Chapter 12: Bob – August 17, 2133
I surfaced from [18 hours 26 minutes] of library and project reading. I’d had the forethought to set up an interrupt for anyone speaking to me.
I turned my camera to see a very upset Dr. Landers. His voice shaking, he said, “We’ve just had another attack. Someone tried to blow up some critical components. They missed their target, but four of my staff were killed. We’re going to a secondary operations center. How’s your reading coming along?”
This last sentence was such a non-sequitur that I had to run the last few seconds through my mind to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. “Uh, fine, doc. Why, specifically?”
“We are going to attempt to move up the launch. That means that you may have to receive some of your final training in-flight, as it were.”
Oh, holy crap. “Okay, doc, what do you need from me?”
“I’ve dropped a file into your queue. Read it immediately. Then we will back you up with that knowledge assimilated, shut you down, and physically move you to the ship.”
“Physically? Really? You’ve never heard of ftp?”
“That would have worked right up until a couple of weeks ago when they blew you up. Where do you think the spare unit came from?”
“Oh.” They had brought the replicant matrix down from the ship? That was the spare?