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  Each time the screen named a location, the appropriate area was highlighted and zoomed to take up the whole screen. “Use command ‘normal’ to return to zero zoom factor.”

  Michael walked out from behind his desk to stand five feet in front of the screen. His office was large; easily thirty by forty feet.

  God only knew why Bethany Anne had placed him in an office the size of a small house. For now he occupied a small portion with a small sitting area, his desk, and the screen.

  “What if I wish to track something on the screen?” he asked.

  “Specify cell and use the command ‘track’ or touch the screen when you speak the command ‘track.’”

  Michael touched the snake creature. “Track.”

  The creature replaced the middle of the screen. “Zoom creature.”

  “Factor?”

  “Two.”

  Unsurprisingly, the snake became twice as large. What did surprise him was that the view shifted and he was now viewing the snake from the air.

  “What’s happening?”

  “Request requires use of the AV long-distance data acquisition device to maintain zoom factor.”

  “Couldn’t it just zoom farther?” Michael wondered aloud.

  “Command modification required: ‘maintain position and adjust amplification.’”

  Damn, Michael thought. Next time read the fucking manual.

  However, now he knew the little spy devices could track. He watched the snake for a time. It slithered like an Earth snake but also had eight appendages which it used like a lizard’s feet. They curled up alongside the body anytime it went through water, but it used them to travel on land.

  There was a knock on his door and he tasted the thoughts of the person on the other side for a fraction of a second. “Come in, Tabitha.” He kept his concentration on the screen.

  This was better than watching those old shows on the Discovery Channel, because here he had no idea what to expect. He heard Tabitha’s soft footsteps as she joined him.

  “Watching the world?” she asked. “I hear there are some wild things out there.”

  He pointed to the screen. “I’m watching this snake with eight arms, or legs,” Michael explained as he scratched his chin. “I’ve seen it strike at a couple somethings that… HOLY SHIT!”

  Both Michael and Tabitha jumped back from the screen when a reptilian foot so large it filled the monitor slammed down.

  “Turn on the sound,” Tabitha commanded and bedlam erupted from the speakers. Trees were being destroyed, and something was bellowing.

  “Follow that!” Michael commanded.

  The foot lifted off the ground, and where it had been they could barely see Michael’s pet snake crushed against an overturned rock.

  “Screen, follow the large creature,” Tabitha commanded. The view changed as the remote unit went higher, then something sent it careening into a tree.

  The screen blanked.

  “Changing to secondary random surface scene,” the screen announced.

  “What the hell was that?” Tabitha asked, and looked at Michael. He had his thumb and forefinger on his chin and his eyes were still on the screen, but his mind elsewhere.

  Tabitha started shaking her head when she connected the dots. “Oh, hell no, Michael! Bethany Anne isn’t going to want you to hunt a fucking dinosaur on this planet.”

  Michael turned to look at her and raised an eyebrow, but otherwise his face remained expressionless. “I didn’t know you could turn on the sound.”

  Chapter Three

  High Tortuga, Hidden Space Fleet Base, Prime Building

  Bethany Anne, red eyes blazing, glared across the room at her betrothed and enunciated her words very clearly.

  And very slowly, and at a significant volume.

  “I. AM. NOT. A. BABY. POD!” she damn-near screamed.

  Her hands were on her waist, legs braced apart as she stood in the large living room of her personal quarters. The furniture was mostly shades of gray.

  She would have preferred white, but that was too hard to keep clean even with the synthetics she had access to. Plus, she expected to have a messy child who would challenge her ability to keep anything clean for longer than it took to walk out of the room and come back.

  If she had ever figured out how to make her eyes shoot lasers, Michael might have been using his enhanced speed to dodge beams of death at that very moment.

  Michael raised an eyebrow. She was almost two hundred years old and very emotional. He was over fifteen hundred years old (albeit he’d spent many of those sleeping) and completely unimpressed.

  “You are going to be a mother; ergo you are a baby incubator…unless you would like our son—”

  “Daughter!”

  “Whatever.” Michael waved a hand. “Our child to be placed in the Pod-crib ADAM and TOM offered to monitor for you.”

  Bethany Anne’s breathing was tense and her nostrils flared in and out as the logic of Michael’s argument sank into her mind.

  He’s an ASS!

  >>I think he just wants you to think through the potential consequences of you going into any fights where the child could be harmed.<<<br />
  I’m a damned superwoman! she mentally hissed. How the hell is something going to go wrong with me?

  TOM, her resident alien entity who was connected to and integrated around her spine, sent, Well, technically he is right. It isn’t like I understand everything that is presently going on in your body. Your emotions are heightened right now, which is sending new chemicals through your system. I’m having trouble understanding which ones are safe to mess with, so I’m leaving all of them alone.

  Bethany Anne thought about that for a moment. Oh, God!

  She put a hand out to Michael and covered her mouth with the other. He pointed to her right and she took off, jumping over the couches (both of them) that were between her and the bathroom so she could rid herself of her stomach’s contents.

  Did you do this to stop my argument with Michael? she fumed at TOM.

  No. I just got done telling you I don’t know what the chemicals do or why they are present. As John Grimes would say, “Shit happens.”

  ARRGH! Bethany Anne sent as she heaved. I hate you both.

  When Bethany Anne came out of the washroom ten minutes later her voice a bit more sedate. “Thank you. The, uh,” she waved to her stomach, “situation caught me unexpectedly. Your directions helped.”

  Michael just nodded, keeping quiet.

  “I don’t like being told what I can’t do,” she continued. “And I’m a little annoyed that this is altering my life. I’m not used to being confined.”

  “I am aware of that.” Michael nodded again. “However, just because you don’t like hearing something doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to be said.” He walked over to her and opened his arms. She eyed him before leaning into his embrace.

  Her voice was muffled when she spoke a moment later. “This dushn’t mean I’m going dow’en eashily on this.”

  Michael, his chin resting on Bethany Anne’s head as he held her, kept his face blank; no smile to be seen. One couldn’t know if there were cameras active for other reasons, which she’d check at the most inopportune time to see if he had been smirking

  Like now.

  “Bethany Anne, I know we have the technology here to safely grow the baby...of whatever sex...outside your body.”

  She punched him gently. “I’m not going to tell our child I was too self-centered to give her the best location possible to grow into a glowing young lady.”

  I’m sure he will be happy to hear you were voting for the opposite sex and was therefore very disappointed when our little boy popped out… Well, shit. Thankfully Michael had been smart enough to keep his comment to himself—especially since he realized how hypocritical it sounded even to himself.

  Perhaps at fifteen hundred years old or thereabouts, he was finally maturing just a bit. He sighed as Bethany Anne grumbled something under her breath.<
br />
  Why had he agreed to marry someone so much younger?

  Oh yeah…she was the only one with the ovaries to push back at him when he was being a full-fledged in-your-face-unforgiving-kill-everyone-fucktard.

  He smiled (not smirked). That might be the personality aspect which had attracted him the most to her. Unfortunately, it was also the one that was going to make the better portion of the next year a living hell.

  He sighed. “Bethany Anne?”

  “Hmmph?”

  “I have a suggestion. Your choice to take it or not.”

  “Mmmhmm?”

  Since she tensed when she made the sound, he could tell that she was ready, willing and able to punch him again. No man will have gone down in history as having to deal with more pain to support the birth of his child, he thought. “I understand you have deployed spy drones throughout the major and several minor cities.”

  “Surveillance drones,” she mumbled. “Spy ith very negative.”

  “Mmmhmmm,” he agreed. “Surveillance drones. Where is the main center for data acquisition and correction enforcement located?”

  Bethany Anne leaned back and peered into Michael’s eyes, her mouth twisting slightly as she thought about it. “There isn’t a main center. We have ADAM route all requests to the person on duty in our security center here. Just this morning we had an issue in Thon with some hoodlums trying to intimidate a young Noel-ni who didn’t want to join their gang.”

  Michael raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t heard this story yet. “And what did you do about it?”

  “Well, we killed them,” she answered blankly. “There was audio and video proof of several crimes, two of which were enough to justify the death penalty. And that isn’t including the fact that they were going to damage Baba Yaga’s orb, and were trying to grow their gang.”

  “Right.” Michael took a deep breath and let it out. “I suppose the video is—”

  “On the public net related to all law enforcement. The bodies have been removed. They had no family besides their gang, so we sent the new leaders the proper status update on their former members and informed them of the statistical probability of their own demises should they continue as a gang.” She thought about it for a moment and continued, “We also provided them with information on potential jobs and supplied chits to give them access to the subterranean trams that travel to the jobs’ locations.”

  “How would they know they have jobs waiting for them?”

  “The instructions pointed them to the new data resource locations. We are calling them ‘libraries’ because they are the closest equivalent to what we had on Earth. They can take the necessary skills and non-medical tests there. After that they will be directed to where they can get a free checkup, and then they will be given options for appropriate jobs.”

  “What if we have no proper jobs for them?” Michael asked. “And how did this get implemented?”

  ADAM answered that one. “Michael, we have been working on these projects for over two years. Much of this was implemented, or at least the buildings and initial infrastructure were created, while Bethany Anne was still Empress of the Etheric Empire. We have three major infrastructure projects going that require a significant amount of muscle, so we can use those who are strong but not very intelligent. We have jobs available for just about everyone.”

  Michael’s eyes narrowed. “Are these challenging jobs?”

  Bethany Anne snorted. “Hardly.” She stepped back, then went over to a couch and sat down. “If they want challenging and/or enjoyable jobs they will need to use their off-time to learn new skills. Training is available at all major infrastructure sites. Security is rather tight, and harassment is not allowed.”

  “So.” Michael followed Bethany Anne, but he sat down on the couch that faced her. The two gray couches had a white carpet with two-inch pile and a sleek-looking coffee table between them. “Chain gangs?”

  “No.” Bethany Anne shook her head. “Remember, these are jobs for those who can do nothing else. Is it make-work?” She flipped a hand from side to side. “Sort of. We actually do need the infrastructure, but the muscle isn’t required until Stage Three—which is somewhere between ten and twenty years out. We could use EI-controlled machinery and do it quicker, but this way it provides a job with benefits if they’re willing to put in the effort. I don’t care if they get pissed off, learn a trade, and get the hell out of the sweat job. That’s the point. I’m not allowing free-loading here. Do something. Anything!” She tossed her hands up. “I can’t believe that so many of those stupid sayings we had on Earth are so appropriate.”

  “Which are those?” Michael asked.

  “How about ‘Idle hands are the devil’s workshop?’” she offered. “I’m not sure which mother said that, but it’s true.”

  “It came from the Bible. I can’t remember if it was Proverbs or Philippians,” Michael supplied.

  “Not a mother?” Bethany Anne’s eyes narrowed. “Seriously?”

  Michael nodded. “Seriously.”

  “Sounds like something a mother would say,” she finished, but let it go. “Either way, I don’t want them to have nothing to do. There are no options. If they tell us they need to stay and help a family member, we can confirm that.”

  He thought for a moment, then asked, “This is part of your MPPS project?”

  She nodded.

  He had nothing to add at the moment. No wisdom gleaned from over a thousand years of living, and no suggestions either. He shrugged and dropped the subject. “So, what do you think about creating a nice central area, designed like the pit back on Earth? Bottom level with a table and one wall of screens, but four or five levels of work desks around an oval or circle. We can pipe all the security reports in. You’d have a single place to work out the kinks with the security implementation, and to organize and authorize further efforts. At some point, you know, we’ll need to leave and go out there into the deep dark to look for the Kurtherians. You will need a good team back here, and for that to run efficiently you need to train them. Record everything you do to video. Permit discussions about your efforts and modify the laws as needed.”

  Bethany Anne’s eyes were staring at him but she wasn’t seeing him. Her mind was probably split into multiple threads. Two were likely carrying on conversations with ADAM and TOM, and others were acquiring and analyzing data regarding their ongoing efforts.

  Michael pulled out his tablet and hit the button to resume watching random nature feeds from around the planet.

  He wanted to find another dinosaur. While Bethany Anne was thinking through his suggestion, he would do something just as important—at least to him.

  He would hunt the body that went with the foot he had seen earlier. He didn’t want to tap more resources, and he didn’t trust Tabitha not to ask about his viewing habits.

  That young woman would turn on a dime and rat him out to Bethany Anne. Besides, getting away with the very tiny plan that was hatching in his mind was going to be icing on the cake.

  Although if he failed there might be hell to pay.

  High Tortuga, Hidden Space Fleet Base, Queen’s Personal Quarters

  “ADAM.” Bethany Anne sat back on her couch and lifted her feet onto the coffee table. She sure hoped Michael didn’t come in and see her like this.

  She would freely admit she didn’t like it when he did the same thing, but in the symphony of her silence she enjoyed the position despite the term hypocrite running through her mind.

  She was complicated. He would just have to deal with it, but it would go down so much better if he didn’t show up or she could pull her legs down in time.

  She sighed. She was going to need to get an ottoman in here for him. She looked around and grimaced.

  It would ruin her feng shui, dammit—which was the reason she had been reticent in the first place.

  Men. Such a pain in the ass when it came to fucking up the furniture.

  “Yes, Bethany Anne?” ADAM had long ago stop
ped trying to figure out why Bethany Anne would speak to him aloud sometimes and mentally others. His advanced statistical analysis could predict the weather with more accuracy.

  “Let’s talk about this central pit area Michael suggested.”

  “Yes?”

  “I like the idea of three tiers, each with seven desks on each side. Each at least forty-eight inches wide, with monitors layered into the desktop. Let’s have a set of steps going from the entry to the bottom on both sides. Large table at the bottom good for meetings of…uhh…” She thought about it. “Ten? No, we might have larger meetings there and need everyone, so make it seven to each side and two on the ends. So sixteen.”

  “Screens in the tabletop as well?”

  “Yes.” She smiled. “Make it piano-black. In fact, make everything black…and maybe a little chrome. Carved out of the rock, smooth floors with carpet down the steps and in the main area, but stone under the work areas on the three tiers. Wait, add a fourth on the same level as the entrance with space for chairs for different species to sit.”

  “Areas for reporters?”

  “Oh, hell no.” She shook her head. “Fuck that. Make sure we place enough video cameras in there to get every person from every angle. Some of them will have high-enough resolution to grab headshots out of the input for PIP efforts. The last thing I want is a bunch of questions about why I just ripped off some annoying twit’s head for asking the wrong question. They can send in their questions via messaging or video, or wait. But that’s a good point. Have our second phase build a large news-and-reporter area for discussions near the pit.”

  “Very well.”

  “Okay, give me a second.” Bethany Anne thought back to when Michael had suggested the pit. He had caught her attention with his first sentence.

  It hadn’t been positive attention, but it was nevertheless attention.

  Michael had said, “We need to build you a babysitter.”

  “Do what? I’m going to sit with our little girl for the most part.”

  “Not for him, but for you.” Michael had clarified.