Professor mFumbo was next in. He seemed quite excited about getting a fancy new computer at Kris’s expense. But of course he would.
“Will you be paying for plug-in surgery?” the professor asked, rubbing the back of his neck where Kris had added a net access to the plug-in that gave Nelly a direct connection to her brain. “I understand that can be quite expensive.”
“It is,” Kris said, “and believe it or not, this is setting me back enough for even a Longknife to blanch at. No. You can talk to your computer like you do to your present system. I had to subvocalize to Nelly the first time I found myself under a gun. We survived.”
“I’d never expect to face a gunman,” the professor insisted.
“Never can tell around Longknifes,” Sergeant Bruce said with an easy smile.
“Yes, of course,” the professor said, and went looking for a cup of tea.
“How much longer before the great moment?” Sergeant Bruce asked. “Abby really wants to know.”
Abby’s smile turned into an elbow in the ribs. “Speak for yourself, Marine. Don’t you go hiding behind a working-woman’s skirts.”
“A smart Marine uses anything for cover,” he shot back, but put some distance between his soft side and her hard elbow.
“I think we’re about ready,” Nelly said. “I’ve been bringing them up and loading what I want on them as Beni put them together. Cara’s Dada is the last one. It needs the least work done on it. I’m putting them in Smart Metal™ skins so you can accessorize them any way you want. Abby pointed out the need for that. Kris, I will want to put myself in a new skin as well.”
“Nothing’s too good for my girl, since she’s already ordered it and paid for it from my account.”
“Will you ever let me forget that?”
“I’ll think about that. Hmm. Nope. Don’t see a good reason to let you forget it.”
“There are a lot of things you probably wouldn’t want everyone here to know about you, Kris,” Nelly said. “I can think of several incidents in high school that you found extremely embarrassing.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“I haven’t in the past. But I bet Abby could make a tidy sum for the both of us if I let her in on all the dirt. Remember that time in college . . .”
“I remember nothing,” Kris said, eyeing the overhead.
“Nothing about high school. Nothing about college, and definitely nothing about the cost of your kids.”
“I thought we could arrive at an acceptable settlement.”
“You know, Kris,” Jack said, “I thought it might be good to have someone covering my back like Nelly, but I’m starting to have second thoughts.”
“Me too,” chimed in Abby. “A girl’s got the right to have a secret or fifty.”
“And I’m sure that you will bring up your new computer to recognize those important needs,” Nelly said.
“So how come you don’t?” Kris asked Nelly.
“Look who brought me up.”
“There is that,” Jack said, rubbing his chin. “So, you’re stuck with Nelly the way you raised her.”
“Looks like it,” Kris said. “Hey, anyone here want the one and only original Nelly? I’ll swap you for the brand-new version. Think of all the time you’ll save, not having to train your new computer.”
Kris’s suggestion was greeted by a crushing silence.
“Did I miss something?” Chief Beni said, stepping outside the plastic walls of his temporary clean room.
“Nothing much,” Penny said. “Kris was just trying to escape her just deserts. What do you have for us?”
“Brand-new computers,” Chief Beni said with full hamish flair, “fresh from the hands of a computer god, my friends. I want this one,” he said, putting a tray of personal computers down on a table and selecting one.
“Cara, the turquoise jewel is yours,” Nelly said. The twelve-year-old grabbed it and held it up for a good look.
“How do you tell them apart?” Kris asked, looking at the others.
“There’s no difference,” Nelly said. “Until you download the contents of your old computer into the new one and start using it, they’re all just about the same.”
JUST ABOUT? Kris thought.
MAYBE Jack’s is a BIT More DECISIVE. Penny’s will CAST ITS search PARAMETERS a BIT WIDER. I DIDN’T know WHAT To Do for ABBY.
I’M sure she will Do JUST fine.
The chief did have a surprise for them. Dangling from each computer was a thin wire headset. One by one, he attached it to each new owner’s head at his or her temple, then ran it around one ear and down to the back of the neck. He checked the results of this installation with a black box in his left hand.
“It’s not as fancy as a direct insert into the brain, but it should be able to pick up a lot of your brain waves, and send as well,” the chief told them.
Captain Drago went off to one corner to sit and stare at the ceiling, his lips occasionally moving. Professor mFumbo headed for another. Penny and Abby settled down at a table, put their new and old computers next to each other, and waited for each of them to establish its own separate network. Jack, Colonel Cortez, and Sergeant Bruce took their own table.
Cara started sitting next to Abby, but in a moment she jumped up, announced, “Dada has just so many fab games,” and dashed out, only to return a few minutes later with her gaming gloves, earphones, and goggles. This time she settled down on a couch and was soon waving her hands through a game.
“It’s teaching her the mathematical relationships she was having so much trouble with. But don’t tell her that,” Nelly whispered.
Chief Beni hovered at first one table, then another, making sure no one had any complaints. Once he was satisfied everyone was happy with his work, he went back into his clean lab.
“What’s he up to?” Kris asked.
“Da Vinci is not talking to me at the moment,” Nelly said. “I think they’re doing something they don’t want public yet. I hope the chief doesn’t hurt Da Vinci.”
“You can always wipe it down to basic and start all over again,” Kris said.
“Would you do that to a baby of yours?” Nelly snapped.
“Hold it, girl. You don’t really want to be a person, do you? You’ve got advantages we flesh-and-blood types just don’t have. You sure you want to adopt all our handicaps?”
“I don’t know. I need to think about it.” And Kris found a growing quiet in her head.
She considered roving the tables, but everyone seemed intent on staring at his or her computer or the overhead or the carpet. Even the view ports now showed only the wall of the space station with its disorder of pipes and conduits; nothing fun there.
Kris was just about to go see what Ron was up to when a voice said in her head, Can you hear Me, Kris?
Since the voice sounded like her chief of security, Kris thought, YES, Jack. How’s IT GOING?
This is WEIRD, you SOUND JUST like yourself.
So Do you.
I Don’T HAVE To punch for you. JUST KIND of VAGUELY Think Kris AND SOMETHING I WANT To say To you, AND you GET IT.
SEEMS THAT way. We’ll HAVE To WAIT for SOMEONE else To Try This COMMLINK To see how Much THINKING IT Takes To GET up a PARTY line.
Nelly, you LISTENING To This?
Of course I AM. Don’T BOTHER Me, THOUGH.
Kris: She’s JUST as snippy in your HEAD as she is in your ear.
Jack: I KIND of EXPECTED THAT.
ABBY: EXPECTED WHAT?
Kris AND JACK: YOU’RE here!
Kris: Hey, THAT CAME OUT TOGETHER.
Penny: WHAT CAME OUT TOGETHER?
There was crosstalk for a second that sounded like unintelligible cocktail chatter, then all of them fell silent.