All These Worlds (Bobiverse, #3)

by Dennis E. Taylor

Bridget put down the pitiful remains of her burger and leaned forward. She looked me straight in the eyes, my cue to shut up and pay attention. “Howard, my relationships are my business. No one else gets a vote. I loved Stéphane, and I’ve mourned him fully and properly. Now, I enjoy your company. And will continue to do so, despite a bitch of a daughter and some zit-faced mouthy mall-rat. Do you have something you’d like to add?” “No, dear.” I grinned at her, and she rolled her eyes.

“Well, you have a few more years until his group gets to Gamma. Maybe come up with a sales pitch.” I sighed. If there was a hell, it was in sales.

“Uncle Will,” he said, blushing slightly. “You, uh, you look younger on the phone.” I smiled. “Stage lighting.” I wasn’t about to try to explain Howard and Bridget. Assuming he didn’t already know about them.

Well, I was procrastinating, and I knew it. I took a deep breath and walked slowly up to the bed. I remembered the first time I’d seen Julia Hendricks, on a video call with Minister Cranston. I remembered the stomach-dropping shock as I looked at an almost perfect likeness of my sister, Julia’s several-times-great-grandmother. She still looked like Andrea, like Andrea would have looked had I been alive to see her as a grandmother. I reached down, put my hand against Julia’s cheek. The first time I’d ever touched her. Well, it seems Howard finally installed tear ducts. Damn. I wiped my eyes, then turned to Justin. Tears were running freely down his face.

Justin shook his head. “Uncle Will, don’t take this personally, but I don’t think very many people will ever choose replication. It was an experiment designed in a darker, more authoritarian time, when people were seen as just replaceable cogs.” He smiled sadly at me. “And the amount of work you and the other Bobs have put in—well, it looks to the average person like permanent servitude. Who wants to spend their whole afterlife doing chores?” “Ah, that explains a lot.” I nodded in thought. “Once Howard resurrected the technology, we were kind of expecting an onslaught of requests. We’ve gotten zip.” “I think you are probably the end of the experiment.” I said nothing, just looked down at Julia. Maybe just as well.

Howard laughed. “Screw ’em. I’m happier than I’ve been since, hmm, since before Jenny, actually.” “Jenny’s long dead, Howard. Eventually, Bridget will be as well.” I shrugged apologetically at Howard’s sharp look. “Sorry, I think the funeral has me a little down. Just a year after we lost the colonel. Ephemerals, indeed.” “Yeah…” Howard reached over and gave Spike a quick pat. “Immortality sure isn’t all upside.”

“I will be dipped in shit.” Yoshi’s mouth hung open. He turned toward me, eyes goggling. “Okay, I’m impressed. How’s it work? Not like the flyers…” “No, of course not. No turbo-props. Or helium, ironically. Helium, the city, uses a series of SURGE coils.” “But that can’t be right. Gravity is always nullified in a SURGE field. This isn’t supposed to be a free-fall city, is it?”

al fresco.”

fait accompli.”

“Jotunheim? It sounds like someone sneezing.” He shook his head. “Unacceptable. We prefer Takama-ga-hara.” I quickly referenced my libraries. It took less than five milliseconds to find the definition. “The dwelling place of the Kami. Nice. And perhaps appropriate. However, westerners will shorten it to Takama. Just sayin’.” He grinned. “An acceptable risk.” “Okay, done.” I returned the smile. “Jack will be pissed. His theme is kaput.”

“Fine,” I replied. “Almost done. 864 cargo bays. That number mean anything to you?” There was a moment of silence before Neil replied, “It’s 600 base 12. And, come to think of it, the Others image that Bill retrieved had six feeding fingers on each side of its maw.” I grinned. “Coincidence? I think not.”

“So why’s he doing what he’s doing?” “Two-pronged strategy. Attempt to gather as many printers as he can, while denying them to us. Geometric progression means a small advantage up front can turn into an insurmountable lead, eventually.”

Casimir Effect.

“Tell the city defenders not to shoot down the surviving ships,” I said to Gina. “They might lead us back to the leadership.” Gina nodded, and we settled back onto the grass. It was an odd juxtaposition—revolutionary leaders, in the middle of a shooting war, directing operations while lounging on a manicured lawn.

Will grinned back at me. “Holy crap on a cracker. Fifteen hundred ships or fifteen hundred trips. Or one gigantic cargo carrier!”

Fred stepped forward, grinning his usual smug, nasty grin. “Hello, Robert. Robert’s lackies. I suggest you accept the inevitable. Your friend is going to be—” Fred looked down at the arrow protruding from his chest. With a surprised expression, he fell to his knees, then collapsed sideways to the ground. I turned to look at Buster. “Dibs,” he said with a shrug.

walked to the elevators at the end of the bay and got in with a half dozen random strangers. Interestingly, two hundred years later and twenty light years away, people still behaved the same in elevators as they did in Original Bob’s day. Everyone turned to face the doors, and ignored each other.

nodded an acknowledgement. I could have been offended, but I’d rather have the question asked and answered. “Representative Hubert, it is a good question, and well worth asking. And the answer is that I spend a considerable portion of my time considering all the alternatives. The problem is that, no matter what course you navigate, there is always a bottleneck. Whether it’s lack of printers to build everything, or lack of sufficient material, or lack of drones and roamers to assemble the parts into the end product—it’s always something. Shift your schedule and you simply shift the nature of the bottleneck. Printers, for instance, are the most complex thing that a printer can make, except for something biological. They take forever, and have a high defect rate because of the precision required. So it’s not as simple as just making more printers to enjoy the benefits of exponential growth. You give up considerable manufacturing opportunity while engaged in that particular task.”

Pascal’s Wager

Justin was silent for a few moments as he looked around the room. “Y’know, Uncle whippersnapper, a lot of the younger ones probably don’t even recognize you. You’ve made fewer and fewer appearances over the years. Is that on purpose, or just the Others thing?” And there it was. The thing I’d been avoiding. But I owed it to Justin to not evade. “It’s a bit of both. I think it was your mother’s death that really got to me. People die. And I remember each and every one, as clear as the day it happened. Over time, that’s more and more unhappy memories to deal with. I think I’m trying to move toward thinking of my relatives more as a group and less as individuals.” I gave him a small smile to soften the message. “It distances me a little—well, a lot—but on balance I think it works out better.” “So I’m the last one of our clan that you’ve been keeping in touch with?” “Yeah. Bob-1 calls it ‘fading into legend’.” “Well, I’m glad to have known you, Uncle Will. And it’s nice to know I’ll be remembered.” I snorted. “Look around. I don’t think that’s an issue.” We spoke for a few more minutes, then I excused myself and gave up my chair. Someone immediately sat down for their turn with the clan patriarch. I raised my hand in a parting wave, and Justin smiled at me before turning to answer a question. Family.

We watched this panorama, totally entranced, until we were startled by a thump, accompanied by a slight shaking. I looked around in surprise. About two thirds of the way up the dome, a blimp had attached itself to the city. It appeared determined to hold on, and… “Uh, it’s…” I pointed, at a loss for words. “I’d say it’s definitely a he,” Bridget replied, chortling. “So he’s... It looks like he…um…” “He likes us.” Bridget bent over and began to laugh, full belly laughs, arms wrapped around herself. “Not a single one of my engineering courses covered this,” I said. Bridget fell over onto the grass. Up above, the blimp continued to prove its love.

It forced me to think about my future here, though. I’d been part of the tribe for almost twenty years now, and I had lots of friends beside Archimedes. I could continue to live here, occasionally modifying the android to simulate aging. Hell, I could even come back as someone else in a few years. The question was whether I wanted to do so. Was there a point? Or should I just go with my original plan and fade away? I sat down close to Archimedes, and he smiled weakly at me. “I may be joining Diana soon, Bawbe.” “Hey, ixnay on the awbe-bay.” I wasn’t sure how the translation routine would handle Pig Latin, but Archimedes chuckled. “Sorry, Robert.” He paused to breathe for a few moments. Even that seemed to be more effort. “It’s been great having you around for all these years. It’s been a most interesting, and a very good life. But I think I’m done.” I put my hand on his arm. “Hang in there, buddy. There’s so much more to see.” Belinda came over with a wooden bowl filled with stew. We made sure Archimedes was sitting comfortably and she placed it before him. Archimedes ate slowly, methodically, more as a chore that needed to be done than out of any sense of enjoyment. At that moment, I truly realized that he was just waiting to die. An overwhelming wave of sadness almost incapacitated me. I had to take deep breaths to keep from having a panic attack. Which, when I thought about it, was pretty silly. Computer, remember? But however I parsed it, my friend was dying.

“Hersch, this one’s going to hit.” “The Earth?” “Cuba.” “Cuba? But they’re—” Neil nodded. “Still there. We aren’t scheduled to pick them up for another hour.” “How long?” “Twenty-eight seconds, now.” I stared at Neil for a couple of milliseconds. A hundred and fifty thousand people currently made Cuba their home. There was no chance to do anything at all, not in that amount of time. “So they’re…” “As good as dead.” I didn’t know anyone there, of course. I’d only been in the system for a day or so. But Riker, that is, Will would. I hoped he hadn’t done the calculations. Thirty seconds was an eternity to us. Thirty seconds of thinking about people you know, now alive but soon dead… Neil was looking down at his board, his eyes squeezed shut. “I’ll tell him, buddy. Afterward.” Neil looked up at me and nodded. He swallowed several times and got back to work. The silence hung heavy in the room for the rest of the minute.

As hard as this was for us, it was infinitely worse for them. They’d been living under a potential death sentence all their lives, but it had been a diffuse, indeterminate and impersonal kind of threat. Now, the threat loomed over them, personal and immediate, potentially to be carried out at any moment. I picked up a video feed from a random roamer. People had generally managed to wedge themselves into the netting that we’d provided. It probably gave some feeling of up and down in the weightless environment. The refugees nearest to the camera all had their eyes closed. Huddled, some with their arms wrapped around each other, they seemed to be trying to merely endure. In some unknown time, they’d either be offloaded, or they’d be suddenly dead. Not much to look forward to.

Doppler effect

He hadn’t woken up yet. I tried to let Archimedes sleep as long as possible, to keep up his strength. I reached over to nudge him, and… Nothing. No breathing sounds. No pulse. I could hear a low whining sound. It took me a second to realize it was coming from me. A hand on my shoulder. Belinda. “Robert? Robert? You have to move.” I looked up to see Buster gazing down at me, sadness on his face. I realized I was in the way. I got up, walked stiff-legged to the other end of the tent, lay down and curled into a ball.

The funeral for Archimedes was huge. It was not just his family; almost every living Deltan had been affected by him, one way or another. By the time the procession was over, Archimedes was covered in white flowers. When the family moved in to fill in the grave, I asked them if I could have some time. Everyone looked at Buster, who nodded. Archimedes and I had been inseparable for twenty Earth years—about eighteen years on Eden. It was a reasonable request.

When we were done, Buster said, “You can have his things, if you want. You’ve been his best friend for years.” I responded with a brief smile, about all I could manage. “Thanks, Buster, but I think I’ll be going. Archimedes was all that was holding me here.” Buster gazed at me in a perplexed silence for a few moments. Then he said, diffidently, “Robert? You’re the Bawbe, aren’t you?” “Yes, Buster, I am.” I shrugged. “And with Archimedes gone, well…” “Will we be okay?” I nodded. “Yes, you will. You’ve gotten control of your environment, now. You’ll show the world who’s boss. And in some huge number of hands of years, your children’s children’s children will come find me and mine.” I stood. “Goodbye, Buster. Belinda. Live long and prosper.” And without looking back, I walked out of the village to the waiting cargo drone.

I dismissed my VR and frame-jacked up to maximum. At this level, I could sense jitter in my perceptions as my hardware attempted to pixelate reality. As we reached the five light-day point, I ordered Guppy to broadcast a message directing all local Bobs to get out of Dodge. Anyone caught too close to GL 877 in a short while would need a new paint job.

Slightly behind me, the planet formerly known as Epsilon Eridani 1, a planet the size of Mars, struck the star at the north pole with a relativistic force equivalent to half the mass of Jupiter. At the same moment, the former largest moon of Epsilon Eridani 3 struck on the opposite pole. Stars are hot, but not really dense. The two planets penetrated to a significant depth before they ceased to exist. The impacts created twin shock waves that raced through the star toward the core. As the disturbances penetrated deeper and compressed the stellar medium, regions that weren’t quite able to sustain hydrogen fusion suddenly found the ability. Regions that were already sustaining fusion found their ability greatly increased. Elements that were nowhere near being able to fuse in the current environment suddenly found themselves with the energy available. Helium fused to carbon and oxygen, and fusion cascaded all the way to iron. In a matter of minutes, the total energy output of the star jumped by a factor of several hundred. The delicate balance of outward energy pressure and inward gravitational pressure was obliterated, and GL 877 exploded outward at half the speed of light. It would take three hours for the star to swallow the entire system; however, it took half that for the blast of radiation to sterilize everything.

Daedalus and I would see this blast as radio waves. But we’d have to stay at high tau for several light-years before it would be safe to even think about decelerating. That’s for the Pav. And for all the other, unnamed species that you’ve seen fit to remove from existence.

Hail Mary. I didn’t want to raise false hopes, and I wanted to ensure we continued planning for a frontal assault. Anyway, about ten days ago, GL 877 went nova. There is nothing left in that system now, right out to the Oort cloud. Confirmed by the monitor drones, just before they expired.” Neil and I looked at each other in shock. “We can do that? Dude!” Neil said. I stared at Bill. “Someday, some species is going to observe that explosion and wonder what the hell is wrong with their stellar models.”

Garfield stepped forward. “Bill, remember that discussion we had about us being Homo sideria?” I mock-glared at him. “Et tu, Garfield?”

gestured to the soldiers. “You have power, in the ways that matter. You’re able to keep yourselves safe here. We’ll make sure nothing gets out of control up there.” I gestured to the sky. “Beyond that, unless you specifically need us for something, we’ll leave you alone. I think, as a group, the Bobs have finally figured out our place in the cosmos. So we’re going to be stepping back.” Hazjiar gazed at the soldiers for a moment, then smiled at me. “Some of us, I think, will be happy to hear that. I am not so sure. In any case, we will live.” She stood. “Thank you, Jock, for the news. I will inform the Council.” I stood and gave her the Pav head bob, and walked to the cargo drone. I stepped in and turned for a last look. As the doors were closing, I saw Hazjiar give me the Vulcan salute.

looked down once more in the direction of Las Vegas, and thought back to that last day as a human being. I remembered the conversation with my mother and Andrea—and felt a deep and abiding regret at not having had one last conversation with my father and with Alaina. There was that last meal with my employees, who—I now realized—were possibly my best friends on the planet at the time. Their lives were now less than a footnote in history. As gone, as utterly forgotten as any random individual from the Middle Ages. No longer even a ripple in time, except to the extent that I could keep their memories alive. I sighed to myself. It seemed sometimes that life was nothing more than the accumulation of emotional baggage—memories, regrets, and lost opportunities.