Chapter 1: Un-Retiring

I was retired after 23 years of active service in the Navy, just enjoying not having to get up if I didn't feel like it. Our children were finally grown and in college, and my wife and I did whatever we felt like every day. I puttered around on the computer, drank too much with my neighbors, complained about the way the world was going to pot, and went fishing every chance I got.

One thing I didn't do was golf. It had been suggested, semi-seriously, by more than one person that if I'd been willing to take up golf I could have made Rear Admiral and stayed in for a while longer. I wasn't sure that it was worth the effort. I was an Engineer. I fixed broken machines. I didn't do politics very well.

When I mention the world going to pot, it turns out I was right. It seemed like just about everybody had their own hate group. Some hated the blacks, some hated the whites, some hated the Jews or Mexicans. Me? I was just about convinced that there was something to all the "New World Order" crackpot rumors about the UN being behind all the racial strife as well as having people in the Department of Homeland Security up at the policy level. If you believed some of them, the UN was ready to take over the whole country just as soon as they could engineer a crisis big enough to justify declaring martial law. DHS had, in the last twenty years or so, bought more guns and ammo than the US Army had. Just as bad, there were websites that talked about what you could do to help take the DHS down when it happened.

Some websites talked about secret committees of rich Austrians or whoever that really ran the world but they made no real sense when you actually got down to looking at their evidence. The websites that warned us all about the UN subverting our constitution actually had links to real documents, real treaties, real events. It was enough to make me worry. When I wasn't drinking or fishing, that was.

Diana did a whole lot of nothing, too, visiting with her friends and volunteering here and there for a couple of charity-oriented places when she wasn't taking care of me. Really, it was the life I'd always dreamed of when I was still serving, but after a few years I was beginning to get bored.

When this corporate recruiter, a Mr. George Robinson, for a company I'd never heard of -and neither had Google- showed up at our condo, I'd had about enough of the tinfoil-hat brigade for a day but it was too early for drinking and the weather was too lousy for fishing. Sure, I'll talk to him.

We had stepped into our 3rd bedroom, the one we had set aside as a library and office, so that we could talk. He had pulled something out of his briefcase, unfolded it on the floor where it turned into a green-glowing ring, and told me to step on it. I would be someplace else.

No sales pitch, no lead-in, no nothing. I had smiled and told him that this was just too complicated for me to do right the first time and asked if he could demonstrate it for me. He said "Fine, wait a second, I'll be right back."

He had stepped on it -the ring turned red- and disappeared. The ring turned green again, then after a few seconds it turned red just before my recruiter appeared again, this time facing me and walking off it. He almost ran me over, since I was getting a closer look at the ring.

"What's the range on these things?"

"I don't know. I just know that when it's ready it glows green, and when it's not ready it is red or not glowing at all."

"Okay, any idea how long this will take? I mean, will I be back for dinner?"

"I don't think so. Frankly, I'm just the recruiter and I have a lot of other people to talk to, so if you'll step on the pad I'll get on my way. The people waiting for you will be able to answer all of your questions."

"Hmmm. Is this pad staying here so I can come home again, or are you taking it with you, stranding me wherever I am?"

He had smiled and said "And that is why I was told to recruit you if at all possible. You don't go anywhere you haven't thought through yet, like a pilot."

"Who told you that?"

"Admiral Thomas Kennedy."

"I thought he died. Car crash or something."

"Or something. We staged an accident that made it look like he died. He's still alive, and he told us we need to get you on the team. Okay, you aren't going to want to come back, but I can go first if you want, then come back for the disk."

"What are you going to tell my wife, when you come out of this room without me?"

"You went to the bathroom. And I try to avoid awkward questions like this."

"You really need to come up with a better sales pitch than this."

He had sighed. "Yeah, I know, but this is all still new to me, too. Okay, just wait until the disk is green again before stepping on it." Then he had gotten on it again and disappeared again.

I couldn't resist. I had to try it out. I stepped on the ring...

... and I was walking into a different room, one with several people waiting for me. On a ship. That much was obvious. In fact...

"This ship was not built by us. Do we know who built it?"

"Yes, the same people who gave it to us built it; it's ours fair and square. Gentlemen, I give you Captain Roger Edelmann, the engineer I wanted. I may outrank him, but if he ever gives me an order I will say "Yes, sir" and do it. Others will stop to argue that he can't give them orders, and they will all get killed. Me, I'm doing what he tells me to do." That was Admiral Kennedy, the man who had led the formal inquiry into my part of the Blowfish accident.

I smiled. "Sir, the rumors of your death appear to have been..."

" ... greatly exaggerated, yes, I know. Actually, you are probably going to have to 'die', too."

That made me pause for a minute. Didn't I just spend all morning reading a website that collected all the "One World" hidden government conspiracy rumors? That was one of the things pointed out by the kooks, all the people who disappeared every year. If you had to 'die' to join the conspiracy... "Do I want my wife to die with me?"

"Yes, probably, if you still like her. We're building something out here, and until the UN goes public we can only get dead people to work for us. It makes it really awkward going home to see the grandchildren."

"So we can't tell anyone?"

"Exactly. If you tell your wife, she has to die with you."

"There has to be a better way to do this. Am I supposed to go back through that thing and tell my wife I have to kill her? I don't expect that to go well."

"No, just bring her up."

"Up?"

"We are on a ship, yes. However, we aren't floating in the Atlantic. We are actually behind the Moon, pretty much at the limit for those disks." He pointed at the green ring I had just stepped off of. "From here you'll have to take a shuttle to where the actual work is happening, out around Jupiter. You still have your fishing boat, right?"

"Yes, sir."

"That will work fine. Go get your wife; bring whatever you would take if the two of you went out fishing, lunch basket, cell phone, whatever. We'll make the boat disappear, it'll look like an accident, and you'll both be dead. For what it's worth, welcome to the human race's first interstellar war."

I had to laugh. "Are we the good guys or the bad guys?"

"We're actually allied troops. There is a civilization out here that is in trouble, and they need help. They will provide the resources but we have to do the fighting. Apparently they can't or won't fight, not even to save themselves."

"And what do we get out of it? Are we just mercenaries?"

"Hopefully, we stop the bad guys before they get to Earth. And we get access to a lot of technology like these ships."

"Okay, let me go get Diana. This shouldn't take long. Mr. Robinson?" I waved at the 'corporate recruiter' who had gotten me into this mess.

That hadn't taken very long, really. I just explained that I was being recalled to active duty for a secret program, and we had to disappear. Go get dressed for fishing, we'll take the boat. I asked Mr. Robinson if I could take my laptop.

"Would you take it to go fishing? If so, sure. If you wouldn't take it fishing with you, then no don't take it. We don't want it to look like you are trying to disappear; we are trying to make it look like the two of you went fishing and didn't come back. I've got a tool that will copy the contents while you got ready."

I did take my iPad, a completely overpriced toy that was sometimes helpful, as I would have taken it fishing; it had a GPS in it. If the apocalypse came and it was too dark to see directions, the iPad would tell us which way was home. Diana put together some stuff for lunch, and we stepped back through the ring.

This time there were just a couple of guys there, and one of them introduced himself as Major French -he was wearing an Air Force uniform- and said that he was our tour guide.

As he was leading us, I pointed out that Mr. Robinson had promised me that they would answer all my questions. To start with, how many people do they have up here? Probably a hundred or so. Why me? Because Admiral Kennedy asked for me. Any idea why? We need engineers who don't get flustered and confused.

Why? Because these ships are run by AIs, artificial intelligences, and they don't think the same way we do. We have lost people and damaged equipment because of, um, communication failures. Admiral Kennedy told us to get some paranoid engineers and used you as an example of someone the AIs won't accidentally kill.

Just great. Okay, one last question for now: "Will the AIs on purpose kill me?"

"We don't think so; they came here asking for our help."

Not quite the confident denial I wanted to hear.

Frenchy took us to a hatch and inside to a little efficiency apartment and told us that this would be our home for a couple of days and to dump everything. He then took us back out and down a couple of corridors to another room with a couple of coffin-looking things. There was another guy there, and he took responsibility for us. Frenchy disappeared again.

These were, apparently, autodocs straight from Larry Niven's Known Space stories. We get in and they fix everything wrong. Okay, what's your success rate with these things? How many people have you lost?

"They don't screw up. WE may screw up and ask for something we decide later we don't want, but the med-tubes don't screw up. Look at me. I'm 56." He looked 25 or 30. "I was a reconstructive surgeon for the Army until I came up here to learn about their medical technology. I used to try to put our broken soldiers back together again and I didn't always succeed. These things will do anything I could ever do, and do it better and faster with no mistakes. They will also regress you back to whatever age you want, or even change your body if you decide that you always wanted to be three inches taller."

"Not me! I'm already too tall for my job." I was 5' 11", and that was noticeably taller than was wise for submarine service. I'd learned to always wear a hat of some kind, whether required or not. It saved a lot of head and neck injuries. "Um, this is kinda quick, do I have to decide what I want right now?"

"Oh, no. This is just a quick checkup and some other stuff. Believe me, you'll feel better when you get out, and you'll feel a LOT better in the morning after a good night's sleep."

"Well, what about you, honey? Do you want to be three inches taller?"

"No, thanks. But, can this thing make me smaller here?" She waved at her chest. "The doctors tell me that they are why my back and shoulders always hurt."

"NO!" That was me, and both the doctor and my wife started laughing at me. "Don't take away my toys! Well, okay, but I want my protest recorded. How much smaller?"

"My love, I wear 38DD bras. I'd like to go down to just D. We'll see if you can live with that."

"We can also have it look at strengthening your back and shoulder muscles. We don't have much experience with women in these things yet, we're almost all men up here, but we talk about what we want and the AIs say that they can be much bigger than yours if they get supported right."

"Well, I don't want bigger, but I'll take that support if you can do it."

"We can do that. Now, as I was saying, we can also do age regression. Like I said, I'm 56 and I look the way I did when I got out of medical school at 30. You'll see some guys all the way back to their teens. Don't judge someone by their apparent age, you'll be wrong. Although, that may be a good judge of their emotional age."

We both chuckled at that. I chose 30 and Diana chose 27, smiling because that's how old we were when we met. We asked if we both climb in, or what, and Diana said she was waiting until I came out again before she climbed in. How long does this take? About 10 or 15 minutes, not long at all. Okay, what do I do? You have to undress and climb in. Diana reiterated her decision to wait until I came out again.

I've undressed in front of guys before - did I mention that I spent 23 years in the Navy?- I've undressed in front of a doctor before, I've undressed in front of my wife before, but I'd never undressed in front of a doctor and my wife before. Somehow, that made it different. I put all my clothes on a chair and climbed into the autodoc. The lid started to close, and I fell asleep just that fast.

When I woke up I felt much better. I had no idea how much everything was bothering me until it stopped. I felt GREAT! I started to get up, and I said "I feel great! Better than I have in a long time."

The doctor replied "Maybe since you were thirty? You've picked up a lot of aches and pains since then. Now, much of the work is ongoing, but your whole body is going to work better once we are done here. Um, I don't know if you noticed yet, but your wife asked for some improvements. You should check them out tonight."

I finished getting up and gave her a hug. "I feel a lot better than I have in a long time, honey. We may get some exercise tonight."

"I hope so!" Then, to the doctor, "Is it my turn?"

He said yes so we let go of each other and I got dressed as she got undressed. That would have gone faster but I was helping her undress. Not that my help was very helpful, but I felt a lot better than I had in a long time, and I wanted to play. In fact...

"Did you ask for this?" I said, waving at something a good more attentive to her than it had been recently, and perhaps more respectable, too.

"Of course I did, dear. That gives you the right to tell the doctor what changes you want in me with a clear conscience once I'm asleep, too."

By that time she had managed to finish undressing even with my help, and fought her way to the autodoc. She climbed in -I helped her with a hand where it belonged, on her ass- and the doctor told me to stand back. The lid closed on her, and the doctor turned to me.

"Okay, she's asleep now and you can tell me what you want her to look like."

"Well, I thought she looked fine when we met. That's the ages we chose, how old we were when we met."

"Then you know what you want already. I meant, do you want her more slender, taller, bigger breasts, smaller butt?"

"The lady I remember meeting looked fine. I mean, she looked great."

"Hold on. AI, can you display Mrs. Edelmann's current appearance and also her appearance at 27?"

Two nude, well, more than pictures but not quite models appeared in the air on the other side of the autodoc, slowly turning. The one on the left was Diana-as-she-was-now, and the one on the right was Diana-as-she-was-when-we-met. I hadn't realized how much we had gone downhill in the last fifteen years. I mean, for a girl in her forties Diana looked good, but the Diana on the right had my pecker trying to reach out and touch it.

"What did she ask for, here?" waving at my pecker.

"Your wife asked if it could be longer and thicker, and we decided on a half inch and a quarter-inch respectively. This will happen slowly over the next couple of days. We could have done that faster but you would have to stay in the tube for an hour or so and we have other people coming up. I should also point out that the difference between a limp penis and an erect one is due to engorgement with blood, so major changes in size will also cause major problems with blood pressure. You don't want the side effects that come with an 18" cock."

"Okay, can you tell if I will fit inside her all the way like that? I don't want to hurt either of us."

"Yes, women are able to adjust for a variety of sizes, although I would recommend not getting any longer unless you modify her, too, and that causes trouble. She has more organs in there than you do, and she doesn't have much room for a deeper vagina. It would be better to shorten you again than to make her deeper."

"Okay, we'll leave that alone. Now, can you fix it so that her back and shoulders don't hurt? I really don't want her chest to be smaller."

"That's not a problem. As I said, we don't have many women up here but us men all talk about this. Large mammaries are a social aberration in our species, and our bodies aren't designed to support that extra weight. I would recommend adding a bit more to her bottom for balance, but not much, maybe an inch around. AI, please show an added inch around her hips and enhanced mammary support to the right hologram."

That's what these were, holograms! Well, they were pretty clear, very good, very easy to see what you wanted. And, with that change the one on the right looked even better than before.

"Um, Diana was developing a pooch right here..." I patted my lower belly " ... and that was causing some trouble. Can you get rid of that?"

"Sure, no problem. Although, with that change you really need to not grow your equipment any longer, as you will fill her up all the way with your current size if you take that pad away."

He had the AI show that, and I said that Diana was just about perfect, for me at least, just like that. The two holograms went away and I sat down to struggle with my wading boots. After that we just stood around talking until Diana was done.

"You need some twenty-year-old golf magazines in here."

The doctor laughed. "You're right. We need some 'Highlights for Children', and some twenty-year-old 'Time' magazines, too. 'President Reagan selected as the Man of the Year', yeah. That would make everyone feel right at home here in my waiting room."

"What did you mean, large breasts are an aberration?"

"Large breasts serve no biological function; the mammary glands don't need all that surrounding tissue. They are only there because today's men like big tits. Because men like big tits, women with big tits tend to be more sexually active and have more children than women with smaller tits, and that pushes natural selection to gradually adjust our species to have larger tits. But, since our bodies have no mechanism to support this useless mass of fatty tissue, they tend to sag and hang after a while."

"You sound like you don't like big tits."

"Oh, I like big tits just as much as you do, I just understand that they aren't a good idea if you are in a primitive culture with limited food and poor climate control. It's hard for a woman like your wife to stay cool in hot weather. She has an extra layer of insulation that skinny people don't have."

Well, that was true. Diana had more padding all around than I did, and she certainly didn't like being hot. Add all that fat on her chest and on her behind ... yeah, she would care about air conditioning a lot more than I would. That made a lot of sense. All right, back to important things.

"Okay, let's talk about my pecker. Should I get it reduced again?"

"No, it's fine if you don't change your wife any more. So, are you planning on screwing her as soon as she gets out?"

"No, we'll wait until tonight for that."

"Right. Please let me know how that goes. The med-tube gave you some nanites, that's what we call machines that are too small to see, that are continuing to clean out your arteries and do other stuff, and they can be re-programmed to make other changes if you decide."

"You don't call this an 'autodoc'? That's what it is, it's an automated doctor."

"No, it's not automated; it's actually just a dumb machine like everything else around here, a combination MRI and nanite programmer. It's the AI that runs it and makes it look smart. Well, it does have some more capabilities for emergency and trauma support, but it's better to make changes slowly using the nanites instead of doing surgery. Think about what kind of surgery would be required to make your wife six inches taller, if she had wanted. It's much better to let the nanites do things like that over a period of weeks."

Every profession that is complicated enough to require training has its own argot, its own jargon, and no one outside that profession can understand what the insiders are talking about when they talk shop. If the doctor running this machine doesn't want to call it an autodoc, that's his call. 'Med-tube' it is.

And of course he was right. Making someone's left leg shorter was done occasionally, to match an injured right leg that had become shorter. That was horribly painful and involved long-term therapy, but it was far easier than lengthening an arm or leg. I didn't want to spend too long imagining the surgery involved in making someone half a foot taller overnight. No thanks, we'll do it their way.

"Speaking of the AI, what access will I have to it?"

"AI, have you been told what access Captain Edelmann should have?"