On The Surface Tension Page 17

  “Where we headin’?” asked one of the cowboys.

  “Up to the orbiting Xylol manufacturing facility to pick up the rest of my group,” answered Anton.

  “No sir. Not until you fly out to my town and we pick up the rest of our families,” stated the cowboy.

  “We don’t have time for this,” Anton argued.

  “Well, then, make time for it,” Jeremy ordered. “Sheriff Dolan is right. This was part of the deal.”

  “Not my deal,” said Anton.

  “It is now, son,” drawled the Sheriff, resting his hand on his revolver.

  “Now everyone calm down,” Chris said through the drone speaker. “We have time to go get your people, Sheriff Cowboy. I trust your families will be ready to go immediately. Go on Anton, fly over there.”

  “Where is this town?” Anton asked.

  “Head east, about two days’ ride.”

  Anton smirked. “How far is ‘two days’ ride’ in non-primitive-savage terms?”

  “Just fly east, Tussbucket,” Cornish Bob growled.

  Anton lifted the transport off, and they banked to their left. Within ten minutes they had spotted the town on the screen ahead.

  Suddenly alarm klaxons blared.

  “Dammit, did they find us out?” Cain said.

  “I don’t think so,” Anton answered, puzzled. “That’s a military alert.”

  Anton adjusted the screen. The scale had broadened to show the planet as a much smaller circle near the center of the screen. Hundreds of lights flashed like stars at all points.

  “Are those…?” asked Jeremy.

  “Yeah. Enemy ships. We are under a massive Demon attack.”

  *****

  Smithson wrapped the lone remaining LaGrue’s damaged robotic arm around his shoulder and helped him hobble towards a massive door. He helped himself to two of the pistols and some magazines from the multitude of dead LaGrues that littered the floor.

  “Where are you hurt?” he asked.

  LaGrue checked himself. “Looks like none of the damage was life critical. Artificial lungs intact, circulation operational. Just power supply backup and locomotion damage. Some reduction in strength amplification.”

  “Good. Where can we go to talk without being interrupted by any more of you?” Smithson asked.

  “I know a place—but no, my others would think of that. You better choose.”

  Smithson led them randomly down several massive stone halls filled with LaGrue busts and portraits of him in heroic battle scenes. They came to a door in an alcove and entered. It appeared to be the quarters of a worker, which was unoccupied.

  “This will do for now,” said Smithson, and eased LaGrue into a wooden chair by a rough table. LaGrue heaved a ragged breath.

  “What am I going to do?”

  “Interesting you said ‘I’ instead of ‘we,’” Smithson said.

  “It is odd,” said LaGrue with a wry smile. “I am a series of individuals, not connected like Eiffelia is. That is how she is able to match me. She can stay connected across times and universes in a way that I cannot. But she cannot best me because each of my selves is independently operational without the others. Any one of us can duplicate into hundreds of other LaGrues, each with a rift generator of his own. We should be unstoppable! But….”

  Smithson held his tongue, allowing LaGrue to finish the thought.

  “But so can she, using her minions! Every time we engage, we quickly reach infinite regress, each trying to out-produce the other with rift generators, with fleets of starships, going back farther and farther in time to cut off her slaves from being born, her planets from populating, her stars even from forming! And always competing for full Pangborn carriers. It is madness! And when I don’t engage her? Even worse madness. Building all these monuments to myself, building empires to worship me with my godlike power? It’s…horrible. I have to stop it. We have to stop it.”

  “How will you convince all of the LaGrues to help you?”

  “We are all the same. If I have come to this conclusion given this set of facts, they will all come to the same one too.”

  “But will they all believe you?”

  “Of course. I have seen what I have seen, and each of them can independently observe the same thing for themselves. What I had been missing was a certain point of view to observe the facts from.”

  “I think,” said Smithson, sitting at the table across from LaGrue, “that you are going to have a harder time convincing all the rest of the LaGrues to end things than you think.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Smithson pursed his lips and exhaled.

  “Look, I am not one of the Mods who know things. I’m just a low-level operative, but I know what I know. And I know that once you split your ego into others, the clone aspect only goes so far. From the moment you duplicate, you have a complete, self-sufficient, new human there who has its own perspective and experiences that are not shared. Even with identical brains, the patterns that develop are only so similar. And the egos are entirely dissimilar.”

  “We are similar enough that we think the same way and the same things. We are fundamentally the same person, split into many.”

  Smithson stroked his beard briskly. “Think of it this way. You are going to be asking another you to end this game. What if one of your other yous asked you to do it? Would you?”

  “Of course! As long as there is one of us to continue on.”

  Smithson squinted. “Wait, are we talking about the same thing?”

  “We are going to commit mass suicide,” blinked LaGrue. “Only one of us should continue. It is the natural order.”

  “Whoa there, compadre. Why don’t you just destroy all the rift generators but one and have all you LaGrues live out your natural—I mean, un-natural lives—here on LaGrue world? What would that hurt? The game would end without the lemming part.”

  “That’s a myth, by the way,” LaGrue instructed. “Lemmings don’t commit mass suicide.”

  “Then why should you?

  LaGrue slumped, pondering. “Even though we are duplicates of the same ego, we are different. I would have a hard time turning myself over to non-existence, even though without one of my predecessor LaGrues I would not exist. I’m not sure any of us even know at this point who the original one is. We all just sort of wake up after a jump back to duplicate, each with a slightly different set of memories. I remember setting out to duplicate and having three of me materialize. We then all jumped and picked up a fifth. So with an incredible amount of reconstructing memories, assuming every one of us was completely honest, we could in theory reconstruct which one of us was the original LaGrue. Assuming he is not one of us locked into an infinite regress line with Eiffelia. There must be an easier way.”

  “You are assuming,” said Smithson, “that the LaGrue who ultimately gets to live your old life and return the rift generator to Ron must be the original one. Why is that?”

  “It seems a fair way to determine who lives out of this.”

  “You are all the same. You might as well choose by chance.”

  “As distasteful as that sounds, I see no logical reason not to,” nodded LaGrue. “What we need is a way to ensure that none of me is tempted to cheat and live on with a rift generator. What would be the best outcome is one that also annihilates Eiffelia in the bargain.”

  “I’m pretty sure that won’t happen, no matter how you play this. She has been playing this game for a long, long time.”

  LaGrue stroked his chin. “You are correct, of course. But perhaps I can hurt her, set her back. Perhaps if I plunged a ship with a rift generator onboard into the sun of each known system where she has a planet with an ocean that she uses as a home location? The resultant supernovae would wipe out the whole system, her sponge body with it.”

  Smithson raised his eyebrows. “That sounds pretty drastic. What about the other inhabitants of the planets in those systems?”

  “Her modus operandi is to operate wit
hout any intelligent life in the vicinity of her sponge bodies, with the exception of some captive populations of slaves drugged beyond salvage to make sure she is fed and defended. I am willing to sacrifice them in order to achieve my objective. Even if she survives in some locations that are unknown to me, the eradication of most of her entire systems and the slaves she has cultivated will set her back for generations.”

  Smithson scowled. “Well perhaps I am not willing to allow you to sacrifice them. They might be drugged thralls, but they are sentient beings capable of healing from her drugs.”

  LaGrue steepled his hands and nodded. “I appreciate your position and will consider the possibility of another solution.”

  Smithson narrowed his eyes, untrusting. It occurred to him that LaGrue might well carry out this plan, but the only way to stop him would be to immediately kill him. But it further occurred to him that should he do this, the other LaGrues and their minions would likely capture him and the entire scene would repeat. The situation had a momentum beyond his control.

  “What are you going to do with me?” Smithson asked.

  “I will take you to wherever you ask and leave you.”

  Smithson considered. He needed to report this situation to the Mods. “I would like you to take me to a Chinese restaurant in Seattle called House of Kong.”

  “An odd request, but done.”

  *****

  Valentina Pavlov shaded her eyes and tried to continue reading the children’s book, but the setting sun and her tears were making it difficult. She looked out across the vast city from the vast stone patio attached to the vast LaGrue bedroom with the massive LaGrue statues and let out a shuddering breath.

  “Mommy?”

  “Yes, Mandy?”

  “I don’t like it here either. The only thing I like about it is I don’t have to be Mandy 42 anymore, just Mandy.”

  “Yes. That is the nice part.”

  “But LaGrue is just as bad a boss as Eiffelia, isn’t he?”

  “Yes honey. Just different.”

  “Yeah. We don’t have to pretend we are stupid and drugged any more, but we have to pretend we like LaGrue like everyone else does. It is the same.”

  LaGrue popped into existence before them, making them jump.

  “I hate it when he does that, Mommy.”

  “Me too, sweetie.”

  “Good evening, wife,” he said.

  “I am not your wife,” Valentina mumbled.

  “Of course you are,” LaGrue countered. “Even though you are not happy about it. But you will be happy to know that our relationship will soon change.”

  She waited, trying to gauge his mood and meaning from his bearing. He seemed pensive and a bit wistful.

  “We will soon end our war with Eiffelia by sacrificing all of me but one. We have all decided. By the operation of random choice, I have been selected as the only surviving LaGrue. The rest of me are even now as we speak piloting vast armadas of our ships to attack every known homeworld of Eiffelia. We will pilot our ships into their suns and destroy her utterly. Only I will be left. We will take a ship and use the rift generator to insert into the world line where we were working at the base under the Denver Airport—the last time we were together without two or more of me. The only change will be that we will replace our versions of ourselves at that point, which will likely be enough to start a new world line in which we will be married. Mandy will be our child. We will decline to join Ron and Tracey when Cornish Bob attacks them and will thus not participate in that world line. We will live happily for the rest of our lives.”

  Valentina sat quietly, digesting this.

  “I do not understand what you mean by ‘replace’ our versions in that world line. Do you mean they will just pop out of existence when we get there?”

  “Of course not. We will have to replace them by posing as ourselves. Those old versions must be removed.”

  “What do you mean ‘removed’? That is no better than saying ‘replaced.’ Just say it: Do you mean they will be killed?”

  “Of course,” LaGrue spat. “But that is ok, we are the same people, just from farther in the future.”

  “You are a monster.”

  Why are you so difficult? You have no choice here. You will obey me. Once we are inserted into the new timeline, if you tell anyone about this, they will think you insane.”

  “And what makes you think I won’t just divorce you at that point?”

  LaGrue seemed genuinely surprised. “Why would you do that? Have I not treated you like the queen you are? What is so bad about me? I do not understand you.”

  “And you never have, fool.”

  LaGrue started to storm off but caught himself.

  “Well we shall see how this turns out. We are leaving.”

  “When?”

  “Now. This instant. Gather what things you need.”

  “I have nothing to gather,” Valentina whispered.

  “Then come with me to the end of the patio,” he said, grabbing her arm.

  Valentina took Mandy’s hand in her free arm, and they walked to the edge of the stone patio. LaGrue spoke into his rift generator. A short time later, a large ship flew into view and came to hover at the end of the patio. A walkway was extended from a door that opened in the ship, and another LaGrue emerged and joined them.

  “Greetings, Most Fortunate!” he said, a bit over-enthusiastically. “I bring you your chariot to begin your new lives.”

  The surviving LaGrue beamed with pleasure. “Thank you, Sacrificer. Have you made the modifications which will return the rift generator to you after delivering us to our timeline?”

  “Indeed, Fortunate, I have programmed the ship to drop you off, wait five minutes for you to exit, then return here.”

  “Excellent work, Sacrificer. May your end be glorious!”

  “And may your life be long and grand, Fortunate One!”

  The survivor LaGrue escorted Valentina and Mandy down the gangplank. Out of the corner of her eye Valentina caught an odd expression on the other LaGrue’s face.

  Is he hiding something?

  The ship itself seemed oddly familiar in outline. She wondered why.

  “Have a seat while I seal the hull, wife.”

  “Wait….”

  LaGrue ignored her, and busied about the control room. Then it occurred to her where she had seen the ship.

  “Wait!”

  The ship made the jump at that moment. They were thrown into the nauseating effects and were left writhing on the floor.

  “Can…can a rift generator be made to self-destruct?” she panted.

  “I suppose it can,” he answered, groaning.

  “Will it explode or make a rift?”

  “I don’t know. Why?”

  “He wasn’t sending us back to when we were investigating the wrecked ship and the rift under the airport. He sent us back to be the ship and make the rift. He’s going to kill you. And us. No survivors, no new timeline. He’s rigged the ship to blow a rift open and throw the hulk into that new universe. They decided without you to all go down.”

  “That’s….but why?”

  She could only shake her head before the explosion took them.

  —10—

  “This control room is too crowded—I need most of you to clear out. At least the corpse. He stinks,” Anton complained.

  Anton had landed the transport ship near the town, and the Sheriff left to round up the townsfolk.

  “What is going on up there?” Chris fidgeted, looking over Anton’s shoulder at the display screen.

  Anton pointed to the screen with the hundreds of points of light slowly circling the planet and the sun at its center.

  “I’m not sure at this point. They aren’t attacking anything, but Eiffelia hasn’t put up any ships to fight them. I think if we can get the hell out of here we might be able to slip through before any shooting starts.”

  “We still need to crash the Xylol 23 factory,” Elanor demanded. />
  “I think those demon ships will handle that for us,” Jeremy said. “We just need to get the hell out of here.”

  “Ang on there me ’ansums, there is something afoot that ’ol Bob can smell even beyond his own corruption. Tune your communications to a broad band to see if we can pick up some discourse between the Demons and the sponge.”

  Anton touched the screen, and shortly voices were heard.

  “…then we are at an impasse,” said the unmistakable voice of Eiffelia.

  “Not at all,” answered a voice vaguely familiar only to Cornish Bob. “There is only one outcome to this. One of my ships will make it through whatever you throw at us and will plunge into your sun. The resultant meltdown of the ship’s rift generator will trigger a supernova which will cause each rift generator in all of my ships to supernovae by chain reaction. The resultant cluster of supernovae will incinerate this entire planetary system and all nearby.”

  “You are willing to end our war in this way, Professor LaGrue?” asked Eiffelia.

  Cornish Bob slapped his forehead, dislodging gobs of flesh. That’s who it is!

  “I am. And as you no doubt can detect, this scene is being enacted on as many of your host planets in as many world lines as I have been able to discover in the course of our eternal war. I am not foolish enough to assume that I have discovered all of your planetary systems, but I might have. And at the very least this will hurt you. Badly.”

  Eiffelia laughed. “You are indeed a fool. Of course you do not know all of my home worlds throughout all timelines and universes. All I will have to do is start rebuilding on the surviving timelines retroactively then expand again into whatever you have destroyed. Your gesture here is empty. We will be back to our exquisitely enjoyable infinite regressive conflicts in no time at all.”

  “Of course I will not destroy you. That is a hope but not an expectation here. I am doing this to destroy me.”

  There was silence on the airway for long seconds.

  “You are…quitting?” Eiffelia asked. “How selfish of you. Not only will you deprive me a great deal of pleasure by ending our game, but have you thought about all the poor human slaves on my home worlds that service me? Millions will die.”