Maneka sent back the flow of her own gratitude. It was odd, she reflected yet again, how their relationship had altered since she first reawakened in his backup survival center. In many ways, they were closer than ever, and Lazarus had learned far more about human emotions—and occasional irrationality—than any other Bolo was ever likely to have learned. After all, the two of them had spent over a Standard Century living in the same "body."
Yet they'd lived there as two totally separate entities. When they linked fully, they fused even more seamlessly than they had when Maneka had possessed a human body, but between those periods of fusion, there was a scrupulously maintained firewall between their personalities and viewpoints. Which was probably just as well for her, given the overwhelming nature of any Bolo's personality.
There were still times, many of them, when she regretted the loss of her mortality. Her psychotronic state had done nothing to reduce the pain when friends and loved ones died, and although Lazarus'
sensors and computational ability had become hers, there were moments when she longed inexpressibly to once more experience the smell of hot chocolate, the taste of a hot dog smothered in chili and onions.
The touch of another human being's lips upon her own. She could still relive those experiences, for her psychotronic memory of them was as perfect and imperishable as any Bolo's, but it wasn't the same, and never could be.
Yet if much had been lost, much had also been given, she told herself. Her own particular version of Operator Identification Syndrome was just a tad more pronounced than that of any other Bolo commander in history, she thought with a flicker of amusement. In fact, in very many ways, she'd had two
"husbands" for the past hundred and five Standard Years. She and Ed might not have shared any physical relationship with one another over those years, but the shared parenting of their children and her own total, if not precisely normal, involvement in their lives had produced a binding which defied the use of any other terminology. And for those same years, she and Lazarus had been, quite literally, wedded in a single body.
And from the moment Adrian Agnelli allowed himself to accept that somehow, impossible though it had seemed, Maneka Trevor was still alive inside the duralloy body of Unit 28/G-179-LAZ, she had also enjoyed a full and infinitely rewarding "career."
"—under Admiral Ju's capable command," the general said. "If our projections are met, the initial Bastion settlements will be fully self-sustaining within no more than two Standard Years. And, of course, our new colonists' military security will be as high a priority for us as our own security here in Lakshmaniah has always been. In space, that security will be the responsibility of our Navy. And on Bastion itself—"
It is not difficult to follow my Commander's—Maneka's—thoughts at this moment. Indeed, I have learned more of Humanity, and of this Human in particular, since the day of her physical death than even I had ever suspected might be learned. They are a most remarkable species, my creators. So many of them fall so short of the standards to which they aspire, yet all have the potential to aspire to them. And some, like Maneka Trevor and Edmund Hawthorne and Adrian Agnelli and Indrani Lakshmaniah, rise to the very pinnacle of that potentiality, despite the brevity and fragility of their lives.
It has been an enormous privilege to be part of that process, although I realize that not even my Commander truly recognizes the extent to which that is true. Humans see the sacrifices of the Brigade. They see the shattered war hulls, the casualty roles. They see the Bolos which have been decommissioned, the older Bolos whose personality centers were burned when they became dangerously obsolescent. In their inner hearts, they fear that we who serve as Humanity's sword and shield must resent the fact that our creation condemns us to a warrior's existence and the pain and death which so often awaits the warrior. They do not fully grasp the fact that we Bolos recognize in ourselves—in our fidelity, our sense of identity and continuity and our commitment to the proud history and honor code of the Dinochrome Brigade—an echo of flawed Humanity's endless struggle to achieve that same fidelity, that same commitment. They gave us as our common birthright that greatness for which they themselves must eternally strive, and the best among them have served—and died—on our command decks, as loyal to the beings of molecular circuitry and alloy and fusion power plants as ever the Dinochrome Brigade has been to the beings of fragile protoplasm who created us. And that is why we can never resent them. Because even in their failures, they have always honored the compact between us.
I believe Maneka, to whom, more than any other Bolo commander, it has been given to experience both aspects of the Brigade's tradition and continuity, may actually have come to understand that Bolo-Human compact better even than we Bolos do. And that understanding is a part of what fits her so well to the task to which she has been called even after the death of the Human body in which she was born.
I am proud of her, and of the privilege of serving with her. Almost as proud as I am grateful for the insight into Humanity which she has given me.
"—the planetary defense component, of course, will be, as always, the responsibility of the Dinochrome Brigade."
This time there were no cheers when Simmons paused. Instead, there was a sort of breathless silence. An intense anticipation which could have been chipped with a knife. All eyes turned towards the far end of the field, and Hawthorne felt, rather than heard, the deep sigh which went up from that gathered multitude as twelve stupendous duralloy forms rumbled into motion.
Edmund Hawthorne's vision was no longer what it once had been, despite all that modern medicine could do. But he didn't have to see them clearly. He'd seen the schematics, the technical summaries. In fact, he'd helped develop the plans for their construction before his own retirement.
He looked out over them, seeing the massive hulls—each just over two hundred and twelve meters in length and almost thirty-five in width. The two main turrets, each mounting a pair of 210-centimeter Hellbores, on the articulated barbettes which gave both turrets an effective 360 degree field of fire. The twelve secondary turrets, each mounting a pair of 35-centimeter Hellbores. The missile hatches; the new, improved, thicker antiplasma appliques; the antipersonnel clusters; the smooth swell of hull over the bulk of the integral counter-grav generators which made them independent of any assault pod.
They were something new: the Mark XXXIV Bolo, named Resurgent and developed from the starting point of the Mark XXXII-XXXIII plans which had been stored in the colony ships' memories.
Each of them forty thousand tons of duralloy, weapons, and power, better than twice the size of the antiquated Mark XXVIII Bolo before whom they had stopped.
Yet as they stopped, they elevated their main and secondary weapons in salute, and after a moment, a hatch on the battalion commander's missile deck opened. A man in the uniform of the Dinochrome Brigade—young-looking, but with strands of silver threaded through his hair—rose through it on a counter-gravity lift. He had blue eyes, very dark hair, and a sandalwood complexion, and Edmund Hawthorne sat up a bit straighter in his life-support chair, old eyes bright with approval as his grandson saluted the ancient Bolo in which his grandmother's mind and spirit lived.
"Bastion Detachment, Dinochrome Brigade, Indrani Command, reporting for deployment off-planet, ma'am!" he said, his voice amplified over the Bolo's speakers.
There was a moment of silence, and then the voice of the Commanding Officer, Dinochrome Brigade, Republic of Indrani, replied.
"Very well, Colonel Hawthorne," Maneka Trevor said. "Prepare your battalion for deployment."
"Yes, ma'am!" Colonel Anson Hawthorne braced to attention, then turned on his heel to face the main optical head of the Bolo upon which he stood.