Sam,” replied one of the group. “I’m Tina, and these are Fred, Tony, and Barb. We’re looking to homestead. We’ll be jumping as soon as we see a good spot.”

“Starting your own town?”

“Nothing so ambitious. We want to get away from towns altogether. Don’t need them. The fishing is good, this isn’t one of the cold segments, and a nest is easier to make and maintain. And we won’t have to worry about the juniors getting into trouble.”

“So you’re going back to the wild?”

“Pretty much. Don’t need the rest of it—counting irons to see if you’re ahead, you know?”

“Yeah,” I replied. “I do, kind of. You aren’t the first group I’ve run into that’s doing this, either.”

She smiled in reply, and I glanced at the other three. None of them seemed inclined to chime in. It was unsettling. This was an intelligent species devolving almost right in front of my eyes.

Tina and I talked about inconsequential things for a bit, until Tony suddenly declared, “Food time,” and slipped over the edge of the boat. The others joined him, Tina giving me an apologetic shrug before leaving.

I settled myself on the deck to get a bit of sun, following the sailor’s tradition of resting whenever possible. A couple of the other deckhands joined me after glancing at the captain, who was ignoring us for the moment.

A few minutes later, the members of the sabbatpooted onto the deck and settled down with their catch. It was a comfortable, drowsy, idyllic interlude—something I hadn’t gotten anywhere near enough of since the Starfleet issue started. If I’d still been bio, I’d have drifted off to sleep. Some of my co-workers seemed to be doing exactly that.

Tina had mentioned cold segments. That was interesting. “Tina, have you ever been in a cold segment?”

“No, but my da lived in one for a while. It snowed sometimes, and there was ice on some of the streams. I’ve never seen snow or ice. Hard water, right? Weird. Different fish, too, and some other plants and animals that are different.”

She thought for a moment. “Da used to tell stories of segments that had other oddities as well. There was supposed to be one that was mostly water, with only islands sticking up here and there. Another one was dry, and the river actually disappeared under the land. I don’t know how much to believe and how much was Da trying to scare us when we were juniors.”

“I don’t think your da was making it up,” Ralph volunteered. “I’ve heard of segments with different climates. They always have different plant and animal life. Whether the plants and animals came first, or the different climate came first, I don’t know.”

I started to wish I’d paid more attention to Bridget’s conversations with Quinlans and the theories she’d discussed. This had the feel of a discussion of evolution based on the mistaken idea that Heaven’s River was a natural environment. And deism was replacing history in regard to the Administrator. Top that off with the back-to-nature movement and a possible loss of sapience, and the Quinlans were in peril of ceasing to exist as an intelligent species possibly within as little as a few more generations. Was it time for the Bawbe to get involved? Did I dare start stirring the pot again?

And was it a good idea while I was still in-country and vulnerable? I could just blow up the manny and return to virt if I got in trouble, but Bender didn’t have that option.

I’d finally managed to get everyone together for a meeting. Hugh was parked in Will’s beanbag chair, but the rest of the expedition members were present in floating video windows. I’d just finished describing the latest conversation with fellow deckhands and passengers.

“I think you’re correct, Bob. It’s going that way, although maybe not as quickly as you fear.” Bridget crossed her arms, a distinctly worried expression on her face, which clashed with her mildly reassuring phrasing.

“I don’t know if it matters,” Hugh replied. “How long it’ll take, I mean. The takeaway is that it will happen if nothing changes. I don’t think we can refuse to deal with this.”

I gazed at him, head cocked. I still hadn’t had a chance to bring up the whole question of the Administrator’s true status—and Hugh’s true motivations. How would he play this?

“And how would you suggest we do that?” Will asked.

“Contact the Administrator. Talk to them. They may not realize what’s happening.”

“Maybe once Bender is safe,” I said. “Not until. That’s not negotiable. And anyway, what makes you think they don’t know?”

Hugh’s brows knit together as he glanced at me. “Seriously? You think they’d want that?”

“Depends on what the Administrator’s motivations are. Maybe they’d consider a non-sentient but living Quinlan race better than a sentient but always-on-the-edge-of-extinction version. Like a perverse instantiation, you know?”

Now Hugh was all but glaring at me, his eyes narrowed. At that moment, I think we understood each other. I might have just blown any element of surprise, but on the other hand, it might force a reaction of some kind. It seemed a worthwhile trade-off.

“Certainly there’s no reason not to try,” Bill spoke into the silence. “Once Bender is safe, as you say. We can just start broadcasting radio from all our drones. Or send in a spider to dance in front of a camera. Either they’ll investigate and open a dialog, or they’ll blow up our devices. We’ll know better once they’ve set the tone.”

“And what if they do blow up our roamer? Or whatever device,” Bridget said, her voice tense. “Do we just walk away? Do we just let an entire intelligent species go? Can we ethically do that?”

“Starfleet would.”

I glared at Garfield. “They’re not really a moral standard to hold up, right now, Gar.”

“Uh, I meant Star Trek’s Starfleet. Not the current crop of idiots we’re dealing with.”

“Oh.” I nodded. “True. But even then, Original Bob always thought that was a bunch of dreck.”

“Focus, please,” Bridget cut in. “This isn’t a comicon. We’re discussing the fate of an actual intelligent species.”

Bill smirked at her. “Okay, look. We won’t invade or anything, but we won’t just go away either. We’ll keep poking until we can get a statement from the Administrator. If they tell us they have everything under control and we should go away, do we really have a right to butt in?”

I rubbed the bridge of my nose and sighed loudly. “It always comes down to this, doesn’t it? Edge cases. Gray areas. I agree with Bill, at least on the basics. We can’t decide now, and we can’t decide until we contact the Administrator.” I glared at Hugh. “Which we won’t do until Bender is out of danger.”

I reentered my manny on the Clipper just as the crew was starting to stir for the morning shift. Ralph assigned a deckhand named Gil and me to gathering breakfast, and I happily dove into the water with a small net. There was never a lack of any of the Quinlans’ several favorite prey species. Careful balancing of the ecosystem by the Administrator? Or just a case of too few predators?

I mused over the question as I gathered breakfast. I pooted onto the deck just seconds before Gil, but I noticed that his bag was fuller. Most likely he intended to eat the overage; Gil was known for his appetite.

The captain grabbed a few fish for himself, then the rest of us sat around the fish bowl. I ate the minimum that I could get away with without arousing suspicion, interspersing my meal with a lot of conversation. Tina and her friends were more than willing to talk about their views on the world—well, Tina mostly. The others nodded a lot.

During a lull in the conversation, Ralph looked up and said, “Well, that’s weird.” I followed his pointing finger to see a small bird-equivalent perched on top of a pallet of crates. “That’s a firl. They’re forest birds. What’s it doing out here on the river?”

“Lost?” I ventured.

Ralph shook his head. “I don’t—” At that moment, the bird, seemingly embarrassed by all the attention, flew off. He shook his head again, and conversation drifted to other topics.

I would have dismissed the matter as inconsequential except that I’d seen that species of bird around on the boat a couple of times. I’d just assumed it was looking for food scraps. But Ralph’s bemusement had me paranoid. I scraped a few bits of fish from my current helping and set them aside.

When we were done with breakfast, and the captain had started ramping up his morning delivery of abuse, I took a moment and placed the food scraps on top of the crate where the bird had perched.

Life on a Quinlan boat was very much a panic and boredom thing. When in port, we worked until we dropped, whereas while en route, tasks tended to be routine and easy, if somewhat dull. This left me multiple opportunities to keep my eye on the food offering. The firl buzzed the boat twice more but showed no interest in the scraps. A couple of ackrels, though, descended on it with cries of noisy delight.

So maybe firl were herbivores? I might be overgeneralizing from Terran examples, but birds tended to be opportunistic feeders. Even hummingbirds ate insects when available.

I sighed silently and grabbed the net to retrieve the afternoon meal. I felt a little silly, getting bent out of shape over a bird. Ralph had been convincing, but still …

Mealtime conversations were always freewheeling but hadn’t been nearly as interesting since Theresa and I had parted ways. I often found my mind drifting while the others argued the fine points of Quinlan life. Bridget would probably be very interested, and in fact might be replaying the sessions as fast as they could be transferred across the SCUT connection. I snapped back to attention, though, when Gil said, “Hey, Sam, your pet is back.”

Sure enough, a firl was hopping around on the pile of crates. I scraped off a bit of fish and tossed it in the right direction. The firl froze for a moment, then went back to hopping around, completely ignoring the offering.

In fact, it appeared to be … reading labels? That couldn’t be right. I turned back to my companions but kept one eye on the animal. It eventually left the pallet and flew over to another stack and repeated the performance. And the more I watched it, the more convinced I became that it was looking at the shipping information on the crates.

I contacted Hugh on the intercom. “Hey, Hugh?”

“What’s up, Bob?”

“Do we know if the Administrator’s technology level is advanced enough to include small drone-like units?”

“Unlikely. No SURGE drive.”

“What about something that emulates a bird?”

“Uh … ornithopter kind of thing? Yeah, I don’t see why not. The Boojums were masterpieces of miniaturization. You said so yourself.”

“Yeah. Uh, you’re on a boat, right? Have you seen any small birds hanging around?”

“Lots of ackrels. Rats with wings, they are. But nothing else.”

“Let me know if you spot any firls, okay?”

“Will do.”

Hugh sounded a little puzzled as he signed off, although whether that was because of the request or the fact that I hadn’t confronted him on the AI issue was anyone’s guess.

Meanwhile, the firl had finished investigating a third stack and was back to the miscellaneous pile, which included my crate. Paranoia was no longer a valid explanation.

As soon as we settled down for the night, I went back to virt and called Bill. He showed up in a video window right away. “What’s up, Bob?”

I explained about the firl’s behavior, then asked him about Quinlan drones.

“I agree with Hugh about the lack of SURGE being a limiting factor. But there’s no reason why the Administrator couldn’t have security devices that mimic birds. Even in Original Bob’s day, they had mechanical devices that could emulate bird flight. And the Administrator has had generations to work on it, and no real alternative.”

“But why the Clipper? I’ve been careful to avoid any connection with previous me. The backpack’s put away, Bender’s not visible, I look different. What could have tipped it off?”

“You don’t know that it has been tipped off, Bob. Think of how the CDC would track down disease spread. Lots of detective work, mapping of contacts, logical extrapolation, and so on. They can’t find Bob with a bulky backpack anywhere, so it’s logical to assume you’ve either gone into hiding or found a different way to get around. They know where you left the infrastructure, because they have a failed use of Natasha’s card. From there, it’s just a case of working outward. And given Quinlan limitations and the geography of Heaven’s River, they can concentrate mostly on east and west.”

I nodded, thinking it through. “And river travel is the obvious method. No doubt they’re watching for Quinlans swimming in a directed manner as well. They can’t know for sure that I won’t risk submerging Bender.”

“Which is probably splitting their efforts,” Bill replied. “Good for us. But shipping the matrix is an obvious ploy if you think of it. They could board and inspect every crate of every ship in two segments, but I imagine they simply don’t have the personnel for that.”

“So maybe they’ll be looking for anything even the slightest bit odd, like the lack of detail on my shipping label. And maybe the shipping guy remembered me wanting to travel with my crate.”

“Uh-huh. They’ll be watching for anything even a little off. Even if it doesn’t pan out, it applies pressure.”

“Yeah, you’re right. And they’ll keep adding tactics for as long as they aren’t successful.” I shook my head at Bill and sighed deeply. “Looks like I’m right back in the fertilizer.”

We coasted up to the dock in the town of Six Hills. No one knew why it was called Six Hills. You could only get four hills from the surrounding territory, and only that if you were generous with the interpretation of the word “hill.” By this point, though, I just rolled my eyes at Quinlan naming conventions. Maybe there was a subtle sort of irony involved, like naming a large man “Tiny.” If so, I hadn’t caught on yet.

There were cops waiting on the dock as we pulled up, which was perplexing to everyone except me. As soon as the gangplank was down, the gendarmeriemarched up, straight to the postal pile, and grabbed the crate with just my name on the label. Which wasn’t actually my crate, as I’d swapped labels with another crate the night before. And rearranged the stack, just in case their instructions were very specific. I felt a bit bad that someone in Little Creek wasn’t going to get their shipment, but there wasn’t much in the way of alternatives.

The cop read the label, then said loudly, “Which of you is Sam?”

I raised my hand and stepped forward.

“You’re going to have to come with us.”

I feigned surprise and displeasure. My acting was reinforced by the very real surprise and displeasure expressed by the captain and crew. I was a hard worker and therefore popular.

“Sorry, folks, but we need to have a talk with this person at the station. I’m sure you’ll be able to find a new crew member quickly.”

Uh-oh. I’d been expecting something like the scenario with Snidely—open the box, nothing there, sorry to bother you, et cetera. “Excuse me,” I said. “How long exactly is this interview supposed to take?”

“Could be a couple of days, Sam. The officials will be coming in from another city.”

“But …” Oh, this was ungood. If it had just been overnight, worst case, the captain probably would have waited. We didn’t have a deadline for anything that was on board at the moment, and the cargo we were contracted to pick up was all nonperishable. But the captain wouldn’t wait days, especially some unknown number of days. Time was money for a riverboat.

The captain came over to me. “I’ll be sorry to see the last of you, Sam. You’re an exceptionally good worker. And not much of a complainer. Here’s what I owe you to this point.” He handed me some coins, which I pocketed. The subtext was crystal clear—the Clipper would be leaving as soon as they got their cargo squared away.

The cop was polite, and waited until I’d said my goodbyes and grabbed my backpack, then led me off the dock and into town. Behind us, another cop carried the shipping crate. “What’s going on? What are you looking for?” I asked.

He gazed at me for a moment, maybe trying to decide how much to tell me. “I don’t have much of anything for you, Sam. We were given the name of the boat, the name on the label to look for, and orders to take both you and the box to the station, pending a visit. I don’t even know who is coming”—he leaned in close—“but the scuttlebutt is that it’s Crew.”

“Crew? Aren’t they a myth?”

The cop smiled at my apparent naivety. “I know a lot of people think that, Sam, but law enforcement has to work with them occasionally. We know they’re real. Some of them have weapons”—he mimed holding a gun and firing it—“that can put you to sleep from a distance. I’ve seen them.”

Oh boy. So I was to be held for some number of days until Crew could come and examine me. This was well past ungood, heading for double-plus.