Ted Online Pt. 11

Would they risk civilian lives? Or more accurately, was he willing to gamble on the idea that they wouldn't?

He sighed, "Let's pause in orbit, I want you to scan the sites. If there is a high military presence, or heavy weaponry at the sites, we'll abort. If there isn't... we go forward. Let's also prioritize by the largest sites first."

Sally smiled, "That works."

He frowned, "Isn't the space port in Australia Martian soil?"

Christi nodded thoughtfully, "Yes, and it would be faster if we made trips between the sites and Australia instead of the sites and Mars. Still, we'd be crossing in and out of Australian airspace, so we'll need to submit a flight plan."

He snickered, and squeezed Sally's arm. The two women still hadn't left his personal space, and he found he really didn't mind, even if they were a bit distracting.

Chapter Twenty-Three

The ship was fast, but it would still take them some time to reach Earth, and they kind of had a plan now. He was still angry, but he was thinking straight now at least, mostly. He wouldn't allow his women to mourn like that if he could stop it, but he considered that he needed to make sure what he did wouldn't make it worse.

They had a fairly simple plan of action, and it all depended on what they found when they arrived at Earth. They still had about ten minutes though, and staring at the command overlay for the ship started to get tedious.

"So how are you two ladies? You enjoying what you're doing out here?"

It was somewhat of an inane question he knew, it almost sounded like a bad pickup line, even to his own ears. The truth was he kind of felt responsible for them being stuck out on this ship all the time, while gaining resources for the colony. He supposed it was just temporary, or at least things would slow down once the city was built and furnished, and once they had enough material to build the twenty million or so A.I. androids it would support.

Still, he wanted to make sure they were happy enough doing it. They'd talked about a number of things in the past, he'd learned some of their likes and dislikes, hobbies, stuff like that, but he'd always been a little too much of a coward to ask them about the task that he'd somehow set them on. Even if it was their chosen field, it still separated them from the others, at least, physically.

Sally smiled, "Yes, it's important, and it isn't all that hard. Plus, Christi keeps me company."

He got a mental picture from that innocent comment which was far from innocent. He quickly buried it, that wasn't going to help him resist temptation.

Christi nodded and echoed his own earlier thoughts.

"We should actually be done in a couple of months, theoretically. At least until the planet is finished. Things are great though."

He sighed, "Glad to hear it. Thanks."

Sally tilted her head, "For what?"

He smiled and shook his head, "For helping when I asked. Even if it turns out we can't save any of them, at least we're trying."

Christi hugged him again, and replied, "Thank you for thinking of this. They all know, what you're doing I mean. They're also in agreement we shouldn't even try if there is a large military presence."

He tried to ignore her extremely alluring scent, and the fact that she didn't back away at all this time, and the fact that her very soft breast was pushed slightly into his arm. He focused on what she said instead, and was glad to hear it, and not all that surprised to learn all the A.I.s already knew of his efforts, even if it was spur of the moment and only fifteen minutes old.

Sally leaned back in on the other side and kissed his cheek, and she too claimed the other arm.

He wasn't stupid, he knew exactly what they were offering. Not right that second of course, they had shit to do, in like five minutes.

It was the longest five minutes of his life, as he stared at the command window, and tried to ignore the incredibly sexy and alluring blondes on his arms. For goodness sake, he was in love with eight women, or rather, seven plus one more on the way with Jennifer. Assuming she didn't run for the hills that is. Then he had the empress and princess.

So eight, hopefully, in his family, plus the two alien royals which was all about the pleasure. He knew he was bad at the friends with benefits thing, but Xia and Xenia were just too alien, he knew he'd never fall for them, and they certainly wouldn't fall for him.

Regardless, he would have that problem with Christi and Sally, if he gave in and slept with them, he knew it wouldn't be just once. So he firmly reminded himself he already didn't have enough time, and focused very hard on the command interface window until they reached Earth...

The scans took a few minutes, and then they had to go over the data.

Sally sighed, "It looks like we need to avoid a third of the locations. They're either at military bases, or federal buildings where there are either troops or highly trained armed agents. The others seem to just be covered by police."

He thought about that for a minute, the police wouldn't have highly damaging weapons, and he had more faith that the police would avoid collateral damage.

Christi added a window to his overlay and said, "This is the best we can do. In order of how many androids are currently outside of these locations waiting to be processed."

He nodded, "Let's do it."

He felt nervous as hell, despite their apparent advantages, he hoped it would just end up being nerves. He also hoped whatever waves his actions made down on the planet, that it wouldn't be all bad. He wasn't naïve enough to think he wouldn't be demonized by the U.S. government again. Or perhaps worse, they would pass it off as the actions of the A.I.s themselves.

It all kind of scared him, A.I.s were supposed to have rights, it was incredibly how fast and callously those rights had been disregarded when the government got nervous.

After all, they weren't human.

Then again, neither was he. Not anymore. If he were still human the stakes of his actions would have him sweating. Being heroic was what'd gotten him in this situation to begin with, and this would have much further implications.

The ship went down to the surface, right outside of Seattle. The large airlocks and bays meant to haul resources from the asteroid belt opened up, and using gravity fields the A.I. androids waiting to be destroyed fell off the surface, and quickly filled the bays. The police on the ground were caught completely flatfooted by the surprise, and the doors closed as they moved toward the next destination.

He knew they'd get maybe one or two more for free before a response was seen by the government. If they even got that long. He also knew if he'd had to do it alone it would have taken much longer.

Christi said, "We got several thousand. Jets are being scrambled from several nearby bases."

He raised an eyebrow, "How do you know that, there's nothing on sensors yet."

Sally explained, "No, but the androids turning themselves in at those locations reported it. They must have expected this, because the jets were already set to launch."

He nodded, it hadn't even occurred to him to use the doomed A.I.s as an information source, but it was what A.I.s did.

"Of course. See if we can keep ahead of them."

He frowned, still worried about the A.I.s getting blamed for this.

"Can we stream this, put it on the net. What I'm doing I mean. I want to make sure both the government and the people are aware it was my idea, and not yours. Maybe with a fifteen-minute delay?"

He figured that was enough of a buffer where the government couldn't use the stream as an up to date source for where the ship was, and where it was going. They were probably lighting up multiple radar sources as well as satellite trackers, so it probably wouldn't make much of a difference, but it still seemed the prudent thing to do. Operational security and all that.

Sally tilted her head, "Alright, we can do that. We'll send it to the media as well as social media sites and YouTube. Are you sure you want to do this?"

He nodded, "If we don't, the government will just use it as an excuse and example that A.I.s have gone completely rogue."

On that last word, the ship shook violently, and he grabbed both Sally and Christi to try and keep everyone upright. They helped of course, and they all managed to stay on their feet.

"What was that?"

Christi noted, "We're at the second sight," her sentence was interrupted by a second smaller shake, "and pulling androids off of the surface."

Sally frowned, "Missiles. It appears that they've been reprogrammed to go off as soon as their internal guidance shows them being redirected from the target. In space that wouldn't be a problem, but here in atmosphere the ship is being bombarded by air pressure waves from the explosions. The hull is holding and there's been no damage, but that first one shook us up a bit."

A few more vibrations went through the hull, but nothing like the first one.

Sally explained at his questioning look, "I increased power to the gravity emitters to intercept the missiles farther out. I'm also making sure they're exploded where they won't damage anything on the ground. You okay?"

He nodded, "Fine, were any A.I.s harmed?"

Christi hugged him tighter, and then stepped back now that the ship wasn't shaking. Not very far though, the cute blonde was definitely still in his personal space.

"Minor cosmetic damage, their skin will heal."

Sally said, "Approaching the third location."

He kept an eye on incoming missiles, so far the jets kept at least a twenty-mile separation from the ship, however several missiles were on the way. They waited a few seconds, and took those out, and then yanked several thousand androids off the ground. He knew it wasn't all of them, many by now would have gone inside to be reclaimed as they were calling it. He rolled his eyes.

Still, they were making a difference. Small or not, it mattered.

The next twenty minutes or so saw their holds filled up, and they went sub-orbital to jump over to Australia.

Sally said, "We are cleared to approach the spaceport."

He sighed with relief. He half wondered if they'd turn them away, given the nature of their mission, but apparently they didn't mind tweaking the U.S.'s noses a bit through association. He also believed there was more to it than that, they didn't agree with what was going on in the rest of the world, just like he believed most citizens didn't.

Humanity really was better than the actions of the governments, and the men and women who feared their loss of power, at least he liked to believe so.

They unloaded the androids at the spaceport, they'd have to be reloaded later of course, and taken to Mars, but only after they'd secured the safety of as many as they could.

Then they went back to the U.S.

Several of the sites seemed to increase their speed, as if determined to kill as many of the androids as possible. No doubt due to orders. They managed to make three trips altogether, the third one the ship was a little over half full. They rescued a little over half of the A.I. android population. Between avoiding a third of the sites, and the other two thirds actively working to process the androids and destroy them, they lost almost five hundred thousand.

Still, it had been more than worth it to save the ones they had... He also couldn't have done it without Christi and Sally. He could have of course, but his mind worked much slower, and he might not have saved nearly as many without them as with them.

He wound up leaving the ship on the first trip to Mars, he gave them both a hug, and even a chaste kiss. Both of them gave him significant looks, so retreating seemed like the best idea. Probably the most absurd thing about it was he actually felt guilty for not sleeping with them, which was very ridiculous, and quite possibly insanely arrogant. Still, he had to draw the line somewhere. Eight was already too much, or at least, that's what he told himself as he left the ship.

His cock clearly wasn't impressed with his logic.

He swallowed as he landed, and saw Silvia, Amber, Mia, Helen, and Trudy waiting for him with scowls on their faces. He hadn't really given it much thought, he'd run off without telling anyone where he was going, much less inviting them along. Of course, he'd been afraid they'd try to talk him out of it. Huh, he knew there'd be a bad side to having that many mates...

Chapter Twenty-Four

"Umm, hi," he said brilliantly.

Silvia shook her head, "You ran off, without saying a word, what the hell were you thinking?"

The four A.I.s were quiet, obviously more than okay with letting the human woman spearhead his questioning.

He frowned, "I wasn't. I was angry, and there was an urgency to it. I wanted to do what I could to alleviate the pain I felt from Mia, Helen, Amber, and Trudy. Okay, that's an understatement, I wanted to beat whatever caused their pain into submission or death at the time I left. I also knew the longer it took to get to Earth, the more androids would be destroyed. I assume you got a full record of what went on through Sally and Christi? By the time we got there, I was thinking straight enough to do the smart thing."

Silvia shook her head, "Why didn't you take Trudy with you, or grab one of us?"

He sighed, "Honestly, I was afraid she'd try and talk me out of it."

Trudy sniffled, and then moved forward to hug him, which set off a domino effect of sorts, and the rest of the A.I.s quickly followed suite. They were obviously happy about what he'd done, and were grateful, but also annoyed he'd left them behind. Apparently though, he'd already been forgiven?

Silvia sighed, and joined them, apparently not mad at him at all. Had she just been angry on their behalf? Maybe, she seemed a little exasperated his other life mates at any rate.

He decided not to overthink things. It was a Saturday, and while they weren't jumping up and down because they'd still lost half the A.I.s until they could be restored, they also weren't breaking down. He imagined it was a somewhat of a bittersweet moment, which is pretty much how he felt at the time. He found it hard to regret any of his actions, although next time he'd make the time to invite them along on his crusades.

The six of them headed down to the condo...

The weekend went by in a blur as he spent time with his family, both stolen one on one moments, and of course group activities. He'd just spent the last six hours with Xia and Xenia, and Xylla had joined them as well. He'd be completely wiped out if he wasn't what he was now, they'd really been demanding. Not that he'd minded at all, and if sleeping with incredibly hot triplets had been on his bucket list, he'd be able to cross it off now.

It hadn't been, but clearly that was a sign he hadn't been aiming high enough.

His hair was still a bit damp, the ladies hadn't needed one of course, when the three of them had changed back when the poison had fully kicked in, he wound up showering alone. He was back in the main audience chamber, but now there were over thirty seats in the room, all sitting slightly lower than the empress's throne, which really was more like a tub to contain her body.

It was his first meeting, and his plan was simple, say as little as possible. He was very uncomfortable in his position. The fact he couldn't speak with any authority about Earth itself was apparently of no importance to Xenia. He wasn't there to commit Earth to anything as far as he understood it, he was just there to represent their interests outside of the solar system.

Make sure they weren't taken advantage of, and possibly there'd be opportunities for trade, but considering humans weren't in space yet, just A.I.s, it wasn't very relevant yet.

He also represented Mars as well, which didn't sit all that well with him either. He'd rather be in a lab inventing something, or pushing for the next breakthrough. He wasn't a very political person at all. Clearly though, he was a better choice than any of the A.I.s, who would no doubt have become the servants of the galaxy if left to their own devices. Someone had to be selfish on their behalf, and it seemed he'd been elected, or more accurately, he'd elected himself.

He looked around the room, and there were over thirty aliens. Some of which were humanoid, at least a third. He also recognized a few from Earth's popular fiction, and wondered if the Earth just hadn't been visited before. The small childlike grays were there, with large black eyes, and thin sticklike arms and legs. As were races that appeared to be devils, angels, elves, dwarves, and a few other types from fairy tales and fiction. It was kind of a surreal moment.

There were four legged creatures, bug like creatures, and ones that defied simple description. The Xaran suddenly didn't seem all that odd, even with no apparent skeletal structure, or any other kind of structure in their bodies. In comparison that is.

He wasn't sure what he'd expected, but it was apparent very quickly that senate meetings were boring. He got a few looks from the others when Earth was introduced as a part of the empire, but most of them looked bored, or like they couldn't have cared less if they'd tried. The subjects were extremely dry, and mostly about trade negotiations, and rights to systems.

Earth and Mars hadn't claimed any systems so he had nothing to say.

Since no one tried to claim Sol, he kept his mouth shut, and tried not to fall asleep. It was kind of a shock, he'd expected to be excited, and he had been, for about five minutes. He paid attention though, he couldn't do less than that.

He would take bored though, exciting would mean one of the empire's worlds were under attack and needed help, so bored was good.

He did get a few surreptitious looks as the meeting went on, but he couldn't really tell what the looks were for. Measuring perhaps? He had no way to measure their body language, or decide what meant what. They were alien after all. There was one race that looked like a two-foot tree with moss on it, how the hell was he going to read their body language?

He knew Mia and some of the others were watching through him, and she had that whole database from the Xaran's ship, hopefully she'd be able to dissect what meant what during the meeting. He hoped so anyway. When the meeting concluded, they all filed out, and no one approached him.

He supposed that made sense, he was the new kid on the block, and they probably assumed he'd have nothing of real value. He found he was just fine with that. He made his way back to his room, and logged out...

Chapter Twenty-Five

The next six weeks passed quickly and not much changed.

He did manage to catch up in math and science, and before the Mars city was finished and ready for Silvia's patients, he started working with Trudy in the lab. He had a fairly good understanding of how FTL and those technologies worked, though there weren't any breakthroughs in power or systems technology. He did have a few ideas for weapons, but given his mates' proclivities in that direction he didn't pursue that avenue.

At the end of the six weeks, he felt closer than ever to Silvia, Trudy, Helen, Amber, and Mia. Their five-day system seemed to work wonderfully, and now that he was in the lab he got even more quickies during the day with all of them, who seemed to have less reservations about interrupting his research than they had his studies. Maybe they'd just known how much he wanted to get back to work, schooling hadn't been bad, but he hadn't felt all that productive during that time.

Nicci and Kara had grown dear to him as well. They were both incredibly passionate women, and he was surprised at the breadth and thought they'd put into their planning to come live on Mars after their graduation. They both loved him with a passion and certainty that quite frankly, baffled him at times. Of course, he was just as caught in their net as they seemed to be in his.