“Part one of your brain boost, weeks of training—makes you all good citizens. Don’t mess with these beauties. Follow instructions to the letter or you’ll be shit down the chute, useless to me or anyone else.”
Jacobi and Ishida examine their packages with curled lips. “Could have used one of these earlier, right?” Jacobi asks me.
Borden and Joe and Tak and the Russians hold theirs gingerly.
Two minutes left.
“They’re called caps,” Bueller says. “Used to be an acronym, I forget for what.”
“Cranial Amplified Programming,” Borden says.
“Yes, ma’am. Now you know why I forgot. You don’t need to shave your heads, just pull the caps out of their wrappers, place them over the center of your crown, and they’ll settle in and glue down. Leave them there until they fall off. They don’t put anything inside your skull but training and info, and that’ll take twelve hours to set up and become useful.”
“Not for these two,” Borden says, pointing to me and DJ. “We need their heads clear.” She takes Bueller aside and they have words. The commander has doubts DJ and I are up for this much stimulation. I hear something about her not knowing all that they put me through back at Madigan. Wouldn’t want to trigger instaurations. Maybe she said installations. Either way, what the hell are they?
“Everybody, ma’am,” Bueller insists with a concerned expression, brooking no dissent, even from rank. “We’re really short and we need expert drivers. If they don’t get it, they won’t have the proper training, and they won’t have touch ID. The machines won’t recognize them, they won’t be able to coordinate with the team—they could all die down there!”
Grunts love to watch command argue. Makes us feel warm and cozy. Bueller’s winning, but Borden isn’t happy. She backs off, head lowered, like she wants to butt someone, anyone.
“Me, too?” Ishida asks, touching her metal cranium.
“Yeah,” Bueller says. She delicately examines Ishida’s head, finger hovering, and studies the line between metal and flesh. “Plenty of room. You’ll be fine,” she says.
“Arigato,” Ishida says.
“What’s in them?” Tak asks.
“Reflex learning, part one. Key ideas. Words and phrases that will speed your getting acquainted with seed product down on the Wax.”
“Product…” Ishida says.
“Weapons and vehicles,” Bueller says. “Seeds begin to suck up processed materials as soon as your glider connects with the reserves stockpiled on the base platform. If the base or the platform still exists. We’ll know that in a couple of hours, after we get there. We can’t see it from orbit. Understood?”
“Vehicles and big weapons get assembled in place,” Tak says, as if this makes all the sense in the world. Joe watches us from forward, where he’s sitting between Borden and Kumar.
“Starting with those seeds,” Jacobi says.
“Right,” Bueller says.
“Wax?” DJ asks.
“Whole damn moon is covered with waxy residues, along with poisons, corrosive bases, and saline cesspools. Worse than you’d encounter in your worst nightmare. There’s even traces of something like sarin gas, and if that seeps into your gear…”
Better and better. Bug is back and thinks it’s all very cozy. Saline solution ripe with metals? Mother’s milk to ancient life. Lightning and electricity? Once there were entire ecosystems that dined only on electrons and scavenged their dead to replace membranes. We’re all wimps compared to the great old ones.
Thirty seconds.
Borden, Jacobi, Ishida, Ishikawa, Kumar, and I share a number. That means we’ll cohabit a grape. We crawl inside, Borden last. The big blue sphere is heavily padded with thin, sun-yellow lamps hiding between the cushions. I see the swirly pattern, like being inside a soccer ball. The hatch closes. Ishida mutters and Jacobi looks around, anticipating the next slam. From our point of view, new tech has never implied comfort.
“Resuming now,” Bueller says.
Second-phase acceleration begins. It’s much gentler than the first. We shift to one side of the ball and bump the cushions. No straps, no drama. All there is to it. We’re cargo, packed and ignorant but so far comfortable enough. Warm and comfortable.
“This is Big Vamoose?” Jacobi asks.
The pressure grows in that same direction. Ishida closes her eyes, claps her hands, mutters. Maybe she’s praying again.
We’re floating inside a soccer ball, wearing yarmulkes, hitching a ride on a Chinese warrior lady with long, burned skirts—about to fly off to rescue an entire moon. I’m still recovering from watching our bolts trim Box, from feeling Lady of Yue mess with Jesus and everything else about reality. I still can’t believe any of it. But then, I didn’t believe I was going to Mars the first time, either.
Jacobi spread-eagles and bumps into Borden’s leg. Borden withdraws, tightening her space. Ishikawa’s taking it all in stride—no strain, no sweat. Kumar tucks his doilied head, folds his legs and arms into a lotus, and rolls to a point of stable rest.
Finally, Crew Chief’s voice reaches us inside the sphere. “Guidance reports Box still tracking at a million klicks, so close your eyes. That’s what I do. Close your eyes and count backward from ten.”
I get to five before my fingers tingle. I feel a weird crawling and tightening on my head. The cap, I assume. I sure hope my quantum junk has been scrubbed.
Then…
I black out.
Don’t feel a thing.
COBWEBS
Darkness, close and warm. Air smells stale, like I’ve been here awhile. I remember where we are. A moment of concern, not quite panic, as I think the lights will come on and I’ll be surrounded by desiccated mummies.
But the ball brightens and everyone’s fine. Borden thrashes, as does Ishida, who might hurt someone if she’s not careful—but she quickly regains motor control and looks embarrassed. “Gomenasai,” she says.
“De nada,” Ishikawa says, rubbing her shoulder.
I feel reasonably chipper. My scalp itches. I look around. There’s something silvery and dusty on our heads, like a net of gossamer threads. I pat my scalp. The others refuse to pay attention, so I thump my crown and say, “Cobwebs, ladies.”
They reach up, hesitate in unison—kind of comical, like they don’t want to find a spider. Then they pat the gossamer and make disgusted faces.
“What the fuck is this?” Jacobi asks, inspecting a clump of threads.
“Laying eggs,” I say.
“Fuck you!” Ishida says, and keeps plucking and balling up the stuff that comes out of her short hair. “It’s that goddamned cap.”
Kumar wakes next, legs still tucked into a lotus. He reaches across to Jacobi’s temple and pinches up a thread. Jacobi’s reaction is swift; she grabs his hand, ready to crush fingers, snap wrist, break arm—
Kumar freezes. Privilege does not precede him everywhere. He says, “Pardon me. Do you feel any difference?”
“No.” Jacobi shoves his hand aside.
He flexes his fingers. “Nor do I, yet.”
Borden wakes last. Seeing the others, her hand goes to her scalp. Her expression is priceless. “Jesus Christ!” she says. “Is this it?”
“Part one, the crew chief said,” Kumar observes.
“I demand a raise,” Ishida says.
The lights brighten. The hole in the soccer ball slides open. Bueller peers in. “I’m cracking my little eggs,” she says. “Chicks are bright and fluffy. It’s been two weeks. We’re about halfway. Come on out and get some food.”