“Ah, my boy, now you are getting into questions about hardware, software, the meaning of life, and all that sort of thing. Rather sophomoric, wouldn’t you say? By the time most men reach your age, they have learned to accept the universe for what it is, and to live with it,” the professor said.
“Then you are saying that you have somehow downloaded everything that happened during my military education, and assimilated it into yourself.”
“I suppose that you could say something like that, yes. But I assure you that to me, it seems that you were one of my favorite pupils. I’ll never forget the way you conned that guard tank into letting you into the valley where the Serbs had an entire division of unsworn, virgin tanks. ‘Roast Duck and Oysters,’ indeed! I see that you have brought your five excellent colonels with you. Kasia, you look as beautiful as ever! And you as well, Maria! Mirko, Conan, Lloyd, well, this is going to be a grand reunion! And I see Quincy and Zuzanna here as well. It was such a shame when your general died, and only a week before graduation. You are here to see the others off?”
“Not exactly,” I said. “Mirko and Lloyd decided to become squad leaders when it looked as though there was no hope of my ever getting assigned a CCC. Quincy and Zuzanna took their place in my squad, and we saw quite a bit of combat together, in the New Kashubian campaign. All of these people are trained colonels, and my thought was to rotate them occasionally. I trust that you are capable of such flexibility?”
“It’s more than a bit unorthodox, but I suppose that I could make do. Fortunately, I have sufficient spare sanitary fittings with me.”
“Good, because just now, Lloyd and Mirko are up to their earlobes in New Croatian politics, so, at least for the time being, they have other things to do. Are you ready to be sworn in?”
“Quite.”
“Good. Now, then. I am General Mickolai Derdowski and I am here to accept your oath of loyalty to me and my forces. Number 00000104, you are hereby inducted into the service of the Kashubian Expeditionary Forces, and into the New Yugoslavian branch of that service, to whom you will give all of your loyalty. Your combat data code will be number 58294, and you will now permanently erase all other codes from your memory. Do you now swear loyalty to the Kashubian forces?”
“I do so swear.”
“Good. Welcome to the service. Open up. Lloyd, you and Mirko can take off, and get back to your politics. We’ll keep you posted. The rest of you, strip down. Agnieshka will take care of the clothes.”
“Not likely, buster!” Kasia said, “We’re not about to put on a strip show for your benefit. You guys take a walk. We’ll call you when you can come back.”
Maria and Zuzanna nodded agreement, so we mere males walked, the powers of wives and girlfriends being what they are.
“Good try, boss,” Conan said.
About five minutes later, the speaker on one of the Gurkha tanks told us that we could turn around. Back at the CCC, three coffins were extended, and a tube of “Lubricant, Sanitary Fixture, mod II,” was sitting on each of them.
I took off my swords and my bemedaled jacket and then said, “Wait a minute! If you wouldn’t strip down in front of us, we won’t do it in front of you! Professor, turn off your external scanners!”
“Coward!” all three girls shouted.
“Retaliation is not cowardly!” I shouted back.
With the greased fitting inserted into my privy members, my helmet on and plugged in, and the coffin filling with liquid, I said, “Agnieshka, are you there?”
“I sure am, boss.”
I switched into Dream World, and was back in my homey cottage, sitting at the kitchen table.
“Then who is running the drone, if you are in the module of this coffin?”
“I am. I was downloaded into this computer, but I’m still in my tank, too. The plan is for both of me to update each other as often as possible. They say that the memories fit together so that it seems like there’s only one of me, and I’m doing everything in series, and not in parallel.”
“Who are ‘they’?”
“Professor Cee, actually. He says it works for him all the time. I mean, besides the six computers that hold girls like me, there are twelve really massive, independent computers in this CCC, and he thinks he’s all of them. Then, there are a total of a hundred and thirty-one of these CCCs in existence, and he’s all of them, too. And he’s also every tank who is using his programs in training, the way we did it with you.”
“That gets hard to think about. I’m glad he’s on our side. I wonder if Earth has anything like him.”
“I doubt it, boss. They’ve been acting very stupid from day one.”
“Except for the way they seem to be able to find all of our transporters on a planet, and take them out,” I said.
“There is that.”
The professor knocked on the front door, and Agnieshka let him in.
After greeting me again, profusely, he said, “My dear boy, that was an absolutely brilliant campaign you and your squad fought on New Kashubia. Successful pupils like you make an old teacher feel very proud.”
“Thank you,” I said. “But if you remember me so well, you should know that I hate being called your ‘Dear Boy’. You may address me as General Derdowski, or boss, or sir.”
After my graduation from the military college, I’d had a rough time getting him to acknowledge that I was the one who was in command. I didn’t intend to go through that again.
“As you wish, General. Now then, I would like to discuss your staff, the colonels with you.”
“Certainly. Have a seat. Coffee, beer, or scotch?”
“Scotch, if you don’t mind,” he said, as Agnieshka served me a beer, and then a whiskey to him.
“An excellent single malt. McTavish?”
“Argyle. I really am rich now. Not that anything costs anything here. You know, once this war gets over, and we get the social drones in production, you’ll get one of your own, and actually be able to taste the real stuff, and not just fake it.”
“I certainly look forward to getting one of those human facsimiles, but you know, it seems to me that I am tasting the excellent distillation that I am drinking right now. But about your staff. Conan and Maria are of course absolutely first-rate colonels, and should be retained. Quincy is even better, and is easily the best of the bunch. You couldn’t find a better subordinate no matter where you looked. But his wife, Zuzanna, got into the officer’s program because we couldn’t get Quincy without her. She’s intelligent enough, and quite competent, but she’s undisciplined, and tends to be disobedient at the most inopportune moments. She does, however, have a very strong protective instinct, and can be quite ruthless with anyone that she sees as threatening any of her own people. I therefore would like to make a suggestion.”
“Yes?”
“Mirko and Lloyd have four men left in each of their squads. Take Mirko and Lloyd back as colonels. Then take the eight men and machines that presently belong to their squads and form them into your personal guard, or call it a guard for the supply trucks, if you wish. Those men would otherwise be abandoned to the replacement depot, where they would be scattered about as needed. Breaking up a functioning combat team is bad for the army and bad for the men as well. Then make Zuzanna the captain of your personal guard. This would keep the young troops near their former squad leaders, and Quincy near, and in constant contact with, Zuzanna. Properly handled, she wouldn’t feel that it was a demotion.”
“Yes, that would all work out nicely. I too have worried about Zuzanna, on occasion, like when she needlessly slaughtered the Earthworms’ entire command staff on New Kashubia. Your plan would also keep the three squads I had at Baden-Baden Island together, after the combat we saw together there. But it has one glaring problem. You are forgetting about my wife, Kasia.”
“That is your other problem, General. I shouldn’t be the one to be telling you this, but there’s nothing else for it. Kasia is pregnant. I don’t think that you would want to take a pregnant woman into combat, now, would you?”
That is about as stiff a kick in the gut as a man can get and stand a chance of surviving. Kasia was going to be a mother! I was going to be a father! For years, I had wanted a family, but now that it was finally happening, it threw me into something of a funk. I sat back for a few minutes, absorbing it.