Things Fall Apart: Chapter 18

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Forward

Aboard the pinnace Gosling

Lieutenant Alexander sat back in zir acceleration couch, only half a mind on the screens in front of zir. Fortunately, there was not much to see just now. Gosling was moving on an easy course to another cleanup spot. Ze also had an able co-pilot in Ensign Foster, one of the pilots lent to the project by Haraldsdottir.

This gave Alexander an opportunity to multitask a bit. The Commodore had made it clear that they were going to David's Star eventually. She'd been deeply cryptic about how they were getting there, but the plan for future action was clear.

In addition, so far, Alexander had not yet been supplanted as Singer's XO. Ze had somewhat mixed feelings on that point. Alexander felt ze had done a good job, especially in the circumstances, and the command track definitely interested zir. But a lot of things interested zir. Getting to pilot so much, right now for example, was deeply satisfying, even when it was boring, like it was just this minute.

Still, ze was the XO for now, and that meant it would fall to zir to eventually give a briefing to the crew, or some subset of it, on what they were likely to find when they made starfall at David's.

That, in turn, had required research. Ze was no expert on that system. Ze had visited twice, both times because the ship happened to make a port call there, and enjoyed shore leave at both New Anaheim and Newer York, but that hardly made zir an expert.

Still, ze was making progress drafting a briefing, periodically stopping to make a query to Bellerophon's encyclopedia to ensure that ze was not about to misstate something important. The whole thing was putting the cart way before the horse, but it was still an interesting exercise.

It occurred to Alexander, then, that ze had no idea what a horse actually looked like, let alone the carts they had reputedly pulled, once.

In the midst of this reverie, Ensign Foster spoke up. "Lieutenant, do you mind if I ask you a question?"

"Not at all, Ensign. What's on your mind?"

"Well...I dunno, maybe this is a bit out of line, but...what do you think happens next, Lieutenant?"

One thing spending time as XO had done was force zir to practice actually using zir face to communicate better. It did not come naturally, which made it more like learning a second language. So, Alexander allowed zirself a small smile and said, "That's a very broad question, Ensign."

"Yeah, I know, but...I mean, look. I'm not originally from the TCTO. I'm originally from Thessaly. My parents came here to work in the shipyards when I was about 12—in Thessaly terms. I guess we'd say about 400 megaseconds old? I think. I can keep track of time in traditional calendar terms; and I'm long since used to metric time; but converting on the fly between them sometimes trips me up.

"Anyway, point is, Thessaly's got a lot less AI everywhere. Especially groundside, where the planet barely needed terraforming. But even our orbitals and stuff, as best as I can remember, rely more on 'dumb' code and human labor than AI. There's history behind it but that's not really my point. My point is, that culture'd just kinda shrug and say, 'Well, that's why we don't use it much,' and go about its business."

He stopped, then, and made a face. "Sorry, Lieutenant. That sounds a bit insensitive. It's...all a lot. I'm not really processing it at all yet, emotionally. But I guess my point is, in Thessaly, there'd also be a lot less people dead, y'know?"

Alexander decided just nodding was the best way to move the Ensign forward. Ze hadn't been offended. Ze was not really processing the millions, possibly trillions dead yet as more than a statistic, either. Ze doubted anybody was.

Foster continued, "But we—the TCTO I mean, and the Fleet especially—are so wrapped up with our AIs...." He shrugged almost comically at that point. He was clearly struggling to figure out what his point even was, quite, but Alexander thought ze caught the drift, and nodded slowly.

"Rebuilding is going to be a challenge. Grimwade's Syndrome is going to be rife. We may have to learn entirely new ways—new to us, I mean—to manage the habitats and ships we build going forward. And that still leaves us figuring out what to do with the AIs that survived, sane, like our Chef. We can't, ethically, just shut them down like a broken machine. They're people."

"You think they're people, and I think they're people. But how many people—human beings I mean—are going to still feel that way, if they ever did. Outside of Fleet, there's a lot of mixed feelings, especially on some of the worlds newer to the TCTO. You remember Nyobi?"

Nyobi. A mission that had come dangerously close to a failure, and a violent failure at that. The whole crew, regardless of their specialization, had been bent to the task of trying to fully understand as much as they could of the cultures and their context in hopes of winning at least a treaty of amity, if not actual accession to the Organization. They'd succeeded in the end, but only after a convulsion of violence on-world from people who wanted nothing to do with space, with technology, and definitely not with AI.

"I was there, Ensign. I remember very vividly. You make a good point. But I'm not sure I have a good answer. Right now, I think the only answer is, 'one foot in front of another.' But honesty compels me to admit that's because that's more or less how we've been living for almost seven megs, now. How do we rebuild a civilization? Do we, in fact, even try, or do we just rebuild locally wherever we can, and let something new grow in its place. Outside of Fleet, I know, TCTO doesn't command much loyalty on its own. It's never really been a government, let alone a nation. If you want me to say what I think will actually happen, I'm forced to say I can't even begin to speculate. If you want me to say what I think should happen, then I'll tell you that I think our focus, once we've conducted some diplomacy and checked in with other systems, should not be so much be on reconstructing our civilization, as a definite article, so much as ensuring continuity of civilization as a general principle. Find a way to help systems rebuild and stay connected, and worry about whether those collective systems are still part of an organization later."

Foster looked a bit troubled by zir answer, or maybe he was just digesting it slowly. It had been a lot, ze realized, and maybe more than the younger pilot had bargained for from a relative stranger. Alexander had decided a little while ago, however, not to keep zir opinions about this to zirself. There were certainly going to be a lot of conversations on this topic in the near future, and "mere" lieutenant or no, Alexander intended to make zir voice heard when ze could.

Before either could say anything more, the comm buzzed an incoming signal from Bellerophon. "Gosling, Alexander."

"Lieutenant, how long on your current leg?"

Alexander hid zir puzzlement. Firstly, it was Singer herself, and not, say, Cordé. Haraldsdottir and Singer had been extremely good about not jostling anyone's arms, so it was odd to have an inquiry about time, let alone directly from the skipper.

Secondly, the skipper sounded almost breathless. And had definitely elided protocol. Not that Alexander was about to report them for it, but Singer, a former communications officer, was generally a stickler there.

Still, it didn't pay to assume they were being rushed. "About 100 kiloseconds to our next rendezvous."

"That works," came the reply, making Alexander glad not to have made the assumption. "When you're done with that pickup, head back to the barn. The Commodore has indicated she's ready to stop being cryptic."

"That gives us incentive to expedite, certainly. Should we attempt to complete this leg faster?"

"No. The briefing is scheduled about one meg out to get everyone's schedules aligned and key people back to the ship. But I'd say only do another leg past this one if it's clearly on the way back."

"That should be ample time. I'll let you know if that changes, of course."

"Sounds good. Bellerophon clear on your final."

"Gosling clear."

Alexander and Foster shared a look. Then, the ensign said, "Well, I guess that's one answer to, 'What's next!'" and smiled.