Chapter 2

I lived out on a lake in the middle of heavily wooded countryside in Minnesota. Even though I'd been gone about two weeks before my adventure with Jawa was finished, no one seemed to have been by the place or noticed that I'd been gone. The cottage reeked with the smell of trash that should have been taken out a long time ago and the refrigerator was damn scary as well. I took care of all of the really shitty jobs first thing and left all of the windows and doors open to air the place out a bit.

Jawa's crash landing had interrupted what was to be a six week stay at the cottage. That life altering event had happened on my eleventh day up here so the fridge had been pretty full. Oh well! Soon enough things would smell alright again I promised myself while cleaning things up.

While I'd been cleaning, my mind was busily laying out what to do next and once I was finished with the cleaning blitz I locked things up and drove back into the nearest town of any real size. Jawa's Replicator technology had been pretty damn cool I do have to admit — but nothing beats real cooking and I really had a need for a thick juicy steak with all of the trimmings!

As I drove the sixty miles my mind drifted a bit and I found myself thinking about all of the things I'd missed in life: good female companionship, sons and daughters, and most of all close friends to share life's pleasures with. Not that a merchant mariner has a bad life, but you really don't get to build much of a circle of friends outside of a few other seaman you end up getting teamed up with from job to job. Having a steady supply of honestly good sex with a woman you loved was just not going to happen and with STDs as rampant as they are the idea of "a pussy in every port" would be pretty much the same as a death wish. Now with the new lease on life that Jawa had given me I could pretty much start all over again — but this time I'd be starting out wealthy and secure.

My musings drew short as I pulled into the parking lot of Carver's Steak House. You really couldn't go wrong with anything on the menu here, but I was set on one of their thick sirloin steaks and a really cold beer!

This rather attractive waitress headed my way and introduced herself. "Hi my name's Mina and I'll be serving you tonight!"

"Damn if I ain't the luckiest son of a bitch then!" I said giving her a mock leer to let her know I was just teasing her a bit.

"Now, now mister! We don't offer those kinds of services!" then she bent down and whispered loudly "At least not where everyone can hear about it."

"Oh! Well maybe you'd better tell me what kind of things you do offer then so I can stay out of trouble," I suggested.

Mina handed me a menu and I pointed out just what I wanted. She turned my order into the cook and was back in a flash with my beer.

"The salad bar comes with your meal sir and I'll be back with your steak and potatoes as soon as they're ready."

"Thank you Mina," I replied as she turned to leave.

The food was very good and I flirted shamelessly with the attractive young waitress every chance I got. She played the game rather nicely and I'm pretty sure we both were having fun with it. My tab came up to about thirty dollars and I left two fifties on the table when I walked out. I figured there'd be a pretty good chance Mina would remember me if I came back this way again!

I hadn't even made it back to my truck before she was running after me. "Sir! Sir! You made a mistake! This is far too much money! You've overpaid!"

I turned to her and smiled "Now how can you say that? I had a wonderful meal and was served by a charming and beautiful woman. I think I did quite well for the money I paid, besides — it can't be easy waiting on horny old goats like me all of the time and you did a spectacular job. Just think of it as my way of saying thanks! Now you get back in there before your other customers die of starvation."

Mina gave me a wonderful smile and turned to head back into the restaurant. "You be sure to come back now Bill!" she said over her shoulder as she stepped through the door.

I'd truly enjoyed flirting with the twenty something young woman, but as I drove back to the cottage it really bothered me that she probably just thought of me as an old man.

I walked into the utility shed and carefully closed the door behind me. The lights came on as the door was shut and once again I had to adjust to the paradox of spatial distortion. The spatial distortion chamber was controlled by one of the more special and amazing gifts Jawa had left me with: an Artificial Intelligence. I just couldn't seem to come up with a suitable name for it until I was in the restaurant tonight. One whole wall of the restaurant was covered in those sexy drawings known as "The Vargas Girls". I decided to name the AI Vargas.

"Good evening Sir," the AI intoned in the polite manner Jawa had programmed it.

"Good evening to you as well," I greeted in return.

"I've thought of a name for you."

"Oh? What would that be Sir?"

"Vargas. I'd like to call you Vargas."

"Vargas. That sounds like an interesting word Sir. What does it mean?" the AI inquired.

"It's not so much what it means that made me select it. You see there was an artist who painted some pictures I really like and he went by the name of Vargas."

"Oh I see. The name provides some personal enjoyment then. Good. I'd much rather be called a name that has positive meaning to you than perhaps one of the more colorful swear words your planet's languages seemed to abound with," Vargas responded doing his best to sound like an English butler.

I chuckled at his response. "Now Vargas, I'd like you to tell me more about the many things that Jawa left for me."

"That would be my pleasure Sir."

About two hours later, after spending about ten minutes trying to figure out a polite way to tell Vargas I had enough, I finally just said "That's enough for now. It's too bad there isn't some faster way for me to learn about all of this."

"Oh, well there is Sir. You can learn about it while you sleep," Vargas informed me.

"While I sleep?" I queried.

"Yes Sir. You'd need to sleep in the learning chamber of course but it was designed with your comfort in mind so that shouldn't be a problem. Shall I show it to you?"

"Please."

To me it looked like a fairly comfortable bed ringed by a dozen or so obsidian obelisks set in an evenly spaced circle. Each obelisk was about eight feet high and apparently contained an instructing AI that could somehow link into my mind while I was sleeping and instruct me.

"I should probably just go back and lock up the cottage first," I muttered to myself.

"I can have a drone take care of that Sir," Vargas offered.

"What if someone sees it?" I asked.

"All of your drones are cloaked when operating outside of this facility Sir."

"Oh. Well if by that you mean invisible then go right ahead and take care of it then."

I stripped out of my clothes and lay down in the bed. Almost immediately I drifted off into a deep sleep. When I woke up five hours later, I was completely stunned by the sheer number and variety of things Jawa had left for me. First, the twelve instructing AIs that ringed my learning chamber were repositories for most all of the knowledge attained by sentient beings within the explored universe. Jawa had literally left me with the means to build spaceships and travel the universe, terraform planets for human habitation, develop meaningful trade with other space faring races, as well as seemingly endless other possibilities!

The very first thing I needed to do was to get control of the situation around me before anyone attempted to end my existence or take these fabulous gifts from me.

"Vargas what time is it?"

"The chronometric device you removed from your wrist is displaying 4:15 AM."

"Well in that case good morning Vargas. Now I have a few questions that you could help me with. First, is there anyway for the two of us to communicate when I am away from this place without the risk of our communication being intercepted or listened to by others?"

"Is there any form of communication you'd prefer?" Vargas inquired.

"Telepathic would be nice but probably not possible," I replied with a chuckle.

"I'm sorry sir, you are correct. Unlike your organic brain, I do not have the necessary receptors for that type of communication," Vargas informed me.

"You're not saying that I do have them are you?"

"Sir I believe that Jawa has already shared with you the fact that prior to your stay in his medical suite you were only using a small portion of your brainpower. Now there are areas of your brain that are gradually coming into play that you have never utilized before. Though the medical AIs had not encountered any of your specific kind in the past, you do share many characteristics in common with Jawa's kind. This similarity has led them to hypothesize that you may in fact acquire telepathic capabilities," Vargas stated.

"Well that could be interesting I suppose, but it won't help me communicate with you then?"

"Regrettably not sir; however I could implant a small crystal within your skull that would interface with your mind and act as a communications relay between you and I," Vargas offered.

"Tell me more."

"Its use is quite simple. You just think of who you want to communicate with and what you wish to say and the device will create the communications link and handle the transmissions automatically."

"I thought it would just be you and I talking Vargas."

"Primarily that might be true, but this would also work with any of your other AIs or any other human you decide to have fitted with a similar implanted crystal."

"And the communication transmissions can't be detected by Earth technology?"

"Correct. The transmission is actually sent through a higher dimension that the crystals are sensitive to."

"That would do it!" I replied enthusiastically.

"So Vargas, how do we go about doing this and will it be painful?"

"I just need you to visit the medical suite for a few hours. We inject nanobots in your blood stream that will carry the materials to the correct location in your brain, grow the crystal and the organic interface, and after their job is complete be carried out of your body via your urinary tract. There should be no pain sir," Vargas answered.

"Alright then Vargas. I'll just move to the medical suite now then."

Right around seven thirty in the morning woke up feeling very refreshed and alert. I knew why I was in the medical suite and was quite anxious to test out my communications crystal.

"Vargas can you hear me?" I thought to the AI.

"Yes sir I can and with perfect clarity I might add."

"Wonderful! What kind of range can we communicate over?" I inquired.

"I'm not certain I understand you sir. Are you asking if we can switch between frequencies and if so what range of frequencies? Or are you talking about distance?"

"I was thinking about distances Vargas." I clarified.

"The exact answer to your question involves quite a lot of mathematical formulas. It might be best if I let you know that this type of crystal and organic interface were developed to solve the problems of Galactic growth experienced by a conglomerate of cooperative species who refer to themselves as the Paxtal Federation. Their Federation had been growing steadily for more than two millennia and since they were a highly democratic organization they needed a quick and reliable form of communication. The distances involved as their federation continued to expand quickly exceeded the capabilities of any previously known communication method and they were forced to devise a more advanced method of communication or see their Federation fall apart as it became impossible for all of the members of the democratic organization to have their say.

"To summarize, I don't know of any distance limitation and can point to the fact that the Paxtal Federation now has member worlds that spread across an entire galaxy," Vargas concluded.

"Wow! I guess I don't need to bother you any more about that for now."

I ate a breakfast provided by the replicator while we worked on my list of concerns: personal security, wealth, transportation, and power. I've already lived a respectable span of years and had quite a bit of time to read and think. Yes I've heard that absolute power corrupts absolutely and I've seen enough examples to believe it to be at least partially true. On the other hand I've seen some pretty major screw-ups by governments of every variety and doubt I'd be any worse to live under than a bunch of power crazed bureaucrats.

The more Vargas and I talked about these concerns the more obvious my feelings on the various subjects became both to Vargas and myself. It wasn't as if I wanted to rule the world as much as it was that I didn't want anyone else ruling over me. I had technology that could benefit mankind in countless ways — or I could just build a large spaceship, grab a handful of like minded colonists and go terra form another planet while leaving Earth to fend for itself.

In many ways the idea of colonizing another world was very appealing; but I did feel some loyalty to my fellow human beings — just not to any governments in particular. I knew that with the technology at my disposal someone, even here in the good old US of A, would be tempted to just take over the entire planet instead of dealing with the problems that multiple forms of government represent. In some ways I could see a benefit in that, but I could see a tremendous amount of potential problems as well.

I figured that I needed to establish my own country on new real estate that no country now claimed. Vargas and I came up with a rather ingenious multi-stage plan to do just that. The first stage alone fascinated me and I knew that I would enjoy all of the work ahead of me.

The start of the plan required that we build a spaceship capable of in-system travel. Adding Faster Than Light (FTL) engines for galactic travel could come later and the class of ship we needed in the beginning might never call for it since this ship basically needed to be able to carry cargo from Earth to the moon and back. Once our first ship was in place we would need to carry a large number of drones to the moon and build a factory there. This factory would harvest the necessary raw materials from the moon to build a very large spaceship as well as numerous other items.